Why I’m “Comin’ Around” on Josh Thompson
When RCA Records Nashville recording artist Josh Thompson first came on the scene a few years ago, I had a few pretty harsh words for him, calling him a “fake Outlaw” and specifically taking exception to his name dropping of Waylon Jennings, saying:
Waylon Jennings died for your sins Josh, and all of the sins of country music. And until you can understand what a TRUE Outlaw is, and especially if you’re just going to use it as some marketing term, I wish you’d keep the name Waylon Jennings out of your damn mouth.
At the time, Josh Thompson seemed to embody the worst of the emerging crop of “new Outlaws” Music Row was manufacturing to capitalize on the anti-Nashville, anti-country pop sentiment that was brewing in mainstream fandom. His over-machismo douchebaggery and immature songs were worthy of the utmost ridicule.
Then over the last few months I began to see his name pop up more and more in connection with interesting projects and events, and hearing some people whose opinions I tend to respect talking about Josh in terms like being “surprisingly impressed” or that he was showing signs of “maturing”, some in connection with festivities surrounding the recent release of Waylon: The Music Inside Vol.2 of which his cover of “Love of the Common People” appears on.
Now Josh has released this “Comin’Around” song and subsequent video ahead of his upcoming sophomore album Change, and I can see why it’s making some folks come around on Josh himself. Don’t get me wrong, it could all still be a ruse. One marketing idea might be getting swapped for another marketing idea here. My eyes are wide open and my antennae perked. But when I was hard on Josh Thompson, I also promised I would be fair, and it would be unfair to say anything but that this song displays both growth and substance.
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, and compared to a lot of mainstream country music in general.
February 20, 2012 @ 11:34 am
The video you posted is the first I’ve listend to of his. The song is good. The video is ok. That thing behind him is wierd but kind of cool. My 2 sugestions to him would be 1) Loose the ponytail. Ether let your hair down or cut it but get rid of the rubberband. 2) Try to find a song that doesn’t sound so much like Montgumery Gentry. It’s not a good song but it’s not original.
February 20, 2012 @ 11:54 am
The number one suggestion you give him is to do something with his hair? I’d say he’s doing pretty damn good.
February 20, 2012 @ 8:54 pm
Agree with Logan!
Josh Thompson is the real deal, but caught in the Nashville system. He’s the exact kind of artist we should rally around, similar to Randy House and the Dirt Drifters.
February 20, 2012 @ 11:54 am
don’t care for the song. first i’ve ever heard of him. yeah, well. he still isn’t on my radar. as for the weird fan thing behind him i think it’s just a gimmick to get folks to watch the video and then talk about him and the song. looks like it’s working. sorta.
February 20, 2012 @ 12:04 pm
The official explanation of what the “thing” is in the video is a “carnival”.
February 20, 2012 @ 12:12 pm
A good friend commented the other day that he believes the whole “underground” neo-traditional, roots-oriented (pick a term, I don’t care) movement in music that has been gaining steam the past 15 or so years has peaked and is on its way down. I disagreed and said I think it’s just beginning and in fact is being adopted, hijacked, co-opted (pick a term) by Nashville and will continue to be. This video and song would be evidence of that. Taylor Swift donning a banjitar would be evidence; the Pistol Annies would be such as well. It still reeks of corporate music though in my opinion.
February 21, 2012 @ 4:01 pm
Or maybe those artists you are critical of as corp. chickens are actually becoming more of who they really are.
Taylor has been picking a banjo and guitar since she hit the scene. Of course she was a child and a female at that so, perhaps that is why it didn’t resinate with you and appeared to be coporate pulling the strings. Truth is Taylor probably has more creative freedom than any artist this side of Jay Z and Kanye today.
February 20, 2012 @ 12:18 pm
This is bound to piss some people off, especially right after that whole article praising Johnny Corndawg’s music but condemning his image. Isn’t this kinda a 180.
February 20, 2012 @ 1:26 pm
Well, people will be pissed off no matter what I do. You can’t please everybody, so instead I just try to be as honest as I can and let the cards fall where they may. I can’t control if people post links on Facebook mischaracterizing that I was attacking Josh Hedley and that I have no right to criticize music because I’m not a musician. What I can control is my own actions, and when I said that one of Josh Thompson’s songs insults me more than if someone had told me to go suck my mother”™s dick, but also told him I would be fair to him thereafter, and then the guy does a complete 180 in the direction of his music career, I feel the need to man up and let my honest feelings be known, just like I did in the second half of the Jonny Corndawg review that very few of the detractors even read. I try to be a man of my word.
Josh is still a mainstream puppet with mild songs, and I loaded down this review with enough qualifiers that there should be no question in that. But it’s not nearly as bad as it was before, and regardless of the motivations or reasons, country music is a little better off for it.
February 20, 2012 @ 1:55 pm
No, I don’t guess you can please everybody, but you could probably please a few more with a better sense of timing. And I appreciate the honesty, it’s one of the things I like most about this site. You treat artists the same on both sides. All I’m saying is that I think it’s the wrong thing at the wrong time. I don’t know if you have listened to country radio in a while, but the whole prodigal son thing is already pretty well entrenched. Josh (or whoever wrote it) does put a bit of a newer spin on it, I’ll give him that much, but there are still some worn out phrases thrown in there and the music still sounds like watered down skynyrd to me. But I guess I can see where you are coming from.
February 20, 2012 @ 3:28 pm
I agree the timing could look bad, but many times the timing of my articles is not based on some master plan, but the news cycle which is completely out of my control. For example the Jonny Corndawg article was stimulated by the Nashville Scene calling him the next “David Allan Coe”. This article was stimulated by Josh Thompson releasing this song and video late last week. And many times the timing has to do with how much time I have to commit to writing, and what I’m feeling passionate about at the time.
February 20, 2012 @ 12:47 pm
Making my ears “bleed a little bit less” isn’t quite good enough for me. I will pass.
February 20, 2012 @ 1:01 pm
hes not the pretty boy cowboys that most on the radio are nowdays…no its not that great but..i can respect him.
February 20, 2012 @ 1:45 pm
I’ll admit I don’t mind Josh Thompson. When he first came out he had that song “Beer on the Table” which I absolutely could not stand and thought it was one of the dumbest songs out there. Althought I hated that song I do like his song “Way Out Here”, “Blame It On Waylon, and this song. But I’m not as close-minded to mainstream country music as I feel alot of people on this site are. To me I see a place in “Country Music” for all types whether underground, red dirt/Texas country, or mainstream.
February 20, 2012 @ 2:11 pm
I couldn’t have said it better myself. This site is called ‘Saving Country Music.’ We’re not going to wake up some sunday morning to the radio playing ‘Bastard Child’ by HBG. With artists like Thompon serving as a stepping stone for the more authentic sound, that could very well be the case in the future. You can’t, in an instant, convert a Justin Moore lover into a Hank III fans. But, again, with people like Thompson those same people may do some research and find associated acts that are actually decent. Good write up Trig.
February 20, 2012 @ 4:46 pm
Trig, will you please post a rant on Justin Moore’s new song “This is NRA Country?” It seriously might be the worst laundry list country song I’ve ever heard. A lot of the same ideas in the video as “Country Must Be Country Wide.” If I could punch Justin Moore square in the nuts, I probably would.
February 20, 2012 @ 7:27 pm
If there is one thing I hate more than Justin Moore it is those kids who leave comments on his youtube videos. They always seem get into arguments over how “Country” they are. I don’t know why but stuff like that gets my blood boilng.
April 12, 2012 @ 11:16 am
Justin Moore has a few good songs on his new album…the best song by far that he has recorded is “run out of honkeytonks” …I also really like “bed of my chevy”. I could certainly pass on some of his stuff though.
February 20, 2012 @ 6:27 pm
I feel like I am semi-open to mainstream country, but this sucks. Seriously, same rock instrumentation with pedal-steel and banjo sprinkled in. Guy in front with an acoustic, copy and paste.
February 21, 2012 @ 8:23 am
^
yep.
When listening to above song, my reaction was a resounding “meh…” The Garth Brooks sound will just never do it for me. Whether it’s Josh Tompson, Brad Paisley, Chesney, or whoever….. The big studio instrumentation and arrangements just leave so much to be desired.
February 26, 2012 @ 8:10 pm
Could not agree more.
February 21, 2012 @ 3:56 pm
Leroy Virgil cuts this song and this site explodes in praise.
I think it is a decent song. The thing I like about it is, it is a bit deeper thinking than the simple laundry list song of what is country. Not that much deeper, but deeper than Jason Aldean will ever be.
You strip this down and Josh is talking about county songs his dad listened to, small towns and church.
This is still light years from Hank3 or Jamey Johnson’s country music.
April 12, 2012 @ 11:13 am
Josh Thompson wrote a song that Aldean cut…pretty sure Aldean does not really write anything of his own…so this may indeed be as deep as Aldean songs (or at least church pew or bar stool kinda town) because they have the same writer. I will give one compliment to Aldean…his albums contain much better music than the singles they decide to play ALL DAY on the radio.
February 23, 2012 @ 1:43 am
It’s not so much the lyrics or the actual voice of the singer. What drives me up a wall is the big Nashville arrangements. That is what makes songs like this so terrible. I go see Dale Watson on a regular basis at the Continental Club in Austin so maybe I’m spoiled. Had this song been recorded with an acutal band maybe I would like it. It seems actual musicianship has taken a backseat. It is just words sung over a carbon copy studio arrangement that could have been placed into any other cookie cutter top 40 country song.
This goes for almost all mainstream country songs that I could see myself actually enjoying. I’m not totally against studio musicians, hell Dale Watson recorded his “Carryin On” album in Nashville with studio musicians, but they were ACTUAL musicians with talent.
April 23, 2012 @ 4:13 pm
@Icecoldcountry…Hank3 or Jamey Johnson ? Huh? Really? “Light years away” from them is so true but not in the way you meant it! I think you must have ice in your ears! I’m not a big Josh Thompson fan but this song has got a great message and its well done. Best thing he’s released and it’s not dark and self absorbed