So, what have you been listening to lately?

[uwe]

Just listening to the comparatively recent Foo Fighters. 

I must be getting old, but a lot of that ultra-distorted sound I find physically painful to listen to. There, I said it.

For stadium grunge pop metal, I think I'll stick with Nickelback. This is now my fourth or fifth Foo Fighters album, yet again it fails to click. Their neo-Beatlish backing vox and general influences are just about their only saving grace for me.

[uwe]

PS: This I like (for obvious reasons), not representative for the album.



If I understand the YouTube comments correctly, then this song features Macca on drums and has the Foo drummer singing. If that is true, then I grant them a tongue-in-cheek humour Nickelback would most likely be incapable of.

More Beatles here:

[Dave W]

Don't listen if you don't like real country.

Two years ago Sarah Patrick was posting home videos.



Then she was discovered by David Frizzell, who signed her to his label. Her first single is out, and she made her TV debut with him about 3 weeks go (music starts about 2:20)

[uwe]

I really like what she does, but I marvel at your definition of "real country" - to me the first song is American folk (Dolly Parton track or not) - the way she does it stripped and unaffectedly. Which opens the discussion whether "real country" is not folk, of course. But let's put it this way, this particular song (in that rendition) is more Newport Folk Festival to me than Nashville. But what does ze Kraut know!

The second song - steel guitar drenched as it is and with her delivering a more "country" vocal - is country alright, but is it really that far removed from what you would hear at a dozen Nashville radio stations playing "new country, old country, all country"? I'm not putting the song down, but it's not exactly rugged, robust or rural country to my ears. I thought "real country" was more something like this?





Or is Greg Brown more singer/songwriter than country? Now I'm all confused. 

Beyond all badges, her (Ms Patrick's) debut CD will be mine, so please keep us posted.

[westen44]

I can't wait for Dave's response to all this.  This should be good. 

[Dave W]

A country song doesn't become folk just because someone does a cover solo on acoustic.

No, you'd never hear You're The Reason God Made Oklahoma on a modern country station.

Eliza Gilkyson is a folk artist. Lucinda Williams has strong country influences in a lot of her work.

Dolly Parton developed into more than strictly a country artist, but in 1973 you could only hear it on country stations, the type that played music you never hear on mainstream country stations today.

[Dave W]

On this morning's playlist, more David Frizzell



And my favorite father/daughter duet,playing to a big crowd in Germany

[4stringer77]

I didn't realize Mike Huckabee was back on TV. I'll have to see if I can find that TBN channel now.

[Dave W]

I didn't even know he had a TV show since I don't have cable. Thanks to YT, I can see a lot of the good stuff.

[Pilgrim]

When I think old time country, I think Roy Acuff's Great Speckled Bird.  Dave has taken me to task for this, but as a guy whose radio career started by spinning country in the late 60's, I still have this association. It kinda makes my teeth hurt.



I'm more a fan of what was (then) modern country for the 60's and 70's with stuff like Dick Curless, Marty Robbins and Johnny Cash. Newer stuff like "Chatahoochee" may be rather pop, but it's good music IMO.

[uwe]

Anything with Kendall in it is good. My first love back at TASOK, 9th/10th grade was Kendall S. from Nebraska. Sigh ... I'll never forget that first song we danced to.





Enough of this wuss romance!!! Back to work!

[westen44]

When I think old time country, I think Roy Acuff's Great Speckled Bird.  Dave has taken me to task for this, but as a guy whose radio career started by spinning country in the late 60's, I still have this association. It kinda makes my teeth hurt.



I'm more a fan of what was (then) modern country for the 60's and 70's with stuff like Dick Curless, Marty Robbins and Johnny Cash. Newer stuff like "Chatahoochee" may be rather pop, but it's good music IMO.

As Dave has pointed out before, the Roy Acuff song is old-time gospel, not country.  Marty Robbins is a great example, but personally I consider him "Western," not really country.  That would probably be debatable with some, though.  I've called Johnny Cash country myself, but I'd say he really can't be categorized anymore.  Dick Curless may or may not be country.  But I've been within driving distance of Nashville much of my life and I've never heard of him. 

I'm not saying a Nashville connection is a must, but it often helps.  Personally, I tend to prefer country music originating out of Texas, but I haven't heard it that much, don't know much about it and can assume it's often something considered more of a regional phenomenon.  For some that may be intentional considering that a fair number of people consider Nashville toxic. 

[Dave W]

As many years as I've been listening to radio, the only times I've ever heard The Great Speckled Bird was on Roy Acuff's live segment on the Opry. It may have been played on a gospel show on a country station, but not on regular commercial country. And Roy Acuff's commercial popularity was pretty well over by about 1950.

I don't understand why you keep bringing up Dick Curless. Yes, I know you liked him, that's fine, but he was a very minor personality. I could rattle off the names of a couple dozen 60s-70s minor artists I like that were more representative of what was being played on commercial country stations than Dick Curless.

Marty Robbins' cowboy ballads were big crossover hits. Most of his many chart hits weren't cowboy songs at all, though.

I was going to put on some Creedence but I'll listen to Marty instead for now.

[Pilgrim]

Fair enough - from that 60's and 70's I remember many artists like Country Charlie Pride, Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette, Ray Price, Dolly Parton and early Kenny Rogers and Glen Campbell (who was a sideman for many bands before going solo.)  Prior to that time I heard a bit more gospel on country stations,

Late in the 70's there was a "trucker/CB" thread in country music; Jerry Reed had a big couple of hits in that genre especially because of the movie Smokey and The Bandit. Curless was indeed a minor figure in country music, he just happened to tap into that market a few years earlier.

[amptech]

Marty has a great voice. No lack of pesonality either