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A Friend In California (album)
''A Friend in California'' is the forty-first studio album by American recording artist Merle Haggard with backing by The Strangers, released in 1986. Recording and composition Haggard produced the album with Ron "Snake" Reynolds. Most of the songs were written by Haggard and Freddy Powers, who had become one of Haggard's favorite writers during this period. ''A Friend in California'' boasts a re-energized-sounding Haggard performing several up-tempo numbers like "This Song is for You," "Silverthorn Mountain," and "I Had a Beautiful Time." He also plays off his own legend with "The Okie from Muskogee's Comin' Home" and the autobiographical "Mama's Prayer" which pays tribute to his late mother. Other noteworthy tracks is his bluesy take on the Floyd Tillman classic "This Cold War with You" and the obligatory western swing paean "Texas." Critical reception Music critic Robert Christgau wrote "Just when I decide he's gonna lay back forever he ambles into this. No Nippophobia, minim ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merle Haggard
Merle Ronald Haggard (April 6, 1937 – April 6, 2016) was an American country music singer, songwriter, guitarist, and fiddler. Haggard was born in Oildale, California, toward the end of the Great Depression. His childhood was troubled after the death of his father, and he was incarcerated several times in his youth. After being released from San Quentin State Prison in 1960, he managed to turn his life around and launch a successful country music career. He gained popularity with his songs about the working class that occasionally contained themes contrary to anti–Vietnam War sentiment of some popular music of the time. Between the 1960s and the 1980s, he had 38 number-one hits on the US country charts, several of which also made the ''Billboard'' all-genre singles chart. Haggard continued to release successful albums into the 2000s. He received many honors and awards for his music, including a Kennedy Center Honor (2010), a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (200 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Country Music
Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, old-time, and American folk music forms including Appalachian, Cajun, Creole, and the cowboy Western music styles of Hawaiian, New Mexico, Red Dirt, Tejano, and Texas country. Country music often consists of ballads and honky-tonk dance tunes with generally simple form, folk lyrics, and harmonies often accompanied by string instruments such as electric and acoustic guitars, steel guitars (such as pedal steels and dobros), banjos, and fiddles as well as harmonicas. Blues modes have been used extensively throughout its recorded history. The term ''country music'' gained popularity in the 1940s in preference to ''hillbilly music'', with "country music" being used today to describe many styles and subgenres. It came to encompas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Epic Records
Epic Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese conglomerate Sony. The label was founded predominantly as a jazz and classical music label in 1953, but later expanded its scope to include a more diverse range of genres, including pop, R&B, rock, and hip hop. History Beginnings Epic Records was launched in 1953 by the Columbia Records unit of CBS, for the purpose of marketing jazz, pop, and classical music that did not fit the theme of its more mainstream Columbia Records label. Initial classical music releases were from Philips Records which distributed Columbia product in Europe. Pop talent on co-owned Okeh Records were transferred to Epic which made Okeh a rhythm and blues label. Epic's bright-yellow, black, and blue logo became a familiar trademark for many jazz and classical releases. This has included such notables as the Berlin Philharmonic, Char ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amber Waves Of Grain
''Amber Waves of Grain'' is a live album by American country music artist Merle Haggard with backing by The Strangers, released in 1985. It was Haggard's third live album in four years and was recorded at the Hollywood Star Theater. It features a mix of Haggard's big hits and other, more obscure tracks. The title cut, written by Freddy Powers, is a paean to the American farmer, in keeping with the spirit of the Willie Nelson-spearheaded Farm Aid benefit, as does "Tulare Dust" and "The Farmer's Daughter." The LP peaked at number 25 on the ''Billboard'' country albums chart. Title The title comes from the line "For amber waves of grain," from the song "America the Beautiful". Critical reception Track listing #"Amber Waves of Grain" (Freddy Powers) – 3:49 #"Tulare Dust/ Mama Tried" (Merle Haggard) – 3:00 #"The Farmer's Daughter" (Haggard) – 2:51 #"The Okie from Muskogee's Comin' Home"(Haggard, Powers)/"Okie from Muskogee" (Haggard, Eddie Burris) – 3:44 #"Gone with the Wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Out Among The Stars (Merle Haggard Album)
''Out Among the Stars'' is the forty-second studio album by American recording artist Merle Haggard released on Epic Records in 1986. It reached number 15 on the ''Billboard'' country albums chart. It contains the song "My Life's Been Grand," which Merle wrote with Gordon Terry of The Strangers. Background ''Out Among the Stars'' features a plethora of producers and more of Haggard's increasingly sentimental and mellow sound. Aside from the Dixie blues of "Pennies from Heaven," the album is dominated by romantic and tearful ballads adorned with the smooth keyboards and processed guitars that were typical of Nashville recording at the time. The album was the result of songs consisting of left-over tracks from his days with MCA Records which were bought out by Epic and the reason many of the songs have a dated sound. The only newly recorded tracks appearing here are "Out Among The Stars", "The Show's Almost Over", and "Almost Persuaded". The single "Out Among the Stars" failed to c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
I Had A Beautiful Time
"I Had a Beautiful Time" is a song written and recorded by American country music artist Merle Haggard backed by The Strangers. It was released in January 1986 as the first single from the album '' A Friend in California''. The song reached number 5 on the ''Billboard'' Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart. Personnel *Merle Haggard– vocals, guitar, fiddle The Strangers: *Roy Nichols Roy Ernest Nichols (October 21, 1932 – July 3, 2001) was an American country music guitarist best known as the lead guitarist for Merle Haggard's band The Strangers for more than two decades. He was known for his guitar technique, a mix o ... – guitar * Norman Hamlet – steel guitar, dobro *Clint Strong – guitar *Mark Yeary – keyboards *Dennis Hromek – bass *Biff Adam – drums *Jimmy Belken – fiddle *Don Markham – trumpet, saxophone *Gary Church – trombone, trumpet Chart performance References 1986 singles 1986 songs Merle Haggard songs Songs written by Merle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Strangers (American Band)
The Strangers were an American country band that formed in 1966 in Bakersfield, California. They mainly served as the backup band for singer-songwriter Merle Haggard, who named them after his first hit single " (My Friends Are Gonna Be) Strangers". In addition to serving as his backing band, members of the Strangers also produced many of Haggard's records, sang lead vocals on select tracks, and co-wrote many of Haggard's songs with him, including the No. 1 singles, " Okie From Muskogee" and " I Always Get Lucky with You". From 1969 to 1973, they issued several records independent of Haggard, released on Capitol Records, and even had their own Top 10 hit single called " Street Singer" on the Billboard Hot Country Songs Chart. Three members of the Strangers would go on to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Between 1969 and 1987, the Strangers were voted Band of the Year by the Academy of Country Music eight times—more than any other group in history. History 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Floyd Tillman
Floyd Tillman (December 8, 1914 – August 22, 2003) was an American country musician who, in the 1930s and 1940s, helped create the Western swing and honky tonk genres. Tillman was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1984. Biography Early life He was born in Ryan, Oklahoma, United States, and grew up in the cotton-mill town of Post, Texas as a sharecropper's son. One of his early jobs was with Western Union as a telegraph operator. In the early 1930s, Tilman played mandolin and banjo at local dances and eventually took up the guitar. Musical career Tillman moved to San Antonio played lead guitar with Adolph Hofner, a Western swing bandleader, and soon developed into a songwriter and singer. He took a job with Houston pop bandleader Mack Clark in 1938, and played with Western swing groups fronted by Leon "Pappy" Selph and Cliff Bruner. He also worked with Ted Daffan, and singer and piano player Moon Mulli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the database was first made available on the Internet in 1994. AllMusic is owned by RhythmOne. History AllMusic was launched as All-Music Guide by Michael Erlewine, a "compulsive archivist, noted astrologer, Buddhist scholar and musician". He became interested in using computers for his astrological work in the mid-1970s and founded a software company, Matrix, in 1977. In the early 1990s, as CDs replaced LPs as the dominant format for recorded music, Erlewine purchased what he thought was a CD of early recordings by Little Richard. After buying it, he discovered it was a "flaccid latter-day rehash". Frustrated with the labeling, he researched using metadata to create a music guide. In 1990, in Big Rapids, Michigan, he founded ''All Music Guid ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Christgau
Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and later became an early proponent of musical movements such as hip hop, riot grrrl, and the import of African popular music in the West. Christgau spent 37 years as the chief music critic and senior editor for ''The Village Voice'', during which time he created and oversaw the annual Pazz & Jop critics poll. He has also covered popular music for ''Esquire'', '' Creem'', '' Newsday'', ''Playboy'', ''Rolling Stone'', '' Billboard'', NPR, ''Blender'', and '' MSN Music'', and was a visiting arts teacher at New York University. CNN senior writer Jamie Allen has called Christgau "the E. F. Hutton of the music world – when he talks, people listen." Christgau is best known for his terse, letter-graded capsule album reviews, composed in a co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Friend In California (song)
"A Friend in California" is a song written by Freddy Powers, and recorded by American country music artist Merle Haggard backed by The Strangers. It was released in May 1986 as the second single and title track from the album '' A Friend in California''. The song reached number 9 on the ''Billboard'' Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart. Personnel *Merle Haggard– vocals, guitar, fiddle The Strangers: *Roy Nichols Roy Ernest Nichols (October 21, 1932 – July 3, 2001) was an American country music guitarist best known as the lead guitarist for Merle Haggard's band The Strangers for more than two decades. He was known for his guitar technique, a mix o ... – guitar * Norman Hamlet – steel guitar, dobro *Clint Strong – guitar *Mark Yeary – keyboards *Dennis Hromek – bass *Biff Adam – drums *Jimmy Belken – fiddle *Don Markham – trumpet, saxophone *Gary Church – trombone, trumpet *Donna Faye Harman - Background Vocals Chart performance References ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roy Nichols
Roy Ernest Nichols (October 21, 1932 – July 3, 2001) was an American country music guitarist best known as the lead guitarist for Merle Haggard's band The Strangers for more than two decades. He was known for his guitar technique, a mix of fingerpicking and pedal steel-like bends, usually played on a Fender Telecaster electric guitar. Nichols is considered one of the founders of the country music subgenre the “Bakersfield Sound”, which includes such notable country artists as Haggard, Buck Owens, and Don Rich. Biography Roy Ernest Nichols was born in Chandler, Arizona, to Bruce and Lucille Nichols, as the first born of seven children. The Nichols family moved to Fresno, California, when he was two, where they owned a camp for migrant farm workers. Sometimes a traveling gypsy band would stay at the camp and the young Nichols would hide and watch them play. His father Bruce was also a musician, playing upright bass at local dances on the weekends in the San Joaqui ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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