Tammy Wynette

The Essential Tammy Wynette

“There are so many great records that have influenced me. Tammy Wynette’s Greatest Hits, but also Willie, Waylon, Jessie Colter and Tompall Glaser’s Outlaws and The Jayhawks’ Tomorrow The Green Grass.

Neil Young

Harvest

“Neil is just an all-around great artist — great songwriter, singer, player, and does the work to remain vital even after doing it for so long.”

Joao Gilberto

Getz/Gilberto

“I listened to this record a ton while I was making Crows.”

The Beatles

Help!

“There are many songs I wish I had written!  Can we start with the Beatles Help!? It has “Yesterday” on it.  I’d take that one…“

Grizzly Bear

Veckatimest

“As far as new releases, I’ve been digging this.”

Allison Moorer – Like The Rain

2. Moorer skips over a whole lot of backstory and jumps right into the character, who has replaced “all the happy” in her head, and whose “every step feels like a mistake.” The implications of what happened are many, from abuse to ignorance, but she shows the confusion of the character by noting that even the omniscient narrator doesn’t know how she got “so blue”, broken into “too many pieces”. Moorer gives a voice to the large amount of women that suffer from verbal and physical abuse but never speak out. The central character gives no reason for not speaking out, but is sure she’ll “never say a word”. In light of Moorer (and sister Shelby Lynne)’s family tragedy, this gains a whole new meaning as well, highlighting victims of tragedy who find themselves unable to speak out.

3. Producer R.S. Field (Shelby Lynne, Hayes Carll) gives the song a jangly, relatively lighthearted touch, with an arrangement that wouldn’t be far off from a Jayhawks song. This treatment makes the tough subject matter go down easier, and stands as a metaphor for Moorer’s increased ability to unflinchingly write on difficult subjects. Whether that is a result of age, experience, or her marriage (and child) with Earle, fans of Allison Moorer are the ones reaping the rewards.

Allison Moorer – The Broken Girl

1. I had the chance to talk to Owen Temple a few weeks ago about 5 records that have inspired him over his career. One of the questions involves a song that he wishes he had written, and he chose Leon Russell’s “Stranger in a Strange Land”. Taken from Leon’s 1971 record Leon Russell and the Shelter People, the song finds a man questioning why the world doesn’t go his way. This stripped down version illuminated the eternal search for meaning embodied in the song.

2. Russell lists several unanswerable questions throughout the song that have been shouted at the cosmos by thousands of people:

“How many days has it been since I was born?
How many days until I die?”

He then turns inward to ask himself if he has the ability to make his lover happy, lamenting his failure to do so thus far. He then shares the title line, a choice bit of wisdom known to the infant but elusive even to the wise man. The feeling of alienation expressed in thousands of country songs (perhaps chiefly “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”) is attributed to the fact that maybe we simply don’t belong here. Russell comments on the state of affairs in the world: the money chase, the leaders taking people astray, and people’s unkindness to one another, before imploring the listener to “recognize the bells of truth when you hear them ring.”

3. Leon Russell has written, in effect, an answer to all the songs of loneliness and solitude, attempting to give a reason why man feels so alone in this world. Owen Temple’s version lacks the R&B swagger (and gospel choir) of Russell’s original, but communicates the simple, brilliant message. The fact that Russell manages to fit the words burro and ecology into the same song is just icing on the cake.

Owen Temple – Stranger in a Strange Land (Leon Russell Cover)

The Stray Cats

s/t

“This is really hard to find nowadays, I found it at a local record store. I remember seeing the cover and wanting to do what they did — there’s only three guys, and it doesn’t seem like rocket science, but its pretty intricate and interesting. “

The Reverend Horton Heat

Smoke ‘em If You Got ‘em

“He made no apologies for not being commercial enough. His dedication to his songwriting and his show are what I always admired. I was lucky enough to be right there, he was like my uncle, and a professional on his own terms. He knew when to say no, when it made sense.”

Doug Sahm

The Genuine Texas Groover

“I listened to this record while we were making This Crazy Life — he had a sound that spanned a whole lot of genres, being able to blend his influences into something all his own. I never like to limit myself to western swing or honky tonk, I like to mess around with all of it. Doug showed that people are supposed to have their own sound, their own voice.”

Buddy Holly

Greatest Hits

“I wish I had written “True Love Ways” — that song is just really hard to beat. He wrote it when he was 22, and brought strings into rock music. By today’s standards, he might be considered a nerd, but he is definitely one of the fathers of rock and roll.“

Ryan Bingham

Roadhouse Sun

“At times I don’t even know what to think about him — he used to open our shows with just an acoustic guitar. It seems like his contemporaries are moving in one direction, and he just throws something out that no one expected.”

Eleven Hundred Springs – Every Time I Get Close To You

2. Robison makes a small distinction in the first verse that makes all the difference. Though he says he has seen his old flame around town, all of the details come through a friend — that the new boyfriend “ain’t that bad”, and that the old flame is “so happy now”. By separating himself from the news, he drums up that heart-sinking feeling of being left behind, though he admits that the new love “looks good on you”, before wondering if he “can do it all over again”. Many country songs brag about being able to move on, but Robison touches a vulnerable nerve here, unsure of himself.

3. The chorus finds him rattling off a series of common phrases — “40 is the brand new 30/ and 30 is the new 18″, before hoping out loud that “losing is the brand new winning”, and expressing is fear that the new boyfriend is “the new me”. Rather than expressing anger at the broken relationship or bravado at the new relationship he has found, Robison looks inside and wonders if he is now outdated, and unable to try again.

4. Robison’s strength is in the small details that make the song personal — which he showed off in “Travelin’ Soldier”, perhaps his best known song. The main character of that song heard about her fallen love and retreated under the bleachers to react, which perfectly encapsulated the hidden nature of their relationship. Here in “The New Me”, Robison lays out the feelings of uncertainty that hit especially close to home in a small town, and does so with the nuances that have made him one of his generation’s best writers.

Bruce Robison – The New Me

2. Ryan’s voice accompanies a trebly guitar over spare sounding drums to great effect, creating a live feel with a bit of Sun Records brightness. Bingham finds himself in limbo, wondering what to make of a relationship, noting that he could “write a book” about what he doesn’t know. Truth be told, there isn’t a lot more to this song, lyrically speaking. Its strengths lie in its heavy backbeat and simple feel. Once upon a time, music didn’t have to reach climactic emotional peaks with string sections and boys choirs to have an impact. In turn, Bingham is able to capture a simple feeling of uncertainty and let that be enough.

3. This track, written by T-Bone Burnett and Stephen Bruton, has its roots in the 70’s outlaw country movement that produced Jeff Bridges’ fictional character. In the film, Bingham and his band back up Bridges at a stop in New Mexico, taking over when Bridges is racked by sickness. In the real world, Bingham is a perfect candidate to continue blazing the outlaw trail, with his latest offering being a great blend of 60’s rock and troubadour country (read my review of “Country Roads”). Burnett and Bruton have produced a soundtrack that fits seamlessly with the music from that time period, and with enough musical integrity to stand alone, apart from the film. Bingham’s personal style fits well enough to make this track a success.

Ryan Bingham – I Don’t Know

Neil Young

Live Rust

“ When I was 19, I listened to this thing forever, before I started playing guitar. If there was anyone that made me want to get into music, it was Neil.“

Sir Douglas Band

Texas Tornado

“Doug Sahm — He makes San Antonio really cool, which it is. He plays blues, Tejano, just that old style. I really admire that he did what he wanted to. A lot of musicians talk about him, but I dont think he gets enough credit.”

Ernest Tubb

The Legend and the Legacy

“Michael and I were trying to write honky tonk songs while making Hard Times. If you want to call yourself a honky tonk singer, you had better listen to Ernest. He’s not the best singer in the world, but he’s the best at what he does, which is good news for me.”

Kris Kristofferson

Spooky Lady’s Sideshow

“Theres a song called “One For the Money” that he wrote for Sam Peckinpah, that I wish I had written. Also, from the same record, “The Lights of Magdala” is about as good as it gets.“

Scott Nolan

Canadian Amplifier – Bootleg Series Vol. 1

“He does stuff with sound, and this little bitty guitar, that is cooler than anyone I’m hearing. He can do more interesting things with beat up old equipment that new gear can’t recreate. Also a great writer.”

Adam Carroll – Rice Birds

2. Beginning and ending his stanzas with the same line, Keith shows how quick the ups and downs can actually happen. He almost plateaus in the second stanza, resolving that “nothing’s changed except you’re gone”, but quickly spirals back into self loathing, commenting that “seems like all I do is wrong”. He also laments the fact that he can’t seem to keep from writing about his lost love, and he might be able to if he could quit writing songs. If there’s one thing he doesn’t lack, it is self awareness, as he seems to be able to simultaneously be in the middle of heartbreak and observe himself from the outside.

3. Gattis’ original, more stripped down version of this song deserves as much attention as Robison’s take, which fits perfectly into his latest record Beautiful Day, a record describing the ups and downs of a divorce. Though this “throwback” is only eight years, Big City Blues is a solid record from front to back, and one that warrants a lot more praise than it has received.

Keith Gattis – Down Again

2. Chuck recorded Let Freedom Ring! in Mexico City with Greg Leisz (who produced Dave Alvin’s King of California) at the helm. He sought help from original E Street drummer Ernest “Boom” Carter and, on this song, ex-Nickel Creek fiddler Sara Watkins. Her lilting vocals and swooning fiddle give its shuffling rhythm a nice drawl. Prophet speaks of an “only child”, who was “born to run” (pun intended, as drummer Carter gave that song its signature heft). “Unwanted in seventeen states”, the child wanders around the country while Prophet wonders about her parents, whose baby is “never coming home”. He moves on to tell the story of a youngest child, who scrapped for everything he could get growing up. By the time he enlisted, Prophet notes, he was “three times a dad”. The chorus implies his death, and Prophet’s subtle mention of his occupation makes clear his feelings on war.

3. Prophet finishes by noting the presence of “Jesus on the billboard” and how we have pounded our fists at the sky in vain, asking for some relief from this world. Finishing with the now loaded chorus, he shrugs his shoulders, and the song enjoys one last bit of music before fading away. This is not an overtly political song, as Chuck shows that the parents of runaways and fallen soldiers go through the same thing. Loss is one thing that makes us human, and this simple jaunt carries that simple message, with just enough sugar to make it go down easy.

Chuck Prophet – What Can A Mother Do?

#10: Sam Baker

Cotton

This music should be kept in museums. The finale of his trilogy on grace and forgiveness, and not a bit cheesy. Read the original review.

#9: Levon Helm

Electric Dirt

The only American member of the band continues to show people around his homeplace, 40 years and counting. Read the original review.

#8: Justin Townes Earle

Midnight at the Movies

Building on what he started with his first record, JTE’s pen gets deeper and wiser. Read a single review.

#7: Ryan Bingham

Roadhouse Sun

One of the best young voices in country harnesses his rocking sound with a little 60’s touch. Read a single review.

#6: Ben Kweller

Changing Horses

Rollicking good time from an indie rocker exploring the music he grew up on.

#5: Owen Temple

Dollars and Dimes

Most of the time we hear stories from the big cities of America. These are stories from the areas in between. Read a single review.

#4: Todd Snider

The Excitement Plan

Don Was strips Todd down, pulls him together, and puts out his most consistent record yet. Read the original review.

#3: Lyle Lovett

Natural Forces

Lovett uses his keen eye for songs and delicate touch, as always to great effect. Read the original review.

#2: Tom Russell

Blood and Candle Smoke

Cowboy beat poet ruminates on the American west and the history that lies beneath. Read the original review.

#1: Dave Rawlings Machine

A Friend of a Friend

Rawlings proves that quality always trumps quantity, with a 9-song record that stuns from beginning to end. Read the original review.