Country copper busy living and singing

Sean Hefferon
DARREN Gillis has been busy living his country music dreams. Big dreams that saw him last month playing in Tamworth – the home of the Big Golden Guitar. He was invited to play at the Tamworth Country Music Festival as a top 5 finalist in the radio 2TM Discovered Competition.

Budding country singers the world over would break more than a few guitar strings to play at the Australian festival which is the second biggest country music festival in the world after the big show in Nashville, Tennessee, USA.

Tamworth has been the culmination of several months of touring for Darren who has been strumming his guitar in places as far afield as Shark Bay, Kalbarri and Green Head.

Along the way he was first place winner at the 2024 Lancelin Busker Festival where
he said, “I got poached by a fella that runs the Chapman Valley Country Music Festival who said I should have a crack at the Emerging Artists and I did and ended up
winning that, which is fantastic.”

In between the Chapman gong and playing at Tamworth he got that call to tell him he is
a finalist in the WA Country Music Awards for 2025.

The call up being for his Busy Livin’ track – a song that speaks to community, connection and living your best life. This song is in contention for the “Traditional Country Single of the Year”, with the winner announced at the Boyup Brook Country Music Festival next week.

It’s a dead certainty that Darren has been busy living and it was only last year that he
recorded a music video of his song titled “Drink” at the Wicklow Shearing Shed in
Toodyay. The song is about good times with mates and is a feelgood, toe-tapping tune, that just may have you heading to the fridge for a cold one (or two).

Darren’s connection to Toodyay goes deeper, however, than producing a music
video. His folks live in the Wheatbelt town and, admitting he has been “like a gypsy in the
wind” and wanting to “plant some roots”, he bought a block next door to them.

Darren’s also country boy at heart having been born in Albany and raised in the south coast town until his family moved to the Red Centre. As he said, moving to Alice Springs in the Northern Territory was a “bit of a change in all respects” and he stayed there, going to high school until the family moved back to Perth when he was 20 years old.

He joined the WA Police Force when he was 21 and has been policing ever since while keeping the music alive “always with guitar in my hand around the campfire”. Being a country copper has seen Darren serving in some very remote spots throughout both WA and the NT including Broome, Bidyadanga, Yuendumu and Tennant Creek.

Other places he has been based at include Darwin, Perth, Goomalling, Dowerin and now his current station in Tambellup. For Darren a key part of country policing that he loves is becoming a part of the community on all fronts.

“It’s not a case of locking up the bad guy. It’s a case of getting the bad guy to, you know
get back onto the straight and narrow, trying to give them a bit of support as well.”

He gives the example of a guy out on bail in Goomalling for ages “and I was sort of
touching base with him a lot and he was very stoked when he got off bail and got a job and back on track. “He came down to the station and told me; to me that’s a win in a case as well.”

Being a country copper with guitar in hand was likely far from Darren’s mind when
he was growing up in a house awash with the music of legends like Johnny Cash and
Weylon Jennings.

“Country music was always in our lives. “Mum used to play the piano accordion and
Dad played a little guitar as well and they’d have jam sessions at home. Classic.”

He picked up his first guitar in his teens and “dabbled with it for a while and then
dropped it” and before he knew it life got in the way, as it does.

In the last decade he started to get serious about guitar playing and songwriting.

Growing up with and playing music has been a big part of Darren’s life, a life that changed when he was based in Dowerin. On a personal front, he and his then wife parted ways and he started to get more serious about songwriting and music, a focus that helped him get through some tough times.

Pausing for reflection, he said “Life was quite isolating at that particular time but I
got to the other side and brought out some songs which have tracked pretty well across
the last few years.” Not surprisingly a few of Darren’s song focus on mental health including “Cuss the Black Dog” with the dog being the “black dog of depression”.

As a frontline worker Darren has seen the effects of and suffered the loss of close
friends to the black dog. It’s a moody yet uplifting song that he hopes will connect with those who are fighting their own mental health battles and help them to stand firm, reach out and keep fighting.

For Darren reflecting on personal trials has made him take a punt to live a dream
of playing in Tamworth and “give it a crack over there”.

As he said, “For the last four years I’ve been working full time but only taking 80
per cent of my pay for this year off”. A sacrifice that has allowed him to take
time off to pursue his country music goal while receiving 80 per cent of his pay.

Darren Gillis, country copper and country singer is definitely busy living and chasing
his dream.

There’s perhaps a message in that for all of us.