Loretta Lynn - Van Lear Rose
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Free Music Notes for Van Lear Rose
Free Music Review: Jack White's homage to true Country Music
Hit: 4 Stars
Jack White appreciates classic country and bluegrass music. This is evident with his involvement in Goober and the Peas, contibuting to the Cold Mountain soundtrack, and even the sounds in his band, the White Stripes, particularly his latest album, Get Behind Me, Satan. Jack White also loves his own sound but not in a narcissistic way. In my opinion, this album has nothing to do with Loretta Lynn, specifically. Jack White wanted to give back to classic country and bring it back to modern radio for a whole new audience. He knew he could not do this alone, however. If he came out with a classic country sounding album, he could possibly alienate his rock fans, and the country music listening community would not respect it, nor him. Thus, Loretta Lynn comes into the picture. She is his muse because she IS classic country. From her upbringing to who she is today, she epitomizes all that classic country makes itself to be. She is simple, humble, earnest, and genuine, a true classy country woman in every way (he showcases her personality and spirit in her "story" Little Red Shoes).
Now in terms of classic country, the songs Loretta Lynn wrote are not groundbreaking. She covers a myriad of situations that have been done before by other artists, as well as herself, but don't let that stop you from taking a listen. Though the songs may seem cliche, that's what Jack White wanted. He wanted her to write from her country heart her country life experiences in a heartfelt, simple, and honest way, encompassing the aura of classic country. He took it upon himself to give it his own personal style to give it a modern flair, and he created an album that takes the listener on an emotional journey, from foot stomping hand clapping joy to lamentful heart-wrenching sadness. He did an excellent job capturing the true spirit of Loretta Lynn and re-introducing classic country to an audience who isn't familiar with it.
Free Music Review: An album that is as brilliant as it is improbable
Hit: 5 Stars
Who'd a thunk it? Loretta Lynn, the grande dame of country music, retired for most of a decade with only a single mediocre album to show for her return to the business after her husband's death, teaming with punk-garage genius Jack White to produce the best album of her career. I only recently discovered this beauty of a disc. I had Lynn's MCA collection ALL TIME GREATEST HITS, which contained about all of the Loretta Lynn I ever expected to own. But going on a White Stripes binge lately it suddenly inspired me to sample the album I remembered he had done with Lynn. It simply bowled me over.
Before country outsider Willie Nelson started attempting to record true albums in the seventies, the rule in country music had been to produce a couple hit singles and then surround them with rapidly recorded schlock, figuring that fans would buy the albums for the two or three gems, ignoring the rest. As a result, there are very, very few great or even very good country albums before the seventies and eighties. Almost every country artist (George Jones is one of the few exceptions) is best collected via the hits anthology since their albums mainly consisted of filler. Jack White, however, comes from a different background. In indie rock the tendency is to make every song count and there are scores of albums on which all or nearly all of the cuts on a disc are first rate or at least interesting.
What is amazing here is that Lynn excels at producing an entire album of original material. On no other album has she ever contributed so many original songs. Jack White, on the other hand, seamlessly adjusts to country. This is no surprise, since he seems to possess and almost limitless musical vocabulary. Here he keeps the production simple and to the point, always keeping Loretta's voice clearly at the center of things. His guitar playing calls less attention to itself than on White Stripes recordings but instead uses it to brilliantly and tastefully enhance every song.
The most surprising thing about the album is how strong the songs are. Very, very few performers continue to write new material as they approach seventy. Ray Charles for the last couple of decades of his life merely recycled the hits of his creative decades, producing little or no new material. One would hardly have blamed Loretta Lynn if her comeback had consisted merely of performing the huge number of hits from her catalog. Instead, she has created a set of songs that stand comparison to anything she has created. The title track is simply brilliant, and there are a string of absolutely stellar cuts from beginning to end. "Family Tree," "High on a Mountain Top," "God Makes No Mistakes," and "Trouble on the Line" are all vintage Loretta Lynn. "Miss Being Mrs." is almost unbearably personal, as she sings about her departed husband. Country songs are stuffed to overflowing with spouses leaving spouses, but knowing that her husband left her by dying brings a deep poignancy to this song. She is absolutely brilliant in the ultra feisty number "Mrs. Leroy Brown," all the way down to the end when she suddenly says, "Come on Jack, let's get out of here." But the highlight of the album for me is unquestionably "Portland Oregon," which tells of two people meeting in a bar. Though Loretta Lynn is listed as the writer of the song, it is so thoroughly embellished with classic Jack White touches he should get co-credit. This is the only song where the two switch vocals and the results are just exquisite. Who would have thought a 30-year-old punk rocker and the 70-year-old grandmother could kick it like this? White's guitar work is brilliant, while Lynn's lyrics are simply delightful, as well as being delightfully inscrutable. The very first words of the song are:
Well Portland Oregon and sloe gin fizz
If that ain't love then tell me what is
The rest of the song tells of a man and woman meeting in a bar for a night of passion, driven by great guitar, wonderful vocals, and great lyrics. For instance, Loretta sings:
Well sloe gin fizz works might fast
When you drink it by the pitcher and not by the glass
Some might wonder how strong Loretta Lynn's voice is. After all, she was nearly 70 when this was recorded. She clearly isn't as strong a singer as she was in the sixties, and her age shows when she tries to sustain a note for any length of time, but all in all her voice is amazingly strong. If you compare her work here to any of Johnny Cash's work with Rick Rubin, she is in vastly better voice than Cash was. Cash adjusted wonderfully to aging, making the changes to his voice work wonderfully with his material. He clearly was a different kind of singer than he was in the rest of his career. Loretta Lynn, on the other hand, is pretty much the same singer she always was and stylistically has had to make no concessions to age.
This album has to go down as one of the great and unexpected delights in the history of music. I'm hoping the two of them can get together for an encore. If we don't, at least we got this one brilliant collaboration.
Free Music Review: AWESOME
Hit: 5 Stars
Loretta Lynn rocks. Awesome cd. "Portland Oregon" is one of the best songs I have heard in a long, long, time. No one says "Oregon" like Loretta. Rock on, Loretta!Free Music Review: Yeah, Hey!
Hit: 5 Stars
It is the rare CD that leaves me wanting more. It is rarer still that I hear anything out of Nashville that engages me, period.
This is a bit of history. Sure, the thing sounds great. Even the piece with Miss Lynn telling that story about how she got her red shoes, with musical accompaniment, was priceless.
I don't have adequate words to tell you how stunning this all is. I have a couple of the American Recordings of the late Johnny Cash, and I have to say, there is a difference here. Mr. Cash sounded like an artist at the end of his life. Miss Lynn sounds, quite frankly, marvelous. There might be a little bit of weakness on some upper-range trills, but this is NOT a record that sounds like she's on her last legs, or that she's slowing down at all.
That this is the first recording of her career were she wrote all the songs is miraculous. I think she should do this more often. Laughter, tears, prominent sentiment, murder, cheating, they're all here. And she sings them into the ground.
To quote Mr. Welk: Wonderful, wonderful!!
Free Music Review: What Fans have waited for!
Hit: 5 Stars
Yes, it's as good as you've heard. This is classic Loretta Lynn and an absolute must for any music fan.