garth brooks
As I said I would report on earlier: Regarding Garth Brooks and his HUGE popularity:
"Brooks enjoyed one of the most successful careers in popular music history, with over 70 hit singles and 15 charted albums to his credit and over 115 million albums sold in the United States alone, breaking records for both sales and concert attendance throughout the 1990s"
Garth Brooks' first album ('Garth Brooks') was released in 1989 and was both a critical and chart success. It peaked at #2 in the US country album chart and reached #13 on the Billboard 200 pop album chart. Most of the album was traditionalist country, influenced in part by George Strait. The first single ahead of it was "Much Too Young To Feel This Damn Old", a country top 10 success. It was followed by his first well-known song, "If Tomorrow Never Comes", which was his first country #1 and is still considered one of his best-crafted efforts. "Not Counting You" reached #2, and then "The Dance" put him at #1 again; this song's theme of people dying in the course of doing something they believe in resonated strongly and together with a popular music video gave Brooks his first push towards a broader audience. Brooks has also claimed that of all the songs he has recorded, "The Dance" is his favorite.
The album No Fences followed in 1990. It reached #1 on the Billboard country music chart (staying there for 23 weeks) and #3 on the pop chart, and would go on to become Brooks' biggest-selling album, with global sales of over 20 million copies. It contained what would become Brooks' signature song, the blue collar anthem "Friends in Low Places", which was a favorite of American troops serving in the 1991 Gulf War. The album contained two other Brooks classics, the dramatic and controversial "The Thunder Rolls" and the philosophically ironic "Unanswered Prayers". Also a hit was the affectionate "Two of a Kind, Workin' on a Full House"; all four of these songs hit #1 on the country chart.
Garth Brooks' third album, Ropin' the Wind, was released in September 1991, entered the pop album charts at #1, a first for a country act. 1993 album In Pieces was another instant number 1 success, going on to sell in the region of 10 million copies world-wide. "
I'll add another vote for Patsy Cline. I recall having read a couple years back that according to RIAA, her Crazy was the all-time number 2 jukebox song, by number of plays. What was number 1, you ask? Happy Birthday, according to that ranking, and by a hefty margin.
Someone who I think hasn't been mentioned deserves serious consideration - Emmylou Harris. Her album The Ballad of Sally Rose, a cohesive thematic opus which amounts to a country opera just as tightly done and fully realized as any rock opera, is one of contemporary music's most overlooked treasures, regardless of genre. Just about every song is very good, but one, Woman Walk The Line, is outstanding -
Don't bother sittin' at my table
Just because I'm on my own
Yes, I'm a woman and I'm lonely
But that don't mean I can't be strong.
Once again he's not beside me
And tonight he won't be coming home
So I just need a place to miss my baby
When he goes out to do me wrong.
Tonight I wanna do some drinkin'
I came to listen to the band
Yes, I'm as good as what you're thinkin'
But I don't want to hold your hand.
And I know I'm lookin' lonely
But there's nothing here I want to find
It's just the way of a woman
When she goes out to walk the line.
Evrery night's a little longer
Than the one that came before
But when I hear them sing a sad song
I know just what I'm cryin' for.
I don't want to stay home waitin'
Don't have to wonder where he's been
He'll be someone else's baby
Before he's in my arms again.
Tonight I wanna do some drinkin'
I came to listen to the band
Yes, I'm as good as what you're thinkin'
But I don't want to hold your hand...
Can the long haired redneck get an honorable mention?
This one used to make me giggle and it still makes me smile.
If that ain't country lyrics
Recitation:
The old man was covered with tattoos and scars
He got some in prison and others in bars
The rest he got working' on old junk cars
In the daytime
They looked like tombstones in our yard
And i never seen him when he wasn't tired and mean
He sold used parts to make ends meet
Covered with grease from his head to his feet
Cussing' the sweat and the texas heat
And skeeterz
And the neighbors said we lived like hicks
But they brung their cars for pa to fix anyhow
He was veteran-proud, tried and true
He'd fought till his heart was black and blue
Didn't know how he'd made it through the hard times
He bought our house on the g.i. bill
But it wasn't worth all he had to kill to get it
He drank pearl in a can and jack daniels black
Chewed tobacco from a mail pouch sack
Had an old dog that was trained to attack
Sometimes
He'd get drunk and mean as a rattlesnake
And there wasn't too much
That he would take from a stranger
There were thirteen kids and a bunch of dogs
A house full of chickens and a yard full of hogs
I spent the summertime cutting' up logs for the winter
Trying' like the devil to find the lord
Working' like a nigger for my room and board
Coal-burin' stove, no natural gas
If that ain't country, i'll kiss your ass
If that ain't country,
It'll hair lip the pope
If that ain't country, it's a damn good joke
I've seen the grand ole opry,
And i've met johnny cash
If that ain't country, i'll kiss your ass
Recitation:
Mama sells eggs at a grocery store
My oldest sister is a first-rate whore
Dad says she can't come home anymore
And he means it
Ma just sits and keeps her silence
Sister, she left 'cause dad got violent
And he knows it
Mama she's old far beyond her time
From chopping tobacco and i've seen her crying'
When blood started flowing' from her calloused hand and
It hurt me
She'd just keep working' trying' to help the old man
To the end of one row and back again like always
She's been through hell since junior went to jail
When the lights go out she ain't never failed
To get down on her knees and pray
Because she loves him
Told all the neighbors he was off in the war
Fighting' for freedom,
He's good to the core and she's proud
Now our place was a graveyard for automobiles
At the end of the porch there was four stacks of wheels
And tires for sale for a dollar or two
Cash
There was fifty holes in an old tin roof
Me and my family we was living' proof
The people had forgot about poor white trash
And if that ain't country, i'll kiss your ass
If that ain't country, it'll hair lip the pope
If that ain't country, it's a damn good joke
I've seen the grand ole opry,
And i've met johnny cash
If that ain't country, i'll kiss your ass
I'm thinking tonight of my blue eyes
Concerning the great speckled bird
I didn't know god made honky-tonk angels
And went back to the wild side of life
