charlie brown Posted June 1, 2014 Share Posted June 1, 2014 Sorry, NO ONE said people with "Southern accents" sound "Dumb!" At least that I know of. Natural accents, I have no problem with, talking or singing! It's when it's faked, or unnaturally fabricated, that it becomes "Stupid Sounding," and disingenuous! That's all. I don't even mind "nasal," if it's "real" (Like Dylan, and John Lennon, etc.). CB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Karloff Posted June 1, 2014 Share Posted June 1, 2014 So true. My trio has decided we will only do it for $20. Seriously, if you want to hear Brown Eyed Girl, put $20 in the tip jar. We need a new PA after all! haha ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 1, 2014 Share Posted June 1, 2014 CB... I general I'd agree about "accent" and "nasality" or whatever... OTOH, doggoned if I can do "Waltz Across Texas" without unconsciously affecting an Ernest Tubb sound - as if the words never were written and the lyric is an instrumental with his voice as the instrument. Also, I'd add I've heard far more folks try to sound like Dylan or Beatles than themselves when doing Dylan and Beatle music. Thank heaven a lot of others did their own arrangements. But then again, at what point does a "cover" seek to be a copy rather than a "version," interpreted through the musician's own head? m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zigzag Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 Ernest Tubb had a show syndicated through a local station every Saturday, just before local talent Arthur Smith and the Crackerjacks. My favorite Tubb song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWmbFXJDHrM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charlie brown Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 CB... In general I'd agree about "accent" and "nasality" or whatever... OTOH, doggoned if I can do "Waltz Across Texas" without unconsciously affecting an Ernest Tubb sound - as if the words never were written and the lyric is an instrumental with his voice as the instrument. Also, I'd add I've heard far more folks try to sound like Dylan or Beatles than themselves when doing Dylan and Beatle music. Thank heaven a lot of others did their own arrangements. But then again, at what point does a "cover" seek to be a copy rather than a "version," interpreted through the musician's own head? m Yeah, there's bound to be SOME carry over, in the sound of a recording, to how it's played/sung by a cover band, or individual. Especially, in our youth, more than later. IMHO But, old (youthful) habits can die hard, for sure! CB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charlie brown Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 The thing is, too...that there are as many sub-genre's in "Country" music, as there are in Pop, Rock, or Jazz. So, "Which" Country music "sucks"??? LOL CB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 CB... I was about to make the same comment about splintering of "country." Also, again listen to late '50s "country" and tell me there's not a huge bit of jazz to stuff like Patsy Cline material. Or Willie, for all that. m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
surfpup Posted June 2, 2014 Share Posted June 2, 2014 So, "Which" Country music "sucks"??? The one they play on mainstream country radio. But the same can be said for pop or rock for that matter. As usual the good stuff tends to be buried underneath the crap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
surfpup Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 Just came across this recent quote for Travis Tritt that seems apropos to this thread... There’s a mentality in the country music world of Nashville that says, “You don’t know anything, and we know how to do this.” It’s “We know what’s best for you: You get to the microphone, sing what we tell you to sing, play what we tell you to play, and you’ll be fine.” That scares people away from branching out and doing things that creatively are out of the box. The music business establishment does not have a crystal ball. They do not know everything that they tell you they know. I’d say to any of the new people coming out, ‘Find the courage to step out and try it your way.’ Otherwise, what we get is a cookie-cutter mentality that isn’t good for artists who are having to portray themselves as something they aren’t, or that are capable of doing so much more but are being stifled. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 I think on top of that, there's another "deal" in that I'm not sure anybody knows what "country music" is, and how to make it work. A lady friend/guitar student had some Warner albums and some chart material technically as a "country" artist - but frankly I always considered she was doing pop/rock material. That's in the early '80s. I think she was happy enough with the music, but the road can be exhausting physically and mentally. I've also seen that in Kitty Wells, "The Queen of Country Music" when she and her husband were in a little travel trailer on the county fair circuit back in the late '70s. I dunno how they did it; they weren't kids. But... let's say I wanna be a "country music" star. What do I do? What kinda music, rhythms, instrumentation? Let's assume I'm still young and "interesting looking" and sing a lot better than I do. Emphasize the "Cowboy?" We've already seen that doesn't sell all that well. So... Hmmmm. It's gotta come down to "who'll pay for what" in the long run, and whether you can keep your music continuingly new and memorable in one way or another for an increasingly splintered music audience. m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 We are on a couple week trip and I have to say the current country offerings on the SiriusXM is pretty dreadful this year. rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
darling67 Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 Ya.lmao.that does make country look lame as heck..country music isn't my main love but I do like it ( the older stuff) we need some redemption.. and Emmy, lets face it,she's gorgeous woman who's backing vocals could make a crack whore with throat cancer sound good.... Right on, Rowdy! This is the Country music I dig. Not sure if I get your Emmylou reference or not... but I love her voice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 I have some friends in the radio biz ... but I have to say I just don't listen to it. I'm at work now, listening to some relatively "new" cowboy stuff. Enough "stuff" to keep me awake, not enough to be distracting. m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaiser Bill Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 I have been primarily a country musician since '79. I played top 40 rock from '57 to '78. I've watched the demise of country music for quite a while. It used to be just for hicks and farmers I was told. Then around 82 things changed. It seemed like rock bands that couldn't "make it" in that arena went into what they passed off as country. A prime example is "Super Love" by Climax. That to me was the beginning of the end for country music. Hank Jr. helped ruin it for me also. Now its all mainstream pop and not country at all. Someone said its a formula. Thats correct.."x" number of guitars, maybe a steel or a fiddle, and someone that can carry a tune in ripped up jeans I wouldn't work on my car in wearing a ball cap and sporting a beard. There are exceptions like George Strait and a few others. As great a guitarist as Brad Paisley is...would it kill him to wear a real shirt?? A prime example of what country music was are the Time Jumpers. Some of the best musicians around. Since the passing of John Huey, the band has added Paul Franklin Jr and Vince Gill. Two top players that keep up the band's level of professionalism and high musical standards. One of my best friends is the steel player with Rodney Atkins. I've been to his show, and the steel is so buried under distorted guitars that it might as well not be there. I told him about it, and he said the sound man is told how they want the band to sound. Again a formula. Thanks for letting me vent and express my personal opinions. I feel very lucky to be working in an area where people still want to hear REAL country...steels, fiddles, and songs about something other than girls and dirt roads. Songs without distorted guitars where the singers still dress in decent clothes and sing songs that aren't re-hashed rock. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
charlie brown Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 It seems like there's been a steady, general decline in the overall quality of Pop, Rock, and Country music, for some time. Partially, at least, due to the "formula" formula! Ironic, when a lot of musicians, it would seem, are better than ever, at least technically. But, when "money" becomes more important, and trumps the music itself (and, everything else), we're all in trouble, IMHO. It's one reason why most of the really good stuff, is now "underground," or at least not on "Top 40" radio, anymore. That, and the fact that it's so fragmented, and compartmentalized, compared to previous era's. The "look," has become more important, than the content! All Flash, and no Substance! "Sex Sells," all that crap. CB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 I think the "deal" on this is kinda a long story that is cyclical with batches of deja vu. I can't forget how anything but a flattop was pretty much immoral and they wouldn't allow drums at the Opry. The '50s were an incredible period of change in music for dozens of reasons - largely related to technology even in the symphonic and opera sorts of performance. We got in rapid and affordable packages for the time: PAs that were portable, amplification for all our stuff, batches of electrical guitars that increasingly fought feedback and allowed louder playing... crowd expectations for PA expanded. Heck, in the early '60s I watched PAs at places like the old Club 47 in Cambridge, which was horrid as I recall, to the almost-as-bad stuff I used in the mid '60s to some half decent stuff in the '70s. When I was in college even the bluegrass band was crowded around microphones and ... less than a decade later "old time" fiddling competitions had far better PA and stage setups. Then too, many fiddlers started putting pups on their instruments... The pedal steel? It evolved from the lap steel to replace the "dobro," first with multiple necks for different tunings... then came experimentation in the '40s that resulted in the 10-string thing used on current pedal steels along with a volume pedal (!!!) and... it wasn't until the late '50s that we really had a standard sort of pedal steel. Meanwhile the "jazz/pop/rock" single melodic string picking took off for the "electric lead guitar" and wow. Even in the '70s some of the guys still doing bluegrass/old time on flattops were really pickin' crazy material. So I guess you could say I consider "country" to be kinda a combination of folk roots, pop, jazz and blues influences placed into a roughly blue collar rural concept that kept the "story" and lyric primacy of the old English/Scots-Irish folkie traditions as opposed to "lyric." Problem is that American music, especially, is such an amalgamation of styles that it's hard to say this or that until various recording company bosses figure they have the formula to make money. At that point there tends to be a freezing of a sort of style. Then again, don't forget that the same thing happened to "country" back in that '50s transition period from "hillbilly" and "Texas swing" into something generally considered "country." But even then, "Country" and "rock" and "pop" generally were more a matter of music aimed at specific audiences than something that defined the music itself. Was "Ring of Fire" with trumpets really "country" or pop? What was "Rockabilly?" How about the harmonies of "doo wop" that were more jazzlike? Was "Crazy" really a pop/jazz piece but done by a "rural audience" media? I can't forget how Lawrence Welk cleaned up with his band in the North Central part of the country by doing a wide range of music from polkas and waltzes to "cowboy" to some fiddle stuff and... whatever those "country" crowds in the region thought was neat. The cowboy stuff in the '30s through '50s "singing cowboy" period was ... interesting ... and at times obviously not the best of "art." But Bob Wills did make stuff happen yet ... sheesh, "Country?" <sigh> I still think it's more "music aimed at an audience" more than differences in the music itself. And as old Chris Ledoux noted in one of his more popular tunes, even a cowboy likes a little rock 'n' roll. m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 Here's what I'm listening to tonight: and and some other stuff... like a cowboy tune in sorta reggae rhythm about the magpie? m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
surfpup Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 We are on a couple week trip and I have to say the current country offerings on the SiriusXM is pretty dreadful this year. rct I find the "Outlaw Country" channel on Sirius to be pretty good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brundaddy Posted June 3, 2014 Share Posted June 3, 2014 Silly to throw out the baby with the bathwater. There's a vast amount of horrible sh!tty cheeseball blues, for instance, but that doesn't mean blues sucks - same for any style. Even back in whatever "good ol days" you choose, any given style was mostly crap. People tend to forget the crap. Well, except for Beatlemaniacs, but that's another thread for another time. But to my point, one man's trash is another man's treasure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rct Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 I find the "Outlaw Country" channel on Sirius to be pretty good. Yes, that would be our favorite one. The Highway usually has something deliciously recorded and well made, no matter which stuffed suit is murdering the vocals. But nothing this year, it's really pretty bad. rct Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gibson Artist Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 It's not about "the music" anymore...it's about making a fast buck! A LOT of fast bucks! Same thing, in the "Pop" music field! I couldn't possibly tell you, which is worse! However, there is Good/Great "Country" music, but you won't find it, on commercial "Country radio" or CMT, for the most part. At least, IMHO. CB Country music died in the 80s. Today, its all country pop or country rock, or some kind of country fusion spew they try to hook people on to. Imo, country music is johnny cash, waylon jennings, george jones, hank williams, conway twitty, dolly parton etc. Rascal flats and all the other country pop guys today are just not country. People are free to call modern country whatever they want or like it all they want, but from my perspective modern country aint real country music. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brundaddy Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 Country didn't die. There are still "keepers of the flame" like Hank Williams III and Junior Brown. Hell, Willie Nelson still tours and draws pretty good crowds. To avoid the stigma of "country" associated with what's on the radio, some acts fly under the "Americana" or even "Roots" monikers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
badbluesplayer Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 John Huey with the Time Jumpers crying in their beers- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Fi-BhsKOMA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gibson Artist Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 Country didn't die. There are still "keepers of the flame" like Hank Williams III and Junior Brown. Hell, Willie Nelson still tours and draws pretty good crowds. To avoid the stigma of "country" associated with what's on the radio, some acts fly under the "Americana" or even "Roots" monikers. Yeah but when you see people like the florida georgia group doing country rap its obvious how weak mainstream country really is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
milod Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 Okay... Whatta you call this? Rock? Western Underground? I can tell you Chris was the real thing cowboy. You can understand the words as you should with "country." Some of it's really what I hear real cowboys liking to hear; the second could qualify more as "country," but...??? It's kinda like somuvthe mix I hear in local saloons. Chris has been gone a while, but the point of kinda a sorta rebellious perspective on life and music is pretty real in a real cowboy country around here. The same guys will play some rock with a fiddle and country with a pedal steel and who knows what may be done in between... In fact, I've heard some local "country" guys get away with what amounts to an extended manouche bit as good as you'll hear in a city anywhere. Fiddle and guitar. Sheesh. I guess the old "Don't Fence Me In" attitude reigns in reining country. <grin> m Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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