Rolling Country 2006 Thread

(This post was somewhat inspired by the conversation about "Stays In Mexico.")

Related thought: has there been much that one could call psychedelic country coming from country-identified (as opposed to country-rock-or-alt-rock-identified) performers? I mean sonically. I'd think Mexican music could be an entryway.

(Obv. I already know about Big & Rich. Any others?)

(But I'll listen to this alb more to see what penetrates.)

My mailbox seems to be experiencing a country drought in recent weeks, though I just got the new Randy Rogers Band CD today; maybe that will help (I liked their/his last one). I talked about the Rammstein LP earlier on the metal and world music threads, and yesterday I just sent in an MTV Urge Informer metal blog on it, emphasizing "Te Quiero Puta!" (my favorite track) in all cases. Right now Sons and Daughters' "Johnny Cash" from the Optimo *Present Psych Out* mix CD (also featuring Chambers Bros, Hawkwind, Skatt Bros, Arthur Russell's Dinosaur) is on; I forget who Sons and Daughters are, but this track somewhat reminds me of the Mekons' country-ish stuff but with a more Kraut-rock drone to it (so yeah, psychedelic, but obviously not what Frank's looking for). My favorite song on the new Shooter album is still "Hair of the Dog." I think I gave "Chatahoochie" a 7.5 or 8 out of 10 in *Radio On* when it first came out, and if I gave it an 8.0, I probably overrated it. (Best thing about it is its surf riff, which I wish surfed more.)

I believe you, Roy, on Allison's record. I thought her last record was one of the most needlessly doleful things I've ever heard. the tempos, they was for shit. she doesn't seem to have a record-making knack.

and yeah, Shira Small doing Donny Hathaway or whatever, on "Wayfaring Strangers," is one of the best things on that record. I still quite like Caroline Peyton's, and the Priscilla Quinby one about the lure of the sea. Andy Beta caught up with Small in New York. His LA Weekly piece is darn good; between the two of us, we found a lot of the Ladies.

It's been a strange year for country. Last year seemed so various, so diverse, so full of (to my ears) fresh stuff that came from somewhere kinda new. I have yet to hear Shooter's record, and have been so harried trying to even listen to, and write about, what I have to, that I'm still anticipating really attending to Trent Willmon and the Dixie Chix. But apart from the Chix, has this year seemed a bit disconnected somehow, a bit lacking in drama? Or is it just me?

I still think Jamey Johnson and Blaine Larsen have done the most interesting stuff this year--newcomers rule?

and Xhuxk, I sent ya a Charlie Rich burn yesterday.

Anthony, I think my favorite line in "Chatahoochie"'s lyrics is when he drops her off early but doesn't go home; are there any other songs (any genre) where that very common occurence actually occurs? (My least favorite line, which Alan sings way more often, is where "it gets hotter than a hootchie-cootchie," which may well be an actual idiom used in real life by some people but makes me cringe every time regardless.) In general: I'd like the song more if Kenny Chesney was singing it. Somehow Kenny strikes me as more likely than Alan to skinnydip and/or strip down to bathing trunks at a fishing hole. (That doesn't actually happen in the song though, does it? But it's probably implied. I think in the video, jet-skiing was somehow involeved. But what do I know, I grew up with a backyard swimming pool, so swimming in mudholes has always made me kind of squeamish.)

peter north, in my local paper this morning, talked about Jackson as a concert performer, versus Tim McGraw, and apparently he is unable to seduce stadiums, i dont know what this means, but yeah...

(i also really like burger and a grape snow cone)

someone should email jd and ask him to record this

>the video montage that preceded his performance did mention the word "bohemian" (a word Jimmy Buffett, to whom Chesney's often compared, actually embodies)<

i have no IDEA whether she meant for this to be a provocative statement

I haven't been connecting big to country this year, but I'd assumed that was just me, that I was distracted by other music, not listening to enough radio, got my key supplies cut off in April (Village Voice duplicates arriving courtesy of xhuxk, records sent by obscure cxxntry dudes at the urging of xhuxk, etc.). I still haven't gotten to the Carbon Leaf, Sam Roberts, Cindy Smith, Linda Ronstadt, Kris Kristofferson, and Van Morrison, or the Fahey tribute, and need to hear more than the first few tracks on the (somewhat promising) Bernard Fanning, Ashley Monroe, and Tea Leaf Green and on the (not-so-promising) Shawn Mullins, Grace Potter, Rhonda Vincent, Tom Brosseau, Demented Are Go (and few of those are the core of country music, anyway).

The following I've listened to only once, so any resemblance to actual reactions are a coincidence:

Th' Legendary Shack Shakers - Rousing polka-gypsy-blues-country clatter but too emotionally detached for all the cacophony, though could make my ballot if albs don't come pouring into my PO box.

Yonder Mountain String Band - More entertaining than I'd expect from rustic-decor folk-club country, but still kinda meh. The banjo kicks. It's hard to stop a banjo from kicking.

Julie Roberts - Warm voice, as you know, but this tends towards So-What-Ville.

Ralph Stanley (Carter Family songs) - This reaches me despite the man's elderly throat. Songs can't be beat.

Blazing Country - Sits home around the stodge fires, but I remember (this was a few months ago) finding some of this touching.

Willie Nelson (Cindy Walker songs) - Heard this in extreme background while I was packing; I'd probably listen more for the songs than the singer, at this point.

Parnell and DBTs I've already mentioned, ditto for Shannon Brown, who's a pop babe and a rocker and who could well make my ballot.

Carrie Underwood - Need to borrow this from the library again to see what all the crowing is about. I thought it was nice, but I never swooned.

Ryan Adams - Starts rockabilly but then goes to layered stillness. This will take more listens for me to figure out.

Electric Boogie Dawgz - Don't know if they'd count for country; unreconstructed rock 'n' roll barfucks, but "unreconstructed" misses the point of r'n'r which is supposed to deliver me from days of old. But I actually get a big hooting good time out of this.

Jace Everett - Thought it wasn't bad, but I've subsequently forgotten what it sounds like.

John Rich reissue - Straight-up pop country. Proves he shouldn't do pop country straight.

Country song of the year for me is still noncountry Marit Larsen's "Only a Fool," which has the feel of a nice little throwaway. There's no indication yet that EMI plans to market the album anywhere but Norway, though I can't imagine they won't.

I'll go back and read this: so Ann Powers is calling Jimmy Buffett a boho? He's a species of boho, for sure, dumb shirts and all. A tanned bohemian.

a lotta people love Radney Foster's new one, I think it's kinda like one of those third-level Marshall Crenshaw albums like "Mary Jean and Nine Others."

I miss the stuff that came via Xhuxk, too. Frank, Tea Leaf Green: I did a short preview of them for the Scene, and talked to the lead Tea, the keyboardist. They're way into '70s rock (he told me, "I mean, I can't think of one single bad rock record from 1972!"). They have long intstrumental passages that are jam-band via some circuitous route that includes Genesis and Steve Hackett and "Firth of Fifth," and Spirit and the Band. One song about John Brown, many others about the California landscape, getting back to nature, one really interesting one about being in Mississippi and watching TV somewhere and seeing California wildfires burn and wishing somehow that Mississippi would too--some weird take on southern history and travel and so forth that tells me they could be a good band. I mean, there's too much fucking piano, all those jam-banders take after Chuck Leavell and Bruce Hornsby. And the songs could be sharper. But they're onto something--rarely can I attend to something like this, but I found their instrumental sections actually tryin' to signify something, and it just furthers my opinion that jambands are full of confused white people who almost get the notion of the demi-funk they're attempting. And my Pat Metheny/Bill Frisell theory of Mid-American Pseudo-Homily and Gothic, all those pentatonic demi-jazz notions. Cool jazz and prog rock and whatever the Allman Brothers did, and the fucking Dead--I dunno, I'd just as soon read Art Pepper on jail ettiquette and think dark thoughts about the fate of Kool Jazz.

and im not finding alot of country i love this year and most of it is ancient, realtvely speaking (willie, jessi, kris, ralph stanley, the dead johnny cash (with his first no 1 since live from san quinton). there are exceptions, some of the new toby, two songs on the new neko,when the star goes blue, that daddy song i wrote about earlier, not very much else)

thinking of the 70-dead contigent, im shocked at how tender i feel about the work, and how strong it is...

the new video from road hammers is really boring, but listening to the album again, after hearing the song on the radio, i am reminded on how mccoy's voice makes my pussy wet, in a way that almost nothing has for a very long time, and girl on a billboard has a rampant eroticism, which is missing from country i think, but was present last year. (and he is opening for nickelback and playing the stampede on the same week!!)

i havent bought julie roberts, but im tempted to, and still waiting for gene watson and another promo,

what does everyone think of hank williams jr/big and rich's track thats how they do it in dixie? (i think im bored, but not offended, the whole veterans schitck that occured before this one, seems to be an arlington/badonkadonk rip off, the same one two punch gone stale, but am willing to reconsider)(it doesnt bother me as much as Building Bridges, which is just awful)

has anyone heard Yee Haw by Jake Owens cause i havent, but the title intriuges me

And yeah, Anthony, Hacienda Bros. is nice little genre piece, nothing great, but I am a fan of Dan Penn and his production is nice, and I'm nearly always somewhat entertained by that soul-country mix. It's a good record, far as that shit goes. You sending Gary Bennett, Anthony? That was a nice piece above, by the way.

I mean, Buffett's career was far more "bohemian" than Chesney's, I think. Buffett until "Margaritaville" was a pure cult figure--I remember being into Uriah Heep or Yes or whatever in junior high and these hipster kids knowing about Jimmy Buffett. Incipient singer-songwriterdom-in-opposition-to-rock, which didn't respect its elders enuff. Future fans of alt-country. And I think Buffett always preached some kind of eternal party mixed with fairly conventional, LSU-tailgate-party, Auburn-grudge-fuck values. Which makes him a southern bohemian, harbinger of whatever the fuck this exurban, rube-urban landscape is I'm living in. I mean shit, there's a new-age shop up the road in Clarksville and you can get some kind of ziti there, also those Torani flavors in coffee, and crystals for your knob-ache. And their bagels are flown in from Sysco Systems, I wanted to get my mother a bagel back when she was still eating solid food and these New Agers tried to charge me $2.25 each for a plain two-week-old bagel flown in from New Brunswick or Kansas when I can get fresh-made and quite decent in Nashville for about .65 apiece. So that's who I think Chesney is playing for, the people who have decided to get into Crystals and Wicca and Coffee at this joint--I hear 'em play modern country in there sometimes and once I commented and they were really concerned, perhaps I didn't like country?

I like it fine, I wanted to say, but I don't like your overpriced bagels or the whole atmosphere of post-boho in exurbia. And that's what Ann Powers is getting at in her piece, and I suppose she needs to get out of Los Angeles and come down here and go to Texas Hold 'Em Night at Kickers and hang out at the Wal-Mart/White Castle. I recently broke my rule of never going out to eat in Clarksville unless it's a couple of halfway good barbecue places, and went to eat at something Grille where my club sandwich came with a side of vile, yellow, coagulating honey-mustard sauce that developed a kind of scrim as I sat there and which the waitress assumed I wanted.

You notice, I talk a lot about food these days; I'm doing my running thing, and seems like I never am able to sit down and really take my time, and that's how I feel about music too. I'm just now really getting into Julie Roberts--I think it does tend toward bleh, but I quite like the drinking song and the small-town girl song, and goddam if "Sex and the City" doesn't need to get down south--Atlanta would be good, but I'd like to see it in Hattiesburg, Miss., that town needs a boost. Anyway, Bill Friskics-Warren kept telling me that "Men and Mascara" was good, good pop, and it is good pop, very good.

I guess bohemian for Ann Powers isn't a cloistered, dank city thing, she gets that so that's great. But Buffett is a beach bum, and I've never once been tempted to go into his Margaritaville place in New Orleans, I drank a fucking hurricane one of my first trips down there, back when I stayed out in Metarie in some weird hotel and didn't know any better.

Anyway, I find it a provacative and not entirely thought-out way of getting at Buffett, but a nicely enough judged way to get across what she's really getting across, that Chesney is some kind of insanely energetic, jolly, happy celebrity of the kind who's not even *worried* about "bohemian" or "non-bohemian." Like I say, Ann Powers is good, but come on, Ann, welcome to the New New South! "Bohemian" is a funny word to use but people here *don't usually think in those terms*.

Chesney's not anyone I get any kind of bead on *at all*. Is he gay? I dunno.

And yeah, Anthony, Hacienda Bros. is nice little genre piece, nothing great, but I am a fan of Dan Penn and his production is nice, and I'm nearly always somewhat entertained by that soul-country mix. It's a good record, far as that shit goes. You sending Gary Bennett, Anthony? That was a nice piece above, by the way.

I mean, Buffett's career was far more "bohemian" than Chesney's, I think. Buffett until "Margaritaville" was a pure cult figure--I remember being into Uriah Heep or Yes or whatever in junior high and these hipster kids knowing about Jimmy Buffett. Incipient singer-songwriterdom-in-opposition-to-rock, which didn't respect its elders enuff. Future fans of alt-country. And I think Buffett always preached some kind of eternal party mixed with fairly conventional, LSU-tailgate-party, Auburn-grudge-fuck values. Which makes him a southern bohemian, harbinger of whatever the fuck this exurban, rube-urban landscape is I'm living in. I mean shit, there's a new-age shop up the road in Clarksville and you can get some kind of ziti there, also those Torani flavors in coffee, and crystals for your knob-ache. And their bagels are flown in from Sysco Systems, I wanted to get my mother a bagel back when she was still eating solid food and these New Agers tried to charge me $2.25 each for a plain two-week-old bagel flown in from New Brunswick or Kansas when I can get fresh-made and quite decent in Nashville for about .65 apiece. So that's who I think Chesney is playing for, the people who have decided to get into Crystals and Wicca and Coffee at this joint--I hear 'em play modern country in there sometimes and once I commented and they were really concerned, perhaps I didn't like country?

I like it fine, I wanted to say, but I don't like your overpriced bagels or the whole atmosphere of post-boho in exurbia. And that's what Ann Powers is getting at in her piece, and I suppose she needs to get out of Los Angeles and come down here and go to Texas Hold 'Em Night at Kickers and hang out at the Wal-Mart/White Castle. I recently broke my rule of never going out to eat in Clarksville unless it's a couple of halfway good barbecue places, and went to eat at something Grille where my club sandwich came with a side of vile, yellow, coagulating honey-mustard sauce that developed a kind of scrim as I sat there and which the waitress assumed I wanted.

You notice, I talk a lot about food these days; I'm doing my running thing, and seems like I never am able to sit down and really take my time, and that's how I feel about music too. I'm just now really getting into Julie Roberts--I think it does tend toward bleh, but I quite like the drinking song and the small-town girl song, and goddam if "Sex and the City" doesn't need to get down south--Atlanta would be good, but I'd like to see it in Hattiesburg, Miss., that town needs a boost. Anyway, Bill Friskics-Warren kept telling me that "Men and Mascara" was good, good pop, and it is good pop, very good.

I guess bohemian for Ann Powers isn't a cloistered, dank city thing, she gets that so that's great. But Buffett is a beach bum, and I've never once been tempted to go into his Margaritaville place in New Orleans, I drank a fucking hurricane one of my first trips down there, back when I stayed out in Metarie in some weird hotel and didn't know any better.

Anyway, I find it a provocative and not entirely thought-out way of getting at Buffett, but a nicely enough judged way to get across what she's really getting across, that Chesney is some kind of insanely energetic, jolly, happy celebrity of the kind who's not even *worried* about "bohemian" or "non-bohemian." Like I say, Ann Powers is good, but come on, Ann, welcome to the New New South! "Bohemian" is a funny word to use but people here *don't usually think in those terms*.

Chesney's not anyone I get any kind of bead on *at all*. Is he gay? I dunno.

i have sent gary bennett, have you nto gotten it ? :(

kenny chesney is not gay, but i cant read his beads sexually either, there is a peice to be written about the ambiguity of that presentation.

And I like the Haceinda Bros too - -both CDs, but the new one more since there's more covers hence more good songs. But yeah, I'm kind of a sucker for soul-country too. And yeah, album's far from great.

I'm not sure if I still have that Julie Roberts album around. I liked the title track; rest struck me as bleh; maybe I was wrong. (Also, I think I still have an early version of the album, and the track list changed, apparently. Same with Ashley Monroe as I recall.)

And speaking of Bill Friskics-Warren, I've been paging through his and David Cantwell's top 500 country singles book from a few years ago *Heartaches By Number* a lot while in the bathroom the past couple weeks, and I like it a lot; I'm impressed by their openness to pop-country (they even have Juice Newton in there), and the wide-openness of their genre-defining actually reminds me of *Stairway to Hell* in some ways. They tend to underrate *recent* pop-country, for the most part, but that's okay; they still like some of it. And I'm starting to think the *Urban Cowboy* disco-crossover era (though I have no idea how much country actually tried cross over in that direction) was a lot more interesting than they let on. And they keep mentioning Dave & Sugar as an example of lame crossover stars from that time, which is funny, because I don't think I'd ever even heard of Dave & Sugar til I opened their book. And they proabably fall back on "social consciousness" justifications too often. An enlightening read, nonetheless. (Actually, what it REALLY reminds me of Dave Marsh's Top 1001-or-however-many singles of all time book *Heart of Rock and Soul*, which I wish I still owned a copy of.)

And Edd and Frank, I guess I *could* still be emailing unknown bands to have 'em send you their CDs, but it takes time, and it's a little weird since I'm not actually editing a section where somebody else might write about the bands anymore. Also, I get *way* fewer duplicates to pass on these days, and I can't rely on a newspaper to pay the postage anymore, though it's possible I'll mail Frank my advance CD-R of Towers of London anyway. (And Frank, by the way, thanks for the mix CD, which will get played on my roadtrip upstate starting tomorrow muchly I'm sure, and Edd, thanks in advance for the Charlie Rich burning.) Anyway, what I suggest y'all start doing more is emailing the bands (at least the cdbaby and myspace bands) yourownself. And definitely start with the Victory Brothers, whose album is so far (1) my country album of the year (2) my overall album of the year (3) my Big N Rich album of the year and (4) my Texas Hold 'Em album of the year even though I haven't played poker since high school, and should be heard by one and all. It's getting reviewed in the first installment of a monthly roundup I'm writing for *Harp* magazine, and if I hear back from the band afterwards I'll try to remember to pass on some addresses, but meanwhile you might just wanna go to their webpage and email them directly; it's easy, I do it all the time, how d'you think I discover all these bands in the first place? Anyway, here's a list of other acts you might think of contacting who've put out records I've liked lately that I'm guessing you mostly haven't heard; the cdbaby ones you can email straight from their page, and the myspace ones frequently list a webpage with contact email addresses. Anyway, good luck (and I hope these links, which I'd been saving in a file for a while, work):

Victory Brothers, Big N Rich style dance/country/rock from L.A.:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=58969629

Big Dictator, early AC/DC-style metal from Long Island:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/bigdictator

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=48160709

Penny Dale, Stevie Nicks-inspired country from Nashville:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=8670245

Lucas McCain, Southern Rock from Georgia, better than the new Drive By Truckers CD:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/lucasmccain

Dirty Birds, garage rock from Portland:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/dirtybirds

Miko Marks, a black woman from Oakland via Flint, singing country:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/mikomarks

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=47331552

Savage, attempted hair-metal from Nevada; sounds more like Chrome-style art-punk:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/savagerocksyou2

Wolfgang Bang, snotty punk from L.A.:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/wolfgangbang

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=4151478

Joanna Martino, goth-influenced Christian teen-pop, from Tennessee:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/joannamartino

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=24911247

K. Wilder, triple-A alt-country with jazz overtones, from Florida via Virginia:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/kwilder3

Daj, '80s-style dance/pop/rock gal from Florida:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/dajmusic

Nell James, 17-year-old Long Island girl prog-rock-guitar/singer-songwriter:

http://www.myspace.com/nelljames

Matt O'Ree, heavy New Jersey blues-metal guitar dude:

http://www.myspace.com/mattoree

Riverside, middle-aged pot-bellied country metal band from Missouri:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/riverside

Some other ones you might wanna search:

Terry Lee Bolton
Becky Hobbs
Hot Rollers
Lucky 7
Secret society of the sonic six
Katie Neal
The Cool and Deadly
Alan Bros
Sonic orchid
Fat Matt McCourt

http://www.emusic.com/lists/showlist.html?lid=881317&p=1

Listening to it right now, and it sounds good. For one thing, it's DANCE MUSIC. For another thing, the title rhymes with "I hear the twins are back from Saginaw." Also he spells out "Yee-haw" at the end. And some of the rest of his CD sounds even better -- "startin' with me" is about all his fuckups in life, starting with a one-night stand with his best friend's little sister. "the bottle and me" is good i-drink-alone honkytonk. my favorite so far though is "eight minute ride", very hard-rocking biker country (with one guitar part that *might* be deserve to be called psychedelic), and a title that may or may not beat motley crue's premature ejaculation in "ten seconds to love" by two whole seconds, i'm not sure yet. also jake seems to be bragging about how big the rims on his truck are, or maybe that was just his tires; there's a difference, right? but also maybe the most blatant making-of-love in a major label country tune since a different song about riding (cowboys), by big n' rich. so what's jake owen's deal, anyway? he used to be a pro golfer or something? sure does look like a handsome devil in that cover photo.

I should have said "some of the rest of his CD sounds really good, too." "Yee Haw" may or may not be the best track; I'm leaning toward the eight-seconds one, but haven't decided yet. "The Bottle and Me" is actually fairly perfuntory, as hardguy drinking honkytonk laments-as-brags go. ("Whiskey's Got a Hold on Me," the alcoholism track that ends the somewhat subtler new Randy Rogers album, which sounds conistently good but not great so far, is better.) And the thanking-Dixie song (a duet with Randy Owen -- should I know who that is? is it Jake's brother?) works more as a post-Southern-rock power ballad than as a tribute to Southernness, if that makes sense. (I.e., it sounds better than it reads, because of its pretty guitar melody.)

(Ha ha, can you tell I'm procrastinating on packing for my roadtrip?)

I'm also liking jake's "places to run," about running out of escape hatches, sad and laid-back, with a real ease to the delivery, and some spanish guitar. both jake owen and randy rogers play the lazy country boy charlie daniels used to play in his much younger days, i'm noticing. and in "eight second ride," jake and the girl he picks up sing a charlie daniels song together in his truck. my three favorite cuts so far on the rogers album all have titles that start with the word "you" and end in the first person: "you could've left me," "you could change my mind," "you don't know me." i like his sound, especially his drums and guitar. his vocals are less in-your-face than you'd expect, but i have a feeling they'll sneak up on me.

okay, now i gotta run to the store for car supplies.

don

i will complie and email tomorrow or the day after

I have no compunctions about asking CD Baby vanity bands for promo copies. But I do take a halt on asking for free stuff when I know absolutely no one will accept a pitch on it. Taste wars, you know. We lost, they won.

ps) jake and his conquest in "eight seconds ride" sing "a country boy can survive," which is by hank jr not CDB, obviously. duh.
pss) i talked about tea leaf green a lot upthread, too! (first!)

(chuck, are you registered anywhere, or is this not elopement?)

Hah! I kept mine in the john for a couple months (hey, it's a long book)...

David's one of my best friends and I've said this before but everybody on this thread should own it. It's a great reference for one but also a provocative and inspiring read--in the sense that it'll send you hunting for a lot of country records you either never heard or had forgotten about.

http://www.lexjansen.com/marsh/index.htm

Very cool online database to the book, plus more lists including Heartaches, Hoskyns' Country Soul book, Doo-wop and R&B vocal groups. No Stairway though :(

My advice is 'don't bother.' Unless, of course, you actually care about an oral history of Slayer, one never actually quoted to any interesting extent, or the occasional "I like [this band that moves more promotional copies than it sells]" doggerel.

http://www.emusic.com/genre/feature/200606/286.html