Rolling Country 2009 Thread

Their sure wasn't anything country about Carrie on the award show. She was so OTT, Paisley made something of a veiled dick joke about the effect of her hot pants.

'Course, Paisley was only country when he ad-libbed and the performance of his wonder of
consumer electronics songs came off like Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, which isn't bad but...

The LATimes in nothing if not reliable in its hagiography. Ann Powers was unleashed on CMA to this effect. However, even she couldn't ignore Taylor Swift's affinity for bum notes in live
performance anymore, all the more remarkable for her being in a setting where the women performers hardly ever hit bum notes.

Swift was "universe-shifting" in one sentence, and "off-tune, a consistant a characteristic" in another.

Brad Paisley's gee-whiz tune to the alleged wonder of consumer electronics was "an ode to tech-inspired liberalism."

No mention of the appearance of the Little Jimmy Dickens perv, Paisley's human prop for sneaking fat girl and dick jokes onto the ends of his records.

Tuscaloosa Ann, on the job.

about the effect of her hot pants.

For those who didn't see it, came in the performance segment, where she came off a fuck-me
lounge, surrounded by Weimar Republic-era dancing girls in black lingerie and nylons. There was a lot of pelvic thrusting and shimmying-like-snake going on.

Xhuxk, I'm curious why you have no interest in hearing the new Underwood. There's no reason her songwriters might not come up with another "Before He Cheats."

That said, I got the album two weeks ago and haven't listened yet because I forgot that I had it.

As an aficionado of live Taylor Swift cover songs on YouTube, I will say that whether she's in tune or not is a crapshoot, but that she gets there sometimes. Award shows are where she wobbles most. She does have my favorite singing voice in the world right now, so hurray for the recording studio.

No doubt I've posted this before, but here's her "Take A Bow"; her pitch is in the same shooting range as the target for the first two-thirds, then wanders off, along with her faith in men, and this barely bothers me at all on a clip I'm not listening to every day. Her skinny wavering nasality delivers the song's bitterness far more effectively than Rihanna or Ne-Yo did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPeuqiDSCYk

(But iirc Ne-Yo sang the song in first-person not second, so the song for him isn't bitterness but embarrassment.)

Oh, and this is what I wrote about "Fifteen" in my weekly roundup (also talked about Rihanna, whom I've been talking about here, there, and everywhere, to strangers on the street and customers at fast-food joints):

Taylor Swift "Fifteen": Lots of this is obvious and wide-eyed, just as it intends; the events and insights are normal enough, less varied and restless than her real fifteen was, I'm sure (I can't imagine that anyone who is fifteen has no thoughts about, e.g., global warming and one's place in the cosmos not just in the sight of boys) but there's art in when and how Taylor places her observations. "You're gonna be here for the next four years" has the right mixture of anticipation and fear. Lots of joy in this, the whoosh when she sings "He's got a car and you feel like you're flying." But the line that everyone remembers, me included, what the whole song seems unable not to be leading us to, is "Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind" - though what actually catches me in the throat is the next line, "We both cried," one girl's heartbreak directly transmitted to another. TICK.

Lots of good commentary on the Jukebox about Lady Antebellum's "Need You Now." Read through to the comments, where everyone who'd not previously heard the band had simply assumed they were emo from their moniker.

Xhuxk, I'm curious why you have no interest in hearing the new Underwood

Because I wound up considering the single a major annoyance (which makes me not have very high hopes); because I never return to her first two albums even though they seemed good enough at the time; because listening to new country albums is starting to seem like work, so I'm spending more and more time listening to old '70s hard rock and '80s electro-funk albums. Of course, if a copy fell into my lap, I'd probably get around to putting it on eventually. Though I've had a copy of the new Gary Allan album here for a week (due out early next year), and I haven't put that on. A passing phase, maybe? We'll see.

Taylor Swift will, in my mind, always be from the suburb of Reading where I spent many weekends seeing the Dead End Kids, a seminal but formally unacknowledged band that had a lot to do with US glam metal in the late Eighties. They furnished many of the most volcanic rock 'n' roll shows I've ever witnessed.

So Taylor has always been been fairly lame in terms of what the region was capable of -- particularly in bowling allies in the Seventies -- with regards to high energy, sparkly strutting stuff. About the same as a singer as the DEK guys, certainly not better or
worse.

I put her as writing a song or two better than Herman's Hermits -- on the order of "Mrs
Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter," "Henry the Eighth," "No Milk Today," but no cover as good as "Sea Cruise." Taylor is doing decent pop rock but nothing as good as the Monkees' TV show theme, Stepping Stone, Last Train to Clarksville, Pleasant Valley Sunday, Valerie, etc...

After fifteen years, maybe something as memorable as Stepping Stone, a bit better than the
Porpoise Song, Tom Petty after "Damn the Torpedoes" and the big jangle, some extra points for allegedly being empowering for all US teenage girls who wish to sing along with her. Was there a US guy band that mustered the same past the Monkees as far back as the Seventies? The Rollers? I don't think so.

Lady Antebellum's "Need You Now" has become my favorite country single of this year. Maybe because my sweetheart is another state away..

Anyway, she's as overexposed in the way that only the US media can provide, a year or two after Miley peaked for the same reasons. Demi Lovato's fallen through the cracks and what happened to the Wreckers?

xp So anyway what's kind of weird is that my (at least temporary) tiring of listening to country has bizarrely coincided with my move to Texas (albeit alt-country Austin). Which means that it's very possible that the most country-obssessed period of my life might well wind up being the time I lived in New York! Figure that out. Maybe I'm as contrarian as people say I am, and I just don't know it.

Anyway. Some Metal Mike Saunders stuff on proto-Taylor 1999 teen-pop country, which he posted, um, somewhere (Myspace maybe?) then emailed out. Cryptic as usual, but as usual that's also part of the fun. No idea if the youtube links will work; if not, just cut and paste them obv(the youtube comment toward the bottom is one he found, apparently):

November 18, 2009 6:55 AM
the point here (below) is that....uh...oh, that the 1964 barry-greenwich HOF writing team could have cranked out timeless hit songs for Jessica and/or Alecia that would have been remembered forever and played on oldies stations beyond that.

nashville 1999 on the other hand couldn't figure out how to wipe their own butt if given three hands and a team of "handlers." even after shania/mutt lange had written them an entire TEMPLATE on how to write/produce country/pop/rock crossover hits.

the Lila McCann "With You" video was pretty great (and probably LMc's best song) though!
huhh, doesn't exist on Youtube (like the jessica andrews videos/embedding) -- WMG group are still doing their nazi-purge of everything that surfaces.

there's two horror-show youtube clips of Lila howling live, but i'm not in the mood to kick puppies or throw kittens into trains right now. it will have to wait a bit. (her mangling a Disney tune sitting on a piano bench is a real wtf wtf wtf vocal, i mean the average 10 year old would even start yelling "stop! stop! make it stoppp!" flat/ sharp/sharp/flat, everywhere imaginable but in tune. and without any pattern or rhythm or reason to the tonally homeless wandering. i believe the word "TONE DEAF" is in the house here. (lots of famous singers sing a little flat; occasionally one would even sang chronically sharp -- Linda Ronstant mid-70's, painfully hideously so). (When Will I Be Loved / everly brothers cover might be the most hideous kill- me- right- now-make-it-stop out-of-tune vocal ever on a pop hit song, way past the point of simple pain). but flat/ sharp/sharp/flat, all over the place, even from line to line -- just doesn't happen outside of karaoke bars.

November 18, 2009 6:00 AM

Who Am I live/CMAs the entire performance of this was one of the greatest live-TV vocals i've heard in my entire life, chills-down-back crazy great

(1st album hit, lame song/ballad but sung acapella shows her very tight/nice vibrato)

= fabulous huge voice that Nashville totally wasted/blew it -- J/A didn't get even 5 first-rate strong songs in her entire aborted career ((and tw of them were on/from the first album, ie non-single title-track Heart Shaped World and You Go First (Do You Wanna Kiss)). fuuuck, retarded! coming up in the 50's, she would have wound up cutting at least a half dozen strong honky-tonk/hard country albums like Kitty Wells, Jean Shepard, and had the same kind of 20-year recording career.

November 18, 2009 5:57 AM
Alicia Elliott ("I'm Diggin' It") was an even better singer and an even bigger Nashville fiasco (the completed second album never even came out) -- the I'M DIGGIN' IT album was one notch short of wonderful, and i still pull/pass on copies of it (out of the 50 cent bins) to anyone to this day.

the class of '98-'99 female singers, Lila McCann (after the pretty good first album, gold like the followup -- see J/A comment -- crap material and no A&R clue) / Jessica Andrews / Alicia Elliott -- is an eternal black mark, whatever, in the lists of musical crimes against mankind (mishandling of young talent being a big one).

as i was sayin

classic hard-country voice, born/raised in MUSCLE SHOALS alabama and (fact) influenced by the town's 60's soul-music legacy -- it shows up in both her vocal sound (unique) and phrasing. half country / half black, whoa and wow.

the I'M DIGGIN' IT album sold really well (but didn't crossover pop into the britney/backstreet tsunami that the videos were angling for -- the single itself stalled just outside pop Top 40) and the backstory of whatever the hell happened (that the completed second album was never released) (in-house label "reference copies" supposedly exist) has never surfaced to this day. both Jessica Andrews (who got at least to cut four? albums, each one crappier with lamer-material than the last. no, i only have three i think -- the lead single to no.4 didn't hit, so the album was shelved or not even finished) and Alecia Elliott are the great lost country-singers (incredibly young when their first HIT albums came out) of last decade turning Y2K -- they should've been Brenda Lees (with crossover hits) but instead Nashville turned their careers to shit (J/A) and worse, stillborn (A/E).

November 18, 2009 5:55 AM
both You Go First (Do You Wanna Kiss)

http: / / www. youtube. com/ watch?v=eVMaLMnp4uw

(no embedding / definitely the coolest amusement- park-setting video ever) and I'm Diggin' It are two of my favorite/upbeat/fun videos of their era, or maybe ever

http: / / www. youtube. com/ watch?v=lBlDlodGkck (no embedding)

I'm Diggin It (lead single, w/"rock/dance remix" long version also on the CD-single, and great) (best use of colored I-Macs in a pop/rock video, by a mile)

http: / / www. youtube. com/ watch?v=gUneUGZfGRM

You Wanna What? (second single from the album) (15-year-old elliott co-wrote it, probably the lyrics)

YOUTUBE COMMENT:
marcometer (3 months ago)
i had such a crush on her (Jessica Andrews) in high school. her LeAnn Rimes and Lila McCann were the reasons why I had a small country phase from 1999 & 2000 when I was in high school. Now I just can't listen to country anymore, I'm just not feelin' it anymore.

oh good lord, Lila McCann. couldn't hit a note in tune if it was the size of barn and she had all day with a shotgun. wonderful sounding voice but one of the most off-key (outside the studio) singers EVER. "acoustic" live TV footage of her (from 1998-1999) is like bizarro-world music, vocals so flat she drove off the ditch, over the hill, and off the cliff in a tractor with no brakes.

You'll have to parse out the spaces in those URLs if you cut and paste. Some have probably figured that out already.

Notable recent Hot Country Songs debuts (and where said songs are on said chart this week):

#41 Keith Urban "'Til Summer Comes Around" (best song on his current album, or at least I thought so the last time I listened to the thing.)
#53 Montgomery Gentry "Oughta Be More Songs Like That" (which raises the inevitable question, "like what?" I almost don't want to listen to the song to find out the answer.)
#56 Houston Country "I Can't Make It Rain" (clearly an answer to all the gross r&b and rap hits from the past couple years about "making it rain," whatever that means -- people seem to disagree on the issue.)

Got my Nashville Scene Country Music Critics Poll ballot in the email a couple months ago. Curious what other people might be voting for. I sort of lost track somewhere along the line, I think, but my top albums and also rans at the moment (without going back and doublechecking their worth lately, and without probably having time to do so again before I send my ballot in) look something more or less like this:

1. Collin Raye – Never Going Back (Time Life)
2. Brad Paisley – American Saturday Night (Arista Nashville)
3. Miranda Lambert – Revolution (Columbia Nashville)
4. Mac McAnally – Down By The River (Show Dog Nashville)
5. Pat Green – What I’m For (BNA)
6. Ashley Monroe – Satisfied (Sony)
7. Phil Vassar – Traveling Circus (Universal Records South)
8. Eric Church – Carolina (Capitol)
9. Tim Carroll – All Kinds Of Pain (Gulcher)
10. Charlie Robison – Beautiful Day (Dualtone)

11. The Boxmasters – Modbilly (Vanguard)
12. Megan Munroe – One More Broken String (Diamond)
13. The Flatlanders – Hills And Valleys (New West)
14. Blackberry Smoke – Little Piece Of Dixie (BamaJam)
15. (Various) – The Man Of Somebody’s Dreams: A Tribute To The Songs Of Chris Gaffney (Yep Roc)
16. Sarah Borges And the Broken Singles – The Stars Are Out (Sugar Hill)
17. Toby Keith – American Ride (Showdog Nashville)
18. Rufus Huff – Rufus Huff (Zoho Roots)
19. Buckwheat Zydeco – Lay Your Burden Down (Alligator)
20. The Bottle Rockets – Lean Forward (Bloodshot)

Eli Young Band's Jet Black And Jealous would probably make my top ten if it hadn't come out a couple months before January 1, and thus be disqualified. Phil Vassar could move up or move down; it's not out yet, and I've only listened to the advance twice. Etc etc etc.

Er... actually, got the ballot in the email a couple days ago, not months. Thinking about these ones below for reissues, though all but one probably stretches the definiton of "country" (and that one actually stretches the definition of "reissue," but the ballot defines a reissue as "any album where at least 50% of the performances are more than five years old," so the Headhunters definitely qualify):

1. Richard Thompson – Walking On A Wire Discs One And Two (Shout! Factory promo reissue)
2. Kentucky Headhunters – Live/Agora Ballroom Cleveland, Ohio May 13 1990 (Mercury reissue)
3. (Various) – Winter Dance Party: 50th Anniversary Special: The Day The Music Died (El Toro reissue)
4. The Scene Is Now – Burn All Your Records (Lexicon Devil reissue)
5. 16 Horsepower – Secret South (Alternative Tentacles reissue)

Singles. Probably missing a zillion of them.

1. Jamey Johnson – “High Cost Of Living”
2. Love and Theft – “Runaway”
3. John Rich – “Shuttin’ Detroit Down”
4. Sarah Buxton – “Space”
5. Rascal Flatts – “Summer Nights”
6. Caitlin & Will – “Even Now”
7. Lady Antebellum – “Need You Now”
8. Toby Keith – “American Ride”
9. Brad Paisley – “Welcome to The Future”
10. The Flatlanders – “Homeland Refugee”

11. Taylor Swift – “You Belong With Me”
12. Phil Vassar – “Bobbi With An I”
13. Keith Urban – “’Til Summer Comes Around”
14. Billy Currington – “People Are Crazy”
15. Jace Everett – “Bad Things”
16. Krista Marie – “Jeep Jeep”
17. Jypsi – “Mister Officer”
18. Brooks & Dunn – “Cowgirls Don’t Cry”
19. Sarah Borges And The Broken Singles – “Do It For Free”
20. Eli Young Band – “Guinevere”

21. Montgomery Gentry – “Long Line Of Losers”
22. Trace Adkins – “I Can’t Outrun You”
23. Collin Raye – “Midlife Chrysler”
24. Jessica Harp – “Boy Like Me”
25. Brooks & Dunn – “Indian Summer”
26. Taylor Swift – “Fifteen”
27. Kenny Chesney – “Out Last Night”
28. George Strait – “Living For The Night”
29. Rodney Atkins - "Chasing Girls"
30. Kid Rock – “Blue Jeans And A Rosary”

31. Megan Munroe - “Moonshine”
32. Gloriana – “How Far Do You Wanna Go?”
33. Trace Adkins – “Marry For Money”
34. Lady Antebellum – “I Run To You”
35. Heartland – “Mustache”
36. Jason Boland and the Stragglers – “Comal County Blues”
37. Pat Green – “What I’m For”
38. Miranda Lambert – “White Liar”
39. Alan Jackson – “I Still Like Bologna”
40. Montgomery Gentry – “One In Every Crowd”

Discounted a few Southern Soul singles and the Love Willows' "Falling Faster" from this list as "not country enough," though I might be able to be convinced otherwise, if anybody has a strong opinion on the issue.

Eh, Vassar album's not top-ten material, actually. (His transvestite single might be, but probably won't quite make it.) Also considering bumping Toby a few notches (on both lists) for dumbo politics and being stuck in a mediocre-album rut and for his best song this year being one he didn't even write himself. We'll see.

My own Nashville Scene Ballot. Reissues were tough to come by this year. I was interested in that Dolly Parton box set, but have put off buying it for now. The John Rich single probably would have been #11. As for albums, just missing the cut were Holly Williams, Boxmasters and Eric Church.

TOP TEN COUNTRY ALBUMS OF 2009:

1.Brad Paisley - American Saturday Night
2.Miranda Lambert - Revolution
3.Buddy & Julie Miller - Written In Chalk
4.Willie Nelson & Asleep at the Wheel - Willie & The Wheel
5.Elvis Costello - Secret Profane and Sugarcane
6.Flatlanders - Hills & Valleys
7.Otis Gibbs - Grandpa Walked A Picketline
8.John Anderson - Bigger Hands
9.Dailey & Vincent - Brothers from Different Mothers
10.Phosphorescent - To Willie

TOP TEN COUNTRY SINGLES OF 2009:

1. Brad Paisley - Welcome to the Future
2.Taylor Swift - You Belong To Me
3.Flatlanders - Homeland Refugee
4.Zac Brown Band - Toes
5.Miranda Lambert - White Liar
6.Keith Urban - Kiss A Girl
7.Darius Rucker - Alright
8.Billy Currington - People are Crazy
9.Lady Antebellum - Need You Now
10.Carrie Underwood - I Told You So

TOP FIVE COUNTRY REISSUES OF 2009:

1.Elvis Presley - From Elvis In Memphis
2.Jayhawks - Anthology
3.Leon McAuliffe - Tulsa Straight Ahead
4.Woody Guthrie - My Dusty Road
5. Randy Travis - Inspirational Hits of

Assuming anybody's still out there, here are a couple country-related issues that have been raised on other threads in the past week or so; might make sense to pick them up here. Or then again, might not.

In the middle of a Kentucky Headhunters discussion started by George:

Rolling Past Expiry Hard Rock 2009

it's still kind of amazing in retrospect that the Headhunters actually ever had country hits. Weirder still: 1990, when that live set was recorded, would have been exactly in the smack-dab middle of their commercial prime, between '89's Pickin' On Nashville (which I've never heard) and '91's Electric Barynard (which is a good record, but not nearly as boogie-rocking as the live album.) Makes me curious about when country music videos and CMT actually may have nudged butt-ugly acts off the air (which, wow, might be an obvious parallel to what had happened with MTV in respect to '80s rock radio.)

― xhuxk, Tuesday, 1 December 2009 16:31

Arising out of a mostly typically frursratingly ignorant discussion of Toby Keith and whether current commercial country is worthless or not:

Btw is there any modern country employing virtuoso steel pedal players and fiddlers?

― Adam Bruneau, Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Can't think of many current fiddle or pedal steel virtuosos on the country charts (though ha ha, Keith Urban and Brad Paisely are real good guitar players.) There are tons of crack sessionmen in Nashville, obviously; just not sure how much space they're given on actual albums. (Paisley hands over space on most of his albums to some old-style jamming. But I can't think of the last big virtuoso bluegrass crossover -- Ricky Skaggs, maybe? And he was a while ago. Of course people like the Dixie Chicks have crossed from the bluegrass world, though I'm not sure to what extent they'd be considered virtuosos. But I tend to virtuosophobic, so maybe I'm neglecting somebody obvious.)

― xhuxk, Tuesday, November 24, 2009

toby keith's 'american ride' video

Good point, re: ugliness, from George:

In the hit-with-the-ugly-stick department, don't see how the Headhunters have anything on Zac Brown or Jamey Johnson.

And there were probably some unpretty rock guys who survived MTV's great early '80s Foghat purge too, come to think of it -- most obviously ZZ Top, I guess, though they learned to make a joke out of it. (Actually, though, I do suspect country still has more tolerance for ugliness than popular rock or pop have in the past 25 years or so.)

So I just figured out (after hearing it several hundred times, probably) which '80s pop records Brooks & Dunn's "Ain't Nothing 'Bout You" from 2001 sounds like. Frank has always said Londonbeat, which may well be possible (haven't heard them in ages), but what I hear now is "Midnight Blue" by Lou Gramm in the rhythm, and, uh, "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley in the melody. At least that's what I heard when I heard it on the radio this morning. Next time might be different.

So when are other folks besides jetfan going to post their country favorites of the year here? I've been relistening to albums after all the past couple days -- Mac McAnally, Ashley Monroe, Tim Carroll, Rufus Huff (see Rolling Hard Rock for more new discussion of that record), Blackberry Smoke, Megan Munroe, and Charlie Robison all hold up better than I'd expected. Eric Church bored me more than I thought he would. All of which means there'll be stiff competition for the lower rungs of my ballot top ten -- a lot of those albums seem neck-and-neck, quality-wise. Also, I somehow missed including Those Darlins above; probably they belong in my top 20. Seriously doubt they'll make Top 10, though.

Haven't heard some of the albums that jetfan listed. Tried the John Anderson a few months back, and I'm a fan, but it struck me as pretty subpar; definitely thought his version of "Shuttin Detroit Down" didn't match John Rich's. And I think I gave cursory listens to those Buddy & Julie Miller and Otis Gibbs albums, or a few tracks on each of each anyway, way back at the beginning of the year, and they struck me as really drab. But maybe I should've given them more time; who knows.

the Buddy & Julie Miller was pimped by a lot of friends, and, yeah, it bored me too. Well-intentioned, etc.

And relistening to Those Darlins now after a few months not, their routine is hitting me as more irritating than fun. Good chance that's also how I'll feel about the King Khan and BBQ Show in six months. At the permalink below I try to explain why I think their new album isn't worthless, after which George and Scott set me straight (and George points out that they're touring with the other band in this paragraph):

Rolling Past Expiry Hard Rock 2009

So yeah, as much as I like the idea of Those Darlins, truth is they just sound too tinny and thin (at least on record, but in most live clips I've watched too) to manage the wild and raucous stomping their songs clearly strive for. You could blame that on production budget, except that white country blues guys like Charlie Poole and Frank Hutchison (whose "Cannonball Blues" they cover) somehow managed to get a raucousness into their sound that Those Darlins don't --- even though those guys were limited to the recording technology of the '20s or '30s (Alternately, play Those Darlins' "DUI Or Die" against either Bo Diddley's or the Dolls' version of "Pills" -- which it basically rewrites. They're not even close to the same league. I wish they were.)

New Xgau CG -- Honorable mentions for Joe Nichols and Black Crowes ("Finally the lyricism their South deserves--sometimes even the songs" hmmm -- haven't heard it, but now I'm at least slightly curious); Big Dud for new Skynyrd though he says one cut would make a decent Darius Rucker B-side (haven't heard that either); handful of choice cuts from Tim McGraw, Taylor Swift ("Jump and Fall" -- zzzz), and, surprise, Toby Keith -- "Ballad Of Balad" (which is pretty awesome actually, middle-eastern tinge on up, and would've been a "bus song" in earlier days) plus the smooth-jazzed eulogy for Wayman Tisdale (which is kinda sweet).

http://music.msn.com/music/consumerguide/

(Link will switch to a new guide next month, like always)

The 9513 is listing their top 100 Country albums of the decade:

http://www.the9513.com/top-country-albums-of-the-decade-100-91/

Looking over the list so far, I realize I have no Dale Watson CD's in my collection, yet I've always wanted to buy something by him. I've heard enough to be curious, but years pass and I forget about him. Still, I'm intersted in the 2006 album that the 9513 site ranks.

Have barely skimmed their list, but I assume that'd be Whiskey Or God? That's from 2006, anyway, and it's the one I'd vouch for -- made by Nashville Scene list, and almost my Pazz & Jop, that year. I've heard a couple others by him, though, that'd didn't quite cut it.

Yeah, it's Whiskey or God. I think I'm going to go look for a used copy of it. Has me intrigued. Thanks.

They've also got From the Cradle to the Grave on there.

I'm really liking Keith Urban's 'Til Summer Comes Around.

I think it's his strongest single from his new album, which I haven't felt compelled to play much.

Yeah, I thought it was the best song on the album, which I haven't felt compelled to play at all since I reviewed it for the Voice when it came out. The previous singles have done absolutely nothing for me.

In other news, I think I have my Nasvhille Scene ballot figured out, but I'm procrastinating on sending it in, in case anybody posts lists here containing songs or albums (or better yet, songwriters) that somehow have slipped my mind. Sadly, that seems increasingly unlikely at this point. But I'll give it a couple more days, I guess.

I think my end of the year singles would go something like this.

1. A Little More Country Than That - Easton Corbin
2. Need You Now - Lady Antebellum
3. Living For The Night - George Strait
4. Satisfied - Ashley Monroe
5. People Are Crazy - Billy Currington
6. Seven Vern Gosdins Ago - Darren Kozelsky
7. Do I - Luke Bryan
8. I Told You So - Carrie Underwood
9. White Liar - Miranda Lambert
10. Things To Do In Wichita - Mark Chesnutt

Also really enjoying these albums;
Sarah Darling 'Every Monday Morning'
Owen Temple's 'Dollars and Dimes'
Kirsty Lee Akers 'Better Days'

Listening to Darius Rucker's singles is odd. Sometimes he lets Hootie out and it's almost laughable. Not that I dismiss his attempts at country simply because he was in Hootie and the Blowfish. In songs like It won't be like This For Long, he fits right in with lots of new country's family themed songs. I'm actually getting tired of this theme in country singles. I think something hurting him is the lyrics can be long winded. Maybe I don't want a song to spell the whole story out to me.
I also just listened to Jamey Johnson's High Cost Of Living. I'm surprised at it's honesty and forthrightness. Does it get played on G.A.C. or CMT? A new outlaw country? In Colors was one of my favorite singles of last year.

It won't be like This For Long, he fits right in with lots of new country's family themed songs. I'm actually getting tired of this theme in country singles

And even more so, the whole pervasive "You're Gonna Miss This"/"Don't Blink" theme. Those three songs have been making my wife want to throw the car radio out the window all year because, she says, if they're enjoying the present as much as they say they are, how come they're so obsessed with how they'll be thinking about it in the future?

No idea if "High Cost" gets played on the video channels (which I only see when I happen to be in a hotel room, which isn't often.) I've only heard it on the radio one time (documented upthread somewhere, I think.)

So when are other folks besides jetfan going to post their country favorites of the year here?

I'm going to start cramming albums now; was working on a piece for the Las Vegas Weekly that I thought was due today so everything else got ignored including relatives' birthdays. Turned out that the piece is put off for a week (and I'm keeping my fingers crossed) but I'm treating it as done - LVW is owned by Greenspµn Media Group, which just laid off over 40 writers across a range of publications including the Las Vegas Sun. This is not good. The editor of LVW does care about writing quite a lot, so I hope something survives...

I'm skeptical I'll ever stay awake through an entire Brad Paisley album, but will give this one a chance. Played the Collin Raye earlier in the year and liked the voice and the sound a lot but wasn't connecting to many of the tunes. Will definitely spin it again. Love the Borges single, which sounded new wave, but the album stalled, but should try it again too. Thought the Holly Williams album had four solid tracks and the rest was blah but that might be enough to make my list, and I'll give her another twirl. Singer-songwriter leanings. Oh yeah, and there's Taylor Swift, whom nobody talks about anymore: I've had the Platinum Edition of her last year's album atop my country albums list as a placeholder - she's 3 for 6 on the new tracks, the best of which, "Come In With The Rain," has been floating around the Web for two years, the second best is an acoustic version of a song already on the album, and the second worst was chosen as the single; for Taylor 3 for 6 is not a good percentage and the new tracks are basically just an excuse for me to reassess the album, 'cause I fundamentally missed the boat on it last year, though did give it third place.). Second on my list is Ashley Monroe's Satisfied which was in the can for three years before getting an official release, and that was digital only. Might vote an EP of hers too, if it's this year.

Got scads of songs on my singles list, however, despite barely listening to country radio all year.

new tracks are basically just an excuse for me to reassess the album, 'cause I fundamentally missed the boat on it last year

I put her seventh on my Nashville Scene ballot last year, and she deserved better, and she was never not on the radio or in the media this year. But Fearless still feels like 2008 not 2009 to me, and I'm going to keep it that way. Which is unfair to Taylor since I'm considering Lady Gaga 2009 for Pazz & Jop purposes, but then again I barely noticed Gaga's exitence in 2008, so there's a difference. Also, Taylor is guaranteed to make plenty of my non-album Scene lists. So it's not like I'm leaving her to flap all by herself out in the wind. She'll do fine in life without being on my album ballot, I'm sure.

Toby's Wayman Tisdale song sounded better than I would've predicted over the car radio today, but maybe I just like smooth jazz. Also heard, for the second time, "Bonfire" by Craig Morgan (#5 on the country chart as we speak), which is basically an imitation of Jason Aldean pretending to be Bad Company. Still don't like it much, though.

"Need You Know" by Lady Antebellum is coming into my room from my housemate's radio. Seriously dope song imo.

My Nashville Scene ballot (which I just filed):

TOP TEN COUNTRY ALBUMS OF 2009:

1. Collin Raye – Never Going Back (Time Life)
2. Brad Paisley – American Saturday Night (Arista Nashville)
3. Mac McAnally – Down By The River (Show Dog Nashville)
4. Ashley Monroe – Satisfied (Sony)
5. Miranda Lambert – Revolution (Columbia Nashville)
6. Pat Green – What I’m For (BNA)
7. Tim Carroll – All Kinds Of Pain (Gulcher)
8. Charlie Robison – Beautiful Day (Dualtone)
9. Megan Munroe – One More Broken String (Diamond)
10. Rufus Huff – Rufus Huff (Zoho Roots)

TOP TEN COUNTRY SINGLES OF 2009:

1. Jamey Johnson – “High Cost Of Living”
2. Love and Theft – “Runaway”
3. John Rich – “Shuttin’ Detroit Down”
4. Sarah Buxton – “Space”
5. Rascal Flatts – “Summer Nights”
6. Caitlin & Will – “Even Now”
7. Lady Antebellum – “Need You Now”
8. The Flatlanders – “Homeland Refugee”
9. Phil Vassar – “Bobbi With An I”
10. Taylor Swift – “You Belong With Me”

TOP FIVE COUNTRY REISSUES OF 2009:

1. Richard Thompson – Walking On A Wire Discs One And Two (Shout! Factory promo)
2. Kentucky Headhunters – Live/Agora Ballroom Cleveland, Ohio May 13 1990 (Mercury)
3. (Various) – Winter Dance Party: 50th Anniversary Special: The Day The Music Died (El Toro)
4. The Scene Is Now – Burn All Your Records (Lexicon Devil)
5. 16 Horsepower – Secret South (Alternative Tentacles)

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST MALE VOCALISTS OF 2009:

1. Collin Raye
2. Mac McAnally
3. Toby Keith

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST FEMALE VOCALISTS OF 2009:

1. Taylor Swift
2. Ashley Monroe
3. Miranda Lambert

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST SONGWRITERS OF 2009:

1. Taylor Swift
2. Chris Gaffney
3. Mac McAnally

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST DUOS, TRIOS OR GROUPS OF 2009:

1. Rufus Huff
2. Blackberry Smoke
3. Brooks & Dunn

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST NEW ACTS OF 2009:

1. Tim Carroll
2. Rufus Huff
3. Megan Munroe

COUNTRY MUSIC’S THREE BEST OVERALL ACTS OF 2009:

1. Taylor Swift
2. Collin Raye
3. Brad Paisley

Will probably put Martina McBride's Shine on my ballot. Warm voice, good tunes, nothing totally outstanding but I like every song and the rockers rock; choice cut would be rocker "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong," co-written by (among others) Stephen Barker Liles of Love And Theft and Robert Ellis Orrall, who's had his hand in the first Taylor Swift album and the first and only Love And Theft album.

(Didn't mean to italicize that Love And Theft album; I doubt that Orrall had anything to do with the album entitled Love And Theft, just with the band. Btw, has anyone here heard the Love And Theft album?)(Which is called World Wide Open.) The other two writers of "Wrong Baby Wrong Baby Wrong" are the Warren Brothers, whom I think Xhuxk once voted for.

I have no time to read this whole thread, so I will ask a quick question. I like George Strait and I like Dwight Yoakam. Can you offer me 3-5 male performers doing similarly trad/stone-face material? I don't want anything even slightly wannabe-rock/crossover-ish (I've already listened to Montgomery Gentry and I don't like them) or suburban housewife radio crap (Paisley, Chesney); nor do I want alt-country. I want old-school shit of the George Strait/George Jones/Dwight Yoakam/Buck Owens school, but by younger or lesser-known dudes. Many, many years ago I remember reading favorable reviews of a guy named Marty Brown. That's sort of the type of thing I'm looking for. Got anything for me?

Try Justin Townes Earl " The Good Life" or Midnight At The Movies" But you might think of him as alt country, I don't. John Anderson's new album "Bigger Hands" or his 2 disc anthology. Mark Chesnutt"s newish album might that "old school shit" feel you want.Vince Gill's "These Days" might be your best bet.

Though if I were you I would reconsider your feelings toward new country as just wannabe-rock/crossover suburban housewife radio crap. Go out to a honky tonk that plays radio country, ask someone to two step or waltz, dance to it, have a few beers with it. Hearing the music in the right context and it might open you up to hearing it different. Just saying.

This is what I've got for an expanded singles list, and I won't have time between now and Monday to rethink it much. Best year easy for singles since I've been doing the poll; a lot of these are unabashed dance numbers - possibly are a more typical reaction to the Great Recession than "Shuttin' Detroit Down" is.

1. Love And Theft "Runaway"
2. Jamey Johnson "High Cost Of Living"
3. Taylor Swift "You Belong With Me"
4. Sarah Buxton "Space"
5. Lady Antebellum "Need You Now"
6. Caitlin & Will "Even Now"
7. Sarah Borges And The Broken Singles "Do It For Free"
8. Taylor Swift "White Horse"
9. Brooks & Dunn f. Reba McEntire "Cowgirls Don't Cry"

10. Miranda Lambert "White Liar"
11. Jack Ingram "Barefoot And Crazy (Double Dog Dare Ya Mix)"
12. Rascal Flatts "Summer Nights"
13. Brad Paisley "Welcome To The Future"
14. Randy Houser "Boots On"
15. John Rich "Shuttin' Detroit Down"
16. Jamie O'Neal "Like A Woman"
17. Taylor Swift "Fifteen"
18. Kenny Chesney "Out Last Night"
19. David Nail "Red Light"

20. Dierks Bentley "Sideways"
21. The Parks "As Long As You're Going My Way"
22. Holly Williams "Keep The Change"
23. Phil Vassar "Bobbi With An I"
24. Collin Raye "Mid-Life Chrysler"
25. Flatlanders "Homeland Refugee"

(I have a strange way of dividing things into tens. I still haven't caught up on my lost sleep from earlier in the week, I guess.)