>Doing other people's songs just doesn't have the same stigma in country
>(though maybe it does these days <g>) as in some other fields; why, as late
>as his Philadelphia live album, Merle Haggard was doing impressions of other
>artists (Johnny Cash, Hank Snow, Marty Robbins, Buck Owens)....
>Anyhow, this Thompson stuff is great; I've got the Radio Broadcasts, and I'm
>going to grab Brazos ASAP. Thanks, Dina.
>Jon Weisberger
Yeah that disc sounds good, Dina..
I'm just thinkin though, Jon, that at the time of these live Hank
Thompson cuts, there was less stigma about doing hits in most fields.
Certainly pop singers would almost automatically do current hits in their
live shows...and this was the era of "Your Hit Parade" as a TV hit, with
the show's cast doing other people's pop hits every week. R&B artists
certainly did this too...and even eraly rockers.
(They wouldn't even have been THOUGHT of as covers, would they! Covers
still meant deliberately stepping on somebody else's record release to grab
some bucks off the same number, certainly not performing them, which I know
you know)..
So, as this sort of very public fan of some singers who write and writers
who sing, and somebody who, back when I did it, wrote in the rock press, I
just wanna say--I love versions of songs done by others whos style we know
too. And they don't even have to be drunk as Bottle Rockets to do it!
(Those Merle live covers are fairly terrific, too!)
Barry
