Capital News, October 1985: Leading country guitarist BOB HOWE has been travelling the globe for the past twelve months casting, his critical gaze over the music business, and is currently touring the UK as MD for international singing star Frank Ifield. He now presents in the first of two reports, especially for Capital News, some of his impressions of the World-Wide CM scene.

When it comes to CM there is no doubt that America does it the biggest, even though their claim of being the best needs some qualification. Indeed, they produce the best original CM, but they also possess it in varying degrees of quality from the top down to substandard. The huge population difference between America and Australia creates a false impression as they produce such a wealth of brilliant material it becomes hard to conceive of them creating anything less

Nashville is the CM Mecca, ,and 19,100 registered believers crowded into the city during June of 1984 for the annual Fan Fair, a week long celebration of all that is CM, with an even greater crowd this year. They consumed over 16,000 pounds of fast food, and spent over $20,000 on souvenirs. At the official Fan Fair events alone, 600 CM artists provided 100 hours of CM, while most of all the other performing venues in the city added innumerably to that total. Over the entire week Nashville's economy was boosted by an estimated $4.7 million!

True testimony indeed to the commercial power of CM in America today. At the other end of the scale the local Nuns distributed hundreds of pounds of leftover chicken and barbecue lunches from the Fan Fair shows to the city missions, shelters, and poverty pockets.

BARBARA MANDRELL (prior to her car crash from which she is thank fully recovering well), signed an estimated 12,000 autographs at her newly opened museum complex and related shops which include a superfast photo processing store. This was easily one of the most used franchises by snap happy tourists displaying a photographic fervor equal to any Japanese tourist in an effort to take home a personal portrait of their favourite stars. Back at the Fan Fair booths, REBA McENTIRE was also suffering from, writer's cramp. During a light hearted moment she was heard to quip; "Boy, 1 wish 1 had a shorter name! That SYLVIA has got it made!"

The Grand Ole Opry no longer in the Ryman Auditorium but now part of the multi-million dollar Oryland complex, has become an anachronism in terms of the current CM scene, yet remains a perennial favourite with the tourists and hardcore fans, ensuring its continued success. With musical segments as short as fifteen minutes, interrupted by live commercials behind closed curtains, and presenting an array of performers rivalling Ronald Reagan in the antiquity stakes, the Opry makes no concessions to the modern world as the closely knit community of members struggle to preserve a mixture of sentimental nostalgia inside the new theatre. A must for hardcore fans, and a history lesson for others if only to illustrate why the outlaws had to move to Texas!

The nightclubs of the Printers' Alley are now upmarket cover charge venues named after various star owners and presenting mostly cabaret styled shows, while Tootsie's Orchid Bar and Lounge, is fading into a memory, much as the photographs that line its walls are fading to yellow.

The cowboys in Los Angeles are more the exception than the rule, but they do congregate in several areas, notably North Hollywood, home of the Little Nashville Club, Nudie's, the late costumiers' showplace for his rhinestone clad outfits, and the infamous Palomino Club. Once a breeding ground for the founders of country rock, the Palomino no longer caters exclusiveiv for CM.

The western sprit abounds in Las Vegas, where the hot winds blow the dust in from the Nevada desert, making the air-conditioned respite of the casinos as welcome as the Last Chance Saloon must have been to the pioneers of the west! Wild West styled gambling houses abound, while in the lounge of the El Rancho casino, Calamity Jayne (sic) and her Cowpunks perform redneck and outlaw music with just a touch more showbiz panache than artistic conviction.

To the North and the East Coast, CM becomes more of an oddity in market visibility terms yet, as on a nationwide level, it is not overlooked entirely by commercially aware radio stations who recognise that it moves towards filling the gap left by MOR (Middle of the Road), as AOR (Adult Orientated Rock) captures the mass record buying public. Indeed, as the bulk of the current Nashville Sound melts into musical saccharine and the Outlaws ponder old age and their bank balances, the true spirit of CM is being revived at the hands of artists like RICKY SKAGGS, EMMYLOU HARRIS, and THE JUDDS, all of whom retain credibility in the total music world without deliberately styling themselves crossover (c.f. the ultra-critical English rock rnagazine NME has recently run color features on Skaggs and The Judds). Touted rather prematurely as the 'next big thing', PSYCHOBILLY AND COWPUNK (..."don't call us cowpunks, I'm not a cow..."- Maria from Lone Justice) has yet to prove itself as more than a variation of the club-rock scene that has fallen into passing favor, although it can be hoped that the influence of the best of these bands, such as Jason and the Scorchers. Lone Justice, and Tex-Mex merchants Los Lobos, will help broaden the outlook of the young market and the music media in general.

That's the US impression of BOB HOWE. He's back in the UK preparing a screed for us on CM in Britain appearing in a forthcoming edition. He's presently working from home base of Wellingboough, Northants, England. - Cap Newsman.

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