GERMAN DUO: HOBBS TEAMS UP WITH ROCK 'N'ROLLER ON CD

Local recording artist and syndicated television host Lou Hobbs has teamed up with a German rock 'n' roll musician for a CD that was released this month throughout Europe.

Hobbs and German rockabilly recording artist Rockin' Roary are among artists featured on a compilation CD. The CD, "Heroes," which was released Sept. 4, also features Roary's band, The Stone Valley Band, the Animals and Wired West.

Roary was in Cape Girardeau with Hobbs on Thursday as a part of their efforts to secure airplay for the CD on U.S. radio stations and to find a U.S. distributor. The two just returned from Corpus Christi, Texas, where they had spent a few days promoting the CD.

"We are helping each other," Hobbs said. "Hands across the ocean."

Roary agreed. "Friendship. That is what music is all about," he said.

Hobbs has five cuts on the CD including his autobiographical song "Back to Missouri" and "Living on the New Madrid Fault Line," the song which brought Hobbs national prominence in December 1990 when the late Iben Browning, a scientist, predicted the possibility of a major earthquake along the fault.

One of the songs on the CD, "Corpus Christi's Calling Me," was penned by Hobbs and St. Louis musician Scott Campbell. Hobbs went to Corpus Christi not only to promote the CD but to pitch the song as a theme song for the city. While there, Hobbs filmed a music video featuring the song.

As Hobbs and Roary promoted the music in the United States, they made plans for the promotion in Germany and throughout Europe, including a possible trip by Hobbs to Germany. Already the new CD has been mailed to radio stations throughout Europe where American country music has become increasingly popular.

"They know more about our music over there than we know about it here," Hobbs said.

The two musicians came to know each other because of a song that Hobbs recorded in 1962. Unbeknownst to Hobbs, the song was pirated onto a German album in the mid-1970s.

Hobbs learned of the piracy 20 years later when the song appeared on a CD in Germany. It was from that CD that Roary first heard Hobbs' music.

Roary records all of his songs in English because, he said, "This kind of music sounds awful in German."

When he heard Hobbs' early rockabilly songs, he told his friends that he wanted to meet the Cape Girardeau singer. In 1995, when Roary went to Nashville, Tenn., to receive the King Eagle Male International Artist of the Year Award, he made arrangements to meet Hobbs.

Hobbs traveled to Nashville not only to meet Roary but to film a segment for his syndicated television program, "The Lou Hobbs Show," featuring Roary in the recording studio.

Roary then began to promote Hobbs' music in Germany, helping two of Hobbs' songs -- "What's Wrong with Me" and "Somebody Shoot the Jukebox" -- reach the top 10 on the country charts in Germany.

Hobbs' television program, which is in its 13th year, airs in 200 cable markets in a five-state area.