Battle of the Honkytonkers

"the kind" = "the king". tho i'm pretty sure hank was familiar with the kind as well.

Hank is of course the King, and Lefty Frizzell is the Duke. But I'm a Californian, a Native Son of the Golden West, so give me Merle Haggard and Buck Owens.

I like Junior Brown, but there's no way he's in the same league as Hank for honky-tonk-ness. Couple of good, funny honky-tonk songs (Party Lights, My Wife Thinks You're Dead) and a few interesting instrumental flashes on the guit-steel. Probably too interesting to be a real honky-tonker (i.e. his stuff is not music for drinking and fighting on sawdust floors) to the same degree that Hank's is. So who COULD rival Hank? Well, nobody, really.

For good timing honky tonk, Jimmie Rodgers would be the only rival to Hank, but Hank would win on the grounds that he was more purely c&w, while Jimmie was more blues.

For heartbroken honky tonk, George Jones would be Hank's only rival, but Hank would win because George Jones would hit you over the head with a chair for implying that Hank was not the king.