Ken Burns' COUNTRY MUSIC Documentary

https://www.mediavillage.com/media/articles/IMG_4959.jpg.1440x1000_q85_box-0%2C0%2C596%2C413_crop_detail.jpg

...was just a category on today's Jeopardy, so let's anticipate/dread/debate whether we need this when we already have Cocaine & Rhinestones etc.

camera pans over a daguerrotype of a hill billy

I'm excited about it. But I don't listen to "podcasts"

was there a thread to talk about American Epic? it was ok.

Final episode focuses entirely on how Wynton Marsalis' collaboration with Willie Nelson revitalized country music.

I wonder if they'll do like they did w/Fusion in the Jazz doc by being handwavy re:the importance of Byrds/Gram Parsons etc. and Country Rock.

that's Rosanne Cash up there, no?

Yes.

this seems so boringly obvious to me.

and when you can say that about a ken burns endeavour, hoo boy.

was there a thread to talk about American Epic? it was ok.

They were showing some of these this afternoon as an undercard to Burns' premiere. Quite good! I really liked the Charley Patton segment.

David Cantwell has a review:

newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/ken-burns-delightful-country-music-gets-the-big-things-mostly-right

Bloody hell, WYNTON <is> in this!

It's pretty damn good so far

Bloody hell, WYNTON <is> in this!

Narrator sounds to be Peter Coyote.

It is. He's Burns go-to for narration.

first ep was pretty good to me.

_billygoat testicles_

that part just played again. archived for posterity

Great opening ep.

and the rerun of American Epic beforehand was an inspired foreword.

"this seems so boringly obvious to me."

lol @ calling 99% of what's being covered in episode 1 "obvious."

I could listen to that first a cappella bit with Dolly for hours.

otm

how many episodes are there of this? man, Ep1 was a pretty deep dive.

Eight, I think

They're showing four this week, and the other four next week (Sunday-->Wednesday each week).

All of the first 4 are already on the PBS app on Roku/FireTV/etc.

oooh! that's good. i know people dunk on wynton and his inability to see beyond his own jazz glasses but the historical information in the jazz doc is very useful for educational purposes when students have no idea what jazz is or where it came from beyond what i've said. it confirms that teacher is not crazy. i am assuming the country music one is similar?

(i don't show them the whole thing, it's too long, but the chapters about the origins are great aside from the graphic imagery of lynchings and constant talk about prostitution -- which actually caused trouble in one of my classes but that is neither here nor there nor jazz nor country)

I guess I will watch the first ep of this but I am v v skeptical

It's good!

Does anyone actual listen to Wynton Marsalis? He's released maybe 100 or so records, but I don't think I've heard a note.

wasn't he involved in a recent movie about buddy bolden?

(of course it's buddy bolden)

i listen to marsalis / have seen him play live / have talked to him once or twice. he's phenomenally knowledgable about music but also quite opinionated. he's allowed to be!

I figure he must have some sorta fanbase beyond those who might casually pick up a Jazz CD at Barnes & Noble. There's also those who might casually pick up a Jazz Christmas CD at Barnes & Noble. I haven't ever met a single Wynton fan, though.

(although a trumpeter acquaintance once told me and several other skeptics that one of Wynton's early records -- possibly his debut as a leader -- is "actually really good! Nobody believes me, but it's good!")

Something I noticed re: Wynton's interview: At one point he makes a quick hand gesture revealing he's holding his trumpet in his right hand.

Might be surgically attached.

whats weird is i get him mixed up w George Winston & think he’s the barefoot piano guy

Wynton is a really good live musician and bandleader and composer! His fans are very much of the "jazz as american classical" audience though and that puts a lot of folks off.

Does anyone actual listen to Wynton Marsalis?

i have a chico freeman album from the early 80s with wynton on a couple tracks. i'll just mirror the cliche: he sounds like mid-60s miles. passable, but it must suck to have recorded as much music as he has and never once had a unique or dinstictive thing to say.

anyway I really enjoyed the first ep, impressed that they covered so much ground but still kept it interesting

loved Merle singing Mule skinner blues ... and Vince Gill demoing the Carter Scratch ...

and man gimme some of whatever Marty Stuart is taking/bathing in to still look so great

this is admittedly not my area of expertise but this seems like a funny discussion about Wynton and whether or not he has actual fans. he's one of the most famous jazz musicians in the world!

wonder if they will gloss over the horrific story of spade cooley & how he got pardoned by reagan

it must suck to have recorded as much music as he has and never once had a unique or dinstictive thing to say.

It's one thing to be in your late teens and early 20s and talking shit about Miles Davis, because you've got your whole career ahead of you to prove and illustrate your point. But Wynton's pushing 60 now, and you have to wonder if he looks back on his career and regrets that he hasn't taken one single solitary risk in his musical life.

xpost mmm yes wondering that myself
although by the same token i dont want a super detailed account because it’s so horrific

i enjoyed last night's episode of the show but felt like it dragged a lot in the second half. i'm still "in" tho

also i think Marty Stuart is my favorite country artist ever

xp - yeah neither do i but i do want it to be acknowledged -- he was one of the most disgusting and horrible people i have ever heard of and he was pardoned by ronald mc donald reagan !!!!

I don't see any reason to make a big deal about the Reagan pardon, Cooley was dead already anyway.

I mean on the list of shitty things Reagan did it's kinda low

Cooley obviously a horrible monster who should've died in prison, but the parole board let him out (not Reagan) and then the dude died.

well i for one am glad he died

nevermind my digression. i plan to watch this ASAP.

Has there ever been a Jimmie Rodgers biopic?

The 1982 film Honkytonk Man, directed by and starring Clint Eastwood, was loosely based on Rodgers' life.

i loved the Jimmie Rodgers & Carter family stories
i only knew the barest outline

XP I guess that was it. Here's the real deal in that short film excerpted in the first ep.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyHulWOZBpk

many xps - my dad got every new Wynton album that came out (and Wayman Tisdale).

I’m watching ep 1 now and it took 21 min but I’ve started crying. I can’t wait to show this early ep to my students!! I don’t really care about the evolution of country all that much but the roots make me so weepy.

GENE AUTRY'S SCI-FI MOVIE

Fuck the NRA (ulysses) at 1:27 16 Sep 19

Wynton is a really good live musician and bandleader and composer! His fans are very much of the "jazz as american classical" audience though and that puts a lot of folks off.

it's definitely not rewriting jazz history and marginalizing many important artists to advance his own agenda and lucrative career!

A marvelous episode. I learned a lot about Bob Wills.

The Ryman really is as magical a space as it's portrayed.

First great discovery for me so far is The Maddox Brothers & Rose. Somehow they'd escaped me until now, but now they're my new favorite thing.

this episode is my lowkey favorite era of country, a period i affectionately know and grew up with as “Looney Tunes country” - it’s all the songs bugs & daffy sang! <3

plus my Nan quite liked Gene Autry

xp to m@tt: sure and he catches a ton of justified shit for it too! But he's also helped underwrite a full generation of musicians and has paved the way for tons of funding for an otherwise severely neglected segment of the arts and all too often that baby gets thrown out with the bathwater.

man I love Roy Acuff

Everybody probably already knows this, but the station near Del Rio that the Carter Family came to work at with the goat gland guy was later where Wolfman Jack made his name, and later provided the inspiration for "Heard It On The X" by ZZ Top.

They left out the finest moment of the Light Crust Doughboys long career
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKKJfBgZOCo

Aaaaaaaahhhhhhhhaaaaaaaa (Bob Wills holler)

Ralph Emery: STILL ALIVE.

HOWWWWWWWWW-DEEEEE.

Already been a couple of interviews with folks who died a few years ago, like Ralph Stanley and Merle (of course). Like the Scorsese Dylan neo-doc, it kind of tips its hand about how long these things have been in the works.

The word first got out they were working on this in 2015, and I assume they'd already been putting it together for a while before that.

love how much Merle has been in it already

I'm an episode ahead of the broadcast schedule, but GODDAMN Patsy Cline was made of magic and I just got a little teary.

meanwhile, on normal schedule: they could do a whole series just of Bill Monroe stories

they could do a whole episode just on Audrey Williams and another episode on Billie Jean Williams/Horton

anyway i loved this ep

whole series just of Bill Monroe stories

“Lookin like death eatin a cracker” is a phrase I will now keep with me always

"Hoss, you ain't jivin'."

got about an hour and a half into the first ep. tbh Burns is a hard sell for me cuz I *really* hated that Jazz one, and his general style is sort of stiff imo.

This is pretty good though, very exhaustive and detailed which is always great to see. And I admit I get a little teary when Dolly and Merle and various other folks show up (no idea who that young fiddler guy is or why they give him so much screentime).

Was watching this with my wife and I asked "when are they gonna get to the goat testicles?" and she was like "wtf are you talking about", and lol 5 minutes later: goat testicles

lol

Have we talked about how Season 2 of Cocaine and Rhinestones is apparently entirely George Jones? (C&R was, before this, the most thorough and entertaining deep dive into country I've heard.)

xpost Yeah, who is that fiddler? Most/many people I recognize, but not him.

btw fyi this is my favorite Maddox Bros and Rose song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgGZCTHKLUw

xps

oh, he's the Old Crow Medicine Show guy.

i got a little bored with Episode 1 but i think that was just the subject matter. obviously i am more of a Bill Monroe / Ralph Stanley / Maddox Brothers / Hank guy, cuz i loved last night's episode.

i could listen to stories of old-time bluegrass scene pissing matches all night.

Yeah, who is that fiddler? Most/many people I recognize, but not him.

if I didn't know better I'd say he was a Bruce McCulloch character

I don't do podcasts so haven't heard the Cocaine and Rhinestones stuff but my substitute has been Mike Judge's "Tales from the Tourbus" (season 1 is all country) which appears to cover a lot of the same territory/stories

xp

and George Jones got two episodes. They are fucking hilarious of course. Esp when he starts doing his Donald Duck shit.

people can dunk on Ken Burns all they want but the visual element of his docs is extremely valuable, esp for educational purposes. the clips and photos and imagery really help a viewer to transport to another time and place. the C&R podcast is great but it's audio-only, which can be alienating for people who a) aren't particularly auditory b) don't speak English. it's great if that is what you're looking for/if you already know the background & basics of country music, but for a beginner, KB docs are quite good! (caveat: the jazz one has a number of well-documented problems and i haven't watched the entire country one yet obvs)

I like that the doc is subtitled AND has a Spanish language version on the app

and yeah who tf is that verbose fiddler!?

I posted already, it's the guy from Old Crow Medicine Show.

xpost Listen to the epic on The Judds, it's fascinating.

Have we talked about how Season 2 of Cocaine and Rhinestones is apparently entirely George Jones? (C&R was, before this, the most thorough and entertaining deep dive into country I've heard.)

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, September 18, 2019 11:25 AM (two minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I need to listen to that. I've only heard the "Okie From Muskogee" episode, but damn, that was just one revelation after another. Hell, that one episode was better-researched than most 33 1/3rd books.

sorry
another question: why does "the guy from old crow medicine show" get such a primo spot?

Because popular? Due to that Wagon Wheel song? Also: young, photogenic?

the clips and photos and imagery really help a viewer to transport to another time and place

yeah can't deny this, the visual archival aspect is fantastic

ugh that fuckin Wagon Wheel song

I mean in one sense it's funny/somehow appropriate that their big hit is a reworking of a Dylan outtake but that's more a testament to Dylan than them imo

Wagon Wheel is why my guitar teacher refuses to sit in with our farmer's market bluegrass band.

Wonder how much that song made Dylan?

obviously the real irony is that Dylan was probably just reworking some other half-remembered folk song himself, but he was smart enough to aggressively copyright every goddamn thing he did

A la AP Carter!

Shakey, Cocaine & Rhinestones is extremely your shit. You should make an exception.

I just don't have time to listen like that, I don't have a commute and if I'm home I'm listening to music + doing other shit at the same time

I enjoyed the half dozen eps of Cocaine & Rhinestones I listened to, but when I got access to the mike judge show I never really went back.

Burns' style can be easy to eyeroll at but I enjoy the docs and find them valuable as audiovisual textbooks. Obviously he displays certain biases and blindspots but if you're a mildly critical viewer its pretty easy to see through them and still get huge amount of interesting info and context. If you dont approach them as the last word on the subject and just think "I want to mainline a lot of dry information that I didnt previously know" theyre pretty hard to argue with imho. Like yeah hes not some super edgy iconoclast but I dont really need that in a PBS doc abt country music.

that being said i always avoided the jazz one bc I always heard that one had the most problems, but I think at this point I know enough about jazz and have heard enough about the problems of the doc that I can watch it and see through the cracks

I also always see recommendations for the first season of Mike Judge’s animated Cinemax series Tales From the Tour Bus.

It’s mentioned along w/ the podcast above and more in
Writer Carl Wilson ‘s review of Burn’s show at Slate

I knew the final years of Hank Williams were bad, but the blow-by-blow details were grueling.

This series is typical Ken Burns and it's working fine for me. When the jazz series came out, I was just starting to listen to jazz, so I benefited both from his version of the history and the controversies about what was omitted and why. This time I'm starting with somewhat deeper knowledge but am still enjoying and learning from the show.

I wonder if the country industry/establishment and fans are going to push back on this series in similar ways?

the first season of Mike Judge’s animated Cinemax series Tales From the Tour Bus

the second season is fantastic too! It's just not about country.

https://slate.com/culture/2019/09/country-music-ken-burns-pbs-documentary-series-review.html

I cringed alot when they kicked off the launch concert w/Marty Stuart discussing the marriage of "White fiddle and Black banjo" before introducing a duet between Ketch Secor (Old Crow dude) and Rhiannon Giddens.

is there a t*rr*nt of this anywhere yet?

It's streaming for free on the PBS site.

is that available outside the USA?

CAD, i am seeing torrs of this online now btw

ok, will check tonight

they're like 45gig all inclusive tho!

Series is 19+ hours.

15+ hours, actually.

Belatedly coming around to country in my late 20s, it took me more than a decade to learn as much as these eight programs provide.

Also, Polk Brockman wuz robbed, although I believe he is mentioned in the accompanying book.

I'm not sure when I "came around" to country - feel like Willie Nelson and Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton were in my musical vocabulary from childhood, but there were definitely *aha* moments down the line when I dug into specific things as an adult, like when I got a randomly got a Buck Owens record from an abandoned storage locker or first heard the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" sometime in the late 90s.

xp

I just don't have time to listen like that, I don't have a commute and if I'm home I'm listening to music + doing other shit at the same time

what about listening as you fall asleep? THE PODCASTS NEED YOU SHAKEY!!

Haven't seen any of this, but i've not read any of the gnashing of teeth that accompanied Jazz. Is that just the nature of the respective genre audiences?

Speaking of this NGDB, I must admit I finally had to google who the (slightly) countrified Paul Kantner looking talking head was.

listening to something for content purposes while i try to fall asleep is one of the worst ideas out there for falling asleep! if i am trying to fall asleep, i am 100% not trying to pay attention to something i am trying to learn about.

i was living in nc and in my mid 20s when i started trying to teach myself about country music. the carter family was one of the first places i started and last night i got to recommend them to a student! i am enjoying this country music experience so far, and also enjoying seeing others discuss what they learned/enjoyed about it.

Is that just the nature of the respective genre audiences?
some people will always look for and find something to critique/they are usually vocal /shrug

also i forgot that i had a weird crush on vince gill at one point!

I don't think so, but to me the biggest objection with the Jazz one was its deliberate omission of huge swathes of the genre. I'm not sure if that happens in Country yet or even what would be the likeliest candidate for excision, it's a pretty cohesive genre and there aren't a ton of "controversial" offshoots (recent Lil Nas X brouhaha is something of an anomaly)

xps

xpost It's a good question. One off the cuff theory is that both country and jazz stress the importance of tradition as much as breaking with tradition, but the jazz doc perhaps leaned too heavy on tradition and too far away from the tradition of breaking with tradition, which downgraded (or denigrated?) the import of some of the more radical figures in jazz. Maybe?

It also helps that country is just easier to talk about. There are lyrics, there are simpler melodies, it's a little easier to illustrate a->b->c etc.

Vince Gill might be one of my favorite musicians whose music I never listen to.

like, the problem with Jazz was it's dismissal of vibrant, key figures with huge discographies that had a large impact on its overall direction. idk who would be analogous figures in Country. I mean, Jimmy Martin was bitter to his dying day about not being let into the Grand Ol' Opry but his importance to bluegrass is not controversial.

xp

Haven't seen any of this, but i've not read any of the gnashing of teeth that accompanied Jazz. Is that just the nature of the respective genre audiences?

― a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, September 18, 2019 2:43 PM (ten minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think it's at least in part due to Burns having learned a few lessons from Jazz. iirc, he went into Jazz with little-to-no knowledge of the music (by his own admission), and sought out Stanley Crouch and Wynton Marsalis for guidance. He either didn't know or didn't care that they had a very narrow and conservative (in every sense) definition of the music, and the series reflected that (though Crouch and Marsalis are undoubtedly deeply knowledgeable about what they're knowledgeable about; it's when they expound upon what they're not knowledgeable about that problems arise).

Presumably, he cast a wider consultative net for this series, and maybe did more thorough research and fact-checking (both things being a lot easier in 2015-2018 than they were in 1997-1999).

the jazz doc perhaps leaned too heavy on tradition and too far away from the tradition of breaking with tradition, which downgraded (or denigrated?) the import of some of the more radical figures in jazz. Maybe?

not maybe, for sure. iirc wynton requires jazz to swing, so ken burns did too and reduced the free side of jazz to an afterthought (the final episode is terrible), which is clearly out of line with contemporary opinion & taste & too reliant on orthodox notions of jazz.

or what tarfumes said :)

idk who would be analogous figures in Country.

Who is the Cecil Taylor of country & western?

similarly, the Baseball series was steady when Burns had massive figures like Ruth and Robinson to focus on. He rushed through three decades in the last episode.

I've never seen the jazz doc, I only know the criticism.

Is there a good thread to talk about Jazz? I'm watching it as I make my mixes and was kind of annoyed about how it started with ROOTS -> YOUNG LIFE OF LOUIS ARMSTRONG (erm odjb, bit embarrassing, let's move on) -> HOW ABOUT MORE LOUIS ARMSTRONG? You get the impression that somehow nobody made any jazz records between 1917 and 1925.

that's Crouch and Marsalis for ya

listening to something for content purposes while i try to fall asleep is one of the worst ideas out there for falling asleep! if i am trying to fall asleep, i am 100% not trying to pay attention to something i am trying to learn about.

Totally understand this point, but idk I can't just zone out and try to fall asleep. Trying to concentrate on something when I'm beginning to feel sleepy pushes me into hypnogagia sooner.

Is there a good thread to talk about Jazz?

This one maybe?

Ken Burns Says "Jazz" 3 Billion Times (actually 2.97 bn) in Under 3.5 Minutes (Single of the year?)

Burns is def into having protagonists

Podcasts I listen to at sleep time are ones which have the right balance of interesting topic and lack of a need to pay attention. Right now the British History Podcast works. Takes me a week to get through each 30-minute episode.

xxp cheers monty

Depending on his team of consultants, I wonder how much time will be devoted to SoCal country rock a la Parsons/Eagles/etc. I'm not sure I want much of it tbh when time would be better spent covering Billy Sherrill's production work with Columbia/Epic in the early 70s and later 70s crossover stuff like Eddie Rabbitt, et al. If those things never get documented it would be a shame.

The Byrds are explicitly mentioned in the synopsis for the late-60s ep (#6).

Just realized that ep 4 (which airs tonight, but I already watched it) covered Elvis and Cash at Sun did not mention Charlie Rich even ONCE.

I'm not sure I want much of it tbh when time would be better spent covering Billy Sherrill's production work with Columbia/Epic in the early 70s and later 70s crossover stuff like Eddie Rabbitt, et al.

That's what I don't understand about these series; not enough time to cover all the important stuff? Make a longer series!

XP Rich might come up later, particularly if they get into Sherrill. He was a journeyman for years, which could get summed up in a segment in a later ep right before discussing "Behind Closed Doors" etc.

I really hope they get into Sherrill. Very interesting and weird man.

I have no doubt C&R will get into him in S2 if it really does revolve around George Jones, so if we don't get it here we'll get it there.

My Dad wasnt a big drinker but when I was little sometimes at Christmas him & his best friend would get drunk & put Johnny Cash’s “A Boy Named Sue” on the record player at full volume & sing to it at the top of their voices. He loved all the big names from the 50’s and 60’s but didnt own a ton of records though. But I absorbed the songs he got the biggest kick out of. Then as a teen I somehow decided to reject country music completely for coolness reasons, idk :( Finally in my first year of Uni I heard the Beasts of Bourbon do a cover of Hank Williams’ Ramblin Man, and their orginal, a random b-side “The day Marty Robbins Died” and the door unlocked again. I guess hearing bands I loved profess their love for country music suddenly made it ok to openly enjoy and explore country from then on.

I’ve been gently trying to convert Mr Veg into a fan - he was VERY reluctant at first & came around slowly but interestingly it was the Drive By Truckers that made him become more receptive and now he’s way more onboard. He’s watched all the Ken Burns episodes so far and has been enjoying it, which has been really great. It’s been fun being able to watch it together - if it was 10 or 15 years ago I dont think he would have.

Drive By Truckers rule, is why

:D

otfm

Marty Stuart and his Barry Manilow hair and banjo is my favorite commentator.

he was born with that haircut, he gon die with that haircut

Gonna get a Honky Tonk haircut...Hey now hey now now

marty’s hair is fkn majestic

that aint a hairdo
that’s a mane

yep

we watched the live concert special from earlier this year - Marty busting out Orange Blossom Special on mandolin was fantastic, and Dwight Yoakum doing Mamas Hungry Eyes killed me.
Dunno about Larry Gatlin’s Sunday Mornin Coming Down though. i love the ~idea~ of it, but in execution is just sounded weird.

I love how Tom T. Hall sounds like an old time movie wiseguy.

Wow, did not know that ROGER MILLER discovered the Patsy Cline crash site.

Back to Charlie Rich for a sec, I sincerely hope this gets covered

https://classiccountrymusic.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/john-rich-735x413.jpg

Loved that willie had originally written the song “crazy” as “stupid” - it’s fun to sing it that way in retrospect.

yeah that cracked me up

...singer-songwriter Rosanne Cash (daughter of Johnny) and mandolin virtuoso Marty Stuart (former child prodigy) could moonlight as music historians. But they’re all, by definition, industry insiders. There are barely any scholars or critics offering more distanced analysis, the way they might in a Burns war doc. The 85-year-old music historian Bill C. Malone is a welcome presence, and it helps to have the black banjo player Rhiannon Giddens, who has worked to reclaim that instrument’s African American roots, but they ought to have more varied company

from Carl Wilson's article on the show in Slate

He also says:

Burns pays appropriate homage to the pivotal role of Ray Charles’ 1962 cover album of Nashville hits, Modern Sounds in Country & Western Music, while omitting that it was mostly barred from country radio.

i believe (i'm hedging here because it was in the 1980's and i was very young... could conceivably have been another daughter?) roseanne cash lived down the street from me when i grew up and she gave out full-sized candy bars for halloween. nice lady.

She would've been married to Rodney Crowell then.

ooh pitchfork takedown

He's right, but we're not the doc's intended audience: it's the usual PBS libs who love Johnny Cash because he's not cornpone. And even then the series has (thus far) avoided it. To avoid the Great Man Theory, maybe Burns should've concentrated on sounds, trends, myths, and iconography: bluegrass, Grand Ole Opry, yodeling, late '60s TV shows. It IS true that the documentary turns country into a sepia-tinged genre deserving respect instead of saying, "Uh, no, it's often tacky and racist, yet also absorbed gospel and the blues and sequins and awesome." Maybe Burns worries that his viewers can't handle complexity.

yeah the most astute criticism (and I'm only two episodes in) seems to be the "there are no villains, only heroes" line. Cuz it would be possible to walk away from this and think everyone in the country industry was an open-minded, progressive icon and that is uh definitely not true.

the racism seems to happen outside the frames and boundaries of the story - the overall racism of the country is acknowledged, but it's treated as happenstance that the first performer at the Grand Ol Opry was black also turned out to be the last one for like 50 years.

It's a tightrope, obv, because lingering on the racism will confirm the worst suspicions of skeptics who loathe the genre anyway, which re-asks the question whom the doc is for.

I will say this, the doc has kinda made me want to hunt down and listen to every single Merle Haggard album (why because I am crazy)

You should, especially his 1967-1972 and 1976-1982 runs.

I have a lot of that stuff but there's gaps

and oh look lol of course here's some old blog that has them all

it's treated as happenstance that the first performer at the Grand Ol Opry was black also turned out to be the last one for like 50 years.

That reminds me, I wonder if he'll touch on The Pointer Sisters performing there. It might be too minor a thing in the grand scheme, but it's cool to me!

I will say this, the doc has kinda made me want to hunt down and listen to every single Merle Haggard album (why because I am crazy)

― Οὖτις, Thursday, September 19, 2019 3:18 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Nothing crazy about this. Al OTMFM.

(And do not sleep on 2000's If I Could Only Fly, one of his all-time best, which is saying something.)

yeah, three of his 2000-2011 albums are among his best

looks like I'm not missing as much as I thought, a handful of things from the 70s, the Bonnie & Clyde album and the two live albums (Okie/Fightin Side of Me), and most of the stuff after Big City with the exception of a dozen songs or so

singer-songwriter Rosanne Cash (daughter of Johnny) and mandolin virtuoso Marty Stuart (former child prodigy)

And one-time band member with and, later, son in law of Johnny Cash, too, joining the company of not just Crowell but also, for a time, Nick Lowe.

Anyway, racism is a cloud that hovers over all of America's history. It is indeed a tightrope, because if you bring it up as an explicit subject for further exploration, where do you stop?

My favorite Merle Haggard story, the last time I saw him it sounded pretty bad - like, literally, it was not his fault, it was the PA or the room or something. So I went back to the soundboard hoping for something clearer, and there was this beleaguered sound guy just getting excoriated by an audience member. "Merle Haggard is an American treasure and you are making him sound terrible!" Audience guy otm, but I'm not sure the sound guy could have done much more with the shitty room.

If I Could Only Fly is an incredible album, always knocks me on my ass

Merle Haggard is an American treasure and you are making him sound terrible!

new board description

Was anyone ever named Eck aside from those that come up in this context?

I love this doc for giving me a quasi vacation to another time and place every time I sit down to watch some of it. It’s like a little daily trip to Countryville ❤️😀

yes! perfect description

wau this one was new to me
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jsy6gqni1go

minor quibbles aside LL otm

https://www.stereogum.com/2058155/ken-burns-country-music-review/franchises/sounding-board/

Also,
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-country/louvin-brothers-movie-satan-is-real-ethan-hawke-836410/

Seem to recall that Roy Acuff actually auditioned twice for the Opry. Having failed the audition the first time he amped up the waterworks when he finally got asked back again for the second go-round.

Okay, just looked it up, he apparently auditioned multiple times over the years. In particular he came on as a guest crooning "The Great Speckled Bird" which flopped miserably but Alton Delmore saw something in him so he was invited back a little while later and he sang it again, this time in the more emotional style which made such a big impression.

So does this go all the way up to the present day? (Peter Coyote: “Taylor Alison Swift was born on a Christmas Tree farm in Reading, Pennsylvania in 1989...”)

From what I read it tapers off a lot by the time it reaches recent decades

The last episode will be packed and rushed just like all his other chronological docs, I bet.

Or like the end of David Lynch's Dune.

It'll just be freeze frames and captions, like the end of "Animal House."

B-b-but at the very end there will be an Easter egg in which there are some Frost Giants in Stetsons planning revenge on Asgard/Nashville.

Okay, am only half-way through last week's offering- I am a Slow Watcher- and, although, I kind of resent the fact that information it took me years to accumulate is now easily available in this digest format and agree with the basic criticisms linked to about it skimping on some deeper analysis, basically finding this a pretty solid offering. Agree with others such as LL and VG about the visuals being extremely useful and about watching this being a little pocket holler universe to escape into.

Whoa, Fred Foster another one of those they interviewed just in time. Had to search and found: Rolling Obituary Thread: 2019

Last episode is supposed to go up to 1996. Why that year, I don't know. Do wonder if that means near the end they'll cover Uncle Tupelo and the 'No Depression' movement.

Of course, they could be lying, and they go ahead a little to spend 30 minutes tracing the lineage of "Wagon Wheel".

Stereogum review I linked to seems indicate that stuff will not be covered. So No No Nanette Depression.

<Sad Jay Farrar Face>

Weird James Redd factoid I feel compelled to add to thread: the first time I heard “Blue Yodel No. 1 (T for Texas) ” was at a Half Japanese show at Maxwell's.

But perhaps one of you first heard it that same way. If not,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o0Olph6TlO4

Who is the Cecil Taylor of country & western?

Doug Sahm?

But perhaps one of you first heard it that same way.

Haha, I def heard that via half japanese before I’d ever listened to Jimmie rodgers

Burns is def into having protagonists

Billy Sherrill is to Waylon/Willie as George McClellan was to the Union Army

xpost Willie gets pretty free. Townes was a pretty big impactful country radical, kinda.

Lyle Lovett would be the Count Basie, I guess.

A nice, speedy (in more ways than one) five minutes on Roger Miller.

In the fifth episode?

Because he's mentioned in the fourth, along with Mel Tillis.

Sorry, I am almost caught up on last week's episodes.

Really liking the commentary from Ray Walker of the Jordanaires.

Yeah, in the fifth. They go over his career there in a 5 or so minute segment including a great anecdote from Raplh Emery about his pill use.

Speaking of pills, the whole Pete Seeger show w/June and a jacked-up Johnny is on YT:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ep7Sh9XZ98A

Jack White's Pomphawk is...very Pomphawk-y.

That 'Pretty Little Lady' mastercut is something else.

when they showed the footage of Cash & Dylan at the piano Mr Veg said right away, “wow...he is gacked out of his mind”

weirdly, i’d never noticed before! how dumb is that.

all i know is that now I need a 10 part series on Merle in the worst way. just seeing him talk about his life even briefly makes me tear up. and then Dwight actually crying

i mean

oh Jack White’s pompadour = he’s gone full Ed Grimley now, no turning back.

man, tonight's episode was for me. Bakersfield, Buck, Loretta, Merle, Dolly, Cash ... whew.

Wondering if that Dwight interview was conducted in the immediate wake of Merle's passing.

BTW, I don't know how easy it is to track down, but the Haggard American Masters episode from about 10 years ago is killer: loads of great vintage footage framed by clips of Merle and his wife driving around Bakersfield looking for important places from his past.

so far my favorite line from this show is "he was named after a mule he admired"

I assume they're saving George Jones for the 70s...? He's been referenced a few times and popped up in photos, but otherwise he's conspicuously absent.

Yeah, they get to George in the late '60s/early '70s.

Do not sleep on an ace 2018 Ace Import of a very belatedly released, very live George---here's a tweet briefly expanded for my Nashville Scene ballot:
George Jones/Jones Boys: Live in TX '65: Brave ballads of self-torture x "C Jam Blues," "White Lightnin'," "Bony Maronie," "B Bowman Bop." Panhandle Rag," "Jole Blon," JB trusty/Bladerunner crooner also cool w girl part on "We Must Have Been Out of Our Minds," heavy guests too, incl. steel guitarist Buddy Emmons and fiddlers Red Hayes and (on "Jole Blond") Rufus Thibodeaux ("Two-By-Four," George calls him). The JBs crooner is Don Adams---android-sounding, strangely(?) satisfying.

xxxxpost Wynton, Nate Chinen's excellent Playing Changes: Jazz For The New Century(2018) incl. intriguing descriptions of his earliest releases, in which he did apparently do his and his combo's damnest(s?) to put his money where his mouth was, with strenuous excursions on his versions of the post-avan cutting edge, or something like that Yadda yadda when he did, some years after taking reins of Jazz At Lincoln Center, become more the Complete Entertainer----dig United We Swing: Best of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Galas, with Willie and Dylan and Blind Boys of Alabama and Ray Charles, also some lesser lights shining at best they can themselves---and yeah his xpost first w Willie and also their tribute to Ray, with horns like Cab Calloway Orchestra at its 30s wildest, also Snorah Jones sprinkling a little blue dream dust there at the right moments.

Best of last night, visually: Long tall JC's pilled, incredible shrinking mouse face keeps atop his roller coaster lankiness. Did not know that he was dogged for supposedly having "Negro" wife!
Rosannn, affectionately: "Dylan knew the melody [to 'I Still Miss Someone'} better than Dad did."
JC, smiling: "You've changed the melody."
Dylan, enthusiastically: "Yeah I changed the mel-oh-deee."

Didn't see whole ep, but also appreciated Merle on young Loretta: "She sung her way out of prison." And sounded like he might be right that her singing on the first single, "Honky Tonk Girl," was her best ever, although she still makes really good albums.

Really liking the commentary from Ray Walker of the Jordanaires. Fave that I heard was his description of how Patsy had Willie's demo phrasing stuck in her head, which didn't fit the preordained slower, shuffle-y arrangement---but then she did it, speeding up just for a liminal flickering vibration of "Crazy"-ness during the last note of every line, like she's gonna fly off the perch, but...

Xpost'96, eh? If it ends with the circus flashpot soap opry of Garth, bringing Chris LeDoux Aerosmith Elton John Billy Joel Knights In Satan's Service, and some good self-written weirdo ballads, into demographically apt realms and reams of mainstream country family entertainment, that'll be a good place to end it.

Cash & Dylan at the piano

I don't think I'd ever seen this before, unless it shows up in mangled form in Eat the Document...?

It's definitely in the PBS/Scorsese Dylan doc from 2005.

ah, forgot about that

So
Lesley Riddle
DeFord Bailey
Arnold Shultz
Rufus “Tee Tot” Payne
Gus Cannon
Ray Charles
Charley Pride
Darius Rucker

But I’ll bet
No Bobby Hebb
And especially
No Jerry “Swamp Dogg” Williams, Jr.

Or Arthur Alexander

didn't know Emmylou Harris was so revered in the seventies as a purity pony -- that was a revelation

I loved watching ten minutes devoted to George Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today," compensating for a near-total absence or as part of "and Tammy."

Billy Sherrill!

Any interviews with James Burton? I was shocked to hear an interview with him just last week. Still alive!

Inexplicably, Burton isn't even mentioned in passing, despite the inclusion of a brief clip or two of his playing.

Nice repurposing of Cisco Pike footage.

Inexplicably, Burton isn't even mentioned in passing, despite the inclusion of a brief clip or two of his playing.

I can't remember specifically, but I definitely remember seeing his paisley Telecaster...probably during an Emmylou Harris clip.

Charley Pride illustrating "Loving Her Was Easier..."...

For a second thought Peter La Farge was Nick Cave.

Whole lotta these fuckers have died since recording these interviews. Good on Ken for getting this done.

But i guess they didn't get Leon Russell? I know they have a set narrative, but Hank Wilson's Back was the 2 in the 1-2 Roots Punch behind May The Circle...

There better be more coverage of glen campbell than “like Johnny Cash, he had his own television show, but it was nowhere as important as hee haw.”

I think that actually was it, and it sucks.

That said, less Vietnam more Junior Samples.

Being inspired after watching Dolly Parton sing “Dumb Blonde” to look up Curly Putman’s songwriting credits came across this:
The Paul McCartney & Wings hit "Junior's Farm" was inspired by their short stay at Putman's farm in rural Wilson County, Tennessee in 1974

what a contrast

Merle Haggard’s Mom takes the greyhound every chance she can to see her son in prison and takes on all the shame & disgust from her own family & rematived, while Kristofferson’s mom disowns him ~by mail~ just for trying to become a country singer

momma haggard <3

rematived = relatives

O_o

Yeah, that was pretty nice of Merle’s mom.

I am an episode behind. So Kris Kristofferson is coming up next? Do they mention him sneaking demo tapes to Charlie Louvin?

Also, apologies for getting confused and thinking Connie Smith had been married to Marty Robbins.

Kristofferson is a big part of tonight's show, ep 6. Louvin isn't mentioned, but Cowboy Jack Clement and Marijohn Wilkin are.

Thanks. One time I heard an interview with Kris Kristofferson during which they called Charlie to discuss this and anything else they might want to talk about. After Kris and Charlie greeted each other they barely said anything, seeming to be holding back some laughter, presumably at whatever unbroadcastable words would have come out of Charlie’s mouth at any other time.

Think the deal was that Charlie was breaking a rule by accepting a demo tape from the janitor or whatever Kris’s actual job was, although not sure how this lines up chronologically with the Marijohn Wilkin relationship.

Here is some background and that conversation:
http://blog.lightintheattic.net/a-conversation-between-charlie-louvin-and-kris-kristofferson/

Also in case the doc never gets to it and you missed the earlier Chemirocha craze here is a link:
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/chemirocha-how-an-american-country-singer-became-a-kenyan-star

Goddammit they skirted Glen Campbell entirely by classifying him as a pop singer and I’m fkn PISSED

Ugh

Just throwing this out there, but Jimmy McDonough's book on Tammy Wynette (and Billy Sherrill and Glenn Sutton and George Jones and George Richey) is great.

That’s on my list, in my pile etc./pvmic

Somebody circulated a copy of St least the first episode with announcements for the visually impaired. So I need to download a NE version.

I thought the last episode was fairly well done, even though it ended with a slide show of all post-1996 country performers (without identifying any of them, which was a little annoying). But that may be my ignorance; if I'd known nothing about the music, I might have thought the last episode of Jazz was fine. Also, for as much as they focused on the commercial success of each artist, George Strait didn't get much coverage, despite having 60 (!) number one hits.

Were there any super-glaring omissions in the final episode?

Like many of you, I’m unsure how I can go on living now that I know George Jones once marketed women’s underwear called Possum Panties.

— Jon Wurster (@jonwurster) September 24, 2019

yeah that was a horrifying detail O_o

George's Secret

See the end of item 6 here:
https://www.neatorama.com/2015/06/17/10-Facts-You-Probably-Didnt-Know-About-the-Beatles/

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/simpsons/images/4/49/I_Love_Lisa_66.JPG/revision/latest?cb=20131017175029

Lots of good links on here, thanks. Here's the xpost excellent James Burton interview:
https://www.npr.org/2019/09/03/757066866/elvis-guitarist-james-burton-i-went-professional-when-i-was-14 with a mention of the new monster box Elvis: Live 1969.

lol Grisso.

Year he ascended the come-back launched in Ded. '68, subsuming country and all his other genres/subgenres, a la Dylan and The Band, electric Miles, etc.

Goddammit they skirted Glen Campbell entirely by classifying him as a pop singer and I’m fkn PISSED

― Squeaky Fromage (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, September 24, 2019 12:49 AM (fifteen hours ago)

I'm holding out hope that they return to Glen for "Rhinestone Cowboy" -- that was a giant hit. Perhaps it shows up in the Ronnie Milsap section where we see how popularized country had become by the mid-70s. Opportunity there to talk about his evolution from Square-Jawed Purveyor of Jimmy Webb Songs to Cocaine-Riddled Beardo Fighting With Tanya Tucker.

Aren’t there like two hours reserved at the end for Johnny Cash’s Rick Rubin comeback?

i always sort of thought of glen campbell as basically a pop star too, there i said it

Yes, Cash's Rubin recordings get a lot of time, though Rubin isn't interviewed, which is too bad -- it would've been nice to hear why he chose to work with Cash, and his perceptions of how Cash's fans, and the country audience at large, would receive the records. And no, they don't return to Glen Campbell; the only coverage he gets is the couple of sentences and few seconds of "Wichita Lineman" in episode 6 or 7.

"Country" and "pop" are the "this is Jazz" and "hey, that's not Jazz!" of this series, apparently.

Unless there was more in the front half of ep 4 (which I missed), but it seems like Jim Reeves and Ray Price got a similar treatment, except spread out in pithy bits over a couple of shows.

Cash's Rubin recordings get a lot of time

this is disappointing idgaf about those records personally

ray price was a giant

Indeed, glad I got to see him live when he finally ventured north after a long hiatus.

Think he was Hank Williams’s roommate for a bit and started out as kind of a Hank clone, beehive it or not.

They <did> mention that! Price was quite the Honky-Tonker before embracing balladeering.

Rick Kienzle's Southwest Shuffle: Pioneers of Honky-Tonk, Western Swing, and Country Jazz starts at a peak, then tracks the adaptation, or lack thereof, of adventurous country artists to the rise of rock & roll and The Nashville Sound and Countrypolitan, yeesh. Ray Price made a comeback into honky tonk with a strong beat, rallying the more mobile geezers and even some rock-tending kiddos---then he decided he did wanna go genteel, making his road dawg band learn them weepers (also sometimes crammed some lounge string players etc. into the clubs) And you out there in the audience, you better 'preciate it! Interesting story.
What the hell, he and the audience survived. Later did some good albums with his former teen bass player, Willie Nelson.

Was just trying to think of that book. Believe it may have a chapter on Jimmy Wyble.

Guy Clark!

No Doug Sahm, huh.

They did Ray Price dirty, no question

xpost Hi James, I don't remember there being a whole chapter about Jimmy Wyble, but he's def in there---says he got to play on the wonderful Frank Sinatra - Live in Australia With the Red Norvo Quintet (1959), which may have gotten lost; didn't come out 'til 97, on Blue Note, where it belongs. Everybody's so happy and excited, how can they do the lonely cosmic ballads right? Well, they do! Helps that it's also the many moods of Frank, and one of his jazziest ever, with no need for an orchestra. Jest doin' what comes natcherly.

Have they mentioned Freddy Fender?

Yeah. He and Johnny Rodriguez share a segment.

a highlight tonight was Billy Sherrill yelling at George Jones "that's 'Help Me Make It Through The Night' ... FOOL!" when Jones kept singing Kristofferson's melody while recording "He Stopped Loving Her Today"

For those who don't think of Glen Campbell as Country:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jah3hg119g

(Note: this time I spared you the British Guitarist Reacting to this)

So when Bob Wills interjects “Domino!” what the heck if anything does this mean exactly? Part of me wants to think it is some Victorian formulation for some more intense oath perhaps akin to Héctor Lavoe saying “diablo!”

(I want to believe!)

A minced oath, if you will. Oh, I think I just figured it out. D’oh!

Using George Jones' collapse into alcoholism and homelessness and resurrection with "He Stopped Loving Her Today" to frame the era of last night's episode was pretty masterful ... similar to how Cash's fall and redemption were covered in the previous episode. Also, Ray Benson's chortling while talking about the utter chaos of Willie's July 4th picnics was priceless. I also got chills with the Roy Acuff film on the screen being lifted to reveal the new Opry crowd. That was an all-time moment right there.

Controversial opinion perhaps: was Emmylou Harris necessary? or all the minutes devoted to Gram Parsons?

Gram had to be talked about to set up Emmylou, who was necessary. I would've spent less time doing that (with Gram), though.

I may be ignorant here, but the documentary posits her as a Turning Point in the '70s that I've never read anywhere (nor do her albums bear this out).

I would have given more than 60 seconds to the likes of Barbara Mandrell, Kenny Rogers, and Dottie West.

Mandrell was basically the female Marty Stuart ffs.

exactly!

Emmylou seems more relevant in this context than Gram, but it's a fair question why she gets so much time while other artists much more central to the 70s country charts are ignored or passed over too quickly.

One obvious example: Conway Twitty (though personally I'd rather hear Emmylou than Conway in his 70s loverman mode)

I was a wee boy in the 70s, so I don't know. I will say that the utter ubiquity of Emmylou records for cheap prices must mean they sold shitloads when released.

I guess Eddie Rabbitt is going to ignored entirely. Oh well.

i'm definitely not an expert but even i thought they spent a *lot* of time on Emmylou.

Emmylou is pretty important for setting the table for the New Tradionalists, helping popularize songs by Van Zandt & Crowell, and later on basically saving the Ryman from the, er, wrecking ball.

She also sold tons of records in the '70s to audiences outside the Country spectrum.

otoh I'm glad Rosanne Cash got a spot: a crucial precursor to hot country even if she prefers to be regarded for her Americana stuff.

Self XP Of course, I think it's also weird that they completely sidestepped Linda Ronstadt, unless Trio is covered in the finale.

Gauging the bent they're taking towards the modern era, I 100% expect Trio to be covered.

Hanging out at Guy Clark's house seems like a good time, btw.

Also, Hazel Smith reminds me so much of basically every woman on my mom's side of the family. Watching her speak is a joy. R.I.P.

XP Have you seen Heartworn Highways? Like a 1/4 of it is hanging at Guy Clark's house!

No mention of Trio whatsoever, unless it was briefly mentioned and I missed it. I too assumed it would be talked about, especially considering how much time they spent on Dolly and Emmylou in the earlier episodes. Hell, it even felt like they'd set it up: they had Dolly going to Hollywood, so Trio would've been a perfect back-to-the-roots bookend.

Wow, shocked!

a way bigger hit than The Highwaymen too

you know what back-to-the-roots country album is better than trio?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/33/K.d._lang_-_Shadowland.jpg

Yeah, it crossed over to the Pop chart when very few country albums did. There's only one other country album on the Billboard 1987 end-of-year albums chart, and it's Randy Travis.

xp

I never thought about setting Trio and lang against each other.

lol yes luckily we live in a world where both exist! i just think Shadowland is criminally underappreciated

Despite being raised in Alabama, I didn't grow up in a country music family. I knew basically nothing about it and assumed it was strictly for old people. k.d. lang and (loosely) Chris Isaak opened me up to that world for investigation later into my twenties. I guess that partly explains my favoring the traditionalist approach to the music, because it's the door I walked through. If I'd grown up with country radio in the 1980s, I'd likely view that stuff with less suspicion. Like, I'm a Dwight/Rosanne/Rodney partisan, but I know fuck all about people like T.G. Sheppard and Reba (<-- except her sitcom was funny fuiud).

Gauging the bent they're taking towards the modern era, I 100% expect Trio to be covered.

now that i am finally into episode 4-5 i can see how this is becoming similar to Jazz in its focus on character. i don't think i'll watch the whole thing tbh. it's something i would gladly go back to periodically though, if i had access to it.

Was jerry lee lewis’ career in country completely skipped too?

Yeah, LL, that’s exactly what I am feeling. Funny (not really) how things become more predictable as we get closer to contemporary times when the players are still alive or freshly dead as opposed to the by now mythical origin story.

I will say with their overview of George Jones i cant wait for Cocaine & Rhinestones entire season of George episodes.

i mean i already was excited but :D

obv also v much going to be :( and ;_;

Rosanne singing at the Ryman for Johnny's memorial concert got me pretty good.

Also, it reminded me of this, which was from a different Johnny/June memorial. As far as I know, this only happened once and they never bothered to pair up in the studio. Their voices together are fucking MAGICAL.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCqpw-5KL4g

Was almost sure that was going to be /glad that wasn’t a cover of “Jackson.”

Fun fact: Jerry Leiber has a songwriting credit on “Jackson.” I think he did some doctoring or editing or something.

First recorded by The Kingston Trio!

Yet another Trio

Roseanne was booked for ACL Fest that year, but cancelled when Johnny died. They filled her slot with other artists coming up and doing two Johnny tunes apiece. I remember Ray Benson, the Drive-By Truckers, and iirc Tift Merritt playing...not sure about the others.

that record exec recalling the Judds - “Wynnona had braces & Naomi looked fantastic as always”

:/

Wasn't expecting a Gun Club shoutout

well shit i cried a LOT during that episode

Forgot Keith Whitley died so young.

They all actin' like the Highwaymen didn't happen...

Cool. Did they interview Klaus Voormann right before he died?

Sorry, that was two bad jokes rolled into one

If don't have time to watch the whole eight hours, here is a highlight reel I recommend:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4rA1-6ah7s

They skipped over an essential period in Kristofferson's career:

https://youtu.be/PMW4Ad8fIF4?t=209

thank you for bringing that into my life, tarfumes

oh my god

O_O

.

Hello, I'm James Redd.

One more episode left for me. Assuming it’s going to be lots of little capsule career summaries and J.R. Cash dying to wrap things up.

Pretty close – there was more on the emerging stars of the period (Garth, Reba, Strait, Travis, Gill, Judds) and not much on artists who had been covered in previous episodes.

I actually thought they could’ve done a bit more on Cash’s American Recordings period given how many modern pop standards he interpreted and how, frankly, unique it is for an artist at that point in his or her life to register her another meaningful chapter in an already illustrious career. It also cemented Cash and country for a third generation of fans.

Man, that goat gland doctor got around, though I suppose he was gone by the time period covered by the last episode.

So I’ve pronounced the word “Appalachia” differently from what I have heard on this show my whole life.

Apparently the melody of “I’m Thinking Tonight of My Blue Eyes” which later was reused for “The Great Speckled Bird,” “The Wild Side of Life,” and “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels” was - surprise!- based on some earlier song, although there seem to be different ideas about what that was.

Wikipedia mentions a song called “Thrills That I Can’t Forget,” which does indeed sound similar.

I actually thought they could’ve done a bit more on Cash’s American Recordings period given how many modern pop standards he interpreted and how, frankly, unique it is for an artist at that point in his or her life to register her another meaningful chapter in an already illustrious career. It also cemented Cash and country for a third generation of fans.

I wasn't totally on board w/how they presented that part of Cash's career, which wasn't quite as tragic as portrayed. At the same he got dropped by Columbia, he was having hit records and sellout shows with the Highwaymen. He also got another--ultimately hitless--solo deal with Mercury. I didn't know he played Branson, going from that to Rubin and The Viper Room is nuts.

Not to start a horse challopera, but am I the only one who prefers Kris Kristofferson tunes in the countrypolitan ladies man mode of “For the Good Times” and “Help Me Make It Through the Night” to the more singer/songwriter stuff?

XP Also: We needed 15 minutes about this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTP9__vi3d4

I was fine with the coverage of the American Recordings - there's no need to for it to be pumped up more than it was.
However I'm also not super crazy about them as a body of work.
I love what it did for his career and his performances such as they were were laregely great. But after the first album of covers it felt more and more like Rubin was just getting the old man to do tricks. It scratched the surface of him as a performer, and I was kinda salty that it made people feel like they were Cash fans now that he was singing the songs they already knew. Then again it probably got a lot of people to go back and appreciate him so there is that. idk. maybe it's just me.

No, not just you.

Realistically, how many “Delia’s Gone”s was he going to come up with?

They were a mixed blessing to be sure. On the positive end he gained a new audience, paved the way for other comebacks (Merle, Loretta etc), and established a lineage between, you know, Tom Petty, Beck, Soundgarden etc. and the Carter Family in the American Music Canon.

OTOH, this at the cost of the broader spectrum of his work, gaining many fans who didn't and/or wouldn't look further or dig deeper. I like to say that Cash is always "The Favorite Country Singer of People Who Don't Like Country (Otherwise)", and The American Recordings is where that started.

Think it may have started well before that but yeah

David Cantwell's marvelous Haggard biography ponders the question of what might've happened to Hag's career if his (solid) '90s albums had gotten the tenth of the hipster massaging afforded to Cash (NB: he does not begrudge Cash's success0.

Speaking for myself, Haggard >>>>> Cash, always and forever.

Hard to argue with

I think Cantwell's recent Tanya Tucker piece for the New Yorker put it pretty well:

Because it’s a late-career country-music comeback, “While I’m Livin’ ” is bound to be compared to Johnny Cash’s “American Recordings.” But Rick Rubin, the producer of the Cash album, succeeded in part by shrinking Cash’s complexity to a kind of two-dimensional rebellion. Carlile and Jennings have done the opposite: Tucker has never sounded so well-rounded.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/tanya-tuckers-new-album-might-be-the-best-of-her-long-underrated-career

(xp)
Although there was that recent flapdoodle when Bob Dylan said that he preferred Buck to Merle.

Alfred otm. In some ways, Cash sounded to me like he was trying to get to where Merle had already been for about a decade.

Idk if Kristofferson warranted all the screentime he got bh

Merle is obviously, at the very least, a better songwriter than Cash. This seems indisputable.

Better guitar player too

I love Cash & Merle equally for different reasons

Personally I really love Cash’s appreciation & love of music (despite my misgivings abt the Rubin stuff)
he had that Elvis quality where it was clear that he worked hard to honor not just the song but the writer/the emotion in his delivery - Peace in the Valley or Sunday Morning Coming Down, you feel how much he enjoys those songs. And his live prison albums at Folsom & San Quentin capture the electricity he had when he could really connect with an audience. Lot of Elvis similarities imo.

(xp)
Probably should add better bandleader as well

Preferring Hag doesn't mean I don't like Cash, let me be clear.

What this series did was kick my ass about finally buying and streaming second-tier worthies like Ricky Skaggs and Keith Whitley, not to mention blasting Patty Loveless' Honky Tonk Angel for the first time in years.

Yeah Cash is great, in different ways

Agreed. VG otm

I thought the Tucker single I reviewed a few weeks ago pretty blah but I'll return.

Where Cash triumphs is in the creation of a mythopoetic self that absorbed a century of country tropes and traditions; his voice lent the amalgam gravitas (can you imagine, to take a minor example, Waylon or Willie or Hag on U2's "The Wanderer"?). To call him inflexible and one-note, as I've seen elsewhere, isn't just wrong but beside the point.

He was def not one note. So many novelty songs, for one thing

He’s one of those one of those people whose legend looms so large that it may sometimes seem that the only options are to accept it all lock stock and barrel or be forced to knock it down a peg.

Tanya Tucker’s new album seems to have the almost the same cover as Bruce Springsteen’s.

Tanya's album is my favorite of this year so far, it's very much in her lane but in a rich, joyful way. I love it so much.

oooh there's the endorsement I needed

btw Reba McEntire's album released earlier this year is marvelous too

Just listened to the first track of that TT album and it sounded pretty good so I will take VG’s word and give the whole thing a whirl.

Okay, that banjo passing ad at the beginning of every episode I could have done without.

Many Generations of "Wagon Wheel".

Which was co-written by Ketch Secor. It all makes sense now. Perhaps this was already explained upthread.

ohhh THATS what that song was?
>:(

i woke up one morning with “comin my way outta north caroline” in my head and i was SO annoyed

Even better, he fleshed out the original Dylan skeleton while he was in prep school.

AP Carter didn't go to prep school.

I just watched _The Third Man_ in full for the first time

AP Carter didn't go to prep school.

https://www.savingcountrymusic.com/biggest-oversights-in-the-ken-burns-country-music-documentary/

Thanks. I don’t know much about Don Williams, used to get him confused with Don Gibson, but I love this song he wrote and performed when he was more of a folkie with the Pozo-Seco singers:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSybml7XsH4

Hm. Maybe he didn’t write it.

Nope. And only sang backup and strummed guitar probably. Still, I only learned about the Pozo-Seco Singers recently and for me they really hit the spot of old school Renfaire folk rock.

I went the other way. I bought a Pozo Seco record back in the 90s, but never investigated Don Williams solo until he died a couple years back. A bit about how Don had a big west African fanbase would've been worth including in the series, imo.

There's a tiny subgenre of future Country guys in Psych bands like that, including Jerry Jeff Walker in Circus Maximus and Steve Young in Stone Country. Townes Van Zandt supposedly played bass for the 13th Floor Elevators on occasion.

Okay I think I got it straight now: Don Gibson was the Sad Poet and Don Williams was the Gentle Giant.

I saw Townes Van Zandt open for Jimmie Dale Gilmore at The Bottom Line once and I have to say, while I am usually pretty tolerant of people’s eccentricities, he kind of freaked me out a bit.

I liked the story about how when he worked with the Cowboy Junkies, he asked had any of them shot up on a horse.

I actually lived in Austin for a few years, but hardly ever crossed paths with any of the notables, although I did see Joe Ely in a coffee shop once and almost housesat for Steve Young while he was going on a State Department tour of Mongolia or something. Then a few weeks after I moved back to NYC I walked out of my office on 52nd street and saw Jimmie Dale Gilmore pass right in front of me.

I think maybe I did laundry once with someone who lived in a place as Lucinda Williams used to live and had one of her shirts/famous people I have known

Good thing I wasn’t asked to be a talking head on that show or I would have really wasted time.

lol

I might have recited the lyrics to Gary Stewart’s “Single Again,” then gotten a little emotional and said “That’s good!”

Oh, did they mention Gary Stewart?
So glad for incl. music and comments of Jeannie Seely, but was Merle's mention of Lefty Frizzell (as his inspiration) the only one?

Did not realize that Charlie McCoy played that excellent guitar on "Desolation Row!" And that this chance encounter, leading to one-or-two take otm, led D. to A-List-Nashvillecatville.

or "Desolation Row"!

I want to say it was a first take, too.

Thought he said two takes, unless they didn't record the first.

Don't think they did mention Gary Stewart, so maybe it wouldn't have been a waste of time for me to mention him after all.

Don't remember too much about Lefty being in the doc except as an influence on Merle and maybe someone else.

They seem to have maybe mentioned "Long Black Veil," if not him singing it, at least in the context of Marijohn WIlkin writing it before she discovered Kris Kristofferson and it is mentioned here: https://www.pbs.org/kenburns/country-music/favorite-country-song but I'm not sure, I am not such a good note taker.

Watching episode two now, they got Jean Shepard! She died in 2016.

Feel like we should poll the talking heads on this at some point

Marty wins for me <3

I like Marty but maybe he’s too much of a good thing.

Is it nitpicking to question Tom T. Hall putting a character called Mister Harper into “Harper Valley PTA”? It seem like a structural flaw if not a paradox or a time loop. If he owned the whole valley, wouldn’t he send his kids to a fancier school somewhere else? Unless maybe his family used to own the valley but lost control of it due to bad business dealings.

There's a three part Cocaine and Rhinestones just about that song.

Lefty Frizzell is also discussed to not massive length in the Hank Williams ep (#3).

There's a three part Cocaine and Rhinestones just about that song.

In case anybody missed it, Shakey dropped some science on us recently that Bob Dylan’s country voice was basically him doing Lefty Frizzell.

Actually don’t think I finished listening to the third, Tom T. Hall-based episode of the podcast about that song, so maybe that detail IS discussed.

Will have to check Shakey's post, thanks.
If he owned the whole valley, wouldn’t he send his kids to a fancier school somewhere else? Was a common Southern thing back then, to save some bucks, because egalitarian, complacent, and/or teach your kids to know their places, as big tadpoles in a small pond. Or this is how it seemed to me, before official desegregation (then "seg academies" started appearing, not always for the rich).
Unless maybe his family used to own the valley but lost control of it due to bad business dealings. Could be---as labor laws came into existence and tightened up, sometimes not much, could still make a big difference. Also there might be Harpers with different levels of income, most with more or less than the aforementioned Mr. Harper moving away, another Southern thing, then and now.

So, good of T. to slip that in there.

Actually Shakey’s post is almost ten years old, but I only saw it recently:
Poll: Nashville Skyline

bob dylan's lefty frizzell gives me more kermit the frog imo but it does make me like his singing voice a little more thinking of it as lefty

Wondering if Cornelius Brothers and Sister Rose were influenced in their naming convention by The Maddox Brothers & Rose.

Okay, I do have one firsthand story that actually might be of interest to you. When I was introduced to Jimmy Wyble I was told “he played the solo on ‘Roly Poly’,” so I asked “And did Bob Wills say ‘Aah, Jimmy!’?” “Yes, and he hated it every time.” And Jimmy looked at me and said “I preferred to remain anonymous.”

haha that's so good. Def talking-head worthy :)

Lefty Frogzell:

http://toughpigs.com/uploaded_images/royrogers-726794.jpg

Frog Dylan

You guys are reminding me of something in this post

I really like Felice and Boudleaux Bryant and recognize their significance as the first full-time songwriters in Nashville but felt maybe there was a bit too much time devoted to them.

I believe Boudreaux co-wrote this novelty number I have a soft spot for with one of their favorite artists, Little Jimmy Dickens:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6PH2wPsEnM

In episode two I wasn't too into the Minnie Pearl section. It was fine and I get why she's a country icon, but she wasn't really a singer or musician.

BTW, wiki says some of the interviews took place as early as 2012! Ken Burns must have a lot of pots cooking on the stove at once.

Minnie Pearl was a great ambassador for the Music for longer than just about anybody, and also figures in to a surprisingly big number of other artists lives (Hank I etc.).

This is all covered in later episodes.

^^^

Yes, this is true.

Some stuff I don’t think I saw in this doc but it kind of complicated and doesn’t always show up in other histories, particularly related to Why Nashville?:
1) Before BMI, before Acuff-Rose, before the Bryants, it was very difficult for a songwriter to make a living off of/collect royalties for this kind of music or to connect with the artists since things were still so regional, except for in Hollywood because of the singing cowboy craze, where somebody like Cindy Walker could be a full-time songwriter and survive. Although the doc does mention that Gene Autry was big enough for ASCAP to handle his publishing.

2) The breakthrough moment for Nashville as a recording hub is often said to be the freak pop hit in 1947 of Francis Craig’s “Near You” on Bullet Records, founded by Jim Bulleit, who left/was forced out shortly afterwards but still mentored other independent record label owners such as Sam Phillips.

And Randy Wood of Dot Records.

Debating whether to get a haircut this week or to just let it grow out to full-on Marty Stuart nirvana.

I know why Minnie Pearl is important to country music culture, I just wasn't that interested in her story. I mean, Buck Owens is as famous (may even as important) for Hee Haw as he is for his music, but I would be bummed if the doc spent more time on the former than on the latter. But I do look forward to hearing Pearl's story fleshed out and connected to others, if that is the case.

It’s fleshed out a bit, but it might not be what you are after.

Came to say, do you guys know about this podcast:
https://holdingthingstogether.com/page/1/

Thanks, will check that!
Also re your mention of things were still so regional, except for in Hollywood because of the singing cowboy craze, the West Coast, and Hollywood in particular is the initial setting of the book I mentioned upthread
Southwest Shuffle: Pioneers of Honky-Tonk, Western Swing, and Country Jazz starts at a peak, then tracks the adaptation, or lack thereof, of adventurous country artists to the rise of rock & roll and The Nashville Sound and Countrypolitan, yeesh. They're having to go back to the boonies from which many of them sprung, or worse (well not going back to the Dust Bowl etc but some of these cats were from okay palces, they just wanted to do better, and Nashville was not that, to them).

Also does this series mention that Nashville was orignally yet another industrial hub, to which the music biz was a graft that took a while to take: swarm of migrants from the Asheville axis, after the establishment of monster station WSM--but I've also read that country was often not the top format in local radio, during the mid-to-late 20th Century at least, because many of the people who moved to town for work were more attached to music of their home states--another reason for countrypolitan etc, smooother less rootsy sounds, although some of that was also for Southerners who had escaped ro were trying to escape from rougher roots.

Also did they mention Charlie Rich, although I get that he might not be full-time country enough for much mention, like Doug Sahm and Elvis.

Charlie Rich is brought up briefly during discussion about Billy Sherrill in the '70s, and later they play the clip of him burning the envelope at the CMAs.

Seems like in a way the only reason they brought Rich up was to set up that clip later.

He got a really backhanded mention that at least one of those podcasters was pretty mad about. He was referred to in passing as an “R&B journeyman.”

Elvis gets quite a bit of airtime during the Rockabilly segment, which maybe goes on longer than it needs to, Doug Sahm nothing, even though the Texas Tornados are mentioned for a second at the tail end of the Freddie Fender segment, described as being created by Freddie along with Flaco Jimenez to promulgate conjunto music, which seemed to me to be close but not quite accurate

many xps - i have not heard of that podcast James, looks good.
i have downloaded first ep!

Doug Sahm nothing, even though the Texas Tornados are mentioned for a second at the tail end of the Freddie Fender segment, described as being created by Freddie along with Flaco Jimenez to promulgate conjunto music, which seemed to me to be close but not quite accurate

Yup. I also took exception to them setting up the Austin scene and not mentioning him when they were rounding up scenesters. Furthermore, they totally overlooked Willie Nelson's Atlantic period, which Sahm figured into somewhat heavily.

Thought there was too much Guy Clark tbh

And too much Rodney Crowell commentary as well tbh

But I guess he was grandfathered in to an automatic upgrade to more legroom and screentime for having once been part of the extended Carter/Cash Family.

B-b-but in that case, Nick Lowe wuz robbed! Unless he sent Elvis Costello as his proxy.

They didn't get into Carlene Carter as a recording artist either.

Guy Clark is pretty important as making a home base for all the Texas ex-pats in Nashville. Plus, thanks to Heartworn Highways, there's tons of footage of him and those guys doing their thing at that exact time.

Also does this series mention that Nashville was orignally yet another industrial hub, to which the music biz was a graft that took a while to take: swarm of migrants from the Asheville axis, after the establishment of monster station WSM--but I've also read that country was often not the top format in local radio, during the mid-to-late 20th Century at least, because many of the people who moved to town for work were more attached to music of their home states--another reason for countrypolitan etc, smooother less rootsy sounds, although some of that was also for Southerners who had escaped ro were trying to escape from rougher roots.

Roy Clark also talking about having bib overalls and 2 tailored tuxedos.

Two tuxedosbib overalls and a microphone

Call BR-549 to find out where it's at!

https://img.discogs.com/Q1ARpqwtzO3n20ex8xCVV_GbSW4=/600x593/smart/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(90)/discogs-images/A-1623841-1366102122-3075.jpeg.jpg

Lol

Podcast says KB started working on this eight years ago, think I heard.

The Dillards weren't in this, huh?

They were standing behind Rodney Crowell so you couldn’t see them

*Ahem* https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-country/glen-campbell-museum-nashville-rhinestone-stage-869072/

james i am obsessed with that damn holding things together podcast

Cool. I just started listening. I listened to Rebecca's radio show first instead.

Aka, Honky Tonk Radio Girl

they drop some great info

like Jimmie Rodgers being huge amongst a tribe in Kenya thanks to missionaries

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/chemirocha-how-an-american-country-singer-became-a-kenyan-star

You never heard of the Chemirocha before? I envy you finding out about that for the first time

So if I read correctly, major label recording didn’t hit it’s stride in Nashville until 1957, when Steve Sholes using Elvis money and momentum to instruct Chet Atkins to build the new studio RCA studio, with presumably the incident mentioned in the series about Decca not moving to Dallas and Owen Bradley building their new studio happening around the same time

Ugh “its” not “it’s”

Obviously there was recording on before that, some of it in WSM’s Air Castle Studio, not sure where else exactly.

This gives a pretty good idea of the timeline:
https://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entries/nashville-recording-industry/

This too: http://sportsandentertainmentnashville.com/the-history-of-music-row-60-years-of-greatness/

and this: http://www.scottymoore.net/studio_mcgavock.html

i see PBS is already shipping DVDs

and the library has ordered 'em

I read somewhere that the 1927 landmark Bristol sessions were recorded there (Bristol TN, not UK, which would have been innaresting) when Nashville was mostly known as a minor-ish industrial town---this article seems pretty accurate, from what I recall (no I wasn't there):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_sessions

Right. I think the it is stated in many places, including this doc, that this was the first significant recording of this music in the South.

By which I think I mean a one-two punch of the Fiddlin’ John Carson recordings in Atlanta and then the Bristol sessions.

If you liked the doc, the companion book is essential. Probably my favorite thing on TV all year.

Seems like the companion book has extra stuff that’s not in the show.

Just noticed Tommy Duncan imitating Robert Johnson.

Well, good morning, Captain!

This is your old pal Gene Autry calling. I was just passing through town and thought I’d call to see how y’all were doing.

They didn't get into Carlene Carter as a recording artist either
Is her father ever even mentioned?

I don't think so. They just brought up that June was married when she and Johnny first got together.

Somewhere (I hope) I've stiil got an ancient twofer CC CD, Blue Nun/Musical Shapes, from her Nick Lowe era, with other members and colleagues of Rockpile, I think: good but could use re-masterting, as I thought even when it first came out. Later she worked with Al Anderson, who had left NRBQ and moved to Nashville--okay songwriter, though I preferred his guitar, with which she and he ripped it up on Austin City Limits.
Best album of hers I've heard is 2014 Carter Girl, where she folds elements of the Family sound and karma into her own rolling thing. At first I really liked the 2017 Mellencamp offering featuring her, Sad Clowns and Hillbillies---he's a painter of such---but later it seemed kind of stupid, because of his mannerisms, which he actually sounded happy with, even though I've liked several of his albums.
(They prob didn't mention the Mellenplate formula of denim pop country, since that was mostly post-'96, when the hats were starting to come off.)

They just brought up that June was married when she and Johnny first got together.
They were both married iirc?

To other people, I mean

Yes. Figured it went without saying.

my interest started to flag when they were goin in to Hank Williams Jr. and Roseanne Cash careers but then they tied it all up nicely with Pancho and Lefty

i haven't seen this but: rosanne cash rules and king's record shop changed country music. is it just boringly rendered

The episode they focus on her in is by far the longest one, and to be honest, they could have moved both her and/or Hank Jr. to the next one for better effect.

ahhh. jeez i gotta start watching this already

I think all the eps are streaming for free on the PBS site now, so dig in!

they are streaming until 10/6 iirc

oh shit i'll never finish lol

It’s on Kanopy now.

Wow. Who has access to that anymore?

I do

tbh I don't use it much though

Replacements thread reminding how things like their country covers and pastiches helped lead the way, for me and my cohort at least, back to the this stuff, along with the same from pub and punk rockers, especially Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe, as well as the not-uncommon “turn” from punk to alt-country and early adopter country punks like, say, Jason and the Scorchers, whereas before this was just music I was forced to listen to in the car with my dad, on a pretty tightly formatted station such that the only time I heard about Lefty Frizzell was on a Sunday night interview show. Kind of dreading watching the last episode as it rides off into the sunset as I doubt this will be discussed, didn’t notice it in the penultimate episode.

Forgot to mention X and The Blasters and no doubt several more.

Which I just reminded myself of, but will leave to others to bring to thread if they want.

Ah, thanks for reminding me that Jason (Ringenberg) has a new album out this year, though it's not on his bandcamp (yet?)---lots of stuff here:
TS: Lone Justice or Cruzados or Drivin' & Cryin' or Green On Red or Del Fuegos or Jason & The Scorchers or Long Ryders or Bodeans?

and

The Blasters: C or D?

Did they mention "Dead Flowers"? Still need to check Townes VZ's version.

Don’t think so. Believe they did mention Gram Parsons’s involvement with Exile On Main Street, but that was probably the extent of any Rolling Stones connection.

Darn. Oh yeah, some of this pertains:
Giant Sand / Howe Gelb P0X

Never appreciated until now the country, blues & rockabilly classics that were introduced to me by Beasts of Bourbon covers alone

I think Cantwell's recent Tanya Tucker piece for the New Yorker put it pretty well:

/Because it’s a late-career country-music comeback, “While I’m Livin’ ” is bound to be compared to Johnny Cash’s “American Recordings.” But Rick Rubin, the producer of the Cash album, succeeded in part by shrinking Cash’s complexity to a kind of two-dimensional rebellion.

Remember too that Cash--perhaps with some label influence--had cast a wide net for material for some time: He was one of the first Country artists to record Dylan; "Ballad of Ira Hayes" was by a Greenwich folkie; and in the '80s he was recording Nick Lowe material and stuff from Springsteen's Nebraska.