Palo Duro Records

From Kathy Coleman

There are few artists in the history of country music who have had greater and more lasting influence than Buck Owens. This is true for all manner of west-coast country artists, as well as mainstream, whether people realize it or not. For nearly twenty years Buck Owens was an invited guest in a half-million or so American households every week as one of the hosts of the syndicated hillbilly sensation, Hee Haw!, and he wrote and sang some of the most enduring songs in country. The Derailers are here to show us all, through Buck’s music, just how true that is.

About the only complaint I have about this disc is that lead singer Brian Hofeldt, along with the rest of the Derailers (Ed Edkins, Scott Matthews, Sweet Basil McJagger, and Chris Schlotzhauer), sound almost too much like Buck Owens and the Buckaroos. This isn’t a bad thing, at least, not in my opinion - I love really close covers. But it is a truism that when a tribute comes this close to the original, you might as well listen to the original. Still, there’s a lot of love in these tracks, with some of Buck’s best and most well-known hits, such as “Foolin’ Around,” “I’ve Got A Tiger By The Tail,” and “Love’s Gonna Live Here.” Thirteen tracks (and the liner notes say there’s a bonus track, “Cajun Fiddle,” but it’s not really a “track,” per se, rather about a minute of fine fiddlin’ tacked onto the end of “Big in Vegas,” written by Buck). And I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love this. I really do… largely because I lack a lot of Buck in my own collection. In fact, the only way I’d love this disc more was if it included my favorite Buck song, “Made In Japan.” It’s also missing some of Buck’s fun, tongue-in-cheek humorous songs, and for some reason includes “Johnny B. Goode,” which Buck did record but was hardly a “Buck Owens Song,” and could have easily been sacrificed for something truly Owens-esque. Of course, I could make a long list about what’s not here - what’s important is what IS. More

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 8th, 2007 at 11:00 am and is filed under Derailers, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.