Big & Rich: Album of the Decade?

FWIW, "the race thing" is probably the most irritating thing on the record to me. I can't really listen to Love Train (even though I love the fact that they just decided to call their song Love Train, as if it didn't matter that there already was a Love Train--it's a great little snapshot of their "Fuck it" attitude) because the lyrics are just too hard to take: "The whole color thing's never made sense to me." Really? It hasn't? That's shocking. You think we should all just get along? Can I subsribe to your newsletter? To me, this line by itself undercuts some of the other actually interesting stuff about race on the alum.

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I think that attitude is total horseshit. They might as well sing "some of my best friends are black!" Though that's obviously implied on the record, of course.

What tractors, Yancey?? You mean the country group by that name, from a few years ago, who I remember nothing about, assuming that was even their name? Were they even any good? (I thought they were some corny retro act, but maybe I was as wrong about them as I was about the Kentucky Headhunters, who I stupidly ignored back when they actually had hits.) I do know that some people think Kenny Chesny's tractor is sexy, though. (Unless that was Marc Chesnutt's tractor; I forget.)

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Overall, I still prefer DBT's lyrics but I think Big and Rich have got better hooks, both great bands in my book.

"not nearly as parrot-like as..."

What about lyrics? Surely B&R's are more Buffetesque than those others folks', no?

Big and Rich are quite
aggressive and flashy in
their lyrical approach

The rhythm section might be better (or worse) now that Isbell's wife is playing bass for them (Earl Hicks left the band, right?)

and that's true about Shonna Isbell being the new bassist, when I saw them play last year here in town she was terrific, a great new addition.

Anyone who likes the black cowboy rapper, whatever the fuck his name is, is batshit - he's TERRIBLE. That song he's on is inexcusably awful. Awful kanawful. Totally without merit.

Overall, I dig the album. Not sellin' it back. I'm definitely sold on the homoerotic angle yall got goin upthread too, even the booklet speaks volumes.

Are there any available solo recordings? Who's who? Does Big do most of the lead vocals or is it John Rich?

http://wmm.warnermusic.ca/ecard/big&rich/

i just put this up on friday afternoon and it hasn't been sent out yet. there appear to be problems with the windows media stream, so i recommend choosing the realplayer option for now.

are there other bands in country, or bluegrass, or anywhere doing the same thing?

and they do, as chuck noted way above, have great voices.

(and speaking of two-parts, one other band that big & rich vaguely remind me of is fountains of wayne, and i can see power-pop fans being all over this album if they ever hear it.)

My girlfriend (who says Big & Rich's harmonies in "Rollin'" always remind her of Metallica, of all people): "Drain STH, I think. Abba. I guess they may have more than two parts though."

Also finally saw the CMT awards on rebroadcast over the weekend. It was really entertaining for the first hour-and-half, then my wife got home and I told her how good it was and then, bam, Rascal Flatts and Keith Urban and other snoozes. I insisted we keep it on until the Gretchen Wilson/Big & Rich thing, though. I wonder what Ray Price thought about multiracial cowgirl hoochie dancers?

But, as energized as I am by the country-as-classic-rock/ country-as-dance-music, genre-hopping stuff Chuck is pumping, I think "Remember When" (that's Alan Jackson) is about the loveliest thing I've heard in a long time.

Okay, so now she says the harmony intervals in "Rollin" (and apparently a few other Big & Rich songs) are exacly the same intervals used in "Carry On My Wayward Son" by Kansas and parts of "Nothing Else Matters" by Metallica. Which would seem to be some kind of medieval interval, used in European folk music and some bluegrass, but rarely in mainstream country..assuming, as an entirely interval-illiterate person, I am repeating/understanding this right. (Most of the harmonies on Big & Rich's album apparently use the more usual country intervals.) Also, the Bee Gees and other people have apparently have used constant harmonies, so maybe it's not as rare as fact-checking cuz suggests above. Or maybe it is. (I find this topic fascinating, partly because it makes me feel completely stupid and incompetent as a critic who never even notices such details!)

The suggestion upthread that this isn't totally new is OTM, of course. It seems like Nashville has been building to this for years, but the fact that Horse of a Different color still feels so fresh and like a storming of the gates is a real testament to how good it is. Or something like that.

Me too! And it's really beautiful. I hadn't thought medieval, but the Metallica comparison is a good one. The upper part (is that Rich?) is constantly changing his harmonic attack, sometimes in standard thirds, sometimes, um, other stuff, and sometimes going to an octave apart, I guess for extra impact. The album only exists as a tape in my car right now, so I'm not sure, but I think my current favorite is the note on "TON" in "feelin' like TONto."

My fave is "er" in "take me farther" on Holy Water. It soars.

And whoever thought anyone'd mention Metallica as vocal harmony forerunners? Fuckin' sellouts!

the bee gees use a bit of everything. lots of solo singing, lots of two-part and lots of three-part. they mix it up, like almost all normal harmony bands do. even the classic two-singer bands tend to blend a variety of approaches, from solo verses to call-and-response bridges to close two-part harmonies to lead-line-plus-wordless-backup-vocal part.

the thing that intrigues me about the big & rich album is how relentlessly and obsessively it features one of 'em directly harmonizing with the other on nearly every word of the entire album. they don't switch to call-and-response. they don't take solos (save for a minuscule number of lines, like the first line of the verse in "live this life" and a stray line here and there in "drinkin' 'bout you"). the singularity of the approach is maddening and brilliant.
it's high concept. (or high lonesome concept, if you will.)