Kacey Musgraves seems to be pretty popular, but I don’t really see her as traditional country, and frankly can’t get too excited about her.Īnother point is that it seems like the mainstream music press have really really pushed Monroe, Musgraves, and Pickler. I hope she has success with her independent label, but that remains to be seemed. Not exactly a resurgence of traditional country music. Kellie Pickler deserves credit for 100 proof, but it was a commercial failure that resulted in her getting dropped from her label. She may end up breaking through, but I don’t think we’ve got to that point. Son Volt and Holly Williams are both on independent labels and (as far as I can see) have not had great sales or radio play.Īshley Monroe could break through the album was at the top 10 for sales (down to 18), and it seems like everyone is promoting it, but I’m don’t think its getting played on the radio or CMT. While I hope classic country is making a comeback, I’m not sure that the records your pointing to really show that much. – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – Preview & Purchase Tracks from Honky Tonk Things are finally changing, and if Son Volt’s Honky Tonk is any indication, they’re changing for the better. But from American Idol’s Kellie Pickler, to Ashley Monroe, to Son Volt, classic country is making a strong resurgence, and its fans may have to stop playing the downtrodden, forgotten demographic card they’re so used to identifying with.
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Something is going on in country music right now, and we may not know its full breath or impact until we’re able to look back on it in the future. He’s more about giving off hints and moods, and letting the listener’s ear and mind construct the realism according to their own experiences. Farrar favors ambiguity in his songwriting to constructing characters and trying to get you to care about them. At the same time, it is very cohesive and thematic in its approach, allowing you to get lost in the music. It’s pretty sedate throughout, with not a lot separating the individual tracks from each other. Son Volt never really takes Honky Tonk up tempo. For my money, Honky Tonk‘s can’t miss track is the eloquent and heart wrenching “Angel of the Blues.” Jay Farrar’s chord selection is sublime, sucking you into the solemn story.Ī little worry that this album will be too sleepy for some folks is probably warranted. But there’s still a few overlays in this album that inform Son Volt’s alt-country roots, like the warbly organ on “Livin’ On,” or the watery guitar on the album’s final track “Shine On” that is indicative of 60’s styling. 2009’s American Central Dust seemed to hint of the more hard country direction that Honky Tonk eventually came to represent. This move can’t be described as completely out-of-the-blue though. They cut a classic country album because they wanted to. Son Volt is playing classic country not from habit, but from choice.
This doesn’t hinder the music, it instills it with heart. There’s a little Flying Burrito action going on here, where country is come to sort of from the outside looking in. But if Honky Tonk‘s heart rests anywhere, it is on the West Coast, and not just in “Bakersfield,” one of the album’s better tracks. “Hearts and Minds” and “Brick Walls” also build from a double fiddle bed.
The song “Seawall” mentions West Virginia and Kingman, Arizona, and features the double fiddle indicative of Texas. Honky Tonk draws its influences from across the American country music landscape. Honky Tonk is way more Jason Eady than Jason Isbell, featuring simplified, classic country stories, steel guitar and fiddle, and a revivalist spirit that champions the idea that the classic country sound will always be relevant as long as working-class people gather in beer joints for camaraderie, conversation, and commiseration.
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But instead of trying to figure out how to ride that popularity wave, Farrar and Son Volt release an album that is so doggone country, you could almost call it conceptualized.
Maybe, just maybe, classic country is cool again.Īs one of the original members of Uncle Tupelo, Son Volt frontman Jay Farrar is one of the forebearers of the alt-country sound that now has morphed into the all-encompassing Americana behemoth that here in 2013 is enjoying a meteoric rise in influence. As the enlightened country music public was attempting to ingest all the recent offerings from a cavalcade of female artists doing their part to save country music like Holly Williams, Kacey Musgraves and Ashley Monroe, alt-country legacy band Son Volt released a fiercely classic country album themselves called Honky Tonk, proving that the resurgence of real country is multipronged, multisex, and multigenre.
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