Bob Weir: "George Jones is my favorite musician."

Dave Edmunds duetting with Country music royalty in the form of Carlene Carter. This song is found on Carlene’s Musical Shapes album, which was produced by Dave’s partner in the great band Rockpile. If I remember correctly Carlene and Nick were married at the time. After Nick she was with The Heartbreakers’ Howie Epstein. What a babe!

Dave and Nick are both huge Everly Brothers fans, and included a 7" EP containing their recordings of four songs by The Brothers with the first pressing of the Rockpile album, one of the greatest of the 1980's.

I’m delighted to find myself surrounded by like-minded music lovers!

@hifiguy42: Love Wayne Hancock! An old bandmate of mine (Paul Skelton) plays guitar on Wayne’s debut album, Thunderstorms And Neon Signs. Wayne made his appearance during the CD era (1995), but a couple of his albums are available on LP for you vinyl purists (I’m looking at you @slaw 😊). Let’s not forget to mention Hank Williams III, who covered one song from the album.

While I’m at it, let me bring to everyone’s attention a few other duo’s who make music featuring great 2-part harmonies in The Everly Brothers-style:

- I’ve already mentioned Larry Campbell & Teresa Williams, but they deserve to be re-mentioned. Great songs, great singing, great musicians.

- Another is the pairing of Australians Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson, who made two albums together (they were also married for a time). Kasey also has a buncha solo albums.

- Foster & Lloyd made their debut in the mid-80’s , part of the New Traditionalist movement that included Steve Earle, Randy Travis, Lyle Lovett, Marty Stuart, Ricky Skaggs, Rodney Crowell, Patty Loveless, George Strait, Clint Black, Keith Whitley, etc. They’ve made four albums together, spread out over time. Radney Foster is pure Country, Bill Lloyd more of a Power Pop practitioner. How the two ended up together I don’t know.

- I think everyone already knows about Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, right?

There are other artists who regularly employ 2-part harmony singing, none more so than Dave Edmunds. At first he harmonized with himself (via the luxury of multi-track tape recording), but once he hooked up with Nick Lowe the two became a great team.

The Everly Brothers were not only great harmony singers, but Don Everly was a master at playing acoustic rhythm guitar (on the custom Everly Brothers model Gibson, based on the fantastic J200, my favorite acoustic. Emmylou Harris likes it too.) Their recordings also feature the best of the Nashville studio musicians, as well as exceptionally good recorded sound. And they had their choice of the best songs, particularly those of the husband-wife writing team of Boudleaux and Felice Bryant.

No discussion of 2-part harmony singing is complete without mention of Paul McCartney and John Lennon. Though they based their early duo-style singing on that of The Everly Brothers (okay, they copied them 😊), the radically different textures of their two voices did not make for an ideal blend. Yeah I know, a minority opinion.

Feel free to add your own suggestions. You can’t have too much harmony singing!

@yogiboy: I have two copies of The Everly Brothers Songs Our Daddy Taught Us album on LP, but not an original. I have yet to find one of those, but have it in Rhino Records and Ace Records (UK) pressings.

I’m an Everlly Brothers fanatic, with twenty seven of their titles in my LP library (and six on CD), as well as four of Phils’ solo albums and one of Don’s (plus one on CD). The challenge in acquiring them is finding copies in VG+ or better condition. They were bought mostly by 1950’s and 60’s teenagers, who played them on a kiddie record player or stacked on an entertainment console record changer.

Sure @stringreen, though I think of him as Mr. DeMent. 😊

More of the Charlie Starr interview with Otis Gibbs. Amongst other topics, Charlie talks about the Starday Records era of George Jones. While on Starday, George was much more a Honky Tonk singer, recording "White Lightnin'"and "Why Baby Why". You gotta hear "She Thinks I Still Care", a killer song popularized by George.

I can understand that @stuartk. I'll bet it's because of the production by Billy Sherrill: too syrupy, with all those massed strings. George's earlier stuff, when he was on Starday Records, isn't like that. George even did some Rockabilly, under the name Thumper Jones!

Another great duo are Larry Campbell & Teresa Williams. They have made three albums together, one very recently. All are full of excellent music making of the highest caliber.

Larry served as Dylan’s road band leader, multi-instrumentalist (guitar, mandolin, pedal steel, fiddle, and banjo!), and harmony singer for 7-1/2 years, then went to work for Levon Helm, providing him with the same service. He also produced Levon’s two Grammy-winning albums, as well as those of other artists. If that wasn’t enough, Larry also works as a session musician, with many recordings to his credit. Not just Country and/or Singer-Songwriters, but even bands like The Black Crowes. A very, very talented guy.

Larry and Teresa are coming to Portland in November, so I’ll finally get to see and hear them live on stage!

Oh yeah, I forgot to include Steve Earle. Iris DeMent too! Another great duo, this one more recently, was (Radney) Foster & (Bill) Lloyd. I could have included Lucinda Williams, but I don't think she is really a Country singer. Same with Mary Gauthier.

Yep @hifiguy42, I figured so. I do have the Just Me And My Guitar album, on LP. The series of eight 2-LP chronologically-arranged Hank Williams compilations on Polydor are essential imo. 

I would like to add to your list Lefty Frizzell (a favorite of Merle Haggard, and singer of "Long Black Veil", a great song The Band included on their debut album), Buck Owens, Johnny Horton (as a kid I started my subscription to the Columbia Record Club with his Greatest Hits album), Johnny Cash (my Mom had his Ring Of Fire LP, which I wore out on our Magnavox console), The Louvin Brothers (if you like The Everly Brothers you’ll like them), Webb Pierce, Ray Price, Carl Smith (Carlene’s Pa), Tom T. Hall, Charlie Rich, Faron Young, Ricky Skaggs, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Vince Gill, Clint Black, Randy Travis, George Strait, Rodney Crowell (a great songwriter too), and Keith Whitley. Though categorized as Rock ’n’ Roll, The Everly Brothers have deep Hillbilly roots, and have made some purely Country Western albums.

And let’s not forget the gals: Wanda Jackson (a girlfriend of Elvis’, and a favorite with Rockabilly enthusiasts. I’ve seen her live!), Tammy Wynette (my personal favorite), Skeeter Davis (in the mid-80’s she did an album with NRBQ. She was at the time married to NRBQ bassist Joey Spampinato, who is Keith Richards’ favorite bass player.), Loretta Lynn, Kitty Wells (now THERE is a hillbilly!), Patsy Cline of course, Dolly Parton (when she isn’t pandering), Connie Smith (she’s married to Marty Stuart), Patty Loveless (I LOVE Patty!), Rhonda Vincent (also an excellent mandolin and fiddle player), Alison Krauss, Rosie Flores, and the Queen---Emmylou Harris!

The Grievous Angel album, being a various artists compilation, is a mixed bag. My feeling is that Gram was a much better songwriter than singer (he sings flat throughout his debut solo album. He’s much better on his second), so interpretations by other singers is fine with me.

By the way, I attended the Return To Sin City---a Tribute To Gram Parsons tribute show held at the Universal Amphitheater in 2004. It too was a mixed bag, the low point being the disgusting behaviour of Keith Richards, who was hanging all over poor Norah Jones, who looked horrified. He also sounded like sh*t. They sang "Love Hurts", a song thought by many to be a Parsons song. Nope, it was written by Boudleaux Bryant, and recorded and released in 1960 by The Everly Brothers. A FANTASTIC song! The Brothers version is considerably better than the cover by Gram and Emmylou.