Fifty-five years after the band America was formed, Dewey Bunnell finds it “very satisfying that our songs still have a life. All of it is exciting.”
I had a nice chat with Bunnell recently in advance of America’s appearance at the Providence Performing Arts Center on October 18. He was relaxing in his home in northern Wisconsin. He spends half his year there, the rest in California.
“I’m coming off a three-week break,” he said, “the longest this year. We started in March, doing a half-dozen shows a month. We’ll end on November 15 in Clearwater, Florida, after doing a total of 41 shows this year.”
For decades, Bunnell said, “we’d do 85 to 100 shows a year. Now it’s half that.”
America was formed in England when three Air Force kids – Bunnell, Dan Peek, and Gerry Beckley – met at an air base outside London. Bunnell is the only original member still performing. Peek left the band in the late 70s and passed away in 2011. Beckley retired in August of 2023.
“I didn’t know it was a full retirement at the time,” said Bunnell, who had suggested an extended hiatus. By February of 2024, “I was getting antsy, and we had requests stacking up. Good offers, good venues. I asked Jerry if he was ready to go back out, and he said, ‘Nah, dude, I’m good.’”
At that point, Bunnell’s manager said, “Well, Dewey, you can do it.” So Bunnell pulled a band together, and he’s back out on the road.
Looking back, Bunnell says the key to America’s success was “writing our own material.” They started out doing covers of songs like “California Dreamin’.”
“We’re still doing that,” says Bunnell, along with a cover of Neil Young’s “Cinnamon Girl.” Shortly after “Horse with No Name” was released, it was “identified” as a “Neil Young song.”
Bunnell doesn’t shy away from having been influenced by Young and groups like Crosby, Stills, and Nash, the Beach Boys, and the Beatles. “Harmony singing was magical, a new sound then. I was fascinated by how that works. And everybody is inspired by something, someone. It’s reflected in your work at some point.”
“Horse with No Name” went to Number One on the Billboard 100. “That was a big deal. A Number One record for our first song.”
Bunnell wrote “Horse,” and he takes full responsibility for the lyrics. “I wrote it in rainy old England, drawing on a desert theme. Our family used to take cross-country trips, and we would stop in the Painted Desert, in the Mojave. Nature was a constant in our lives. I was trying to relive our hikes in the desert, the sights and sounds of the desert. Nothing too exciting about that.”
When it was released, many folks thought it was about drugs. “Horse” is a nickname for heroin, and some radio stations refused to play the song. Bunnell says that drugs were not part of their culture. “Certainly, there was hash-smoking in England, and some American kids would come over with weed. But we spent more time in pubs drinking beer.”
I asked how the trio settled on naming themselves America. “We were playing around the area, getting the reputation as ‘those American kids.’ Plus, we were homesick, wanting to identify with our country. Chicago had just come out. We figured, they called themselves a city, why not call ourselves a country?”
I tell Bunnell that I’d heard three America songs on satellite radio on a recent road trip. “Ventura Highway,” “Tin Man,” and “Horse with No Name.”
“We’ve crossed the threshold to classic rock,” he says. “If you’re getting airplay, it works.”
Bunnell is already committed to a performance schedule for 2026. “It’s always been a pain traveling. Fatigue, long layovers, lots of downtime, and dead air.” Bunnell’s friend Al Jardine of the Beach Boys is “still out there, and he’s 83.”
Bunnell, now 73, doesn’t think he wants to travel at Jardine’s age. “I want to live my life not on the road. I like being home. I like not having a looming schedule. I like not working.” He pauses for a moment. “But two days from now, I start doing it again.”
Dewey Bunnell and America will perform at the Providence Performing Arts Center on Saturday, October 18. For tickets and information, call 401.421.ARTS or visit www.ppacri.org.