Me And The Seventies

 

I'm not sure why I have a love/hate relationship with the decade of the 1970's. Truthfully, it was the most impactful decade of my life. I was young enough to experience every moment; not yet so old that the years ran together like a muddy river.

I came of age in the seventies. I was still a high school girl from '70 to '73; I got married for the first time in 1974, and I became a mother twice over between 1976 and 1978. I also landed my first "real" job and quickly learned that work was something to endure rather than enjoy. It wasn't fulfilling; it was a slog ~ a slog of menial tasks and a morass of neurotic coworkers.

Maybe I've dismissed the 1970's because I didn't particularly like the person I was then. 

If "clueless" was an actual term back then, clueless was my middle name. I was painfully naive about life. Not that it was necessarily my fault. My family wasn't exactly The Cleavers. In fact, my dad, if he worked at all, played at being a part-time bartender. But truth be told, he spent most of his time planted on a stool on the other side of the bar he owned. Thus my mother was perpetually angry. She'd carefully mapped out a way to better their lot in life by abandoning farming and purchasing a business, a motel/bar combo, but she ended up doing all the work while my dad played. Everybody always knew my dad was an alcoholic, but he kept the demons at bay simply by the responsibilities of planting and harvesting the wheat and potato fields. Give him a bar right next door, however, and a woman who could be relied on to shoulder all the work, and he was lured to whiskey like a child offered candy from a pervert in a van. 

Thus my home life consisted of pots and pans slamming and a cold shoulder. I escaped to the quiet of my room and fashioned my own sanctuary. I had one actual friend and a handful of acquaintances I only interacted with in the school hallway or in whatever classes we happened to share. 

My inner life was consumed by the music I let wash over me. I collected albums and cheap electronics, like a JC Penney reel-to-reel tape recorder and a "stereo component set", which set me back an outrageous hundred dollars, which I'd amassed from my many summer hours of cleaning motel rooms. I stayed up 'til three or four in the morning during summer vacations, my ear glued to the radio, the third component of my new stereo setup. I tuned the dial to WHO and WBAP and if the heavens allowed, WSM. I fancied myself a singer and recorded three-part harmonies on my reel-to-reel. (I actually wasn't as bad as I thought at the time.) I typed up music "newsletters" on the manual typewriter I'd somehow claimed from my mom, who'd bought it with the intent of producing motel invoices.

My life was insular.

So, I never learned much of anything except how to swish out a toilet and make hospital corners. I could fry up a grilled cheese sandwich and stir together some Kraft macaroni and cheese, which I did whenever my mom was busy manning the motel desk and Dad was, naturally, indisposed. Nobody at home ever talked to anyone else. I had a little brother and sister, who I think I must have conversed with at some point, but they were little kids, after all. How much could we have in common?

I was on my own, a strange amalgam of independence and naivete. Anything I learned, I discovered through experimentation and failure. My mom never went clothes shopping with me or taught me about makeup. I employed my talent for observation to simulate what the other girls my age were doing and I mimicked them. 

I did learn how to smoke, however, all on my own. Smoking wasn't so much cool, per se, as it was another means of escape. 

The music that dominated my senior year in high school was an incongruent mix of country at home and rock blaring from the car radio of my best friend's beige Buick (No, I hadn't yet learned how to drive, either). Alice and I dragged Main Street on Friday and sometimes Saturday nights, singing along to Stuck In The Middle With You and Drift Away and The Joker.

 

Our tastes in country singles matched, too ~ Ride Me Down Easy, Southern Lovin', Here Comes The World Again. 

 

I met my first husband on one of those Main Street runs. I thought the friend he was with was better looking, but the four of us matched up more or less according to height.

My future husband was older and had lived on his own, so he knew how to cook, whereas I did not. I could man a mean vacuum cleaner, though. We married in 1974 and since no one we knew actually rented an apartment, the thought never even crossed our minds. Instead we trudged down the highway from my parents' motel to a mobile home lot and were bamboozled into paying far too much money for a 12 by 66-foot tin box. I was thrilled. Finally something of my own that didn't require proximity to two crazed ultimate fighters.

We furnished our home with a Sears green and white flowered sofa and a set of K-Mart tables, among other cheap amenities. K-Mart and Woolworth's were my go-to's for curtains and bedspreads and collapsible nightstands. I brought my bed and my TV from my motel hideaway. That first Christmas I plopped a two-foot plastic tree atop a table and decorated it with home-crafted ornaments (it didn't require many). We inherited a console stereo, which claimed one wall of the living room and after work I spun Emmylou Harris's Elite Hotel (loved that album) and one by someone named LaCosta, who it turned out was Tanya Tucker's sister. 

The communal radio at work was tuned to rock, so I still had one foot in that world. Sundown, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, and Mockingbird were the order of the day.

(Not to state the obvious, James, but those drugs seem to really be kicking in.)

My first son was born in November of 1976. I worked up until his birth, albeit not at that soul-sucking job I'd landed right out of high school. Truly, that place was yet one more dysfunctional family, but I wasn't tied to them by blood, so I bailed. Where did I go? Well, shoot, back to Mom and Dad. In my defense, however, Dad was newly sober and had become an actual human being, and thus my mom was ninety per cent less frenzied. 

Once I delivered my son, however, I retired. I loved it. Achingly poor, yet happy. I knew it couldn't last, but I was willing to forego a Country Kitchen breakfast and a couple of new LP's if it meant watching my baby grow. Anyway, I still had the radio:

And I hadn't abandoned country completely.

(although this is kind of skirting the country line)

 

                                           (whereas this is definitely country)

In March of '78 when I became pregnant for the second time, we traded up to a fourteen by seventy-eight-foot mobile home with three bedrooms. Those extra two feet wide, boy, felt like a palace, Still a tin palace that sounded like Armageddon during a hailstorm

In December I gave birth to my second son and I knew my mom-time was fast waning.

In rock, nothing much struck me. This track was considered "rock", but come on. It's Roy Orbison dressed up in a new package:

 I dipped my toe back into country music, kind of as a farewell to the decade.

 

In essence, despite all signs to the contrary, I grew up in the seventies. And yes, I did eventually learn how to cook. I also learned how real life works, how to stop apologizing for my talents; how to wrangle two toddlers into a car and motor over to the mall and come out the exit doors sane. How to soothe colic. How to fall in love with an unlovable dog who loved no one but me. How a clothes dryer works so much better if one occasionally cleans the lint filter. How linens dried on a fresh-air clothesline smell so delectable. How to coax houseplants to flourish. 

How a baby's giggle is manna from heaven. 

In ten short years I went from a self-involved, self-pitying victim to an actual grown-up human. 

I was the last person to see that coming.

 

Seventies Pop

My husband I have a difference of opinion. He loves classic rock; I hate, hate it. I hate Aerosmith, and to me, Rolling Stones tracks sound tinny and weak. Led Zeppelin is okay, but I never bought any of their records. The Who is a complete mystery. Forget any of the heavy metal bands. I'm not a fan of angry music.

I think the disconnect is as simple as AM radio versus FM. In the seventies my spouse was an album guy. I bought no rock records, but I binged on AM radio, mostly because I was surrounded by it, either at work or on my portable transistor. In my small town, FM radio was a niche. Nobody actually tuned into it, probably because the lone classic rock station was lazy and didn't even try. Anybody who was anybody glued their car radio dial to 550, KFYR. KFYR played the hits; not deep album tracks.

Thus, my husband's and my musical experiences were completely divergent.

Like I once denigrated seventies country music until decades later when I learned better, I scoffed at seventies pop ~ cheesy, manufactured, trivial. 

Turns out I was wrong. 

Oh, there were plenty of cheesy hits throughout the decade, including possibly the worst single of all time, "You're Havin' My Baby"; and there were others. You Light Up My Life, My Girl Bill, Muskrat Love, Afternoon Delight, American Pie (😉 ~ maybe that's just me).

And tons of one-hit wonders. But that's what makes the seventies so singular. One top ten hit and never heard from again. Come on, Brownsville Station? Paper Lace? Yet, if you were around then, you've never forgotten those singles.

I currently have 310 tracks on my seventies Spotify playlist, but never fear ~ I'm not going to inundate you with 310 music videos. I'll choose six or seven, tops, ranging from "fun" to "classic" (yes, there were classics!)

 

FUN

1973 ~ The Hues Corporation ~ Rock The Boat

 1974 ~ ABBA ~ Waterloo

Also 1974 ~ The Guess Who ~ Star Baby

1975 ~ America ~ Sister Golden Hair

CLASSICS

1974~ Dave Loggins ~ Please Come To Boston

1973 ~ Elton John ~ Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

1971 ~ Nilsson ~ Without You (sorry for the fake "live" video)

1974 ~ Gordon Lightfoot ~ Sundown

1977 ~ The Bee Gees ~ How Deep Is Your Love

I could go on and on (obviously), but one must know when to stop. Suffice it to say, I now love the seventies. It could be nostalgia, but I believe it's a case of not recognizing the good while it was happening.

By the way, I like cheesy songs as long as they're deliberately corny and not a steaming mound of cow patties masquerading as "super serious" ditties. (I'm lookin' at you, Paul Anka and Debbie Boone.)

Therefore:

And:

I think I just may come back to this topic at a later time.

I like having fun.

 

 

A Quintessential Country Song ~ Nineteen Seventies Edition

For years I denigrated seventies country music. Bear in mind, though, all we had in those years was radio (mostly AM radio) and just like today, radio stations essentially spun the top twenty singles in constant rotation. So, for example, in 1976 we heard Dave and Sugar and Billy Crash Craddock and Freddy Fender with his plunky acoustic guitar. Over and over. 

Not to mention Mary MacGregor with her "Torn Between Two Lovers" (definitely not a country song) and Elvis's bombastic "Moody Blue". Seventies country radio accepted all comers. That was the problem.

That's not to say I didn't buy country singles. I was poor enough to barely afford those, but I plucked them from the Woolworth's end cap four or five at a time. Still, I was feeling surly toward country. I didn't buy Good Hearted Woman by Waylon and Willie on principle. I shuddered at the sight of Kenny Rogers singles. I never once purchased a John Denver record. Artists I'd loved for years, like Johnny Rodriguez and even Merle, were now issuing crap, and I refused to lay down money for an inferior track based solely on sentimentality. I was a stern musical taskmaster.

Crystal Gayle was kind of a freak of nature. I knew she was Loretta Lynn's little sister, but face it, the reason people stared in awe at Crystal on their TV's was because of her four-foot long locks. They were like a second person 

Everyone, I guess, needs a life goal, and Brenda Webb's (Crystal's) was growing her hair out as long as grotesquely possible. Catching her on the tube, it was hard for me to concentrate on the songs, because I was completely mesmerized by her hair.  

Crystal first caught my attention with a track that oozed like maple syrup into everyone's brain in 1977. Suddenly she was everywhere. The song wasn't exactly country. It was something, but it wasn't country.

I found her affectation artificial, especially since she started out sounding like this:

Nevertheless, this new Crystal Gayle was off to the races. 

But the artificiality of it all riled my purity senses. I wasn't ready to let country disappear, For the same reason that I abhorred John Denver and skirted past The Eagles, I rejected this woman who pretended to be something she wasn't. Yes, I enjoyed Olivia Newton-John's "Let Me Be There" and "After The Lovin'" by Engelbert Humperdinck, but I never claimed they were country.

Thus, I missed a few Crystal Gayle gems. Like this one:

But this next Crystal track is quintessential. Richard Leigh wrote it, like he wrote Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue and these:

I didn't recognize the perfect fusion of song, production, and performance until decades later. Interestingly, this is the most country song Crystal Gayle recorded in her fleeting career.

One must experience it on vinyl: 

And you don't even have to be distracted by her hair.

So, granted, seventies country wasn't all bad. In fact, the decade produced a ton of seminal music.

In future posts, I'm going to highlight that ~ if only to purge my demons.

 

Country Concerts

 

The evolution of country concerts is remarkable. I've seen almost every major country act live up to the point at which country ceased being country. I have very few regrets -- acts I didn't get to see. Some of the omissions were my fault; others simply weren't in the cards.

I grew up in a small town, where the most exciting diversion for a thirteen-year-old was bowling a few games at Midway Lanes or taking in whatever Elvis movie was playing at the local theater. (Yes, there was one movie. Multiplexes were yet to be invented.) I'd refashioned myself as a country music fan because my new best friend was a country music fan. In the late sixties we were rather outcasts because of that, but I probably would've been an outcast anyway.

There was one venue in town that presented country concerts, the World War Memorial Building, an ancient cement edifice with a wide staircase of concrete steps leading up to heavy wooden doors. The auditorium may have had one set of bleachers -- I don't remember -- because Alice and I always managed to get front row seats on the floor. We were kids. What else did we have to do but show up two hours early and stake out our positions in that non-reserved seat era? Alice and I attended nearly every concert presented there. It didn't matter if the artist belonged to the timeworn past, like Ernest Tubb or Kitty Wells, or was a legend like Buck Owens and the Buckaroos, or was someone just beginning to make his mark, like Charley Pride. We didn't care. Tickets were cheap and what was the alternative?

If one was to take in a Merle Haggard concert, the ripest time to do so was 1968. Mama Tried was in constant rotation on the radio, and Merle already had a long rope of hits, from I'm A Lonesome Fugitive to Sing Me Back Home. Alice and I were in love with him. We arrived at the venue extra early and snagged our hard metal chairs on the aisle of the first row. We waded through the opening acts, Freddie Hart and some other lost-to-time artist; then Merle strode to center stage. With The Strangers and Bonnie Owens behind him, this impossibly handsome man proceeded to sing just to us. Or so it seemed. I sat crunching peanuts, mesmerized, then realized he was smiling directly at me. I smiled back widely with peanut skins pasted to my molars. After the concert Alice and I went around to all the artists, band members included, and got their scribbles on sheets of paper we'd hastily grabbed before leaving home. 

The WW Memorial Building was where we also saw George Jones bring a blonde singer back to the stage to sing some very electric duets with him. The guy strumming rhythm guitar behind them grimaced and I had no idea I was witnessing a real-life soap opera. I later learned that this new girl, Tammy Wynette, had fallen for George, and that her long-suffering husband strumming behind them had suddenly been relegated to background scenery.

By 1970 my town had built a brand new real concert venue, the Bismarck Civic Center. It was cavernous, with miles of upper tier bleachers and actual padded seats. The first concert I took in there wasn't country. It was the Grass Roots (Was Creed Bratton from The Office part of the group then? Couldn't tell you.) But later, country acts were bused in. I probably saw Alabama three thousand and fifty-two times, give or take, at the Civic Center. Eventually though, this building encapsulated the entirety of my country concert experiences. Name one country artist from the seventies/eighties era and I most likely saw them -- Ronnie Milsap, Gary Stewart, Vince Gill, Alan Jackson, Trisha Yearwood, Reba McEntire when she was still performing at rodeos.

Still, I had to travel a hundred miles to the North Dakota State Fair to see Faron Young, The Oak Ridge Boys, and Highway101.

I even motored to rural county fairs to see the likes of Stonewall Jackson and LaWanda Lindsey.

There arrived a point in the late seventies at which I gave up on country music. It wasn't easy, but it had to be done. It was time to make a clean break. Country had become a parody of itself. Charley Pride was recording versions of pop hits, and acts like Sylvia and Dave and Sugar permeated the airwaves. I tuned my television to MTV and didn't look back.

Then sometime in the mid-eighties my parents talked me into attending a concert with them at the Civic Center by some guy named Randy Travis. I folded my arms across my chest and pouted my way through the first two or three songs. I never admitted it to them, but this Travis guy was actually pretty good. 

My parents also inadvertently introduced me to a fresh-faced singer, another of their latest fads. I happened to stop over at their house one night when they'd already plugged in a VHS tape and were mesmerized by an artist I'd never heard of. His name was George. I sat down on their couch and muttered disdainful remarks, until I finally shut up and actually listened. 

A few years later my ultimate quest peaked at Fargo, North Dakota, where I finally snagged the holy grail -- a concert by The King, George Strait. 

I'd motored all the way to Billings, Montana to seize this once-in-a-lifetime chance, only to learn after checking into my cheap motel room that a sudden snowstorm in Wyoming had stranded George and his crew and that the Billings concert was canceled. There was absolutely nothing to do in Billings, Montana -- literally nothing -- except play video poker on bar-top consoles, stagger back to the motel room, fall into restless sleep, then zoom across the barren landscape the next morning as fast as I could back home, crestfallen. 

It wasn't until a couple of months later that I learned The King would be in Fargo. I'd come this far. This time I would not be refused. It was worth the wait. 

I passed on a chance to see Shania Twain, even though the Civic Center was only a five-block trek from my home. Singles from her first album were popular on the radio, but I still hadn't decided if I liked her or hated her. Too late, I determined I liked her.

I walked out on a Hank Williams, Jr. show, the only time I ever walked out of a concert, except for a three-artist bill with Vince Gill, George Jones, and Conway Twitty. No offense to Conway fans, but I just could never stomach him.

Here and there, hither and thither, I caught other acts. I saw Marty Robbins in Duluth, Minnesota. I also saw Kenny Rogers there with my parents. 

When I was eight years old, I saw Loretta Lynn and her band perform at Panther Hall in Fort Worth, Texas. Panther Hall was a revelation. It was a de facto dining hall with elongated white-clothed tables, and one was required to cart in their own booze. The hall provided mixers but sold no alcohol. I dutifully ordered the steak and a salad with "no dressing", which flummoxed the waiter. (I was eight.) I somehow secured Loretta's autograph, which looked to me like "Buffalo Lynn".

When I was five years old my mom took me to my first country concert at the Grand Forks Armory by the afore-mentioned Marty Robbins. I remember he sang A White Sports Coat, and I remember that my mother nudged me after the show to go up and get Marty's autograph, but I demurred, too shy and self-conscious. 

In 1999 I saw Marty Stuart perform The Pilgrim at the Orpheum Theater, then saw him again at the Medina Ballroom with his band, The Fabulous Superlatives. 

I caught a binoculars-required Brooks and Dunn performance at the Target Center.

I saw Dwight Yoakam two or three times throughout the 2000's (He was worth repeat viewings).

The second best concert I ever saw was at a small venue, a casino. Diamond Rio had long been in constant rotation on my CD changer, but nothing I'd heard on CD compared to their live performance. Unlike Alan Jackson, who radiated an "I don't give a damn" attitude throughout his Civic Center appearance, Diamond Rio was on fire! There's no feeling like sitting in the second row of a tiny theater as Marty Roe and Jimmy Olander and Gene Johnson sang and played just for me.

But the very, very best concert was the one I attended with my mom. It wasn't that I was in love with Garth Brooks. I was a definite agnostic. And I don't even remember how it happened that we found ourselves in the third row of the Civic Center. The concert wasn't memorable for its theatrics, although there were plenty of those. It was the absolute joy on my mother's face. I think the two of us stood for the entire two-hour show. That was the last intimate moment my mom and I spent together and I savored it.

And so it was that my mom took me to my very first concert when I was five and that our musical life came full circle. 

No, I never saw Waylon. I don't think I saw Johnny Cash. If I did, I've forgotten it. I never got to see Mom's favorite singer, Ray Price. I'm pretty sure I caught Porter and Dolly, but my memory bank is somewhat fuzzy. Likewise, Mel Tillis. I wish I could have seen Lynn Anderson and Connie Smith and alas, Jerry Lee Lewis. 

I did see the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band at some kind of trade fair and they were wondrous. 

At thirteen I came this close to witnessing Bobby Bare in person, but a freak snowstorm forced Alice's brother to drive us home early, so I was forced to watch Bobby on a squiggly local TV feed.

Admittedly I've forgotten many of the artists I saw in person, and it's likely they've been forgotten to time as well. I sat through many, many opening acts in forty-odd years of concert-going -- one-hit wonders and no-hit wonders.

I wouldn't undertake the headache and dollars to endure a country concert today. Face it, I've seen the legends. Would a second George Strait show equal the thrill of the first? Not a chance. The quest was part of the reward.

I have the sweet sensation, however, of hearing a certain track on Spotify and remembering the time...

 

Thoughts On Country's "Greatest" Albums

This week Rolling Stone issued its edict coronating the one hundred best country albums of all time. They've done these lists before, but as much as I detest Rolling Stone (which used to be a music magazine) I can't dump on them too much this time around. They either managed to shake some older writers from the mothballs or they actually sat down and listened to a bunch of old albums, because they included some like this (#63), one of the best live country albums of all time:
 

 

 

As for more modern albums, they also honored "Ghost On The Canvas" by Glen Campbell (#88), which I fell in love with upon hearing the opening track.

 

 

 

And this album (#18!) is superb:

 

($62.93?? Good thing I already own it!) 

 

 

It was clear without even reading the article's preface that the article's contributors strove to only include one album per artist (with some exceptions), which is a little disingenuous, because I would easily place multiple George Strait and Dwight Yoakam albums on my list. I also question the albums by these artists they did choose, but taste is subjective.

 

One notable omission, which for a "hip" publication is head-scratching, is this:

 

 

In my late teens and early twenties I was a huge consumer of country albums (later CD's), and due to either the sparsity of choices and later, more disposable income, I bought a ton of clinkers. In an earlier post I even included a photo of my collection (misleading because the rows of CD's are two deep), and that wasn't even the entirety of it. It didn't include my stack of LP's or the boxed sets that are stashed under my bed. Not to mention hundreds of 45's. Yes, I still have all of them. 

 

But what I found, eventually, is that I return to certain titles when I want to hear some good music. 

Here are some of those:

(Good luck. Let me know if you can find it anywhere online.)

 

 

 

 

(C'mon Amazon. $33.49?) 

 

I know, I know ~ Red Headed Stranger and Will The Circle Be Unbroken get all the press in lists like Rolling Stone's, but frankly I listened to each of them one time and never again. 

 

And I know I could go on and on cataloguing my favorites, but I don't have an eidetic memory. 

 

Musical tastes are subjective, and sometimes you simply had to be there. But I can say without hesitation that you won't go wrong listening to any of my choices.

 

Really. 

 
 

The Non-Country Listener Checks Out The Current Top Ten

 

According to my lone source of country music news, country is navigating back to that nineties sound (the best decade in country music ever). So since I never know any of the artists Saving Country Music's articles reference, I thought I should find out for myself if that is actually true. I've done this exercise a couple of times in the past with disastrous results, but I have my fingers crossed!

The rules are simple: Clearly I've never heard any of these tracks before, so I will review them as I watch the music videos. This time I'm relying on American Country Countdown's chart for August 22, 2022, the most recent chart currently available. And I'm only reviewing the top ten, because I am not a glutton for punishment.

Bear in mind, I'm grading on a curve.

Wheeeeee! Here we go!

#10 ~ You Proof ~ Morgan Wallen

This is the first time I've ever heard this guy, who's for some reason controversial (because someone apparently recorded him having a private conversation with a friend). He's clearly not the best singer ~ nasally and he tends to slur his words ~ but he's certainly not the worst.

This song is perhaps following a modern trend, starting with a bare-bones verse and filling out the rest of the track with repetitions of the chorus. I can see the sing-along allure, but the subject matter, previously done to death, could use some fattening. I do give him props, though, for essentially keeping it country.

I haven't obviously heard the other top nine singles yet, but I will give this one a B-.

 

#9 ~ Damn Strait ~ Scotty McCreery

One might not want to do a song that instantly reminds the listener of King George, That said, the track is definitely country, kind of second-tier country, however. It's inordinately easy to write a song with hooks that are song titles. 

How about this:  

Mama Tried to Sing Me Back Home but I Was A Lonesome Fugitive, when all she ever wanted me to be was a Working Man. Merle used to be my favorite singer, but now I can't even listen to him because then I'll Start Loving You Again.

I vaguely remember this guy from when I used to watch American Idol (probably the last season I watched it) and he has a good country voice, but this song is cheap pandering. He can do better. B- 

#8 ~ Truth About You ~ Mitchell Tenpenny

Interesting storyline. This guy is a good singer, in the Travis Tritt vein. I don't know if he's had any previous singles, but this track is one that'll capture your attention when it bursts out of your car radio. I admire a song that tries to say something and isn't trite. I wouldn't buy it, but that doesn't mean I don't appreciate the effort. B

 

#7  ~ Like I Love Country Music ~ Kane Brown

Kind of a cross between Brooks and Dunn and Achy Breaky Heart, this is a damn fine bar song. I would dance to it. Again, I know nothing about the guy or any history attached to him, but with this track he is definitely doing nineties country in the truest sense of the word. Granted, it's a throwaway, but I suppose Boot Scootin' Boogie could be labeled a throwaway, too. That doesn't mean music can't be fun. In fact, it's supposed to be fun. B+

 

#6 ~ With A Woman You Love ~ Justin Moore

A bit reminiscent of Tracy Lawrence's later releases, Moore has a decent country voice and the track's production does harken back to the nineties days. And kudos for a song that is written in the verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-chorus standard. Unfortunately, it doesn't really resonate with me. The sentiment is great, but this track just sounds ordinary. B-

 

#5 ~ The Kind Of Love We Make ~ Luke Combs

 

I like this one. Frankly this guy has one of the best voices in country music today. The melody is one I could find myself humming when I'm trying to fall asleep. I also like the fact that he's not the cliched "leading man"'; he just has a great voice. Best so far. A-

 

#4 ~ She Had Me At Heads Carolina ~ Cole Swindell

Okay, nothing like stealing a melody from a more famous song. I hope Tim Nichols and Mark Sanders got songwriting credits on this. I guess this is one way to get on the radio. A cheap way. He's not an original singer and for stealing somebody else's song, this one gets a D-.

 

Oh, here's how the original goes:

#3 ~ Take My Name ~ Parmalee

 

I don't know who Parmalee (pick a better name) is, and I don't know what this is. This is something that movie producers would consider a country song. It's not. I vowed to watch every YouTube video 'til it's completion, but I knew where this one was going. F+

 

#2  ~ Last Night Lonely ~ Jon Pardi

I've read that this guy is the real deal. Apparently he has better tracks than this.This one has a lot of noise, but no real purpose. I will say that the production is over the top, and not in a good way. D 

 

#1 ~ At The End Of A Bar ~ Chris Young and Mitchell Tenpenny

Kids, don't be fooled by the racket. To be honest, I lost interest in this video and started doing other tasks. Mitchell, your number eight song was eons better. And just when I started to think that the nineties really were back.  F

 

So, just like the last time I tried this experiment, Luke Combs wins. But props to Tenpenny (#8, not #1) and Brown. There's a lot to like here, but not much originality. 

And Saving Country Music, you told me that this Pardi guy was someone to watch. I think I'll pass.