Ashton Shepherd: Keepin’ It Rural Where Country Grows

Look It Up

 Ashton Shepherd’s much-anticipated second album, Where Country Grows is released today, and is being celebrated with a super-duper deal from Best Buy, where you can buy it for only $7.99.

The Inky Jukebox wanted to check this out, so conducted a survey of her local Best Buys this morning. Not only did they not stock it, they had never heard of it. Huh. So The Inky Jukebox went to her local Target to see if they were trying to compete, and found that they only had one copy (surely the entire stock had not been bought by 10 AM?) for full price, and it was not even on the new releases rack.

RAM Country on Yahoo! Music

The Inky Jukebox was actually rather pleased by this outcome. Why? Because the temptation to buy the actual CD if it had been at either place, on sale, was too great to pass up. Instead, The Inky Jukebox traded in $12.99 worth of her iTunes reserve and bought the Deluxe Edition online. This version contains four extra songs, some of which are the best songs on the album. It’s also available as a Deluxe Edition download on Amazon for $13.98.

Saving several songs for a deluxe download makes a fan feel a bit cheated, if you really want to know. It goes along with the pre-release four-song EP many companies are putting out now; it used to be that if you bought a single or the EP, then you would not be charged for those tracks when you eventually bought the album they appear on; not no more. Now, if you buy the actual CD (always nice for the higher quality sound), you have to fork over $3.96 more for those online-only tracks. If The Inky Jukebox had indeed found it for $7.99 at Best Buy, that would have worked out at $11.95 (not including tax and gas money). Remember when CDs cost $19.99 and everyone complained? Well, it's inching back up there, y'all. 

Bottom Line: It’s better to take a big bite of that apple, y’all.

This only leaves the problem of what to have Ashton sign when The Inky Jukebox finally meets her. Hmmmm.

This record sounds more produced than her first, the sublime Sounds So Good, but that might be an illusion brought on by the three-year wait. If you like your country old-school, you will like this album; it is chock-full of decent up-beat foot-stompers and ballads. But while there are plenty of great songs (standouts include “Where Country Grows,” “While It Ain’t Rainin,’” “Rory’s Radio,” and “What If It Was”) there are no smack-you-upside-the-head jaw-droppers like — well, every single song on Sounds So Good.

Ashton Shepherd is the real deal; the girl can sing her ass off and gives it her all on each track. By all means, go out and buy Where Country Grows; The Inky Jukebox suspects it will grow on you. But don’t forget to pop Sounds So Good in your cart as well. 

Rolling Stone Loves Ashton Shepherd

It's A Bird! It's A Plane! No? It's Bacon!

Don’t look now y’all, but there is a giant hickory smoked spiral-sliced ham flapping its greasy wings right up there above the trees. What’s the occasion for such porcine shenanigans? The country-hating Rolling Stone has just published a decent-sized POSITIVE focus feature on Ashton Shepherd. They even provide the upcoming album’s title track “Where Country Grows” to listen to in its entirety for free! Awesome!

Check it out HERE!  

It seems oddly possible that they might actually like her. The Inky Jukebox’s jaw is still plastered to the floor. This from a publication whose list of the 100 Best Songs of the last 11 years includes Brad Paisley's "Alcohol" at #92, The Dixie Chicks' "Not Ready To Make Nice" at #77 (?), and Johnny Cash's "Hurt" at #15. The other 97 records consists entirely of songs by Radiohead. Not that there's anything inherently wrong with that, but if this is truly an all-genres list, why wasn't Tim McGraw's "Live Like You Were Dying" on there? WTF?

There is no justice in the world. We'll have to take all the flying pork we can get. 

Drinking Songs About Drinking

Make It A Stiff One

Ever since cavemen invented guitars and someone took a chance on that nasty fermented stuff swishing around at the bottom of a flask and discovered the twin  joys and perils of alcohol, music has served as a vehicle for sharing some of the lows experienced as a result of hitting the bottle. The woes of booze is a subject whose genesis has found a particularly rich history in country music, which has never shied away from songs that celebrate the many ways one can fuck up in life.

Putting together a list of Alcohol Blues is a difficult task because there are so many songs to choose from; one could compile a Top Ten from David Allen Coe and/or Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard and George Jones and Johnny Cash alone. OK, individually. Whiskey features prominently, as you’d expect, but so does Tequila, and let’s not forget George Jones’s “White Lightning.”

Therefore, The Inky Jukebox presents this list of ten Drinking Songs that you might have overlooked. The list has been narrowed down by these criteria: the song must be about something that has gone or will go badly wrong as a result of drinking, and it isn’t simply about beer. You could have a list about beer all by itself. Usually, though, songs about beer are happy and involve partying and having a good time at the bar with babes. Likewise, this list avoids, where possible, songs written about bars or being at a bar — there are plenty of those too. 

This is not a happy list. This is a cautionary tale.

• “Alcohol” – Brad Paisley

That being said, we’ll start with a humorous take from a song whose title needs no explanation. It’s an instant classic, and this video is a compilation from Paisley’s 2010 H2O tour, where the song proved to be a rowdy, raucous finale for an audience of very drunken people who have paid more than the price of admission for cheap beer and/or those hideous “frozen concoctions” that help one hang on. (To what? Not your dignity, that’s for sure. Ladies.)

• “Sometimes A Man Takes A Drink” – Trace Adkins

Trace Adkins sings this beautifully, but The Inky Jukebox can’t find him doing it on YouTube, so here is the song’s co-writer Larry Cordle doing it at a WSN event. All good country songwriting features juxtapositions; this song makes the most of a clever twist: “Sometimes a man takes a drink / but sometimes a drink takes a man.” So true, brother, so true.

• “Ten With A Two” – Kenny Chesney

Originally written by Willie Nelson (who let’s face it in the looks department, rates nearer two than ten), this version by Kenny Chesney punches it up with steel drums and swinging horn section that would probably make your head explode if you had the kind of hangover he indicates here. An homage to the danger of donning beer goggles, y’all.

• “Whiskey and You” – Tim McGraw (Chris Stapleton)

In country music, the reason men drink themselves silly is because of some woman. Either she left him or she won’t. Thus the poor chap ends up finding solace at the bottom of a bottle, which strangely enough, gives him the magical ability to compose those wonderful paradoxes. Here’s one of them: “I’ve got a problem but it ain’t like what you think / I drink ‘cause I’m lonesome, and lonesome ‘cause I drink.”

The best-known version of this song is by Tim McGraw, but that's just because he's such a superstar. It was written by Chris Stapleton, late of the bluegrass band The Steeldrivers. Here he is singing it the way only one who write it can. Absolutely beautiful.

• “High Cost of Living” – Jamey Johnson

Jamey Johnson knows from drinking yourself into a hole to chase a broken heart. He’s also a master of the twisted lyric: “The high cost of living / Ain’t nothing like the cost of living high.” The Inky Jukebox prefers this bit of live performance to the “official” video, which features some skanky-looking dude and a car and a girl etc.

• “This Bottle (In My Hand)” – David Allen Coe and George Jones

It’s David Allen Coe and George Jones, y'all. What more do you want? Drunken Squirrels?

• “Whiskey Won The Battle” – Ashton Shepherd

This song builds steam as it gathers energy like an incoming storm that tears to shreds everything around it. This is a fall-down-can’t-get-up drunk you know will hurt in the morning. Or for years.

• “Guilty” – Bonnie Raitt

Ain’t nothing like the sound of drunk-ass era Bonnie Raitt singing while drunk off her ass. The Inky Jukebox loves this live recording from some rowdy bar somewhere whose patrons that night got treated to an awesome rendition of a classic drowning-your-sorrows song. “It takes a whole lot of medicine darlin’ / For me to pretend that I’m somebody else.” Yep, Randy Newman wrote that, go figure. Sing it, sister.

• “You And Tequila” – Kenny Chesney and Grace Potter

Another by Chesney simply because this song’s video was just released today, and the video for it is oddly hot. Though the protagonist and his lady friend are hopeless drunks, they still manage not to spill those carafes of liquor as they stumble down hallways barely clothed.

• “Hair of the Dog” – Shooter Jennings

When you’ve “drank all night till the crack of dawn” like Shooter, you, too can wake up wishing you were “dead and gone.” On the other hand, you could wake up with the ability to sing like him, which wouldn’t hurt. The Inky Jukebox wonders if, with a name like “Shooter,” one is destined to live up to it?

* * * * * * *

Let's not forget these honorable mentions:

“Whiskey Lullaby” – Brad Paisley and Allison Krauss

“Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound” – Hank Williams Jr.

“Sunday Morning Coming Down” – Johnny Cash and Kris Kristofferson

“Wasted” – Carrie Underwood

“Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off” – Joe Nichols

Ashton Shepherd: A Country Woman

"From the red carpet to Walmart in the blink of an eye."

The Inky Jukebox's favorite quote of the day comes from Mr. Ashton Shepherd, Roland, who delivers this gem as part of his wife's new promo video.

Also delightful is Ashton's son James, who wants the viewers to know that he doesn't know how she manages to do it all with a music career and a husband and little'uns and all. He's going to be more impressed when he gets a brother or sister later this year AND his Mom is busy with the new record, Where Country Grows, which comes out July 12. If you ask us, it grows in Leroy, Alabama, in the Pickin' Shed, and right inside her.

She was recently voted one of GAC's most beautiful Moms. She wears it well, don't you think?

Ain't Nothing Like The Sound of Ashton Shepherd

Look It Up

Ashton Shepherd has just released the first single, “Look It Up," from her forthcoming second album to be released April 1st 2011.  

Who? You ask. Never heard of her. That’s OK. Ashton Shepherd is the best singer you’ve never heard of. But now you have, so there’s no excuse.

I have been eagerly awaiting the release of this record; her 2008 debut, Sounds So Good was an album rich with vibrant songs and powerhouse singing. Every song on it is a winner, and the ballads take your breath away.

But it wasn’t until I started looking up YouTube clips of her singing on the fly – at radio stations, in cafés, in the studio – that I really appreciated what an enormous talent she is. This gal can SING.

Maybe you’ve never heard of her because the native Alabama twang is thick, or because she has not been given the gift of a sweet spot on a major tour. In many of the videos you get to see the unaffected young mother simply running at the mouth in a way that more seasoned artists rarely do, and I must admit that this was the quality that I feared would get buried as and when she hit the big time.

Not to worry. The clip of her singing her new song to studio executives has plenty of that. I will not provide a link, however, because for some reason her guitar is out of tune and does her no justice.

Here’s the video of her new song instead. The new song is OK. It’s your typical song about cheating. Whatev. And, by the way, it sounds an awful lot like Eric Church’s “Smoke A Little Smoke.”

I won’t beat about the bush: girlfriend looks good in it, but the video is rubbish. Listen up, you folks who manage her: stop it. Stop trying to make the girl Hollywood. The video is asinine: are we to believe that this country girl with a thick accent dressed in a plaid shirt and (obviously brand new) designer flares lives in an LA suburb with tennis racquets and a goof for a husband? Oh COME ON. Here’s an idea: Simply film her singing. That’s enough. Take a lesson from her first video, the sublime “Sounds So Good.” (Compare this to a live version at a radio show.) No auto-tune there.

Here’s Ashton Shepherd doing what she does best. Do yourself a favor: Look it up.

Regular Joe

Whiskey Won The Battle

Takin' Off This Pain

Ashton Shepherd's Website