About this time last year, I was telling everybody that 2012 was going to be the year of Kentucky-born and Nashville-based singer / songwriter Sturgill Simpson. “Mark my words,” I said. He had a brand new, professionally-made album in the can featuring recently-minted Country Hall of Famer Hargus “Pig” Robbins amongst other notable contributors.
The year was 1974, and a two-story stucco office building / studio located two blocks from Nashville’s infamous Music Row at 916 19th Avenue South got christened “Hillbilly Central” by a New York-based music writer. Hillbilly Central was the brain child of Tompall Glaser, a member of the Glaser Brothers, who took the the money he earned from some success in the country music business to revolutionize it.
Last night Tim McGraw and Faith Hill began their stint of shows at Vegas’s Venetian, and apparently the show opens with an unveiled shot at country music’s traditionalists and two artists they hold dear: Waylon Jennings and Hank Williams. Tim and Faith’s “Soul2Soul” show opens up to Waylon’s “Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way” playing mockingly.
The fight for the purity of country music is almost as old as the genre itself. The conflict between pop and traditionalism, and the fight for creative control for artists runs like a thread throughout country music’s history, defining it as much as the twang of a Telecaster, or the moan of a steel guitar. Here are some of the most iconic images of country music revolution, and the stories behind them.
The first thing this album does is remind you that Waylon Jennings left us too early. The strength of the compositions validate that sentiment. All artists go though peaks and valleys in their careers, but passing away at 64, Waylon was never afforded the legacy era that his fellow Highwaymen have enjoyed; the “Golden Years” of an iconic country career.
Alright, so we’ve all now had our yucks over this story of a naked Randy Travis being arrested, and I am certainly not above guilt, but I am seeing some fairly alarming rhetoric surrounding this story that I feel is unhealthy to the country music environment. The details of the story may be funny, but the incident is not. Celebrity or no, Randy Travis is a human being who is clearly going through a moment of crisis in his life.
This is a classic materialistic, chauvinistic, image driven song and video with positively no soul, relatively no story, and absolutely no attention paid to message or artistic appeal. It’s fluff. The only difference between this song and one from Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Kenny Chesney, or Brantley Gilbert is … well … nothing.
That’s right ladies and gentlemen, your hero, the lord of underground roots, the savior of independent music, Shooter Jennings, is releasing a duet single and video with the most pop-ity pop of pop country uber doches, the “Nickelback of Country Music”, American Idol’s Bucky Covington. The song is called “Drinking Side of Country” and all indications is that it will suck hard enough to send a golf ball through a garden hose.
Think what you want about former American Idol contestant Kellie Picker’s latest album 100 Proof and its striking traditionalist approach, but what may be even more interesting and inspiring than the album itself is the story behind it. After recently parting with her label, Kellie’s narrative is becoming similar to the one of Waylon Jennings, the country music Outlaw that Kellie cites as a primary influence.
For months, Leroy Virgil of the infamous Hellbound Glory has been dropping little tidbits about a potential triple album coming out in the future to be called MericA. For the holiday, Leroy has released the lyrics to the upcoming title track, and in true Virgil fashion, they work just fine without the musical accompaniment.
Buddy Holly’s father had kept the motorcycle until 1970, when he sold it to someone in Austin, TX. Then in 1979 for Waylon’s 42nd birthday, the two remaining Crickets Joe B. and J.I. tracked down the 1959 Ariel Cyclone, bought it back, and had it hand delivered to north Texas where Waylon found it sitting there in the middle of his hotel room after walking off stage that night.
Do we really think legions of her fans are going to gateway from her music to Waylon Jennings, or even Alan Jackson, or even Justin Townes Earle? And for as many people she may convert to the pop version of country, may she scare just as many away from the traditional side? What are the ratios here? For all the good she may do enticing young fans to the genre, is she chasing away the older ones?
From Nashville to New York , from Detroit to Seattle, fans will be getting together to raise funds for diabetes research and to pay tribute to one of country music’s biggest Outlaws. From Whitey Morgan & The 78’s to Shooter Jennings, from Rachel Brooke to Jackson Taylor, bands and artists will be giving of their time to help out a good cause.
Marty Stuart is on an amazing roll ladies and gentlemen. What he’s doing right now with lead guitar player “Uncle” Kenny Vaughan and The Fabulous Superlatives is stuff that legends are made of. You know those periods in an artists’ career that you look back on like they can’t do wrong, churning out amazing songs and albums one after another?
Hollywood seems obsessed with finding talent among the masses with their silly reality show contests like American Idol and The Voice, when in reality there’s a boatload of talent just sitting there waiting to be discovered right under their surgically-crafted, cosmetically-sculptured noses. So here’s a list of some bands that are go ready, right now, no excuses.
Today is the released date of Long Gone Daddy, an album Curb Records is releasing that contains outtakes from early in Hank Williams III’s career when he was under contract with the label. Most of the material on the album has been released previously. according to a press release released today by Allcorn, he had no more consent from Curb to release his song “This Ain’t Montgomery” than Hank3 did.
Country music songwriting legend and original Outlaw Billy Joe Shaver will be releasing a loaded 20-song CD package with companion DVD called Live at Billy Bob’s Texas on July 17th, recorded in the “World’s Largest Honky Tonk”. This will be Shaver’s first album in five years. Billy Joe Shaver will be the 42nd artist to release a “Live at Billy Bob’s” album.
From the outside looking in, one may look at the lineup of The Muddy Roots Festival for example, and wonder how all these bands could all be booked right beside each other and it work seamlessly. This illustrates the dramatic sonic and geographical diversity that goes into creating what we know now as the underground country roots, or “Muddy Roots” world.
“Garth Brooks did for country music what pantyhose did for finger fucking.” This is a quote attributed to Waylon Jennings, and one that’s hard to argue against. But over time, Garth Brooks’ music has fallen more into favor with traditional country music fans who once revered him as the country music anti-Christ. Why? Because Garth’s music is actually country.
If you are truly a fan of country music and have an open heart, you will like 100 Proof. In the Tammy Wynette, Loretta Lynn mold, 100 Proof revives the lost appreciation for the strong, yet sweet country woman, while staying away from the surface symbolism that erodes the substance from many of the other artists that attempt this difficult feat.
Yesterday Hank Williams III whose preparing for an East Coast tour in March participated in a live chat on Yowie.com where he dropped some interesting tidbits about some upcoming plans and projects, including that he’s planning to tour Europe again June 15th through July 15th, and will be releasing an unspecified collaboration with David Allan Coe in a couple of months.
I don’t love this song, I’m still nowhere close to a Josh Thompson supporter, and I’m not exactly sure what that weird thing is behind him in the video. But even if this is the effect of a marketing move, this song is a much better direction for Josh, and the ears of real music fans will bleed a little bit less when this comes on compared to some of his previous work.
Waylon Jennings was never awarded a traditional legacy era. Passing 10 years ago from complications with diabetes at 64, Waylon never had a chance to fulfill that elder statesman role in country music in a similar way his fellow Highwayman Johnny Cash did with the re-emergence of his career in the mid-90’s, or as another Highwayman Willie Nelson does today.
Diamonds & Gasoline has a lot of the common earmarks of a Red Dirt album, and a lot of a good freshman album, even though officially it is their 2nd release. I really like this album, but moreover, I really like their potential, and am excited to see what the Turnpike Troubadours have to offer in the future.