yeah see those are limelight ho's rebel. i dont think their heart is in what they do.
sometimes an artist will forget the "for the love of it" and focus on the money of it only.
thats what these kind you mention do. sure they write good tunes and everybody sings along. you got to remember, as a player yourself, you look at things a little differently
than the "normal folks".
how many time shave you listened to a jammin song for the first time and didnt even hear the first word? man i cant count that high for me lol. then i have to go back and actually listen to the song itself. first go i got so caught up in the guitar i forgot to listen to everything else. well the "normal folks" dont have that ability that we do, and i dont use that word "ability" like its always a good thing. sometimes i think its a freakin curse to be honest. i cant just set back and enjoy the music for what it is sometimes. i gotta nitpick it to death and dont even realize im doing it. we players tend to catch the flaws and the screw ups as well as the wool when its pulled over the listeners eyes lol.
if you read my sig that ole supro once said and how true it is, i sometimes miss being one of those but w/o the booze. just a regular joe thats not in the know. follow me on this?

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63supro
"The good thing is in a club situation, most of the patrons are trashed and really can't tell the difference."

[quote="Screamin' Armadillo]Adapting, bastardizing, changing and even sanitizing isn't horrible or immoral in and of itself. But to try to draw a line between what Pat Boone did to "Tutti Frutti" and what Elvis did to "Hound Dog" is ridiculous.[/quote]

Even though I really like Elvis, I don't think it's quite so clear cut. If you were a black musician at the time, did it really matter to you if it was Elvis or Pat Boone covering your song? Either way, you were probably not getting jack due to your contract while some white guy was rolling in the dough. Actually, you'd probably have a bigger beef with Elvis than Pat Boone, because at least Pat Boone albums were a VERY poor substitute.

Getting back to country music, I think the 1970s and 1980s were probably the worst thing that could have happened to country music. Country music was still good in the 1970s, but so many non-country acts tried to sound country. Then in the 1980s, it seemed like all the country acts were trying to sound non-country. I would argue that country music hit rock bottom with Billy Ray Cyrus.

A lot of people who buy country music today just want something with a little twang, and that's relatively safe listening for all audiences. While there is a market for the varieties of country that Waylon, Willie, Merle, Johnny, Hank Sr, Buck, and Bob played... it's small.

The 2 radio stations I listen to the most are Willie's Place and The Roadhouse on XM. 90% of the time, you'll hear some good country music -- much to my wife's dismay. For some reason, the combo of my pickup truck and country music causes her to doze off.

All music builds on each other, even when it's "rejecting" the past. That's why people do "covers", to give a new, hopefully fresh and creative, spin on a song. Elvis's rendition of Big Mama Thornton's "Hound Dog" moved it to a different genre. In that way, it was no different than Ritchie Valens taking an old Mexican folk song and creating a Rock classic from "La Bamba".

Country has ties to folk music, of course. Johnny Cash was an early Dylan fan and Hoyt Axton was good friends with Arlo Guthrie and did a cover of the PPM song "500 Miles". Those are just examples. Most musicians don't give a cr@* about "genre" and just enjoy it where they find it.

waycool,yeah I understand what you're saying and it is kind of a curse,when people are slobberin' over some "artist/star" and saying "have you heard this?"....I am usually thinking this sucks....I could play better than that 30 years ago.
What has always bothered me and thousands of other musicians is that I might not be one of the best,but I know some who are and still unknown.

yeah ive known some great players over the yrs, some well know and others very unknown. i know some studio guys that dont want to be known too.
funny how that works isnt it.
im was once known as well, but for all the wrong things.

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63supro
"The good thing is in a club situation, most of the patrons are trashed and really can't tell the difference."

Like Pete townshend wrote "Rock is dead". Theres no more good rock stations like in the 60's & 70's. There's either country (rock wannabee's), or insepid homoginized rock. Most of them can't sing to save their lives (they can fix it in the studio). or more concerned with their dance routines. I guess contry is the new rock?
You used to go out on a weekend & hear some good live rock in every major bar in town, but bar owners would rather some joker DJ play disco (dance music) or kareoke. What a concept. Cheaper than paying a live band !!!!!!
Good rock radio is no longer promoted, classic rock stations would rather play the same songs ya heard over & over again, 40 or 50 years ago. That you were barfing on back then.
Gone are the days of good musicianship, pure emotion & more than 3 chord songs. Songs shouldn't be longer than 3 minutes either.
Thanks to the PMRC for ruining rock music.
Like others here, I'd rather listen to my vinyl, than MOST of the dribble on most CD'S today. Yup I still have my turntables.
I am 58 years old, still have my long hair, "Long live rock". Keep on rockin".......

The PMRC didn't ruin rock music at all... in fact, I'd argue that 95%+ of the greatest rock music ever wouldn't have required a parental advisory sticker.

Some of the greatest acts of all time worked in an era where the record companies themselves wouldn't dare put foul language onto a recording. If you listen to Johnny Cash live at Folsom (or was it San Quentin), you'll notice that he had a very minor cuss word bleeped out.

Talent doesn't require vulgarity to get across its message...or to even shock and offend. The PMRC basically provided a tool to identify artists that were lazy when it came to their lyrics.

We've become our parents. I remember Harry James hawking Big Band anthologies in 1970...and he was 54 at the time. That's younger than any of Yes, ELP, or most of the Prog Rockers. It's the same age as Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols. It's also younger than me.

So when someone says all the great music was from the 60's and 70's I remember my dad's generation saying all the great music was from the 30's and 40's. They considered the 1953 emergence of Rock'n'Roll to be a passing fad...

Look, I may not have a clue to the attraction of Lady Gaga (at least musically), Kanye West, or even Taylor Swift, but that doesn't mean they aren't part of a whole new generation of music.

You know you are getting old when you keep saying music (or base-ball playing) isn't as good as it used to be, that young people don't know what they are missing. We heard it when we were young, too...I mean it's ridiculous.

Bob Feller said Nolan Ryan wasn't as fast as he was. Walter Johnson told Bob Feller HE wasn't as fast as Johnson had been. Sense a pattern of nonsense here?

wow, im so greatful that the allman brother didnt believe that songs should be limited to 3 minutes.
the PMRC is a whole different story. i dont think they ruined rock, though they tried.
thank God for Dee Snider and his hard work. Dee fought long and hard at capitol hill
often single handed while the rest of rock n roll personalities were nothing less than cowards and wouldnt stand up for the music or themselves.
thank you DEE for all that you tried to do for us brother.

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63supro
"The good thing is in a club situation, most of the patrons are trashed and really can't tell the difference."

I should have clubbed Tipper Gore over her blonde melon with my Les Paul while I had her standing beside my Marshall amp with it shattering her fat rump on a summer day in July 1983,was it? she was campaining for Al Jr....I said yeah,I've heard of that old guy,she said no that's his father....I just wiped some sweat away and said whatever,and walked offstage.

i still cant figure out why nobody helped dee out in our nations capitol.
everybody just stood by and watched while he got beat and dragged from one end of capitol hill to the next.

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63supro
"The good thing is in a club situation, most of the patrons are trashed and really can't tell the difference."

thank you tc Rocker.

Back to the original post, I really like cross-pollination of musical genres...I love it when a country band puts a bluesy bend on their songs or a rock band plays a country-style song. Clint Black is a great blues harp player, the Stones have several songs that can only be called "country" and Hank Williams, Jr. is a Southern Rock musician by any definition...and I think all those things are cool.

I think what irritates me is the fact that modern top 40 country really sucks for the most part. The combination of bland, generic songwriting with bland, generic performers playing bad pop songs makes it almost completely unlistenable.

Somebody mentioned Billy Ray Cyrus being the nadir of lousy country, and I have to agree. Most of the male country artists after him are just variations of his theme (although there are notable exceptions).

There is good country music out there--Jamey Johnson, Jack Ingram, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Lucinda Williams, Terri Hendrix, Joe Ely--but we just don't hear it on the radio much.

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Good Vibes To Y'all!



Screamin' Armadillos
Texas Roadhouse Music
Guitar/Slide Guitar/Harp/Vocals

Speaking of Billy Ray Cyrus--when "Achy Breaky" was a hit, I was occasionally playing with a country band. The leader of the band insisted that we learn/play new hits (as well as the old standards and songs we actually liked playing), and we all groaned when he brought up "ABH".

As a 22-year-old smart-aleck, I had a flash of brilliance and said, "I'd love to sing that one--let me do it!" Everybody in the band (except the leader, bless his pointy little head) was suspicious, but they agreed.

I sat down with the other guitar player and we wrote new lyrics to the song, describing the damage that would be done to all the major internal organs if you told them the girl left.

"Don't tell my liver/it might not forgive her/and please don't ever tell my spleen
Cuz if you tell my spleen/it might do something mean/like blow up, rupture and make me scream.
Don't tell my bladder/my weepy, leaky bladder/and please don't tell my colon, too.
Cuz if you tell my colon/I might just start to moanin'/and make a big mess when I go poo..."

I went on to describe the problems with my "plaque-encrusted molars", "receding gums", "enlarged prostate" and other body parts. The band fell out laughing at the lyrics (with the exception of the leader--he got ticked off at me) when I debuted the new lyrics live in the middle of a show (we rehearsed it "straight").

The thing that disturbed me was the fact that about half the audience never realized I wasn't singing the right lyrics. A good number of people were paying attention and laughed, but many people just went on dancing like I was singing it properly. It made me realize what dolts many people were when it came to music, and how little they actually paid attention to what was going on around them.

I think the same is true today in regard to top 40 country.

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Good Vibes To Y'all!



Screamin' Armadillos
Texas Roadhouse Music
Guitar/Slide Guitar/Harp/Vocals

now I would have listened to that bladder,spleen song.
I guess lots of guys bored with lyrics have just gotten sarcastic and replaced the words...we did a blues song years ago that our drummer sang,"your mama don't wear no panties."