Rolling Country 2013

Oh, the mechanical bull is actually a mechanical sheep, unless it's a bull in sheep's clothing.

Do mechanical sheep dream of the beautiful shepherdess, who plays the gatta, bagpipe of her native Galicia?
http://www.npr.org/2013/01/19/169639816/a-bagpipe-slinging-spaniard-finds-a-home-in-new-york-jazz

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/01/17/cristianapato_nimg_7966_wide-d8e27c2404aa3f64c66a0b70d6bd05135e637a8f-s4.jpg

Musically and video-wise, "24/7" is pretty agreeable, but not hardly country at all. A long article about K-pop may still be on the New Yorker site--I'm tempted to call it in-depth, but don't know if anybody who knew anything about the subject would agree.

New York City has a country station for the first time in 17 years:
http://www.nashfm947.com/about/

awright! Sounds good, thanks.

Jewly Hight on Gary Allan in Nashville Scene. Make sure to read the comments on Jewly's comparison of Allan to Neil Young.

who plays the gatta, bagpipe of her native Galicia.
It's spelled gaita, Don. .

(Knew something seemed familiar about the boom-claps in "24/7." Subdee points out that there's more than a passing resemblance to Hannah Montana's "Hoedown Throwdown" -- though boom-clap aficionados will notice that, while Hannah goes "Boom boom clap, boom de-clap de-clap," 2YOON go "Boom clap, boom-b-boom clap." Think 2YOON provide more juice overall.)

That Nash FM website is a catastrophe.

How so? I'm listening to it now, still sounds OK (clear sound, typical contemporary country programming, minus OD of commercials on my local stations)

So anybody heard the new Allan? Hight's passing descriptors seem promising.

the station might be great (can't listen, i'm in the UK) but radio stations really need to have more than an "about" page on their web site! like.... what are they playing now? what shows do they have? what's their schedule? anything exciting coming up? etc

I've got a review of the new Allan coming out in Rolling Stone -- I like it a lot, think it's his best in years, though its first half beats its second half. (Wrote up the new Tim McGraw, which I like less, there too.)

Liking the new Ashley Monroe even more than the Allan. And I just got an email saying Kacey Musgraves' album is out March 19.

yeah Tracer they could use info on the web page; maybe it's coming--hopefully with an app to make it more playable for far-flung hopefuls--but what is this deal with US vs UK listening on the Web--like I can't listen to some BBC stuff; related legal issues?

very hopeful about Ashley and Gary; skeptical vs. hopeful about Musgraves (see my above re "Merry Go Round" vs. "Undermine")

Marco Club Connection Names Top Ten Country Dance Club Hits for 2012
(Nashville, Tenn. – Jan. 7, 2013) Little Big Town and Eric Church topped the list of dance club hits in 2012, according to the Marco Club Connection’s 9th annual ranking of Country dance favorites.

Every December, the Nashville-based company surveys a panel of nearly 250 club owners, DJs and dance instructors from across the country to compile its rankings. Overall votes by the panel determine each song’s placement on the list.

Bobbe Morhiser, Manager of Venue Marketing, states “This year's top ten contains a number of young, fresh talent. I'm proud to see new music impacting the club and dance community so quickly. We also saw a few ballads in the top ten, which is a switch from the surge of remixes seen in previous years. Proving that a great song will thrive in a high energy dance setting just as well as a dance remix.”

The Top 10 listing for 2012 is as follows:

Little Big Town – “Pontoon”
Eric Church – “Springsteen”
Kip Moore – “Somethin’ ‘Bout A Truck”
Luke Bryan – “Drunk On You”
Easton Corbin – “Lovin’ You Is Fun”
Dustin Lynch – “Cowboys And Angels”
Parmalee – “Musta Had A Good Time”
Toby Keith – “Beers Ago”
Florida Georgia Line – “Cruise”
Carrie Underwood – “Blown Away”
Morhiser added, “There was a positive trend in this year’s voting. New artists Rachele Lynae, The Lacs, and Levi Riggs were all well represented in the voting, illustrating openness among the dance community to new and compelling music, whether it be from a major label, or an independent.” A complete archive of Club Connection’s Top 10 Country Dance Club Hits by year can be viewed at http:www.MarcoClubConnection.com.

About Marco Club Connection: A division of Nashville-based secondary radio promotion company, Marco Promotions and The Aristo Media Group, Club Connection specializes in marketing dance club singles to nightclubs and dance venues across the country. Club Connection maintains a national database of more than 240 venues and world-renowned dance instructor contacts, reaching more than 200,000 club patrons each weekend. For more information, visit: www.MarcoClubConnection.com.

sorry, it's http://www.MarcoClubConnection.com

They're educational on the floor too! http://www.marcoclubconnection.com/dance-steps/

Okay, those of you dismayed by my incompetent exercise in "boom clap" genealogy will be relieved to know that 2YOON were likely copying their "boom clap, boom-b-boom clap" not from Miley, who did a different boom clap, but from other people, such as m-flo, who did the same boom clap, boom-b-boom clap ("Miss You") - and m-flo may have been copying a previous boom clap, boom-b-boom clap. Of course, boom claps go way back (here's Crooked I from the mid '00s, but he's not doing the specific boom clap, boom-b-boom clap in question); for all I know the first boom clap appeared the year after the invention of the timpani, which is 18th century or earlier, says Wikip. Someone here who actually knows something about hip-hop or country might want to enlighten me.

I apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

This looks interesting--I'll have to pull out the copy of Diana Trask's Miss Country Soul I bought years ago for 99 cents:

"Various Artists - Country Soul Sisters CD/2xLP (Soul Jazz)
A celebration of feminism in country music. Country Soul Sisters charts the rise of female singers in country music from 1952 to 1978. As well as country legends Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Tanya Tucker and Tammy Wynette, Country Soul Sisters also features artists such as Bobbie Gentry, Nancy Sinatra - who also made country music but existed outside the traditional Nashville framework. Also highlighted are country soul music protagonists such as Jeannie C Riley, Diana Trask and Barbara Mandrell. Far from the traditional conservative image of country music this album features songs whose lyrics deal with female empowerment and subjects that include child prostitution, abortion, death and angels, workplace sexual exploitation, small town bigotry and more. Includes 68-page book with extensive sleevenotes, photos, etc."

"Miss Country Soul" is pretty good, by my reckoning, but "Diana's Country" is better: I love the version of "The Choking Kind" on that record.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FE0hAdRm8JM

The Soul Jazz comp is really a primer on female country singers from Kitty Wells' "It Wasn't God Who Made" (included) along with Trask, Jody Miller...and the concept of "country soul" is dubious at best. There are a couple of Wynette LPs from the '70s that are a bit more "soul"-influenced. Norma Jean doing Swamp Dogg's "She's All I Got" is interesting. "California Cottonfields" is just a plain old country standard. I recently saw a Del Reeves or Wilburn Bros. show re-run on the RFD Channel, and a forgotten female singer in go-go boots was doing Tony Joe White's "Willie and Laurie Mae Jones," which was a kind of country-soul signifier back then, since it's about a white sharecropping family and a black family, and not a tale of Togetherness at all. I can only imagine Kitty Wells singing "Delta Dawn."

Dolly Parton — Don't Let It Trouble Your Mind
2. Lynn Anderson — Fancy
3. Jeannie C. Riley — I've Done A Lot Of Living Since Then
4. Bobbie Gentry — Reunion
5. Tammy Wynette — Tonight My Baby's Coming Home
6. Jean Shepard — A Satisfied Mind
7. Nancy Sinatra — Get While The Gettin's Good
8. Tanya Tucker — California Cotton Fields
9. Sammi Smith — Saunders Ferry Lane
10. Connie Smith — If It Ain't Love
11. Jean Shepard — Two Whoops And A Holler
12. Billie Jo Spears — Mr. Walker, It's All Over
13. Patsy Cline — Ain't No Wheels On This Ship
14. Barbara Fairchild — Color My World
15. Loretta Lynn and Conway Twitty — You're The Reason Our Kids Are Ugly
16. Jeannie C. Riley — Harper Valley PTA
17. Jody Miller — A Woman Left Lonely
18. Kitty Wells — Delta Dawn
19. Diana Trask — Show Me
20. Norma Jean — He's All I've Got
21. Bobbie Gentry — Ode To Billie Joe
22. Bonnie Guitar — Tender Words
23. Barbara Mandrell — Husband Stealer
24. Diana Trask — I'll Never Do You Wrong
25. Kitty Wells — It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels

Chris Willman on C&W and the NRA

http://popdust.com/2013/01/29/sandy-hook-does-country-music-have-a-gun-problem/

Country soul: I'd add "Son of a Preacher Man" and prob other Dusty; Freda Payne's "Band of Gold", Aretha's "With Pen in Hand", "The Weight", prob others by her (didn't she contribute to Rhythm & Country & Blues & Western? May not be exact title). Several, if not all from Stacy Fairchild's first album. Gladys Knight's "Rainy Night In Georgia." If incl guys, Al Green's "Together Again" and "For The Good Times", OC Smith's "Son of Hickory Holler's Tramp"--well yall can guess the rest (seems like guys did most of the more obvious choices)

rather not get into gun control here; I did way much on ILE

Yes he is raggedy, but right (also Left) often enough to suit me:
JANUARY 30th, 2013 - New York, New York - Steve Earle is set to release his new album The Low Highway on April 16th via New West Records. The 12-track set is the anticipated follow up to 2011's Grammy Award-nominated album I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive and is the first billed as "Steve Earle & The Dukes (And Duchesses)." The album is also the first to feature "The Dukes" band name since 1987's Exit 0. The Low Highway features his live band consisting of Chris Masterson, Eleanor Whitmore, Kelley Looney, Will Rigby and Allison Moorer and was co-produced by Earle and Ray Kennedy (whose production partnership known as the "Twangtrust" was behind Lucinda Williams' Car Wheels on a Gravel Road). The Low Highway is Earle's 15th studio album since the release of his highly influential 1986 debut Guitar Town. It will be available as a single compact disc, deluxe CD/DVD set, digitally, as well as 180 gram vinyl. The album track "Calico County" from The Low Highway is streaming now at RollingStone.com.

Between the opening title track and the reflective closing of "Remember Me," The Low Highway is very much Steve Earle's road record, and one that has seen many miles. Earle states in the album liner notes, "I've been on every interstate highway in the lower forty-eight states by now and I never get tired of the view. I've seen a pretty good chunk of the world and my well-worn passport is one of my most prized possessions, but for me, there's still nothing like the first night of a North American tour; everybody, band and crew, crowded up in the front lounge, eating Nashville hot chicken and Betty Herbert's homemade pimento cheese, swapping the same tired old war stories half shouted over the rattle and hum of the highway. And I'm always the last one to holler good night to Charlie Quick, the driver, and climb in my bunk because to me it feels like Christmas Eve long ago when I still believed in Santa Claus. God I love this."

The Low Highway also features "Love's Gonna Blow My Way" and "After Mardi Gras," two songs Earle co-wrote with Lucia Micarelli, his co-star in David Simon's original HBO Series Treme. Earle played a recurring character, Harley, a street musician who mentored Micarelli's character Annie during the first two seasons. The songs were written specifically for the series and an additional song written by Earle for Treme, "That All You Got?" was performed by Micarelli's character with the Red Stick Ramblers during the third season premiere. All three songs are included on the new album and appear in recorded form for the first time here. Earle's previous composition written for the series, "This City," garnered both Grammy and Emmy Award nominations in 2010.

On February 19th, Steve Earle will release via his own E-Squared Records label, a limited edition 7 inch of the album tracks "Burnin' It Down" and "That All You Got?" in support of Independent Music Stores. The record is available on red vinyl and is a limited edition pressing of 1,000. Each cover has been hand-signed by Steve Earle and is hand-numbered.

In addition to the release of The Low Highway, Steve Earle also signed a two-book deal with Twelve, an imprint of Grand Central Publishing/Hachette Book Group last year. The first will be a memoir and the second a novel. Earle's memoir, the book he swore he would never write, will be a literary work in three acts. The first section will focus on meeting Townes Van Zandt and the complicated friendship and music mentorship that ensued, taking place in Texas and Tennessee. The second section will center on bottoming out in Nashville, culminating in a prison sentence, during which Steve got clean. The heart of the third and final section will be recovery, starting around the recording of the masterful album, Train A Comin'. The novel is a work of historical fiction and will tell the story of a runaway slave who survived the battle of the Alamo. Earle previously released a collection of short stories, "Doghouse Roses (2002, Harper Collins) and his critically acclaimed debut novel, I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive (2011, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt). Of the novel, Patti Smith stated "Steve Earle brings to his prose the same authenticity, poetic spirit and cinematic energy he projects in his music. I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive is like a dream you can't shake, offering beauty and remorse, redemption in spades."

A protégé of legendary songwriters Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark, Earle quickly became a master storyteller in his own right, with his songs being recorded by Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris, Waylon Jennings, Travis Tritt, The Pretenders, Joan Baez and countless others. 1986 saw the release of his debut record, Guitar Town, which shot to number one on the country charts and immediately established the term "New Country." What followed was an extremely exciting and varied array of releases including the biting hard rock of Copperhead Road (1988), the minimalist beauty of Train A Comin' (1995), as well as the politically charged masterpiece, Jerusalem (2002) and the Grammy Award Winning albums The Revolution Starts...Now (2004), Washington Square Serenade (2007), and Townes (2009). His previous album, I'll Never Get Out Of This World Alive (2011) was also Grammy Award nominated.

The Low Highway Track Listing:

1.The Low Highway

2. Calico County

3. Burnin' It Down

4. That All You Got?

5. Love's Gonna Blow My Way

6. After Mardi Gras

7. Pocket Full Of Rain

8. Invisible

9. Warren Hellman's Banjo

10. Down The Road Pt. II

11. 21st Century Blues

12. Remember Me

There's an LP House Of Joy from The King Cake Band that from the sample clips on Amazon sounds quite good; a blues and country band, more or less. Singer and lead guitarist is Mike Bloomer, whom I knew a bit in high school (he was younger, went to nearby Parish Hill when I was at E.O. Smith, then went to E.O. Smith after I graduated). Then as now he was a good, no-bullshit guitar player. I like what I think of as the clarity of his singing, though I'm not sure what I mean by the word "clarity."
Good, direct guitar playing (though I'm not sure what I mean by the word "direct," either: has bite, doesn't kill you with sustain, but uses enough for a sense of emotion). If you search YouTube for "King Cake Band" you'll find a number of live clips, several of which are collected at the tubeguru2000 site. They sometimes use two drummer/percussionists.

The country guest shots on this should be okay....and I wanna hear any track feat. Allan Toussaint.
JOHN FOGERTY’S NEW RELEASE
WROTE A SONG FOR EVERYONE
AVAILABLE MAY 28th
ON VANGUARD RECORDS

FOGERTY’S NEW RECORDING OF HIS CLASSIC
“BORN ON THE BAYOU” WITH KID ROCK
WAS USED IN NFL NETWORK’S COVERAGE OF
SUPER BOWL XLVII

ALBUM AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER NOW
ON ITUNES AND AMAZON!

JOHN FOGERTY’S much-anticipated album WROTE A SONG FOR EVERYONE will be released May 28th on Vanguard Records, his first for the label. Beginning today (February 4), the album is available for pre-order in both the iTunes and Amazon stores. One of the album’s highlights--FOGERTY’s immortal swamp rock smash hit “Born On The Bayou” which the legendary rocker has recorded with Kid Rock—was used by NFL Network in their coverage of Super Bowl XLVII fittingly played in New Orleans.

Wrote a Song for Everyone tracklisting:

1. Fortunate Son (with Foo Fighters)
2. Almost Saturday Night (with Keith Urban)
3. Lodi (with Shane Fogerty and Tyler Fogerty)
4. Mystic Highway (John Fogerty solo)
5. Wrote a Song for Everyone (with Miranda Lambert feat. Tom Morello)
6. Bad Moon Rising (with Zac Brown Band)
7. Long As I Can See the Light (with My Morning Jacket)
8. Born on the Bayou (with Kid Rock)
9. Train of Fools (John Fogerty solo)
10. Someday Never Comes (with Dawes)
11. Who'll Stop the Rain (with Bob Seger)
12. Hot Rod Heart (with Brad Paisley)
13. Have You Ever Seen the Rain (with Alan Jackson)
14. Proud Mary (with Jennifer Hudson feat. Allen Toussaint and the Rebirth Brass Band)

Produced by FOGERTY, one of rock’s most important artists and a national treasure who’s sold over 100 million records, WROTE A SONG FOR EVERYONE is a celebration of his iconic songbook and a collection of 12 classics and deep tracks from his remarkable canon of hits as well as two brand new songs, “Mystic Highway” and “Train of Fools.” [yadda yadda]...As FOGERTY explains in a cover story in the current (January/February) “Legends” issue of American Songwriter: “I encouraged each of these artists to come up with their own vision of my song, rather than just redoing what I’d recorded in the past. I was hoping they’d have some different twist so it would be fresh, so I’d have to work, too. I wanted it to be something new.”

WROTE A SONG FOR EVERYONE marks FOGERTY's ninth studio solo album since disbanding Creedence Clearwater Revival. Mixed by Bob Clearmountain, it was recorded in Los Angeles and Nashville except for "Proud Mary" which was recorded in New Orleans with AllenToussaint and the Rebirth Brass Band... FOGERTY has performed with the Sound City Players, the all-star band assembled by Dave Grohl to play the music created for the film and other classics, at recent shows at both the Sundance Film Festival and the Hollywood Palladium.

JOHN FOGERTY will tour in 2013 and look for him to be at this year’s SXSW in Austin (dates/events TBA).

More interested in this:
Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell's Old Yellow Moon Out 2/36, Confirm Tour Dates with Richard Thompson Electric Trio
Richard Thompson's Electric Out 2/5
Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell will embark on series of tour dates this March with co-headliner Richard Thompson. The tour is in celebration of the duo’s new collaborative album,Old Yellow Moon, out February 26, 2013, on Nonesuch Records.

Old Yellow Moon is a duets album featuring four songs written by Crowell as well as interpretations of eight songs including Hank DeVito’s “Hanging Up My Heart,” Roger Miller’s “Invitation to the Blues,” and Allen Reynolds’ “Dreaming My Dreams,” among others. The album may be pre-ordered now on iTunes and in the Nonesuch Store, where orders include a limited-edition autographed print of the artists along with an instant download of “Hanging Up My Heart.” Richard Thompson's new album, Electric, produced by Buddy Miller, will be released February 5 on New West Records.

Harris is a 12-time Grammy winner and Billboard Century Award recipient whose contribution as a singer and songwriter spans 40 years. She has recorded more than 25 albums and has lent her talents to countless fellow artists’ recordings. In recognition of her remarkable career, Harris was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2008. Old Yellow Moon is the follow up to her’ acclaimed 2011 release, Hard Bargain, which debuted in the top 20 on the Billboard 200 chart. Associated Press called it “gorgeous” and said Harris’ “silvery soprano is in fine form,” while USA Today called it “exquisite ... her unmistakable soprano, at once grainy and ethereal, still wraps itself around a lyric with an angel’s delicate warmth.”

Crowell is a multi-Grammy-award winner whose songs have been recorded by Johnny Cash, Norah Jones, Etta James, and Grateful Dead among others. His 1988 breakthrough Diamonds and Dirt generated five #1 singles and a Grammy Award for the song “After All This Time.” His critically acclaimed works The Houston Kid, Fate’s Right Hand, The Outsider, and Sex and Gasoline were followed by the 2010 release of his memoir, Chinaberry Sidewalks. Last year, Crowell released KIN: Songs By Mary Karr and Rodney Crowell. The album made its debut at #1 on the Americana and Country Rock album chart and spent 3 weeks at #1 on the Americana album chart. His honors also include an ASCAP Lifetime Achievement Award and membership of the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Richard Thompson, a recipient of BBC’s Lifetime Achievement Award and Mojo’s Les Paul Award, was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the Queen of England’s 2011 New Year Honours List. He was also recently honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriting by the Americana Music Association. Thompson’s songs have been recorded by Robert Plant, REM, Elvis Costello, Bonnie Raitt, and many others.

Also, here's their new version of "Hangin' Up My Heart": tight, fast, rueful, resolved nice steel guitar (YouTube sound, but not too bad)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-NEjg2eL8SQ&feature=player_embedded#

Dow, I saw Emmylou and Crowell at last week's tribute to Jack Clement.

Here's my shortie on pretty good Fleetwood Mac-and-cheese country trio Blue Sky Riders. Featuring the country-rock pioneer Kenny Loggins.

rat nice---hope the Clement concert will be an album, or a something (must check YouTube; ditto for Blue Sky Riders). Thanks!

Thanks for posting that, dow - turns out I'll be holidaying in Chicago when that show comes through, so I'll be able to go along. Although I'd been vaguely checking listings for Chicago venues I know, it hadn't occurred to me to see what was going on at the Symphony Hall. I can be Snooty McRootsy for the evening. Good news!

13. Have You Ever Seen the Rain (with Alan Jackson)

would listen

Yeah! Also, Bottom of the World is Terry Allen's new album, after 14 years. Anybody heard it? The most info I've found is here:
http://www.houstonchronicle.com/life/article/Terry-Allen-s-on-top-with-Bottom-4203310.php Has some pix of his art too.

http://ww2.hdnux.com/photos/17/33/72/4046521/3/premium_article_portrait.jpg

Listening now to a live set, archived on KUTX. So far, so good: spare, quiet (Lloyd Maines and a few others backing Allen's keys); no drums, but good rhythm http://kutx.org/musicarchive/terry-allen-at-kutx-1-18-2013-11am

Finally posted about Neil Young's Americana over on my livejournal, along with thoughts about "Hey Joe" and Niela Miller, whom we discussed a little bit back on Rolling Country 2009.

Van Ronk's version of "Mean World Blues" has been floating on my headbox since the early 70s; so glad Neila's acetate finally came out as an LP/download on Numero, though I still don't have it--have heard her pre-"Hey Joe", which has its own appeal. Young has said he heard Rose's versions of "Hey Joe" and others when Rose came though Canada with the Thorns, a drumless but apparently sufficiently folk-rocking combo, as Young remembers hearing them in the early-ish 60s. But how does Shocking Blue pertain?

Sorry, Niela not Neila.

what do we think of Lady A's "Downtown." Their best single since "Need You Now"?

Don, Tim Rose is the connection to both "Hey Joe" and "Venus," and the two songs have parallel compositional stories. (If that's what you're asking, why I wrote about both in the same blogpost. If you're asking whether Shocking Blue had a role in Neil's decision to use "The Banjo Song" as the basis of his version of "Oh! Susannah," I have no idea.) No need to repeat here what I wrote there.

(And I'd rather people read the way I unfold the story on my lj than have it all diagrammed and explained for them here, which would spoilerate it further.)

I just now re-read your post, once again got how Tim Rose relates to "Hey Joe" and "Susannah", but once again don't see anything about him doing "Venus", but once again infer that you mean he did that before they did, or did something they based it on/ripped off. So basically we're somewhere on the same page. Anybody heard the new Ashley Monroe? Really wondering about that, esp. w title like "Weed For Roses" and "Monroe Suede."

Ah, finally spotted melody's resemblance to this beloved (by me) mid '80s MTV hit meaning Bananarama's cover of Shocking Blue's "Venus", which you explicity say, not just imply, sounds to you like Young's Rose-derived "Oh Susannah." So I should've done more than infer your point.

I still need to read Frank's Neil/Niela/"Hey Joe"/"Venus" thing. I turned Flash off on my Firefox browser, where I've got the livejournal blog bookmarked, and keep forgetting to check it out when I'm using Google Chrome.

Meanwhile, here are 1000+ words I wrote about Mindy McCready yesterday:

http://www.spin.com/articles/mindy-mccready-dead-37-suicide-remembrance

And yes, as I say somewhere above, I have heard the Ashley Monroe album, and I really like it a lot. That and the Kacey Musgraves are probably my two favorite albums of 2013 so far. Actually more surprised, though, by how much I've been liking the new Mavericks album, which is one of the most beautifully sung country albums (or really, any albums) in recent memory. Rhythms are Latin-derived throughout; vocal melisma moves from Latin to, eventually, completely over-the-top Middle Eastern, in an eight (!)-minute long song near album's end. Weird thing is, these guys have never really hit me before -- I've got a greatest hits CD from 1999 which I've always liked but never really loved. So I don't know whether I've just missed the boat in the past, or whether sounding this adventurous is a new thing for them, which they're permitted to do now that their big country-hitmaking years are now in the distant past. (Though it looks like "Born To Be Blue," the first single from the new album, has actually gotten to #46 country, their highest chart placement since 1999.)

Yeah I knew you mentioned the Monroe, was curious about details; will def have to check Gary Allan and even Mavericks, whose very late-blooming is most unexpected and kind of inspiring. This is on McCready is the kind of perspective the music rarely gets in such circumstances. I need to check more of her stuff. For those of us who don't want to have to sign into Spotify via Fecebook, here's a couple of original albums and several collections: http://www.myspace.com/officialmindymccready/music/albums

Should've said perspective incl foregrounding of the music is what we rarely get in such circumstances.

Jason Waldrop, a friend of mine from college, reviews AKA DOC POMUS for Blue Railroad.

I wouldn't call Pomus's work "country," but this thread seemed the best place for the link. And Elvis's Pomus/Shuman-penned "Little Sister" is the sort of rockabilly that's now in the DNA of country.

Jason works the lucky card/return the favor trope well, builds it as he goes, it clicking in strong when Dion shows up (which I won't spoilerate for you).

First I've heard of Blue Railroad; it looks good, has impressive interviewees (Paul Simon, James Taylor, Lieber & Stoller, Chrissie Hynde, Billie Joe Armstrong)(not that I know if those artists are impressively interesting while being interviewed).

getting that Mavericks album now

Paul Zollo of Blue Railroad is the best interviewer of songwriters that I've ever read. It probably helps that he's a fine songwriter as well.