Rugged Stuff

The Dixie Chicks, Court Yard Hounds and Me

By R. Keith Rugg, 6-05-10

Yes, I know it’s been a wicked long time since I last posted here on Rugged Stuff.  Even so, it’s been a much longer time since the Dixie Chicks did anything with their musical careers.  But now they’re back, two of ‘em at least, so it seemed like a good time for me to make a comeback, too.

If you’re a newcomer to Rugged Stuff, or even just if you’re like me and your memory isn’t what it used to be, here’s the story so far- I liked the Dixie Chicks’ music, but didn’t like them bashing the U.S. president and I enjoyed their much-publicized spat with Toby Keith.  And at one point, after all of the dust had settled, I contrasted the Chicks’ resulting careers with Keith’s resulting career, and noted that while he had reported an annual income of $48 gazillion, the Chicks hadn’t done anything in the music field lately (and that their website sucked.)

And if you can believe it, the Chicks posting still gets hundreds of hits, while only about two or three people a month are still reading about Garth Brooks, George Strait and Dan Seals.

So now Emily Robison and Martie Maguire- the two Chicks who didn’t bash Bush live on stage- have come together as the Court Yard Hounds.  And just like the proverbial bad penny, here I am, too.

But before I review the album, let’s get one thing straight.  I was right.  (I usually am.) The Dixie Chicks music career was stopped.  Hibernating. In suspended animation.  On ice.  I don’t care what reasons their fans throw at me, ‘cause I didn’t say anything about reasons.  I just said that they were “off the radar,” and people went into a tizzy.  But here it is, straight from the horse’s (Hound’s) mouth.

Robison and Maguire could no sooner take an indefinite vacation from music than they could from being related. So as the mother band’s hiatus grew into a longer vacation than anyone originally anticipated, “dormant” began to equal “torment” for these two working musicians. The Dixie Chicks were last seen triumphing at the Grammys in early 2007…

Done and done.  Now, on to the disc.

***

Firstly, I’ve got to say, this disc starts off slow.  In fact, after waiting some three or four years for an album from these women, I was expecting something great.  But as the first track left me cold, and the second song failed to impress, and the third song wasn’t so special, I was thinking, “Holy cow!  I can’t write about this; people are just going to say I’ve got a grudge against the Chicks and that I can’t write an impartial review and I’m going to look like a big chump!”

Luckily, two things happened.  Some of the later tracks were better than the earlier ones.  And some of the earlier ones got better the more I listened to them.

If there’s one recurring theme to the disc, (other than what you might read into it, knowing that a lot of it is written by Emily Robison in the wake of her divorce), it’s that of ‘Simple and plain, growing into something more deep and complex.’ Sometimes the theme works, and sometimes it doesn’t.

The disc opens up with “Skyline.” Like I said, starts simple, with acoustic guitar, and eventually grows into something more.  My thoughts on this song were that it sounded under-produced, and that I would not have used it to open the album.  It’s nothing special and somewhat forgettable.  Its redeeming quality is that it showcases Robison’s voice.  Because no matter what you want to say about the Dixie Chicks or the Court Yard Hounds, you simply cannot deny that Emily Robison has an absolutely beautiful voice.

The thing is, this song was intentionally placed at this spot on the disc.

Rather than start off with a barnburner of an opener, it was Maguire’s suggestion that listeners be eased into the album with the subdued “Skyline,” which describes the inspiration Robison found just gazing at the view of San Antonio from her loft during a dark time. The song opens with just an acoustic guitar and Robison at her most tender, before a few soft drum rolls and Maguire’s lulling fiddle lead the ballad from the bitter into the sweet.

So it was done on purpose, but I think it was the wrong choice.

Coming up as the second track is “The Coast.” I didn’t much care for it at first, but it has really grown on me, and now it’s maybe my third or fourth favorite on the disc.  It’s lightweight, it’s light and frivolous, but that’s what it’s meant to be.  A good summertime song.

Number three is a more solid song, it starts simple and builds to complex, and I think I might have actually started the disc with this one.  Not a complete standout, but it’s more solid than the earlier songs, and it has the folksy twang to it that is more at the heart of this disc than is country music.  (Court Yard Hounds is not a country album, or like what the co-producer Jim Scott calls the Chick’s earlier “gee-wow country thing.”)

Song four, “See You in the Spring,” starts out, surprise surprise, with a guitar and a voice.  Not deep, not complex.  This is a duet with Jakob Dylan, starts out with the female, reply/echo with the male.  Listening to this song, I can’t help but call to mind “The Picture” duet by Kid Rock and Cheryl Crow.  (Which, by the way, I’ll admit is a good, decent country music song, even though I slammed on Kid Rock and the music industry for playing his “All Summer Long” on the country music radio stations…) This song, as you build up to more depth, is a decent and solid song for this disc.

And now here we go, a song that I don’t doubt is meant to be a big showpiece, Track 5 is “Ain’t No Son.” The official website calls it “…the fiery outrage of ‘Ain’t No Son,’ a rocker sung from the myopic point of view of an angry, unaccepting father.” It starts off real heavy with fiddle in a way that brings to mind a Celtic folk sound, and then lays the banjo in real hard, and it’s not a bad song, for what it is, a piece about a son coming out about being gay to his father.  I’ll just come right out and say it, because I don’t know how to sugarcoat it- Why are these two sisters performing this song?  Why are they singing these two male P.O.V.s?  Why isn’t this song being performed by a guy or guys?  Really.  Why?

Okay, now we get to songs six and seven, “Fairytale” and “I Miss You.” THIS is what I’ve been waiting for.  THESE are the songs that it’s been worthwhile to wait on for years.  “Fairytale” is nice, again it builds from simple to complex, but there is a purity to it that feels as if it reflects more studio attention, or something.  It is a killer showcase for Robison’s voice.  This song, I like.  Unlike some of the earlier tracks, the simplicity of this song is a strength, rather than a weakness.

(One picky little point… the lyrics go, “Every girl wants the fairytale, I guess I do, too.” Well, if every girls wants the fairytale, and if you are a girl, then you don’t have to guess, you’ve already stated it as a fact, you do.  If there was ever any doubt that you, too, wanted it, then the line should have been ‘Most every girl…’ or ‘Lots of girls…’ or something.  I KNOW this is a stupid picky point, and you can just cite poetic license, but it’s the line that opens AND closes the song, and it’s been bugging me from the very first time I heard it.  But if THAT’s my biggest problem with the song, well, then, yeah, it’s a pretty doggone good song.)

And “I Miss You” is the absolute best one on the album.  It’s my ultimate favorite.  I’ve mentioned before that this album is at heart more folk than it is country, and this song again brings to mind what I think of as New England folk music.  It’s got some twang, it’s haunting, and it again drives home the point that Emily Robison has a beautiful voice.  (I know, that assessment is getting a little bit old, but whatcha gonna do?) I can’t say enough about this song, I love it.
And some of the lyrics in “I Miss You” also caught my ear.  They have this to say about reading into the lyrics:

Some Court Yard Hounds listeners may be eager to put every lyric up to a magnifying glass… and it’s not necessarily a completely misguided impulse, given that the sisters have penned obviously deeply felt songs before, even when Natalie was singing them. It’s no secret that Robison’s divorce sparked a good part of the material, but the sisters do discourage anyone from reading the album as a diary.

But there’s a set of lines in this song that goes-

I, I can make a choice
To fade away or make a stand
And you gave me my voice
But being gone wasn’t in my plan

-and I can’t help but wonder if Emily and Martie are talking to Natalie Maines here.  Just wondering.

“Gracefully” is notable in that it was written by Martie and she sings lead on it.  It’s also got a touch more of the C&W sound to it.  It’s a good song, but it might have been better served with a little quicker beat… it’s a bit of a plodding piece.  But again, it’s good.
Number nine, “April’s Love” is a deceptive piece.  It’s easy to overlook, easy to forget about; until you hear it again.  Even as I was writing this review, it slipped my mind just how good it was, and that I actually rank it in my mind as perhaps tied with “Fairytale” as my second-favorite song on the album… or maybe even a notch above “Fairytale.”

On the other hand, “Then Again” ranks low.  Don’t care for it.  Could do without it.  Wait, on second thought, it’s not that bad.  Kinda catchy.  They call it “self-doubting feminine levity.” Maybe that’s why I’m waffling about it.

Track 11 is “It Didn’t Make a Sound,” is kinda jumpy, juke-joint jumpy, smoke-filled honky-tonky piano-plinking jumpy. Even though it’s a heartbreak song.  This is the song that I would have closed out the album with.  It’s kinda got a jam-session, no-clear-ending sound, goes kind of dinka-dinka-dinka-dada-dinka-dinka…dinka…dinka-dinka…dinka.  Dinka.

So when you get to the final track, “Fear of Wasted Time,” you’re already mentally done with the disc, and then you’ve got to sit through this song that’s nice, solid, mellow, time-passing, good-sounding, etc.  This song would be a good anchor for the album, say two-thirds of the way in, maybe third song from the end, but I think it’s a bit wasted to use it as the finale.

So there you have it.  The Dixie Chicks, the Court Yard Hounds and Me.  Let the games begin.

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