Back In The Swing of Things was originally released in 1998 as The Voice. It was repackaged and released under its new title in 2004. Since Gosdin was long out of the spotlight by then, the album didn’t produce any singles and failed to chart. It would also mark his final album release as he passed away in 2009.
The twelve-song album opens with the title track, a delightful western swing number that finds Gosdin in a barroom to recover from a break-up only to get over his sorrows when he hears his song on the jukebox. I love the production on this song, a peppy mix of fiddles, steel guitar, and upright bass. A departure from the ballads he usually prefers, “Back In The Swing of Things” offers a nice change of pace.
Another track in this same vein is “Chip Off The Chip Off The Old Block,” a number finding Gosdin declaring he’s country “From My Hat back to my White Socks” and comparing himself to George Jones and Merle Haggard. Lofty comparisons aside, it’s a catchy little tune. The fiddle and steel provide a nice bounce and help the listener engage with the otherwise inane lyrical content. I understand the intent he was going for here, but he shouldn’t have to try this hard to prove his worth, especially after recording “Chiseled In Stone.”
The album also has two songs with distinct 90s style production. “Fire In Our Bedroom” is a typical Gosdin cheating song but with a twist – he and his girl are fine; it’s everyone else who’s sleeping around. “Maybe Then I’ll Be Over You” should’ve been great, but the somewhat creepy hook – “when they lay me six feet under, maybe then I’ll be over you” leaves me kind of cold. But the Diamond Rio-esque arrangements make both songs highly listenable and fresh sounding.
On Back In The Swing of Things Gosdin appears to be making an effort to keep his production modern and in turn those choices keep the album from sounding dated. But he doesn’t stray too far from his wheelhouse either as he proves with “Baby, That’s Cold” a traditional ballad led by heavy steel guitar. Much like George Strait’s “You Can’t Make A Heart Love Somebody,” we have a woman telling her man she never really cared about him in the first place. The production is perfectly placed here but the chorus is lacking in substance – he mentions how her admission hurts him, but he never gets to the heart of his true pain. Nevertheless, “Baby, That’s Cold” is still a beautiful song to listen to.
“How Can I Believe In You When You’ll be leaving Me” and “I Know What Its Like (To Be Alone)” are also in Gosdin’s classic style of songs with relationships on the rocks. Both, though, are in different stages of breakup – in the former, the relationship is nearly over while in the latter he’s been alone for more than two years. Both songs are okay, but can’t match the power of “Baby, That’s Cold.” If I had to choose, I like “How Can I Believe In You When You’ll be leaving Me” better because of its barroom setting and more moody production.
Thrown in for good measure, are two covers of excellent country songs. “Would These Arms Be In Your Way” was a #36 peaking single for Keith Whitley in 1987 and the lead from his Don’t Close Your Eyes album. Gosdin treats the song differently than Whitley does, with a fiddle-laced arrangement. In a side-by-side comparison, I like Gosdin’s version better as it feels more easygoing. He also seems to perform the song with just a bit more conviction.
The other cover, “A Picture Of Me (Without You),” is one of four duets with the vocalist LaDonna Kay, a Bluegrass and country singer. Already familiar with the Jones, Connie Smith, and Lorrie Morgan versions of the song, I had never heard it as a duet. Compared with Morgan’s version (of which I’m most familiar), Gosdin puts a contemporary spin on the arrangement that comes off too modern for my tastes. But Kay has a good voice and gives the track an extra dose of flavor, which I like.
The other three duets with Kay are just as good. From a production standpoint, “Let’s Don’t and Say We Did” is easily the warmest and most inviting. “Streets of Gold,” a song about Heaven, uses fiddles to help it ease along, and “We Must’ve Been Out Of Our Minds” showcases the blending of their voices to stunning effect.
Overall, Back In The Swing of Things is a very enjoyable album from Gosdin. He found (and co-wrote) some great songs, and the addition of Kay as a duet partner gave the album an added dimension. I highly recommend this to anyone willing to seek it out; unfortunately it’s out of print.
1983 saw a new label for Vern, Compleat, and a real comeback. This was his first album for the label, and was produced by Blake Mevis. The production shows some signs of its era with liberal but not overwhelming use of string sections and sometimes slightly dated sounding arrangements of the backing vocals, clearly patterned after Janie Fricke’s contribution to earlier Gosdin records, but it allows that voice to shine.
The classic title track is a stunning song, with a beautifully understated vocal which is, like many of Vern’s recording, a masterclass in singing country music. Bitter but weary of fighting it, Vern addresses a wife he knows is planning on cheating on him:
There’s a closet full of dresses that I bought you
And here’s the keys to the new car in the drive
And before you leave our room
Put on your best perfume
If you’re gonna do me wrong, do it right
Oh, the next time the phone rings
I won’t answer
I don’t wanna be the fool I was tonight
I don’t wanna know the truth
I don’t wanna see the proof
If you’re gonna do me wrong
Do it right
The pain is palpable. It was Vern’s biggest hit to date, and quite an achievement for an independent label, albeit one distributed and promoted by the major Mercury, and although a peak of #5 was still four spots lower than it deserved. It might have been known as one of George Jones’s classic hits, as Vern and co-writer Max D Barnes had pitched it to the Possum, but he had unaccountably failed to record it. That seems like a real missed opportunity, which Jones acknowledged when he finally got around to covering it on his 2005 set Hits I Missed – but then we would never had heard Vern Gosdin’s own superb version.
Matching its predecessor’s performance, second single ‘Way Down Deep’ picked up both tempo and mood with a positive love song Vern wrote with Max D Barnes and the latter’s son Max T Barnes. It’s very good with a happy feel as it celebrates falling in love, but lacks the emotional intensity which makes Vern’s best work his heartbreak ballads, and is one of my less favourite tracks here.
The wistful ‘I Wonder Where We’d Be Tonight’ was the third top 10 from the album, making it his most consistent and successful release to date. Vern ponders regretfully what might have been if he hadn’t broken up with an ex he still loves, delivering another perfectly executed vocal on an excellent song.
The record is packed full of now-classic recordings. ‘Tennessee Courage’, which Vern wrote with his brother Rex (who died in 1983 aged just 45 after recording backing vocals for this album) is beautiful but sad, portraying a man taking refuge from his loneliness in a bottle of whiskey:
Now my good friend Jack Daniels stands tall on the shelf
And he’ll go to war with my troubles
And he’ll never desert an old friend when I’m hurt
And needin’ some Tennessee courage
Straight 90 proof can alter the truth
Put hair on your chest in a hurry
I know I’ll survive
Raise hell for a while
With the help of some Tennessee courage
The song was later covered by Keith Whitley in his posthumously released I Wonder Do You Think Of Me, the latter’s alcohol-induced death giving an added poignancy to the choice. Vern also repeated his exquisite AMI top 10 hit ‘Today My World Slipped Away’, a song always worth hearing again. The lesser known ‘I’ll Try’ is almost as good, Vern offering a warm and supportive helping hand to someone in pain:
I’ll try to help you understand what love is all about
And why the things you want so bad
You seem to do without
And if your heart should start to cry
As you watch dreams inside you die
And you need someone to tell you why
I’ll try
‘Favorite Fool Of All’ has a devoted Vern all too aware he is fooling himself that his faithless lover will not break his heart like those of all her past conquests.
If the sad songs are the best, there is also some happy material worth hearing. ‘I Couldn’t Love You More’ is a touching love song with a pretty tune, and ‘My Heart Is In Good Hands’ is also nice. While there really isn’t a bad track, the closest we get to filler is with ‘I Feel Love Closin’ In’, a pleasant enough chugging ballad about falling in love, and even this is tenderly sung making it sound good.
This outstanding album was released on CD in 2001 on Vern’s own VGM label and this version is still fairly easy to find. One of the greatest singers country music has ever seen, and high quality material, make this a must-have.
I recently retired a group of CDs that have lived primarily in my car for the past year or so, and thus have been greatly overplayed. While flipping through my collection for albums to replace them with, I had one of those rude awakening moments when I came across one album in particular and realized that it has been almost twenty-five years since its release. I’ve had it since it first came out, but it certainly doesn’t feel like it’s been that long. It’s an album that I can’t imagine ever being without, and it inspired me to put together a list of other albums that I’ve had for longer than I care to admit, that I’ve always enjoyed and still play all the way through on a regular basis.
In putting together the list, I decided to limit it to studio albums that I’ve had for at least twenty years. I’ve been listening to country music for much longer than that, but in the beginning when I was still too young to earn my own money, I was somewhat limited in what I could buy so my purchases in those days tended to be hits compilations. For that reason, some of the usual suspects — Haggard, Jones, Wynette and Parton don’t appear on the list. So, without further adieu, here are my selections, in no particular order, for the ten most essential albums in my collection:
1. Keith Whitley– Don’t Close Your Eyes (1988). I had heard a few of Keith Whitley’s songs on the radio prior to the release of this album, but I wasn’t really aware of who he was until the title track became his breakthrough hit. Up to that point, his material wasn’t always worthy of his considerable vocal talent, but everything about this album was just perfect. The follow-up, I greatly prefer it to his follow-up album, the posthumously released I Wonder Do You Think of Me.
2. Randy Travis – Storms of Life (1986). All that needs to be said about this album is that it changed the course of country music. It’s arguably the greatest country album released during my lifetime, and indisputably the most important. What more needs to be said?
3. Anne Murray — Let’s Keep It That Way (1978). I didn’t actually get this one in 1978, but I did buy it on cassette sometime in the early 80s and later bought it again when it was released on CD many years later. While never primarily a country artist, Anne was one of my gateways to country music back in the days when country radio stations were virtually non-existent in the north. The album included “You Needed Me”, one of the biggest hits of Anne’s career, and her only record to reach #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the US. Aside from that, however, it is one of her more overtly country efforts. It was the first of ten Murray albums to be produced by Jim Ed Norman, who later went on to run Warner Bros’ Nashville division.
4. Barbara Mandrell– I’ll Be Your Jukebox Tonight (1988). By the late 80s, the New Traditionalist movement was in full force and many veteran acts had been swept off the charts. Many of the artists who had enjoyed great success with crossover material tried to adapt by releasing more traditional material. After a lengthy dry spell, Mandrell looked as though she were poised to defy the odds and reclaim her throne at the top of the charts. Her excellent cover of Ray Price’s “I Wish That I Could Fall In Love Today” reached #5, but unfortunately it was her last appearance in the Top 10. Though it doesn’t contain any of her signature hits, I’ll Be Your Jukebox Tonight is the finest album of her career.
5. Willie Nelson — Always On My Mind (1982). Prior to the release of this album, I wasn’t much of a Willie fan, but he won me over with the title track, which had previously been recorded by both Elvis Presley and Brenda Lee. Willie’s version was one of the biggest hits of 1982 (has it really been 30 years?!?) and became his signature tune. The album also includes excellent cover versions of “Let It Be Me”, “A Whiter Shade of Pale” and a remake of his own “The Party’s Over”.
6. Reba McEntire – Whoever’s In New England (1986). It’s hard to pick a favorite Reba album from this era, because all of her work during this period was excellent. Whoever’s In New England marked a move back to a slightly more contemporary sound, following two ultra-traditional albums, 1984′s My Kind of Country and 1985′s Have I Got a Deal For You. Whoever’s In New England became her first gold album and the beautiful title track earned her a Grammy award.
7. Tanya Tucker – What Do I Do With Me (1991). I’ve been a Tanya Tucker fan for longer than I can remember. I can remember singing along to “Delta Dawn” when I was about four years old, though it was probably the Helen Reddy version that was getting played on local radio stations at the time. I bought and wore out quite a few of her hits compilations on cassette, and I also won an autographed copy of 1982 LP Changes, her only release for Arista Records. She had been a guest on a late-night syndicated radio show called Hot Country Nights. I remember trying to stay awake for it but I fell asleep before her segment of the program aired. She left some copies of her album, however, which were offered as prizes in a contest the next night. I got mine for correctly identifying Charlene Tilton as the spouse of Johnny Lee. However, it is her platinum-selling 1991 album that is her finest and the one that I play all the way through most often. It seems like it was released only yesterday, but on the other hand, it does seem like a very long time since music this good was heard regularly on country radio.
8. George Strait — Livin’ It Up (1990). As with many of the other artists on this list, most of my early George Strait albums were hits packages. The first studio album of his I ever had was a homemade copy of 1987′s Ocean Front Property, which a friend had given me. I got a CD player for Christmas in 1988 and got his If You Ain’t Lovin’, You Ain’t Livin’ album through Columbia House shortly thereafter. But it is Livin’ It Up that I come back to most often.
9. Patty Loveless – Honky Tonk Angel (1988). This was the first Patty Loveless album I ever owned. At the time it seemed like her commercial breakthrough — it contains her first two #1 hits “Timber, I’m Falling In Love” and “Chains” — but it was really only scratching the surface of what was to come in the following decade following her switch from MCA to Epic. My favorite track on this album and the reason I bought it was “Don’t Toss Us Away”, which features harmony vocals by Rodney Crowell. MCA had thought this would be her first #1, but it only got to #5. Despite its more than respectable chart performance, it’s not one of her better remembered records today.
10. Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn– Making Believe (1988). Conway and Loretta stopped recording together in the early 80s when Conway moved to Elektra Records, which was later absorbed by Warner Bros. At that time, it was still relatively uncommon for artists on different labels to record together. When Conway rejoined MCA in 1987, it was announced that he and Loretta would once again record together. This album was their one and only reunion in the studio. It consisted of five previously released tracks and five newly recorded cover versions of country standards such as “Release Me”, “Half as Much”, “Please Help Me, I’m Falling”, “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still In Love With You)” and the title track. But despite being only half a new album, the magic was still there. This is another album I wore out on cassette before buying it on CD.
What are some of the albums in your collection that you consider to essential listening, and that you can’t imagine being without?
Following the success of There’s More Where That Came From, Womack released the single “Finding My Way Back Home” in August 2006. A return to the poppier sounds she favored on I Hope You Dance, the song failed to rekindle her radio career and an album of the same name was shelved.
Her next full-length album Call Me Crazy finally saw the light of day in the fall of 2008. Upon release critics hailed the album as one of the year’s best and praised Womack for continuing to explore her roots and show that women don’t have to rely on singing feel-good songs all the time. Read the rest of this entry »
Vince Gill’s seventh studio album hit shelves nearly two years after his landmark I Still Believe In You. Once again co-produced with Tony Brown, When Love Finds You continued to build on Gill’s newfound superstar status, selling 4 million copies and spawning 6 hit singles, it also built on the singer’s knack for striking the perfect balance between his pop-tinged and traditional country sound.
Meant to recapture the mega success of “I Still Believe In You”, the adult contemporary-leaning ballad “Whenever You Come Around” was showcased as the lead single, and found its way to #2 on the country singles chart in the Summer of 1994. The title track – a #3 hit – follows much of the same electric guitar and synthesizer love song format. The former features Trisha Yearwood singing harmony.
The best showcases for Gill’s fast-fingers guitar playing comes from the album’s pair up-tempo singles. Proving that a lusty ode to womankind can be done right, “What The Cowgirls Do”, written by Vince with Reed Nielsen, rocks hard with a healthy dose of piano and guitar, and the charm of the lyrics – “they love to go all night, and treat you right” – fall just short of chauvinism. Even better is the contemporary country sounds of “You Better Think Twice”, which finds the singer urging a would-be notch on his buddy’s belt to rethink her feelings. Layers of piano and hard-hitting bass playing by Michael Rhodes make it a good time top-tapper. Both songs hit #2 on the country chart.
As good as those up-tempos are, two other singles steal the spotlight on When Love Finds You. The stone country weeper “Which Bridge To Cross (Which Bridge To Burn)”, co-written with the legendary Bill Anderson, tells of a man in love with two women and at a loss over which one to choose. Here, a tinkling honky-tonk piano and a crying fiddle frame Gill’s high lonesome delivery of a stellar lyric. Best remembered today is the perennial “Go Rest High On That Mountain”, featuring Patty Loveless and Ricky Skaggs on harmony. Gill began writing the eulogic ballad after the death of Keith Whitley in 1989 but didn’t finish it until 4 years later following the death of his brother.
There are really no songs here in need of skipping. On the roadhouse-flavored “South Side of Dixie”, co-written with Delbert McClinton, Gill again kicks up his heels and showcases his guitar skills. “If There’s Anything I Can Do” hits just the right groove of pop-country perfection as does “Maybe Tonight”, which Gill co-wrote with his then-wife Janis. Coincidentally, another of the album’s tracks was written with Amy Grant, who would become Vince’s second wife. “If I Had My Way” is a more spiritual and humanitarian love song than a foreshadowing of a romantic relationship, and features a stripped down production.
When Love Finds You found an artist in his commercial prime, and delivering the goods to as many people as he ever would. Vince Gill does not disappoint the masses with this release, be they neo-traditionalist or converted rock and roll fan.
One would be hard pressed to find any duds within Merle Haggard’s Capitol catalog; during his dozen or so years with the label he and Ken Nelson created an impressive body of work. While Haggard continued to produce worthwhile music in his post-Capitol career, it’s generally acknowledged that his output was more hit or miss after he departed the label. Serving 190 Proof, produced by Fuzzy Owen and released in 1979 on MCA, is one of his less interesting efforts, despite producing two Top 5 hits.
Haggard wrote or co-wrote nine of the album’s eleven tracks, including the two singles “Red Bandana” and “My Own Kind Of Hat”, both of which peaked at #4. “Red Bandana” is about a pair of free spirits, 30 years into their relationship, and now she apparently wants to settle down, but Merle states emphatically that “I can’t change and live the way you want me to.” “My Own Kind Of Hat” is a whimsical ditty about marching to the beat of a different drummer. The catchy lyrics have fun with some words that contain double meanings, as well as a few double entendres:
There’s two kinds of brothers and two kinds of lovers
And two kinds of babies to hold
There’s two kinds of cherries and two kinds of fairies
And two kinds of mothers, I’m told, and told …
The rest of the album takes a more serious tone. The opening track “Footlights” is one of the most introspective songs Haggard ever recorded. It talks about the loneliness and isolation of life on the road, having to put on a brave face and smile for the sake of the fans, and — despite tremendous professional success — having to little to celebrate in his personal life. “Got Lonely Too Early (This Morning)” is a little more upbeat, despite the serious lyrics. The melody is somewhat similar to “C.C. Waterback”, which Merle would record a few years later with George Jones, but “Got Lonely” lacks the energy of that later track. It plods along and somehow doesn’t quite work.
The album’s best track is one that Haggard didn’t write. “Heaven Was A Drink Of Wine”, penned by the always reliable Sanger D. Shafer, finds Merle in therapy to overcome a drinking problem. Had the song been written a few years later, one could easily imagine Keith Whitley singing it.
As the album progresses, it becomes more and more apparent that Haggard was in the midst of a midlife crisis of sorts. He talks about loneliness and advancing age in “Footlights”, a drinking problem in “Heaven Was A Drink Of Wine”, and in “Driftwood” he is drifting through life without purpose. He finds that he can’t run away from his problems in “I Can’t Get Away” and in Red Lane’s “I Must Have Done Something Bad”, he’s been betrayed by a wife or girlfriend and thinks that it must be retribution for something he did in the past. He turns nostalgic with “Sing A Family Song” and holds out some hope that things will get better in the album’s closing track “Roses In The Winter”, which despite, being a very pretty song, doesn’t seem to be a good fit for Merle.
Whether it was his state of mind or the absence of Ken Nelson, Serving 190 Proof is somewhat less than the sum of its parts. Most of the songs are good, but as a collection it seems a bit lifeless. By most other artists’ standard, Serving 190 Proof would be considered stellar work, but while it is by no means a bad album, it fails to reach the high bar set by Haggard’s earlier work on Capitol. While it is not his best work, it is still worth a listen, and is easy to find on CD and as a digital download.
Grade: B
Merle Haggard released two albums in 1967, I’m A Lonesome Fugitive in March and Branded Man in August. Both were produced by Ken Nelson and appear to have been recorded concurrently at Capitol Recording Studios in Hollywood. Like his previous two LPs, the 1967 offerings broke with the day’s usual practice of building albums around one or two hit singles and cover versions of recent hits by other popular artists. Instead, Haggard’s albums consist primarily of original material written by the artist himself, occasionally co-written with Bonnie Owens, and a few select entries from other well-known songwriters including Tommy Collins, Hank Cochran and Liz and Casey Anderson.
The Andersons penned “The Fugitive” (also known as “I’m A Lonesome Fugitive”), which had been released the previous December. It is noteworthy not only because it became Haggard’s first #1 hit, but also because it was his first convict record, a theme he would revisit many times over the next 40 years. Inspired by the popular television series “The Fugitive” doesn’t reveal whether the antagonist is guilty or wrongly accused, which contrasts with Haggard’s later prison songs, in which the narrator is usually guilty and remorseful. The version on the current CD is an alternate take but isn’t significantly different from the better-known hit version. Initially reluctant to discuss his past transgressions, Merle was persuaded by Johnny Cash to face the issue head on rather than giving the tabloids the opportunity to do so. “Life In Prison”, in which the protagonist concludes that a life sentence is perhaps worse than execution, is perhaps his earliest self-penned effort about life behind bars. Although “The Fugitive” was the only single released from this set, many of the album’s other cuts were possible contenders. “Someone Told My Story”, with Bonnie Owens’ prominent and familiar harmony vocals, is a particular favorite of mine, as is “My House of Memories.” There are two covers on the album — a remake of his own “Skid Row” which had been his Tally Records debut a few years earlier, and Jimmie Rodgers “My Rough and Rowdy Ways”, which is only one of three tracks on the album in which Merle did not have a hand in writing (the other two are “Mary’s Mine” and the title track. The original album closed with the spirited “Mixed Up Mess Of A Heart”, which Merle wrote with Tommy Collins. The Buck Owens influence is readily apparent on this track. The current 2-for-1 release includes two bonus tracks: alternate tracks of “Life In Prison” and “Someone Told My Story”, which while nice to have, don’t add much value to the collection.
Branded Man, released five months after I’m A Lonesome Fugitive, is a stronger set than its predecessor. This time around Merle relied a little more on outside songwriters, with Tommy Collins contributing three entries, and co-writing a fourth with Merle. The great Hank Cochran wrote “Loneliness Is Eating Me Alive”. But the highlights of this album are the two singles, both penned by Haggard. “I Threw Away The Rose”, which was perhaps inspired by the 1962 film The Days Of Wine And Roses, was Merle’s follow-up hit to “The Fugitive”. Peaking at #2 in Billboard, it just missed becoming his second #1 hit. Instead, that honor went to the next single, the album’s title track, which topped the chart in September 1967. The semi-autobiographical number deals with an ex-convict’s unsuccessful attempts to wipe the slate clean and get on with his life.
Though it was never released as a single, “Somewhere Between”, co-written with Bonnie Owens, is a well-known album cut that has been covered many times by artists such as Suzy Bogguss and Keith Whitley, and is on my short list of favorite Haggard tunes. Tommy Collins’ “Don’t Get Married” is the best of the non-Haggard penned tunes, but Merle’s cover of the classic “Long Black Limousine” is surprisingly pedestrian and the weakest cut on the album. The album closes with two bonus tracks: alternate versions of “I Threw Away The Rose” and “Loneliness Is Eating Me Alive”. Both are quite different from the better-known versions. They sound as though they were recorded live in the studio, and I suspect that both are previously unreleased Tally recordings.
Because neither album was recorded in Nashville, many of the usual names are absent from the session musician credits, although the great Ralph Mooney plays steel guitar on both albums. Glen D. Hardin, who would later become well known through his association with Emmylou Harris, plays piano. Oh yeah, and some guy named Glen Campbell plays guitar.
This 2-for-1 release, available on CD and as a digital download, is excellent value and well worth adding to your collection.
This was the third of five straight #1′s for Keith Whitley between 1988-89. It was written by Sonny Curtis and Ron Hellard, and issued as the fifth single from Whitley’s landmark Don’t Close Your Eyes album.
Craig Campbell is a relatively new artist on the successful independent label Bigger Picture, helmed by famed producer Keith Stegall. He has a single rising up the country charts, but had managed to fly under my radar until a week or so ago, when C M Wilcox pointed out Craig’s song ‘You Probably Ain’t in a recent edition of Quotable Country over at Country California, his witty weekly take on the more notable or bizarre comments made relating to country music. That song appears on Craig’s self-titled debut album, which has just been released.
A lot of country fans seem to be getting tired of the seemingly unending assembly line of songs telling us how very country the singer is, often set to a notably un-country melody or production. Country radio, however, A lot of country fans seem to be getting tired of the seemingly unending assembly line of songs telling us how very country the singer is, often set to a notably un-country melody or production. Country radio is as keen on such fare as ever, but it looks as if Craig Campbell, Keith Stegall, and Michael White. writers of this song, share our frustration:
You can talk to me about tractors
Cowboy boots and pickup trucks
Old canepoles and dirt roads
And spit and skoal and a dixie cup
You can tell me (all a)bout your grandpa
And how he turned you on to Hank
If you gotta tell me how country you are
You probably ain’t
But if this initially seems to be a well-deserved sharp and well deserved little jab at the popular “I’m country” songs, in some ways, it is what it appears to disparage, when the old man in the bar who has voiced the comment adds:
He said, country is a way of life that’s almost gone
It’s about being honest and working hard
Looking someone in the eye and
Being who you say you are
I’m afraid I’m not convinced that everyone in rural areas is (or used to be) honest and hardworking, so although I still like the complete song, and love the chorus, it doesn’t really hold up lyrically for me as a whole. On the positive side, Craig has a fine voice, and at least this is a well written and genuinely country song.
And if Craig is critical of those posturing about country lifestyles, he does not eschew the subject himself. The likeable ‘Chillaxin’’ is not very ambitious, but has an attractive tune, and a lovely and appropriately relaxed feel, which could make it a summer hit. The next single, however, is reportedly, the rather dull ‘Fish’, which is rather like one of Brad Paisley’s lesser songs, trying to be amusing but falling short, and not even successful at the double entendre it tries for. Carson Chamberlain and Tim Nichols helped Craig write ‘That’s Music To Me’, with nods to Keith Whitley and Merle Haggard as well as the usual litany of high school football, family life, church on Sunday mornings and the Georgia scenery. It’s quite a good example of its kind, with another pleasing melody, and Craig sells the genuineness of the emotion underlying it, but it’s hardly groundbreaking lyrically:
Soaked in the whiskey and washed in the blood
That’s who I am and what I love
A hoe down fiddle, a little off key
An old hound dog howling
That’s music to me
The very perky ‘Makes You Wanna Sing’ (written by Craig with Rob Hatch and Lance Miller) glorifies the simple pleasures in life (and yes, rural ones), and the humming on the chorus gets irritating with repeat listens.
Others will have been introduced to Craig by way of his charming current single ‘Family Man’. This paints a realistic picture of a hard-pressed married man desperate to keep his temporary factory job to support his wife and kids, and is filled with genuine warmth and sincerity as he relates the various responsibilities of a father and shows how important his kids are to him. ‘My Little Cowboy’ (about striving to live up to his father’s belief in him, first as a child and then as struggling musician trying to support a wife and child of his own) is a little more heavy handed lyrically and offers a heavier vibe musically, which is less suited to Craig’s voice.
Trying to make ends meet in hard times also inspires the cheerful and very catchy mid-tempo response to a debt collector, ‘When I Get It’, which he wrote with Jason Matthews and Jim McCormick, although I found the na-na-nas in the chorus annoying.
One of the highlights is the interesting and nicely paced ‘I Bought It’, written by Craig with Philip Douglas and Dan Murphy. It starts out sweetly with a young couple just starting out in life together, with him buying a ring, the the mood sours with her infidelity and lies (which he also buys), and finally there is a little twist in the tale when he lies to her that he is willing to take her back.
Craig and/or his writing partners have a good ear for melody which is more consistent that their lyric writing, which is occasionally a little cliche’d. He co-wrote most of the songs, with only a couple from outside writers, one of which is provided by his producer. Keith Stegall wrote the seductive fiddle-led ‘All Night To Get There’ with Craig’s friend Lee Brice and Vicky McGehee. The only completely outside song is ‘That Going Away Look (About Her)’, written by Carson Chamberlain, Wade Kirby and Michael White, a well-written third-person account of a couple on the brink of separation, with a lovely mellow sound, which sounds like an outtake from Chamberlain’s protégé Easton Corbin.
Keith Stegall produces with his usual reliable light touch, offering sympathetic support for the young Georgia-born singer, whose voice is the real star here. His warm vocals with a lovely smooth tone are a delight to listen to, even on the less stellar material – rather like the aforementioned Corbin. Overall it’s a very likeable project and one showing great promise for the future. I certainly hope his career goes well and we hear more from him.
I am, incidentally, less than impressed by the packaging of the physical product. The CD liner notes are unfortunately almost entirely illegible thanks to being squeezed into a minuscule space to make room for a lot of pictures.
It’s quite a coincidence that just last week I wrote about “soundalike” artists. Little did I know that another was about to emerge. New Columbia artist Bradley Gaskin sounds very like Travis Tritt both in his general style and in his vocal inflections, although I think he has his own voice. On his MySpace he calls his music “Johnny Paycheck meets Keith Whitley”, and he is also influenced by Haggard and Jones – definitely a good basis.
He wrote the song himself with Vicky Walker, proving himself a fine songwriter as well as a great singer, and this is an extremely promising debut.
Opening a cappella, this is a very traditional broken-hearted honky-tonk ballad with some beef in the production. Gaskin is produced by John Rich, who discovered the Alabama-born singer when he won Rich’s Get Rich talent show, but Rich does a much better job than usual, providing a solid honky-tonk backing for Bradley’s rich baritone. The overall production is quite full at times, but it has light and shade, and Gaskin has the vocal power not to be overwhelmed. His expressive vocals ally that power with an emotionally convincing performance.
The lyrics offer a familiar picture of a heartbroken man hoping to kill the pain with a drink or two, but the song is very well put together, and the vocal delivery really sells the song. There’s just enough gloss to make it radio-friendly, in the vein of the early 90s and particularly the aforementioned Travis Tritt. I hope he can join Chris Young and Easton Corbin among the younger artists keeping country on country radio; he even has an advantage over them in his songwriting ability.
The label wasn’t actually planning to launch Bradley until May, but apparently he sang this song at the Country Radio Seminar in Nashville, brought the house down, and they decided to capitalize and have rush-released this to radio. Let’s hope it is as well received across the airwaves and launches a very talented artist to a successful career. I’ll certainly be keeping a keen eye out for more from this exciting new artist.
‘Ahm real glad you could meet me here,” drawled my companion for the night’s Kenny Rogers Christmas show. “Ah had about 10 minutes to get ready, and this is whut ah looked like when ah crawled outta the pile.” He went on to excuse the way he looked and thanked me again for meeting more than halfway at the Ashland Towne Center Mall. But he never made any excuse for his slants on the English language. Once, he told me I ‘talk like the people on T.V.’, but that was about all we ever said about the vast differences in our linguistics. What’s even more interesting is that he and I grew up less than 40 miles apart, myself in Portsmouth, Ohio, and he on the southern side of that imaginary Mason Dixon line that is the Ohio River in these parts, in Judds-country in Ashland, KY. Coincidentally, we were travelling even further into Appalachia that night to see Kenny Rogers and Linda Davis – all the way to Huntington, WV. (The wrong-turn parts of West Virginia make up none of my story here.)
I have an extended family on my mother’s side that live right here in the small state of Ohio – northern Ohioans from the big city of Cleveland, and they too, have a unique speech that separates them from us in the southern part of the state. Their speech is faster, peppered heavily with ‘ums’, and longer O’s. The population of southerners who took to the Rust Belt so long ago has seen their dialect generations removed. That doesn’t mean it isn’t alive and well down where it came from. Accents and their origins are a geek-hobby of mine, and these are what I see up close everyday – there are far more interesting examples outside my tri-state area.
Living right on the border of the Mason Dixon line is really a fascinating thing to watch. Kentucky being a commonwealth state allows for much looser laws regarding almost anything, and that readily breeds a yee-haw attitude, especially for outsiders just down for a visit. And it’s certainly interesting to start hitting seek on your car radio as you go south on U.S. 23 or I-75 from here. Country is still number one in those parts, even as we lose more stations in my market (2 gone in a year now). The geography quickly becomes one of an agricultural area in a hurry southbound as well. And, of course, these are just my immediate surroundings. The south is full of metropolitan places.
All those things are fun to watch, but my biggest thrill when I get to head south is U.S. 23 itself. As soon as I cross the Ohio River, it becomes Country Music Highway, with a designated artist for each stretch until you reach the next hometown junction. First up for me is Billy Ray Cyrus – he’s from Flatwoods, about 20 miles from here. Then we come to The Judds portion through Ashland, on through Ricky Skaggs and Loretta Lynn country. Lynn’s sister Crystal Gayle, Grand Ole Opry star Hylo Brown, Dwight Yoakam, and Patty Loveless round out the highway’s best parts. As you enter into the roughest of the coal-mining counties, Gary Stewart Highway takes you the rest of the way.
Signs along the way will point you to some landmark places in country music, including Van Lear and Butcher Holler. You can even stop by Loretta’s homeplace. Then head on to Pikeville, hometown to Loveless and Yoakam, and the place where Ricky Skaggs and a young Keith Whitley teamed up. Keith Whitley’s omission on the highway’s luminous roster is the one flaw in an excellent tribute to the wealth of talent from the area. If you ever get a chance to drive the 150 mile-stretch, be sure to stop in Paintsville at the Country Music Highway Museum and see Dot. She’s great.
I still want to head down to Montgomery and visit Hank Williams’ gravesite, and there are thousands of things I want to see and do in Texas. But I’m just as proud of the heritage from my own local area, even if those guys in Kentucky do speak a little differently.
Whenever Chris Young’s name comes up in conversation, the consensus is often that he is an exceptional vocalist who has yet to find songs worthy of his talent. While I’ve enjoyed most of his records so far, I have to concede that this point of view is not without justification, for while Young’s vocal chops put him in the same league as Haggard, Jones and Whitley, he hasn’t yet released a “Mama Tried”, “Grand Tour” or “Don’t Close Your Eyes”. He has, however, shown steady improvement with each release, and while “Tomorrow” doesn’t quite reach the lofty heights of those classics, it is his strongest single release to date.
The song is about a couple’s reluctance to go their separate ways despite knowing that their relationship is broken beyond repair. It’s a tried and true theme that we’ve heard countless times, in classics such as “For The Good Times”, “I’m Not Ready Yet”, “Someday When Things Are Good” and “Put It Off Until Tomorrow.” It’s hardly an original premise for a country song, yet it’s one that always seems to work, and “Tomorrow” is no exception.
Young sounds personally invested in the lyrics and makes the listener feel the couple’s angst and pain. His performance is emotional, yet not overwrought or bombastic like so many contemporary country records. The presence of the fiddle and steel will please traditionalists, while the slightly more prominent electric guitar riffs give the record enough of a contemporary edge to appeal to prevailing radio tastes. I wouldn’t be surprised if this turns out to be another #1 hit for the Tennessee native, and I am looking forward to listening to his new album, for which no release date has yet been announced.
Grade: A
“Tomorrow” doesn’t officially ship to radio until February 22nd, but in the meantime, you can listen to it here.
I restricted my top 10 singles list for the year to tracks which were formally released as singles, but a lot of the best music of the year was hidden away on albums. So to finish up our review of the year in country music, here are my favorite tracks from albums released this year. I’ve restricted the selection to one per artist (not counting duets), and I’ve excluded the albums which made it to my top 10 albums list to avoid too much duplication and to prevent the list being too long.
20. Trace Adkins – ‘Still Love You’ (Cowboy’s Back In Town)
Moving to Toby Keith’s label seems to have encouraged the talented but often artistically misguided Trace Adkins to give in to his worst instincts, but there is still some decent material on his latest album. This ballad swearing enduring love (written by love song specialist Jeff Bates with Robert Arthur and Kirk Roth) is a little heavily orchestrated, but has a great, understated vocal from one of the best voices around. It’s a shame the rest of the album wasn’t up to the same standard.
19. Gretchen Wilson – ‘I’m Only Human’ (I Got Your Country Right Here)
Gretchen has just scored an unexpected Grammy nomination for ‘I’d Love To Be Your Last’ from her self-released I Got Your Country Right Here, prompting general bewilderment from country fans online. But while that track isn’t bad, this song is rather better, a plaintive bar-room tale of a woman trying to resist the temptation of dalliance with a married man, which Gretchen wrote with Vicky McGehee, Dave Berg and Rivers Rutherford.
18. Jon Wolfe – ‘Play Me Something I Can Drink To’ (It All Happened In A Honky Tonk)
If you think Easton Corbin sounds like George Strait, you need to check out the Strait stylings of Jon Wolfe on his strong independent debut album. I particularly liked this classic country style bar room song (written by Kevin Brandt and Bobby Terry) about a guy seeking to get his broken heart temporarily cured by whiskey and a jukebox stocked with Hank and Jones.
17. Jamie Richards – ‘Half Drunk’ (Sideways)
A great song from a Texas-based artist about trying to get over an ex by drinking, but running out of money halfway through.
16. Miss Leslie – ‘Turn Around’ (Wrong Is What I Do Best)
A lovely steel-led heartbreak ballad written by honky tonker Miss Leslie herself, but sounding as though it could be a forgotten classic from the 60s.
15. Shawn Camp – ‘Clear As A Bell’ (1994)
This lovely song was my favorite from Shawn’s “lost” album which was resurrected from the Warner Bros vaults this year.
14. Zac Brown Band – ‘Martin’ (You Get What You Give)
Jamey Johnson personified a guitar in the title track of The Guitar Song, but Zac Brown sang a love song about one on their latest release. Charming and unusual.
13. Gary Allan – ‘No Regrets’ (Get Off On The Pain)
I’ve been disappointed by Gary’s musical direction over the past couple of albums, but the heartbreaking honesty of this touching song expressing his feelings about his late wife (which he wrote with the help of Jon Randall and Jaime Hanna) was a reminder of his excellent early work.
12. Jolie Holliday – ‘I’ll Try Anything’ (Lucky Enough)
A gorgeous cover of a sad song previously recorded by its co-writer Amber Dotson about struggling to cope with lost love. I can’t find a link for you to listen to the studio version, but here she is singing it live (after a nice version of ‘San Antonio Rose’. And as a bonus, here she is singing ‘Golden Ring’ live with Randy Travis.
11. Curly Putman – ‘Green Green Grass Of Home’ (Write ‘Em Sad – Sing ‘Em Lonesome)
The songwriter’s own version of his classic prisoner’s dream is as convincing as any version I’ve herd of this celebrated song.
10. Toby Keith – ‘Sundown‘ (Bullets In The Gun, deluxe version)
Toby is always a bit hit and miss for me, but this surprisingly restrained live version of the sultry folk-country classic is a definite hit.
9. Darin & Brooke Aldridge – ‘The Last Thing On His Mind’ (Darin & Brooke Aldridge)
I loved this husband and wife team’s sweet bluegrass album and this somber Easter song (written by Dennis K Duff) was the highlight for me.
8. Teea Goans – ‘I Don’t Do Bridges Anymore’ (The Way I Remember It)
Teea Goans’ retro independent release featured this lovely classic-styled ballad, written by Jim McBride, Don Poythress and Jerry Salley. Her voice is sweet but not that distinctive, but this breakup song is definitely worth hearing.
7. Catherine Britt – ‘Sweet Emmylou’ (Catherine Britt)
The Australian singer’s latest album was a bit hit and miss for me, but there were some very strong moments, including Catherine’s lovely version of her tribute to the healing power of the music of Emmylou Harris, which she wrote some years ago with Rory Feek. It has been released as a single in Australia.
6. Bill Anderson – ‘The Songwriters’ (Songwriter)
My favorite comic song of the year is the legendary Bill Anderson’s celebration (more or less) of songwriters’ lives, complete with the protagonist’s mother’s preference for a career as drug dealer for her son. Bill isn’t much of a singer, but this song (co-written with Gordie Sampson)is irresistible.
5. Randy Kohrs – ‘Die On The Vine’ (Quicksand)
One of the first songs to grab my attention this year was this lovely song warning a son against taking refuges from trouble in alcohol, written by famed dobro player and songwriter Randy Kohrs with Dennis Goodwin.
4. James Dupre – ‘Ring On The Bar’ (It’s All Happening)
I loved this sensitively sung low-key mid-tempo Byron Hill/Brent Baxter song about a man trying to figure out what happened to his marriage from youtube discovery James’s independent debut album, produced by Kyle Lehning.
3. Lee Ann Womack – ‘Liars Lie’ (Country Strong soundtrack)
I’m beginning to get impatient for a new album from Lee Ann, and this soundtrack cut has really whetted my appetite. This excellent song, written by Sally Barris, Morgane Hayes and Liz Rose, and the combination of Lee Ann’s beautiful vocals and the harmony from Charlie Pate, a pure country production (thanks to Lee Ann’s husband Frank Liddell and Chuck Ainlay), and a fine song make this a sheer delight.
2. Chris Young – ‘Chiseled In Stone’ (Voices EP)
Song for song, this young neotraditionalist’s three song EP of covers was the most impressive release of the year, allowing Chris to exercise his outstanding baritone voice on really top quality material – something sadly missing on his two full length albums. This Vern Gosdin song was my favorite of the three, but his takes on Keith Whitley’s ‘I’m Over You’ and John Anderson’s ‘Swingin’ were also great.
1. Alan Jackson ft Lee Ann Womack – ‘Til The End’ (Freight Train)
This particular treasure is not very well hidden, as although it hasn’t been released as a single it gained sufficient attention to get a well-deserved nomination as Musical Event of the Year at the recent CMA awards. This exquisite reading of another Vern Gosdin classic was by far the best thing on Alan’s latest (and possibly last) album for Arista.
Do you have any special favorite album tracks from this year which haven’t gained the attention they deserve?
While great mainstream releases have been a little thin on the ground, there’s been some good music released if you look around, on both major and minor labels. Here are my favorite albums of the year (with links to fuller reviews):
The best Texas country album of the year by a solo male vocalist. In the opening track Aaron talks about “seldom being heard on your radio”, but this is just the sort of music which ought to be at the heart of the mainstream.
Not quite everything gelled for me on Dierks’s bluegrass-influenced project, but it was a brave attempt at artistic growth and one of the most ambitious and adventurous records of the year. He was rewarded with three CMA nominations, more airplay than bluegrass can usually command, and respectable sales figures.
The legend returns with his best work in years. His voice has suffered the ravages of age, but his songwriting is still inspired, with ten of the twelve tracks consisting of solo Haggard compositions which stand comparison with his past repertoire. Highlights include the reflection on the changes brought by time, ‘I’ve Seen It Go Away’, which opens and sets the tone for the album.
A delightful set of covers of classic country duets by the excellent Amber Digby with her producer Justin Trevino recall the best of country music’s proud duet tradition.
A really charming set of folk-country songs with pretty tunes mostly penned by the singer. The highlight is the Louvin Brothers style ‘Are You Stringing Me Along’, but it’s all worth hearing.
Jamey’s magisterial double album opens with his cover of a previously unrecorded Keith Whitley song, ‘Lonely At The Top’, contrasting the miseries of fame with the greater problems of those less successful. It is chock full of songs about broken hearts, an unsentimental look at poverty (‘Poor Man Blues’, ‘Can’t Cash My Checks’), God (‘I Remember You’, ‘My Way To You’), country life, and country music itself, plus a song for Jamey’s little girl (‘Baby Don’t Cry’). Alongside the Whitley song are covers of Vern Gosdin’s ‘Set ‘Em Up Joe’, the Kris Kristofferson-penned Ray Price classic ‘For The Good Times’, and a malevolent take on ‘Mental Revenge’ (written by Mel Tillis but best known by Waylon Jennings), and legendary songwriter Bill Anderson duets with Jamey on the title track. This is not as dark as Jamey’s masterpiece That Lonesome Song, and I didn’t feel the songs were quite up to that standard. With the whole more than the sum of its parts, this is still a deeper and more challenging record than almost everything else cut in Nashville these days. Jamey has managed to sell pretty solid numbers despite the lack of a real radio hit so far this time around.
This record was something of a revelation to me. I’ve never really got Marty Stuart’s music before, respecting his musicianship and admiring his approach, but never really loving the results. At last, this statement of what country music should be grabbed me from the first vibrant notes of opener ‘Branded’, in a set which is full of fire and energy. The backing is superb (with a handful of instrumentals including a steel guitar centered performance of ‘Crazy Arms’ by its writer Ralph Mooney). Marty’s vocals are truly heartfelt on the ballads and forceful on the up-tempo material, with wife Connie Smith duetting with him on a love song, and the material is excellent. Favorite tracks include the somber co-write with the dying Johnny Cash, ‘Hangman’.
Our August Spotlight Artist Joe’s long-awaited bluegrass album was well worth the wait. His voice sounds as good as ever and is ideally suited to the high lonesome sound, the production and musicians were spot-on, and the songs were great.
I loved their debut, and their follow-up has all the charm of the original. Joey’s beautiful voice is still front and center, but Rory gets a bigger profile than previously, with the odd solo line and one lead vocal on his touching tribute to his father, ‘My Old Man’. Carl Jackson’s lovely clean production is the perfect match. Songs range from the witty sideswipe at the music industry which provides the title track to a set of sincere love songs, with a warning to a potentially erring husband (‘God Help My Man’), some western swing and country gospel along the way. This is one of those albums where you believe every word is true.
Dierks Bentley and Joe Diffie’s respective takes on bluegrass got most of the headlines this year, and both won places in my personal top 10. But for my money, the best of the lot was the underrated Ken Mellons with this superb album with character filled, emotional vocals, excellent material and outstanding bluegrass picking. It was hard to put my top five in order, but in the end this one just edged the rest. If you haven’t heard it, and like bluegrass as well as country, it really is an essential purchase.
Trisha’s second album, released in 1992, is still my favorite. Garth Fundis’s production is sympathetic, with a number of special guests who support the record without overwhelming it. Trisha, who I regard as one of the most naturally gifted vocalists in country music and a subtle and tasteful interpreter of emotion, was at the peak of her vocal powers and interpretative ability, and the song selection was excellent.
The hypnotically bluesy lead single ‘The Wrong Side of Memphis’ (written by Gary Harrison and Matraca Berg) was a big hit, peaking at #5, with a semi-autobiographical tale of a young singer on her way to Nashville. The instrumentation is punchy without being over-produced, with harmony vocalists including Raul Malo, whose Mavericks’ bandmate Robert Reynolds was shortly to become Trisha’s second husband. It is atypical of the album as a whole, which is focussed on failed and failing relationships, a theme perhaps resulting from Trisha’s own recent divorce from her first husband.
Harrison also co-wrote (with Tim Mensy) ‘Nearest Distant Shore’, a beautiful ballad addressed empathetically to a friend (or perhaps to the protagonist’s inner self) trapped in a destructive relationship, and advising:
You vowed you would not fail
But this ain’t success
It’s a living hell
There’s nothing left to lose
You’re already alone
Swim to the nearest distant shore
There’s only so much a heart can endure
You gave it your best
Forgive yourself
You can’t hold on anymore
It’s not as far as it might seem
Now it’s time to let go of old dreams
Every heart for itself
Swim to the nearest distant shore
Trisha perfectly conveys the intensity of the emotions here without ever seeming melodramatic, supported by Garth Brooks’ harmony.
The second single, and the album’s biggest hit, adhered to the general mood, while being less obviously personal. The exquisitely sung ‘Walkaway Joe’, featuring a harmony vocal from former Eagle Don Henley, tells the cautionary tale of a young girl who makes a catastrophic choice of boyfriend (“the wrong kind of paradise”). Ignoring her mother’s words of warning, she finds out the hard way when he robs a gas station and then abandons her. It peaked at #2 on Billboard, making it the album’s biggest hit, and was nominated for a Grammy.
Arguably, the biggest star in country music today, at least in sheer commercial terms, is Taylor Swift. She controversially swept the board at last year’s CMA award ceremony, but has been overlooked in most categories this year. Her undeniable appeal to young girls has led to suggestions that as her fans grow up, they will outgrow Taylor, and that her current stratospheric career may not be sustained at the same level, while others have suggested that she may mature as a songwriter and actually expand her fan base. Fans laud her songwriting (even when they admit her vocal shortcomings), particularly given her youth, implying she will improve further as she gets older. Sales figures for her upcoming third album are likely to be scrutinised closely. A look back at other teenage country stars is not encouraging.
The most famous teenage country stars of the past are LeAnn Rimes and Tanya Tucker, both of whom became stars at the age of 13, but neither of them had an easy road to maintaining that success. Tanya’s teenage stardom fizzled out after she moved to a sexier image and pop material, and endured a few years in the wilderness before making her comeback in the mid 80s. The jury is still out on LeAnn; her initial hit with ‘Blue’ was very much in the vein of Patsy Cline, for whom the song had originally been intended, but since then she has seemed uncertain of her identity as an artist. One cannot help wondering if that was because her initial career path was influenced by her parents. Like Tanya, she chased the pop crossover market, with more success, but the pop world is a fickle one, and in 2005, she was back in country music with some accomplished pop-country. Her emotional comeback hit ‘Probably Wouldn’t Be This way’ was a very fine record, but overall I didn’t feel she had really developed as an artist as much as I would have hoped considering how phenomenal she was as a child. She was not able to sustain this second blast, and the recent unfavourable publicity relating to her private life is unlikely to help. Her upcoming covers album may be produced by Vince Gill, but what we’ve heard from it so far does not inspire. Unlike Taylor Swift, however, LeAnn and Tanya were not marketed to their peers, and neither wrote songs as teenagers. Rather, both were presented as girls with voices mature beyond their years, and Tanya in particular recorded very adult material right from the start.
Following the initial success of LeAnn Rimes, the late 90s saw other labels jumping on the bandwagon and signing big-voiced teenagers. The 15-year-old Lila McCann scored the biggest selling debut album of 1997 and a #3 hit in ‘I Wanna Fall In Love’. Hers was another flash in the pan, as she only had one more top 10 hit. Her bright pop-country records have not worn particularly well, and an attempt at a comeback as an adult in the mid 2000s met with general indifference. The very similar Jessica Andrews had an almost identical career trajectory: her first hit at 15, in 1999, a solitary #1 the following year, with radio interest subsequently diminishing, and a comeback attempt which soon fizzled out. These girls were initial beneficiaries and longterm casualties of the Nashville tendency to copy the latest trend. Both had good voices, but not very distinctive ones, and their youth made their vocal ability and longterm potential seem more impressive than perhaps it really was.
What impresses in a teenager does not necessarily translate into exceptional adult ability. Further, many of these young artists have not really developed a strong sense of themselves as an artist, tending to adopt the latest trend. The roots of their artistry often seem to run rather shallow, and there is usually (and inevitably) a lack of maturity. Wynonna was only a teenager when The Judds burst onto the scene, but it seems clear that although Wynonna’s voice provided the essence of their music, their musical direction was largely directed by Naomi. Looking at some of Wynonna’s later solo music, one wonders if left to her own devices, she would have picked country music as the market place for her undeniable talent.
Many young artists are signed to development deals which do not pan out, leaving them high and dry a year or two down the line. Examples of promising young artists chewed up by the system include Ashley Monroe, whose excellent Satisfied finally won a digital-only release last year after years on the shelf; she has now signed to the LA branch of Warner Brothers. Her friend the Australian Catherine Britt never saw her superb RCA album released in the US at all. Both girls were lucky to some degree in that their singles had made some critical waves, and they have been able to continue musical careers, even if mainstream country stardom has so far escaped them. A worse fate lies in wait for the many who sign to a major label, but never seem to release a thing. I remember some years back, there was some buzz surrounding a then-14 year old named Alexis who was signed to Warner Brothers and was supposedly very talented. If you’ve never heard of her, that’s because no records were ever released, and she was eventually dropped by the label. Might artists like this (particularly one who should still be in school) be better served if they waited to sign a record deal until they were ready to make a record? Not everyone who wants to become a star is going to succeed, and the excitement of apparently achieving that dream must surely derail thoughts of a backup plan.
Another of today’s superstars, Carrie Underwood, tried and failed to get a deal in Nashville as a 15-year-old, and in the long run that failure probably did her a favour, giving her a free run when she auditioned for American Idol. Fellow Idol alumna Kristy Lee Cook, who did sign to Arista at 17, saw no discernible benefit from this, only to have her second deal with the same label (post-Idol) fizzle out after a rush-released album and some rather half-hearted promotion.
But could this be such an artist’s only chance anyway? Billy Gilman’s career was one which could not wait on maturity because it was based on his unbroken child’s treble. A modest success as a 12-year-old has not translated into a career as an adult. Taylor Swift’s longterm career trajectory is as yet unclear, but so far her success has been built on her appeal to girls her own age and younger; delaying the onset of her career might have helped her hone her often derided performance skills, but she would have lost that USP – the insight into the emotional lives of high school age girls.
One of the artists we are spotlighting this month, Ashton Shepherd was signed to MCA at 20 with a songbook of material she had composed in her teens. In her case, her youth was balanced by the life experience which came with early marriage and motherhood. She was lucky in that her debut album was released within a year, with label boss Luke Lewis saying then that they had not delayed, in order to capture her raw talent before she got sucked into the system. However, that meant that while the album she released showed a great deal of promise, it was also evident that there was room for improvement.
It is mainly females who seem to be victims of this trend, with male singers rarely being spotted before they hit their 20s. One exception is Blaine Larsen, who emerged at just 18 with a mature voice and material which spanned the age appropriate (‘My High School’, and the teen suicide-themed ‘How Do You Get That Lonely’) and songs clearly designed for someone rather older (‘Teaching Me How To Love You’), which however well sung were not entirely convincingly from such a young man. He didn’t really click with radio and is currently going the indie route, with a new album expected this year. It is unclear whether he will have the chance of a comeback, or if his big chance as a teenager was his one and only chance at making it big.
Instrumental musical prodigies run counter to this to a degree. Ricky Skaggs, Keith Whitley and Marty Stuart were all playing bluegrass professionally as teenagers, but only became country stars in their own rights years later. Alison Krauss was recording in her teens but although she sang on her records, she was promoted mainly as a fiddle prodigy. Indeed, those early vocal efforts barely hint at the unique vocal talents she developed as an adult.
Sometime your first shot at success is the only chance you’ll ever get. The public’s first impression may well endure, and an artist whose juvenilia becomes the best-selling work of their career, may never achieve what might have been.
Do you think a young singer should take the first shot at realizing their dreams, or wait until they have honed their craft?
Back In The Swing of Things was originally released in 1998 as The Voice. It was repackaged and released under its new title in 2004. Since Gosdin was long out of the spotlight by then, the album didn’t produce any singles and failed to chart. It would also mark his final album release as he passed away in 2009.
