Rediscovering Country Music

My parents were big country music fans. I grew up listening to it, and disliking it. Though, in the past 10 years or so, I've gained a lot of respect for the genre and the early performers of the music. The less said about the pop music currently masquerading as country, the better, in my opinion.

Mom liked George Jones, Charlie Pride, Dolly Parton and Porter Wagonner for the most part. Dad liked Conway Twitty. Both disliked the so-called "outlaw movement" (Cash, Nelson, Jennings, etc.). After revisiting these artists, I have a deep respect for the work of George Jones. No one can touch him as a vocalist. His voice is so earnest, the emotion in his work is almost palpable. Patsy Cline also had an amazing voice, innocent and experienced at the same time.

One thing, I've been discovering lately is the humour in a lot of country music. Jones has a wonderful track called White Lightning that makes me smile every time I hear it. A lot of clever novelty music came out in the 60s that tended to be associated with country music. I'm sure everyone my age growing up had a copy of one of those Goofy Greats or Wacky Wonders albums. One of the mainstays was Roger Miller's "You Can't Rollerskate in a Buffalo Herd":



Miller's work straddled novelty and conventional country. His biggest hit was "King of the Road", a fairly mainstream sounding country act and a song I associate with my youth. My family used to travel across the country in an old station wagon, eating at gas station diners, and "King of the Road" reminds me of the people we might meet at these places, and some of the food we ate too.



Miller's creativeness is more apparent in his novelty tracks though. Besides "Buffalo Herd", he's had minor hits with "Do Wacka Do", "Chug a Lug", "Dang Me" and, a recent discovery of mine, "My Uncle Used to Love Me But She Died". I came across this song due to some live footage from country act The Sweetback Sisters, and I tracked it back to Miller.



Roger Miller is close to me for one main reason, the song "England Swings". One of my most fond memories is my grandmother rocking me on her legs singing "England Swings" to me. The song always makes me smile.



As a footnote, I got very confused when discovering Roger Miller's name for the first time. As I'm sometimes wont to do, I discover mainstream artists through more obscure artists. I found the band Mission of Burma back in the late 80s when I first started in community radio, then discovered the side project No Man, who usually put on their albums "No Man is Roger Miller". I thought Roger Miller was part of the name of the band, but Roger Miller is also the name of the guitarist of Mission of Burma. So, was the band referring to the country singer or the guitarist? And who was this country singer that was being referred to by a post-punk band? Yes, I rediscovered Roger Miller (the country artist) through Mission of Burma, not the other way around.