He also won best album for Shock 'n Y'All and best video Beer for My Horses with Willie Nelson, while Martina McBride won top female vocalist.
Toby Keith caused controversy over his flag-waving post-11 September song Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue.
Keith had won entertainer of the year in 2003 but walked out of the venue after being overlooked for other awards.
Duo's success
Last night he said: "Thank God for blessing us," he said. "Let's all go partyin' and rock out here in Vegas."
Vocal duo Brooks & Dunn won top vocal duo award, taking their haul at the awards to 17.
Alan Jackson won single record of the year and vocal event for his song Five O'Clock Somewhere.
"Thanks to the academy and of course all the fans that made this such a fun song to hear on the radio," said Jackson.
"I'm just really grateful that I get to live this life and I get to share it with so many wonderful people," said McBride after her win for top female vocalist for the third year running.
Randy Travis won song of the year for Three Wooden Crosses, while the best group award was again won by Rascal Flatts.
― Gussy, Thursday, 27 May 2004 10:51 (twenty years ago) link
― Gussy, Thursday, 27 May 2004 10:58 (twenty years ago) link
― Gussy, Thursday, 27 May 2004 10:59 (twenty years ago) link
The Dixie Chicks MAY have been intentionally overlooked, but I doubt TK scored any points FOR his jingoistic stance -- "Courtesy" isn't even on the album (although "American Soldier" is). He just made a great record.
― briania (briania), Thursday, 27 May 2004 11:10 (twenty years ago) link
― Big Toby (briania), Thursday, 27 May 2004 12:00 (twenty years ago) link
― Morley Timmons (Donna Brown), Thursday, 27 May 2004 13:31 (twenty years ago) link
Olivia Newton-John to thread.
― Joseph McCombs, Thursday, 27 May 2004 13:34 (twenty years ago) link
Now, let's see what he's done before this record. "I Wanna Talk About Me" was the worst country novelty record to hit the scene since Billy Ray. "How Do You Like Me Now" was a big hit that I never understood why it was so big. "A Little Less Talk, A Lot More Action," that's probably his best song. As for Courtesy of the Red White and Blue, that's not nearly as much of an asshole song as people suggest.
― My name is Kenny (My name is Kenny), Thursday, 27 May 2004 13:38 (twenty years ago) link
Sitting in the parking lot late one night, patiently waiting for sobriety to return, I found this song on the radio, and I laughed until a blazing dove came down from Heaven and did a little tap-dance on my beer-soaked skull.
For that moment, and that moment alone, I dub Toby Keith a classic. I imagine that I would have thought G.W. Bush to be a classic too, if I had met him in his drunken prime. If George & Toby had remained on their barstools, happily oblivious to the world of politics, I'd have a good deal more affection for both of them.
― Butter Leather, Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:05 (twenty years ago) link
― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:06 (twenty years ago) link
I love this bar,It's my kind place.Just walk in through the front door,Puts a big smile on my face.It ain't too far; come as you are.Mm, mm, mmm, mmm, mmm, I love this bar.
I've seen short skirts; we've got high-techs;Blue collar boys and rednecks.An' we got lovers; lots of lookers;I've even seen dancin' girls and hookers.And we like to drink our beer from a mason jar:Mm, mm, mmm, mmm, mmm, I love this bar, yes I do!
I like my truck, (I like my truck),An' I like my girlfriend, (I like my girlfriend),I like to take her out to dinner;I like a movie now and then:
But I love this bar,It's my kind place.Just toeing around the dance floor,Puts a big smile on my face.No cover charge; come as you are.Mm, mm, mmm, mmm, mmm, I love this bar.Mm, mm, mmm, mmm, mmm, I just love this ol' bar.
er
― Gear! (Gear!), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:09 (twenty years ago) link
― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:11 (twenty years ago) link
― robin carmody (robin carmody), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:16 (twenty years ago) link
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0349/eddy.php
By the way, I didn't see much of the country awards last night, but Big & Rich's performance was COMPLETELY. FUCKING. INSANE. Easily the most entertaining live musical performance I've seen on TV in, I dunno, forever. (Since, what, Funky Four Plus One on Saturday Night Live in '81? Public Image Ltd on American Bandstand in '80? Something like that. I dunno, maybe I'm forgetting something. But still...)
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:20 (twenty years ago) link
― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:21 (twenty years ago) link
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0244/kogan.php
Don Allred's two cents:
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0222/allred.php
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:22 (twenty years ago) link
― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:24 (twenty years ago) link
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:24 (twenty years ago) link
Which song did they do? Wonder if this'll be rebroadcast. I fuggin love these guys right now. Though the songs *may* all be about 30-75 seconds too long. But what to cut out???
(xpost)
― frankE (frankE), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:26 (twenty years ago) link
― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:27 (twenty years ago) link
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:28 (twenty years ago) link
― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:30 (twenty years ago) link
― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:31 (twenty years ago) link
SERIOUSLY! I'm especially big on Wild West Show (western epic as breakup metaphor, the plaintive "Hey Ya."s, the imagery, is that Zamfir I hear blowin?, the list goes on), Drinkin' 'bout You...shit. The whole thing. Can't wait for the article, Chuck.
― frankE (frankE), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:31 (twenty years ago) link
― frankE (frankE), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:32 (twenty years ago) link
― Doobie Keebler (Charles McCain), Thursday, 27 May 2004 18:38 (twenty years ago) link
― Joseph McCombs, Thursday, 27 May 2004 19:43 (twenty years ago) link
I were very confused.
― M@tt He1geson (Matt Helgeson), Thursday, 27 May 2004 19:47 (twenty years ago) link
― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 27 May 2004 20:24 (twenty years ago) link
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 20:32 (twenty years ago) link
Big & Rich: Album of the Decade?
― chuck, Thursday, 27 May 2004 20:33 (twenty years ago) link
as no other barwould contain the many kindsof types of people
but the radiois the great big leveler,there's no cover charge
― Begs2Differ (Begs2Differ), Thursday, 27 May 2004 20:47 (twenty years ago) link
The Chicks did well last year, didnt expect them to do well this year.
― anthony, Friday, 28 May 2004 05:25 (twenty years ago) link
Matos was right about Big & Rich, I have to say.
Anyway, I'm all about Toby's red, white and blue ear monitor here. (Shot was from a show in Afghanistan last week.)
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 21 May 2007 17:44 (seventeen years ago) link
Ryan Adams - Toby Keith rant.
http://www.sendspace.com/file/12l582
― MRZBW, Monday, 21 May 2007 17:55 (seventeen years ago) link
Toby Keith is a gigantic cock.
― HI DERE, Monday, 21 May 2007 18:07 (seventeen years ago) link
ah, a man with good music and shit politics vs. a man with idk maybe good politics who used to do good music but now is shit.
toby's a much better comedian so he wins.
― JoshLove, Monday, 21 May 2007 20:17 (seventeen years ago) link
"Ain't No Right Way" is one of the better political songs of the last decade -- so damn pained!
Should I get Big Dog Daddy next?
― livin in my own private Biden hole (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 7 August 2011 13:33 (thirteen years ago) link
man I heard "Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue" on the radio today & got seriously pumped up---totally effective & fabulous song, despite my ambiguities with the ideal it propounds. They played "Made In America" about an hour later & here I am driving in the heartland in an army town, with soldiers having been sitting in the front of my classroom today as it is each term here, and Keith's got me again; he's very good at what he does!
― Euler, Thursday, 25 August 2011 22:46 (thirteen years ago) link
"Red Solo Cup" has quietly become the sort of inescapable perennial heard at barbeques.
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 7 June 2012 23:23 (twelve years ago) link
it was released barely 6 months ago, it's just entering its first barbecue season!
― shipl.de.al (some dude), Friday, 8 June 2012 01:52 (twelve years ago) link
Who are you even kidding?
― how's life, Friday, 8 June 2012 22:53 (twelve years ago) link
it's an even more try-hard i got friends in low places and not as good
― wack nerd zinging in the dead of night (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 8 June 2012 22:56 (twelve years ago) link
but it's still ok
Went to a party last weekend and the bar stools had red solo cups painted on them, along with lyrics from the refrain.
― how's life, Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:23 (twelve years ago) link
Heard it three times this weekend in three different places.
"I Love This Bar" >>> "Get Drunk and Be Somebody" >>>>>> "Red Solo Cup"
but who am I kdding
― a regina spektor is haunting europe (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 20 June 2012 13:26 (twelve years ago) link
I've never actually heard "Red Solo Cup," but I mentioned it the other day and was mildly surprised that people knew what I was talking about. (The only contemporary country fan I know IRL is my mom.)
― Never translate Dutch (jaymc), Wednesday, 20 June 2012 14:08 (twelve years ago) link
"I Love This Bar" is pretty good, isn't it?
― Geoffrey Schweppes (jaymc), Thursday, 8 August 2013 01:01 (eleven years ago) link
Yes. The 2002-2006 period is worth a Spotify playlist.
― first I think it's time I kick a little verse! (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 8 August 2013 01:06 (eleven years ago) link
I love I Love This Bar, whatta melody on the chorus.
― Euler, Thursday, 8 August 2013 01:46 (eleven years ago) link
i'm not happy about this
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 00:37 (seven years ago) link
stealing the young girls' hearts
― example (crüt), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 00:41 (seven years ago) link
for a while he was a Democrat. RIP.
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 00:54 (seven years ago) link
Wow what a surprise he turns out to be a shithead who could have seen it coming
― blonde redheads have more fun (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 04:28 (seven years ago) link
musician who makes bombastic songs for republicans turns out to support bombastic republican president
― a self-reinforcing downward spiral of male-centric indie (katherine), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:14 (seven years ago) link
like, I'm sure it was fun for the people playing 20-dimensional music critic chess with this guy's not-remotely-murky politics (if you qualify as a celebrity, which if you're a musician giving an interview in a major publication you qualify as in this metaphor, the political views you claim in an interview are whichever views will best "activate" and/or placate the fans) but come on
― a self-reinforcing downward spiral of male-centric indie (katherine), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:47 (seven years ago) link
for a while he was a Democrat
Hey, remember Zell Miller?
― Don Van Gorp, midwest regional VP, marketing (誤訳侮辱), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:50 (seven years ago) link
well, I never gave a shit about his politics, which were obvious from about 1998 onwards. But he still made good records until 2006 so
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:50 (seven years ago) link
― Don Van Gorp, midwest regional VP, marketing (誤訳侮辱),
and George Wallace
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:51 (seven years ago) link
Toby Keith is a gigantic cock.― HI DERE, Monday, May 21, 2007 2:07 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― HI DERE, Monday, May 21, 2007 2:07 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
I still stand by this.
― (The caption: “fine dining.”) (DJP), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 15:57 (seven years ago) link
also, he looks like bathing offends him
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 16:00 (seven years ago) link
They don't call them the Great Unwashed for nothing.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 16:17 (seven years ago) link
i wanna talk about me & as good as i once was are all-time songs and it's hard for me to reconcile the cleverness and self-awareness of them with someone who'd agree to play for fucking donald trump, and actually this is one of the awfulest things about people like trump, or marine le pen, or other shit-stirring know-nothing populist nativist dickbags, is they end up appealing to some otherwise fine, funny, decent, interesting people who unfortunately have been culturally isolated enough to not think very deeply about what they're getting into and suddenly before you know it they're posting racist facebook memes
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 19:56 (seven years ago) link
he still made good records until 2006 so
this. plus a handful of really good singles for four or five years after that.
― fact checking cuz, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:25 (seven years ago) link
they end up appealing to some otherwise fine, funny, decent, interesting people who unfortunately have been culturally isolated enough to not think very deeply about what they're getting into
i don't think toby keith is culturally isolated, and i assume he does think about what he's getting into. i also assume, based on keith and assorted others who said yes to this gig, that not having had a hit in several years makes it either a) easier to say yes or b) harder to say no, or both.
― fact checking cuz, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:30 (seven years ago) link
he also wrote a song about kicking terrorists in the ass with your boot
― global tetrahedron, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:32 (seven years ago) link
toby keith also played the RNC, it didn't come out of nowhere (he said he "would have played the DNC if they offeredd" but that's kind of like me saying that I'd accept $1 million from trump if he offered: so unlikely a possibility as to be moot)
― a self-reinforcing downward spiral of male-centric indie (katherine), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:33 (seven years ago) link
the one time i saw him live, about 10 years ago, he was great for the 80-ish minutes of his regular set, then he came back for the encore and the entire arena, not just him, turned into a red, white and blue kick-terrorists-in-the-ass-vote-republican-and-be-christian rally. it was legitimately scary. but those 80 minutes were still great.
― fact checking cuz, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:48 (seven years ago) link
i kinda liked this song o_O
no you're right he doesn't really have the same excuses that say my jackass father-in-law does
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 20:58 (seven years ago) link
it's not as poignant as Alan Jackson's
― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 17 January 2017 21:38 (seven years ago) link
May very well be Trump's secret ISIS plan.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 17 January 2017 21:48 (seven years ago) link
"Beer for My Horses" just went by the radio and, wow, I can't believe any station would play this in 2020. Also, wtf, there was a movie??
― j.o.h.n. in evanston (john. a resident of chicago.), Thursday, 2 July 2020 15:13 (four years ago) link
Yeah, used to hear this on the radio all the time (back when I lived in a red state small town) and always did a double take at the lyrics. The awful thing is the chorus is kinda catchy so when I hear it on the radio I sometimes catch myself humming it later that day.
― Lily Dale, Thursday, 2 July 2020 17:33 (four years ago) link
NEWS: Amid impeachment effort, Trump is giving medals to @tobykeith and @RickySkaggs — national medal of the arts, several sources tell me— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) January 13, 2021
― j.o.h.n. in evanston (john. a resident of chicago.), Wednesday, 13 January 2021 21:23 (three years ago) link
RIP
― jaymc, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:14 (seven months ago) link
if I speak
― Murgatroid, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:18 (seven months ago) link
“A Little Too Late” “As Good As I Once Was” “Just Talking About Tonight” all classics imo
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:21 (seven months ago) link
what????
― Humanitarian Pause (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:25 (seven months ago) link
Yeah, he had a run of good to excellent albums in the mid '00s. I'd add "Somewhere Else," "I Love This Bar," and about a dozen others to PK's list.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:29 (seven months ago) link
Requisite
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyIwRoPr728
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 13:57 (seven months ago) link
damn the taliban finally got him, sending love & light
― waste of compute (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 14:06 (seven months ago) link
no reason in particular. pic.twitter.com/Ycs9zqdTf1— lieutenant winslow (@lt_winslow) February 6, 2024
― glumdalclitch, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 14:19 (seven months ago) link
Have they started leaving flowers at all the I Love This Bar & Grill locations?
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 14:43 (seven months ago) link
when I turned 21 and started going out the song that would play nonstop is "I Love This Bar", like every local place would have someone playing it 3x a night, one of the few songs I still actively hate, though perhaps "Red Solo Cup" is actually worse, perhaps because he was 50 years old when he wrote it, not to be ageist but if you're that old you should not be at those sorts of parties you giant fuckin weirdo
rest in peace
― frogbs, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:18 (seven months ago) link
My aunt brought out red solo cups for our Noche Buena party in December. We were sitting outdoors.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:19 (seven months ago) link
"I Love This Bar" is great.
I would argue with you Alf but I will show some respect for the recently deceased
― frogbs, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:22 (seven months ago) link
When exactly did this racist asshole earn any respect?
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:26 (seven months ago) link
Some of us who write about country music loved the stuff he released between 1999-2006. We gotta deal with garbage like "Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue" and "Beer For Your Horses" the same way we gotta deal with "Okie From Muskogee" and "Fightin' Side of Me." But Toby Keith is responsible for the hesitation about assessing Toby Keith. I haven't listened to his last few albums, but it wouldn't surprise me if the white trash with money ethos he celebrated and in 2016 and 2020 implicitly empowered hadn't disfigured his songs. Keith had too much talent for it to happen. Or maybe the newer songs do get disfigured in the same way fascism shrivels whatever it touches, including the earlier material I've praised. Either way I wouldn't have bothered even if he'd rejected Donald Trump.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:33 (seven months ago) link
“I Wanna Talk About Me” is an awesome songI think I have Tim H to thank for introducing me to “As Good As I Once Was” which is on the very top shelf of unimpeachably satisfying countrysongs
― Humanitarian Pause (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 15:37 (seven months ago) link
You’re welcome Tracer. Alfred OTM - White Trash With Money was where I delicately alighted from Toby’s truck but the string of LPs beforehand are really good with disgusting moments (and as with all such things everyone has their own bar for where the gross stuff gets too much).
― Tim, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 16:14 (seven months ago) link
i love that bar
― JoeStork, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 16:35 (seven months ago) link
I've always loved ILM's double standard with modern country vs indie like omg Pitchfork didn't start their Sleater Kinney review with a land acknowledgement vs Toby Keith advocating for murdering people in the Midwest or Morgan Wallen said the n word sure sucks but whaddya gonna do?
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:08 (seven months ago) link
mideast obv
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:09 (seven months ago) link
are the same posters dismissing the S-K review the same ones praising Toby Keith?
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:10 (seven months ago) link
actually, Keith's lynching song did advocate murdering Americans.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:11 (seven months ago) link
I think Springsteen's Nebraska was advocating for murder in the midwest
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:15 (seven months ago) link
Some of us who write about country music loved the stuff he released between 1999-2006. We gotta deal with garbage like "Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue" and "Beer For Your Horses" the same way we gotta deal with "Okie From Muskogee" and "Fightin' Side of Me."
Are you sure you get "Okie From Muskogee"?
― The SoyBoy West Coast (Whiney G. Weingarten), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:19 (seven months ago) link
are you sure you do?
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:22 (seven months ago) link
Some good words from Adeem: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=823438616258910&set=pcb.823478716254900
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 17:39 (seven months ago) link
I've always loved ILM's double standard with modern country vs indie
Yeah, this is really weird around here. Toby Keith and Morgan Wallen get met with a shrug and excuses because they've also released good music, but when it comes to indie rock and metal, even the slightest whiff of guilt by association gets an artist rendered persona non grata around here. Which isn't to say indie rock dudes and metal dudes don't often earn being canceled and ignored, but it seems to be a real blind spot for country artists to get a pass for racist bullshit.
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:02 (seven months ago) link
Sure, but how many country critics on these threads overlap with rock and metal ones? Speaking just for myself, I don't practice "canceling," never have.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:04 (seven months ago) link
We also don't spend a lot of time criticizing rappers for being misogynistic.
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:21 (seven months ago) link
The way I see it (surely there is a country album with that title), a huge hunk of country music may share his political beliefs, but only a select few assholes go out of their way to flaunt them, repeatedly and aggressively, and even fewer of those select few assholes (if any) produce much worthwhile enough to overlook their bullshit the way I/we/many/most overlooked, say, Public Enemy's. Like, Brad Paisley's career has been all but ignored ever since he released a *well-intentioned* provocative song, why would I give Toby Keith the time of day for so many *intentionally* provocative, reactionary, jingoistic, xenophobic, racist etc. songs? Especially when there is an almost endless list of other country artists great and small that deserve more ears? Just because he's popular?
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:28 (seven months ago) link
Misogyny is rampant in all strains of music, but how many current acts (rap, country or otherwise) make misogyny a trademark? When people think of Toby Keith - and I'm sure the obits will evince this - they are thinking of one thing first and foremost.
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:30 (seven months ago) link
If we have to drag Merle into this, its worth noting that he changed his views on the war & counterculture over time and didnt hesitate to call songs like "Okie" and "Fighting Side of Me" the work of a dumb ignorant kid.
― waste of compute (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:36 (seven months ago) link
I'm sure the obits will evince this - they are thinking of one thing first and foremost.
Well certainly the obits written by people who know of him for one thing.
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:38 (seven months ago) link
xpost And also likely recorded dozens of songs better than Toby Keith's best, but I'll leave that to the experts
― Josh in Chicago, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:39 (seven months ago) link
Brad Paisley's career had already flatlined before that terrible song. Besides releasing increasingly okay at best albums, he was (a) getting older in a genre that prizes youth on the radio (b) an Obama supporter.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:40 (seven months ago) link
actually, Paisley started getting boring at the same time as Keith.
Also speaking of Merle, when he was old and ailing he was playing a concert and could only make it through about 4 songs. He called Toby Keith up from the audience and had him finish the concert for him (playing Merle's songs of course.)
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:41 (seven months ago) link
i also think we're kinda conflating criticizing a late musician's troubling legacy after they die vs 'cancelling them' and not listening to their music while they're alive.
some people do the former and not the latter.
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:42 (seven months ago) link
like when Prince died we talked honestly about what a son of a bitch he was in the days and weeks after he died but we're still showing up to the threads to talk about his music, y'know
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:43 (seven months ago) link
yeah, I'm not sure what Josh's deal is. Is someone making you listen to Toby Keith? Or are you offended that people on this message board like some of his songs?
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:45 (seven months ago) link
and Hag (with Willie!) was still performing "Okie" as late as 2015:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqJvKaBwBZI
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:46 (seven months ago) link
he was an obama supporter
he was also a Palin supporter at the same time, and loudly & publicly quit the Democratic party before the '08 election because it was "too full of crazies". When pressed, he always tried to aw-shucks himself to both sides because everyones money is equally green, but it didnt take a genius to know what he was pushing.
tbh its hard for me to be unbiased because i cant dissociate him from that moment in time and the ppl i knew who took the racist war anthems of TK and his ilk at face value and ended up not having as good of a 2002-2008 as he did. if thats unfair to his other apolitical barroom singalongs, its a contradiction i can live with
― waste of compute (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:46 (seven months ago) link
Toby Keith: how do you like him now?
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:47 (seven months ago) link
The Dixie Chicks were right to shit on him btw
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:48 (seven months ago) link
wait I missed that you were talking about Paisley re:Obama Alfred, lotta posts crashed in at once there
― waste of compute (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:57 (seven months ago) link
Yeah, I thought so!
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:57 (seven months ago) link
Paisley said his song "Welcome to the Future" was inspired by Obama's victory.
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 18:58 (seven months ago) link
Paisley's big misstep with that song was always more forgivable to me bc it was just so incredibly weird, like he seemed truly surprised that ppl hated it
― waste of compute (One Eye Open), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 19:05 (seven months ago) link
not "Welcome to the Future", the uh... other song
Paisley looks like a good dude.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 February 2024 19:06 (seven months ago) link
look mano handsRIP
― brimstead, Tuesday, 6 February 2024 20:43 (seven months ago) link
So glad I got to write about him before he went after The Chicks (AKA "Saddam's Angels," in that poster he started waving around on stage). Before that, there was a time:
Village VoiceMay 24th, 2002 7:45 PM Issue 22Toby KeithPull My ChainDreamWorksFunk upon a time, when the hairy Feminazi darkness spread across the land, itbecame necessary for a clown prince to assume the position, a wise fool whocould justify or sugarpie the base ballin' ways of batman to wombman. Thus,from Jughead's Archie to Meathead's, from Ozzie and Harriet's paranoid Ozzie toParanoid's (and The Osbournes') Ozzy: As the wig is bent, it came to be, fromsea to shining sea.Except in the country which is just called Country, 'cause y'all know whereto find us. We had such a promising premising prince—Garth Brooks—butt aftera while he was hardly ever home. So it was that, from the ranks ofstud-puppets, one must step up to the plate (others graduallyto be sacrificed for the evilcological balance of the herd). One son who wouldnever stray, just conveniently go 'way (for your beauty rest), and then comeback with grapes peeled like you never saw!Or so you'd be ready to tell him, this Toby Keith, this Oklahoma! Citybilly,this formerly oil-refinin', pro (well, USFL) footballa, with eyes, brains, andpipes under his Jimmie-no-crack-corn (prophylactic) hat. Ready or not, hecomes chuggin' 'round the cloudbank, with his high voice (zero faux-MexicaliMarty Robbins hair-tonic trills), and his low vibrato (free of Waylonic soft-soapopry). Nothing forced. He's too busy to belabor a point, much less a note.Such chuggin', from a John Waite "Missing You"/Puff Daddy "I'll Be MissingYou" (but not Stones "Miss You," not yet) template on his dogtag, also would gogood with fiddles, if he bothered. No banjos either, and there's only one ofhim (sob), and he's Homecoming Court-bait like his old tourmateShania—therefore he's not quite the Dixie Chicks, but if he were a gal, he'd be calledspunky, and that's close enough. 'Specially since the actual D.C.s are busy innon-Homecoming court, and anyhow, it just wouldn't work if we didn't hear a big ol'guy's guy ode-ing up to the joys of submission, for instance on the (burnslike a paper sun and candy rain) title track of his current doghouse penthouse prayer, Pull My Chain.So of course it's "Pull my chain, Toby Keith!" on his message board now.Netgals also hijack "I wanna talk about mememememe," from "I Wanna Talk About Me,"in which a Good Listener just gets taken for granted, as Toby discovers thenerupts over, in a David Puddy way that slays 'em in the whenhouse. He also flows morerapneck genius than was even dreamt of by Fred Durst (Fred: "B-b-but it was writtenby Bobby 'He Stopped Loving Her Today' Braddock! No fair!" True).When "You Leave Me Weak" (goood depletion) gets followed and swallowed by"Tryin' to Matter" (bad depletion), and identifying with the artist gets cold,the ladies have gender lines to scurry back across, if they want 'em. I coulduse an escape hatch myself, from recognizing the persistent hopefulness (ratherthan the expected Country Western self-pity, served up jest ratt) that makes"Tryin' " so painful (as I'm sure Tobe knows) (bitch). Hope might also be thewild hair that makes the faithful married man roar, struttin' about not beingone to "Pick Em Up and Lay Em Down" ("down, down, down," he mutters at onepoint). And hope prods the twisting sheets of "Forever Hasn't Got Here Yet" (theverdict just in: "makeup sex," but not Seinfeld's).The previous album, How Ya Like . . . ('scuse me, Kool Mo Dee) How Do YouLike Me Now, was a chug-to-glide-to-hover-to-Hova-to-ova (title track, anyway,livin' inside your radio) airshow of lifelines. This one rocks harder, dreamspaler, rarely in black-and-white; this isn't Pleasantville, it's Burbtown (inlate Spring, we're green and gray, OK?).
Toby KeithPull My ChainDreamWorks
Funk upon a time, when the hairy Feminazi darkness spread across the land, itbecame necessary for a clown prince to assume the position, a wise fool whocould justify or sugarpie the base ballin' ways of batman to wombman. Thus,from Jughead's Archie to Meathead's, from Ozzie and Harriet's paranoid Ozzie toParanoid's (and The Osbournes') Ozzy: As the wig is bent, it came to be, fromsea to shining sea.Except in the country which is just called Country, 'cause y'all know whereto find us. We had such a promising premising prince—Garth Brooks—butt aftera while he was hardly ever home. So it was that, from the ranks ofstud-puppets, one must step up to the plate (others graduallyto be sacrificed for the evilcological balance of the herd). One son who wouldnever stray, just conveniently go 'way (for your beauty rest), and then comeback with grapes peeled like you never saw!Or so you'd be ready to tell him, this Toby Keith, this Oklahoma! Citybilly,this formerly oil-refinin', pro (well, USFL) footballa, with eyes, brains, andpipes under his Jimmie-no-crack-corn (prophylactic) hat. Ready or not, hecomes chuggin' 'round the cloudbank, with his high voice (zero faux-MexicaliMarty Robbins hair-tonic trills), and his low vibrato (free of Waylonic soft-soapopry). Nothing forced. He's too busy to belabor a point, much less a note.Such chuggin', from a John Waite "Missing You"/Puff Daddy "I'll Be MissingYou" (but not Stones "Miss You," not yet) template on his dogtag, also would gogood with fiddles, if he bothered. No banjos either, and there's only one ofhim (sob), and he's Homecoming Court-bait like his old tourmateShania—therefore he's not quite the Dixie Chicks, but if he were a gal, he'd be calledspunky, and that's close enough. 'Specially since the actual D.C.s are busy innon-Homecoming court, and anyhow, it just wouldn't work if we didn't hear a big ol'guy's guy ode-ing up to the joys of submission, for instance on the (burnslike a paper sun and candy rain) title track of his current doghouse penthouse prayer, Pull My Chain.So of course it's "Pull my chain, Toby Keith!" on his message board now.Netgals also hijack "I wanna talk about mememememe," from "I Wanna Talk About Me,"in which a Good Listener just gets taken for granted, as Toby discovers thenerupts over, in a David Puddy way that slays 'em in the whenhouse. He also flows morerapneck genius than was even dreamt of by Fred Durst (Fred: "B-b-but it was writtenby Bobby 'He Stopped Loving Her Today' Braddock! No fair!" True).When "You Leave Me Weak" (goood depletion) gets followed and swallowed by"Tryin' to Matter" (bad depletion), and identifying with the artist gets cold,the ladies have gender lines to scurry back across, if they want 'em. I coulduse an escape hatch myself, from recognizing the persistent hopefulness (ratherthan the expected Country Western self-pity, served up jest ratt) that makes"Tryin' " so painful (as I'm sure Tobe knows) (bitch). Hope might also be thewild hair that makes the faithful married man roar, struttin' about not beingone to "Pick Em Up and Lay Em Down" ("down, down, down," he mutters at onepoint). And hope prods the twisting sheets of "Forever Hasn't Got Here Yet" (theverdict just in: "makeup sex," but not Seinfeld's).The previous album, How Ya Like . . . ('scuse me, Kool Mo Dee) How Do YouLike Me Now, was a chug-to-glide-to-hover-to-Hova-to-ova (title track, anyway,livin' inside your radio) airshow of lifelines. This one rocks harder, dreamspaler, rarely in black-and-white; this isn't Pleasantville, it's Burbtown (inlate Spring, we're green and gray, OK?).
― dow, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 03:34 (seven months ago) link
I accompanied someone to a Toby Keith concert once - it was surprisingly entertaining! Much better than the snoozefest that was Rascal Flatts. Bummed to hear he passed this morning.
― DT, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 07:49 (seven months ago) link
Didn't know he was friends with Colbert:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZvFqcTVUHQ
― an icon of a worried-looking, long-haired, bespectacled man (C. Grisso/McCain), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 15:41 (seven months ago) link
yea me explaining to my dad why people were yelling country music lyrics at me before calling me slurs https://t.co/yr290x3pcy— Arif Hasan, but NFL 🏈 (@ArifHasanNFL) February 7, 2024
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 16:41 (seven months ago) link
Colbert did a skit with Kissinger once too
― omar little, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 16:46 (seven months ago) link
Toby Keith only sang about dropping bombs on people
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 16:52 (seven months ago) link
true he was only in the propaganda division
― omar little, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 17:01 (seven months ago) link
obviously though he wasn't alone, it was a weird time. it's a shame bc i'm sure he was better than that. though i wasn't into what i did hear, he seems to be more nuanced than idk big & rich.
― omar little, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 17:04 (seven months ago) link
more than rich at least. Big Kenny is a bit of a hippie.
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 17:09 (seven months ago) link
"I Love This Bar" is so bad in every way. Just the most pandering obvious shit, I was embarrassed for whoever was singing it the first time I heard it and then I found out it was this guy and I thought "oh, of course." I know, I know, "But it's a hit!" -- but it's like a bloodless Mellencamp, like Billy Joel with a hat on. May his memory be a blessing to his friends and family but I am honestly mystified to learn that anybody who thinks about songs thinks well of "I Love This Bar," which sounds like it was written by a committee with a view to, if everything goes right, maybe opening up a line of bars.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 18:14 (seven months ago) link
if i've ever heard a toby keith song it was by accident and i have no memory of it, but i still dig reading your old stuff, Don/Dow!! you tongue-twisting speed demon! makes me want to go rite a rok revue.
― scott seward, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 18:30 (seven months ago) link
"I Love This Bar" is so bad in every way. Just the most pandering obvious shit,
Counterpoint: the "mmmm" part gets stuck in my head, and his kind of bar is more egalitarian than what his even more pigfuck disciples would celebrate.
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 19:30 (seven months ago) link
I like my truckI like my truckAnd I like my girlfriendI like my girlfriendI like to take her out to dinnerI like a movie now and thenYessir
― brimstead, Wednesday, 7 February 2024 19:41 (seven months ago) link
sorry, respect
Workin' hard, gettin' drunk
― immodesty blaise (jimbeaux), Wednesday, 7 February 2024 20:29 (seven months ago) link
Yeah, like Alfred,I think the early years were his best. But he had his moments later. Chuck Eddy's Voice view of Keith's career, as of 2008:
...Toby’s image is clearly his own fault: When he made the Statue of Liberty shake her fist in 2002’s outrageously rousing “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue” (awesome karaoke song, btw), Toby defined himself despite himself, and the self-proclaimed conservative Democrat has been trying to live it down ever since. Except when he hasn’t: He’s currently making a movie somehow based on “Beer for My Horses,” the even more despicable ode to lynching (of “gangsters”) that he sang with Willie Nelson around the same time. Add his camel-jockey cartoon, “The Taliban Song” (“Ahab the Arab” updated for the age when “Turkmenistan” is a very rhythmic word), his obligatory “American Soldier” (about how freedom isn’t free), and his soggy dishrag “Ain’t No Right Way” (implicitly anti-choice and explicitly pro–prayer in public schools), and it looks like we’ve got ourselves some Neanderthal species of nationalist numbskull.But here’s the thing: That handful of songs (a couple of which appeared on a surprisingly funky 2003 album entitled Shock’n Y’All, har har) is pretty much where Toby’s editorializing ends, at least on record. His output is no more limited by his war-machine anthem than Merle Haggard’s was by the comparably opportunistic “Okie From Muskogee” and “The Fightin’ Side of Me” when Nixon was president. And not many country artists since Merle have managed a creative streak like Toby’s these past few years—in fact, to my ears, his ’00s output (six albums plus change, including half of 2006’s Broken Bridges soundtrack and a few spare tracks collected on his new 35 Biggest Hits) just might stand up to anybody else’s this decade, in any musical genre.Go ahead and attribute my fandom partly to biographical coincidence: Toby was born in July 1961, a half-year after me; we both have three kids; we’re both straight white guys who’ve done time in inland suburbia. Then again, I’ve never personally worked an oil field or a semi-pro football field, my grandma didn’t run a supper club, I’m not six-foot-four and 240 pounds, I don’t own a bar and grill in Oklahoma, and I don’t do Ford commercials. But we both apparently cut our teeth on the same Bob Seger and John Cougar LPs, so I’m a sucker for the chili-dog-outside-the-Tastee-Freez heartland-rock riffs he stuck in four songs on last year’s Big Dog Daddy, the first album he produced himself. And where I come from, “water-tower poet class of ’73” is a right pithy depiction of hip-hop’s fourth element, and calling your most ZZ-worthy boogie “Zig Zag Stomp” is a darn clever pun.It also helps that the big lug isn’t afraid to make fun of himself—for being a bumbling husband, say, or for being a boyfriend who likes his girlfriend but loves his local bar, or for his aging-athlete body not working as well as it used to. His class resentment (in “Get Drunk and Be Somebody” and “High Maintenance Woman,” say) is totally good-natured as well. But where Toby most manifestly trounces the competition is with his singing (and, frequently, talking), which only gets smarter and warmer and more conversational—richer in both his high and low registers—as his career goes on. The song that first made me take notice, 1999’s “How Do You Like Me Now,” had him bellowing like Billy Ray Cyrus in Meat Loaf mode, but since then he’s figured out how to communicate a masculine vulnerability with an easy-as-Sunday-morning soul phrasing equal to Ronnie Milsap or T. Graham Brown, if not quite Charlie Rich (listen to “That’s Not How It Is” or “Your Smile”); his latest move is a Barry White cover with power forward turned jazz bassist Wayman Tisdale. On his best album, 2006’s White Trash With Money, Toby jumped ship from DreamWorks to his own Show Dog Nashville imprint, where green-eyed country-soul convert Lari White surrounded him with Tex-Mex accordions, Western swing saxes, Dusty in Memphis orchestrations, and Dixieland kazoos, coaxing laid-back nuances and big, blue notes out of him that made perfect sense alongside the same year’s Collector’s Choice reissue of Dean Martin’s 1955 Swingin’ Down Yonder.So Toby’s a bit of a late bloomer: He had six regular-issue albums and a handful of country Top 10s under his belt before his ass-boot woke up the world beyond CMT. The chronological 35 Biggest Hits, for its part, starts off as cautiously (but as competently) as any good Alan Jackson retrospective—the hit about the 18-year-old getting her first upstairs apartment downtown kills me, seeing how I just helped my daughter move to Brooklyn, and “Who’s That Man” and “A Woman’s Touch” employ open space in a ghostly way. And though I hope Mercury canned whoever thought a Sting duet was a marketable concept, even that song makes for a decent divorced-dad depiction. But Toby qua Toby doesn’t really bust out until “Dream Walkin’ “/”Getcha Some”/”How Do You Like Me Now,” beginning 14 tracks in; after that, there’s no looking back. If you’re new to the guy, start with disc two, then check out a few ’00s albums before you shift back to disc one.Getting loud—even a bit blowhard—was the first step. But for years now, Toby’s sincere ballad side has been catching up with his funny rocking side. Even in a genre where vocal aptitude is a prerequisite for career longevity, masterful voices and discernible personalities (especially personalities with hot beefcake sex and a sense of humor and a chip on their shoulder attached) don’t always coincide: Shooter Jennings might match Toby in a war of wits, but he can barely sing a lick, while Toby out-sings squeaky-clean goody-goodies from Travis to Jackson to Strait. And on top of that, though he’s been known to borrow winners from wooden-voiced wordsmiths like Paul Thorn or Fred Eaglesmith on occasion, Toby’s also the rare Nashville star who seems to do most of his own writing.And again, dude can write. I admire his move-over-small-dog-a-big-dog-daddy’s-movin’-in shtick, and how he does way more songs celebrating one-night stands than somebody married 24 years should be able to get away with—and how they don’t come with angst or a moral attached. He’s the kind of burly old teddy bear who’ll stash his sleeping bag (and dog bowl?) behind your couch and finally remember your early-November birthday in December, when he shows up with a ribbon tied around your present—”Brand New Bow” beat “Dick in a Box” by eight 2006 months. And if he’s playing wing man for a night, he’ll take one for the team, even if it means sleeping with the fat girl.OK, that one, “Runnin’ Block” (great football metaphor, huh?), is indefensible—or it would be, anyway, if its chorus melody wasn’t so amazing. Like “The Taliban Song,” it’s one of the “bus songs” that Toby sometimes tacks on at the end of albums—a disingenuous escape hatch he uses when he feels like pulling your chain. Not surprisingly, they’re usually among his livelier tracks. So when do we get a whole disc of those? Soon, I hope, unless the r&b album comes first.
But here’s the thing: That handful of songs (a couple of which appeared on a surprisingly funky 2003 album entitled Shock’n Y’All, har har) is pretty much where Toby’s editorializing ends, at least on record. His output is no more limited by his war-machine anthem than Merle Haggard’s was by the comparably opportunistic “Okie From Muskogee” and “The Fightin’ Side of Me” when Nixon was president. And not many country artists since Merle have managed a creative streak like Toby’s these past few years—in fact, to my ears, his ’00s output (six albums plus change, including half of 2006’s Broken Bridges soundtrack and a few spare tracks collected on his new 35 Biggest Hits) just might stand up to anybody else’s this decade, in any musical genre.
Go ahead and attribute my fandom partly to biographical coincidence: Toby was born in July 1961, a half-year after me; we both have three kids; we’re both straight white guys who’ve done time in inland suburbia. Then again, I’ve never personally worked an oil field or a semi-pro football field, my grandma didn’t run a supper club, I’m not six-foot-four and 240 pounds, I don’t own a bar and grill in Oklahoma, and I don’t do Ford commercials. But we both apparently cut our teeth on the same Bob Seger and John Cougar LPs, so I’m a sucker for the chili-dog-outside-the-Tastee-Freez heartland-rock riffs he stuck in four songs on last year’s Big Dog Daddy, the first album he produced himself. And where I come from, “water-tower poet class of ’73” is a right pithy depiction of hip-hop’s fourth element, and calling your most ZZ-worthy boogie “Zig Zag Stomp” is a darn clever pun.
It also helps that the big lug isn’t afraid to make fun of himself—for being a bumbling husband, say, or for being a boyfriend who likes his girlfriend but loves his local bar, or for his aging-athlete body not working as well as it used to. His class resentment (in “Get Drunk and Be Somebody” and “High Maintenance Woman,” say) is totally good-natured as well. But where Toby most manifestly trounces the competition is with his singing (and, frequently, talking), which only gets smarter and warmer and more conversational—richer in both his high and low registers—as his career goes on. The song that first made me take notice, 1999’s “How Do You Like Me Now,” had him bellowing like Billy Ray Cyrus in Meat Loaf mode, but since then he’s figured out how to communicate a masculine vulnerability with an easy-as-Sunday-morning soul phrasing equal to Ronnie Milsap or T. Graham Brown, if not quite Charlie Rich (listen to “That’s Not How It Is” or “Your Smile”); his latest move is a Barry White cover with power forward turned jazz bassist Wayman Tisdale. On his best album, 2006’s White Trash With Money, Toby jumped ship from DreamWorks to his own Show Dog Nashville imprint, where green-eyed country-soul convert Lari White surrounded him with Tex-Mex accordions, Western swing saxes, Dusty in Memphis orchestrations, and Dixieland kazoos, coaxing laid-back nuances and big, blue notes out of him that made perfect sense alongside the same year’s Collector’s Choice reissue of Dean Martin’s 1955 Swingin’ Down Yonder.
So Toby’s a bit of a late bloomer: He had six regular-issue albums and a handful of country Top 10s under his belt before his ass-boot woke up the world beyond CMT. The chronological 35 Biggest Hits, for its part, starts off as cautiously (but as competently) as any good Alan Jackson retrospective—the hit about the 18-year-old getting her first upstairs apartment downtown kills me, seeing how I just helped my daughter move to Brooklyn, and “Who’s That Man” and “A Woman’s Touch” employ open space in a ghostly way. And though I hope Mercury canned whoever thought a Sting duet was a marketable concept, even that song makes for a decent divorced-dad depiction. But Toby qua Toby doesn’t really bust out until “Dream Walkin’ “/”Getcha Some”/”How Do You Like Me Now,” beginning 14 tracks in; after that, there’s no looking back. If you’re new to the guy, start with disc two, then check out a few ’00s albums before you shift back to disc one.
Getting loud—even a bit blowhard—was the first step. But for years now, Toby’s sincere ballad side has been catching up with his funny rocking side. Even in a genre where vocal aptitude is a prerequisite for career longevity, masterful voices and discernible personalities (especially personalities with hot beefcake sex and a sense of humor and a chip on their shoulder attached) don’t always coincide: Shooter Jennings might match Toby in a war of wits, but he can barely sing a lick, while Toby out-sings squeaky-clean goody-goodies from Travis to Jackson to Strait. And on top of that, though he’s been known to borrow winners from wooden-voiced wordsmiths like Paul Thorn or Fred Eaglesmith on occasion, Toby’s also the rare Nashville star who seems to do most of his own writing.
And again, dude can write. I admire his move-over-small-dog-a-big-dog-daddy’s-movin’-in shtick, and how he does way more songs celebrating one-night stands than somebody married 24 years should be able to get away with—and how they don’t come with angst or a moral attached. He’s the kind of burly old teddy bear who’ll stash his sleeping bag (and dog bowl?) behind your couch and finally remember your early-November birthday in December, when he shows up with a ribbon tied around your present—”Brand New Bow” beat “Dick in a Box” by eight 2006 months. And if he’s playing wing man for a night, he’ll take one for the team, even if it means sleeping with the fat girl.
OK, that one, “Runnin’ Block” (great football metaphor, huh?), is indefensible—or it would be, anyway, if its chorus melody wasn’t so amazing. Like “The Taliban Song,” it’s one of the “bus songs” that Toby sometimes tacks on at the end of albums—a disingenuous escape hatch he uses when he feels like pulling your chain. Not surprisingly, they’re usually among his livelier tracks. So when do we get a whole disc of those? Soon, I hope, unless the r&b album comes first.
― dow, Thursday, 8 February 2024 02:08 (seven months ago) link
Ah thanks for posting that! Great piece.They did release The Bus Songs in 2017. “Shitty Golfer” is a lot of fun.
― Humanitarian Pause (Tracer Hand), Thursday, 8 February 2024 09:38 (seven months ago) link
Raekwon of Wu-Tang posted a tribute yesterday with a photo of them playing golf together. "One of my good friends"
― erasingclouds, Thursday, 8 February 2024 13:44 (seven months ago) link
Make sense. Remember GFK’s pro-war verse on Rules?
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Thursday, 8 February 2024 14:38 (seven months ago) link
This thread is the ILX equivalent of political reporters transcribing the "wisdom" of rural diner patrons.
― Tahuti Watches L&O:SVU Reruns Without His Ape (unperson), Thursday, 8 February 2024 18:31 (seven months ago) link
yeah but you get prime don and prime chuck in the village voice excerpts. you have to look at the bright side.
― scott seward, Thursday, 8 February 2024 18:33 (seven months ago) link
That kind of writing is exactly why I thought there would never be a place for me in the Voice.
― Tahuti Watches L&O:SVU Reruns Without His Ape (unperson), Thursday, 8 February 2024 18:39 (seven months ago) link
Let's talk about reporters in diners in every thread today challenge
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Thursday, 8 February 2024 18:44 (seven months ago) link
Toby Keith's I Love This Diner
― an icon of a worried-looking, long-haired, bespectacled man (C. Grisso/McCain), Thursday, 8 February 2024 19:02 (seven months ago) link
reporters can be eaten in diners too
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Thursday, 8 February 2024 19:02 (seven months ago) link
is that true? he definitely had mixed feelings about "okie" but as far as i remember he proudly defended "fightin' side" to the end. (a fantastic composition and fantastic recording, to my ears, based on a repulsive idea.)
― fact checking cuz, Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:37 (seven months ago) link
yeah, I prefer it to "Okie."
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:39 (seven months ago) link
i thought Okie started as a joke? The story I remember reading once was that they were smoking weed on the tour bus and they passed Muskogee and someone in the band cracked "They don't smoke marijuana in Muskogee!"
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:41 (seven months ago) link
the one time i saw him live, about 10 years ago, he was great for the 80-ish minutes of his regular set, then he came back for the encore and the entire arena, not just him, turned into a red, white and blue kick-terrorists-in-the-ass-vote-republican-and-be-christian rally. it was legitimately scary. but those 80 minutes were still great.― fact checking cuz, Tuesday, January 17, 2017 3:48 PM (seven years ago)
everything i loved and hated about toby keith summed in three sentences about 90 minutes. he was a phenomenal and soulful singer and songwriter. he had some deeply problematic ideas. neither of these things cancels out the other.
― fact checking cuz, Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:46 (seven months ago) link
“Great concert, wonderful memories, shame about the Klan rally at the end but it was wonderful before that”
― the new drip king (DJP), Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:49 (seven months ago) link
Leave Kanye alone
― Beyond Goo and Evol (President Keyes), Thursday, 8 February 2024 20:57 (seven months ago) link
"How Do You Like Me Now?" < the press photo of Trinidad James's visible underwear complete w/ noticeable skidmark
― never trust a big book and a simile (Neanderthal), Thursday, 8 February 2024 21:15 (seven months ago) link
sad lol djp
― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Thursday, 8 February 2024 21:23 (seven months ago) link
Blogged my favorite song of his a couple of days ago:
This isolation booth I'm in is dark and turning cold
And I reviewed him in the Voice in 2002:
Quiet Desert Storm
― Frank Kogan, Thursday, 8 February 2024 22:53 (seven months ago) link
frank kogan, as i live and breathe. will wonders never cease. this thread has really delivered the old home week cheer!
― scott seward, Friday, 9 February 2024 03:25 (seven months ago) link
yeah it is often difficult in the old home, it's nice when they give us a week.
― a single gunshot and polite applause (Hunt3r), Friday, 9 February 2024 03:42 (seven months ago) link
i'd say it's more like a weak cheer tbh
― a single gunshot and polite applause (Hunt3r), Friday, 9 February 2024 03:43 (seven months ago) link