Rolling country 2007 thread

I highly recommend Anthony Easton analyzing I Wish I Was A Mole In The Ground.

Anthony, my and several other people's reactions to the McGraw are up on Jukebox.

I mainly know pub rock by what the pub rockers went on to do; pub rock generated quite a few oddballs - Dury, Lowe, Costello*, Parker, Strummer - which is why the early Springsteen might fit (Patti Smith too, for that matter; the 101ers covered her version of "Gloria")

*don't think Costello was along yet at the pub rock time, but he certainly worked with 'em once he showed up

Billy Swan might've invented pub rock, come to think of it.

Dog-watching for my wife's parents this week, with access to cable TV, saw that Pat Green's "Dixie Lullaby" is #2 on Great American Country's Top 12 "Pure" something or other countdown.
Great song.

Green's "Cannonball" was probably my favorite country album last year--Chuck gave it a few semi-positive mentions on the '06 thread but no discussion otherwise. I'm curious about what you guys think of him (Pat not Chuck.) From some Googling I've learned that he was once some sort of Robert Earl Keen- Texas singer-songwriter, but that his old fans think he's sold out to Nashville.

This may be the only case (that I can think of) of an alt-country artist (if he was ever considered that) going mainstream pop-country (if what he's doing now can be considered that--each of the few times in the past months I've turned on the local country station they played "Wave on Wave" so he must be kind of popular) rather than the other way around.

This may be the only case (that I can think of) of an alt-country artist (if he was ever considered that) going mainstream pop-country

The Warren Brothers with their third album, maybe? (Though it's not like tht one got much mainstream radio play, plus it was sorta more country rock, so they probably don't count.) Um...the Dixie Chicks? Big Kenny? If either of them were ever "alt" in the first place or ever "mainsteam" in the second place. Anyway, good question. I need to ponder this issue more.

I liked Pat Green's previous album to the current one (see my comments below from the 2004 [!] rolling county thread); thought the current one was way spottier but still okay when it came out last year, but maybe I should go back and listen to it again. I've never heard his older allegedly alt-ish stuff, though. But Lucky Ones was #8 on my NashScene ballot in '04.

Here's wot I wrote (preceded by what Matt Cibula wrote, though I still know nothing about Green's Xtn side, assuming Matt's not just making it up):

what about pat green,
is he all crazy-christian
on the new record?
i like the single
but i gave up on him for
scoffing at darwin

Haibun (Begs2Differ) on Tuesday, 21 December 2004 19:16 (2 years ago)


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I had no idea that Pat Green was ever a dumbass creationist (as a matter of fact, I never even heard of him prior to his new album, to tell you the truth, so I came in with no prejudices positive or negative.) I put his new album on my country list because it expertly pulls off the sound of prime era John Cougar, Tom Petty, Jackson Browne, Kenny Chesney in "Summer of '69"/"Margarittaville" mode (e.g.: the one where he's nostalgic for college), Counting Crows in Van the Man mode (e.g.: the opening track), and, um, whatever '70s soul guys Brooks and Dunn sound like.

chuck on Tuesday, 21 December 2004 19:41 (2 years ago)

Last year (I didn't say much!):

pat green album starts out good, gets dull in the second half, still a keeper.
xhuxk (xheddy) on Monday, 4 September 2006 22:05 (6 months ago)

Listening to the new Pat Green & all his Springsteen references (the lovers listening to "Born to Run" on "Feels Just Like It Should" and Pat singing about a 'brilliant disguise' on another track) got me thinking about how the Boss has shown up repeaedly over the last few years in country songs (off the top of my head MontGen's "Hell Yeah", Brooks & Dunn-"She was Born to Run.") .
ramon fernandez (ramon fernandez) on Friday, 29 September 2006 11:49 (5 months ago)

thanks for the love, frank, and if you have dylans version, i wouldnt mind hearing it.

about the mcgraw, the more i keep listening to it--i know its insipid, and stupid, and the lyrics are offensive to the working poor (and at least the video in stealing kisses implicitly talked about wealth, the video was really about estrangement/class in a way the overly arty foto of last dollar isnt), and all of it, at the end of it is indefensible.

but it makes me happy. (i really think that the artlessness of it is what does it--which is absurd, things that pay so much attention to being artless are the height of borgie indulgence, like 10 dollar marmalade or the bottles or organic guava juice or coffee at starbucks, but goddammit, those taste good)

someone else has my tracey lawerence, but i will review it after the move this week.

& it passes the car test, its really easy to sing loud, with company, blasting on the radio, ive dont it a few times.

tis also not about the freedom of being poor, its about chucking everything, to be free--and thats kind of a radical message in capitalism, one of volantary simplicity, well not radical, hes not saying if yr poor, then yr free, hes saying fuck the mcmansions and the bordeuxs and the stetsons, and the escalades, you dont need anything but yr women, and even thats to be negoitated.

I still haven't heard the McGraw song! Maybe I'll poke around for it on line this weekend (and get to that Little Birdy song too, Frank, I promise.)

Meanwhile, Edd: I'll take your pub rock Billy Swan and raise you one Dwight Twilley. (Actually, neither of them ever made more than a single I've connected with, though people rave about the album with "I Can Help" on it. I owned it once, I'm pretty sure.) (Or maybe Creedence invented pub rock?) (As for pub rockers turning into eccentrics, as Frank says, that's a good point. And Ian Dury may be the weirdest of all those guys, but I've never heard his pub rock band Kilburn and the High Roads; how weird were they?)

In re pop-to-alt country moves: Interesting to think of Shelby, Lyle, k.d., folks like that moving in the alt direction for business reasons, since all of them (I assume) wound up shifting more units once they'd stopped aiming for country radio, right? At least long-tail-wise, it would seem to me.

So. Does Rich Boy's album (which I'm increasingly loving a lot of) count as country if he comes from Mobile, Alabama, and raps with an audible drawl? Probably not; I'm not hearing anything countrified on a Sparxxx/Banner/ Field Mob level in the instrumentation anywhwere. But I'm still pretty sure I like "Role Models" and "On The Regular" (and maybe "Lost Girls" and "Ghetto Rich") (and obviously "Get To Poppin,'," duh) at least as much if not more than "Thow Some D's," which is a pretty darn good hit single.

And does Cruachan's Morrigan's Call album count as country if it's the most Irish-jiggy extreme metal album ever made (not to mention the best metal album I've heard this year)? With good songs called "The Brown Bull of Cooley" and "The Old Woman In The Woods," not to mention yet another cover (after Tyr, I think, and the Dropkick Murphys featuring Shane McGowan, right?) of "The Very Wild Rover" (the "very" of which previous coverers have left out) just in time for this snowy St. Patrick's Day, no less?

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=47556196

And does Mojo Stooges Jukebox (compiled by Iggy, whose new album with his band I still haven't heard and am not particularly looking forward to enduring, though I've noticed Anthony's a fan) count as the best country reissue of the year if it's got Jerry Lee Lewis, Eddie Cochran (whose "Cotton Picker" is pretty irritating, though no doubt that's what Iggy likes about it), Link Wray, Howlin' Wolf, Junior Kimbrough, John Lee Hooker, and Bo Diddley squeezed betweens its Trahsmen and Last Poets and Cannibals and Headhunters and Mothers of Invention? I would think so.

I'm also liking what I've heard so far (at least the Sheryl Crow, Deana Carter, Bryan Adams imitating Rod Stewart, Laura Harding whoever she is, and Rolling Stones tracks, none of which I love as much as "Cool Night" by Paul Davis which is also on here but what the heck) on the reissue of the soundtrack to Hope Floats, an apparent old movie from the early '90s or thereabouts I otherwise know nothing about. Still haven't listened to the Mavericks, Lila McCann, Trisha Yearwood, Lyle Lovett, Gillian Welch, or Bob Seger with Martina McBride tracks, but I will eventually, I'm sure.

Another good Southern rock band are these guys; the fact that "A Little Time" takes its music and "Let Your Love Light Shine" take its words from "Shine" by Collective Soul (which, let's face it, was really not that bad anyway in retrospect) are at least made up by the fact that "Nascar Superstar" takes its groove from "Walking The Dog" by Rufus Thomas. Otherwise, I can surely see why ZZ Top picked them as an opening band, though they're more Skynyrd if anything. They are Laidlaw from Houston:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=5893080

(And uh, more Black Crowes than Skynyrd, I guess, but what the hey.)

best metal album I've heard this year

Not counting metal albums that magazines like Decibel might not consider metal that is (i.e, I like Trigger Renegade and some others more)

I like the Mavericks track on Hope Floats! And the Gillian Welch one does not make me sick. And David Grusin's instrumental closer "Justin & Birdie" has a melody similar to "Flamingo Road" by David Johansen. And the Deanna Carter track "What Makes You Stay" (which isn't on any of the three albums I own by her -- was it on her second one, which I don't?) has a melody similar to "I Can't Make You Love Me" by Bonnie Raitt.

Collective Soul influence on Laidlaw mainly rests in the harmonies, I guess.

Rich Boy's "Touch That A**" would be more fun with less retarded words.

I would say Rodney Crowell's whole career has been going back and forth between "alt" and "mainstream" country. Gary Stewart, who would be alt- if anything if he were alive and speeding and drinking today, covered Crowell's definitively proto-alt "Ain't Living Long Like This" in 1977. I don't think Crowell really brought all that much to Elizabeth Cook's new one, which I've heard touted around here as "the record that alt-lovers and mainstream country fans could unite over, if only country radio, those bastards, would play "Sometimes It Takes Balls to Be a Woman." So I dunno, the basic question of who crosses over is a good one; Lyle Lovett and even Yoakam always had feet in both worlds. So did Dwight sell more records once he quit aiming at country radio so much? It's an interesting question to me because I love all those old guys like Moe Bandy and Mel Tillis, and wonder where it is they had to fall back on? Branson.

Anyway, looking at Christgau on Billy Swan, he agrees with me pretty much, the first 3 Monument LPs are strong. But "I Can Help" is '74, by which time pub rock was already almost finished. Or whatever you want to call it. And Chuck, yeah Dwight Twilley, and haven't you expressed yr. love for Moon Martin as well? Andrew Gold? Nilsson? Any number of roots-savvy schmeagles and putzes trying to get around good old macho? In England (he cut some of his stuff in Nashville with Buddy Spicher and Charlie McCoy), Andy Fairweather Low, who would be alt-country today if he'd gone that way for cash, instead of being the secret blues guitar hero and tasty r&b-based sideman he'd always wanted to be. So the blues was his fail-safe crossover place.

Oops, it wasn't Anthony who loves the new Stooges album; it's Tim Ellison!

"Boy Looka Here" (cool marching band beat) also fun on the Rich Boy album. And "Hustla Balla Gangsta Mack" has New Orleans (more era than one probably -- the Meters one and the Cash Money one) in its rhythm and some lively gurl responses from Divinity, and "Let's Get This Paper" does ominousness pretty well. But "Role Models," featuring David Banner and Attitude, totally kicks like party-in-the-background frat rock as far as I'm concerned. Least enertaining tracks: "Madness" (which does ominousness shittily), "Touch That A**" (though its spare sound is okay), "What It Do".

Okay, enough hip-hop. Yes I do like Moon Martin. Quite a bit, in fact.

Lyle Lovett track on Hope Floats, a cover of "Smile" (you know, the "Smile" that goes "smile, 'cause your heart is etc etc") is ridiculous, and ridiculously bad--an entirely inept stab at sounding sophisticated, I gather. Sorry, but it is still way beyond me how anyone can take that dork seriously.

Turns out whose "Walking the Dog" "Nascar Superstar" by Laidlaw sounds like is Aerosmith's, whose sound is also fairly hearable in their "Austin City Wendy." "Swan Song (Tribute to Led Zeppelin)," on the other hand, sounds like guess who. In fact I was thinking of them before I even checked its title.

Pat Green Cannonball has been in my CD changer all day, and I have no more to say about it than I did last year. Mulla, what do you like about it so much? Which are your favorite tracks? It sounds okay, but beyond that...?

I am envious of his shirt on the CD cover, though! He sorta dresses like me.

"Way Back Texas" seems the closest thing to a great song on it, which was I thought last year, too. It wouldn't have been one of the best tracks on the vastly superior Lucky Ones though, I don't think. "Feels Like It Should," where he drives around to "Born To Run," is nice. I can take or leave "Dixie Lullaby" -- just one more fair album track selected as a single.

So has anybody heard Merle Haggard's Hillary-for-President song yet? Saw a blurb about it in the Times a couple weeks back; supposedly he's been doing it live. But as usual I've been too lazy to hunt the Internets for it.

(Basically, I guess you could say Pat Green improves whenever he veers toward '80s Cougar mode; the more country he is, the more a blank he feels. "Way Back Texas" is as rock as Cannonball gets, and therefore as good as it gets. But Lucky Ones was that rock way more often.)

More Hope Floats: Gillian Welch's "Paper Wings" turns out to be a bore as long as she's singing. When she stops, and the guitars come in, it comes to life.

chuck, do we have anything in common, cause i love that lyle singing slow and low, smile, so tired and so beaituful.

Okay, Anthony will be perhaps be happy to hear that I just re-listened to that Lyle track and decided it's maybe not all that horrible. I actually kind of like the jazz backing him up. And his voice is not intolerable in it. There's just something pomopus and too obvious to me about he slows the song toward lethargy, seemingly trying to make it intense or whatever -- Just strikes me as one of the biggest cliches on earth, and I don't buy it for a second. I get the idea he's trying really hard to impress me with his classiness for picking such an old standard to sing, yet he's too detached from the song -- too above it, in some kind of camp way maybe, but who knows -- to actually connect with its emotion. And I know, I know...I'm reading way too many intentions I couldn't possibly know into this, and not only that, I'm assigning what are probably contadictory intentions to it: he wants to make it intense and stay above its emotion; is that even possible? I don't know. All I know is that the performance feels really labored to me, with none of the ease that Alan Jackson or Toby Keith applied to music of a similar ilk (albeit not standards that have already been done to death, which may be part of the problem) last year. Gotta say, though, if that's the "Large Band" on there (that's what they were called, right?), Alan or Toby might consider giving them a call. With a more likeable singer, it's possible they'd rock my world.

Um...okay, maybe that won't make Anthony happy after all. But I'll say this about Lyle: At least he doesn't sing as bland as the guy from Whiskeytown, who also do a song on Hope Floats -- "Wither, I'm a Flower," jeez, though just like Gillian's track it improves when the guitars kick in. In general, though, I've decided that the album has too many tracks I dislike, too many that seem merely okay, and only one (Paul Davis's oldie "Cool Night," which I must own somewhere else, on a K-Tel album or a Rhino CD or a 45, right?) I truly love. Plus, the Seger/McBride "Chances Are" song is not a Johnny Mathis cover. So nope, not worth keeping. Does seem to have been a passingly brave early experiment in linking Nashville to alt-country, though.

(Looking over my Pat Green comments yesterday, they look way more incoherent than I intented. A couple of them, I can barely parse myself.)

...POMPOUS and too obvious to me about HOW he slows the song ...

(among other typos, no doubt.)

Wait, is the Whiskeytown guy Ryan Adams? (I'm too lazy to check, but he was in that band, right? I never spent much time listening to them myself.)

And if so, does that make Hope Floats the only album ever to feature both Ryan and Bryan??

Speaking of the land of a thousand dances (see comments referencing Cannibal and the Headhunters and party-in-the-background frat-rock yesterday), Kelefah says this is the craze right about now in Lafeyette, LA. Sure sounds like '60s soul-turning-into-funk (ready to be covered by rockers in a suburban garage) to me; am I nuts? (I have no idea if these links will work; if not, just go to youtube and search "Cupid Shuffle" yourownself)?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=ExC1oGN5J28

http://youtube.com/watch?v=-GxidrT5GyU

And Frank: Yes, I do indeed like "Bodies" by Little Birdy.

i think that lyle gets this ironic tag more often then he deserves it, or this camp tag, and there are times when camp can come into an arrangement of a classic tune, or camp can be the after effect when a country tune turns into a show tune (im thinking about kd ca smoke, still one of my favourite albums, and thats b/c camp is only one effect and anyway she can sing in a way that lyle never managed, kd around torch and twang had too much consort in her), but i dont think that lovett at all is camp (even his genuine and rather tender cover of stand by yr man)

i bought smile:songs from the movies, and its not all good, sometimes his voice doesnt work, and sometimes his jazz band is a little too eager, and sometime i wish that he bothered a little more to swing or to work the melody or to do anything that a more traditional either country or jazz, but there are moments that might make it my country reissue of the year. among these moments that feature lyle (for example the brushed drumso n gee baby, aint i good to you arent his fault, but they are amazing) , are mostly jazz stanrds, esp. mack the knife or summer wind. his cover of I'm A Soilder in the Army of the Lord doesnt mock god, it even takes the awesomeness and the reverence of the divine into account, and ive always liked You've Got A Friend in Me, its that sentimental slush that manages to be carved into something genuine, because i know that both singer and songwriter can be right bastards when they need to be...

all of that said, the highlight for me, is smile. it reminds me of judy garland singing when yr smiling, because judy was insane, she was depressed, and any attempt for her to smile was a cracked out attempt at trying to convince the world that optisim will fix anything at all, and obv. its bullshit, but for 3 minutes or so, the sheer effort that she puts thru the delusion is convining. now lyle is way too laconic to work that hard at working thru an obvious delusion, but it makes it more beleivable. Someone so wry, so often depressed, and even sometimes ironic, who sings this, realises the disney/norman vincet peale shit wont work in the real world, a little delusion goes along way (other people who covered it who might know this: brian wilson, nat king cole, eddy arnold; other people who covered it who obv. had no fucking idea what was going on: michael jackson)

which disney movie does it come from?

lyle says that it was written by charlie chaplin, that cant be right?

so its not disney, it was used in modern times, which kind of i dont know, add a whole new level of pathos to the whole fucking thing

Btw, speaking of k.d., I got a CD by a group called Lesbians on Ecstasy (which looked like it'd be awful, and which I have no intention to listen to) in the mail yesterday, and their press release called "Constant Craving" (which I have no use for myself) "the lesbian 'I Will Always Love You.'" I had no idea that it had wound up on such a pedestal. What I mainly remember about it is jokes about "Constant Carving With A Butcher Knife" back in Radio On when it came out. Then again, I'm not exactly in the demographic.

i once went to a news year concert with lesbians on xtc, which featured in no paticular order

1) tequilla shots
2) gin
3) dancing with my shirt off
4) being on the stage and deep frenching a v. straight looking guy
5) fondling the breasts of a fat dyke in a diaper
6) watching my friend rachel and her bf have a reationship breakdown because she made out with a v. attractive scenester
7) inapporiately hitting on a famous toronto gallerist.
8) finishing off a magnum of champagne.

the band was amazing, just loud and fast and raw and v. fun, but not nearly as much fun as the night

Re: Cannonball

Must be my personal taste--I like the slower & mid-tempo stuff (Missing Me, Lost Without You) nearly as much as the rockier tracks that front-load the album. "Wayback, Texas" is the stand out, but the title track rocks too. I've not listened to his earlier albums much (though I own a few now) so maybe this one is a let-down, but I really like his voice on here--Country Soul Man in a less show-offy (less Country? less Soulful?) way than, say, Ronnie Dunn. I dunno--there's something joyful about the whole affair.

Mild criticism--in "Love Like That" the line "See those kids over there in the parking lot/ They're probably drinking beer & smoking a lot" annoys me, a not-so-clever self-edit.

Interesting how, with Southern rock bands, it always takes me a few listens to figure out whether they belong more on this thread or on the rolling metal thread. Renegade Rail and Glenn Stewart belonged more here, probably. Laidlaw belong more there, it turns out, but I'll repeart this here anyway:

Speaking of funky hard rock protest songs (and come to think of it, the funk is one thing that REO's "Golden Country" had in ways that Journey could never manage, which is part of why they rocked harder, my nervous system says), Laidlaw have a couple of their own -- "Revolution Is Coming" (top song on their myspace page) and "War Machine," both in the great incoherent-but-that's-part-of-the-fun hippie tradition of "Golden Country" and Grand Funk's "People Let's Stop The War." Along with the comparably boogiefied "Austin City Wendy" and "Nascar Superstar," these are two of my favorite Laidlaw tracks, I think. Which is to say I not surprisingly prefer them in '70s rock (plenty of Bad Company in there too) mode to Collective Soul/Black Crowes mode, though I don't mind the latter. (As for their Zep mode, the lyrics of "Swan Song" turn out to be made up entirely of titles of Zep songs, which is uninentionally very dorky, but sort of endearing too.)

Pulled that new Greencards CD back out today to, inspired by Edd's raves about it. Figured I'd kept it just 'cause it was "pretty good for a bluegrass record" (faint praise in my book), and assumed Edd was overstating his case, but turns out the CD is way better than I'd remembered, so maybe he's right after all. It's not a totally consistent record -- the songs Carol Young sings have a definite end over the songs sung by whichever guy it is that sings -- but high points like "All The Way From Italy" and "Travel On" (one of two Kim Richey songwriting credits, which helps a lot) are so catchy and beautiful that they carry the weaker cuts. Plus, the opener "Waiting On the Night" is almost pop, and the second song "Here You Are" is almost prog in its fiddle etc orchestrations. And "Mucky the Duck" is a real good closer.

Actually, the Greencards' guy singer (which one is he?) sounds kind of like Ricky Skaggs come to think of it. Sounds fine in "Lonesome Side of Town."

"..have a definite EDGE over..." (not end)

[i[lyle says that it was written by charlie chaplin, that cant be right?[/i]

it's quite true. charlie wrote a lot of music, in fact.

Xhuxk, here's my review of the Stooges' "My Idea Of Fun" (band surprisingly powerful, Iggy unsurprisingly unpowerful). People on the Rolling Snap Thread were savagely but inarticulately disliking the Rich Boy album; I like "Throw Some D's" and love "Get To Poppin'" (my number two single of 2005, wedged between "Since U Been Gone" and "La La"), though more on the basis of the sample than the rapping, and the remix f. Pitbull might be the best version but I only recall it from the local (now-defunct) reggaeton station. Haven't heard anything else by the guy. Like Xhuxk, I thought the previous Pat Green was best at its most Cougarish and when Green was doing the Kenny Chesney thing of celebrating college as a place to drink. Haven't heard the most recent. And I agree on placing the Dixie Chicks in the category Probably Alt Turned Mainstream 'Cept None Of Us Except For Don Has Heard The Stuff From When They Were Possibly Alt. Gary Allan might well be alt turned meanstream, except again I haven't heard him early, and I might be overplaying the fact that he like Yoakum got an early boost from the L.A. punk scene. What about Pam Tillis? (Again, her early rock and punk days are unheard by me.)

Speaking of Iggy (but not country), I'm listening to and liking Praga Khan's live version of Iggy's "Lust For Life," raw slamming techno - maybe we can call this style bosh punk.

Dixie Chicks pre-Natalie, right? I can see Gary Allan being an alt-fave under favorable conditions, but have never heard of that happening. I guess it's a who-claims-what thing, with alt claiming honky-tonk & then mainstream saying, Naw, honky-tonk's ours, at least this year. Yoakam, I wonder if he was aiming for the mainstream or the select at the outset. Some artists seem to aim for an alt-audience from the get-go, while others think, why wouldn't everyone love me? And then there's the Maybe everyone would love me if I tried doing songs that sound more like the stuff everyone already loves types.

What about Pam Tillis? (Again, her early rock and punk days are unheard by me.)

I've got Above and Beyond the Wall of Cutey (Warner Bros., 1983) on vinyl (on the cover she looks very new wave wacky -- somewhere between Lauper and Benatar, maybe, though closer to, I dunno, maybe Jane Weidlin in the Go-Gos or Suzanna Hoffs in the Bangles {they were they wacky ones, right?} with a funny hat), but as I recall she looks more punk and/or rock than she sounds. Haven't played it in a while; I'll check it again soon and see.

Yoakam, I wonder if he was aiming for the mainstream or the select at the outset.

Not really sure what you mean by "select" here, but my impression when he put out his debut EP on Oak Records (wish I still had my copy on that label, sigh), Dwight was aiming for and getting a Southern California cowpunk crowd; i.e., his fans, I thought, were Rank and File fans and Jason and the Scorchers fans and Blasters fans, and then maybe some L.A. bizzer caught him and thought he could be bigger? I could be completely deluded, though.

the Greencards record is really good. better than the Duhks or the Stringdusters or any of those folk(ie)s' records. it is a bit too compressed, aurally, for my taste, but that's 80 percent of Nashville records these days. their first two records got a bit precious for my taste, too much fucking fiddling and mandolin playing. this one puts Eamon and Kym where they belong, in the background, give them each a song or two and let them rip off a solo. (they're really cool, nice people, all of them--I interviewed them for a Nash Scene profile that runs this week.) most of it, like Chuck mentions "All the Way from Italy," is first-rate post-Nashville songwriting, too, and Carol Young has a way about her. this isn't a record I'd return to real often except for the opener and "Italy," both of which are just prime 2007 tracks already on my list, but it's sure nice. and their previous records ain't bad at all--I like them best when they're doing honky blues as on "Movin' Out."

now. damn, if I were a well-paid country songwriter with gonnegtions, I could use that line of Anthony's about "fondling the breasts of a fat dyke in a diaper." great.,

got the new Dale Watson finished CD today. he's looking bad-ass on the cover in a graveyard with a headstone that reads "Country Music RIP." I am not overstating when I say that I love the record, and Yuval Taylor put his "I Ain't Been Right Since I've Been Left," from a year or so ago, on a mix CD. also great.

got promo for new Gretchen Wilson, and plan to listen to it over beers tonight...

my impression when he put out his debut EP on Oak Records (wish I still had my copy on that label, sigh), Dwight was aiming for and getting a Southern California cowpunk crowd; i.e., his fans, I thought, were Rank and File fans and Jason and the Scorchers fans and Blasters fans, and then maybe some L.A. bizzer caught him and thought he could be bigger?

i don't know about the LA bizzer bit, not knowing how that stuff works, but when dwight put out that EP (and i still do have my copy!), i don't think it occurred to anyone that you could be a major commercial star making records like that anymore than you could be a major commercial star making records like, say, chronic town.

the gretchen wilson single is awful.

Does anyone mind if I chime in here? I've been browsing this thread for a while, but just registered, finally.

On the subject of Dwight, I first saw him opening for Lone Justice at the Palomino, believe it or not, probably at least a year before either had a record out. I'm not a Dwight historian, but my impression is that he made a stopover in Nashville on the way to L.A. and didn't find things to his liking there--but his intention was always to be a country star, or at least mainstream contender. He loved being part of that Blasters/X/Lone Justice crowd, but he sure never envisioned that being more than a stop in the road, I'm sure. I don't know if he had a master plan for how to regain Nashville's attention by being in L.A., but I'll bet he had some backup plans that didn't necessarily involve hanging out with Dave Alvin.

Of course, Dwight IS a major egghead--and I don't mean that in the male pattern baldness sense, though I suppose it applies--so his time in the mainstream was never destined to last.

The new No Depression has a nice lead review (in the reissues section) of "Guitars, Cadillacs" that all but attributes the invention of alt-country to him. It may go a little far in that regard, because I don't think Dwight ever imagined himself being alt-anything, except maybe in the sense that he was forced to find alternatives to having a record contract for a while.

I still have my original EP... Those were the days. Wish I could go to the Palomino on a typical 1984 night tonight.

--Chris W.

big & rich's "lost in this moment" is either a sappy hard-rock power ballad or a lost yacht rock album track or a bruce springsteen love song circa 1998 or an nsync/alabama collaboration with more guitars. and i think it's as bad as the gretchen wilson single.

on the subject of dwight as alt-country inventor, i'll note that he was the first contemporary country singer i ever paid attention to, and i have a feeling that, as a northeastern indie-rock kid, i was far from alone in that. even if his sound and style didn't specifically predict alt-country, the fact that replacements fans liked him, and wanted to explore further, probably counted for a lot.

Does anyone mind if I chime in here? --Chris W

Welcome, Chris! By all means, you should start posting here all the time. And you should send me a copy of Rednecks & Blue Necks that your publicity person promised me two years ago but I never got, heh heh.

he was the first contemporary country singer i ever paid attention to,

Mine was a couple years earlier: Joe Ely, maybe? Obvious punk connections with him, too. But yeah, Dwight definitely had the new wave stamp of approval in those days. (Hell, I even liked Elvis Costello's Almost Blue back then! Haven't listened to it in decades; was it actually any good?)

Almost Blue? I saw Elvis the C on that tour and of course had the record. It's not any fucking good is what I think. I'm down on Costello's stuff in general after mid-'80s. I think he did Stax better on Get Happy!!!. Or rather, his band did. By that time when he decided to go country I was already listening to country music and had been, pretty much, but obviously I was more comfortable with Gram Parsons and Joe Ely and that sort of thing. Rank and File. Costello however was good with George Jones, I saw that clip of them doing "Stranger in the House" recently, and that's a kick. Mark Nevers told me that he thought Costello sang better than he has in a while on the new Charlie Louvin record; it's not as strained, I guess, it's OK. But I mean nobody on that record sings as good as George Jones, although I really love hearing Bobby Bare and Tom T. Hall on that one cut. (Bobby Bare Sr., as one must clarify in Nashville.) I think we were talking about pub rock above and it seems to me the early Americana shit and the general canonization of '50s and '60s country partially started with pub rock, because then when you listen to Nick Lowe and Edmunds and those guys, they're direct descendents of the Burritos and all that proto-alt stuff. In that sense Dwight Yoakam was definitely like a punk version of country who somehow made it in the mainstream. Through videos, and Pete Anderson, mainly. Rock crossover move only made possible post-post-punk?

New Ry Cooder is something of a chore to sit through. Various modes of antiquity, some interesting guests like Jon Hassell, Roland White, Van Dyke Parks. Kinda like his early stuff, Into the Purple Valley and Paradise and Lunch. Not sure why he had to make his travelin' hobo a cat or his critique of a world that doesn't appreciate the Solidarity of Labor a fable. Some nice moments, but I never thought Ry's voice bore much real weight. One thing that sounds much like Beefheart blues circa '68. Last one, Chavez Ravine, I thought was actually real good--like he was going back to his L.A. Pachuco-rock roots. Nice package, comes with a book and everything, and I mean Buddy the Cat looks cool, I like cats.

I thought Elizabeth McQueen's version of "Almost Blue" was one of the best things on her "pub-rock" record. Hard to think that McQueen will ever make a great album, though, unless someone else is totally in charge. She's got a very nice voice, but she seems to lack an artistic killer instinct, so results run from nice to nice, without much else. I've paid astonishingly little attention to Costello over the years, but my guess is that he's somewhere the opposite of McQueen: does have the killer instinct but doesn't have the voice. But then, when I was listening to him back in the "This Year's Girl" days, I thought his musical instincts evaporated when you went beyond his voice and songs; which is to say that the Attractions could jab you but they couldn't rock you, they didn't manage (or the producer - Nick Lowe? - failed to capture) the basic voluptuousness of music. So he was like the Franz Ferdinand of his day. (I like Franz Ferdinand, a funny glammy take on postpunk, but the band's basic herky-jerk undercuts its viscera.) Then, barely paying attention, I got the feeling that Costello was reaching out and embracing a whole bunch of things that his voice couldn't do justice to.

The bits I've read about early Yoakum match up with what Chris said: he was playing honky-tonk in L.A. country bars in the Valley for patrons who'd rather have heard Kenny Rogers; then the cowpunks found him or vice versa and they were willing to listen and applaud.

Sure, Chuck, I will get you a copy. I remember having two conversations with the publisher's publicist about getting one to you when the book was in the bloom of youth, so I don't know what happened. But I bought a stash for purposes just like this. Actually, I should have waited--I see there are now remaindered copies on Amazon going for cheaper than what I bought 'em for from the publisher a few months ago.

Count me in among those who "discovered" country via "Almost Blue" (not counting childhood viewings of "Hee Haw" and a copy of "Cattle Call" that was the one country record in our household). I love Costello--as in, 98% of everything he's done--beyond most standards of reason, so I should probably refrain from defending him to non-fans, lest I just get apoplectic. But "Almost Blue" was probably never one of anybody's most beloved EC records; if any of his LPs should have had "Stiff" on the spine, it should've been that one. But I love it even if it puzzlingly stuck too close to some sort of remembrance of what Billy Sherrill should do for its own good (after the one raucous cut, the opener). And I think "Good Year for the Roses" is still rightfully remembered as a great single, in the UK, where it was a hit. Anyway, "King of America" was Costello's great "country" record, sort of. There's still more material there waiting to be covered by some brave artist, even though Johnny and Rosanne Cash both got to individual tracks.

On the subject of Dwight, last time he played L.A., he raged from the stage about Brooks & Dunn appropriating his "Hillbilly Deluxe" title (though he didn't mention them by name). Made me wonder... does he pick a bone about that every night?

Thanks, Chris! (Believe it or not, I even put your book on my Xmas list last year, but sadly nobody bought me the copy I'm too cheap to buy myself.)

I personally have never comprehended the attraction of any Costello after Trust, but I've admittedly become lazier and lazier over the years about trying to keep up with the old cuss. Never really connected with Get Happy, either -- if it's Stax, it's Stax with tall he funk taken out, as far as I can tell. (Ha, here's a good question: What is Elvis C's funkiest song ever? I pick "Getting Mighty Crowded," which is a Van McCoy cover, I believe, on the underrated early odds-and-sods collection Taking Liberties, but maybe I'm missing some obvious competition.) On the other hand, I think Frank kind of underrates the Attractions' rocking on This Year's Model.

In fact, so far, I'd say the Attractions rock harder on that album than the Stooges do on their new album. I need to listen more, but so far, I'd say the band sounds almost as thin and drowning underwater as Iggy does. Though maybe I just need to get past Albini's typically self-defeating production muffle, who knows. Either way, though, Iggy pretty much sounds awful. A couple of the songs ("ATM," which may or may not be better than Girls Against Boys' "Cold Cash Machine"; "I'm Fried") do kind of sound like songs though, at least. And I have been loving Steve Mackay's sax blurts in I think "I'm Fried" and the otherwise very shitty and hookless "She Took My Money," which I didn't expect. So far, the track I hate most is "You Can't Have Friends," though competition may emerge as I listen to it more. (On the other hand, I don't get either the people who complain or the people who rave about the allegedly "stupid lyrics." They're just sound like...lyrics.)

This more-or-less random cdbaby Southern-rock CD rocks harder than Weirdness too, as far as I can tell so far. Singer's a little too Steve Earle for my tastes, but "Rebels and Cadillacs" and "Devil Knows His Name" and "I Ain't Him" ["Him" being Jesus] and "Can't Hide the Tears" really kick:

(Oops, cdbbaby down now. Album is Pete Berwick, Last Train Outta Nasvhille. Also liking another new cdbaby CD, by a big-voiced gal named Shawna Corder. Especially liking "Real Good Time" and "Chevy Impala." She tries to reclaim "I Will Always Love You" for country, too, though I get the idea she grew up on Whitney's version rather than the Dolly one herself. I'll post links to these once the site is done doing its Saturday maintenance.)

Also wish I heard a fifth as much rock'n'roll on that new Stooges album as I hear in Neil Sedaka's new The Definitive Collection on Razor & Tie this morning, which is wonderful, way better than I would've expected. I've loved "Laughter In the Rain" and "Bad Blood" and "Breaking Up Is Hard to Do" before, but this album really makes the case for Neil as a great high-voiced pop-rocker. And the closer, "Junkie For Your Love," is diva disco!)