Bobby Bare Jr.
The rest of the album is even less impressive. Wilson’s been praised as more “rootsy” than Shania Twain or Faith Hill–and she is, for what that’s worth. But to me her poppy power-chord hooks and cheesy pseudo-rebellious choruses (“Hell, yeah!”) don’t recall Loretta Lynn or even Tanya Tucker so much as the bottom-drawer hair metal that was all over MTV in Wilson’s youth. Her hit single, “Redneck Woman,” is almost but not quite as cheeky as “Smokin’ in the Boys Room.”
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Country wasn’t always so stubbornly retro: in the 1920s the nascent genre was every bit as diverse and adventurous as blues, jazz, or pop. Jimmie Rodgers, often referred to as the Father of Country Music, may have been the single most omnivorous performer of his day. During one remarkable stretch in 1930 and ’31, he cut several sides with Hawaiian guitarist Lani McIntire, several more with a Latino band from San Antonio featuring Charles Kama on steel guitar, a couple with the Carter Family, one with Saint Louis bluesman Clifford Gibson, and one with Louis Armstrong. He recorded with jazz backing regularly, if not frequently, and the blues were a foundation of his performance style throughout his career. Indeed, Rodgers is as much a part of the blues as he is of country; artists from Furry Lewis to Howlin’ Wolf have covered his songs or cited him as an influence.
That success had far-reaching consequences, though, and from country music’s perspective they were almost all bad. After Elvis, musically inventive white kids–from Dylan to Cobain–gravitated overwhelmingly to rock. There was still room in country for the odd aesthetic disaster such as New Grass, but by and large the genre would become the domain of traditionalists like Merle Haggard. A handful of aging innovators who’d started their careers either before or during the rise of rockabilly–Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson–hung on for quite a while, and largely because of their influence country managed intelligent responses both to the folk revival in the 60s and to classic rock in the 70s. But by the 80s the field was largely down to artists who loved older styles (Lyle Lovett) and artists who loved how they looked on video (Garth Brooks). That’s pretty much where things have stayed ever since: country has become a rallying point for anyone unhappy with any musical development of the past 40 years.
Bare’s latest full-length, this summer’s From the End of Your Leash (Bloodshot), is credited to Bobby Bare Jr.’s Young Criminals’ Starvation League–more a loose collection of musicians than a band, as the awkward name suggests. But Bare treats them as collaborators, not sidemen, and it pays off. On the album’s opener, violinist Andrew Bird comes out of nowhere to screech his way through a remarkable Hendrixoid solo, and on “Don’t Follow Me (I’m Lost)” pianist Cory Younts provides a perfect, wistful hook. In “Your Favorite Hat,” Carey Kotsionis’s childlike vocals chase Bare’s ragged twang around and around, like the singer from the Cardigans trying to harmonize with Steve Earle. And Doni Schroader’s percussion is marvelous throughout.
