Chris LeDoux - Western Underground/Whatcha Gonna Do With A Cowboy/Under This Old Hat
BGO Records BGOCD1117
Chris LeDoux was a singing rodeo cowboy hunk. A one-time world champion bronco rider, he started playing music in his teens, while competing in rodeos and writing about his life on the circuit. His songs captured the romance, the freedom, the dirt and the hurt of rodeo and drew fans who demanded tapes of his songs. He had recorded 22 albums on his own when Garth Brooks mentioned his name in the lyrics of his debut hit, Much Too Young (To Feel This Damn Old). The immortal lines: ‘A worn-out tape of Chris LeDoux/Lonely women and bad booze/Seem to be the only friends I’ve left at all,’ transformed Chris LeDoux’s life from a struggling, near-bankrupt cowboy troubadour into a successful major star who went on to sell more than six million albums.
He was signed with Capitol Records Nashville in 1990 and here we have his first three major label albums, collected in this value-for-money two-CD set with extensive liner notes that not only detail the singer’s life and career, but also givehistorical background on previous cowboy singers Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and Tex Ritter. Chris LeDoux lived what he sang, from songs about rodeo stars—he was a world-champion bareback rider—to tunes about life under a big western sky much like the one hovering over his Wyoming ranch. His music always brimmed with a cowboy’s stamp of honesty. Though he only enjoyed one top ten country hit—1992’s Whatcha Gonna Do With A Cowboy, which featured Brooks on backing vocals—he was a popular live performer with a dynamic stage show that led to impressive album sales.
Each of these three albums are full of top-notch performances and first-rate songs, many of them penned by LeDoux himself. Amongst the many highlights I’d have to select the delightful Thank The Cowboy For The Ride, an Ed Bruce song previously recorded by Tammy Wynette. A song about a childhood romance that endures, LeDoux nails it perfectly. The arrangement is understated, letting the voice and lyrics shine through on this song of love and devotion. But the guy always loved to rock-and-roll, yet never straying too far from his cowboy roots. On Cadillac Ranch and Cowboys Like A Little Rock And Roll he sings with an exuberance and muscle that invoke a Springsteen/Mellencamp spirit of country music, emphasising fluid arrangements and a straight-ahead guitar attack. He explores all the problems and hardships of modern cowboy life in such songs as Making Ends Meet, in which a deserted wife is left to raise her family and a rancher is facing foreclosure. LeDoux’s voice has a wonderful, lived-in quality that makes the lyric all the more meaningful. This is quality, down-home country music with honest and believable western themes that in no way sound hick or dated.
www.bgo-records.com
Chris LeDoux was a singing rodeo cowboy hunk. A one-time world champion bronco rider, he started playing music in his teens, while competing in rodeos and writing about his life on the circuit. His songs captured the romance, the freedom, the dirt and the hurt of rodeo and drew fans who demanded tapes of his songs. He had recorded 22 albums on his own when Garth Brooks mentioned his name in the lyrics of his debut hit, Much Too Young (To Feel This Damn Old). The immortal lines: ‘A worn-out tape of Chris LeDoux/Lonely women and bad booze/Seem to be the only friends I’ve left at all,’ transformed Chris LeDoux’s life from a struggling, near-bankrupt cowboy troubadour into a successful major star who went on to sell more than six million albums.He was signed with Capitol Records Nashville in 1990 and here we have his first three major label albums, collected in this value-for-money two-CD set with extensive liner notes that not only detail the singer’s life and career, but also givehistorical background on previous cowboy singers Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and Tex Ritter. Chris LeDoux lived what he sang, from songs about rodeo stars—he was a world-champion bareback rider—to tunes about life under a big western sky much like the one hovering over his Wyoming ranch. His music always brimmed with a cowboy’s stamp of honesty. Though he only enjoyed one top ten country hit—1992’s Whatcha Gonna Do With A Cowboy, which featured Brooks on backing vocals—he was a popular live performer with a dynamic stage show that led to impressive album sales.
Each of these three albums are full of top-notch performances and first-rate songs, many of them penned by LeDoux himself. Amongst the many highlights I’d have to select the delightful Thank The Cowboy For The Ride, an Ed Bruce song previously recorded by Tammy Wynette. A song about a childhood romance that endures, LeDoux nails it perfectly. The arrangement is understated, letting the voice and lyrics shine through on this song of love and devotion. But the guy always loved to rock-and-roll, yet never straying too far from his cowboy roots. On Cadillac Ranch and Cowboys Like A Little Rock And Roll he sings with an exuberance and muscle that invoke a Springsteen/Mellencamp spirit of country music, emphasising fluid arrangements and a straight-ahead guitar attack. He explores all the problems and hardships of modern cowboy life in such songs as Making Ends Meet, in which a deserted wife is left to raise her family and a rancher is facing foreclosure. LeDoux’s voice has a wonderful, lived-in quality that makes the lyric all the more meaningful. This is quality, down-home country music with honest and believable western themes that in no way sound hick or dated.
www.bgo-records.com