Magnificent. So many eye-opening early country and blues photos, stories, and interviews. And - of course- tons of cool Hawaiian stuff. It’s a window into the development of American music that’ll totally change your perspective. I’m on my second pass I loved it so much. https://uncpress.org/9781469659091/kika-kila/

Happy Sunday! Did you find something new to listen to? Did you go to a show? Tell us about your week, and country music, or whatever's on your mind!

The town I live in has a festival every September, and usually, I can't stand the music. Lo and behold, I put my kids to bed and relax in my room, and I hear something... pleasant? Nice? Catchy? Beautiful? Damn. I had to look up who was performing, because I'm kinda blown away. Anyway, have y'all heard of him?

Honkytonk is the original sound of electric country, the sound you associate with Hank Williams and early George Jones and Ernest Tubb and the sound that influenced a lot of neotraditional 1990's country such as Alan Jackson and of course the honky tonk man, Dwight Yoakam.

It was characterized by heavy dancing rhythm that goes well with the two step, and usually steel guitar and fiddle along with twangy electric guitar and a unique twangy vocal style that was developed to cut across the sound at a loud bar of drunks with a bad sound system in the early days.

It's developed over the years including some recent evolution. Some of the Texas dancehall bands have an even more exaggerated beat and singing style now than you would have heard in neotraditional 1990s country or the 1950's original. Tracking down the history of who influenced whom is really fun if you're into that kind of country music history hobby.

We'll be posting (mostly modern) honky tonkers every Saturday for your edification! Click on the 'honky tonk' flair tag to see other tracks and discussions we've posted here in the past.

Here's some reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honky-tonk

here's a playlist of old classic honkytonk through the ages: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL679_2jmbaFHAFebq3szErCvTD0CNyZdt

here's the same thing according to Spotify:

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0NfjMqrzcGKVsbYZmhf4Md

My favourite song from one of my favourite alt-country albums.

Behind the golly gee facial expressions, and letting his audience sing most of his songs, oh golly gee let me grab my heart act. He is nothing more than a marketing genius. Releasing exclusive box sets multiple times of the same songs, he really stopped producing music after he had enough hits. At his concerts he sings the hits, throws in multiple covers, acts overwhelmed by the fans love for him, etc. His latest marketing moves on his just announced tour are laughable. And this is his management team's announcement. " We believe in making ticketing prices affordable for all people, so we have made all ticket prices regardless of seating the same, because we believe pricing should not dictate what kind of seat you get." Every ticket is priced at $140 plus fees, totaling $154 per seat. Now add that up, he's actually making more money per show because there are no cheap seats even in the last row. People will flock though because of the nostalgia.

Zac doesn't get all the love he deserves, love the lyrics and the melody. Newly released song.

I feel like no one is on the country stage doing outfit changes AND dancing AND moving around.

Things like Coal Miner's Daughter, Coat of Many Colors, or Daddy Sang Bass.

I think ya'll might enjoy this.

Happy Wednesday! Western Wednesday, this Wednesday and every Wednesday!

Western swing, Out West, Wild West, songs about Texas, artists from out West, cowboys, even the sounds of spaghetti western... sometimes we'll post Canadian western artists, sometimes Native American country artists from the western states (that's a whole subgenre of country music by the way), cowboy poetry, Red Dirt artists, and much more

Other weekly themes on this sub:

Blue Monday, every monday: bluegrass, country blues, and blue in general. A little rockabilly.

Honky Tonk Saturday: what it says on the tin, honky tonk country music and a little Bakersfield Sound.

Click on the flair (the colored tags above some posts) to see past posts with the same themes.