Holy SHIT is my reaction to You Do Your Thing by Montgomery Gentry

It means driving an SUV makes you an unstoppable helltank of child-protecting ultrasafety.

oh yeah, there are really lovely gospel parts on that song, right along with their refusal to stop beating their children. after all, that's what their daddies did.

The Alison Moerer record really isn't very good (at least compared to her last couple.) But maybe I will listen more and change my mind.

And yeah, the first time I heard You Do Your Thing I thought "DAMN Chuck's gonna be all over this shit!" It beats Kenny Chesney with a hose.

Unless we're talking "*Arbum Genelic Fripper,* I guess.

Chuck: You're always so confident in your opinions! I admire that a lot. I have a hard time with the idea that my taste can absolutely apply for all other humans on the planet. But let me get over that for a second. This record is far from liver and onions, it HAS hooks (just not the obvious hit-ya-over-the-head Kix-and-Dunn ones you love so much), the stripped-down approach IS sometimes better, it IS brave for a country singer to write and perform songs that are critical of the Amurricaloveitorleaveit idea, I never said that you should listen to any record that's good for you, it's a really good record full of songs that take a little bit of work BUT THAT IS A GOOD THING IN THIS CASE. And when did it become okay to be a snob against NPR people? Isn't that hypocritical? Anyway, it makes no sense as a criticism to imply that she sold out; Moorer's record won't sell any copies at all, and MontGent will be huge for months, because they've got the hooks that apparently are the only thing that matters in music.

(I wrote all that before I read your last post, so let me elaborate just a bit further. I like listening to this album, I have since the first time I heard it, I like the way it sounds, I sing along to it, I didn't have to work really hard to hate it.

Probably an exagerration, of course. I mean, her live album made my top ten country list last year, and I liked the album before that; she must be doing *something* to draw me on on those CDs. But she's not nearly as intriuging or engaging an act as Montgomery Gentry is. Sad to say, she's probably not as smart as them, either. Though given the choice, I'm sure she's the one I'd have over for dinner. (She's way more like ME than Montgomery Gentry. But big deal, you know?)

>hooks are about all SHE had in the first place, near as I can tell.<

she has a really good voice. you might have liked that about her.

chuck, I didn't say that hooks were ALL m-gent had! or at least I didn't mean to. they've both got great voices, their producers frame them very well and have a lot more gospel touches on this record than b&d did on their record (which I think you overrated last year but I also liked), their writers know how to write for them perfectly. (have they ever written a song for themselves? troy has a co-writing credit on my least favorite song on this one.) it's a great record, really, it is, it sounds awesome. but I like the moorer record more, and I think she's a better songwriter with better songs and sings them better. but it's a downer record, mostly; sometimes ya gotta rip it up, and then I reach for my revolver...uh, m to the g.

as for politics...I'll get into this later, elsewhere.

damn we're like the bickersons all up in here.

As for politics, I hope you adhere to as strict a code with ALL artists, and only listen to things that you agree with, songs that measure up to your strict-sounding moral code. That will leave all the "incorrect" songs out there for me to listen to. Montgomery Gentry could not be more different from me, politically, and Eddie looks like every guy who ever wanted to kick my ass...but I will be very happy this weekend drinking beer and blasting their CD while I clean my garage.

Looks like this is "Rollin (The Ballad of Big & Rich)" by Big & Rich featuring Cowboy Troy, first (!!!) song on THEIR album, which means the cut immediately preceding "Wild West Show," which is ANOTHER one of the year's best singles so far. Rap lyrics from the lyric sheet, holy fuck: "BAak home we love to dance/We could be two-steppin' or ravin to trance/And when the party is crunk the girls back it up/We've got the systems in the cars and the 20s on the trucks..."

(The press release calls Cowboy Troy "the world's only six foot five inch, 250 pound black cowboy rapper, who throws down in three languages and has a degree in economics to boot." "Wild West Show" has a chorus that goes "hey yaaaaa" and guitars that totally sound like a spaghetti western or something, and Big and Rich say that their fans listen to Ludacris and Outkast and Kenny Chesney and Johnny Cash and Kid Rock, and that "Nashville's going to catch up with that"...."Life's as large as you want to make it.")

And to Eddie: I admire your brave stand; like I said, I used to feel that way, that there were whole segments of the country that I could snub because they weren't as enlightened as me. Then I realized that that is really fucking arrogant so I stopped. I was so much older then, etc.

Yeah, but what if he does that and still doesn't care for the music?

P.S. Chuck I just bought the Loretta Lynn record.

so i went into the ernest tubb's record shop on broadway, where i assume they would know everything about everything, and very meekly asked who does that "hell yeah" song that's all over the radio, and to my shock and awe, no one who works at the store had a clue. one guy was pretty sure it was the dixie chicks, and even brought me over to the dixie chicks section to help me try to find it on their current album, but that search turned up empty. i thought it was kinda funny that the people selling records to all the tourists in downtown nashville don't listen to the radio. or maybe they've just got it tuned to the honky-tonk oldies station or something. but then again, "redneck woman" would sound FANTASTIC on a honky-tonk oldies station.

i also fell in love with terri clark's "girls lie too" while i was there.

i get the impression with some of the pop-country guys that they could just as easily be working construction or driving trucks, and i don't mean that as an insult or to demean their art, i just mean it feels like their music isn't something they have to step outside of their lives to do...in fact i think you can see the same thing with hip-hop, so many mainstream artists grow up in the same cultural context and share a similar experience with such a large number of people that they just seem to fit the desires and demands of their audience perfectly, whereas these indie-rappers (white or black) often just look like they're trying too hard to relate to a culture they either haven't experienced first-hand, or did experience and then maybe rejected it as too materialistic, nihilistic, whatever (not saying they're right for feeling that way neccessarily).

and as far as the audience is concerned, i think it's also easy to be envious of people who treat their music as an extension of life rather than something to be picked apart and analyzed to death, as something you might have to work a little harder at in order to fit into your ideological/spiritual framework or whatever...basically, i think it's terrific that pop-country does such a great job of speaking to its audience, i don't know, maybe i'm just saying we should cut the misfits a little more slack, i'd argue that they're speaking to people too, just that it might not be as obvious.

i'm not so sure that's true. 99 percent of the people making these records we're hearing on the radio and talking about, whether it's in nashville or anywhere else, have spent their entire lives preparing and practicing to be musicians, not construction guys or truck drivers. they've been eating, sleeping and drinking nothing but music for a long time. they're artists who have SOUGHT to be artists. you don't get record deals by accident these days, at least most people don't. you get them by deciding pretty early in your life that you don't want to be a truck driver or a construction guy. it's a conscious choice and it separates artist and fan in a very real way.

if they give the impression in their songs -- whether they're writing them or singing them or whatever -- that they share similar experiences with their fans, i'd argue that that's because on a larger level all humans share similar experiences. and great singers and writers are able to express that experience in an interesting way. but it's a HUGE effort. what seems effortless is the result of a lot of work. even for rednecks.

I love the CMT site's 'Sorry, video is not supported for Macintosh computers at this time' message when you try to watch anything, even with WMP installed... we don't even want you here, you fuckin' Mac owners

this is the best thread on ILM

this album does indeed rock very hard

RIP Troy Gentry

if you squint a little bit, this is a Hold Steady album

that's not a diss btw