As a child growing up in Prairie Bayou, Arkansas, Evans was rocked to sleep to the recordings of Elvis Presley. His parents, who loved dancing to their old records, instilled in Jody a love for the fifties blend of Country/Western music with R&B which came to be known as Rockabilly. When he was ten years old, his mother took him to see the movie LaBamba. Even though he was taken with the story of Ritchie Valens the real thrill came towards the end when Buddy Holly (played by Marshall Crenshaw) came on the scene. Here was a guy in a suit and tie and glasses (already Evans' daily school outfit) who was not portrayed as a nerd, but as the biggest rock star in the movie. It was not long after this that Evans lost interest in schoolwork and started focusing on music. He saved up enough money to buy a red 1966 Fender Mustang. After a friend showed him how to finger A, D, and E chords, Evans was able to play just about every song Holly ever put on the charts. He put together a four-piece rock combo of classmates and they worked up thirty minutes of classic Holly gold, which the principal allowed them to perform at a school assembly. Naming his group The Silver Crickets, (after Buddy Holly's Crickets and the Beatles, who had once been called The Silver Beatles) Jody was hoping to take this show to the State Beta Club Convention and perform his Buddy Holly impersonation in their talent contest held at Little Rock's Robinson Auditorium. Those in authority determined that he was not ready for such exposure and Evans faced his first major musical disappointment.
Determined to perform onstage at Robinson, Evans found out about a statewide talent contest held there and sponsored by the Arkansas Association of Blacks in Energy. Jody and his band tried out for and won a spot in the contest, had a triumphal performance in front of a predominately African-American crowd at Robinson, placed third in the competition, and were asked back as non-competing entertainment the following year.
Only 17 years old at the time, Evans was asked to participate in a regional talent contest in Memphis. As one of the contestants in this mid-south competition, The Silver Crickets appeared on Memphis' WREG Channel 3. It was this performance that got Jody noticed by the owner of the legendary Sun Studios – the place that launched the careers of Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, and others. Sun offered Evans the opportunity to record some of his original material. Evans explained that he did not have any original material but would do his best to write some immediately. He came back five days later with six original and creative songs.
When the Sun situation fell through, Evans returned to Arkansas a dejected man. He sold guitars to finance an arsenal of handguns and a trip to the Police Academy. Although Sun Studios was not the breakthrough opportunity that he was hoping for, it did provide two invaluable boosts to his musical career. First of all, it motivated him to start writing and performing original music. Second, it provided him with a demo of these tunes to show off. Not able to see this at the time, Evans entered a fallow period where all but gave up on music.
Music, however, did not give up on him. Through Ouachita Baptist University Composer in Residence, W. Francis McBeth, Evans was introduced to Arkansas native and successful songwriter Danny Tate. Tate, in turn, shared Jody's music with Dwight Yoakam's producer and guitarist, Pete Anderson. In 2002 Yoakam recorded Evans' “Sittin' Pretty,” and suddenly Jody had a song on the country charts.
This success encouraged Evans to quit his job with the Arkadelphia police force and move to Nashville. Shortly after arriving in Nashville in the fall of 2003, Tate set up a songwriter's night with Himself, Evans, and the Warren Brothers, who had been judges on Nashville Star the previous season. The Warrens encouraged Evans to try out for Nashville Star.
Evans worked the Nashville scene hard for about seven months. Finally, he decided he was wasting his time in Tennessee and moved back to his hometown and his police work. Once back home, however, he kept his eye on the Nashville Star web site. Once they posted information about auditions for the upcoming season, Evans jumped at the opportunity. In January of 2005 Jody was selected as one of the ten finalists who would perform on the show.
Like a country cousin to Fox's more popular American Idol, Nashville Star pits ten aspiring country singers in a week-to-week popularity contest. Viewers phone in votes at the end of an episode, and each week's lowest vote getter is sent home at the end of the following week's installment. Evans' performances on Nashville Star have ranged from classic rock to modern country and honky-tonk, always performed in his signature rockabilly style. The four remaining contestants were sent back to their hometowns to perform benefit concerts. Evans sold out Henderson State University's Arkansas Hall in twenty-two minutes and raised $10,000 for the Diamond Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross. He performed an hour long, high-energy concert for a rowdy, standing-room-only crowd.
This concert was a triumph for Evans, coming some thirteen years after the school assembly where he first performed those Buddy Holly tunes. After a decade of achievement and frustration, Evans has discovered that, not unlike the plot of a country lyric, it takes a mix of talent, tenacity, the encouragement of loved ones, and a little bit of luck to succeed as a performer. It is that mix that this Arkansas musician will lean on in the years to come.
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