There has been a change in country music over the past few years. I'm not saying it's good or bad but it has, for all intense and purposes, changed. Over the years my exposure to this genre has been from the 1970's to to present. Back when I was working for someone who listened to the old style of George Jones and Lefty Frizzel and the like, it wasn't something I took to readily, but didn't dislike. Perhaps that's why the Marshall Tucker Band and southern rock in general have been a sound I really liked.
In any case, like all good things where money is involved, record companies (that would be the black vinyl things I grew up with) have made it a point to capitalize on it and just push music out of the pipe at a breakneck pace. Don't get me wrong, I like a lot of the things I hear, but I question the writing. The performers are good, there is some original stuff out there and some great bands and really good singers but it seems as though the music has gotten cheap.
David Allen Coe did a song once upon an eon ago that said country songs should contain some of the following: Momma, pickup trucks, rain, prison, trains and getting drunk. It was, at the time the perfect county song. An observation that I have made concerning the content of music coming out of Nashville is that all songs should mention some if not all of the following:
Moonshine
Beer
Drinking beer
Being good at drinking beer
How good beer is
Beer cans
Budwiser
Corona
Ice cold beer
Bourbon
Tequila
Jose Quarvo
Patron
F-150
Silverado
(Dodge never made the cut! LOL!)
4x4
Getting your 4x4 stuck
Shaking your ass (females only please!)
Shaking it
Cut off jeans that show your ass.
Dancing and shaking your ass.
Trespassing and building a fire on private property so girls can shake their asses.
Shaking your ass on truck, tractor or rooftop.
Just how country you are.
Just how country country is
Graphite on public structures.
Just how redneck you are.
Getting your "redneck on"
Kicking somebody's ass
Getting your ass kicked
Wishing you could kick somebody's ass
Hoping you wont get your ass kicked
Guns (any type in general)
30-06
12 gauge shotgun
Dogs
Hunting dogs
Missing your hunting dog
Fishing
Going fishing
Last time went fishing
Boots
Camos
Hangovers
Marshall Tucker Band
Lynnyrd Skynyrd
Johnny Cash
Hank Willams, Jr.
Waylon Jennings
Crying, loving and leaving.
American
America
Made in America
American made
USA
NASCAR
The South
Georgia
Tennessee
Alabama
Kentucky (not a southern state by the way)
Texas
South Carolina
Various Southern cities
And probably a few I failed to mention.
Anyway, the point I am making is that something so simple has become too complicated..... I think there is a song about that....
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Friday, July 19, 2013
I had a dream.....
I had a dream this past week. It was a bit unnerving and somewhat surreal and it's the first time I have had a dream like this. I dreamed about my Dad. He left us 10 years ago next week but he is still here with me. He is in my head and I can still here his voice. Not literally mind you; but figuratively.
My dream was strange because when I woke up, I was very sad and missing my Dad greatly. We were talking like we used to do. I was helping him with, of all things, an air conditioner! Maybe it was because mine was broken and it was extremely hot and humid in here. I just remember him wanting to buy an air conditioner because his was broken. I was helping him do this. We were walking along, I had my arm around his shoulder, helping him along and was so happy to be with him. I wish that dream had not ended so soon. I remember giving him a hug, not wanting to let him go and telling him I loved him.
Was my Dad perfect? Far from it. He was flawed as I am. But he taught me, in his own way, to be who and what I am. Could he have done it better? I can't answer that. Do I wish he had? In some respects, yes. But then I would be a different person and I don't think I would like me much then.
All I can say, is L.J. is greatly missed by me. My love of music, my work ethic, most of my mechanical skills, the ability to see potential in things, and a whole list of other things that I can do are a result of his influence. My thoughts are mine but his influence is there, we both believed that there is no excuse for not working for what you get. Lazy is a disgusting trait that we despised. However, if there was a hard way of getting from point A to B, L.J. would be the first to blaze that trail! Hell! Rube Goldburg could have learned from him! But he was my Dad and I still love him!
I really do miss you now and wish that I could have really given you that hug that I dreamed of this past week. Maybe the sadness will go away in time, or maybe it's the first time in 10 years I have actually let life catch up with me to where I can feel something. Well, I feel sad now, I don't like it, but it's better than not feeling anything at all I suppose.
My dream was strange because when I woke up, I was very sad and missing my Dad greatly. We were talking like we used to do. I was helping him with, of all things, an air conditioner! Maybe it was because mine was broken and it was extremely hot and humid in here. I just remember him wanting to buy an air conditioner because his was broken. I was helping him do this. We were walking along, I had my arm around his shoulder, helping him along and was so happy to be with him. I wish that dream had not ended so soon. I remember giving him a hug, not wanting to let him go and telling him I loved him.
Was my Dad perfect? Far from it. He was flawed as I am. But he taught me, in his own way, to be who and what I am. Could he have done it better? I can't answer that. Do I wish he had? In some respects, yes. But then I would be a different person and I don't think I would like me much then.
All I can say, is L.J. is greatly missed by me. My love of music, my work ethic, most of my mechanical skills, the ability to see potential in things, and a whole list of other things that I can do are a result of his influence. My thoughts are mine but his influence is there, we both believed that there is no excuse for not working for what you get. Lazy is a disgusting trait that we despised. However, if there was a hard way of getting from point A to B, L.J. would be the first to blaze that trail! Hell! Rube Goldburg could have learned from him! But he was my Dad and I still love him!
I really do miss you now and wish that I could have really given you that hug that I dreamed of this past week. Maybe the sadness will go away in time, or maybe it's the first time in 10 years I have actually let life catch up with me to where I can feel something. Well, I feel sad now, I don't like it, but it's better than not feeling anything at all I suppose.
Saturday, July 13, 2013
The neverending story, again.
As it once was, so it is once again. Unless you really know me, that makes no sense at all. Hell, even if you do, it's questionable. It's 5:30 AM and I am preparing for another day of the rude unwashed masses that frequent Wal Mart.
I wrote about change a couple years ago, the nail was hit squarely on the head with that one. The only constant in life seems to be change. The more you try to stem the tide, the more powerful the current gets. Change is in all practicality, inevitable. Be it good or bad it is going to happen. Even if you don't want it, it will happen. I just wish that it was easier to deal with. Maybe that is what will end up killing me, the stress of life and all the turmoil that surrounds itself in this crazy ride of life.
The thing that hasn't changed is the fact that all I do is work. And the harder I work, the less I have to show for my efforts. My body is showing it's age, it hurts more and in more places than ever before. People still don't follow through with promises, I'm afraid I fall into that category myself though. I think that in the grand scheme of things, there are few constants. 3 of which are summed up in a country song, "God is great, beer is good and people are crazy." There are a few more but not many.
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. A quote from Poor Richards Almanac and so true. There are a pocket full of them going to work with me today, now of which will come true. I will do my time, come home, collapse and do it all again tomorrow. And the next day, and the next..... That never changes.
Enough rambling thoughts for today, the voices are growing silent and are leaving the building
I wrote about change a couple years ago, the nail was hit squarely on the head with that one. The only constant in life seems to be change. The more you try to stem the tide, the more powerful the current gets. Change is in all practicality, inevitable. Be it good or bad it is going to happen. Even if you don't want it, it will happen. I just wish that it was easier to deal with. Maybe that is what will end up killing me, the stress of life and all the turmoil that surrounds itself in this crazy ride of life.
The thing that hasn't changed is the fact that all I do is work. And the harder I work, the less I have to show for my efforts. My body is showing it's age, it hurts more and in more places than ever before. People still don't follow through with promises, I'm afraid I fall into that category myself though. I think that in the grand scheme of things, there are few constants. 3 of which are summed up in a country song, "God is great, beer is good and people are crazy." There are a few more but not many.
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride. A quote from Poor Richards Almanac and so true. There are a pocket full of them going to work with me today, now of which will come true. I will do my time, come home, collapse and do it all again tomorrow. And the next day, and the next..... That never changes.
Enough rambling thoughts for today, the voices are growing silent and are leaving the building
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