Rolling Country 2006 Thread

I bought a Charlie Louvin LP, "It Almost Felt Like Love", recently (I'd always steered clear of his solo material, assuming it just wouldn't match up). It's surprisingly fine.

I haven't seen the whole review but that quote is maybe the most wreteched countrier-than-thou-ism I've ever read.

Excellent: Dierks doing "Fast Lanes and Country Roads" from "She Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool," and Brad Paisley "In Times Like These," where he sounds more lowdown, a bluesman even. For that matter, the banal hackery of some of the chord changes, very J.R. and Sue Ellen-pink, that anchor "I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool" as done by K. Chesney and R. McEntire--that's pretty fucking middlebrow and cheesy, but the version is a good one, and useful historical perspective on the bad old '80s. Haven't heard "If Loving You Is Wrong, I Don't Wanna Be Right Yet" by dirty LeAnn Rimes; that might be for my tumbler o'bourbon and smoking jacket, later tonight.

Only ringer so far I've heard on "She Was Country" is Randy Owen doing "Years," that Fogleberg quaver, bearded ass-man in doleful extremis, I don't like it.

hi dere

In possibly related news, there's a glowing full-page review of the new Dierks Bentley album, of all things, in Paste, of all places, arguing that fans of alt-country shouldn't ignore Nashville country, which Geoffrey Himes says has gotten better in the past few years (though he may he overrate Bentley's importance in that equation -- Dierks is hardly the most interesting act in Nashville, though I agree he can frequently be real good -- and Himes mentions the Wrights and Bobby Pinson but not Big & Rich or Toby Keith or Montgomery Gentry as evidence of his claim, which strikes me as somewhat odd). Nice to see the barrier being broken down, regardless.

A lot of what alt-country is, to me, it's just bar music, music you hear in a bar, intellectualized bar music, whatever, and having to worry about my relationship to the supposedly "authentic" or not, is wearying to me and fucks up my thinking and writing. So I don't do it, but I think ND honestly tries to get at some of that stuff and that there might well be something in the effort that I am either too rooted or not rooted enough to fully appreciate. It's just a bar--let's have a drink.

Glad to see that Himes gives country its due; by my lights, Dierks Bentley is a classic case of a pretty good artist whose overall production-design is flawed. Kinda like a pretty good and perfectly good-looking but not spectacularly beautifuly actress who never quite gets lighted the right way on set. What I find interesting about Dierks' last 2 is the utter banality of the whole thing, when you set the sometimes kind of brilliant *conception* of the *sound, playing and production* itself against the, to my ears, deflating *sententiousness* of the sentiments themselves. In other words, the whole ramblin' thing makes me urp, and the point of those records is a) the fact he's got this unruly head of curls, no hat (and MG are significant not least because Eddie wears his big hat/duster and Troy doesn't, and that's the contrast, exactly what they try to do in their music, whereas Dierks is all No Hat) b) the one great trick Brett Beavers has come up with re DB--using this four-four kick-drum stomp to ground some really interesting guitar licks by the great J.T. Corenflos and the surgically applied banjo and the occasional really cool lick as in "That Don't Make It Easy Lovin' Me," which is I think the only great song on the record, just like "Lot of Leavin'" which it rewrites was the only great one on the last one. I find the 4/4 kick a bit intrusive after a while, altho on this one the drummer often does a kind of roll suggestive of some Civil War memory or some forgotten road memory or whatever, and that adds to the whole thing. And the songs are mostly non-songs, actually, and the one where Dierks imagines an egalitarian heaven with the usual post-hobo-sentimental cast of characters, is downright fulsome. Plus, as on "Modern Day Drift," the production itself is wrong, both these records sound like they were just digitally moved around and flattened out, they lack depth. Too compressed. And that's what I find mystifying about country music and some of the writing about it, why not talk about the record as artifice and get into why they sound the way they do? As on Jackson or as on MG, which sounds fucking great. I kind of wish they'd work on their harmonies a bit more, or do something with background voices that wasn't just using some gospel choir, which has become just as much empty signifier as mariachi horns in country music.

Anyway, Dierks just needs a new producer, and god forgive me, but he needs to record somewhere else than Nashville, perhaps. It's obvious that Brett Beavers (who cowrites nearly every song on the record w/ Dierks and one/two others) has created this sound that is supposed to go with a ramblin' persona, and it half-works. And that songs are written piecemeal and by committee to fit into that sound. I'll stop here: Dierks, to my mind, isn't all that interesting as a person or a "star," but the whole process by which he makes records is real interesting and indicative of what can be wrong with how they make records on Music Row these days. And that most of the records made around here sound fucking great.

xps

Oh, good, then I can snatch some time to listen to the Brooke Hogan instead (not a distinctive voice, but for r&b riffiness and catchiness she beats a lot of more distinctive singers, e.g. her producer's gf Janet Jackson).

(Haven't visited the PO in a couple of days; the package with the Mandrell trib arrived, as has the one with the Alan Jackson and the Cornerstone mixes. A couple of mix CDs are on their way to you.)

"Redder That That" - "Redder Than That"

Wasn't the MG album I sent in the same package as the Mandrell one? Weird. I only sent you two packages; should've been in one of those! Unless for some ridiculous reason I forgot to put in in the envelope.

Went back and listened to the MG album yesterday, after Don's and Frank's skepticism about it on this thread, and it's as great as I thought. Only song I could live without is "If You Wanna Keep An Angel," I think. I'll concede that there may not be a "Cold One Comin' On" on here, but who cares -- "Hey Country" (with that cool Stooges chord progression or whatever it is at the start! Though okay, the "lookit that cowboy hat" Alan Jackson reference gets on my nerves, though I think it's supposed to be a joke), "Lucky Man," "Takes All Kinds," "Your Tears Are Comin" (= "96 Tears"/"Who's Crying Now"), "Clouds" (which I didn't get, I admit, til everybody started loving it here), "Twenty Years On" (has any act ever sung better about not getting along with their dads? Probably, but these guys are way up there), "What Do Ya Think About That," "Redder Than That" (great high school reunion song, the "red" stuff is just extraneous gravy), "A Man's Job," and "Free Life in the Fast Lane" all kick my ass. The latter always makes me think of that South Park movie song about "Freedom Isn't Free" more than it makes me think of the Eagles, but damn does it rock -- what's really hitting me about this record is how southern-rock-*expansive* so much of its music sounds; they really sound like a *band* these days. Which I guess maybe they always did, but that doesn't mean I can't be surprised when it happens again (and maybe more). Also, the spoken word sections in I think "Free Ride In the Fast Lane" and especially "Twenty Years On" (I *think* those are the tracks they're in) blow me away every time. And these guys have never sounded as open-hearted and even *happy* as they do on this record (happy even if life does give them a pound of pain for every ounce of pleasure or whatever it is they say); they've never made as many jokes, and the jokes can be really funny! Anyway, the moral platitudes they spout (or remember their dads spouting, usually) are just one very small part of the mix. And nobody else in music now rocks with a comparable immediacy. In my book, it's still the album of the year.

And the MG record, I guess the whole thing works fine as "album" and as a canny reinterp of their *own* image. Still bad-ass but adding some backstory and their own songs which of course derive from all their hard-earned experience to the mix; and I kind of am nonplussed by the spoken-word shit except on "Hey Country" where the duo show a nice feel for the dumb-ass enthusiasm of southern stoners. But I mean they're pop pros (them, their producers, and their songwriters) and it's indeed post-Big & Rich in Nashville. They're one of the few big acts to even try to do the same thing, right? So in the end I think "Clouds" is pretty much a dog, "Redder Than That" is a great idea (right, the redneckery is just a red herring) but isn't quite there. I'm forever a skeptic about Nashville songwriting and a lot of this just seems *almost* real good but almost always too...banal, or something like that. But it's high-grade and you definitely have to enter their universe and all that. (I mean, hearing "Some People Change" on the radio around here, they're promoting the shit out of the record on radio, MG tailgate parties, Meet Us in Lexington, Kentucky, "rednecking and ready to have a good time," and you do get a sense of how ambitious they are, with that single, which I think ultimately gets over on that big chorus of Many Colors on the last "SOME PEOPLE CHANGE," and you think, that's what good about country music--the people.

I like sugarland almost as well--maybe it isn't quite as strong as the first record, but it's ingenious and I suppose "folk-rock" as opposed to british pop. many songs about small towns, one great one about how mean girls grow up into noxious bitches, and jennifer nettles' voice is huge, cutting and, to my ears, sometimes near panic. which is really their theme, panic at moving to the city or back to the small town, and they seem caught in between. but the music is bright and chewy and all that. I dunno, I give it a B+.

saw recently: john anderson sing "seminole wind" and "swingin'" with a band including steve cropper and a big horn section. amazing. he's a great singer, the real fucking thing. also saw t. graham brown, all jolly and round and with a beer in hand, prowling around the stage (this at the ryman--a tribute to cropper for charity) doing his r&b country stuff. great, as well. tanya tucker was there, mark farner did a great "closer to home/i'm your captain," and john kay did "sookie sookie," which cropper and don covay wrote. it was a great show, with james burton and cropper playing guitar and many other guests including delbert mcclinton. but robben ford stole the show: one of the greatest fucking displays of guitar savvy i have ever seen, just mind-blowing. I mean, james burton was standing there looking at robben ford and his face said, "i got to go home."

last night, a bunch of muscle shoals guys got together to back songwriter donnie fritts. fritts can't sing a lick but it was still great, he's got presence, and the musicians were just superb--david hood, spooner oldham, like that. fritts did his "damn good country song" he wrote for jerry lee, delbert mcclinton showed up again and they did a texas blues that killed. the two shows were like a history of country rubbing up against black/white soul in memphis/shoals/nashville.

and, rip, buddy killen. I was gonna say, time to pull out my joe tex stuff, but it's already out.

Wally, my cat, died yesterday, he got diagnosed with heart disease on monday and he went downhill from there, he'd been acting strangely for a few days and finally it got worrisome. he was only 7, and, you know, a great little guy I was attached to, had him since he was born.

That's a good band on Stereophonic Musical Listenings That Have Been Origin In Moving Film Borat; not clear to me how literal their ripoff/appropriations of Middle Eastern European (or whatever) pop are (for all I know it could just secretly be like one of those Sublime Frequencies albums where the music is all stolen from found cassette tapes) (the "credits" on the CD cover are in real or fake Kazakh, ha ha), but the actual music balances out "In My Country There Is a Problem (Throw The Jew Down The Well)" and "You Be My Wife" (rhymes with "we'll make love whenever I like") appropriately.

The guy in the Country Teasers sings as bad as Borat or Waylon, I've decided. His flatness reminded me of Mark E Smith on Full Moon Empty Sports Bag a couple years ago, but on The Empire Strikes Back: Race And Racism In 70s Britain (almost as good a subtitle as the Borat album!) the shtick's really starting to wear thin for me. If anybody wants to convince me otherwise, I'll listen.

"O Kazakhastan" on Borat's album is on now. It'd fit right in on the new Laibach album Volk, which is their renditions of national anthems from the world over. Maybe they read what Frank wrote about Rammstein making a folk move upthread, and decided to one-up them?

Now Dierks is claiming every mile is a memory. His road shtick could easily wear thin too. But probably not until next album, at least.

http://robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=silos

i took out the charley patton collection out of the library, and was kind of disappointed, ive listened to alot of country and blues from the 20s and 30s, well maybe not alot, but enough, and hes good, very good, but i dont know people like uncle dave macon, strike me as much better...

lw TW Artist Title TW lw Move
39 38 KEITH ANDERSON Podunk 513 427 86 2.836
66 ENNIS SISTERS Holding On 66 0 66 0.152
92 75 JOHN MELLENCAMP Our Country 21 15 6 0.274
87 79 BOB SEGER Wait For Me 25 22 3 0.308
72 80 POVERTYNECK HILLBILLIES Mr. Right Now 32 38 -6 0.239
116 101 BOB SEGER Real Mean Bottle (f/... 8 5 3 0.051
162 106 FABULOUS GUNSLINGERS She Rode The Bull 8 3 5 0.115
124 110 BOMSHEL Bomshel Stomp 15 14 1 0.087
117 SUGARLAND Mean Girls 5 0 5 0.160
146 122 NOMAD Meet Me At Midnight 6 4 2 0.080
109 126 MONTGOMERY GENTRY Hey Country 7 8 -1 0.090
128 SUGARLAND Sugarland 5 0 5 0.151
169 138 NO JUSTICE Bend But Don't Break 9 6 3 0.034
189 151 DANIELLE PECK Sucks To Be You 10 5 5 0.048
277 160 KAREN PECK & NEW RIVER Hold Me While I Cry 5 2 3 0.083
145 166 BILLY RAY CYRUS I Want My Mullet Bac... 5 6 -1 0.033
243 170 KENNY CHESNEY Please Come To Bosto... 5 2 3 0.044
176 171 SHOOTER JENNINGS Gone To Carolina 5 4 1 0.018
173 172 TYLER DEAN Built For Blue Jeans 5 5 0 0.032
149 174 JASON ALLEN Kickapoo Creek 5 5 0 0.019
224 183 LANTANA Country As A City Gi... 4 3 1 0.018
223 190 NO JUSTICE Red Dress 4 3 1 0.015
194 COODER GRAW Lifetime Stand 2 0 2 0.018
179 202 SPUR 503 Into You 5 5 0 0.023
168 207 GREAT DIVIDE Crazy In California 6 7 -1 0.024
209 LOST TRAILERS Gravy 3 0 3 0.023
306 219 BIG & RICH Jalapeno 2 1 1 0.010
222 JASON BROWN Touchdown 9 0 9 0.026
225 STONEY LARUE Down In Flames 1 0 1 0.016
240 RODNEY ATKINS Cleaning This Gun (C... 1 0 1 0.004
427 241 SONNY BURGESS A Little Bit Stronge... 3 1 2 0.012*
221 248 SHOOTER JENNINGS Some Rowdy Women 3 3 0 0.009
249 CLEDUS T. JUDD Bake Me A Country Ha... 2 0 2 0.014
227 250 RYAN SHUPE & THE RUBBERBAND Banjo Boy 2 2 0 0.004
260 DAN BERN Trudy 1 0 1 0.008
232 265 TRACE ADKINS Feels Like The First... 1 1 0 0.008
197 266 DOO-WAH RIDERS Dear Beer 4 6 -2 0.004
131 269 MONTGOMERY GENTRY Redder Than That 1 6 -5 0.004
105 270 MONTGOMERY GENTRY Takes All Kinds 1 9 -8 0.024
277 LITTLE BIG TOWN Bones 1 0 1 0.023
291 GRETCHEN WILSON Heaven Help Me 2 0 2 0.021
292 DR. ELMO Redneck Dracula 2 0 2 0.005
296 JIMMY BUFFETT Reggabilly Hill 1 0 1 0.029
304 POVERTYNECK HILLBILLIES One Night In New Orl... 1 0 1 0.008
311 GREENCARDS The Ghost Of Who We ... 1 0 1 0.007
402 324 ELEVEN HUNDRED SPRINGS Why You Been Gone So... 2 1 1 0.009
332 BAKER GIRLS My Kind Of Living 1 0 1 0.005
127 339 BLAINE LARSEN Baby Don't Get Hooke... 1 6 -5 0.005
344 SHOOTER JENNINGS Little White Lines 1 0 1 0.005
359 WELL HUNGARIANS Diamonds And Love 1 0 1 0.005
360 MIRANDA LAMBERT Crazy Ex-Girlfriend 1 0 1 0.004
362 WEIRD AL YANKOVIC White And Nerdy 1 0 1 0.003
213 380 COWBOY TROY Somebody's Smilin' O... 1 2 -1 0.002
388 BROOKLYN TABERNACLE CHOIR I'm Amazed 1 0 1 0.011
400 CHARLIE DANIELS BAND The Intimidator 2 0 2 0.005
403 BOMSHEL Power Of One 1 0 1 0.011
404 BOMSHEL Oh, Baby 1 0 1 0.011
407 MONTGOMERY GENTRY Git-R-Done 1 0 1 0.009
406 435 PEAR RATZ Just South Of The Nu... 1 1 0 0.004
298 447 MARK KNOPFLER/EMMYLOU HARRIS This Is Us 1 2 -1 0.001
256 451 HOGG MAULIES Goodnight 1 2 -1 0.004
178 452 DARREN KOZELSKY Messed Up In Love 1 3 -2 0.004
457 BE GOOD TANYAS When Doves Cry 1 0 1 0.001
461 WOODY HARRELSON/JOHN C. RILEY Whoop-I-Ti-Yi-Yo 1 0 1 0.003
467 CARRIE RODRIQUEZ 50's French Movie 1 0 1 0.001
468 SOLOMON BURKE You're The Kind Of T... 1 0 1 0.001
340 478 TODD SNIDER Looking For A Job 1 1 0 0.001
252 480 KASEY CHAMBERS Nothing At All 1 1 0 0.001

Best new band names: Nomad, Cooder Graw, Doo-Wah Riders, Greencards, Dr. Elmo, Well Hungarians, Pear Ratz, and Darren Kozelsky if and only if his song has a polka rhythm.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061104/ap_on_bi_ge/hispanics_country_music

"I do think a huge portion of the Latin American population loves the same themes: meetin', greetin', cheatin' and retreatin,'" said Eddie Wright-Rios, a Vanderbilt University professor who specializes in the cultural history of modern Mexico.

Where to begin? And the Jeff Walker quote about tapping into the market...No hay negocio como el show.

The power of Latin Country music is that it reaches all people regardless of race, language or ethnicity. The U.S. Hispanic Country Music Association is devoted to uniting Country music artists, musicians, songwriters and fans for the purpose of celebrating Country music in its authentic and universal form – whether in English, Spanish or a fusion of both languages. Together, Latin Country music is the bridge that unites Country music enthusiasts everywhere while acknowledging and appreciating the beautiful and rich Latin cultural influence in Country music.


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kinda really liking the new darryl worley, which starts off with a great kiss-off to his old label and the n-ville establishment, and ends with one of the better iraq-war songs by any country artist, "I just came back from a war," which strikes me as very no-bullshit and real. I guess he does for blooze-country what dierks b. does for meta-grass outlawisms. I need another listen but so far, so really good.

haven't heard the womack yet.

great old stuff: ray price's "night life" and "marty [robbins] after midnight." got 'em burned on one CD, and enjoying them mightily, just smooth as hell, I mean marty does great by shit like "september in the rain" and ray seems to know plenty about "bright lights and blonde haired women." just the kind of thing I need right now.

and the stereo mixes of gene clark's one truly great and essential record, "with the gosdin brothers."

finally, anyone else know the beau brummels' '69 recorded-in-nashville "bradley's barn"? a fine record that really brings san francisco into mt. juliet, actually, and full of unexpected touches. very even-handed, a good version of the everly brothers song "turn around." a real lost moment of a real gone era, and just impeccable sound.