Customer Reviews

Cold Dog Soup

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What makes this wonderful album especially delightful is the way this son of Texas has turned his attention east toward Appalachia. You'll swear that Edgar Meyer was beside Guy Clark as he wrote these beautiful melodies. And I'll be damned if there are no cellos on this record; something is making those soulful, hollow sounds. On top of it all, Clark has written a pocketful of witty and clever lyrics. Guy Clark is an American treasure; Cold Dog Soup is another gem for the chest.

Guy Clark has got an old soul. He's not that much older than me; yet, listening to his songs is a lot like listening to my granddad. For instance, on the first listen to this collection of great songs, I found myself thinking, "How's that again?" or wondering "What the hell does THAT mean?" So, I'd go back and really LISTEN again, and it'd hit me! "Man, that's great; I mean, that's REALLY great!" I'm reminded of the Joni Mitchell line, "The times you impress me the most are the times that you don't try." Guy doesn't even seem to be trying; he just sings it the way it is, and it bowls me over every time! My favorite songs are Cold Dog Soup; Sis Draper; Ain't No Trouble To Me; Water Under the Bridge; Red River; and, Die Tryin', but all the songs get better with every listen! Verlon Thompson's guitar and Darrell Scott's mandolin provide excellent accompaniment for Guy without gettin' in the way of the words. Thanks, Guy, for another great CD!

Although this album sounds great thanks to his stellar sidemen, the songs lack the focus of Boats to Build or Old No. 1. The title track is razor sharp, but the album falls too often into fuzzy sentimentality (Sis Draper and Indian Head Penny)and ends up sounding too precious. The cover of Steve Earle's Ft. Worth Blues is solid if unexciting. The album comes off sounding less like a cohesive work and more like a one-off done with friends-- which has it's definite charms but this batch of songs just lacks the distinctive character and earthy bite of his earlier work (including the superior Dublin Blues.) Buy this one to complete the collection but, coming from a fan and slavish admirer, I think it's a little weak. The problem with being Guy Clark is that the bar is just so impossibly high.....

I think that this is Clark's best cd. Maybe his best songs are elsewhere, but all his studio records except this one gave the feeling that he was forced to get into the studio, to promote his live shows or his songs. For the first time he is relaxed and all the songs seems to flow from heaven to earth. Highly recommended for all lovers of singer songwriters and texas music, and great songs.

Because I do a folk music show on public radio, I listen to a lot of music. Some weeks, I receive more than 60 cds to preview to play on the air. Most of the time, I listen to them once. "Stone Dog Soup" is one that I want to hear again and again. Between Guy Clark's exquisite writing style, his exceptional musician friends, and his outstanding taste in choosing music that he hasn't written to interpret for the listeners, this cd is worth the price of admission. The wide range of styles--from the title cut to "Sis Draper"--brings Guy Clark alive into your living room or the cd player in your car. After hearing this one, it was difficult to move on to the many others I needed to preview. Now I'm buying two more for friends. This is, as they say in Texas, a good 'un. Make that a great 'un. Do your holiday shopping early, and put Guy Clark at the top of the list!

This is one of my favorite Guy Clark efforts. I love the marvellous mixture of the melancholic and the upbeat. Some highlights for me are the elegaic wistfulness of songs like Fort Worth Blues and Forever, for Always, for Certain. These lovely songs are nicely balanced by the energy displayed in such tunes as Sis Draper or Die Tryin'.
For me Guy Clark belong to that select band of singer/songwriters which include such luminaries as John Prine and Kris Kristofferson

This album grows like wild yesterdays and thinking about how it feels to get old. Like good homemade salsa or chile it is better the next day. The title cut is full of the self-same "hillbilly haiku" that has made Guy Clark a favorite since the first time I heard him at back in the 70s. Yeah man get up and rhyme and tell them how you feel and the ghosts of the poets may sing along. It seems a long way from Kerrville/Austin/Ft.Worth to the Mission District but cold dog soup and rainbow pie makes the trip a little easier for all of us.

For the Guy Clark initiated, Cold Dog Soup should meet and exceed all expectations. While the "how did he think of that?" song (Picasso's Mandolin, The Cape, etc.) has not jumped out after two listenings, the overall feel of the album is pure Guy. Perhaps sparser than his last couple of efforts in terms of instrumentation and production CDS makes me think he could sit right on my front porch and sound exactly like this (and wouldn't it be fun to have Emmylou there, too?).

For Guy Clark first-timers "Boats To Build", "The Craftsman" and his first album are better choices. Once you've worn those out you'll buy the rest anyway.

Guy Clark's country roots and West Texas idiom are so disarming that a casual listener might miss the sly literate quality of his songs. Who else gets away with talking about William Butler Yeats and Townes Van Zandt in the same breath? Clark has a poet's instincts and a sense of image unsurpassed by his contemporaries, most of whom are numbered among his admirers. And there is no finer side man around than Verlon Thompson, whose picking is as clean and fresh as a summer morning. God bless this music.

Guy Clark continues to show what great country music really is. In these days of Shania Twain and the like where country is really a form of pop with cowboy hats, here comes Guy Clark with "Cold Dog Soup" that reminds you that great music with poetry in the likes of Hank Williams,Merle Haggard Willy Nelson and Townes Van Zandt still gets recorded. This is the true stuff that makes you think and tap your feet at the same time. This is an incredible production! Great work Guy! From Fort Worth Blues a Steve Earl Song to Red River, man you oughta be proud! This should be on the charts! But with the current country scene forget it.. Oh yeah what a great line " Baby don't let um blow smoke up your dress...." Also if you haven't written the song, you really know how to choose someone elses material and make it yours.