Rolling Country 2006 Thread

Another bet on Womack to win the country poll; voters just visiting country from a rock place and some pure ND sorts (whatever THAT sort would be) vote out of proportion to those who actually follow country closely, in all polls. When somehting scores on both sides of that fence, as Lee Ann's CD does--put your money there. Gary Allan will do well for similar reasons. (I happen to find both albums very deserving, so no arguments here.)

As for the basis of the riff on Lambert's "Kerosene"; you don't have to look further back than Steve Earle's "I Feel Alright "...But she uses it well!

2 1 DIERKS BENTLEY Come A Little Closer 97 93 4 0.8681
1 2 JACK INGRAM Wherever You Are 96 98 -2 0.8678
3 3 CARRIE UNDERWOOD Jesus, Take The Wheel 96 91 5 0.8639
4 4 BILLY CURRINGTON Must Be Doin' Somethin' Right 50 49 1 0.4497
5 5 TOBY KEITH Get Drunk And Be Somebody 48 48 0 0.4289
7 6 RASCAL FLATTS What Hurts The Most 47 42 5 0.4283
6 7 GEORGE STRAIT She Let Herself Go 47 45 2 0.4292
15 8 BON JOVI Who Says You Can't Go Home 33 28 5 0.2968
8 9 LITTLE BIG TOWN Boondocks 32 34 -2 0.2741
9 10 TRENT TOMLINSON Drunker Than Me

That would be me, but I'm actually fairly tepid about the Womack. (And I'm also coming from a disco place, since disco rocks harder than rock; also from a hip-hop place, 'cause hip-hop rocks harder than rock; and a teenpop place, which rocks harder than rock. I guess country rocks harder than rock, too.)

Yes, I'm definitely coming from a rock place (though as a wee-un I was coming from a folk place; that's 'cause in 1963, folk rocked harder than rock).

Such statements always frighten me, as I foresee this follow-up: "OK. Got the Bare. Will never use you as a basis for album purchases in the future."

You used to love her, but it's all over now?

Xgau told me he thought Lee Ann's album was bland; he'd been a fan of "Dance," I think, however. Has he ever liked her otherwise? I think he's also felt both Lee Ann and Deana Carter are overrated, in general. I don't want to put words in his mouth, though.

Am I the only person, by the way, who has trouble thinking of Lee Ann's album as a "roots" move, or whatever people call it? It sounds so pop; I'm not sure she's had a catchier album. Though yeah, obviously, there are throwback string sounds in the production etc. It doesn't *feel* like a throwback album to me, either way. More importantly, though, critics were sent the vinyl version -- So it definitely *looks* like a throwback album to them, if nothing else.

----

Oh wait, here goes:

http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=lee+ann+womack

http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=deana+carter

and yeah, Frank, I thought your Bare/Watson piece was dead-on, at least you seem to be in agreement with me re Bare's voice and the general winding-down aspect of "Moon Was." anyway, I give Mark Nevers a lot of credit for that record--he also worked on Silver Jews' "Tanglewood Numbers," altho apparently he and Berman had a disagreement and Berman took the project away from Nevers in the final mixing stages or something. I had always really disliked Silver Jews but damned if I don't like the new one, even voted for it this year. But as with Bare, not so much the songs--altho Bare's Shel Silverstein take is fine, probably the best thing on the record--as the overall sound of it, is what I like about Berman's record. which isn't something I wanna listen to all the time, too painful somehow, but I sure admire it in spite of myself, and I feel the same way about Bare to a much lesser extent.

xps

Clever and expensive move. I didn't get the vinyl. Can I have yours?

My favorite thing on the Bare is "Everybody's Talkin"--it's not as good as the original, but not much is. Something in the thick vocal dissipation merges so well with the lyrics and melody. When he hits the chorus, the cumulative effect is impossible, unreal.

Hell no, it is beeyootiful!

It's r&b, a lot of it. (But yeah, sure, an old r&b, maybe.) (See also the 100 times I've compared the big hit to "Little Green Apples.") (Which anyway wasn't the kind of country that most neo-trad types embraced, was it? Since when is '70s pop-country considered trad?)

I am probably overstating her soul influence, but what the hell. (More likely, she's inspired by '70s c&w that was aware of r&b then.)

Mike Ireland is a pretty trad-oriented singer/songwriter who really embraces, even obsesses over, elements of '60s-'70s country-pop, and basically approaches them as synecdoches of country tradition, especially the Sherrillian strings.

I think when you nail countrypolitan the way Lee Ann does on the new record, it's a trad move, just not a typical one.

and gosh, soul influences all over the place in '70s and '80s country. even more recent songs like George Jones' "I'll Give You Something to Drink About" show it (I just saw this great clip from some kind of George Jones show that aired in the '90s with him doing this song) like they internalized the bass and drums from Hi Records and added some south-of-border flavor to it all. for that matter, Charlie Rich's Hi/Willie Mitchell sessions are pretty amazing, Hank Williams tunes.

I'm wondering about Lee Roy Parnell, too, now that I've heard his new one (never heard him before; did he have country hits at one point?)

People seem to use "trad country" to mean pre-80s now, a "break" not far from the time, actually, you get the supposedly defining rock/Modern rock break too. Of course, the country sounds of the sixties and seventies were considered by moldy fig types either urbanized sell-outs or bland mistakes then themselves. Even as honky tonk was rejected by lovers of "tradititonal" Acuff and earlier country as too urban, too willing to talk about nasty subjects, and a sell-out when IT came along.

The Womack record largely revives pre-80s sounds. Like Garth never happened. Her music, from the first, referenced and sometimes incorporated honky tonk sounds out of Texas, and much pre-80s twang production and approach, on the ballads especially, I'd say off hand. . The album before this one was simply considered a pop step too far by a lot of people--and that they attenpted to remake LeeAnn's image at the same timemade things worse.

And of course, country music is now and always has been pop music.

This year's record (which for my money, has a very high percentage of strong songs on it), string writing) was a return to the commitment to work in her OWN tradition, essentially. I saw her with a small, tasteful band preview the whole LP live at the Ryman, and the renewed seriousness of COUNTRY intent was unmistakable--at a musical base a lot more sreious than say, Faith Hill scurrying back to get her a "Look; I didn't go Hollywood; I'm just a Mississippi Girl at Heart" shuck. (Womack later did a similar live show on cable--CMT I think.)

At her best monents, I think she's a good a country ballad singer as this generation has; but then, I think Gretchen Wilson is working her way to a strong second in that regard.

No argumento, meanhwile, that the Bobby Bare rceord is generally wonderfu--and lives in a perfect spot between his music and his son's.

(I found this board because Roy Katsen says nice things about it, BTW.And apologize for any of my notorious fast-typing web typos left uncorrected--in advance.)

Faith Hill's most soul music moment is "One" (one of my favorite country singles of the decade.) I kind of hated "Mississippi Girl" until George Smith explained it's basically boogie-rock at heart.

And by the way, welcome, Barry! You should check out that '05 thread, too (and the '04 one, and the No Depression one, and many many more.)

Barry gives the best typos on the planet!

Plus I did not mean
that Earth Wind and Fire was the
soul ne plus ultra

It was just the truth!
And I hear rock but no soul
in Toby Keith's voice

Gary Allan, sure,
many others. (Plus Jessi
Alexander, wow!)

When I reviewed Toby I said that that in a better world "That's Not How It Is" would get play on the Urban AC stations. The song seems to split the difference between Isaac Hayes and Robert Cray. It's more an '80s sound than a '70s (though of course Hayes goes back farther than that).

Black-gospel-based r&b-pop not unlike Whitney, Mariah, Toni (which certainly is soul-related and certainly draws on Ray Charles), but actually I hear something countrypolitan in the tone, though I can't put my finger on it, just as there's something countrypolitan in Celine Dion's tone, though whatever it is it was probably derided as one of the things that made countrypolitan "not country."

To confuse matters, I'll point out that "One" has reggaeish touches in the rhythm.

And to confuse matters more, I think that the Whitney-Mariah-Celine-Faith (though not necessarily Toni) thing draws on Streisand and Garland as well as on Charles, not in the sense that some people find Streisand and Garland camp but rather in S-G's showbiz reaching-for-the-sky moments. Welding Charles and Streisand is intriguing to me since you have Charles' deliberately rough and "sincere" melisma and Streisand's shriek-with-the-birds operatics.

This post is written in what one reviewer called "the Chuck Eddy hyphenated style."

Yeah, but the Kingston Trio clobber the Tokens.