Customer Reviews

Come on Down to Texas for a While: Anthology 1969

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

 

 

This is a nice collection of Fromholz's work, but the sound quality is barely ok. If you are primarily interested in "Texas Trilogy," which has become something of a legend, I would recommend going for the book "Texas Trilogy : Life in a Small Texas Town" by Craig Hillis and photographer Bruce Jordan, which is a fine book in its own right and includes a CD of the song digitally re-mastered from the original tapes. And yup, I own both, and the version that comes with the book sounds much better.

This album contains the best of Steve's work from the first album until today. It includes rare cuts like 'Texas Trilogy' from the Frummox album. For those of us who grew up on Steve's albums, this is a homecoming. For those that missed the Texas music scene in the 70's, this will be a treat. The only thing that's missing is 'Dear Darcy', written for his daughter.

I don't know enough about this album's genre to be as insightful as some of the other reviews, so I will just lay it on the line: I was really disappointed by these songs. I thought they sounded quite dated, almost cheesey and kitschy. I bought the album because it was compared to that of Willis Alan Ramsey whose cd I have darn near worn out from overplay. It was also compared to Guy Clark who I really enjoy. But I find their songs' lyrics have made the journey over the past 30 years intact. Fromholz's by comparison seem gimmicky. Songs such as "Everybody's Goin' on the Road" and "Sweet Janey" are more silly than insightful.

One positive thing I can say about the album is that you get to trace some of the influences of modern acts such as Lyle Lovett through the song "Bears."

...that I had to order a CD all the way from Australia in order to get a great collection of Steve Fromholz music. The man was born and raised not 20 minutes from the house I grew up in and now I live in Austin TX. There are CDs available a little closer to home, but this is a great collection of one of the best singer/songwriters ever to come from TX, and definitely the best to ever reside in Bosque County. Texas Trilogy is the best song ever written about TX.

I have each of Steve Fromholz vinyl records, from the days of the Chequered Flag and second Kerrville Folk Festival, much worn from lots of plays. Finding a professional CD instead of making my own cuts out the scratches and preserves the memories. Great product, great price, great service.

I was living in Austin when this guy with the unlikely name of Frumholz hit the radio with his Texas Trilogy. The town was transfixed. Overnight everybody knew Mary and Billy Archer. Who was this guy? And what was he doing with that name? Ernest Tubb, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Dolly Parton, Porter Waggoner, Loretta Lynn, Charlie Pride, and ... Frumholz? And where were the cutsie-wootsie titles and lyrics. This was gritty stuff, like a depression-era Naturalist novel.

If you like CW music you have probably heard one of Frumholz's songs covered by somebody else, and even if you haven't you have probably heard the essential Frumholz, because the entire Outlaw movement followed his lead.

This album really is a treat. There is every kind of CW song on it and some that are in other districts. The music is still innovative even after 40 years. The fiddle purely drips anguish on one song and explodes in joy in another. The steel work is some of the best you will hear. Same for mouth organ.

You can pull this CD out every week or so and you will hear something you didn't before. And as for the "authenticity" of his songs: he starts one out, "In a bar in Arizona..." About the fifth time I listened to it I realized I'd not only been there but that it was where I met an old Indian who had an heirloom necklace decorated with a few "white man's trigger-finger bones." See what I mean about getting something new each time you listen?