Bobbie Lovesong

The Oak Ridge Boys serve as a reminder for the entire industry on how to evolve as an act over the course of time. They have lost none of their drive, their ability to select material that the public can identify with, and their delight in bringing that music to the masses in concert. Their recent performance at the CMA Music Festival is proof of the latter, and FRONT ROW SEATS is a fine example of one of Music City’s crown jewels continuing to raise the bar to a new musical level.

It slipped out of a Mississippi of hot biscuits, genteel table manners and working-class sense, suddenly overturned by a grave sinning and suicide. Carried on an evening breeze of strings and a supple, foreboding voice like sensually charged breath, “Ode to Bilie Joe”—Bobbie Gentry’s 1967 debut as a singer-songwriter and a Number One single for three weeks in the late Summer of Love—was the most psychedelic record of that year not from San Francisco or London, as if Bob Dylan, Neil Young and Brian Wilson had conspired to make a country-rock Pet Sounds. Except Gentry, just 23 when she wrote the song, got there first, in miniature.

George Jones - Birth Of A Legend: The Truly Complete Starday & Mercury Recordings 1954-1961 (2017) {6CD Bear Family BCD 16100}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 1.92 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 1.02 Gb
Artwork @ 300 dpi (png) -> 51 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1954-61, 2017 Bear Family Records | BCD 16100
Country / Honky Tonk / Nashville Country / Country Gospel / Country Pop

In May 1956, the Texan label Starday issued a wild rockabilly single by Thumper Jones. Its top side, the kinetic “Rock It”, was primal, uncontrolled and wild. The flip, “How Come It”, was less frenzied but still driving and infectious. Original pressings of the two-sided pounder in either its 45 or 78 form now fetch at least Ј200. This is not your usual rockabilly rarity though. The record’s label credited the songs to a Geo. Jones. Thumper Jones was a pseudonymous George Jones (1931–2013), who was cashing in a hip style: the only time he did so with rockabilly.

The Cure were never afraid of artistically defining themselves. They had their own sound, an eerie glamour surrounding a dark whimsicality, yet fans flocked to them throughout the '80s and '90s. Commercial or cult favorites, they're impressive as being one of the '80s' seminal bands who culled more than 30 critical singles. Compilations like 1986's Staring at the Sea: The Singles and 1997's Galore showcased the Cure's accessibility; therefore, having a solid greatest-hits collection might be a bit nonessential. Then again, releasing an album like this at the tip of the new millennium calls for a celebration, and that's what the Cure did. They collected 16 amazing cuts which spanned 23 years and recall what once was…