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Blue Kentucky Girl

Emmylou Harris - Blue Kentucky Girl Audio CD

A fair review of the Emmylou Harris "Blue Kentucky Girl" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Emmylou Harris reviews here, or go back to the Emmylou Harris tabs.

Band: Emmylou Harris
Title: Blue Kentucky Girl
Rating:

Release Date: 1990-10-25
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: Sister's Coming Home 2: Beneath Still Waters 3: Rough and Rocky 4: Hickory Wind 5: Save the Last Dance for Me 6: Sorrow in the Wind 7: They'll Never Take His Love from Me 8: Every Time You Leave 9: Blue Kentucky Girl 10: Even Cowgirls Get the Blues

a must have
Great songs including a number of classics, and great musicians as well. Emmylou at the top of her form. Any fan of Emmylou or Gram Parsons should have this album.

This album is a Treasure!
The songs always make me feel better, the harmony, the band, it all came together 100% on this album. This is one of those very special albums that we play over and over and never grow tired of. I only wish there were more like it! .

Beautiful, but not much variety in mood and tempo...
Emmy has made so many albums that it is natural to dislike some. This 1979 Emmy release was her most "country" up until that time, and while I am a "country" fan as well as an Emmy fan, this LP suffers just a little from having nearly all the tracks sound too much alike. . . I, for one, didn't care for "Wrecking Ball" and believe that "Angel Band" is superior. That must certainly be a minority view! I wanted to love this 2004 remaster with two bonus tracks, and I expected to love it as much as the previous reviewers. Somehow, I don't. I'll play it, but not really often. Perhaps I have heard too much of Emmy over too many decades, and have moved on in my tastes. I can't fault her singing or the accompaniment here. I suppose my problem is song selection more than anything else. Nothing on this CD really grabs my heart and compels me to hear it again soon. So it is competent, but not quite great. My first Emmy LP was "Profile", a compilation of her early hits, and I still think that is a fine collection. If you are new to Emmy Lou, I'd suggest starting with that one.

Emmylou at her absolute best
Ostensibly a departure from her first four country-rock albums and a move into pure country, that description is an oversimplification. If Emmylou had a single best recording, this might be it. The sound here is much like that on Emmylou's preceding four recordings, and there are moments of guitar, banjo, mandolin, and fiddle that have a bluegrass flavor you might expect to hear only on her "Roses in the Snow" album if you believed everything you read in music guides. What is distinctive about this recording is more the pure country song selection than any difference in instrumental style between this and her other albums. What makes it special to me is not that it is consistently excellent, which is the case for most of Emmylou's early albums, but that the level of excellence rises beyond that of most of those amazing recordings, partly due to the particularly well-chosen material and partly due to absolutely breathtaking performances of that material. She was in her best voice, and by now knew how to use it to milk every bit of emotion from each song.

As one reviewer noted below, this CD is worth the purchase price just for "Hickory Wind". This is the quintessential Gram Parsons song, and the most moving rendition of it imaginable. From earlier covers of his material to her country-rock opera based loosely on their relationship, "The Ballad of Sally Rose", Emmylou has paid tribute to her mentor. But here she does so eloquently not only with her remarkable version of this one great song, but in the way the entire album captures the sweet aching feel of country music that Parsons tried to bring to the Woodstock generation, young people much more interested in rock music but open to new ideas. Nowhere else in her discography does Emmylou perform this particular feat so very well. This is where she conveys Parsons' message with all her heart and soul.

Beyond "Hickory Wind", there are absolutely gorgeous versions of "Beneath Still Waters", "Sorrow In The Wind", "Everytime You Leave", and the title track. As others have written, of the many other recordings of the song, none stands up to Emmylou's version of "Save The Last Dance For Me". I'm not quite as fond of "Sister's Coming Home", "Rough and Rocky", or "They'll Never Take His Love From Me" as songs, but the performances are superb, and on any other early Emmylou album they'd have been among the best compositions - she just raised the bar so very high on this recording. At her finest here, she takes a mediocre Rodney Crowell song, loosely inspired by the then-trendy Tom Robbins book, and makes "Even Cowgirls Get The Blues" a rousing finale to a near-perfect album.

For anyone who is at all a fan of Emmylou's early years, this is bound to be a favorite. Many prefer "Roses In The Snow", and I have a soft spot for "Last Date", which perfectly captures the magic of her live shows of the early 80's. But even if you don't agree this is her absolute best, it's unlikely you'll think it's less than magnificent.

Convert someone to country...
Fans of rock likely know Harris by her amazing backing vocals on Bob Dylan's "Desire" or by her more recent recordings that are a bit misplaced in the country sections of CD stores. Emmylou Harris seems to be a name that everyone knows, but country music fans know the name intimately.

Country music used to be anathema to me (I was raised on classic and alternative rock, etc), but my mind finally opened, and this album is one of the reasons I'm glad it did. This is a country album - it's not crossover or experimental country or anything like that - it's pure electrified country. The first few twanging notes of "Sister's Coming Home" will tell any listener that. The highlights of the album tend to be more mellow in tempo: "Beneath Still Waters" is a haunting ballad (which I've also heard was a well-deserved country hit); "Hickory Wind" is another standout ballad that begins sparsely and treads on with little accompaniment apart from slide guitar and fiddle; it's one of the best songs on the album, and it sticks in the head (save a melancholy neuron for it). The most heartbreakingly beautiful ballad on the album is "Sorrow in the Wind" - the incredible harmonies dance up your spine and may induce wailing. Some of the songs are instantly recognizable (at least to some generations): "Save the Last Dance for Me" and "Everytime You Leave" are well-known country standards.

After hearing this album, it's now obvious why Emmylou Harris is such a well-known name. She has recorded some of the best country music available. Her reputation is well-deserved. It would take a very stubborn fan of rock to not warm up to this great album. Country music is the direct descendant of American folk music (rock is too, but not as directly), and the influence of early folk can even be heard on this album, regardless of the twangy electric guitars and drum kits. I never thought I'd say this, but thanks to this album I'm now a country music fan.

You can see a complete list of all Emmylou Harris discography, or go back to the Emmylou Harris tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.