Comments on: Brad Paisley Celebrates First Father’s Day As A Father

By: Chris N.

Chris N. — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 14:48:30 +0000

If Sparks were attempting to sum up the opinion of the community of critics and historians as to the conventional-wisdom country canon, I’m sure “He Stopped Loving Her Today” would at least be in the Top 3. I don’t think that was his aim. Luckily, there are approximately 10 trillion other lists out there with “He Stopped Loving Her Today” at or near their top, so I’d say that’s pretty well covered already.

I happen to think “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” is Hank’s best song, but that’s probably because I’m a depressive. So everything’s subjective.

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 22:13:04 +0000

RE: Jack Sparks’ list.

In his opening paragraph, Sparks comments, “This is my 15th Annual post of the 100 Greatest Country Songs of All Time, starting with the first ten…”

In his blog’s archive, you can find his lists from previous years. There’s quite a bit of overlap in the songs from year to year, but he gets into greater detail as to his “intentions” for the list, which seem to be of issue here thus far, in some of the earlier installations of the list.

Obviously, any list of this sort is going to be subjective– surely David Cantwell and Bill Friscks-Warren would wonder where “Help Me Make it Through the Night” is– but I think the breadth of knowledge of and the respect for the genre he displays in his annual “Top 100″ list more than silences any doubts as to his credibility for including or not including any particular song.

But the point, of course, of any list like this is that it start a discussion (it must be a new development that his comments have been disabled) and he his unique point-of-view and his writing style both guarantee that will happen. I certainly hope he writes up the remainder.

By: Jim Malec

Jim Malec — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 21:33:50 +0000

Yeah, Matt, I agree…especially with the idea that it’s wrong to discount any era. Just because you may not personally like the styles of a certain period doesn’t mean you can disregard those styles and remove them from the genre!
I have a hard time lending credibility to any list like this that doesn’t outline the basis for its selections–why are these songs in the top ten? It looks like a “favorite” list to me, and that’s ok, but if that’s what it is that’s would it should be called.
And besides that, “best” is such a subjective term…I’d rather see something like this called, “The 100 Most Important Country Songs,” or “100 Most Notable..” — you get the idea.
This Top-10 is just bizarre.

And this quote:”The problem is that those with the talent are in the background, playing instruments and providing vocals to peacocks and peahens, who flash into the spotlight, make obscene amounts of money,” is just mind-bottling. I think most Nashville artists would like to know who, besides the top handful, are making obscene amounts of money.

By: Matt C.

Matt C. — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 19:45:50 +0000

Jack doesn’t have comments enabled on his site, so I’ll comment on his Top 10 here.

It’s very hard to argue about lists like these but I have a hard time lending credibility to any list of the top ten country songs of all time that does not include “He Stopped Loving Her Today.” This is just one of the notable omissions from Jack’s Top 10, but it’s the most glaring. Of course, he prefaces his list by stating that he doesn’t respect anything that’s come out of Nashville in the last 30 years, which includes “He Stopped Loving Her Today” and a lot of other great music. He’s simply refusing to consider about half of the genre’s history.

Besides, I have trouble swallowing the country purity argument when the Rolling Stones and Carl Perkins make the top 10.

“Loving Her Was Easier” is a bizarre choice. “Folsom Prison Blues” is, in my mind, one of the most overrated songs of all time, but it’s difficult to argue with. “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” is not even Hank Williams’ best song, let alone the best country song of all time, but again, it’s very difficult to argue against such undeniably excellent songs. The Willie Nelson medley is really a cop out. Each of the three songs featured in the medley could make the Top 100 on their own, so to say that a low-impact live medley of the three is the fifth-best country “song” of all time is a very strange choice.