September 8, 2011

Them Old Country Songs

I find I've been listening to a lot of bluegrass music lately. That tends to happen in the summer - there's something about bluegrass that has an "outside in the warm weather" feel to it, at least for a city dweller like me.

As I listen, I realize that while I often say "I don't like country music" ... I actually like a lot of country music. Now, this isn't bluegrass music (however, this post from 2010 is), but all of this made me think of "Them Old Country Songs", a 3-LP set I picked up many years ago for a few bucks. This is that old-school kinda country music, full of soul and heartache.

Three LPs worth of music means there's a lot of stuff here. Particularly notable though, and by far my favourite track, is "Down Yonder" (LP 1, track 4) - a wild honky-tonk piano piece from 1951 played by Del Wood (a.k.a. Polly Adelaide Hazelwood - a woman in the 1950s country music scene! My goodness!). There is also a version of "Tell It Like It Is" (LP 3, track 2), popularized by Aaron Neville, as well as the upbeat "This Ole House" by Stuart Hamblen, later covered by Rosemary Clooney, mother of now-famous George Clooney (well somewhat famous, but what has he done lately? *snicker*)

Anyway, it's a "who's who" of old country, if there ever was one!