{"id":3622,"date":"2012-01-25T12:01:01","date_gmt":"2012-01-25T18:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/?p=3622"},"modified":"2012-01-25T12:01:01","modified_gmt":"2012-01-25T18:01:01","slug":"hillbilly-highway-the-roadside-church-of-yoakam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2012\/01\/25\/hillbilly-highway-the-roadside-church-of-yoakam\/","title":{"rendered":"Hillbilly Highway – The Roadside Church of Yoakam"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

by Sheldon Birnie<\/strong><\/p>\n

Guitars. Cadillacs. Hillbilly Music. Four short words, and Dwight Yoakam lays out the prerogative of every would-be country crooner since the days of Hank Williams.<\/p>\n

A couple weeks back, I laid my relationship with the music of Garth Brooks<\/a> out to y\u2019all as something that was a long time coming, and \u2014 for a time \u2014 something of a guilty pleasure. Not so with Dwight. Sure, I was aware of his tunes a youngster. But when my brother played me a couple of Big D\u2019s tracks one night over some heady BC electric a few years back now, I became a Stone Cold convert to the Roadside Church of Yoakam.<\/p>\n

Now, Big D\u2019s style<\/a> isn\u2019t for everyone. His nasally yodel, his painted on denim and oversized Stetson; his penchant for the aforementioned guitars, Cadillacs, and unadulterated hillbilly music have deterred many, to be sure. Those who favour folk stylings over country and western aren\u2019t likely to spend too much time with Hillbilly Deluxe<\/em> or Buenes Noches from a Lonely Room,<\/em> but their loss is our gain, friends of Dwight.<\/p>\n

My best gal can\u2019t stand when I throw a Dwight LP on the spinner. In fact, I\u2019ve abandoned the practice if she\u2019s in the room. It\u2019s not worth trying to explain for the Nth time how his songs hit at the heart of the experience of every Podunk boy (or gal)<\/a> who yearned for the bright lights of the city, only to find the city full of scum bags and broken dreams.<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s not just the songwriting and masterful delivery that keeps me coming back for more. The high caliber of musicianship employed on all the Dwight LPs I\u2019ve got racked up at home blows my mind. The backbeat is perfect for any honkytonking you could ever dream up, and the guitar licks are some serious sick shit.<\/p>\n

Dwight\u2019s Bakersfield-inspired take on Hillbilly music set him perfectly apart from the bulk of his Nashville based brethren in the late 80s. And his keen understanding of LA glam is clear when you look at those pants the man somehow fit into in that era; a honky tonk version of what Motley Crue were doing at the same time.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Dwight has always worn his influences on his sleeve, particularly that of Buck Owens<\/a>. Nowhere is it better showcased than on their duet of \u201cStreets of Bakersfield\u201d <\/a>or the full length ode to ol\u2019 Buck Dwight Sings Buck<\/em>, featuring beauty covers of \u201cClose Up The Honky Tonks,\u201d<\/a> \u201cAct Naturally\u201d<\/a> and \u201cExcuse Me (I Think I\u2019ve Got a Hearthache).\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

Like Buck, Dwight is clearly fond of bright lights of Hollywood. Plenty of bizarre parts have come Yoakam\u2019s way since the 90s. My personal favourite is in Tommy Lee Jones\u2019 modern-Western<\/a> The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada<\/em>, where Dwight plays a sleazy-as-shit small town cop, comb over and all. Despite his bald head \u2014 covered by that 10 gallon Stetson most of the time \u2014 and his advancing years, Big D still has the ladies falling over themselves for him. Check out any country-fest he\u2019s headlining if you doubt that, pal.<\/p>\n

Like many bold flavours on the Hillbilly Highway, Dwight is one that \u2014 for some \u2014 comes with time. But if we\u2019re riding this Highway together for a spell, well, there better be some room for a side of two of Big D. To twist an old phrase from Kris Kristofferson<\/a> to make my point, \u201cIf you don\u2019t like Dwight Yoakam, honey, you can kiss me ass.\u201d Let\u2019s roll!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Sheldon Birnie Guitars. Cadillacs. Hillbilly Music. Four short words, and Dwight Yoakam lays out the prerogative of every would-be country crooner since the days of Hank Williams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[214,290,432],"class_list":["post-3622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-columns","tag-country-music","tag-dwight-yoakam","tag-hillbilly-highway"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3622\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}