For this Friday’s column I am going to dig into a part of my record library that I don’t listen to as often as I would like. It’s a genre that had a short life span in popular music but the people that were into it, were REALLY into it.
I will not lie, I love Country Rock. Remember, I went to school in Tennessee when the genre” was at it’s peak. I was so into the whole Southern thing, I even voted for Jimmy Carter! Hey, I wore flannel shirts and he just seemed like a good dude. He was a very good dude but not a mediocre President.
If you do any sort of Google search, Country Rock, comes up a little differently than my vision of the subset. Vince Gill is a great artist and I really love the guy but he is a Country singer. He may play a little louder guitar but that is Country. George Jones, Alan Jackson, Toby Keith, all Country.
No, I guess I should go with what the FM radio stations in the 70’s called it, Southern Rock. Potato, pototo. Not going to split hairs here on nomenclature. When you see my list, you will know what I mean.
To list some of my favorites I will start with the band that for me, was Southern Rock, Lynyrd Skynyrd. Out of Jacksonville Florida, Lynyrd Skynyrd played true Southern Rock. The stories were biographical, the lyrics, at times, were comical and the guitar playing was hard. You can play “Free Bird” until the cows come home and it still kicks ass. However, picking one song to exemplify Skynyrd is not easy, I have decided on two songs, “Ballad of Curtis Lowe’ and “Tuesday’s Gone”. “Ballad” is a semi true story of a boy who used to collect bottles and return them to a store in Florida so that he could listen to some old homeless guy play blues songs for him. “Tuesday’s Gone” is another song written bt Ronnie Van Zandt and Allen Collins that is a warning to the band about rising stardom they were about to experience. It is probably one of my top ten songs of all time and the live version is great.
No conversation about Southern Rock would be legit unless you mention The Charlie Daniels band. Start with “The South’s Gonna Do it Again” and check off the people you want to listen to. This song is such a sweet homage to bands that Daniel’s felt were not competition but friends. I mean Elvin Bishop isn’t that bad looking is he? My favorite CDB song has to be “Trudy”. I know I have brought this song up numerous times before but it is just a funny story about the singer running into the wrong guy at the wrong time and hoping Trudy can come get him out of this jail.
Next on the list is the Marshall Tucker Band. They were a little different because they mingled Jazz, Rock, Country and Blues in a lot of their songs. They also had a brass component to a lot of their songs. Something very few Southern Rock bands would ever attempt. While Charlie Daniels played fiddle, Jerry Eubanks played the flute. They are another group that I find it very hard to single out one song that encapsulates their whole sound but I will say that “This ol’ Cowboy” hits it home for me. I was in some honky tonk in Southwestern Georgia and this song came on the jukebox and it just hit me. I became a Tucker fan right then and there.
Another Florida band, The Outlaws, have to be included here. I know that “Green Grass and High Tides” has been played almost as much as “Free Bird” but I will maintain that “High Tide” is a better song. I mean come on, three lead guitarists playing the middle section for 6 minutes, perfect! Seek out their performance at The Capitol Theater in 1978, it’s one the best live recording on Youtube’s for sure and if you can ignore the 8 second commercial breaks every 4 minutes, it’s worth your time.
I do think the Allman Brother’s transcended Southern Rock years ago but they are Southern boys and they can definitely rock so they are here. They have a vast catalog and me trying to come up with one song is really stupid. Plus, I am not the biggest Allman fan out there so treat my thoughts accordingly. I know that “Dreams” really is not a Southern Rock song per se, but it is a great song by a band that got heir start playing some version of Southern Rock along with pretty much every other Genre’. I will send you over to the Version recorded at the Fillmore East in 1970. The vocals on the recording are a bit muted but you really get to see this band stretch out yet still remain so tight. Duane Allman is at the top of his form during this song. The whole band is for that matter.
Never a big Molly Hatchet fan I will include “Dreams I will Never See” in this article. It is the absolute best thing they have ever done and surprisingly it was written by Greg Allman. Hatchet was a hardcore Southern Rock band that had some success but they never really produced anything other than “Dreams” that I really cared for. One funny thing, their lead singer, Danny Joe Brown, shares a striking similarity to Mr. Meat Loaf.
One of my all-time favorite bands is Little Feat. Some people say they really weren’t Southern Rock but I disagree. They had such a Southern flare to almost everything they did, how could they not be Southern Rock. I know I am going with the odds on favorite here but sometimes, a bands greatest accomplishment is it’s greatest hit. “Dixie Chicken” to me embodies this band whole ethos. great lyrics, musical breaks at the right time and superb musical interplay. Guess all the boys at the bar knew this song.
I have a few honorable mentions for this article:
Black Oak Arkansas “Jim Dandy”. A kookie song with a hard driving beat that sticks in your head long after the song is done. The Winters Brothers Band, “Sang Her Love Songs”. In a deep pile somewhere I found this gem. Beautiful song. Find the live version, it’s excellent. Elvin Bishop, “Travelin Shoes”. Another fun Southern song and if you can’t take the heat you gotta put on those travelin shoes. Again, live version is better. Andy Pratt, “Avenging Annie”. Not really Southern Rock but the concept is similar. More rock than Country but it tells a very uniques story with a strong piano backing.
Two Thumbs up. We definitely have a music parallel here;) Thank You for the review, a Southern Rock Weekend!!