Alan Jackson's Country, Right or Wrong

For some reason, I thought 2008 might be the year that country music helped articulate the Democrats’ Southern strategy. Guess I was wrong – for one thing, the Dems turned out not to have a Southern strategy. (Thanks, John Edwards!) Then John Rich, who not too long ago was explicitly circumventing the two-party system in “Love Train,” turned out to be music’s most sycophantic mouthpiece for certain corrupt and dangerous serial liars. Toby Keith’s embrace of Obama was admittedly unexpected good news, and it was stirring to hear Brooks & Dunn’s great “Only in America” after Obama’s convention speech (even if the duo’s not necessarily on his side). But none of this has really translated as new songs; my favorite politics moment of the country year is still Alan Jackson fondly remembering “Georgia boy just like me” Jimmy Carter in “1976.” Which doesn’t quite make up for "If Jesus Walked the World Today,” where Alan asserts that a modern-day Son of God would be a Chevy-driving hillbilly, and "preach in some little country church, outside the city." Wait, let me guess – he wouldn’t be a community organizer either, right? What bigoted bull. But at least it gives me a peg with which to deal with Jackson’s six-months-old Good Time album. (Neat how I did that, huh?)

First, some quick background: I’ve never been the world’s biggest Alan Jackson fan. The guy’s a cipher, fairly blank as country superstars go, though he’s had some real crafty hits, a few of which (“Chatahoochie,” the superb grass-roots-capitalism statement “Little Man”) can be found on his not-quite-definitive-enough 2007 16 Biggest Hits, but just as many of which (“The Talking Song Repair Blues,” “Drive [For Daddy Gene],” 9-11 memorial Where Were You [When the World Stopped Turning]”) can’t. His one great album, 2006’s Alison Krauss-produced Like Red on a Rose, was a major departure (almost a smoky-room vocal jazz-ballad record, its relaxed tone rooted somewhere between Hoagy Carmichael and Charlie Rich), and commercially a bit of a flop. Good Time is not nearly as good.

It’s also way too long – 17 songs. And "If Jesus Walked the Word Today" is, thankfully, the last of those. (By the way, the gospel choir at the end doesn’t make that number any less ignorant or arrogant. Though I guess it at least serves to imply that, if Jesus stays out of cities, it's not because he doesn't like black people. Good to know!) Before the end, there are a few high spots: “1976” makes me nostalgic for the Bicentennial just like it’s supposed to; “I Wish I Could Back Up” is an appropriately spare memory ballad; “When the Love Factor’s High” and the barrelhouse throbber “Nothing Left to Do” are genuinely sexy sex songs, the latter specifically about a married couple: after Alan and wife put on clean undies then drive to dinner then return home and watch a movie on TV while sharing half a bottle of rum then "get right down to it," what’s left?

On the other hand, the roteness of well-regarded country-chart-topping singles “Small Town Southern Man” and “Good Time” makes me shrug, as does forgettable Martina McBride duet "Never Loved Before.” "Long Long Way" has Alan trying to be a Bob Wills-type bandleader, directing a wanky sort of quasi-bluegrass-or-Western swing jam; kudos to him for trying, sure, but I prefer the song itself to its nowhere bass and drum solos. There’s also a sub-Buffett/Chesney beachcomber called "Laid Back n' Low Key" which I keep hearing as "Laid Back n' Roll Deep," which might have made it an accidental U.K. grime reference had it actually sounded grimey. And “Sissy's Song,” maudlin but stomachable, appears to be about some girl who died. And so on.

On the other other hand, "I Still Like Bologna" -- wherein Alan admits that all those newfangled digital innovations like big-screen TVs and music downloading and cellphones make life easier when he remembers to turn them on, but simple things like processed lunchmeat on white bread still do, too – is a cold cut almost worthy of old Jimmy Carter fan Tom T. Hall himself. I’ve personally never owned a cellphone myself, and I haven't eaten bologna (or baloney for that matter, with catsup or ketchup) on white bread for years, but that's fine. If Alan Jackson wants to be full of bologna, more power to him.