I picked up the Best of Bobby Bare, the poorly titled Razor and Tie/RCA
package of Bare's early to mid 1960s years with RCA, and mainly producer
Chet Adkins. On the whole, I was pretty disappointed. As a Bobby Bare fan
in his later years (Marie Lebeaux, Dropkick Me Jesus, that gorgeous duet
with Roseanne Cash, etc.), I never realized how sappy and pop-glopped his
60s output was. All those wonderful tunes -- Detroit City, Houston,
Miller's Cave -- ruined with Adkins' mega production. And don't dismiss
this as another kneejerk rant against strings, because, through the Jon
Weisberger/David Cantwell Re-Education Program I've attended for the past
couple of years, I've been able to finally appreciate pop production, a
la Roger Miller, Skeeter Davis. But in the case of Bobby Bare, whose tunes
are explicitly rural and working class-oriented, the glossy production
just doesn't work (for me). And I don't even mind the strings so much,
when used judiciously. But add those freaking jingle-like female choral
flourishes to the mix -- and they're added on just about every tune on the
record -- and it's bizarre. I realize the historical context of this sort
of thing, and its connection with the transition of country music from
rural to urban, but I just don't think it works. With most of those tunes,
I've heard them done later, without the glossy arrangements, and they've
sounded a lot better. The Streets of Baltimore, Miller's Cave, Houston,
etc. Finally, the record's last two cuts, they finally leave out some of
the gloss, and they sound great. Most of the clutter that comes between
the listener and the artist has been removed, which, of course, is the way
the good lord intended for this music to be listened to. (Last comment a
shameless provocation.)
On this issue, I guess, once again, I feel the way I felt back in the 70s
as a jazz fan, when CTI came out with a bunch of heavily arranged jazz
records by artists (Deodata, Hubbard, Airto, Turrentine), which may have
hit the jazz-pop target, but seemed to obscure the individual talents of
the players. Oops, getting off target and into rough waters. Dive, dive,
dive. -- Terry Smith
