Reviewing The Top 10 Country Singles From This Week In 1992

 

Ahh, where did the last three decades go? The first Bush was president, the Mall of America opened a few miles away from my home (I've been there once, which was more than enough), Seinfeld was a hit, George Jones was inducted into the Country Music Hall Of Fame, and at the CMA's it was Garth Brooks' year.

I was fully ensconced in country music, and music-wise I remember it as a happy time.

Well, let's see, shall we?? 

I've done a few retrospective chart reviews before, and it's always a fun, and generally surprising exercise. (See this, this, this, this, and this.)

The rules are thus:

• I review the single as a first-time listener.
  
• I must listen to the entire track before offering my critique.  
• I stick with the top 10, because dang, this takes a long time!
• I do my best to find music videos. If all else fails, I use a video of the recorded song.
  

I'm using the American Country Countdown wiki as my reference.

Okie doke! Let's go!

#10 ~ Lord Have Mercy On The Working Man ~ Travis Tritt

The track begins as kind of an homage to Jimmie Rodgers and the Dust Bowl years, with a dobro and a slide guitar, which sets the downcast mood. Then the chorus kicks in with more modern accoutrements to bring us into the singer's present circumstance. This song offers probably the most important component of a memorable composition ~ a singalong chorus. I like the group of background singers punching up the last chorus, signaling that many people are drowning. I can imagine this one going over HUGE at the artist's concerts thirty years in the future.

A- 

 

#9 ~  Cafe On The Corner ~ Sawyer Brown

Honestly, from these first two tracks one would think that 1992 was an awful year. I don't remember it that way. I and my family were doing fine. My career was humming along, my kids had new clothes, I didn't worry about paying the bills. Was I living in some kind of alternate universe?

Anyway...

Despite the rather jaunty instrumentation, this song is a downer. It's well-written, no question, but I question whether anyone will remember it thirty years hence. My impression of this group is that they whirled around from performing goofy little ditties to morose "message" songs in a flash. I do appreciate their foray into serious music, but my optimistic nature prefers one of their earlier hits, The Walk. And songs do need to match the times. Who knows? Thirty years in the future, this might fit right in. Nevertheless, societal realities aside, this ranks a strong...

B

 

#8 ~ The Greatest Man I Never Knew ~ Reba McEntire

I'll just be upfront ~ I don't care for this...at all. Ballads really need to be majestic to succeed. This one isn't. Reba is a great singer, but it sounds like she's straining to hit the high notes on this one. I get that this is about her dad, and I loved my dad, but that love would impel me to write him a better song. Nobody will ever remember this. I've almost forgotten it already.

D

 

#7 ~ Wrong Side Of Memphis ~ Trisha Yearwood

One immediately has to acknowledge the singer's superb instrument. But this song's structure is too repetitive, and has nothing for the listener to latch onto. It seems this is a case of a great singer searching for a style. I hope she finds it. I wouldn't purchase this, and if it were included on a greatest hits CD, I'd skip it.

C-

 

#6 ~ Seminole Wind ~ John Anderson

Few singers are truly original; John Anderson is. One can never mistake him for someone else. The production on the track is outstanding, but a memorable song generally can't be all mood. It would benefit from some change-ups. The track benefits from the singer and from the production.

B-

 

#5 ~ Going Out Of My Mind ~ McBride And The Ride

 
My first thought upon hearing this is Little Texas. The two groups could be interchangeable. I don't know if this one will stand the test of time. It has an unmistakable nineties vibe. That's not to knock it. I like it for what it is. And not to beat this issue to death, but a memorable chorus is key, and this song has one. As a moment stuck in time, this isn't bad.

B

 

#4 ~ Jesus And Mama ~ Confederate Railroad

I have a natural antipathy to songs with Jesus and Mama in the title, unless it's Mama Tried. It seems this group tried to branch out from its rowdy reputation, but sometimes you just gotta stick with what you know. This is certainly not I'm The Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised, unfortunately. It's cloying and pandering ~ an automatic letter grade deduction from me.

D

 

#3 ~ In This Life ~ Collin Raye 

This is how a ballad is done. I can't find a single thing to criticize here. What a universal message. Singer, production, song ~ all superb. Instant classic. This makes me not even want to listen to the others remaining on the chart.

A+

 

#2 ~ No One Else On Earth ~ Wynonna

Fans will probably remember this one, but more for the singer than the song. Frankly, there's far too much going on in it. It's like it has to check every box, which in the end turns it into one sloppy mess. Hopefully Wynonna as a singles act will discover her actual sound.

D

 

#1 ~ If I Didn't Have You ~ Randy Travis (official video only watchable on YouTube)

 

I kept looking for something to say that'd boost this one. I really like the singer, but this is by far not his best effort. I guess the chorus is pretty good, but to be frank, only the singer saves it.

C+

 

So, there you have it ~ a snapshot of the top ten singles from thirty years ago today.

 

My report card:

In This Life ~ Collin Raye: A+ 

Lord Have Mercy On The Working Man ~ Travis Tritt: A-

Cafe On The Corner ~ Sawyer Brown: B

Going Out Of My Mind ~ McBride And The Ride: B

Seminole Wind ~ John Anderson: B-

If I Didn't Have You ~ Randy Travis: C+

Wrong Side Of Memphis ~ Trisha Yearwood:  C-

The Greatest Man I Never Knew ~ Reba McEntire: D

Jesus And Mama ~ Confederate Railroad: D

No One Else On Earth ~ Wynonna: D

 

I believe that if you find one gem, all is right with the world.

I definitely found one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Nineties Roll On

If an artist releases one great track in their career, he can hold his head high. He can't necessarily tour on that, but it seems to me that fans remember that one recording because it was superb, yet forget about all the artist's other marvelous music simply because it all pales in comparison. So, yes, at least a half-hour show, I'm calculating.

Country music today is...? I don't know exactly what happened to country; where it went wrong. I know when it went wrong, which precisely matches the time that I gave up on it entirely. I don't think there are any great songs released nowadays. If there were, I would have read about them and checked them out, for curiosity's sake. I saw a clip today of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and some dude I assume is country (because of his over-pronounced drawl) was singing something about "shut up", and I thought, "good advice". Let's just be honest ~ today's country is awful.

In the late eighties and especially the nineties, however, great, great country music was bountiful. I've already featured many of the standouts, but there are many others. They didn't all produce 60 number one hits like George Strait, but who has?

Tonight, I'm featuring some of the "great" songs released in the nineties.

Let's start here:


 

"Blue" was written by legendary WBAP disc jockey Bill Mack. Bill wrote other songs, too, that became hits. He wrote this one for Patsy Cline, which is evident. It is a throwback for sure, but fans in the nineties were obviously still hankering for good country music. I don't know what happened to LeeAnn Rimes. I sort of know that she became a bikini-clad publicity whore, but as far as music is concerned, I guess she wasn't all that interested. Too bad, because she is a talented singer.

I know, I know ~ Alan Jackson deserves his own post. But much like I've written about Dwight Yoakam and George Strait ad nauseum, I'm not going to rehash all of Jackson's hits here. Again, this is most certainly a throwback; a remake. Jim Ed Brown had a hit with this song sometime around 1968. I'm sensing a theme here, but not purposely. I just love great songs.


 

I am aware that most everyone disagrees with me on this (most everyone is wrong), but for the best pure country voice since Patsy Cline, one need look no further than Trisha Yearwood. I saw Trisha once in concert. It was one of those expo's that small cities used to sponsor to draw folks in to sample local merchants' goods, who had booths set up around the perimeter to sell modular phones (yes, it was the nineties) and I guess, life insurance. The arena featured various acts on a small stage periodically throughout the day, acts that had to compete with the throng of old ladies carting their plastic "expo bags" from booth to booth, stuffing them with giveaway pens and refrigerator magnets. My friends and I claimed seats up in the balcony and gossiped while awaiting the next act to make her way to the stage. I admit I didn't pay much attention to Trisha at the time. I think she had a song called "X's and O's", which was her only claim to fame at the time. Too, I remember my hairdresser lamenting about a Garth Brooks concert she'd attended, which featured an unknown opening act named "Trisha Yearwood". "What big star goes on tour and brings some unknown girl singer with them?" my hairdresser fumed. "Should have been someone like Reba McEntire; not some girl I never heard of!"

My hairdresser and I were sadly ignorant. Feast your ears upon this:



One of the most bad-ass country songs ever was recorded by Foster and Lloyd. However, that was in 1987, so since I'm dedicating this post to the nineties, I will resist the powerful temptation to include the '87 song. Radney Foster and Bill Lloyd, were, too, a throwback, only updated. For being unrelated, their harmonies were almost as spot-on as the Everly Brothers'. Radney went on to do some solo work, but let's not dismiss Lloyd. It was his telecaster that gave the duo its delicious sound.

This is an unfortunate video, an example of the artists letting a dumb-ass producer frame the story. Regardless, this song will keep Foster and Lloyd on tour:



Apparently, 1987 was a landmark year in country. Steve Wariner had "Lynda", which was a track that invariably got people up and dancing in the honky tonks. In 1990, though, he also had this one, which I like. I don't know exactly why I like it; just that I do:



People misconstrue this song. It's certainly not a feminist anthem. To me it's the story of a young girl burdened with a life she never chose, one of whiskey and violence and trying to escape for one brief moment to pretend she was the same as all her friends. Maybe you had to live it to "get it":


 

There was a triad of superstar country artists in the nineties: George Strait, Alan Jackson, and Vince Gill. It seemed that every minute or so, Vince Gill was releasing a new track. If you have any doubt, take a gander at his discography. It's funny; one minute no one knew the name Vince Gill; the next, he was inescapable. This one is my favorite for sentimental reasons. I assigned myself the task of creating recorded music for my mom and dad's fiftieth wedding anniversary celebration, and this was the very last song on the two-volume cassette:



I haven't forgotten Patty Loveless. She's getting her own post. She deserves her own post.

Joe Diffie, Little Texas, Lorrie Morgan, The Dixie Chicks, Lee Ann Womack...

When folks look back on the nineties, they talk about Garth and Shania; maybe if they aren't brain-dead, they remember to include George Strait.

I remember this:



I don't live in the past, but I dare...nay, challenge...today's country artists to match these songs.

Please.

"Women of Country" ~ 2019 CMA Awards

I'd read that the Country Music Association had summarily dismissed Brad Paisley from his regular hosting gig in order to "highlight women". While the sentiment may have been laudable, when one thinks about it, it is rather an insult to female country singers. In what alternate universe were women artists not recognized? I've listened to country since sometime around 1967, which is more than fifty years, and I distinctly remember female singers getting tons of exposure, from Patsy to Loretta to Tammy to Lynn to Connie to Dolly; Tanya in the seventies; Reba McEntire, Pam Tillis, Rosanne Cash and Paulette Carlson in the eighties; Mary Chapin Carpenter, Holly Dunn, Shania Twain, The Judds. The Dixie Chicks in the nineties. But somehow women got short shrift?

Regardless, if 2019 wanted to "right wrongs", there are several issues with this performance:



Number one, if you're "celebrating women", you might not want to have your three stars perform a song written by a man. "Those Memories Of You" was written by Alan O'Bryant and originally recorded by Bill Monroe. You know, women have written songs, too ~ take, for instance, Dolly Parton.

My second impression of this opening is that Carrie really needed to let her seamstress finish adding a skirt to that glittery gold blouson.

The harmonies weren't quite pitch-perfect, but since it was a live performance, a little slack should be granted.

Number three:  Is that Angelina Jolie in the audience, and if so, why?

Four:  Dolly Parton is the ultimate performer. She carried this.

Loretta Lynn is an icon. The gals (whoever they were) who sang "You're Lookin' At Country" are not good singers. Don't they make 'em anymore? I guess, nice hair, though. It seemed that Loretta was in the audience as a prop. One of her twins, Patsy or Peggy, had to whisper in her ear and tell her what was happening. That's sort of disrespectful. New gals, you need to thank your lucky stars Loretta Lynn plowed a path for you.

Some indiscriminate bad singers tackled Tammy's "Your Good Girl's Gonna Go Bad" next ~ poorly. The camera honed in on Natalie Maines in the audience, who could blow all these gals out of the water, even the obviously gay one. I'm not on board with The Dixie Chicks' politics, but talent doesn't belong in the peanut gallery.

Reese Witherspoon? Is this the CMA's or a Hallmark Channel marathon?

Thank goodness for Tanya Tucker. She's younger than me, and showing her age as all of us do, but she can still belt it out. Tanya is an actual star.

Is that goofy Billy Ray Cyrus the camera panned to? If I recall correctly, he hasn't been relevant since 1982, and the mullet, bad as it was, was preferable to...this. And did Billy Ray sire any offspring who aren't crazy?

Pam Tillis is also in the audience, as opposed to on-stage. WTF? Ran out of time?

Gretchen Wilson represented the nineties. Kudos. Not a big splash in the pantheon of country history, but each decade deserves representation.

I'll admit, my curiosity regarding Crystal Gayle was whether she'd kept her freakishly long hair. It seems she has.

Terri Clark, who is an actual bad-ass hat-wearing guitar strummer, is next, and aside from the producers making her sing her song in the wrong key, she is a reminder that some country girls at one time had balls.

Next, Sara Evans does "Born To Fly", irritatingly interspersed with some girl in the audience over-emoting for camera time.

Martina McBride appears onstage to sing a bit of "Independence Day". It is, admittedly, nice to see a few artists who actually impacted country.

Yep, there's Trisha Yearwood in the audience, kept under wraps lest she put the prancers on stage to shame. Kathy Mattea, too. Dang, I guess neither of them fit the predetermined song key.

If Patsy were alive today, she'd sit these ladies down and explain to them the facts of life. "Do you want pity or do you want to sing?" she'd ask. Loretta might talk to them about baking bread with one baby on her hip and three more chasing each other around the kitchen table; and then climbing into a '59 Ford with a guitar bigger than she was and driving fifteen miles on rutted roads to belt out two songs in a smoky dive bar. "What, now, are you squawkin' 'bout?" she might ask.

Dolly should know better. Reba should know better. Spare me the self-indulgence. Either you can compete with men for radio play or you can go sob in a corner. Better still, you can stand up on your own two feet and get judged on your merits.

No time in country music were female artists overlooked. It's a 2019 fiction.

It's admittedly nice to see remnants of the past. That's not a gender thing. For all its imperfections, I enjoyed this video. I personally would have nixed the nondescript artists and focused solely on the stars, but...ratings.

Thanks, CMA's. Next, let's do Clint and Travis and Randy and Alan and George.












 

Yay For Women Artists?

So CMT (which used to be a network), in a shameless publicity grab, decided to anoint all women as "artists of the year". First of all, if you've got about twenty of them, that kinda dilutes the artist of the year moniker. Secondly, who is CMT to decide anything? The only admirable thing CMT has done in the past thirty years is pick up the series Nashville after ABC canceled it.

I remember CMT when it was actually watchable. That's when the great Ralph Emery had a nightly talk show that featured real country artists, and when videos were broadcast that one could distinguish from crappy pop. Everything doesn't get better with age.

Carrie Underwood, Miranda Lambert, Maren Morris, Kelsea Ballerini, Hillary Scott of Lady Antebellum, and Karen Fairchild and Kimberly Schlapman of Little Big Town were the honorees. I know what you're thinking ~ who now? I know Carrie Underwood from watching American Idol all those years ago, and I know Miranda from the tabloids. I didn't watch the telecast, but it seems that the gals honored those time-honored country artists Aretha Franklin and Gladys Knight.

I understand that Carrie is a true country girl at heart, but she's a slave to radio and has to record the stuff that people (apparently) buy, but I don't really admire an artist who sells out. Doesn't she have enough cache now to record whatever the hell she wants? The gals paid lip service to Loretta Lynn and...apparently that's it....and sang a bunch of songs written by guys, which rather undermines the whole #women rule meme.

The problem I have with women who claim they're all powerful is that they seem desperate to prove it by whining a whole lot. That's not powerful; that's pitiful.

For those "artists of the year" who don't know country history (which seems to be all of them), here are some women who didn't whine:

The number one non-whiner was a broad who didn't give a damn that Roy Acuff and Faron Young were on the same bill. She knew she commanded the stage, and she didn't need a hashtag to tell the world she had arrived.

So, for all you Aretha and Gladys fans out there, here is some real country music:

But just keep thinking you're "all that". Those who don't know better will believe you. 

I am one who knows better.

 

 

1997 In Country Music ~ And Work

(when a company disappears)

I suppose others experience it, too -- when a company to which they've devoted their best years disappears. It's eerie to think that one's past is gone, just like that, never to be retrieved or visited, except in memories.

There once was a company called US Healthcare. Really. Even though I can't even find a picture of its logo on Google images. The company was founded in 1975 by a man named Leonard Abramson. The company started small. It was first called HMO of Pennsylvania. There was one office, in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania. I had no clue where Blue Bell, Pennsylvania was, but the city had a rather pretty name. (I now know, in hindsight, that Blue Bell is a suburb of Philadelphia.) In 1983, Mr. Abramson took his company public and renamed it US Healthcare.

In 1990 Mr. Abramson was looking to expand his operation and began a search for a city whose citizenry possessed a good work ethic. That's where I came into the picture. Somehow, Bismarck, North Dakota was chosen. I say "somehow" because Bismarck never got chosen for anything except possibly "world's windiest town". It's true we had (have) a good work ethic. We didn't know any better. We all just naturally assumed we were supposed to work. We didn't know there was a choice. Perceptions of work vary by geographic longitude. I understand this now because I live in Minnesota. Perhaps we Dakotans had an innate guilt that if we didn't go the extra mile we'd be viewed as lazy. Thus we always did much more than was asked of us. Other big companies eventually learned to exploit that guilt, but US Healthcare was the first.

The Blue Bell employees worked thirty-seven-and-a-half hours a week and got paid for forty. We clocked forty hours a week and were grateful for the opportunity. Our Blue Bell trainers viewed us as utter morons, but we abided that and held our collective breath until they whirled back on the jet plane home to PA. Condescending disregard was de riguer for us. 

I only secured my position by divine providence, but I held on for dear life. After all, it paid $6.00 per hour, which was twenty-five cents more than I was making as a Farm Records Secretary. We were the experiment. Let's see how they do and if they can hack it, was the mindset of the Blue Bellians. Well, we did great. Because we worked our asses off. We cared about getting it right. I didn't know anything about health insurance, but I knew how to follow instructions. I began life at US Healthcare as a claims examiner and eventually convinced someone to take me on as an assistant supervisor, and then as a full-fledged supervisor. 

I excelled in supervision because I knew how people wanted to be treated from my many years of being a nobody. It's not rocket science, people. I understood how far a good word could propel even the lowliest of us. How bestowing a modicum of respect could engender results that surprised and delighted even the most self-effacing wallflower.

In 1996 Freaky Phil called me into his office and presented me with an offer that I could "think about overnight and then come back and say yes". It was a pilot program the company called "IKFI" - "Integrated Key From Image". It was a glorified data entry unit that US Healthcare was ready to pilot. Phil's offer felt like a demotion. I was a claims specialist and now I had been selected to slum into the realm of data entry, with a three-person staff of temps. I guess my construct of making peace with Phil hadn't worked after all. I knew my fellow supervisors would look down on me and thank the lord it hadn't been them. That sense of mortification haunted me. I went home Friday evening and fretted for two long days. Some divine sense of approbation told me that this was an actual "opportunity". I didn't see how it could be, but I knew, instinctively, that it was.

I carried my claims binders over to an unused, echoey area of the building. There were cubicles set up, but their desks were loaded down with broken computer monitors and other miscellaneous castoff equipment. A fine layer of dust covered every surface. Someone, in an optimistic frame of mind had long ago constructed a glass supervisor's enclosure in the corner. I grabbed a tissue from the box and tried to scour a peephole in the greasy film. I sat down behind the desk and squinted at the squiggly lines and numbers on my monitor that represented "something", which I would eventually learn was the workflow I was tasked with managing. I received a crash course in the keying process by phone from another Philly Patronizer. I don't remember her name, but her voice dripped with a combination of pity and disdain. Thus, I sat alone in a ghost unit and played with my new toy for three days, until my three temp workers showed up to begin their assignment. I think the company hired temps -- and only three of them -- because they were not convinced this new experiment would work out. 

The IT guys back in Pennsylvania were like actual humans. They were invested in making their new process work, and they didn't treat me like a simpleton. I appreciated that. My three new employees were surprisingly awesome. One girl, Gaby, had emigrated from Germany. She was quick to learn and a joy to be around. The four of us stepped through the ether together and bonded, like hostages do. Phil stopped over often and sat down in my visitor's chair just like he used to do. He never offered any words of wisdom or counsel. He was just bored, and this area of the building was a new place for him to peruse. He exhibited zero interest in this new US Healthcare experiment, which perhaps signaled his confidence in me as a manager, but I don't think so. I think he simply didn't care. 

Dave called a couple of times. Dave was the VP of Something or Other -- possibly the Claims operation -- the guy I'd spilled my guts to a couple of years earlier regarding Evil Connie. I never knew how I ended up on Dave's radar. Maybe he chose me for this new position because I'd demonstrated that I was a fighter. And there was no question that Dave chose me -- Phil was simply his imbecilic conduit. 

Dave was a yeller. He loved to yell at and scare people and take their measure. It was an odd management style, but one that lots of executives use. Dave called one day and yelled at me about something. I responded with facts and figures, not necessarily calmly, but I didn't back down. Dave never again bothered me. I think I garnered his stamp of approval that day. My state of mind was, no other fool will take this job, so sink or swim or stand on the unemployment line, which was a definite possibility, take me or leave me. I never asked for this.

From three to twelve to nineteen, the temps began to stack up. The building manager began constructing additional cubicles. I finally said to Phil, "Come on! Let's hire these people!" Let's make them legitimate. My staff was supporting an entire company, lessening claims examiners' load. We garnered zero respect -- we were, after all, data entry drones -- but I knew and my staff knew that our results were pivotal. 

Suddenly I had thirty-seven folks. I had to designate an assistant/trainer. Kristen had begun as a temp, like everyone had. She was whip-smart and fast, and better at the nuts and bolts of the job than I could ever be, and I was pretty good. She was a kid - maybe twenty years old. I picked her. Kristen handled the day-to-day operations while I composed performance reviews and dealt with the Philadelphia overseers. 

In the blink of an eye, things began to spiral exponentially. I had thirty-seven employees and was instructed to add a second shift. Then I inherited the referral process, which encompassed another twenty-two people, plus their two supervisors. 

By the end of 1997, the IKFI Department had one hundred and fifty staff and five supervisors. 

And I never received the designation of "manager", even though that was definitely what I was.

My new overseer was named Peter. He was a kid, but I ignored that because he was ostensibly my new "boss". Peter resided in the hallowed confines of Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, so our interactions were mostly by phone. Peter took a trip out to the hinterlands a couple of times a year, to check in and assert his authority. He was a decent guy, albeit "by the book". On one of his semi-annual visits, he mandated that we do a survey of our IKFI employees. The next day he paged through the survey results and iterated that there was a consensus that I practiced favoritism. I protested strongly. Peter responded, "Perception is the truth". 

"Perception is the truth" is one of the few management principles I've always remembered. Meaning, whether it's true or not, if people believe it, that is their reality. Peter bestowed upon me my most vital takeaway from my lone foray into management. 

The other thing Peter did for me was to survey the building landscape and recognize that I was sorely being squeezed out, between my five supervisors and the paucity of real estate. "There's an empty office in the corner, just sitting there. Why don't you move into it?" he asked. I stared at him wide-eyed, feeling like a common criminal. 

"You think?" I asked. 

"Why not?"

And thus I claimed the very first and only office I ever owned. 

My relocation was not viewed warmly by Claims management. In management's eyes, I was a pretender; an interloper. After all, IKFI was the branch's unwanted stepchild -- not a "real" department. It didn't have the cache of Claims. Phil was still nominally in charge of the office, but he had acceded the bulk of his duties to his new assistant manager, Linda. Apparently an assistant was needed, because Phil really didn't much feel like working, and someone had to do the actual job of managing. Here is where men and women differ -- Phil didn't care if I had an office or whether I'd pitched a tent in the parking lot. Linda viewed my new digs as a threat to her dominance.

Linda had clawed her way to the top by the sheer force of naked ambition. She was a skinny bleached blonde who was a mom in the sense that she waved hello to her kids just before their bedtime, and left the actual child rearing to a paid "girl". She was the kind of mother who acknowledged she actually had children only when they did something she could boast about, which was apparently not often. She had a boy and a girl, Boy and Girl, we (and she) will call them. Linda's background was not in health insurance, which was perfectly okay by me. My background wasn't in insurance, either. Everybody's gotta start somewhere. But whereas I had found my way to management by enduring the scourge of barely minimum-wage jobs, Linda was a person who inserted herself into her every boss's good graces by flattery and batting her eyelashes. 

I got the measure of Linda the day I phoned her to tell her my mother-in-law had passed away and that I would be taking my three days of bereavement leave, and she responded, "Do you have all your work caught up?"

Linda had initially been hired as a claims supervisor (a nice leapfrog I wished I'd been granted), and then proceeded to kiss as much ass as was required to boost her way to the top. She'd been a sycophant of Connie's, and Connie loved nothing more than boot-licking toadies. Once Connie had been shown the door, Linda latched onto whichever manager happened to occupy the corner office. Thus she eventually became the Dwight Shrute of Claims, Assistant To The General Manager. In her new position (and new office), she had everything she'd ever demeaned herself to be. 

It was an out-of-the-way means of accessing the building, but occasionally Linda took the detour to climb the steps outside my new office, just so she could amble by and shoot disdainful glances in my direction. Some days I'd pretend not to notice her; some days I'd give a little wave, which took her aback, and she'd jerk her hand in the air in an awkward faux-Nazi salute.

Linda deplored the fact that she no longer had control over me, but she made up for that helplessness by denigrating my department in passive-aggressive comments. I didn't care. I loved the fact that my manager resided fifteen hundred miles away.  

I had never before noticed, but now, in my new office, the office's piped-in music was unnaturally loud. I kept hearing this song, and had no idea who sang it or what the name of the song was. Google didn't exist yet. I think all we had was America Online and maybe Netscape. My local music store, Musicland, however, had bored personnel who stood around waiting to answer stupid questions, so I stopped in one evening and repeated a few lines of lyrics to the clerk, and he pointed to a section of CD's labeled, "Boz Scaggs". 

I love this song and I don't care if it doesn't fit any musical category. 

Let me just say that Boz Scaggs is ultimately cool. From "Lido" to "Look What You've Done To Me", he was always there, beneath the surface; under my consciousness. But always there.

It was weird hearing songs from the fabricated tape loop. The company who supplied the tunes didn't want to offend, so they were never too country or too rock -- middle of the road was where they landed. They were inexplicably big on Steve Wariner songs, one of which sort of broke my heart a couple years later, but that's a whole other story.

I didn't pay a lot of attention to radio then, because I had a lot of work stuff rattling around in my brain, but my kid liked this song, and therefore I rather liked it, too:

Make no mistake -- I was still buying CD's -- but country was beginning to disappoint. George released a mediocre album, the new people weren't very good singers (Tim McGraw). Thank God for Mark Chesnutt:

And Diamond Rio:

A singer who rarely got her due, but one of the all-time best singers (country or otherwise) of the modern era, Trisha Yearwood was possibly eclipsed by her future husband's success in the nineties, but wow, I love this:

This was not a great song, but it stands out for two reasons -- one, it was played on the radio ad nauseum, and most importantly, the lyrics featured Bismarck, North Dakota. Sure, you may scoff, but how many songs feature your hometown, unless you live in Amarillo or San Francisco?

As out of touch as I was with the musical world in 1997, I still vaguely remember the media-created controversy regarding who sang this next song better. I know one of the versions well, because it has been my personal earworm for over a year (and I have almost rid myself of it; yet, here I go again). The other version I frankly don't remember, so I'm going to play along and then issue my official decree. (And all this drama for a crappy movie.)

I like Leann Rimes (or "liked" Leann Rimes when she took music seriously, which she apparently no longer has time for, what with her beach bikini pics and all). I loved "Blue". She sang the hell out of that song. But here's the difference for me: Trisha has a warmth to her voice -- like honey. And Trisha's singing is not forced. It just is Trisha on her front porch, maybe with her farmhand husband,  Garth, strumming an acoustic guitar. Trisha doing what comes naturally and drawing in neighbors from miles around, just to hear an angel sing. 

Leann is eyelash-batting. Trisha is instinct.

Music can be a life lesson.

What Is It About THAT Song?

Subliminally, I know the elements of a song that cause my heart to flutter. I choose, though, not to dissect it. A treatise on why humans love music would be supremely boring -- at least without a soundtrack.

I love lots of types of music. Sometimes my favorite song by a particular artist isn't the one that necessarily sears me. Generally, it's the one I hadn't thought about, at least consciously, in forever. But there it is, playing on my radio, and maybe it's the familiarity or maybe it evokes a memory I'd forgotten I had. Maybe it just feels like home, whatever home is.

Then there are the songs that I admit to liking, but not liking too much, but when I hear them, there's just something...

That's where the mystery lies. If someone was to ask me what my favorite Eagles song is, I would probably go with Take It To The Limit.

Except there's this one:

The best Roy Orbison song is "In Dreams", right? Then why do I always choose to play this one?

I don't know why, and I choose not to examine, why I like this next song so much. The nineteen seventies was an appalling decade for music. The nineteen seventies was an appalling decade, period. We had Jimmy Carter and Olivia Newton-John and Whip Inflation Now (WIN!) and seventeen per cent interest rates and disco. Men wearing polyester leisure suits with gold medallions. Jumpsuits. Platform shoes. Still, I like England Dan and John Ford Coley:

Country music is a category all its own. Yes, I have five-star favorites in country music, but let's be frank: country music doesn't fit with rock. You can't combine them. Country is a whole different vibe. Weird thing about music:  styles don't jibe. One must be in a particular frame of mind to listen to each of them. I'm a peculiar hybrid, and maybe lucky; because I love -- love -- both genres. But I don't feel comfortable featuring both of them here. So, perhaps in another post, I'll talk about the country songs that subliminally pierce my heart. 

But back to rock, here are the songs that don't:

1.  Brown-Eyed Girl

2.  American Pie

3.  Rose Garden

4.  Anything written by Jimmy Webb

5.  Honey

In closing, there is a song that has been my earworm for approximately two straight years. It was recently almost replaced by "Creeque Alley", for whatever reason. 

I am not saying that I love this song. I am saying that something is going on here. I don't think it's something good. Obviously a sociologist could discern why this particular song won't exit my brain. I've decided to label it an affliction. I'm hoping by posting it here, I may, one day, get relief. And I really like Trisha Yearwood (no offense). 

Crying

I guess this is the 50th anniversary of the CMA awards.

A bit about me:  I was a "countryholic" most of my life (thus the title of this blog), until country music changed and left me behind. I remember settling in, cross-legged, in front of our big living room TV when I was thirteen or so, devouring the CMA's. I rooted for my favorites to win -- I was even geeky enough to join the Country Music Association under false pretenses. (In those days one could claim to be anyone in the music industry and send in their fifteen dollar money order and become a voting member.)

Around the year 2000, things got wacky, as they say. The final nail in my country music coffin was Faith Hill, who had a single on the charts -- something to do with breathing -- and I said, what the hell? This isn't my country anymore!

I'm not ragging on Faith Hill; she was just the catalyst. There was lots of bad country music that year. So I gave up; removed the preset from my car radio, essentially stopped listening to music all together. Where was I going to go? To classic rock? I hate that stuff. And one can only hear the same oldies about a thousand times before they want to plummet off a cliff. Occasionally I would purchase the latest George Strait or Dwight Yoakam CD. Marty Stuart was my redemption angel. I grieved for country music, though -- the country I'd lost. I immersed myself in other interests -- mostly stupid politics, which, for someone like me is a losing game (trust me).

I found Twitter and became addicted. And on a whim, I decided to follow George Strait. That's where I found this video. For wont of anything better to do, I clicked on it.

I didn't plan to cry.

I never even liked some of these artists that much -- Charley Pride was okay; Dolly, too, was fine. I loved her duets with Porter. Randy I loved, yes. And seeing him sitting there, solitary; knowing the ravages he'd suffered, remembering the vibrancy of his stage presence the one time I'd seen him in concert -- well, that started the tears.

Then there was Ronnie Milsap. George, of course. Reba. Martina. Trisha. Brooks and Dunn. My man Alan. Glorious Vince. Even Rascal Flatts.

I don't even know who some of the artists in this video are. But when they started singing, "I Will Always Love You", I thought, hold on. You guys can't do this song -- not without Dolly.

Then there she was.

Dang, I am embarrassed for crying. I shouldn't be. It's good to mourn. And to celebrate, even if what's lost hurts a little.

I have my quibbles with the video -- artists who were left out and shouldn't have been. But shoot, I wasn't in charge.

I'm just thankful somebody actually remembered.

The Eagles and Country Music

It may have hit country music lovers the hardest -- the news of Glenn Frey's passing.

Why?

Well, because Eagles music is country music. The Eagles can call it whatever they want to call it, but it's country music. Oh yes. Is it any coincidence that Don Henley has just released an album of country songs? No.

I said it before, but it's relevant here -- when I first became aware of the Eagles, I essentially dismissed them; no admission by me that I actually liked those songs. I was inured to the shuffle beat and the moaning cry of a steel guitar that'd roped me into country music in the first place. By the early seventies, though, country music (as I knew it) had gotten lost. I was consigned to listening to songs by people like Billy "Crash" Craddock and Dave & Sugar. People forget how disoriented country music became in that decade. We had Charlie Rich lighting a match to John Denver records, and it was like the 2016 presidential race -- who is pure? Who isn't? Who is that interloper? We hate him! Meanwhile, us little people were just trying to pluck one decent record out of the muck.

This is, I know, obscure, but Tanya Tucker's sister, LaCosta, released a decent album around that time. On it was a track called, "Best Of My Love". I liked it! I thought it was really cool and different. I had absolutely no clue. Eagles? Yes, I'd seen their "Best Of" album in the store, but...eh...not my genre of music, so whatever. Oh, this is an Eagles song? Well, what the hell?

Honest to God, this was how I was introduced to the Eagles:

Thus, I begrudgingly decided I'd give the Eagles a spin. By that I mean, I paid attention when their songs came on the radio. I still wouldn't buy an album that wasn't labeled "country". I heard "Take It Easy" and "Lyin' Eyes", which I thought was good, but too long. It did have something, though. I heard "Already Gone". I did appreciate the harmonies.

Gradually, the Eagles kind of seeped in. "New Kid In Town" caught my breath. I think that was the first single by the group that I actually laid down money for.

Years whizzed by, and in the early nineties, a bunch of country music stars I loved, like Diamond Rio and Brooks & Dunn and Vince Gill, got together and recorded an album called "Common Thread:  The Songs of the Eagles".

That's when it finally hit me: the Eagles are country!

One of the best female country singers ever and my favorite Eagles song:

(Even if one of Trisha's songs has become a perpetual earworm that hasn't subsided, even after all these months.)

Tell me the Eagles weren't country!

Come on!

They could call themselves whatever they wanted. They could deceive themselves, and us. But they were country. I guess they fooled everybody -- every post-hippie who liked them -- every disco'ing guy who dressed up in a powder-blue leisure suit and thought he was hip. But the Eagles, in their subversive way, embedded country music into everybody's consciousness, and nobody was the wiser.

Least of all, me.

Earworms Revisited

Presciently, the Wall Street Journal recently published an article regarding the dreaded earworm. I say "presciently" because I've been plagued by one for oh, about, four weeks now. Thus, I was excited to read the story, hoping it would unlock the secret to banishing my parasite once and for all.

Alas, the only relatable statement I found was, "Songs with earworm potential appear to share certain features: A repeating pattern of ups and downs in pitch, and an irregular musical interval. “It’s like your brain picks up on that unusual element and wants to hear it again.” Okay, check. But how do I exterminate it?

I also learned:

"People who sing and listen to music more often tend to have longer, more-frequent earworms. And people with obsessive-compulsive tendencies are apt to have them more often and to find them more intrusive. Most earworms actually aren’t unpleasant, surveys show...Some earworms are just fragments of a song that repeat like a broken record. That may be because working memory holds only limited amounts of auditory information at one time, some experts say. Another possible explanation is that when the mind hits a part of a song it can’t remember, it loops back rather than moving on."

Check, and check.

• I don't actually listen to music, which may contribute to my current malady. If I listened to music more, I'd probably be able to replace my earworm with something slightly less, or at least equal to, my current torture. I do, however, sing, albeit generally only inside my head, but it still counts.

• I am unaware of any OCD afflictions, but I am rather schedule-enslaved; although I always considered that a positive. It certainly has kept me timely all these years.

• Fragments of a song...yes. That's because I don't know the lyrics beyond the first two lines. I think perhaps had I known the words to this song, I could have avoided this torture all together. But one can't know the words to every song, and if they did, they'd be considered a freak, and that's a whole other set of issues.

How to rid oneself of an earworm, they say?

"Listen to the actual song—all the way to the end. ‘Some people say that’s the only way to achieve closure,’ says Kelly Jakubowski, a Goldsmiths, University of London psychologist."

This is untrue. I've tried it. Several times. It doesn't work.

"Distract yourself with a task that requires attention."

Oh, come on.

"Imagine a different song to drown the first one.‘The Girl from Ipanema’ has legendary earworm-chasing capacity."

Yea, thanks. I hate that song. But even though I hate it and even though "you" (the reporter) suggested it, I got nothin'. It does not commence repeat-play inside my skull.

"Chew gum. In a study, the Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology in April, researchers at the University of Reading in England, 98 volunteers listened to ‘Play Hard’ by David Guetta and ‘Payphone’ by Maroon 5 and then hit a key if they heard either in their heads. Those who chewed gum reported one-third fewer earworms—possibly because the action ties up the same mental pathways used in imagining music, the researchers surmised."

That's so dumb, I'm not even going to experiment with it.

Bottom line is, nobody knows how to get rid of an earworm. Especially me. The truth is, I'm not one of the apparently ten million people who have "Billie Jean" ribboning through their brains. I've heard of Maroon 5, but I couldn't, on threat of waterboarding, name even one of their songs. I do know "The Girl From Ipanema", but that's just because I think there might have been a commercial once that used the song..."Tall and tan and young and lovely"....I'm conjecturing it was an ad for suntan lotion. Or pantyhose.

If I was to guess, I'd say it all started because my husband DVR'd the movie, "Con-Air" and lo and behold, Trisha Yearwood started singing during an early (poignant) scene, and I remembered that sometime back in the nineties. I'd heard that song, but I'd forgotten about it (I have lots of decades-old songs lodged in my cranium, so I can't instantly recall all of them). But my apparently OCD mind wanted to recall it, perhaps to recapture my long-lost youth. Freud would say the song has some subliminal meaning to me, but all I remember is that both Trisha and LeAnn Rimes recorded it, and there was some kind of dust-up in the country music rags about who sang it best (it was Trisha - always Trisha). Other than that, I couldn't give a damn about this song as it might relate to my life at the time -- as if I could even remember my life at that time.

This song will never cease to be my earworm. In fact, it's playing inside my brain right now. It's my cross to bear. I comfort myself with the knowledge that things could be worse.

All I can do is foist it on you, my loyal readers. That may seem cruel, but I'm pretty desperate. Maybe if you shoulder it, my burden will be lifted.

(It pains me to even play this song again.)

Blast From The Past - Top Country Songs - Part Quatro

Another installment in a continuing series........top country hits of a certain year (a certain year when the music was still good).

This time........1991.

The top song of 1991 was "Don't Rock The Jukebox" by Alan Jackson:



Other number one hits from 1991 were:

Unanswered Prayers by Garth Brooks - Garth apparently doesn't allow any of his videos to be posted on YouTube. Must be only available at WalMart or something.

Brother Jukebox - Mark Chesnutt (Mark's first number one) - Sorry, video is unavailable, so here's a different Mark Chesnutt song (well, you gotta improvise sometimes. I like this song better anyway.)





Walk On Faith by Mike Reid



I'd Love You All Over Again - another number one from Alan Jackson (I included this song on a mix tape for my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. This was also Alan's first number one song.) - 1,470 videos on YouTube for Alan Jackson, and this song is not among them. I guess we'll have to hum it to ourselves (it's in waltz time - and a one, two, three, one, two three.)



Two Of A Kind, Workin' On A Full House - another Garth Brooks selection (well, obviously, this video isn't available, either.)

If I Know Me - George Strait (sorry, this one is a no-go also.)

Meet In The Middle - Diamond Rio (their debut single. Diamond Rio was the first country group to have their debut song go to number one on the charts) - This video IS available on YouTube, but not for embedding. Apparently, record companies do not like free publicity for their artists. So, here is another Diamond Rio song, albeit from 1997:



The Thunder Rolls - Garth Brooks again (never mind)

She's In Love With The Boy - Trisha Yearwood (her first #1) - also unavailable. Like husband, like wife.

You Know Me Better Than That - again, George Strait (sorry, Strait fans)

Brand New Man - Brooks & Dunn (their first #1 hit) - here's a very headache-inducing live performance (I mean visually, not audially.)



Anymore - Travis Tritt


Someday - again, Alan Jackson



Shameless - Garth again (no loss)

My Next Broken Heart - Brooks & Dunn (their record company is awfully possessive, too)

So, to sum up 1991, it was the year of Alan Jackson, Garth Brooks, Brooks & Dunn, Diamond Rio, and, of course, George Strait.

Categorizing Music

Just to prove my point (if you go back and read my old posts), Newsweek agrees with me:

Newsweek Got It Right For Once

It makes me happy to know that I'm right, and that someone with a lick of sense sees it my way.

Yea, Merle Haggard's "Bluegrass Sessions" isn't technically "bluegrass". Big deal.

It deserved a Grammy nomination.

Lord knows, we have to take any good music that comes our way nowadays.

And we have to recognize a superior product when we hear it.

Otherwise, all we're left with is Carrie Underwood.

Does that speak well of the music of 2007?

I've decided that I'm going back to the days of AM radio, when you'd hear a bunch of songs, without categories, and you'd decide FOR YOURSELF what the best songs were.

So, my nominees for Grammys for 2007 are:

Merle Haggard - The Bluegrass Sessions
Alison Krauss & Robert Plant - Raising Sand
John Fogerty - Revival
Dwight Yoakam - Dwight Sings Buck
Trisha Yearwood - Heaven, Heartache

There ya go - as Steve Carell would say. (He also says, "That's what she said" a lot, but that has no bearing here.)

So, Merle - 1967, 2007 - that's 40 years and still going strong.

Now WHO'S the legend? I rest my case.

My New Favorite Country Song (For Now)

Check this out! I really like this! I happened to hear it on one of those rare occasions when the local country station was actually playing a GOOD song. Trisha does a great job on this!