Recommendation XXXVII: Little Big Town

It’s Election Day and I just had to make a new entry. A few hours ago, I turned in my absentee voting ballot and I’m excited (and nervous at the same time) to watch the results on TV tonight. I won’t tell you who I voted for, since this is not a political blog – it’s strictly mostly a music blog – but I will encourage strongly that anyone who can vote, to do so.  This is my first time voting, so this was my first time seeing how confusing the amendments can be (the devil is in the details…. you read the fine print on those closely!), so anyone who votes, don’t go by commercials, read up on both sides and make a well-thought-out decision based on your views.  Visiting California last week, on the trip I mentioned before, I could clearly see how the election has impacted my college and its students. It’s really made them, and I as well, more active and vocal about different issues, the likes of which I’ve never experienced in my life before, so I’m enjoying that.  Voting in most places is done at 7pm, and that’s coming up pretty soon for some areas, so get out there!  Vote!  Anyway, I know it’s been a while since my last recommendation post (over a month!), so here it is…

My thirty-seventh recommendation is: Little Big Town’s “Novocaine” from their 2007 A Place to Land album.  I thought this was a perfect song to choose for today, because it’s positive and uplifting, and a great tie in to this day (I had lots of sad songs on my list that just wouldn’t work out lol).  I’m also very glad to finally get a separate post in on Little Big Town.  I’ve been a fan of their’s since “Boondocks” came out, and like everybody else, I can’t get enough of their beautiful harmonies.  They really cannot make a bad song, or sound bad on anything they sing.  One of things I respect them a lot for is the way they change the lead vocal in their music, and don’t keep it all the same – every group member has their own individual personality and vocal, which separates them from other groups/bands.  I may not own any of their albums yet, but I’ve bought several of their material off of iTunes.  I kinda still wish that LBT was still with independent label, Equity Music Group, because their success with them was a step in the right direction for independent labels, and now they’re with Capitol Nashville (though, the new album cover looks loads better).

Recommendation XXXVI: Vince Gill (triple-track)

Now we’ve hit a milestone (for me, at least)…: number 36. This one is real special for me because it’s my lucky number (won’t tell ya why), so I needed a special artist to go with it. I had trouble choosing the artist and the songs that I’d select from them. I know it needed to be a triple track one (hmm, that sounds like a better title than “threesome”, doesn’t it?. Okay, I’m changing it to that now, because the former was almost borderline weird-ish, though it wasn’t intended to be), so I finally made a choice I was satisfied with. This post will be a kinda long one, so prepare yourself for it: take out a comfortable chair and a nice glass of something to sip on…

My thirty-sixth recommendation is/are: Vince Gill’s “Out of My Mind” and “What You Don’t Say” from his 2006 These Days album, AND “Kindly Keep It Country” from his 1998 The Key album.  Yes, yes, it is Vince!  I really couldn’t imagine not discussing him and his music, and it took me quite a while to get to him, but the time has finally come.  Vince Gill is truly one of my absolute favorites and he’s one of the one most talented people in the music industry, ever.  He can sing, write, produce, and play at the highest quality there can be, and that makes him an all-around five-star musician.  I was a fan of his back in the ’90s when I was a little boy, and I didn’t realize how great he was until I bought the Souvenirs album (a greatest hits collection) some years ago and remembered all those songs I loved back then.  As of this moment, I own 71 of his songs (not including the songs I own that include his harmonies/background vocals) and I do plan to add more (he’s probably worked with everybody that I’ve reviewed on this site already lol).  Choosing the three tracks for this recommendation was not an easy task , but I made up my mind.

Recommendation XXXIV: Sheryl Crow

All I can say to this site’s audience: thanks so much for waiting.  It means a lot to me that people still check out this site regularly even when I don’t post too often.  With my time off from school, I’ve got my good times and bad: it’s nice not having to stress over work and papers (my film class woulda been so fun though), but it is killing me not being able to hang out with my many buddies and others back there.  I feel like I’m missing out and will miss out on lots of stuff, and I’m thinking I might not be able to return in 2009.  But I came up with a plan to visit my friends early than planned before 2008 is over, so I’m excited about that (will be kinda expensive though…lol).  Anyway, I can guess what most of you are thinking when you saw the picture on the side: what’s she doing on the site?  She’s not country! I know she may not be considered “country”, but she’s done several works within the genre and she has integrated it somewhat in her style throughout her whole career.  She’s worked with Willie Nelson, Dwight Yoakam, Johnny Cash, the Dixie Chicks, Jack Ingram, Brooks & Dunn, Vince Gill, and others, and even her duet with Kid Rock (“Picture”) sounded more country than most songs on country radio, so I think she’s earned at least a recommendation (She even had another single on the country charts with the poppier single, “The First Cut is the Deepest”, if you can remember that.)

My thirty-fourth recommendation is: Sheryl Crow’s “Anything But Down” from her 1998 The Globe Sessions album.  Sheryl is one of my favorite rock/pop artists and I like a fair amount of her work.  I’d have to say that “All I Wanna Do” (the much much better of the songs with that name.  Yeah, I said it, and I do mean it, Sugarland.) is my favorite song of her’s because it’s so catchy and reminds me of the ’90s.  It’s got a slight country feel to it with the steel guitar that’s used prominently in the track, and her voice is always easy to notice.  Even when she turned pop with “Soak Up the Sun”, she was still as good as ever (though, her rockier, edgier stuff is preferred).  I remember when I was young, I confused her with Martina McBride when I saw her lol, especially with her music video for the James Bond movie, “Tomorrow Never Dies” (now I don’t really see any similarities, except that they had real short hair in the past).  My only complaint about Ms. Sheryl Crow is that she seems to kinda mumble when she performs live and while it it part of her style and isn’t done on purpose, it gets somewhat distracting.  But whatever, she’s still a great music icon.

Recommendation XI: Jack Ingram

Right now, I’m writing this from home because my college semester ended about a week ago, and I’ve been feeling really weird since being back. I definitely am happy to not have to do any more school work until about three months, but when I left my dorm, I was sad to leave my friends behind (well, actually, they left before me, and I left later so I was alone for quite a while, waiting to check out of my room lol). My buddies and I had done a lot within the time we had and had a lot of fun, and I’m not afraid to admit it here, but I do miss them because they live in other states and I can’t spend time with them and next year may be different. This leads me to my next song selection…

My eleventh recommendation is: Jack Ingram’s “Maybe She’ll Get Lonely” from his 2007 This Is It album. When I first got this album (it had all this bonus stuff that came with it because I got it from his site), I had high expectations because the clips I heard from the album were excellent and I do love his remake of “Lips of an Angel” (any nay-sayers, don’t hold that against me lol), but after I listened to the full album originally, I felt a little disappointed. As time went by and I kept listening to the CD day-by-day, I became to love it. Jack Ingram has become one of my newer favorites and I enjoy hearing his music, old and new. It was his Electric album that got me to be interested in him initially and my interest has grown from there with his recent radio singles. I could go on and on about him and the album, but I really want to get to the story with the song.