iCF Music Blogroll…

For this entry, I wanted to highlight my side blog links (just because they inspire me so, and if you read this blog, I’m sure you’ll like these too!).  I am lovin’ how popular blogs are these days.

(the above pic was taken with my camera phone because I couldn’t find any pics online that I wanted to use for this entry, so I just took a pic of Country Universe – the Pam Tillis feature to be exact lol – and as you can see, and what I just realized, is that my room is not lighted too pleasantly haha and it’s messy, but just ignore that.  It may be the cheapest looking pic I’ve ever used on this site, but it works… I think.)

From my Blogroll:

> City Girl, Country Girl :

- I dunno what happened with the site.  Now it’s a protected blog, and you need to login to get access.  I really like it.  I’m going to keep it up, anyway, because hopefully someday it is open to the public again.

> CMT Blog :

- I really like CMT.com’s blog, because it has a lot of different viewpoints (though some of them, I strongly disagree with, and the “Link Ray” posts can be annoying because those ones seem to highlight the already overrated artists – how many times do we have to read about Taylor Swift, seriously? -  but there is interesting news in them, regardless).  Lots of cool stuff available there.

> Country Mike :

- This is Mike Sudhalter’s blog, a fellow country music fan, who shows a lot of enthusiasm for the music he likes, and offers cool insights on different things.  I usually agree with him, and he likes most of the same artists as me, so check his blog out (I wish there was a “comment” section to his posts though!).  His blog is part of Country Standard Time (I’ll get to them later).

> Country Music Central :

- All entries are written by “cowboybleau”, filled with plenty of detail and lots of reviews (so many that I don’t have enough time to read them all!).  He recently redid the look and format of his blog and it looks even better.  His most recent entry is about Ray Scott’s latest album.

Recommendation XVIII: Rodney Crowell & Emmylou Harris

Yes, yes, I know – I’ve been away way too long…two months now since my last entry! I can’t believe it’s been that long and I really do apologize. I went home for winter break and had no internet to work with and since then, I’ve been back in school for January and have been as busy as ever, but now I finally have time to do more online stuff (lucky you). 2007 was quite a year for me and I thought the music was overall pretty good. I was planning on making a ’07 Best-of list, but now, it just seems too late hahaha. Alright, ‘nough chit-chat, and onto the recommendation…

My eighteenth recommendation is: Rodney Crowell & Emmylou Harris’s “My Baby’s Gone” from the 2003 Livin’, Lovin’, Losin’: Songs of the Louvin Brothers tribute album.  I remember that back in 2003, I had no idea at all who the Louvin Brothers were but I saw online ads for the tribute album on CMT.com and I read that Patty Loveless and Ronnie Dunn and many others were collaborating on there and I just had to check it out. CMT.com had an online Listening Party for the album and back then, you were only able to listen to one song per day, and from what I heard, I really loved it. The sweet pure country sound and vocals coming from it were just intoxicating to the ears and soul, and it was not usual to hear an album like this these days, especially with today’s mainstream country stuff. The Louvin Brothers are my kind of guys because based on the music covered on the album it’s perfect for hardcore traditionalists and for fans of the artists on the project. I love the production by Carl Jackson (he’s got a really good voice too!). I keep saying that if I was ever able to make a country album, I’d want Carl Jackson to produce it…or Marty Stuart, because I’d want that type of sound for my record. Anyway, this is one of the BEST albums that I own and I think more people should know about it.

Recommendation XII: Johnny Cash

Again, I have returned after another semi-long absence. I do apologize for not blogging too much as I should be: I get way busy and since it is summer, I’m trying to spend my time exercising, being outside, and trying to find a job lol, and whenever I do come on here, I put off blogging since it takes over an hour just to set up the entries for me. Even though I’m posting this late in the day: Happy Father’s Day to all worthy fathers out there! This somewhat ties into my latest recommendation…

My twelth recommendation is: Johnny Cash’s “The Man Comes Around” from his 2002 American IV: The Man Comes Around album. I’m a pretty big Johnny Cash fan, but I pale in comparison to those who own so many of his albums and songs throughout his lifetime. What drew me to Johnny initially was his song, “Hurt”. I’d love to review that song too, since it is my favorite all-time Cash song, but I chose to do the above song instead. Anyway, I heard “Hurt” for the first time in a country music chat room (believe it or not) and his vocals were so dark and full of real-life pain and…hurt. I knew of Johnny Cash before that, but to be honest, like the fool I was at that time, I didn’t care much for the older singers. It was not until later, after Johnny’s death that I, like so many other people, really listened to and appreciated him and his music. I read lots and lots of things about what he had done in life: so many to list, and I won’t go into that, but he has led such an amazing life and I find his music to be quite unique and incredible compared to everybody else and he was a huge influence on many of my favorite artists. I consider him to be my favorite classic country music legend, or legend in any music in general, and I truly cannot say enough things about him. I really think, had I the chance to meet him when he was alive, we would have so much to talk about.

Recommendation X: Pam Tillis & John Anderson

O.K. I’m back (well, I never really left, but I had to take a two-week hiatus – I myself can’t believe it’s been that long since my last blog entry – because I’ve been super-busy with school work, social life, and anything else left over. I’ve also been somewhat lazy and spending a good amount of time playing video games on N64 with friends lol, but don’t let that throw you off the blog – I know my music and I’m pretty smart!) I did, however, know all this time what album I was going to choose a song from to highlight for this entry. My only problem was choosing which song to do for this one, since it’s such a great album.

My tenth recommendation is: Pam Tillis & John Anderson’s duet, “Life Sure Has Changed Us Around” from Pam’s 2007 Rhinestoned album. This is a special selection because of different reasons: 1. it’s a first here because I have not showcased a duet here before, 2. this album is highly-acclaimed by many people – everywhere I look, everybody loves it, so choosing one song was difficult, and 3. Kevin from Country Universe has been waiting for me to pick a song from Rhinestoned for quite some time lol.