Country Music - Election latest, shrink-wrapped hunks of beef: This week's new Country singles!

Country Music Singles Reviews

Doug Stone, Sammy Kershaw, Hank Williams Jr. and Brooks & Dunn

DOUG STONE : DON'T TELL MAMA:
(MY PICK OF THE WEEK)

Full marks to Jerry Duncan for having faith in one of Country music's finest singers AND a brilliant song.

Stone's vocals are both pitch perfect (a rarity in Nashville these days), and intoned with the emotion a song like this deserves.

The pedal steel's are there because - played that way - they ADD to the song, and NOT because having a pedal steel on a track MAKES it a Country song.

Of course, it goes without saying that Doug will not top the charts. Heck, this song will have Country radio across America asking: "What kind of music is that?"  Why? Because they wouldn't know Country music if it jumped up in front of them and yelled "I'm A COUNTRY song."

SAMMY KERSHAW - REAL PEOPLE:

It's a crying shame. Sammy Kershaw's last album was a masterpiece of good old-fashioned Country music.

This new single (presumably the precursor to a new album) is NOT! In fact, it's  as dull as dishwater!

Why, oh why won't folks let singers do what they're best at instead of trying to mould them into the latest demographic of "what listeners want".

And why won't singers do that for themselves? (Possibly, because labels won't touch those that don't fit those survey results!!!)

Sammy Kershaw is one of Country's all time greats. Hope he gets back to being himself real soon.

HANK WILLIAMS Jr - MCCAIN - PALIN TRADITION:

Man, YOU guys have a problem. You have to choose a President in a few weeks, and you've got a bunch of mad people trying to convince you that their candidate is the best.

Hank nails his colors to the mast as an all out Republican.

Happily, here in Britain, I can marvel from a distance as you guys watch the candidates and their supporters hurl meaningless insults at one another like toddlers in a bun fight at the crèche!

The message is confusing, the delivery is boring ... just like the election campaign!

PS: I just ran this through my spell-checker: It refused to accept Palin, offering in it's place "pain". Hmmmmm!

BROOKS & DUNN : COWGIRLS DON'T CRY:

Fancy a smoothie? Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn might suit.

You know, I remember these guys before they were shrink-wrapped in Nashville plastic and marketed like two sanitized hunks of beef!

I know those brilliant producers on Music Row hunt for perfection, but cutting out every rough edge takes ALL of the feeling out of the music.

These guys might as well sing about two hunks of shrink-wrapped beef for all the emotion they've drained out of the lyrics.

My bet? Surefire Number 1.