If That Ain't Country

Welcome to the expanded edition of the show! Featuring an extra hour's worth of music not included in the radio version! This week we're featuring a slice of Texas dancehall music at it's best from Johnny Bush & The Bandoleros: "Live! At Dance Town USA" (1979). Recorded on New Years Eve 1979 (a Monday night) home town boy Johnny Bush brought his tight Texas country dance band back to Houston's...

In this week's episode we're featuring an excellent slice of 60s Texas country from Al Dean & The Allstars: "From Texas To Nashville" (1967). Hailing from "The Golden Triangle" in South Texas, Al Dean already had a loyal following when his recording of "Cotton Eyed Joe" became a massive smash in Texas in 1967 - eventually becoming the most programmed song on jukeboxes in that state, ever. "Fro...

In this week's episode we're featuring a 1977 album from the clear and resonant vocal of Rose Maddox: "Reckless Love & Bold Adventure". A suitably colourful title for Rose, whose roots in performing came as part of The Most Colourful Hillbilly Band In America: The Maddox Brothers & Rose. After plenty of West Coast success with her brothers, in 1958 Rose Maddox went solo and over the next f...

In this week's episode, we're featuring a 2018 album for RFD-TV personality Merlin Gene, "People, Places & Things". With the first season of the popular Hee Haw-style variety program "The Merlin Gene Show" well underway at the time of recording, Merlin Gene's star was on the rise. Combining an effortless vocal and an excellent sense of humour with a deep reverence for country music's heritage,...

In this week's episode we're featuring another huge album from Conway Twitty: "Play, Guitar Play" (1977). There were two singles and two obligatory number ones. But sales and chart certification aside, this is an album as diverse and enjoyable as anything Conway ever put out. We'll work our way through some country boy rock 'n' roll, swing, a few recitations and the necessary two-steppers: and we'...

In this week's episode we're featuring Merle Haggard's first album for the 1990s and his first for his new label, Curb: "Blue Jungle" (1990). After his former label's parent company (Columbia) fired Johnny Cash in 1985, Hag was mad. Cash's mistreatment and consistent disagreements over artistic direction pushed Haggard to buy his way out his contract and he signed with Curb. What could have been a...

In this week's episode we're featuring the third album from The Mavericks, "What A Crying Shame" (1994). With roots in Miami's alternative and punk scenes, country music became the common ground upon which the band came together, and after two albums with moderate sales success (including one for MCA) producer Don Cook was brought on board for their third. Cook's work with Brooks & Dunn was in...

In this week's episode, we're featuring George Jones' last album of the 20th Century: "Cold Hard Truth" (1999). After an association with MCA for most of the 90s which resulted in decent sales but not so many radio hits, he found himself signed to Asylum Records - a signing which turned out to be his last major label deal. At 68 years of age, Jones was still in sterling vocal form and all that was...

In this week's episode, we're featuring a sensational album from bluegrass progressives The Country Gentlemen: "Joe's Last Train" (1976). The Gents boasted an excellent line up in '76, including of course founding member, guitarist and lead vocalist Charlie Waller, Doyle Lawson on mandolin and vocals and with Bill Holden on banjo this collection of songs reflects that talent. Labelled bluegrass pr...

In this week's episode, we're featuring Jean Shepard's return to form: "Slippin' Away" (1973). Absent from the Top 5 since 1964, Shepard enjoyed a re-entry therein with the title track, written by fellow Opry star Bill Anderson. "Slippin' Away" also marked a change of labels for Jean Shepard (from Capitol to United Artists) - and although her stay near the top was shortlived, it allowed the feisty...

In this week's episode, we're taking the time to remember the almost unrivalled charisma, vocal versatility and showmanship of Faron Young. We've spanned his entire career in this week's show - taken some of his big hits, some of his album tracks and lesser known stuff, added some stories about the Singing Sheriff and packaged it up into a three-hour tribute to Faron. There's a lot that could be s...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the second album in as many years for road warrior Dallas Moore: "Tryin' To Be A Blessing" (2019). Moore has been touring the country relentlessly for the last three decades, and even after all that time on the road, it was during a 2018 collaboration with Dean Miller (son of Roger Miller) in which Moore says he finally found the honky tonk sound he'd been l...

In this week's episode, we're featuring Marty Robbins' third album (of four) for MCA Records: "Good 'N Country" (1974). After twenty years, Columbia Records and Robbins parted ways, and in the singer's own words: "I was just like a small fish in a big pond and it seemed like a good time to move on." He was soon on the roster at MCA, searching for a new direction. Marty Robbins truly was a musical...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the first album from Peggy Sue Wells, "Dynamite!" (1969). Famously the younger sister of Loretta Lynn and the older sibling of Crystal Gayle, Peggy Sue does indeed have hints of both those gals when she sings. However this "small bundle of dynamite" (as described by Loretta on the original LP liner notes) has certainly earnt her mention in conversations abou...

In this week's episode, we're shining the spotlight on just one of the many singers who made up the local fabric of country music nationwide. These were the entertainers and musicians on the ground across the USA and beyond who kept country music vital and happening over countless years in countless venues, clubs, honky tonks and roadhouses during the genre's heyday. These figures are seldom menti...

In this week's episode we're featuring the debut album of Houston area country singer Jason Allen: "Something I Dreamed" (2001). Though 25 years old at the time of recording, Allen's early influences included Lefty Frizzell, Bob Wills and Hank Williams - and it shows. After several years spent in Nashville honing his skills as a songwriter and making all-important business connections, Allen retur...

In this week's episode, we're featuring what remains Ricky Skaggs' only US platinum album, "Highways & Heartaches" (1982). A magnificent sophomore effort on Epic Records, Skaggs was once again given free rein to produce it himself - certainly an uncommon stipulation for a 28-year-old would-be star with next to no country music clout at the time. After hitting town a few years earlier armed wit...

In this week's show, we're parting with tradition and featuring a compilation album from Columbia Records, "Ray Price's Greatest Hits" (1961). Encompassing the bigger hits of Price's 50s and very early 60s output, this truly is a no-duds release - documenting a style of country music that Ray Price pioneered and one which proved a massive shot in the arm for the industry at the time. Apparently fo...

In this week's episode, we're featuring a 2019 release from Oregon's The Hanson Family: "Rhythm Rides Again". Packed full of "western swing, cowboy yodelling and blazing harmony" (as one reviewer wrote) the sibling trio add fresh life to some of western music's most revered staples. Adding an infectious western swing element to the music, Lisa, Theresa and Daniel Hanson have grown up singing toget...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the second album from Central Texan Kelly Spinks: "Thank God For Cowboys" (1987). Spinks has left a decade or more between each of his three full length recording projects, but when he does head into the studio, the wait is always worth it. After an education learned in the dancehalls and honky tonks of Texas from some legendary teachers including Johnny Bus...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the hardscrabble, renegade raconteur Billy Joe Shaver's Columbia debut: "I'm Just An Old Chunk Of Coal" (1981). Shaver's story is one of persistence, resilience, raw talent and significant ups and downs - but his rise to a respected elder statesman of the Outlaw country scene has been almost entirely organic. With virtually no aid from the mainstream country...

In this week's episode, we're featuring an all-Aussie release from Queensland's Jeff Brown: "Wanderin' Man" (2016). This is the first time we've featured an exclusively Aussie album in over seven years of the show's existence - so let us know if you do or don't like it! Email westernred@ifthataintcountry.net - your feedback will dictate if we do it again!   Anyway - Jeff Brown is a tall, laconic Q...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the first hit album for Cal Smith: "I've Found Someone Of My Own" (1972). After several years as rhythm guitarist and frontman to Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours, he departed with ET's blessing and went solo. Kapp Records was his home during and after his time as a Troubadour, but success was elusive. With a glowing endorsement on the back cover of our featu...

In this week's episode, we're featuring a hardcore Texas country album from Jerry Webb: "Red Lips & Honky Tonks" (2007). Originally hailing from West Texas, Webb was a schoolmate to Texas fiddle legend Jody Nix - and it was with his father Hoyle Nix that he learned many tricks of the trade, subbing as a bassist in the popular West Texas Cowboys for almost a decade. After family and career duti...

In this week's episode, we're featuring the fourth and final album on Warner for 80s twangers Highway 101: "Bing Bang Boom" (1991). "Bing Bang Boom" was also the first album for the band after the departure of lead singer Paulette Carlson, who's husky vocal had defined Highway 101's music for the first four years of their existence. Instead, they employed Nikki Nelson to take the reins - and there...