Eric Congdon - Good Ol' Days

Hear The Track Here

I first met Eric Congdon over at MP3 Unsigned and it's nice to see that he's also made the move onto Soundclick, especially seeing as he is an Alternative Country artist because as far as I am concerned you can't get enough of them. I reviewed his Crawlin Back (December 2005) over on that site and liked it a great deal. So just to make sure we are clear about this I am talking about original American [i]country[/i] music here - not the Nashville bastard offspring laughingly referred to as country and western which - to my mind - is a wholly corporate construct. Real American country still wears dungarees for cripes sakes and rhinestones look damn silly on a pair of them, let me tell you.

So, it's already established that I like a good knees up (and a yeeeaahhhh to you too madam) and he's already given me one terrific track so the odds look good eh? I already mentioned when I reviewed that track that he could fit in well with Soundclick's Bob Gretz, Morris P Rainville and the Chairs and that's what I mean by real American folk music. There's some lovely acoustic guitar lead lines running through this tune ably aided and abetted by a solid banjo and an almost subliminal slide guitar. All in all, this is one of the best instrumental lineup to deliver complex, yet incredibly catchy tunes.

Such is the case in Good Ol' Days, a hearking back that is lively, bouncy and as fresh as a Georgia peach - or whatever it's North Carolina equivalent is. Probably grits, except grits couldn't possibly be described as fresh. Yucky and vomit inducing may be two words I'd apply to it. Anyway, where was I? Ah yes, transported to the Land of the Big Sky. Good Ol' Days carries a credibly authentic sound and glory of glorys it's a good song too. Again though I found myself wishing that this artist would publish his lyrics. For someone like me, reading it as I hear it makes a lot of difference to my perception of the song. In this particular case, it didn't matter anyway because within the first few bars I was out organising a line dance - a block long off your tits yeaaaahhhhhhhhh

Excellent American Country/Folk. Highly Recommended (but I'm a big fan of the genre)