When Your Band's Name Gets You Fired

Some asshat at an event called the Du Quoin State Fair in Illinois decided to fire the band Confederate Railroad from its grandstand lineup (after signing a contract with them) because of their name. The band was scheduled to perform with Restless Heart and Shenandoah under the banner “90s Country Reloaded Day” (one of my all-time favorite country eras).

The "woke" imbecile went on to state:

“While every artist has a right to expression, we believe this decision is in the best interest of serving all the people in our state.”

Confederate Railroad was formed in 1987 and hit its stride in the early nineties with country hits like "Queen of Memphis", "She Took It Like a Man",  and "Trashy Women" (not a personal favorite). While not by any means one of my preferred bands, they were innocuous; and you know, I never gave the band's name a second thought. Every band needs a name, after all.

In the case of the Blah Blah Blah State Fair, apparently some annoying political blogger (is there any other kind?) complained that someone's (his) fragile feelings would be hurt by a band he'd never in his life heard of taking the stage in front of...you know, people. And who reads blogs anyway? Apparently only beta boys from the Illinois Ag Department.

Here's the deal, Ag Dude:  It's just a name.

Coming up with a band name can be a tedious process or a spur-of-the-moment one. Sure, you could use a random word generator, which would produce a result like Fungus Quarry; or you could fret about it for months and quibble with your band mates until the resulting animus causes the group to break up. And if you do decide to stay together and ultimately land upon a name that everyone is okay with, then hit the big time, how could you know that some thirty years later a quivering mouse will pull the covers over his head and sob because your moniker has triggered infantile PTSD?

Sure, it starts with Confederate Railroad, but where does it end? We could dissect every country band name and find something to enrage us.

For instance, did you know that Oak Ridge, Tennessee was the place where in 1942 the first atomic bomb was built? Bye bye, Oak Ridge Boys. Sorry.

The name Asleep At The Wheel offends me because it promotes drowsy driving. Ray Benson, you had a great run. Now it's over.

I suppose you didn't know that The Statler Brothers were named after a brand of facial tissue. Is tissue bio-degradable? The environment is too precious to risk it. Harold, Don, et al ~ you've gotta go.

Restless Heart? Making fun of cardiac patients? Real sensitive.

Don't even get me started on Alabama. Roy Moore? Come on...

When it comes to Diamond Rio, I'm stringently opposed to sullying the earth to mine precious stones for the top one per cent to flash.

Oh, so you call yourselves Highway 101? I'd suggest Bike Lane 101 as an alternative. Need I explain?

The Judds ~ I don't know what "Judds" are, but I'm pretty certain I'm opposed to them.

Soon all the billboards will advertise, "Band ~ Your Name Here ~ Coming Soon!", and one can roll the dice on purchasing tickets for the show.

I'd vent my rage at the dolts who work for the Illinois Department of Agriculture, but it's all so silly (except not silly for the band, who lost a crucial paycheck).

I will calm everyone's nerves by posting this:

On The Cutting Edge ~ Country Music 1975

I don't know if I was obstinate or if I just liked what I liked.

In 1975, everybody was fixated on Rhinestone Cowboy and stupid-ass CB radios that no one actually owned except long-haul truckers. Sure, I bought some of the singles seizing the charts (I bought lots and lots of '45's, because they were one of the few things I could afford), but my tastes ran to more obscure, and by "obscure" I mean stone-country tracks.

I was newly married and non-pregnant, although I did possess a preternaturally pampered dog (my first baby). I was loose and carefree, so when my mom and dad proposed a car trip to Texas to visit my sister, I said, why not?

Long car trips sound romantic in novels and memoirs, but they're just basically....long. Kansas wheat fields shed their fascination after approximately five minutes. The most exciting part of a thousand-mile trip is the "Truck Stop - Two Miles Ahead" road sign. Ahh, bathrooms and a short stack of pancakes! One has to play it carefully, however ~ don't drink too much coffee or Dad'll be grouchy when you beg him to pull off at a rest stop just ten miles down the road.

Dad loved driving his jaundice-tinted Lincoln. Ever since he acquired actual money in his late forties, he treated himself to a new car every year when the leaves began to mutate and crumple. The Lincoln was a butt-ugly conveyance, but roomy! Four people (and one dog) could ride comfortably with room for about four more. In the front seat, Mom and Dad rarely conversed except when, after scouring the map, she'd yell, "Turn here!" and he turned the wrong direction, and she'd scold, "I said here! Here!" I mostly ignored the clamor ~ it was business as usual between them. We did a bit of backtracking on the Texas quest, but no real harm was done, except to Mom's blood pressure reading.

(lost)

Unlike the tin can I drove, the Lincoln at least had radio speakers in the rear window deck. Although FM radio was a "thing", Dad always tuned the car radio to the closest AM station in proximity. Listening to music through radio static is a lost art. One has to listen really closely.

This is a song I liked. Forgive the "elderly" David Allen Coe performance, but the only other live set I could find was even sweatier and substance-fueled:

Asleep At The Wheel was a big act in Texas, but in North Dakota, it was "Asleep at the what??" As we meandered further and further south, this song buzzed through the speakers a lot:

Dad always turned the volume knob on the radio as high as he could for this song, and I like it because I like my dad:

Recent Hall of Fame inductee Ray Stevens released a wondrous album in 1975 ~ Dad even had an eight-track cartridge of it, and Dad only owned four eight-tracks. I think I actually bought a few eight-tracks myself, but the technology was asinine. A song would abruptly stop right in the middle and one would have to eject the plastic behemoth and flip it over to hear the second half of the song. And by then, the mood was totally lost.

Here is a track from that album ~ no live performance to be found ~ but still...

The quality of this video is extremely poor, but Tanya Tucker was hot, hot in '75, and I liked this one:

BJ Thomas's voice is like honey; there is no denying. This definitely wasn't stone-country, but who could resist?

There were three brand-new voices in '75, and here is one:

Here is two (no live video performance to be found):

We made it to Fort Worth, Texas fully intact. My sister Carole made up the sofa bed in her den and took Mom on a shopping excursion to Kroger's. She pulled her coffeemaker off a high shelf and brewed up some Folger's for Dad each morning. My dog wasn't happy with Carole's dog and just wanted to get the hell out and go home (my dog was a bit of a snob). We sauntered over to a nearby lake and ordered catfish from a roadside stand (the absolute worst, most vomit-inducing excuse for "fish" I've ever had the displeasure of biting into. The hush puppies were good, though.)

As for country music, I mentioned there were three new voices in '75. Here is the best:

As unassumingly goofy as my dad was, I sure miss him. I'd travel down the road with him anytime.

CMA Awards - 1978

The CMA Awards website is sort of falling down on the job in 1978. Either that, or no one was named INSTRUMENTAL GROUP OF THE YEAR. The nominees were Asleep At The Wheel, Chet Atkins (for group?), the Charlie Daniels Band, Danny Davis & the Nashville Brass, and Les Paul (again, not a group). But alas, there is no actual winner listed. Was this category accidentally left off the ballot? Was it a five-way tie? The possibilities are many. But I guess we'll never know, will we? Not that this is the biggest award of the night, but it probably was important to those nominated, I'd think.

So, in the interest of inclusiveness, I'll just pick a winner. Well, Les Paul is a legend, and deserves a category all his own, and Chet Atkins is also a legend and has already won countless times, and Danny Davis and his Brass don't have any room left on their mantles. That leaves Asleep At The Wheel and the Charlie Daniels Band.

Here's a representation of each:





Well, I just can't pick. Neither of these performances are technically "instrumentals", but they feature instruments! I love both these bands, so I'm just gonna call it a tie and move on. Weigh in with your choice, if you are so inclined.

The INSTRUMENTALIST OF THE YEAR was again Roy Clark. No videos; sorry. Nothing personal. It's just that there aren't too many videos of Roy available, and I've posted just about everything I could find. But good going, Roy! Apparently you learned how to make friends and influence people in Nashville!

Surprisingly, the FEMALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR award again went to Crystal Gayle. I don't get it. I don't have any animosity towards Crystal; it's just that she was kind of a "blip" on the country music scene. She had one big (okay, huge) hit, and some other minor hits, but she's basically known for one song. One song does not a career make.

And try finding a video on YouTube that isn't "Brown Eyes". It's not easy! But here's one, and I don't have any recall of this song, but it seems nice:



Again, surprisingly, the SONG OF THE YEAR award went to Richard Leigh for a song that garnered Crystal the female vocalist award in 1977. That, of course, being, "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue". I don't know about you, and I don't know anything about Richard Leigh, so no offense, Richard, but I don't think I even want to hear that song ever again. But if you have a hankering to hear it, check my post for 1977. It would be rather redundant to post it again.

Luckily for me, the CMA handed out the MALE VOCALIST OF THE YEAR award to someone different this time around! Change is nice. This song technically didn't earn Don Williams the award, since it was released later, but since he probably never won anything again, I thought I would post it, seeing as how it's probably my one and only opportunity:



The VOCAL DUO OF THE YEAR award went to someone new in 1977 as well: Kenny Rogers and Dottie West.

Again, this was a short-lived pairing. Kenny went on to record duets with others, including Dolly Parton and Kim Carnes. And this was Dottie's sort of "pop" phase. It was a snapshot in time. Nothing that anyone's going to remember in the larger scheme of things, but this made it big in 1977:



As a breath of fresh air, the Statlers didn't win the VOCAL GROUP OF THE YEAR award. Nothin' against the Statlers - I like 'em! But it was just time for a change. These four guys gave the Statlers a run for their money, and they were huge in the late seventies. I saw them in concert at the North Dakota State Fair, and I was pretty excited about the whole thing, I must say.

Here's a song from around that time, that surely gave them the nod for vocal group of the year:

THE OAK RIDGE BOYS



The SINGLE OF THE YEAR happens to be one of my personal favorites. Father-daughter team Jeannie and Royce Kendall - THE KENDALLS - had a very big hit with this song, and to me, it still holds up.

And I'll never forget my two-year-old singing along to "Heaven's Just A Sin Away":



ALBUM OF THE YEAR - Ronnie Milsap - It Was Almost Like A Song

I've been posting a lost of Ronnie Milsap videos lately, and I have sort of run out. I didn't realize that Ronnie had dominated the CMA awards for so many years, but kudos to him! I'm a big Ronnie Milsap fan. It's nice to be reminded that talent was, at one time, recognized.

Here's a Ronnie video, and if I posted it before, sorry. Again, there's not a lot of choices out there on YouTube.



ENTERTAINER OF THE YEAR Dolly Parton

I suppose some people view Dolly as one of those institutions that's always been there, sort of like George Washington. I, however, remember Dolly when she was simply the duet partner of Porter Wagoner. When she had her first singles, like "Somethin' Fishy"and "Dumb Blonde" on Monument Records. I guess I watched her career unfold. She, no doubt, helped Porter become relevant. Most of the duets they recorded were songs written by Dolly. Why has she endured, lo these forty-odd years later? I think because she's a great songwriter. And, to some, a great entertainer.

I never really liked Dolly "in person". Because she couldn't just sing the song, without offering some sort of commentary and endless giggling (while singing). Dolly does well singing harmony with others, such as Brad Paisley. Even Kenny Rogers. Just not in person. And Dolly has found a way to stay relevant through the years. In the early eighties, she reinvented herself as an actress. Who doesn't remember this:



I guess the reason that Dolly broke that glass ceiling (later to be broken by a few, but not by many) and be named Entertainer of the Year was probably due to this song, which is pop, and not country, but, hey, that's what they were looking for in 1978:



COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME Grandpa Jones

Louis Marshall "Grandpa" Jones did, I guess, "old time" music. Not really bluegrass, per se. Not really country. He actually could be a serious musician, but his stage persona overshadowed any seriousness that he might have had in him. I kid Grandpa Jones, but he seemed like a decent fellow, and he was entertaining. Of course, we all know him from Hee Haw, and here's a number featuring Stringbean, Roy Clark, and a bunch of others:



So, there you go, 1978. Things were starting to get back to "country" in some respects, but the Country Music Association was still stubbornly clinging to that pop stuff. Weird that the two could co-exist so seamlessly. And people accepted it. A crossroads, maybe. 1979 will tell the tale.