Charlie Daniels just keeps cranking out the music. While this is by no means my favorite CDB album they still put together some exellent music. American Rock and Roll is a tribute to Charlie's rock influences. Class of '63 is Tom Crain's contribution about his high school reunion. Taz wrote Ever Changing Lady not one of my favorites my him. This is a romantic love song i'd rather hear him wail. If you are a CDB fan and don't own this album you will enjoy it. If you are looking for your first CDB album skip this one and buy Million Mile Reflections.
...for the Charlie Daniels Band was that somewhere in the course of the mid to late 80's it didn't suit the pop/rock branches of the record label to have a cowboy hat-wearing band from Nashville signed to their ranks anymore. In the 70's it was cool beyond words to go to a rock concert with your jeans and t-shirt long-haired friends, fire up the ritual concert herb, and enjoy a bunch of guys with cowboy hats and boots tearing up the stage with Hammond B3's, screaming Gibson Les Pauls played through Marshall amps, two drummers, saxophones and FIDDLES! By the time the late 80's rolled around, it just wasn't cool anymore (at least to the record execs) and the pressure to "urbanize" was evident on the lackluster (and forgettable) "Powder Keg" release, replete with its back photo of the most UN-cowboy CDB ANYone will ever see. After this, Charlie and the boys were moved to the Nashville Country branch of the label and were marketed henceforth as a COUNTRY act, which was a smart move considering that by this time Country Music had finally caught up to what Charlie & Co. had been doing all along.
"Me & The Boys" was an album that was released in that drawn out transition period for the band, when still marketed as a rock act and, in my opinion, it is the last release that bore any resemblance to the CDB of the 70's (with maybe the exception of "Homesick Heroes"). Production was getting slicker and more industry uniform sounding, the mainstream pop country leanings were emerging but the SONGS were still there, and so was Tommy Crain and Fred Edwards - long standing members of the classic 70's line-up. In the music industry there always exists a state of morph and change. Maybe that is what Taz had in mind when he wrote and performed his "Ever Changing Lady" on this release?
There's plenty of fiddle fire: "Drinkin' My Baby Goodbye" and "Louisiana Fais Dodo", the stuff of Charlie legend. Then there are some great Americana/Roots/Heartland tunes that are very likeable: Title track "Me & The Boys" and "Talkin' To The Moon" (a very nice cover of a Don Henley song) and "American Farmer", a timely release in a period in which Willie Nelson's Farm Aid was launching.
I've always loved Taz DiGregorio's contributions in the past ("NYC Kingsize Rosewood Bed", "Roll Mississippi", "No POtion For The Pain", "Sugarhill Saturday Night"...Now we're talking Taz!) but "Ever Changing Lady" just simply does not come even close to being one of those songs. I also, with great difficulty, have to say the same thing about Tom Crain's "Class of '63" - it just isn't interesting and falls way short of what he does best ("Cumberland Mountain #9", "Tennessee", "Franklin Limestone", "Lonesome Boy From Dixie", "Blind Man"..Yes now we're talking Tommy Crain!).
The strong points of this release make it WELL worth the purchase if you can find it, as it is out-of-print and very pricey here on Amazon's community. Like I said, this one contains some of the last great traits of The Charlie Daniels Band - the Southern Rock outfit from Mt. Juliet, TN.
We need to get the word out that THIS NEEDS TO BE BACK IN PRINT! Heads up Acadia! TBird! Wounded Bird! and the rest of you really cool reissue labels with balls!
I have owned this album in cassette form and love. Charlie daniels is the best muscian over the span of his career. Every song on this album is just get up and dance to it.
If you ask me what Charlie Daniels Alumbs that I like it would have to be this one cause it's a great alumb and cd. But if you ask me to name my favorite song from that cd it would have to be the song talking to the moon not that the other's ain't good cause they are like the single American Farmer it deals with the plight of the farmers right here in America. But the reason i chose talking to the moon because Glenn Frey wrote it and done it. So buy the cd no matter if you love Charlie or if you like great songs. Rondall
