Country music from a fan's point of view since 2008
For many years my love for country music was quite an isolated one, as I know very few people in my daily life who even like it. In 2008 I started to read The 9513, an excellent country music blog, and began chatting to other fans on the associated forum. One of the other members, J. R. Journey, invited me and two others, Razor X and Erik, to join him on a brand new blog at the beginning of 2009. That blog has been an enormous part of my life for the past ten years. The writing team has changed a bit over that time, currently consisting of myself, Jonathan Pappalardo and Paul Dennis who was previously a contributor of The 9513). One of the things which I was struck by when we started was how generous and welcoming other country music bloggers were.
Sadly, our time has coincided with the decline of real country music as a viable commercial genre, with the major labels putting out pop and rock music disguised as country, and ‘country’ radio having effectively been taken over by stealth. We have done our best to seek out what good music is still being made – and it is out there, plus delving into allied genres like bluegrass. Our weekly chart feature shows the contrast between the hits of years past and those of today all too graphically.
In the last couple of years it has become harder for all of us to find the time to contribute, and with regret we have decided that the time has come to call it a day. We would not have made it this far without you, the loyal readers. Not many of you comment, but we know you have kept on reading and, hopefully, enjoying our contributions. We intend to leave the blog up, so you still have the chance to revisit old posts, but there will be no new content after today.
I hope we have reminded you of, and introduced you to, some great music, through our selection of Spotlight Artists, new music reviews and classic rewind video clips over the past ten and a half years. We have produced over 7000 posts, and most of you read the blog scrolling down the main page. Over the past decade, the post most specifically searched-for was one of Paul Dennis’s series of Favorite songs of the 1980s. We will miss writing for you all, and hope you don’t miss us too much.
Although the McCarters’ debut album had brought them some success, with top 10 hits, Warner Brothers thought they would do better if they modernised their sound a bit. They also decided that since Jennifer was very clearly the star of the group, she should get higher billing, and renamed the group Jennifer McCarter and the McCarters.
The first single from their second album Better Be Home Soon, produced by Paul Worley and Ed Seay, was ‘Up And Gone’, a sprightly up-tempo tune which was their third and last top 10 hit, peaking at #9. It was written by Verlon Thompson and Bill Caswell. The same writing team provided the next single, ‘Quit While I’m Behind’, which reached #26. It is another entertaining song, about deciding to dump a rubbish boyfriend who is cheating on her. ‘Betcha Gonna Love Me’, written by Caswell with Don Singleton, is in similar vein musically.
The title track is a ballad which, oddly, is a cover of a song by Australian rock band Crowded House. Jennifer’s vocal is lovely, but radio was not receptive when it was released as the third single.
Also a flop was the last single, ‘Shot Full Of Love’. This song, written by Bob McDill, was recorded numerous times by artists including Don Williams, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Juice Newton, Nicolette Larson, Chris LeDoux and Billy Ray Cyrus, but has never been a hit. It is about a player with a past who is transformed by discovering true love, and perhaps worked a bit better for a male artist, but is beautifully sung here:
Once I had a heart cold as ice
Love to me was only for fun
I made the mark for each broken heart
Like notches on the butt of a gunOnce I had a trick up my sleeve
And a reputation all over town
I was heartless and cold wherever I go
And I shut down every young boy I foundYes, I used to be a moonlight bandit
I used to be a heartbreak kid
Then I met you and the next thing I knew
There I was
Oh, shot full of loveWho’d have thought that someone like you
Could take a desperado like me
But oh, here I am
I’m as meek as a lamb
With my bleeding heart there at your feet
Sandy Emory’s song ‘I Haven’t Got A Prayer’ is a beautiful ballad with some pretty mandolin. ‘Mountain Memories’ is a charming throwback to the sounds of their first album.
‘Papa Sita’ is a sweet Mexican-flavored song written by Hugh Moffatt.
‘Slow Country Dance’ is a gorgeous waltz written by Mary Chapin Carpenter, who also recorded it:
Down at the bar a woman tells stories
Batting her eyes to someone not there
Her glass is half full (or maybe half empty)
Like the jokes told about her
When they think she don’t hear
Now the perfume is cheap and the makeup is careless
And the dress out of fashion for a woman her age
But she don’t give a damn for those who would cherish
A much lighter step or a much younger face
And love’s never easy or ever as true
When the changing of partners is no longer new
You lead with your heart, closing your eyes
And dance just to dance in three quarter time
The closing ‘I Don’t Wanna Cry Anymore’ is a great upbeat song written by Nancy Montgomery offering hope for the future.
This is not as good an album as the sisters’ debt, but it is still very good, and I would recommend it.
Grade: A
Randy Travis was the first artist I fell in love musically, and one who saved country music in the second half of the 1980s from declining into pop-influenced irrelevance.
Randy’s new autobiography take us briskly through his childhood, blighted by a father who was an alcoholic bully, sometimes violent towards his wife and children, his youthful off-the-rails behaviour, and his joining forces with Lib Hatcher, the married mid-30s club owner who took charge of him and his career when he was barely 17. He admits he was sleeping with her when she was his court-appointed legal guardian when he was just 17 – we would certainly be calling this an abusive relationship if the genders were reversed, with no question. And that doesn’t even take into account the way Randy eventually discovered (post-divorce) just how badly she had been taking advantage of their relationship financially.
After they moved to Nashville Little Jimmy Dickens, a customer at the Nashville Palace, spotted his talent and gave him a chance to sing on the Opry. Ralph Emery was another early supporter. The young Randy, with only an eighth grade education, and not a very committed one at that, was rather naïve, signing anything Lib told him to. He comes across as very modest concerning his remarkable talent.
There is a lot of interesting detail both on Randy’s recordings and his touring. He comes across as a very nice, genuine person but not a very strong character, easily guided by his long term partner, who was in many respects the driver of his career. As we see his catapulting into stardom, it is clear that Lib Hatcher took advantage of Travis, viewing his success as her own. At times she undermined him, both controlling him by convincing everyone he had a number of allergies (he didn’t), and arguing with business contacts. On one occasion she had something close to a standup fight with George Jones’s wife Nancy, the latter coming off better. Randy wasn’t even allowed his own phone.
He did not think about breaking away until Lib’s attentions were distracted by another young man she could control, a young Irish pop singer. He found support from an old friend whose marriage was also on the rocks, and this blossomed into love. It was only after Randy filed for divorce that he began to see how much Lib had been taking advantage of his success financially. However, the divorce also led him into excessive drinking and things soon spiralled out of control, as we all remember from the lurid newspaper reports of public nudity while in a drunken fugue. Kyle Lehning and George Jones both tried to tell Randy he was drinking too much. When George Jones tells you you have a drinking problem – you really, really do.
The book is very well written, with the help of Ken Abraham. Randy is frank about his failings, accepting some responsibility for letting Lib control him, and acknowledging that he handled the new relationship with Mary a little irresponsibly at its outset. There is a bit too much medical detail following the stroke; while Randy appears to want to dispel thoughts that it was due to the drink problem, the level of detail is boring for the non-medical professional.
We end with details of Randy’s continuing recovery, and his gratitude for the support of fellow artists, with an element of redemption as he has mended some bridges burnt by Lib in earlier years. There are a couple of albums’ worth of unreleased recordings which may be released in due course, and my bet (given financial concerns set out in the book) is that this will be sooner rather than later; recent single ‘One In A Row’ is clearly one of these tracks.
This book is enlightening in many ways, and well worth reading.
Grade: A
What was to prove to be the girls’ final secular album was released in 1992.
‘What’ll You Do About Me’ is a vivacious up-tempo song written by Denis Linde. It had been recorded by a number of artists before, most notably Randy Travis on his best selling Always And Forever album, and as an early single for Steve Earle, but had not been a hit when the Forester Sisters tried it as the lead single for this album. Their version is entertaining but feels a little lightweight, and it was largely ignored by country radio. The song was revived a few years later to become a hit at last for Doug Supernaw, who got it to #16.
The title track was the only other single, although again it had limited success. Written by Dave Allen and Tim Bays, it is a rather contemporary jazzy pop tune with little to do with country music, but one with a lot of individuality as the newly single protagonist embarks on dating again. I could imagine this song doing well if someone like Shania Twain had recorded it a few years later. While not to my taste musically, it is well performed and the lyric is nicely observed.
Another up-tempo track with radio potential was ‘Show Me A Woman’, written by the legendary ‘Doodle’ Owens and Doug Johnson. It was later covered by Joe Diffie. The Foresters’ version is rattled out very fast:
Show me a woman who left a man
And I’ll show you a man with a drink in his hand
Doing all he can to survive
I’ll show you a man
You better not let drive
‘Redneck Romeo’ (written by Craig Wiseman and Dave Gibson and later covered by Confederate Railroad) is a tongue in cheek portrait of a good old boy looking for love:
He’s got a hundred keys hangin’ off his jeans
He knows they fit somethin’
But he don’t know what
He’s no cheap date
Spend his whole paycheck
Buyin’ drinks and playin’ that jukebox
Out on the floor he ain’t no square
He’s a romancin’ slow dancin’ Fred Astaire
The Caribbean-tinged story song ‘Wanda’ was written by K T Oslin and Rory Michael Bourke, and is about a women getting over a breakup by going on vacation.
As they often did, the girls included an old pop standard, in the shape of ‘I Only Have Eyes For You’.
Much more to my taste is ‘Another Shoulder At The Wheel’, a lovely ballad written by Gary Burr and John Jarrard which is the best track on the album. ‘Help Me Get Over You’, written by Lisa Angelle and Walt Aldridge is another ballad, delicately sad. ‘Their Hearts Are Dancing’, written by Tony Haselden, is a sweet story of an elderly couple whose love has endured. ‘She Makes It Look Easy’ is an admiring, empathetic portrait of a single mom’s life.
This is perhaps my least favorite Forester Sisters album personally, but there are some attractive ballad and the rest is undoubtedly fun, and well done for what it is.
Grade: B
The Forester Sisters grew up singing in church, and as their career progressed, they wanted to share their faith with their fans. In 1988 they released a side project double album of hymns entitled Family Faith on Heartland Music, and the following year came All I Need on their main label Warner Brothers.
There was even an official single, ‘Love Will’, written by Don Pfrimmer and Byron Gallimore. This is a really sweet idealistic song backed with a string arrangement. It had in fact appeared on their previous album, Sincerely.
Nothing can be everlasting
Or send an Iron Curtain crashing
But love will…Love will not forsake you on the last day that you live
‘Cause you can take it with you when you go…I don’t wanna be there if we all wake up too late
Love’s the only weapon that is strong enough for hate
The title track is a mellow ballad which could be read as a secular love song, but in the context of this album is clearly directed at God. It was written by Steve Bogard and Rick Giles.
The bright and airy ‘Still In The Spirit’ was written by John Scott Sherrill and Thomas Cain.
Christian Contemporary songwriter (and later an artist in that genre himself) Chris Rice wrote ‘Already There’, a beautiful tender ballad about heaven.
‘This Old House’ is not the Stuart Hamblen classic but a pleasant mid-paced song about a real home, written by Greg Davis and John Randall Dennis.
‘Peace Within’ is a Christian country standard, written by Dickey Lee, Allen Reynolds and Susan Taylor. The girls had previously released their delightful version of this song on their Family Faith album, together with gospel favorite ‘Precious Memories’ and the uplifting hymn ‘Love Lifted Me’. Also repeated is a gorgeous soulful reading of ‘Amazing Grace’, performed as a duet with Larnelle Harris, a Southern gospel singer with a rich voice.
The album closes with the traditional ‘Motherless Child’, performed as an ethereal accappella tune.
Some of the production is a bit dated now, but it is not unpleasant. The girls are in great voice and this is an excellent religious album with some country elements.
Grade: A-
My Kind of Country 