Tag Archives: Country

Or, The Whale: Or, The Whale

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Superb rock, country, folk and soul from San Francisco

Why isn’t this band famous? They combine the best elements of West Coast ‘60s rock pioneers (Airplane, Dead, Springfield and Grape), UK folk (Fairport Convention, et al.), and the indie roots view of music as border-free. Alex Robins and Lindsay Garfield’s harmonies on “Rusty Gold” brings to mind Slick, Kantner and Balin, while the plaintive opening lyric (“My dog died and it broke my heart / letting go is the hardest part”) threatens to renew the tears once shed for Henry Gross’ “Shannon.” Here the sorrow is more philosophical than purely sentimental, and the chorus gears up to the anthemic feel of the Airplane’s “Crown of Creation.” The band’s tagline, “voices everywhere,” is a brag fulfilled, as the studied tempos provide opportunity to deeply explore duet and harmony singing as multiple singers bend and stretch the lyrics in vocal textures that complement and contrast. Even Tim Marcus’ pedal steel adds emotional texture to the words with its instrumental voice. The band mixes rock, country, folk and soul, but not all at once, letting one style lead and others tint the songs with subtle colors that create a somber mood. You can pick out influences, such as the Gram/Emmylou (or Phil/Don) vibe of “Count the Stars,” the Neil Young riffs, or the title nod of “Black Rabbit,” but the band never loses itself in nostalgic reverie. Returning to the question of the band’s lack of worldwide acclaim, maybe it’s due to their oddly punctuated name, because it’s certainly not a lack of great music. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Or, The Whale’s Home Page
Or, The Wale’s MySpace Page

Roy Clark: The Last Word in Jesus is Us

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Reissue of Clark’s 1981 album of gospel and country faith

Roy Clark’s worn a number of hats during his career. He’s been an ace guitar and banjo picker, a national television star (both on Hee-Haw and as a guest host for Johnny Carson), a country and pop hit maker, a pioneer in the Branson theater scene, and a member of both the Grand Ole Opry and the Country Music Hall of Fame. Lesser known is his work in singing gospel and songs of faith. His 1971 release The Magnificent Sanctuary Band cracked the Top 40, and though he dropped the occasional album track like “Life’s Railway to Heaven” and “Dear God,” it was ten more years before he released a second new album of praise, 1981’s The Last Word in Jesus is Us.

Varese new CD collects all ten tracks of the 1981 album and adds three from the 1971 release. The song list combines traditional hymns (“Just a Closer Walk with Thee,” “Onward Christian Soldiers” and a wonderfully blue reading of “Peace in the Valley”) with contemporary tunes by Nashville songwriters. The sentiments include traditional bible stories, testimonies of faith, and contemplations of Jesus’ place in contemporary society. Bobby Braddock’s “Would They Love Him Down in Shreveport” highlights the un-Christian nature of prejudice and Bobby Goldsboro’s “Come Back Home” anticipates the savior’s deliverance from hate.

The productions have the clean Nashville sound of the 1970s, with the ‘80s only peeking through in the guitar of “Heaven Bound.” The three selections from 1971 are earthier, with “Wait a Little Longer, Please Jesus” adding harmonica, Roy Nichols-styled guitar riffs, and a Western edge. The Jordanaires provide their typically fine backing vocals, augmented by the female voice of Wendy Suits. Eight of the ten album tracks (along with two of the bonuses from 1971) were included on Time-Life’s out-of-print Gospel Songs of the Strength, but this is the first reproduction of the full 1981 release, and a welcome addition to the Roy Clark digital catalog. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Roy Clark’s Home Page

The Highwaymen: Essential

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The intertwined creativity of Waylon, Willie, Cash and Kristofferson

Though Waylon, Willie, Cash and Kristofferson recorded three full albums as The Highwaymen, the foursome had much richer musical relationships than the purpose-built quartet dates. Legacy’s 2-disc Essential set documents both their official collaborations under the Highwayman moniker, and the duets and covers that found these artists returning to one another over the course of their careers. In addition to seven songs from the Highwaymen’s three albums, this thirty track collection includes solos and duets drawn from the artists’ original albums, television and stage performances (including tracks from the Johnny Cash Show and VH1’s Storytellers), and soundtracks. Among the riches are several covers of Kristofferson’s songs, including Nelson’s 2008 rendering of “Moment of Forever.”

The one previously unreleased track is a live version of Guy Clark’s “Desperados Waiting for a Train” recorded by the foursome at the 1993 Farm Aid concert, but the set’s real strength is its telling of the back-story through cuts sourced from twenty-five different albums. The collection paints a picture of four strong-willed, artistically-rich musical icons who found equal-strength partners in one another, and with whom they could collaborate without compromise. Their shared musical roots (neatly summarized in the trio of songs “The Night Hank Williams Came to Town,” “If You Don’t Like Hank Williams” and “Are You Sure Hank Done it this Way”) and hard-won artistic integrity bound them together like few other superstars, and the musical legacy they left as compadres is winningly excerpted in this set. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Ed Bruce: In Jesus’ Eyes

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Original country, folk and gospel songs of faith

Singer-songwriter Ed Bruce’s career evolved from  songwriting (“The Man That Turned My Mama On,” “Restless,” “Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” “Texas (When I Die)” for Crystal Gale, Waylon & Willie, and Tanya Tucker) to hit making in the mid-80s, but by the end of the decade he’d turned to acting. He released albums sporadically over the next decade, including the inspirational titles Changed in 2004 and Sing About Jesus in 2007. Varese’s new collection pulls together a dozen originals from that pair of self-released albums, offering testimony of rebirth and giving witness to the warmth of faith’s family. Bruce sings of Christian charity, makes the most of his resonant voice on the bluesy “Tougher Than Nails,” and works through feelings of loss on “I Know.” There’s folk, country, blues, two-steppers and gospel swing that will please everyone, and plenty of praise to please the faithful. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Ed Bruce’s Home Page

Ray Charles: Rare Genius – The Undiscovered Masters

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Spruced-up set of Ray Charles vault finds

Of course, this should really be titled “The Previously Undiscovered Masters” since they’ve obviously been discovered at this point, but that quibble aside, this is an impressive set of ten tracks that were, for one reason or another, left in the can. Waxed in the 70s, 80s and 90s at Charles’ RPM International Studios, some of the tracks emerged from the vault completely finished, and some were fleshed out with matching contemporary arrangements. There’s soul, blues and jazz, as one would expect from a Ray Charles album, but there are a few examples of his affinity for country, as well. A cover of Hank Cochran’s “A Little Bitty Tear” is sung as gospel blues, and the album’s biggest surprise is a finished duet with Johnny Cash covering Kris Kristofferson’s “Why Me, Lord?” The latter, produced by the legendary Billy Sherrill in 1981, has Cash singing lead in his resonant baritone while Charles provides soulful electric piano and backing vocals. Charles sounds terrific on all ten tracks, elevating the players (both then and now) with his soulfulness. Producer John Burk (who helmed Charles’ last album, Genius Loves Company) has done a magical job of melding the vintage productions with the new work, creating an album that’s a  great deal more cohesive than you’d expect from a set that began its life as disparate vault recordings. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Various Artists: I Wanna Play!

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Fund-raising collection of country and pop classics

Former Arkansas governor, part-time bass player and conservative television pundit Mike Huckabee has joined with singer-songwriter Aaron Tippin and producer James Stroud to create this collection in support of the National Association of Music Merchants Foundation’s Wanna Play Fund. The fund sponsors research and public education, raising awareness of music making’s educational and health benefits. This CD project will help fund community-based programs that provide music education and instruments to children. Five of the ten tracks (1, 5, 7, 9 and 10) are newly produced (though you’d be hard-pressed to tell Neil Sedaka’s re-recording of “Laughter in the Rain” from the original), while the rest are pulled from the artists’ existing catalogs. Governor Huckabee plays bass on Aaron Tippin’s celebratory title tune, as well as on Louise Mandrell’s cover of Don Gibson’s “I Can’t Stop Loving You.” There doesn’t seem to be an underlying theme to the song selections (and “Honky Tonk Women” is an odd pick for an album associated with children’s education), but the joy heard in these performances aligns perfectly with the fund’s messages about the enriching nature of music making. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

The I Wanna Play CD’s Home Page
The Wanna Play Fund’s Home Page

Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper: Songs of Inspiration

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A terrific, if too short, collection of the Coopers’ songs of faith

Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper were one of country music’s most popular husband-and-wife duos for over 40 years, particularly during their stints on the Wheeling Jamboree and the Grand Ole Opry. Lee (nee Leary) began singing gospel music with The Leary Family in the early 1930s, and upon marrying Cooper in 1939 she began singing bluegrass and country as well. The duo signed with Hickory (the house label of the Acuff-Rose publishing empire) in the mid-50s, and hit it big with Don Gibson’s “There’s a Big Wheel,” the blazing mono mix of which opens this collection. All twelve of these tracks are all gathered from their years with Hickory, selected from singles and the early-60s albums Family Favorites and Songs of Inspiration. Throughout, Wilma Lee sings in forceful, open-throated testimony that simply can’t be ignored. The songs are primarily from country songwriters (Don Gibson, Hank Williams, Roy Acuff, Charlie & Ira Louvin, Fred Rose), though two tunes from one of Judaism’s most successful Christmas songwriters, Johnny Marks, are also included in terrific fiddle-and-steel arrangements. The Coopers recorded many inspirational titles, including singles, album tracks and full theme albums. At only twelve songs, this set merely scratches the surface (notably absent are “There’s a Higher Power” and “Tramp on the Street” – there are also no credits or liner notes), but what’s here is uniformly great. You can find a few more on Varese’s earlier Very Best Of or go all in with Bear Family’s Big Midnight Special. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Dixie Chicks: Essential

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6 chart-toppers, 14 top-tens, 30 tracks = 2 hours of bliss

After the June release of the twelve-track Playlist collection, fans were left wondering if a more complete Dixie Chicks anthology would be issued. That question is answered in the affirmative with this thirty-track 2-CD set that includes all six of the group’s Country chart toppers, and fourteen (of seventeen) top-ten hits spanning all four of their studio albums on Sony imprints. That’s nine years compressed into two hours over which the trio proves themselves consistently original interpreters of unerringly picked material, occasional contributors of original songs, and by the time of Taking the Long Way, writers with their own voice. The group’s sound has often been imitated, but none of their followers have balanced the vocal blend, material, instrumental chops and attitude that makes this group one-of-a-kind.

Earlier female acts like Shania Twain tilted the Nashville axis towards pop, but the Dixie Chicks re-energized the Country empowerment handed down by Kitty Wells and Loretta Lynn. The trio wasn’t shy of being feminine, but they always led with their music. They didn’t smooth out their twang, instead highlighting their fiddle and banjo, and arraying their voices in three-party harmonies. Better yet, the more famous they became, the more they indulged their Texas roots. Rather than taking every crossover opportunity, they let the quality of their music draw more people into the tent. Their songs were liberated, bawdy, touching, emotionally complex and down-to-Earth, paralleling the tumult in their marriages and the growth they experienced as they ascended, sometimes against resistance, to stardom.

Among the most gratifying aspects of the group’s success is their conquering of the mainstream while simultaneously promoting the works of superb, non-mainstream songwriters like Darrell Scott, Patti Griffin, Gary Louris and Bruce Robison. It’s no surprise that their records sounded different than their Nashville peers, as much of the material was created by outsiders whose thoughtful songs weren’t written by appointment. Sonically, the band also leaned on talent from beyond Music Row, with ace steel player (and Natalie Maines’ dad) Lloyd Maines and studio svengali Rick Rubin each taking a turn in the producer’s chair. Oddly, this double-CD set portrays the group in reverse chronological order, opening with eight tracks from the Rubin-produced Taking the Long Way, adding seven cuts from the stripped-down work of Home, eight tracks from Fly, six from the Sony debut Wide Open Spaces, and closing with “I Believe in Love” from Home.

It plays well, but for those just meeting the Dixie Chicks, it’s a strange choice to replay the group’s history backwards. Fans are likely to own the four original albums, and without any new or previously unreleased material (or tracks drawn from outside the four core albums), this collection is really targeted at those who didn’t take the ride the first time. Love it or hate it, summing up an artist’s core material is the Essential collection’s mission – they’re not bonus-laden box sets for fans. That said, the absence of three top-ten hits (“Cold Day in July,” “If I Fall You’re Going Down With Me,” and “Some Days You Gotta Dance” from 2000 and 2001) and several other fan-favorite chart singles leaves this as “most of the essential” rather than an authoritative rendering. Bang for the buck, though, it’s still a great introduction to the band; for the new initiates, a quick reprogramming of the track list is recommended. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Dixie Chicks Home Page

Willie Nelson: Setlist – The Very Best Of

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Good selection of Willie Nelson live material from 1966 through 1979

The Legacy division of Sony continues to explore new ways to keep the CD relevant. Their Playlist series was the first out of the gate with eco-friendly packaging that used 100% recycled cardboard, no plastic, and on-disc PDFs in place of paper booklets. Their new Setlist series follows the same path of a single disc that provides an aficionado’s snapshot of an artist’s catalog. In this case the anthologies turn from the studio to the stage, pulling together tracks from an artist’s live repertoire, generally all previously released, but in a few cases adding previously unreleased items. As with the Playlist collections, the Setlist discs aren’t greatest hits packages; instead, they forgo some obvious catalog highlights to give listeners a chance to hear great, lesser-known songs from the artist’s stage act.

Like most of the artists in this series, Nelson is well-known for his stage act. This set samples previously release performances from Live Country Music Concert, Willie Nelson Live, Willie and Family Live, Wanted! The Outlaws, and The Original Soundtrack: Honeysuckle Rose. There is no previously unreleased material. The latter three albums are much lauded and easily found. The first two, from which tracks 1 through 4 are selected, will be fresh to many ears. Live Country Music Concert was released in 1966 and Willie Nelson Live was released ten years later; both albums feature pre-outlaw recordings of Nelson playing a July 1966 date in Ft. Worth, Texas. As with Nelson’s early studio recordings, these performances find him straining against his band’s straight time and inflexible arrangements. It’s only on the ballads “The Last Letter” and “Touch Me” that Nelson really gets to stretch into the phrasings and melodic transitions that would become his trademarks. The crowd’s rowdy reactions to favorite songs show he was a fan favorite in Texas long before Nashville figured out how to market him to the general country audience.

The track list is filled out with some of Nelson’s most beloved songs and performances, including the supercharged Waylon and Willie duet “A Good Hearted Woman,” a superbly assured take on “Funny How Time Slips Away” and emotional readings of “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” and “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground.” The set closes with the national anthem of the Willie Nelson Nation, “On the Road Again.” By the mid-70s Nelson had assembled a band that could hang with his phrasing and ease their way through key and time changes with the fluidity of a jazz combo. Nelson is clearly energized by the sympathetic playing of his band mates, and the looseness of the cuts from Honeysuckle Rose is especially satisfying. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Good selection of Willie Nelson live material from 1966 through 1979

The Legacy division of Sony continues to explore new ways to keep the CD relevant. Their Playlist series was the first out of the gate with eco-friendly packaging that used 100% recycled cardboard, no plastic, and on-disc PDFs in place of paper booklets. Their new Setlist series follows the same path of a single disc that provides an aficionado’s snapshot of an artist’s catalog. In this case the anthologies turn from the studio to the stage, pulling together tracks from an artist’s live repertoire, generally all previously released, but in a few cases adding previously unreleased items. As with the Playlist collections, the Setlist discs aren’t greatest hits packages; instead, they forgo some obvious catalog highlights to give listeners a chance to hear great, lesser-known songs from the artist’s stage act.

Like most of the artists in this series, Nelson is well-known for his stage act. This set samples previously release performances from Live Country Music Concert, Willie Nelson Live, Willie and Family Live, Wanted! The Outlaws, and The Original Soundtrack: Honeysuckle Rose. There is no previously unreleased material. The latter three albums are much lauded and easily found. The first two, from which tracks 1 through 4 are selected, will be fresh to many ears. Live Country Music Concert was released in 1966 and Willie Nelson Live was released ten years later; both albums feature pre-outlaw recordings of Nelson playing a July 1966 date in Ft. Worth, Texas. As with Nelson’s early studio recordings, these performances find him straining against his band’s straight time and inflexible arrangements. It’s only on the ballads “The Last Letter” and “Touch Me” that Nelson really gets to stretch into the phrasings and melodic transitions that would become his trademarks. The crowd’s rowdy reactions to favorite songs show he was a fan favorite in Texas long before Nashville figured out how to market him to the general country audience.

The track list is filled out with some of Nelson’s most beloved songs and performances, including the supercharged Waylon and Willie duet “A Good Hearted Woman,” a superbly assured take on “Funny How Time Slips Away” and emotional readings of “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain” and “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground.” The set closes with the national anthem of the Willie Nelson Nation, “On the Road Again.” By the mid-70s Nelson had assembled a band that could hang with his phrasing and ease their way through key and time changes with the fluidity of a jazz combo. Nelson is clearly energized by the sympathetic playing of his band mates, and the looseness of the cuts from Honeysuckle Rose is especially satisfying. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Dale Watson: Carryin’ On

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Watson makes old-school sounds with old-school players

Dale Watson has always been a country music militant. But as he’s aged, he’s moved away from explicit railing against the modern country music establishment, choosing instead to show them up by crafting songs that are more country than “country.” Of course, there’s some irony in Watson’s embrace of an era that was scorned by then-contemporary critics who felt Nashville had irrevocably compromised the hillbilly roots of earlier times with the introduction of electric guitars and drums. But one can easily trace the DNA shared by the Carter Family, Merle Haggard and Dale Watson, while many of Nashville’s modern radio stars seem to have grown from the Petri dish of arena rock. The music that Watson idolizes, and the place from which he composes, grew from the same roots, even as electric instruments were introduced and pedals were added to the steel guitars.

His latest album draws directly upon the golden age by featuring Lloyd Green (steel guitar), Hargus “Pig” Robbins (piano) and Pete Wade (guitar) as instrumentalists, with the Carol Lee Cooper Singers (led by the daughter of legends Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper) adding deft countrypolitan touches in the background. Watson’s baritone is less strident than in his earlier days, showing his love of country songs with his vocal caress rather than with lyrical barbs. He shuffles with the swinging glide of Ray Price, tenderly holding a lover, switching to the bottle’s embrace when left behind, and finally counseling the cheaters of the world “How to Break Your Own Heart.”

The album’s title track borrows the rolling rhythm of “Gentle on My Mind,” but its self-assessment of an aging party boy charts a future without John Hartford’s wistful memories. Robbins’ piano and Green’s steel underline the emotions as Watson’s songs wallow in romantic misery, moon over absent mates, and celebrate being in love. The album’s one moment of modern-Nashville-inspired enmity is the closing “Hello, I’m an Old Country Song.” But here the words are filled with sorrow rather than barbs, more nostalgic and resigned than ready to pick a fight. Still, as long as Waston is writing and singing, he keeps the flame of his beloved country sounds vital, and that’s truly the best rebuttal of all. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Dale Watson’s MySpace Page