He grew up in North Carolina to a family with Celtic music heritage. “My family’s ancestors came from Scotland, Ireland and other areas of Northern England. The Blue Grass music and Clogging in North Carolina was an extension of that heritage

From North Carolina he moved to Chicago to get his MBA from the University of Chicago and indulged and learned about the business of “his music”. “I lived in Downtown Chicago where there was almost no country music. But in the suburbs I found it. One of his favorite venues there is The Sundance Saloon at both the old location in Mundelein and now in Waukegan. “The owners and regulars are just great and have been very supportive”.

Earning a spot opening for Kenny Chesney’s Solder Field show as winner of Chicago’s” Next Big Star” competition is one of his more memorable moments. “Play to 60,000 people in solder’s Field was just an amazing experience”. He also played the main stage at Country Thunder, been a featured performer at the Chicago Country Music Fair and opened for Heidi Newfield’s Chicago CD release Party at Joe’s Bar has been among his performances in a very busy year.

Childers has now has made a transition move to Nashville, Tennessee. He said, “If you’re doing country music you have to be in Nashville for the business part of it all.” Since moving to Nashville Childers has recorded his first CD. Female Country Star Jamie O’Neill duets with Childers on one of the Tracks. His favorite tracks is the title track “A Man’s Gotta Do-What A Man’s Gotta Do” and “Cowboy Up” because “They are just so up beat and fun. We try to bring a positive and fun attitude to our music’.

I am kind of special in that event because no one knew w hat the Wah Wah was going to become, of course now it is a worldwide phenomena. But at the time I was only one in the world who had the wah wah. It was really patterned after trumpet music not as a rock and roll musical instrume

Elvis Presley: “It is a very touching story about Elvis. It wasn’t funny, but it showed the side of Elvis that I never knew. They called me to play with Elvis on “Roustabout”. I said no he’s a terrible guitar player. That was my opinion. They said you got to do this thing. So on the first day Tom Parker came on the set and said nobody talks to Elvis. He’s a big star and you guys are nobodies. So one day we were in the tent rehearsing and I was way in the back and I wasn’t even going to be on camera. Everyone left except Elvis. He sat in his chair and stared at me for 20 minutes while I played the guitar

ECE: Was there a problem using three different guitar players on each of your albums?

RA: It was a problem in the past. Finding the right core of people and finding the right chemistry is hard to do. We didn’t like the sound, and then we found Chris. Now we have had him for three years. He is set to do another record with us and that has been encouraging.

ECE: Is being political in your music a personal thing?

RA: Politics were always very prevalent in the punk rock hardcore scene. So it crept into what I do because that is what I care about.

ECE Your music seems more in the mainstream than before, have you been pressured by the record label to do that?

RA: We are pretty much doing what we’ve been doing. I think that mainstream has caught up with us. ECE: How has growing up in Chicago Influence your music?RA: Chicago is a working class town. It is a town of real people with real lives. It is a big part of what we are doing. Being from Chicago can sometimes be tough in the music business because it is an island of cultural isolation. It is tough but we have managed to break though and been touring worldwide for five years

They conveyed stories about growing up in this talented family. Gunner told me, “We were 10 when Ozzie passed away. But I remember he was a real sweetheart and liked to draw us cartoons. I always looked forward going to the Nelson House on Christmas because we always got $5 in our Christmas card. Harriet was our buddy. The best way I can describe her is graceful. She had grace. I remembered once when I was with her someone walked up to her and said, Harriet I always wanted to meet you and be you. My grandmother answered, Honey, I am not even me, remember that.”

He added, "my dad and uncle lived a surreal existence. They didn’t really live in the Nelson Household. They got up and went to a TV set that was an exact duplicate of their home because Ozzie wanted it as real as possible”. Mathew continued, “Our dad was our buddy. My first recollection was sitting on an apple crate off on the side of a stage watching him play and thinking to myself this is really cool. He obviously loves it. The audience loves it. What a great thing and up until I was 12, I thought everyone’s dad was a rock star. He made it possible for us to play and was very supportive.”

Unlike many Hollywood kids these boys are not snobs. Mathew explained, “In our case we got a very healthy dose of people that let us know real quick when we stepped out of line and led us by example. I never saw my father dismiss somebody or refused an autograph. It makes me happy when we play our concerts that people come up and say they met him and he was a real sweet guy”. During the James Burton Festival’s Concert they played their fathers songs. Burton was Rick Nelson’s lead guitarist on both the TV Show and recordings.

Mathew looks and sounds very much like his dad. I told him that and asked him if they do this kind of tribute to his dad often. He answered, “Thank you I take that as a compliment and really appreciate it. For Gunner and I it is as close as you get to the real thing. I would give up anything in my life if I could have 5 more minutes with my father. When we sing these songs we sing them like we mean them because we do.”

Gunner added, "We never did our fathers songs because we were blessed with our own success. But we were asked to play for a 60’s party at a military base in Japan for troops that couldn’t make it home for Thanksgiving. By the second song we decided that if we occasionally did this it would keep our dad around us. He went out on tour and never came back. Playing his songs is our way of saying hi to him”.

What was the first play you did at Next Theater?
HS: The very first play we did was called “Class Enemy”. It was about a group of young men in school in England. It was a hit in Chicago. It was one of the major plays of that time and I got a lot of credit. Credit for my directing ability, credit for my theater and it played a long time. That was the beginning. After that I directed 40 plays that we did at the theater. The theater is still there and it’s been almost 30 years.

What was the favorite play that you did?
HS: I have a few favorites. One of them was Larry Kramer’s “The Normal Heart. We were the first to bring it to Chicago from New York. That was the first play about AIDS and the AIDS epidemic. We opened that and it won a lot of awards.

One day a young man came to my theater and said could you do this play. He was Tracy Letts that just won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and won all of the Tony Awards in New York. That was 12 years ago and the play was Killer Joe. Which went on to New York, London and he has since made a film of it. I read the script and I said ok I’ll give you a chance. He said you were the only one that will even give me a chance. Then I went to my board and they said, ‘if you do this play we will all quit. And I said see you later! They did. We went on and did “Killer Joe” if anybody has ever seen it, you will understand it is really a rough and tumble play. We were very successful and it ran a long time.

What is the state of the theater in Chicago today?
Theater in Chicago is exactly the same as in 1981. It is a fertile proving ground. That is what it really is. People that graduate from many other schools around the United States come to Chicago to try and get a start. What they start is everything. They start small theater companies. They start acting careers. They start their directing careers. The people that begin in Chicago then spread out to rest of the United States. Even people in my theater which is a 200 seat house, so it’s one of the smaller ones, but then they go up to larger ones, so its becomes like a rolling bal.l What you said is correct we really are the teaching place for theater. I always wanted to help American Artists and playwrights. I tried to look for new American playwrights. I did John Roberts Bates before anyone knew what he did. There were many others and too many to remember now.

Jeremy Piven parents are wonderful Chicago Theater people. They ran and it is still there and if fact we shared the same building, the Piven Theater Workshop. They were some of the best teachers ever in this world. Jeremy and his sister acted in many plays at Next. John Cusak too they were all young kids growing up. Gary Sinise, we worked with him on occasion.