Kennedy Center honoree, 70 year old, Brooklyn born Neil Diamond was one of my favorite artists in the late 60's and early 70's. He had some great songs, "Solitary Man", "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon", "The Boat That I Row", "You Got to Me", "Thank the Lord For the Night Time", "Sweet Caroline" (a favorite of Boston Red Sox fans), "Cracklin' Rosie", "Stones", "I Am...I Said", "Song Sung Blue", "Play Me", etc. All of these songs were solely written by Neil, a member of the Songwriter's Hall of Fame. I have nine of Neil's LP's and saw him once in concert at NY's Winter Garden Theater - great show.
Another outstanding Diamond song was the title track to his 1969 album, "Brother Loves Travelling Salvation Show". The album also included a song that could be regarded by some as a put-down of country music.
"You're So Sweet, Horseflies Keep Hangin' 'Round Your Face"
The song begins:
"You're so sweet,
Horseflies keep hangin' 'round your face
Kentucky moonshine
Could never take your place
And your eyes
Could give me goose bumps down to my toes
Feel like the only rooster in the hencoop,
And I guess it shows."
The rest of the lyrics tell of a girl with her front teeth missin' who is more loyal and twice as pretty as his dog. He met her at a county fair bull wrestling contest. She just "looked them critters in the face and down they'd go."
It was just an album track, not a single. Was Neil intentionally goofing on country music or just trying to write a funny song? Don't know. At the time I bought the album, I thought it was hilarious. Those were the days when guys I knew referred to country music as "chicken-kickin" music. Neil did make a country album, "Tennessee Moon" in 1996. Hal Ketchum, Waylon Jennings, Beth Nielsen Chapman, Chet Atkins, Raul Malo and a few others were on the album. I found out about it on Wiki but haven't heard any of it yet.
These days you don't need artists outside the genre to mock country music. There are plenty who do it, ironically, by trying to prove how country they are. If you read country blogs like Country Universe, The 1 to 10 Country Music Review, My Kind of Country, Farce the Music, Engine 145 (successor to the 9513) and Country California, you'll find plenty of reviews on these "see how country I am songs". A few weeks ago, Sam Gazdziak on CU said that sometimes it seems that the songs are "about setting the RRPM (rural references per minute) record. Today, Ben Foster gives new single, "Give a Damn", a "D". It's one of the latest contributions to this awful trend, this one by Lucas Hoge, an artist I'm not familiar with. Maybe there will be a contest at the end of the year for 2011's worst "I'm country" country song. Sadly, there will be plenty of competition.
Here's my challenge to Nashville songwriters: write the best country song that puts a positive spin on the city life experience. I'll even offer a suggestion. Write about that exhilarating feeling you get when you race down the stairs, swipe that metrocard and make it into the subway just before the doors close. Imagine if you also got a seat!
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