Album Review: Brooks & Dunn – ‘Waitin’ On Sundown’

Brooks and Dunn’s third album was released in September 1994. Produced like the first two by Don Cook and Scott Hendricks. In theory, Kix and Ronnie had equal billing, each singing lead on five songs, but Ronnie’s lead vocals were showcased on four of the five singles. This may have been the [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Somewhere Down In Texas’

In 2005, twenty-four years into his hit-making career, George Strait released Somewhere Down In Texas, a collection of laid-back songs that contrasted 2003’s Honkytonkville’s hard honky-tonk sound.  The album landed at the top of the country albums chart as well as the all-genre Billboard 200 and was certified platinum.  It also provided Strait with another [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Carrying Your Love With Me’

George Strait’s 1997 album Carrying Your Love With Me came out when he was at the peak of his commercial success. It followed up the triple platinum Blue Clear Sky, released the previous year, and achieved the same status itself (the last of his studio albums to do so to date). It was [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Easy Come, Easy Go’

In 1992, George Strait teamed up with a new producer, ending an eight-year professional relationship with Jimmy Bowen, who had moved on to assume the presidency of rival label Capitol Nashville. The association with Tony Brown would prove to be even more enduring, lasting until the present day. A change in producers almost [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Livin’ It Up’

George Strait’s winning streak, which began in the 1980s, showed no signs of abating as the 1990s began. The Country Music Association named him Entertainer of the Year for the second year in a row in 1990, and that same year he released what went on to be the biggest hit single of his [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Ocean Front Property’

Strait was on a serious hot streak in 1987 when he released Ocean Front Property, his seventh studio album, co-produced with Jimmy Bowen again. Each of the three singles from the album went to #1, starting with the title track, and the album itself was the first album ever to debut at the top [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘#7′

Despite its title, #7 was George Strait’s sixth studio album for MCA and his third collaboration with co-producer Jimmy Bowen. It was his seventh album overall, if 1985’s Greatest Hits compilation is taken into account. Released in May 1986, it continues where the previous year’s Something Special left off, allowing Strait to further [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Strait From The Heart’

George Strait’s sophomore effort finds him repeating the same winning formula of his debut, from teaming up once again with producer Blake Mevis, to working a pun based on his last name into the album title. Released in June 1982, Strait From The Heart attempts to strike a balance between Strait’s traditional country [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Strait Country’

It was clear right from the start that George Strait was going to be a big star, when his very first MCA single, ‘Unwound’, was a top 10 hit in 1981. It was one of no fewer than six songs on his debut album, Strait Country, to be co-written by Dean Dillon, then a [...]

Album Review: George Strait – ‘Twang’

The title of George Strait’s 26th studio album for MCA suggests that it is a collection of hardcore honky-tonkers, so listeners may be a bit surprised to discover that Twang is one of the more eclectic offerings in his catalog, ranging from honky-tonk and Cajun to polished ballads and a Mexican folk song sung entirely [...]

Album Review: John Anderson – ‘Bigger Hands’

After an unsuccessful attempt at another comeback in 2007 with the John Rich-produced Easy Money, John Anderson’s latest album Bigger Hands was released last month on the small label Country Crossing. It reunites him with co-producer James Stroud, who produced his early 90s records, and the result is mostly fairly understated, and is generally [...]

Album Review: John Anderson – ‘Nobody’s Got It All’

After the brief resurrection of John Anderson’s career in the early 90s, it died down again in the later part of that decade, although he has continued to release some excellent music on a series of major labels. One of my favorites is this release from 2001, on Columbia. It was produced by [...]

The bottle that pours the wine: Songs about songwriting

It’s always about the song in country music. Whether the writer sings the song or not, a topic Razor X raised last week, the song itself is what everything else ultimately depends on. One of the things I love about country music is the range of subjects it tackles, but the thing most songwriters [...]

Album Review: Tanya Tucker – ‘Love Me Like You Used To’

Following the success of 1986’s Girls Like Me comeback album, Tanya Tucker released Love Me Like You Used To on Capitol Records in 1987.  The release produced three hits.  The title track, which served as the album’s lead-single, soared to #2 on the country charts.  The two follow-up singles, ‘I Won’t Take Less Than Your [...]

Single Review: George Strait – ‘Living For The Night’

Honestly, I’ve never been a big George Strait fan. I’ve known some of his songs, his more recent hits, and on a whim I bought Troubadour this past January. When I got it, there were a few good tracks, but it never caught with me and I stopped listening to it.
However, this new Strait [...]

Something with a twist to it

Some of the most memorable country songs are the ones which surprise you, the story song with a twist in the tale, or the song which suddenly goes in a direction you really weren’t expecting. Sometimes the effect is desigend to make you laugh; sometimes it may bring you to tears; there are some songs [...]

Album Review – Keith Whitley: A Tribute Album

One of the problems with making a tribute album is how far the participants are prepared to bring something of themselves to the interpretation, and how far they are so concerned to pay their respects the artist being honored, that the end result is little more than very tasteful, high-class karaoke.
The tribute album produced by [...]

Album Review: Keith Whitley – ‘Kentucky Bluebird’

RCA had a lot of unreleased Keith Whitley recordings in the vaults, and in 1991 the label got his last producer, Garth Fundis, to work on a number of these, leading to the release of Kentucky Bluebird. The album is a bit of a hodgepodge, comprising a mixture of these re-produced tracks, snippets from radio [...]

Album Review: Keith Whitley — ‘L.A. to Miami’

After the commercial failure of his RCA debut mini-album, Keith Whitley changed directions somewhat, moving away from traditional country and more towards a more contemporary (i.e., commercial) sound. The result was 1985’s L.A. to Miami, produced by Blake Mevis, who had produced some of George Strait’s early work. At that time, country radio [...]

Playlist: Favorite George Strait songs

Thursday, April 23rd, is St. George’s Day. George is the name of the patron saint of England. One of the most prominent of the military saints, legend has it that George slayed a dragon that had been terrorizing the people of Silene, in modern-day Libya, doing so on the condition that they convert to Christianity.
And [...]