| Brewed in Texas - Various Artists | |
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Reviewed by Jennifer Webb
Compadre Records is quickly becoming my favorite record label because they keep releasing such great Texas Country collaborations. Brewed in Texas: The Original Texas Happy Hour, has all the Texas guys you have heard before and perhaps some you have never heard of, but they all fit together in a perfect collection of Honky-Tonk bar tunes.
Former Lonestar singer, John Rich, performs "One Bud Wiser," the first single release from Brewed in Texas. As he sits at the bar and gets down and out about how his wife left him (out of the blue), he drinks a beer starts to numb his feelings and so he tells the woman behind the bar to keep the change because at that moment he realizes that his life is not over. He still has a lot of living to do and he will be okay as he sums up the song perfectly with the following lyrics: "Now I don't feel so bad about going home tonight, because I'm one 'Bud' wiser that I was a minute ago. I found an equalizer that makes her memory a no-show."
I know that Hank Williams III admires him, but after listening to Wayne Hancock sing "Juke Joint Jumpin," I cannot get over how alike they both sound as compared to Hank's "Lovesick, Broke, & Driftin' album. The old-time sound and addictive upbeat tempo draws in the listener's attention as you hear about driving around to different places and pausing every once in awhile to go into another juke joint to see what the "scene" is like there.
Boy, does Cooder Graw's version of "Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound" ever belong on this album, and what a perfect choice of group to sing it in the first place. This previously unreleased cover captures the attitude that the writer, Hank Williams Jr. himself, possessed when he originally sang it.
Another song that is also a remake, Cross Canadian Ragweed does a great job singing their version of "Whiskey River," the famous Willie Nelson penned tune that is all about letting the whiskey drown out all of a person's problems.
Roger Creager is up next with the rather humorous "The Everclear Song," that tells the story of a high school kid that is addicted to drinking Everclear and runs around spiking a girl's Dr. Pepper and knocks on her parent's door and leaves her in the yard, and then he put some on the watermelons at his church's picnic when they were saying grace. "They were singing hallelujah and Willie Nelson songs, preacher said it was the best dang picnic that the Baptists have ever thrown."
"Una Más Cerveza," by Tommy Alverson, is about a guy that drives down to Mexico, even though he did not know anything of the Spanish language. Once he got down there, though, he learned how to ask for a beer and so he thought that was enough, until he met a beautiful woman who did not know English and he ended up missing out on getting to really know her because he did not her language.
Adam Carroll lends his story-telling "Ol' Milwaukee's Best" to the collection. He lets all of the listeners know about his problems, like how his first wife left him for another woman, his second left him for another man, his third for his cousin, and fifth to his aunt, along with many others. No matter what, the thing that will always remain a constant is his constant flow of "Ol' Milwaukee's Best" beer.
The final song, my absolute favorite, has Kevin Fowler, Jason Boland, and Clay Blaker with Seth James taking turns singing Merle Haggard's "I Think I'll Just Stay Here & Drink." There is a real "Outlaw" feel to it, only instead of it being Willie and Waylon, it is the Texas Country style that I love so much. The guy's banter at the end of the song really enhances the track and Jason Boland saying, "Gentlemen, start your livers" is classic.
You do not have to live in Texas to enjoy this album, if you love Country Music at all I am sure that you will enjoy Brewed in Texas, and artists like Cory Morrow, Jerry Jeff Walker, Slaid Cleaves, Chris Wall, Rusty Wier, and more that have lent their songs and their voices to this album whose overall theme is what Country songs are said to be about ninety percent of the time - beer.
Song List:
Album cover, used with permission of Compadre Records.
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