Music. According to Kim.

Earlier this year we lost one of country music most beloved artists. Little Jimmy Dickens was truly one of a kind. A great artist, he had a special talent for delivering both a lyric and a story. He was so funny that you could hear him say the same joke more than once and it would be just as funny as the first time. Even when you knew what was coming, he would still make you laugh. Every single time. What made Little Jimmy so special, however, was not his musicality or his sense of humor. What made him special was the way he cared about and loved other people. People don't say nice things about Little Jimmy Dickens; they say wonderful and beautiful things about him. People light up when they talk about him. You didn't simply like Little Jimmy Dickens, you adored him. I never had the privilege of meeting him in person, but I was fortunate enough to see him perform on the Grand Ole Opry several times. It didn't matter who else was on the line up. Little Jimmy Dickens was al...

Welcome to the third installment of this series! If you missed them, you can check out parts 1 and 2  here  and  here , respectively. Again, this is an ongoing thing I'm doing and I'm enjoying it so far. It's fun trying to think of songs that never, or rarely, get covered and then deciding which current artist could do it best. Each installment will feature 10 songs and then if anyone would like to suggest any, let me know and I'll add it in as a bonus song in a future installment. It can be any song, from any artist in any genre from any time period. Before I get started, I want to first to tell everyone about a movement going on in country music right now. Some of you may have heard about this already. I'm taking about the "Sixty for Sixty" movement. What is it, you ask? Well, George Strait will be turning 61 on May 18th. So far in his career he has had a total of 59 #1s. Now we're not talking about the same song being released on multiple charts o...

I'm a big fan of the shuffle feature. Sometimes there'll be a specific album I want to listen to and in those cases I usually end up listening to the songs in order. But most of the time I'll listen to music on shuffle. Whether it's a certain artist I'm listening to or one of my many playlists. I like the randomness of it. Of course, as anyone who listens to their music on shuffle knows, it can make for some pretty interesting transitions. Downright strange ones at times. Especially if you're like me and have some playlists that have a little bit of everything on them. It is said shuffle feature that inspired this post, which is going to be the first of who knows how many. I see this being an ongoing thing. See, the other day I was doing something on my computer and listening to music and it went from Carrie Underwood to Janet Jackson. As I was listening to the Janet Jackson song, it occurred to me that Carrie Underwood could probably do an interesting cover...

Well. We've arrived at the last category in this series. If you recall from my introductory post, I decided against making a pick for Musician of the Year. Mainly because I'm not familiar enough with a couple of the musicians nominated and knew I wouldn't be able to come up with much to say about them. And that didn't seem fair. It's easier to write about artists you don't know too well than it is to write about musicians. Why that is, I'm not sure. Most people seem to be calling this for Mac McAnally (guitarist) and I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that he's won it for the past four years. Not a bad track record, I'd say! My love of the steel guitar makes me hope that Paul Franklin might take this one. But honestly, all five of the men nominated would deserve it. I don't have to know all of their playing well to know that they all deserve it  because I know how strong the talent pool is in Nashville. These five gentlemen being chose...

I want to take a moment and say that my thoughts and prayers are with everyone who was affected by Hurricane Sandy, particularly those in New Jersey and New York. The pictures and footage they've been showing are just heartbreaking. They have a long road ahead of them and it's not going to be easy. Let's not forget about these people in the days to come. And of course, let's say a few prayers for all of the firefighters, police officers and all the other emergency responders in these places, along with all the crews that are going to be working to restore power to those who lost it. I know there's a lot of information out there about ways we can help, but I thought I'd provide some links here as well: The American Red Cross:  http://www.redcross.org/hurricane-sandy?scode=RSG00000E017&subcode=paiddonationsbrand&gclid=CIS7wZ66qrMCFYd9Ogod0HcA_g World Vision:  http://www.worldvision.org/?lpos=top_img_wvLogo The Humane Society:  http://www.humanesociety...

Ah, Album of the Year. One of the biggest awards of the night, second only to Entertainer in my opinion. My choice for Album was an easy one. Another category where I was able to make my pick right away. Without further ago, here are the nominees for Album of the Year: Chief , Eric Church Four the Record , Miranda Lambert Home , Dierks Bentley Own the Night , Lady Antebellum tailgates and tanlines , Luke Bryan And my choice for Album of the Year? Chief , Eric Church. No question. What do I think of the other nominees? Starting off with what I'm sure many will consider one of the favorites for this award, Miranda Lambert's Four the Record . This album has gotten a whole lot of praise from critics, fans and other artists alike. But in all honestly, I'm just not feeling this one. I think Miranda is a lot better than this album. In fact, I know  she is. I loved Kerosene,   Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and Revolution . This album was a bit of a disappointment and one that...

The nominees: Kelly Clarkson Miranda Lambert Martina McBride Taylor Swift Carrie Underwood My pick: Carrie Underwood. This was a pretty easy choice for me, for a number of reasons. But before I go into those, let me talk about the other nominees. Kelly Clarkson. She's a great singer, but I don't understand why she got nominated in this category. Yes, her duet with Jason Aldean was a huge song for both of them. Sure, she released a country version of a song that had already been a single on pop radio. And yeah, she's good friends with Reba McEntire. But none of that makes her a country singer. Her inclusion in this category makes absolutely no sense. If she ever does a fully country album and starts releasing country songs to radio - and country remixes don't count - than I would have no problems with her being nominated for country awards. She could do well in country music, but she needs to fully commit to a project instead of just flirting with the ...

Last post! I enjoyed the ACMs this year, but to be totally honest, I'm going to be happy to be done with them. I said I was going to write about every performance and that I have - took a little longer than I wanted it to, but  that's all right. I'm going to get to the remaining five performances shortly, but just a heads up for what's coming. In two words: album reviews. I have a bunch in my list to do and am hoping to get at least four done this week, if not more. I'll be starting off with Craig Morgan's This Ole Boy , Amy Dalley's Coming Out of the Pain , Casey James  by Casey James and Chase Rice's Dirt Road Communion . That's more than likely going to be the order I do them in. Also on the lineup: Changed  by Rascal Flatts, Hard 2 Love  by Lee Brice, Up All Night  by Kip Moore and Josh Abbott Band's Small Town Family Dreams . I might do one where I review a handful of EP's since there's been some new ones put out lately as well. Al...

"Where words fail, music speaks."      - Hans Christian Andersen "Part of getting over it is knowing that you will never get over it."       - Ann Finger "He who has gone, so we but cherish his memory, abides with us, more potent, nay, more present than the living man."     - Antoine de Saint-Exupery "One word frees us of all the weight and pain in life. The word is love."    - Sophocles Okay, so this is a pretty different kind of opening for me, I admit. I was listening to "Over You" on repeat as I do and was thinking about what the song is about and what it is and that gave me the idea to look up some quotes about love and loss and pain and music. There are so many great quotes out there that it was hard to narrow it down, but I'm pretty happy with what I chose. All of the above seem to apply to this song. Before you continue to my thoughts on the song, I'd like you to take a second or two and read them again. I i...