Country music from a fan's point of view since 2008
Ty England released his third album in the fall of 2000. The record, his first and only on Capitol Nashville, was produced by Garth Brooks. The album spawned three singles, none of which even made a dent on the charts. Highways & Dance Halls found England recording as Tyler England for the first time.
The mid-paced “Too Many Highways” and similarly mid-tempo “I’d Rather Have Nothing” both failed to chart. They were sandwiched between “I Drove Her to Dallas,” which bottomed out at #53. The middle single, the only true ballad of the group, was the best of the bunch.
The album includes a pair of songs written by Bruce Robison. “She Don’t Care About Me” has an engaging melody and nice traditional production. The other one is “Traveling Soldier,” which of course was made famous by Dixie Chicks three or so years later. England’s version is very good, but I didn’t care for the intrusive background singer on the chorus.
Three of the album’s songs would also appear on Brooks’ own The Lost Sessions in 2005. “My Baby No Está Aquí No More” has wonderful production but a hideous rhyme scheme. The other two were the aforementioned “She Don’t Care About Me” and “I’d Rather Have Nothing.”
“Collect From Wichita” is a pleasant and “I Knew I Loved You” is engaging. “Blame It On Mexico” is a cover of the George Strait song from 1981. England closes out the album by reprising “Should’ve Asked Her Faster” in collaboration with Steve Wariner.
Highways & Dance Halls is a very good album with a strong sense of song and wonderfully traditional production from Brooks. The weak link here is England, who lacks the personality vocally to elevate these songs and create worthy moments. He’s a wonderful singer, which he more than proved on his RCA releases, but everything here is too clean, neat and precise.
Grade: B+
We were all saddened here at MKOC by the sad news of the premature death of Daryle Singletary. We’d never covered him as one of our Spotlight Artists because he had a relatively small discography, and had reviewed his more recent releases independently. However, we have decided to combine a look back at his earlier career with two other artists who also emerged the same year, 1995. This was after the neotraditional revival had begun to subside, and none of our three choices had as long a period of commercial success as they deserved.
Daryle Singletary was born in Cairo, Georgia, in 1971. Blessed with a classic country voice, a rich, deep baritone, he began singing in his youth, and moved to Nashville while still in his teens. Having the kind of voice which could make any song sound better, he soon found work singing demos for songwriters. It seems that some of those demos are currently in the hands of an opportunistic label which released a single to capitalize on the publicity following Daryle’s death, but has been forced to withdraw it.
One of those demos, ‘An Old Pair Of Shoes’, was submitted to Randy Travis, who was seeking new material. Randy was impressed not only by the song, which he duly had a minor hit with, but by the singer. He became a mentor to the newcomer, helping him get a deal with Giant Records and co-producing Daryle’s debut album in 1995.
That album resulted in one big hit, the #2 peaking ‘I Let Her Lie’, and Daryle followed it up with a few more top 5 hits as well as some less successful singles. However, he did not sell enough records, and after three albums he moved on from Giant to a series of independent labels. Although he was no longer a real commercial prospect, the music itself was better than ever as he matured as an artist. He was something of a standard bearer for traditional country music in the new millennium.
His most recent album was a superb collection of duets with Rhonda Vincent. His tragic death has robbed us all of many years of great music.
Wade Hayes is an excellent partner for this retrospective, as he too is a traditional leaning artist whose period of success was far too short, although he has a naturally plaintive voice made for country music. Wade was born in 1969 in Oklahoma, where his father had a country band, and he grew up playing guitar and mandolin. He moved to Nashville in 1991 after dropping out of college, and secured a job as Johnny Lee’s guitarist. He also began writing songs and singing demos. His break came through songwriter Chick Rains, who helped him sign with Columbia in 1994.
He was an immediate success, with his debut single ‘Old Enough To Know Better’ topping the charts in 1995. However, after an initial flurry of hits he was unable to maintain his momentum, and after three albums moved to Monument in 2000. This failed to revive his fortunes. He then teamed up with Alan Jackson’s fiddle player Mark McClurg to form a short-lived duo named McHayes, but their sole single failed to catch attention.
After a spell in Randy Owen’s band, Wade returned to making his own music at the end of the 2000s, self-releasing a new album. His career was then further stalled by serious health issues. He fought off two bouts of cancer which were thought by his doctors to be terminal, and is now active again.
Our third artist is Ty England. Gary Tyler England was born in Oklahoma in 1963. He was Garth Brooks’ college room mate, and when Garth got his Capitol record deal Ty joined his road band. In 1995 Ty got his own solo deal with RCA, and a big hit with ‘Should’ve Asked Her Faster’. He later moved to his old boss’s label and was rebilled as Tyler England. However, his post-major label career was less notable than that of our other spotlight artists this month. His one self-released album was not very good, and he is no longer involved in the music business.
We hope you enjoy this retrospective look at three artists who were all regarded as the next big thing 23 years ago.
My Kind of Country 