Yes, "See You Again" is country

[koganbot]

Frank Kogan's Top 20 Country Singles 2007

(I may dick around with this list a bit more. Waited to the last minute; really had to struggle to get twenty.)

1. Miley Cyrus "See You Again" (Walt Disney)
2. LeAnn Rimes "Nothin' Better To Do" (Curb)
3. Taylor Swift "Teardrops On My Guitar" (Big Machine)
4. Miranda Lambert "Gunpowder And Lead" (Columbia Nashville)
5. Reba McEntire f. Kelly Clarkson "Because Of You" (MCA Nashville)*
6. Gretchen Wilson "You Don't Have To Go Home" (Columbia Nashville)
7. Sarah Johns "The One In The Middle" (BNA)
8. Toby Keith "High Maintenance Woman" (Show Dog Nashville)
9. Gretchen Wilson "One Of The Boys" (Columbia Nashville)
10. Tim McGraw "Last Dollar (Fly Away)" (Curb)
11. Eric Church "Sinners Like Me" (Capitol Nashville)
12. Rissi Palmer "Country Girl" (17-20 Entertainment)
13. Carrie Underwood "So Small" (19 Recordings/Arista Nashville)
14. Faith Hill "Lost" (Warner Bros.)
15. Sarah Buxton "That Kind Of Day" (Lyric Street)
16. Big & Rich "Between Raising Hell And Amazing Grace" (Warner Bros.)
17. Alan Jackson "Small Town Southern Man" (Arista)
18. Tim McGraw "Suspicions" (Curb)
19. Rodney Atkins "Cleaning My Gun" (Curb)
20. Billy Currington "Tangled Up" (Mercury Nashville)

"See You Again" is unmistakably rockabilly to my ears: the reverb, the melody, the chords, the delivery. Even has a stammer, albeit with an intent that's different from Elvis's. Maybe someone who knows music theory better than I can help me explain what I'm hearing in the chords that make them rockabilly. Key is A minor, with F a crucial chord, F being the subdominant of C, which is A minor's relative major. Having just said that, I have no idea if it's significant or not. I do know some music "theory," but not in a way that I can put to any useful critical use.

*I linked the vid here to "Because Of You"; one way to interpret it is that Kelly is playing Reba's mother, and, though Reba and Kelly are singing together, what Kelly is acting out is what Reba's mother went through. As a bonus, here's the "Fancy" vid; still gives me the "Rosebud" creepy crawlies.

EDIT: I've posted MySpace links for most of these (correcting about 10 of my posting errors; apologies if you tried links that went nowhere), linked the vids for the ones that either weren't on the MySpace page or were only there in abbreviated versions. Linked both for "Nothin' Better To Do" because I especially like the vid.

Will possibly post commentary in the comments as the day goes on.

BIRD REPORT: You should know that one of these singers flips a bird ("The One In The Middle," duh) and one of them gets the bird flipped on her ("That Kind Of Day"). Add Craig Morgan's "International Harvester," and that's three bird flips I've heard in one day.

Comments

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

Have now acquired the LP - only £9 in HMV, not bad for an import - and had much fun decoding the secret messages in the lyrics last night. Based on one listen, I'd say the album is 50:50 great:hmmm. But it seems to be a good entry point into country for non-experts like me; very much a cross-breed with the teenpop confessional records I know and like.

I'd put "Teardrops" as the fourth or fifth best on the album
That sounds about right. "Tim McGraw", "Picture to Burn", "Tied Together With A Smile" and "Our Song" were the standouts for me on first play.

Teendrops on my guitar

[koganbot]

I'd subtract "Our Song" from that list (haven't warmed up to it at all, though it's the current single, and Xhuxk likes it more than he likes "Teardrops On My Guitar"), would add "A Place In This World" (Taylor Swift as Jordan Pruitt!), "Cold As You," "The Outside," "Stay Beautiful," and especially "Should've Said No" (a track that got me three points in the League Of Pop). (This leaves "Mary's Song" as the one other song on the outside looking in.)

As for "Teardrops," the way she sings "Drew looks," "Drew talks," etc. at the beginning of lines is some of the most beautiful singing ever. The song loses itself a bit in the chorus, getting too sing-songy. By the way, there's a second version of the song with more harmonies and guitars which is the one that's getting the airplay on Radio Disney. I'm not sure which version is the one that's getting Top 40 play (the song started on the country charts, jumped pop about half a year ago, rose and fell and then rose again).

"Teardrops" is Jimmy Draper's least favorite track on the album. Jimmy's the fellow who first told me that I had to pay attention to Taylor, said that he was getting the same feelings he'd gotten from listening to Ashlee's Autobiography.

By the way, I forget if I ever linked you to "Come In With The Rain," the best of the Taylor Swift outtakes. Let me know.

[koganbot]

Speaking of country bands you might find accessible, you should try Little Big Town; I'm ambivalent about them, but their best stuff is like a cross between Lynyrd-Allman and California-era Fleetwood Mac. No one in the band comes close to singing as well as Fleetwood Mac, however. I reviewed them back in my Voice days. And we've argued about them a bit on rolling country - their most recent album was Xhuxk's number one of any kind for 2007.