You mean there's a "Lost Cause" that I Missed...?

Can't let that happen...

In fact I don't know of a country station...period.

------------------
kd...and the beat goes on...

A letter I read from Mr Schmit put me on to a "Theory"

His equation he said was passed on to him was stunningly simple.

A=Audience
R=Reduction
T=Technique.

I was about to let it go until I remembered MY initial immersion with Live Music. The Old SHows, like Billy Walker, Hank Snow and the like were almost Supernatural in their imprinting on me. This was WAY before any casual drug use.

Later the times I spent listening to Bud Charleton and the String Dusters, at Hunters Lodge, and Don West at the Village Barn similarly left me permamantly imprinted.

They had done their jobs RIGHT. At many times since, I have passed on Concert Tickets, as I still regularly do, and the only reason is because I've "Seen The Best" and it really was "enough".

All I have to do to see HS and the Rainbow Ranch Boys sparkling under the carbon arc lights, or Bud Charleton and the String Dusters taking my breath away with "Thunder Road" is to just close my eyes and remember. They did their jobs That Well

I think of My 'Career' playing for audiences. Such as it has been.

Every time I do, I make an effort to go out and talk to people. I feel this sincere urge to tell them, especially if they drink too much, that if anything I want to inspire them, and they'll be able to live their lives without a constant "empty feeling" for "entertainment". I always tell them to "come back with friends", but I get this feeling that I get when I'm lying to somebody. I DO mean it when I tell them to "Drive Careful", and I note the difference between the sincerity of the two.

It's dawned on me that with many of us, that it is our aim to somehow impart things to them that help their "souls" and make them less deficient to the point where they're out there "carousing".

I know it's kind of stupid, and I don't claim to be a rocket scientist, but let's consider maybe that instead of people not liking "our music" being the reason that Austin has now about 10% of the "live country music" that Portland had twenty years ago, maybe it's because Our Music, and live performance of it, has done what we, in our better moments, have wanted it to do.

In short, maybe it's made people feel more "whole". You don't see that many idiots with chicken feathers in their hats 'looking for love' anymore.

Maybe we helped them find it, or at least stop looking for it "in all the wrong places."

Maybe if we'd "known that" we'd have "choked up a little"....

I know it's a stupid thought, but sometimes the best of them are just "stupid thoughts" that no one else thought of before..

SSM as they say...

( .... music plays in the background...,. " (Hello I'm a Jukebox)....... "Tonite the jukebox......")

Maybe it's just the Cops and the MAD Mothers...

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 12 January 2004 at 01:35 AM.]

NYC is the best music place on the planet.
24/7 anything you want, and all of the best pass through town on tours.

If you think there is one brilliant guitarist in a million poaple, then there are at minimum 7-10 in NYC and environs.
But in reality there are more.
Not tons of steelers there, but the ones I HAVE heard were great...
uh and Jeff Lampert's there too.

I have seen more of the best music in my 5 years there than anywhere.

I have been debating coming back to the USA, but couldn't think where.
I had thought Nasville a bit, or Austin, but this post kinda kills either in my mind.

I love NYC, but the cost of putting a studio there is prohibitive.
But musically it is heaven.

Oh yeah I had a bluegrass band in NYC,
we gigged 4-5 nights a week for good money. Better than Austin pay from what I read here.

[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 12 January 2004 at 02:42 AM.]

That may very well be the primary reason! The fans of the country music era that used to be, were totally involved in their quest...as the current outing was winding down they were already making plans with their friends where to go "next" weekend! But, the enjoyment of those events always included the liberal consumption of "spirits", either from a discrete bottle from the bootlegger during prohibition days, or the legal liquor of the later "Club" days.....and of course the biggest fan base of country music MAY have been the weekend crowds around a Juke Box with the volumn maxed in thousands of beer joints all over the USA.

But all those folks had to get in their cars and find their way home after those fun outings, and the days of the police "looking the other way" as long as a driver could still walk without staggering, eventually ended. Driving under the influence citations began to severely penalize violators with substantial fines, and many began to see "jail" time. The fun crowd stopped going out on weekends for fear of getting caught in a road-block with alcohol on their breath, and having to face the Boss on Monday morning and the possible loss of their job.

I'm not unhappy about having fewer drunk drivers to avoid on our streets and highways.....strict traffic enforcement and MAD has given the public a safer environment and undoubtedly saved many lives.

My hypothesis: Was the public's enjoyment of country music during the golden era because they were loyal fans of the music....or was it primarily because of the "party environment" that accompanied it?

I dunno....I only know that it's gone, and Eric only needed one line to say everything I've said!
www.genejones.com

[This message was edited by Gene Jones on 12 January 2004 at 06:17 AM.]

The only place I've been where the general quality of musicians was up there with NYC is Nashville. Because NYC has so many different and thriving musical scenes I give it the edge.
Nashville wins hands down when it comes to country though.

I've been spending a fair amount of time in LA these days but I still don't understand the scene there.

For you guys that get your culture from big radio and tv you are way out of touch. Thinking that the world of music is limited to what you hear on the San Antonio controlled mass market radio is the same as thinking that the only food in the world comes from either McDonald's or Wendy's.

Bob

[This message was edited by Bob Hoffnar on 12 January 2004 at 05:39 PM.]