Saw an interesting video of a recent live show by Ray Price, Merle Haggard, and Willie Nelson the other night. OK I'll admit it, my mom wanted me to watch it because she's a big Ray Price fan.
So. Ray Price. I'm afraid I just don't get it. He can still sing well despite being about 180 years old (most singers lose their voice by then), but as far as I could tell the musical style owed a lot more to the elevator than to anything resembling country music, and the syrupy string trio didn't help matters any. I was told that Ray belonged in the company of these other members of the country outlaw fraternity due to extensive drug and alcohol abuse, but there was no hint of anything dangerous in his performance.
Next up, Merle Haggard. I've always discounted him as a person to be taken seriously due to the reaction of the ordinary person of my age group to his huge hit, Okie From Muskogee, which started, of course, with the famous line "We don't smoke marijuana on Main Street." I only realized the depth of his hypocrisy decades later, when I read this quote: "Main Street was about the only place we DIDN'T smoke it." Still, in recent years I have started to wonder if I was missing something.
I was pretty surprised to see a man completely engaged in the music, singing beautifully, smiling ecstatically whenever one of the backup musicians did something interesting, playing well-conceived guitar solos that always sounded great (even if he did miss a lot of notes) with the prettiest Telecaster tone I think I've ever heard, and singing only exceptional songs, most of which I think he wrote himself. He meant evey note he sang and played, and that means everything to me. Time to reevaluate!
Last up, Willie Nelson. Willie sang a few good new songs with energy, feeling, and commitment. Unfortunately, he sang a bunch of (superb) old songs without much emotion at all. It's pretty obvious that he can no longer muster any enthusiasm for material he's performed thousands of times before. So what we get is a superb musician and songwriter going through the motions. Well, this happens to a lot of performers - when you're so famous that your fans are ecstatic just to be in your presence, it's hard to stay motivated. Note that that didn't seem to be a problem for Merle Haggard.
Oh yeah, the backup band was Ray Benson and Asleep At The Wheel. Great musicians. Not much passion or spontaniety, especially in their short solo spot. Snooze.
And just a cultural note. How this country has changed! This bunch of potheads, ex-convicts, longhairs and reprobates are now cultural icons, and the crowd behaved accordingly. Thirty years ago it would have been different. And the country music fans would have been the ones calling the cops.
