Radney Foster - Tonight

Radney Foster pays homage to veterans with 'Angel Flight,' has Beachland Ballroom date on Friday, Nov. 20 By Chuck Yarborough, The Plain Dealer "Angel Flight" is named after the designation for the Texas Air National Guard C-130 that transports the bodies of Guardsmen slain in combat. It came about partly because Foster's co-writer on the tune, Darden Smith, and Lt. Col. Jim Nugent, who works for the Texas National Guard Support Foundation, both had a hankering for ice cream from an Austin institution: Amy's Ice Cream. Amy's has several locations, and one just happened to be around the corner from another Austin landmark, Waterloo Records, where music fan Nugent had just bought Smith's latest CD. "Darden begins a relationship (with Nugent) and begins to start thinking about having talks with the Texas National Guard about songwriting. He's thinking at this point that it's to help guys cope with PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) issues and re-entry issues," Foster said in a call to his home outside Nashville. Smith learned about "Red River 44," a mission in Iraq in which seven Texas National Guardsmen died when their Chinook helicopter crashed outside Tallil, Iraq. "In the midst of these conversations, the Guard told him about . . . this thing they call 'Angel Flights.'" The songwriter bell in Smith's head went off, and a couple of weeks alter, when he was in Nashville and visiting Foster. "He tells me the story and says, 'Are you interested?' and I said, 'Oh, my God <b>...</b>