These Oklahoma albums are available for the last five years on Spotify.
This is a great way to discover a variety of Oklahoma artists.
Here’s the 2018 Edition.
Here’s an update on the planned OKPOP Museum in Tulsa. “The design team found inspiration in a gold Fender Stratocaster custom made for Bob Wills’
guitarist Eldon Shamblin. The guitar encouraged the project’s gold color palette. “
Here’s some 2018 music with some connection to Texas or Oklahoma:
My 2018 Texoma Spotify Playlist
It’s 100 songs, with one song per artist. I’ve been working on this the last couple of weeks, and some of these artists are new to me.
Also, Texas State University’s collection of music memorabilia continues to grow
As always, enjoy the music!
I decided to open the floodgates for my “new country” list, and added the “plus” to the name to reflect that. I still exclude songs that achieved Billboard Top 40 Country Airplay this year, because those songs receive a lot of attention already. Sure, some of this stuff is better and/or more “country” than others, but I decided to throw it all out there and see what happens. I include young and old, traditional and modern, conservative and liberal, and everything else, so there’s something for everyone to dislike. I’ll harvest the wheat with the chaff.
2018 New Country Plus on YouTube has surpassed 300 songs. There’s one per artist, so a whole lot of people and styles are represented.
I do include some covers. If the only way to fit an Alan Jackson or Dolly Parton on my list is because of a cover, I’ll take it. I include a bit of international music for variety, and Ireland, UK, Finland, Norway, Sweden, Germany, The Netherlands, Denmark, Faroe Islands, Croatia, Australia, Brazil, Paraguay, Mexico, and Canada are currently represented.
I enjoy grouping songs when possible. My “death block” near the end is a particular favorite for Halloween season. William Shatner, the anchor of my first block of “space songs,” is the oldest performer on my list, at 87. Shenandoah’s “Little Bit of Livin'” leads to Sadie McClendon, who is the youngest on my list at age 11. Tyler Booth’s song “Greyhound or a Slow Train” serves as a bridge from songs about trains to songs about animals. Luke Combs makes an appearance on Erik Dylan’s “Baseball on the Moon,” but also shows up briefly in Faren Rachels’ “Uber Driver,” so those songs are next to each other. Joe Denim’s song “Together We’re A Ten” is preceded by three “three” songs and a “Lonely One.” Well, you get the idea.
Capture Kentucky’s Spotify list: Best Unsigned Kentucky Bands Presented By Capture Kentucky and Kentucky Country Music’s Spotify list: Kentucky Country Music
Here’s one of my Spotify lists: Songs About Kentucky
I took the above photo of Tyler Childers last year in Nashville. His songs have made their way to a few bluegrass albums this year, such as Town Mountain, Newtown, and yesterday’s album from The Wooks. Jesse Wells, who is currently in Tyler’s band, was a Wook and shows up on their album. Years ago, Jesse played music with JT Cure (such as the Clack Mountain String Band) , and JT Cure produced The Wooks’ album. Here’s the Childers-penned ‘seng from The Wooks.
JT Cure: “If I were asked to name a single group of modern musicians that embodies the spirit of the music that shares namesake of my home state, the Bluegrass State, it would be the Wooks. These guys share a common understanding of where Bluegrass music came from, where it has been, and where it seems to be heading. They are not afraid to mix in flavors of music that we all grew up listening to and loving and adapting it to the traditional elements of the genre to create something new and exciting much like David Grisman, Tony Rice, Sam Bush, Jerry Garcia and the rest of the folks that pushed the boundaries of Bluegrass in the 1970’s and 80’s.”
Adam Hood, “Somewhere In Between”
Colter Wall, “Songs of the Plains”
The Steve Bartel Band, “Bailey Street”
Tracy Lawrence, “Frozen In Time”
The Wooks, “Glory Bound”
Stephanie Ryann, s/t
Jimmie Allen, “Mercury Lane”
Teresa Neal, “Blue Moon Light”
Morgan Evans, “Things That We Drink To”
John Hiatt, “The Eclipse Sessions”
Josh Oldaker, “Country Revival”
“Volunteer Jam XX: A Tribute To Charlie Daniels”
Quickdraw Homegrown Music, “Without You”
The Bottle Rockets, “Bit Logic”
Shelby Neubauer, “EXP”
Hilary Scott,”Don’t Call Me Angel”
The Watson Twins, “Duo”
Desi & Cody, “Yes, This Is Killing Us”
Jim Rosenberg, “The Cold Hard Truth”
The Lost Trailers, “Between Stages”
Dutch country artist Dick Van Altena released the album “Lonely Hearts” Last week, but I just found it.
In other news, country music is apparently catching on in China: 4th most popular genre
Music Modernization Act signed into law
Kane Brown, Carrie Underwood, and Florida Georgia Line were the big country winners at the American Music Awards, which I did not watch. It’s worth noting from the article that Carrie Underwood performed “Spinning Bottles,” one of my favorites from her album. I’ll also give Kane Brown credit for honoring our military: Homesick.
Speaking of awards, this weekend is the award show for the Pro Cowboy Country Artist Association. If you’re a fan of western music like Colter Wall’s current album, then check out these artists, too.
I usually focus on “new” music, but there have been some quality covers this year, so I made a short Spotify list featuring a few of these: 2018 Choice Covers
Although I originally planned for this to be an all-genre list, most of these are country, or at least feature country artists singing other styles.
Texas Music Pickers posted a top 40 list of The Most Streamed Texas/Red Dirt Artists on Spotify as of September 27th. Keep in mind that their list is restricted to acts who are mostly known in Texas, so major national acts from Texas are excluded (George Strait, Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves, Maren Morris, etc).
Now that Pandora data is available, let’s see how the top 10 “Texas scene” Spotify acts fared on Pandora (“Unique Listeners” data from Sep 9 – Oct 6)
Cody Johnson: 2,281,224
Cody Jinks: 2,071,618
Aaron Watson: 1,333,540
Josh Abbott: 498,037
Whiskey Myers: 1,523,210
Turnpike Troubadours: 826,266
Koe Wetzel: 151,555
Randy Rogers: 823,828
Casey Donahew: 554,417
Parker McCollum: 213,347
I’m too lazy to go through the rest of the 40, but this does show that some acts are much more popular on one streaming service than the other.
Here’s a bit of Texas Hill Country lore: Haunted History of Devil’s Backbone Tavern.
According to the FB page, the legendary haunt reopens October 10th.
” Robyn and John Ludwick, along with Abbey Road of Coupland Dancehall, longtime friends and each highly respected in the Texas music scene, have teamed up to restore the iconic Prohibition era establishment to its “hey day”. The trio will also bring alive the Devil’s dancehall Friday and Saturday nights with bona fide honky-tonk and straight up country bands from near and far, along with the occasional visit from Todd Snider, whose ballad helped put the tavern on the map.”
Todd Snider’s Ballad of the Devil’s Backbone Tavern
In unrelated news, apparently I missed Tanner Fenoglio’s new album Friday. Here it is: Lucky Man
Spotify lists of country music in French and Spanish
I found a Canadian French Country Music YouTube playlist.
Here’s Paulina Rubio singing a bit of country: When You Say Nothing At All
“What is country music ?” Many will answer that it is music with “real instruments, not that electronic stuff.” Since the early days of electronic music, though, there have been various attempts to combine the technology with country music.
The Pandora article “The New Sounds of Country Music: Synth, Funk, and a Bit of Disco” details the history of the “synth” in country music from 1965-present : Pandora article
Here is Gil Trythall’s album, mentioned in the above article: Country Moog/Nashville Gold
Cattle Call is one my favorites from this album.
The old-time fiddle tune Chicken Reel was composed in 1910, but Jean-Jacques Perrey created an electronic derivative decades later called “Chicken on the Rocks,” which South Park featured on an episode.
