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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 20, 2021 10:26:10 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#65 - Flyin' Shoes - Lyle Lovett
I became kind of obsessed with this song the past year. As such there are three version in my top 100. This is the first. The song was written by Townes Van Zandt and I'll get more in to that when Townes' version shows up (spoilers).
Lyle Lovett is a terribly underappreciated performer. It took me some time to discover him as anything other than that goofy guy who Julia Roberts married for a week. But he's a tremendous performer and does a great interpretation of a hauntingly beautiful Townes song.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 20, 2021 13:43:49 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#9 - Charley Crockett - Welcome to the Hard Times
It took me a fair bit of time to appreciate Charley Crockett. I knew that I should. And in a way I did. But that accent threw me off. Just when I thought I was getting in to the music it would sound like Mush-Mouth was singing. Ultimately though his work grew on me and the idiosyncratic voice became a feature not a bug.
This is a fairly typical Crockett album. Which means it's a high quality album that runs the gamut of country influences. This is an album that sounds like you took a sampling of high quality roots music and put it together for a new audience. At least one of the tracks will show up later on my top listens for 2020. So he's one that I think shows that Crockett can do western very well.
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Post by impulse on Jan 20, 2021 13:48:25 GMT -5
Throwback song I haven't listened to in a while. Clean version
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 21, 2021 11:10:49 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#64 - The World is Ending - Brent Cobb
Brent Cobb was (I believe) an new discovery last year, though he's been active for the better part of a decade and has been a professional songwriter for longer. He fits pretty firmly in the Americana universe and his 2020 album "Keep Em on They Toes" was one of the last to drop off my list of favorite albums of the year.
This song hits all those Americana vibes that have grabbed me this year. Strong lyrics. A personal and slightly political stance. Cobb's laid-back conversational styling still conveys his meaning with strength.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 22, 2021 10:30:58 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#63 - Welcome to Hard Times - Charley Crockett
I talked about Charley Crockett a couple days back regarding the album of this same name. This is just a good old-time country song, which is one of the things you come to expect from Crockett. Not that that's all he does. Because he runs the gamut from country to blues to honky-tonk. And while his voice and phrasing are idiosyncratic, they've very much grown on me.
Btw...the song actually starts at the 1:10 mark.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 22, 2021 13:39:19 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#8 - Dean Miller - 1965
Country music progeny have a long history. There are Willie's kids, Paula and Lucas. Shooter Jennings. Hank Williams III. (yes I'm scrupulously ignoring his father, because he sucks) But until this year I was unaware of Dean Miller. Roger Miller's music was an integral part of my childhood. And apparently Dean has been hanging around the outskirts of country music for decades.
His self-penned and self-released album, 1965, may not change his mainstream recognition. But it certainly got my attention. It's not a perfect album. But it's a good album with a few very good songs on it. You can argue the middle bogs down in to Adult Contemporary territory, but overall it's a fine effort with plenty of bright spots. Since I already highlighted the title track, here's another fine track.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 25, 2021 11:26:58 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#62 - I Remember Everything - John Prine
This was John Prine's last recorded song. It was the first song recorded for the album that was set to follow up 2018s "Tree of Forgiveness." This may have been the perfect song for Prine to go out on. It's a lovely ballad where he looks back at snapshots of his life. This is vintage "quiet" Prine. And it's a lovely note upon which to say goodbye to a wonderful songwriter and performer.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 26, 2021 9:58:59 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#61 - My Old Friend the Blues - Steve Earle
Guitar Town was one of the great debut albums and might be my pick for best album of 1986 (though Dwight Yoakam's "Guitars, Cadillacs, etc. is a strong contender).
This was the last track on Side 1 and made it clear that Earle was both more than a roots rocker and had a clear knowledge of depression coming in and whacking you upside the head.
And I really love footage from Austin City Limits.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 26, 2021 10:23:47 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#7 - Colter Wall - Western Swing & Waltzes and Other Punchy Songs
This was really my introduction to Colter Wall (I can't keep up with everything). And what an introduction it is. Dom Flemons' "Black Cowboys" is one of my favorite albums of the last decade. I guess you can say I'm a fan of cowboy music. And that's what Wall gives us here. Unlike Flemons' album this one isn't all old-timey traditional songs. Or even predominantly so. You have a great cover of Marty Robbins' "Big Iron" and a great version of Stan Jones' "Cowpoke." There are also some fine originals by Wall.
While it's not an old-timey cowboy album it's a brilliant contemporary look at the classic western sound. And now I have to go through Wall's back catalog and see what all I missed.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 27, 2021 11:14:50 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#60 - East Virginia Blues - Robert Earl Keen
Eventually everyone does a bluegrass album, so it was inevitable that Keen would do one. The difference is that, while it's clear that Keen loves the genre, he doesn't really change his style on this album or this song. So what you get is a bluegrass tinged Robert Earl Keen Texas sound. And that's perfectly fine.
If you've read any interviews with Keen you know that he's a big bluegrass fan. This Carter Family standard ending up on the list here is largely a testament to my love for Keen in general and a fluke of the algorithm. But it's a perfectly fine fluke.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 27, 2021 12:28:02 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#6 - Brent Cobb - Keep 'Em on They Toes.
If 2020 did nothing else, it introduced me to some great music and great songwriters. Brent Cobb is another one of those guys who had somehow escaped my notice until he started showing up on my Spotify lists with this album.
Cobb is one of those guys who straddles the line between country and the softer edge of rock and thus falls right in to the middle of the amorphous Americana "genre" that seems to encompass the vast majority of what is good in music right now.
This is a pretty quiet album. It's largely acoustic, though you hear a fiddle and a drum now and then when they're reasonable to be there. What sells the album is the strength of Cobb's song-writing and that you can feel that he's telling you how he feels in each song.
The title track has a nice hook and segues in to "Shut up and Sing" to let us know that Cobb is expects to speak his mind and it's simply too bad if you don't like it. We already saw "The World is Ending" come in at #64 on my most listened too songs of the year. Give it a listen.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 28, 2021 10:36:34 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#59 - How to Forget - Jason Isbell
At this point it's pretty clear that anything by Isbell could show up at any place on the list. Well, except maybe "Cumberland Gap." I really don't like that song.
This one was from 2015s "Something More Than Free." Following up on "Southeastern" it had some big shoes to fill. It did a fine job of being a worthy follow-up to a stone cold classic.
This song is Isbell meditating on attempting to move on. He was still fairly newly sober, in a reasonably new relationship and was having significant success on his own. But while he wants to move on he realizes that he also has to recognize that he was much of the problem. And that's important.
"I was strained, I was sad, didn't realize what I had It was years ago I was sick, I was scared, I was socially impaired It was years ago"
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 28, 2021 13:50:01 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#5 - John Anderson - Years
At this point you should almost expect aging country artists to have a late career renaissance album. This is certainly the one for John Anderson. Let me start out by saying that I've never been a big fan of Anderson. Not that there's anything wrong with him. He was just...okay. I generally wouldn't turn the channel if he came on a classic country station. But I also wouldn't go out of my way to listen to his music. One of those "Greatest Hits" once every couple of years kind of guys.
This, however, is a really solid album with a handful of very good tracks. There's a definite nostalgia feel here. And that can be both good and bad. Anderson had been in poor health for a few years and the songs here lean toward looking back on life. And that's fine. We've certainly seen that with late-stage work from both Johnny Cash and Porter Wagoner. Where it can be faulted is that there are a few songs here that suffer from production that is, at best, dated. Some might call it vintage. And that might be fair for most of the album, but it is occasionally dated.
The title track is, in my opinion, the best on the album and it will be coming up in my top songs of the year. The other one that probably gets (got) some notice is "Tuesday I'll Be Gone" because of the presence of Blake Shelton. Good for Shelton for helping Anderson get this album out...but he's still a no-talent light-weight.
This is just a fine late career album. And I'm very glad that Anderson is still hanging on.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 29, 2021 10:18:01 GMT -5
Most listened to songs of 2020
#58 - Something to Love - Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit
It didn't take long to get back to Isbell. The Nashville Sound was a fabulous album. This song is one of the reasons. For someone who is known for sad songs, frequently leaning to the dark and depressing, this is just a damn happy song. Isbell sings about the things he loves, doing the things his wife loves for her, and expressing the hope that his newest love, his daughter, will find her own things to love.
Just find the thing you love and that makes you happy and do it. Write. Draw. Take photos. Knit. Tinker with cars. Sing. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if others don't like it or think you're crazy. Find something to love.
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Post by Slam_Bradley on Jan 29, 2021 13:47:53 GMT -5
Ten favorite albums of 2020.
#4 - American Aquarium - Lamentations
American Aquarium really equals B. J. Barham. He's the only original member left. And he's run off a ton of other members over the years. It's a band that has tread a lot of lines over the years. Not quite Country. Not fully Americana. Red Dirt adjacent, but more through booking and management than ethos.
This album, produced by Shooter Jennings, looks posed to be their biggest. And it's deserved. There's a lot of great stuff here and Barham doesn't avoid courting some controversy. But he's also less overt in his statement than, for example, The Drive-By Truckers. There's a feeling of reaching out to the middle in the political statements here.
The opener "Me + Mine (Lamentations)" is a lamentation of the American Dream. "Brightleaf + Burley" follows up with that with Barham looking North Carolina's dependence on tobacco production and the inevitable loss of that life. All of which lead in to "A Better South" probably the most overtly political song on the album.
Of course there are also songs about sobriety and love. But it's the statement that the band tries to make that make the album more interesting than most.
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