The Steel Guitar Forum

Didn't realize we could state more than one.

Most anything by Dwight Yoakum.
Crazy (I even like playing modern country more)

Well, listing all of them would take forever.

I play everything (except Sleepwalk) that the band wants to play.

It's not my job to like the song. It's my job to play it.

Wow! As per Earnest B.'s inference on another board, these are most bands playlists. If I was hating on everything here, I'd just rather not play. You can get sick of anything. How many times have you played Silver Wings or Swinging Doors fer cryin' out loud?

Our job in the clubs is to entertain the audience and give them something to dance to. Most of the tunes mentioned here are tried and true, easy enough to learn and are familiar to most club goers.

I have tunes I like to play more than others, but at the end of the night, it's about how well you have pleased the owners and the clientele.

Now for my own entertainment practicing and noodling at home, it's just what I want. When I used to get invited to the steel shows, I'd choose the things I like to play without much deference to the attendees, cause that's the format.

One thing you can do is try new ways of playing the same old song.

I saw our man Tommy White on Ray Steven's CabaRay show doing Sleepwalk. That's right, Sleepwalk. He mixed in Night Life into the intro etc. and the song sounded fresh and just great....of course it's Tommy but still...

This thread has been a good healthy dose of light hearted venting. It goes without saying that we do the best we can even with songs we don’t care for. The job is a combination of what you make of it and what you are paid to do. If we didn’t love it we wouldn’t be doing it, but we don’t have to like everything about it.

Over the years, I've played in a several top-40 country cover-bands. Both as a member and as a hired player. I'd have to say, I didn't/don't like to play pretty much any top-40 hit from the mid 1970's to the present. But then again, I didn't play in those bands for the love of the music they chose to cover.

I'm more about traditional country honky-tonk from the 40's through the 60's.

Keep on pickin'!
Glenn

I know this is a rant, so rant on. Sometimes it's useful to let it loose, I get it.

But as long as we're at it, let me say that I don't "hate" any of these songs. Like everyone, I have preferences - sometimes very strong preferences. But I generally find something instructive about playing almost any music.

I don't even "hate" Free Bird. In fact, I really liked it when it first hit almost 45 years ago. It's rock and roll, and I like rock and roll. Even now. Rock and roll, to some extent, is about energy and, yes, youth. I was in college when it hit. I had a ton of free energy back then. But it doesn't exactly surprise me that it (and many of these songs) don't age well for a lot of people. And yeah, FB has gotten beaten to death, like a lot of popular stuff has, and continues to. I've heard it played plenty in the last 40+ years, but rarely hear it played well. It's actually not that easy to play well.

Another point:

Achy Breaky Heart - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTurgi8woVU

Tulsa Time - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6MbPWzIFUk

Basically the same song pattern. I really like one, don't like the other (I'll let you guess which is which.) I'm way more influenced by music than lyrics, but I guess lyrics matter, to some extent at least. But in the end, it all boils down to personal taste. And on matters of taste - de gustibus non disputandum est.

And maybe I'm weird - but I never, ever get tired of playing the stuff I really love. I know it may be hard to understand how anybody could really love what you don't like, but it's true.

Dave Mudgett wrote:I know this is a rant, so rant on. Sometimes it's useful to let it loose, I get it.

But as long as we're at it, let me say that I don't "hate" any of these songs. .

I have to say that I DO hate Leroy Brown. It has the same effect on me that polka has on some people, and rap on others. It is as cringe worthy as an adult person saying, "I know, right?", or "that restores my faith in humanity", or "if you can't handle the heat get out of . . . ", or a politician saying something like, "trust me", or hearing Fleetwood Mac songs at political conventions, or adults telling a crying five-year old, "no one said life was going to be fair", or an adult crying and saying "it's just not fair".
And it's not the lyrics of Leroy Brown, its the melody, that crappy melody that belongs blaring over a megaphone on a rusty merry-go-round at a county fair, county population 2,347, with carnies letting you ride, hoping you haven't seen the wanted posters in the post offices of seven surrounding states. Yes i hate Leroy Brown. Hate it. Thanks, I feel better now. Think I'll have a cigarette.

Most of the above songs, especially Sweet Home Alabama. Worst of all is: Keep Your Hands to Yourself. Ugh!

So, Mr Montgomery... Tell us how you feel about Leroy Brown will you please hahaha! I really like that post. It reminds me of something I would say if Someone got me going on something haha.

So, has anyone ever been forced to play You Light Up My Life? Even at a wedding, these would be fighting words for me. Lucky for me, at weddings I've sung stuff like A Picture Of Me W/out You, and I'll Be Doggone. I was even requested to sing Payin' The Cost To Be The Boss at one wedding haha.

Bobby Nelson wrote:So, Mr Montgomery... Tell us how you feel about Leroy Brown will you please hahaha! I really like that post.

I enjoyed it too. A thing of beauty

Tulsa Time

To me, it's not the songs... it's who I'm playing with.
I cringe when someone calls some of my favorite songs...You Don't Know Me, or Georgia, for example... because there are 1001 different ways to play them, and unless everyone's reading the same chart they can be train wrecks from start to finish.
On the other hand I've had some great times playing most of the tunes everyone has said they hate...it all depends on who's on the gig.

Leroy Brown. I mean, BAD, BAD... telling them right up front this is going to be bad. Shake your booties so we can sing ballads!
Yeah, and London Homesick Blues. You wish the writer would go ahead and go back to Luckenbach and quit moaning. Go back to Abilene!
Manly footwear, indeed.

Don't worry about it Joachim, they're just getting PC on you. Anyone whose taste is different from mine has bad taste.
It may not be so much a matter of taste as of pallette. Where mine is better, of course.
It disgusts me when they spit on mine indeed.

Man Eater. It was painful.

Bob, if you haven't seen this, you need to...I think you'll enjoy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l56Hdjx0ckg

I love the Shreds! Thanks, Skip.

Yeah, Fred... funny stuff. Some shreds are done better than others. I think this may be the best one... enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD6rKhzV_m0

Skip Edwards wrote:Yeah, Fred... funny stuff. Some shreds are done better than others. I think this may be the best one... enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD6rKhzV_m0

Oh man that's' funny!

Skip Edwards wrote:Yeah, Fred... funny stuff. Some shreds are done better than others. I think this may be the best one... enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD6rKhzV_m0

Well, I made it through the first 50 seconds....who do I see about getting my click refunded?

Don R Brown wrote:

Skip Edwards wrote:Yeah, Fred... funny stuff. Some shreds are done better than others. I think this may be the best one... enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD6rKhzV_m0

Well, I made it through the first 50 seconds....who do I see about getting my click refunded?

I had to fast-forward through almost all of it, but the ending was pretty funny ....."Please subscribe for more"

Mitch

Skip Edwards wrote:Yeah, Fred... funny stuff. Some shreds are done better than others. I think this may be the best one... enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jD6rKhzV_m0

Superb! The original artist should be very pleased

I think we should make a master list of all the Songs We Despise and send them off to the Shredder guy for a makeover. Might give us all a whole new appreciation for the originals. Except for Bad Leroy Brown, which already IS a shred....

Skip Edwards wrote:Bob, if you haven't seen this, you need to...I think you'll enjoy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l56Hdjx0ckg

with comments as zany as the song itself.

You can't ignore the wisdom of someone with this much experience:

Captain Teemo
"best song I've heard in a million years"

I have noticed that it's mostly Women that request crap songs. It's always "play something we can dance to". I resist the urge to say to 'em "Why don't you dance off a cliff"? My attitude of late is I wanna play stuff I like; I'm tired of playing "what people wanna hear". Because if you play it well, they will love anything, & I've been with a couple bands that were living proof. That's why when audiences (again mostly women) ask me "Why don't you smile when you play?", I tell 'em "You try being a musician in Florida & see if YOU smile!"

Rich Upright wrote:I have noticed that it's mostly Women that request crap songs. It's always "play something we can dance to". I resist the urge to say to 'em "Why don't you dance off a cliff"? My attitude of late is I wanna play stuff I like; I'm tired of playing "what people wanna hear". Because if you play it well, they will love anything, & I've been with a couple bands that were living proof. That's why when audiences (again mostly women) ask me "Why don't you smile when you play?", I tell 'em "You try being a musician in Florida & see if YOU smile!"

I love this thread!!!

Skip Edwards wrote:Bob, if you haven't seen this, you need to...I think you'll enjoy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l56Hdjx0ckg

Thank you Skip! That's wonderful.