I always rejected the sterotypical country music genre, the crying-in-my-boots Garth Brooks and Toby Keith kind of thing. But I’ve realized over the past ten years or so that it really is just a stereotype, and there’s a wide variety of country music as good as anything else I listen to.
It probably started with Lyle Lovett, who is certainly many things, but a country music singer is very high on the list. And it branched out from there to include k.d. lang, The Dixie Chicks, Loretta Lynn, Ryan Adams, Neko Case, Tift Merritt, Lucinda Williams and on and on. Some of those artists are more “country” than others, but they all prove how effective the genre can be.
My latest country success story is Sugarland, a duo who are currently lighting up both country and pop charts with their new album Love on the Inside and its first single ‘All I Want To Do.’
The group is made up of former Billy Pilgrim singer-songwriter Kristian Bush and co-writer and lead vocalist Jennifer Nettles. Billy Pilgrim put out a teriffic debut album a hundred years ago and then pretty much dropped off the face of the planet. The songs and sound on Love On the Inside are very reminiscent of that album, though Bush stays largely in the background here, playing guitar and contributing the occasional background vocal.
The real star is Nettles, a down-home beauty with a great big voice. She has a charming Georgia twang and an incredible range that feels just right on songs both soft and arena-ready. She’s also cute as can be, and another strong argument for buying CDs — there’s a picture in these liner notes involving a hat and suspenders… (Edit: I have located this photo and presented it in this post)
The songs are uniformly excellent. From the radio-ready pop of ‘All I Want to Do’ to and ‘It Happens’ to ballads like ‘Keep You’ and ‘Very Last Country Song,’ there are wild shifts in tone but not a note feels out of place. The theme, as the title suggests, is love in its many forms. ‘We Run’ is a peppy bluegrass number chronicling a new romance while ‘Already Gone’ is a swinging piano number about the end of a relationship. ‘Joey’ is a lament for a lover who died; ‘What I’d Give’ is a drop-dead sexy slow blues jam about desire. There are really too many highlights to fit into one capsule review. Bottom line is I’ve had a hard time getting this CD out of my stereo, and that’s the biggest compliment I can pay.
Meet Me In Montauk 
A few thoughts:
Really? I have to rush out to buy the CD so I can have photo of Jennifer Nettles in a hat and suspenders? K, I’ll get right on that.
(btw, you are now the #1 site to pop up on google if someone searces for “jennifer nettles, hat, suspenders” — and no, I couldn’t easily find it, thus I was unable to disprove your point 😛 that sometimes CD’s are the superior art form. Still, I can rightthisverymoment open iTunes and download Sugarland in order to listen to it on my drive to school today, and it is about the MUSIC after all, isn’t it?)
The far less superficial thought is this: aren’t all stereotypes of music just stereotypes? I don’t pretend to listen to punk, hard rock, emo, grunge, or any of a number of “types” of music, yet, of course, I have images that pop into my head when I think of those labels and at least a short sample of music that accompanies those images. Of course, they have little to do with what that music is all about. Same with literature, television, movies (except for horror 😉 and, shockingly, people. Doesn’t mean there isn’t a germ of truth there. Who was the comedian who sang the country song about driving his pick-up with his dog and his gun to see his ex-wife? Or some such thing? I bet a relatively decent % of “classic” country songs do contain images such as those joked about. That said, if Lyle Lovett is above all else a country musician, then clearly I am a country music fan. So bring on Sugarland.
And I’m pleased to hear that Billy Pilgrim has made its way back to the musical scene in some manner. I loved their debut (country?) album!
Oh, and I now own Sugarland. Still sipping my morning coffee. I’m sure you’ll let Dana look at the liner notes 😉
I did try to locate the suspenders picture online when I wrote that and was surprised when I couldn’t. Maybe you can’t find everything on the Web!
Okay, Clay may have done it again. I’m only on my first listen, but I can already tell that this album is going to get a lot of play. So thank you, Clay, for twisting my arm (figuratively, of course) and reminding me that there is a lot of good music I’ve yet to hear 🙂 and would miss out on if I decided never to emerge from my old favorites.