Dwight Yoakam - Music Still Maters -

The music still matters to Dwight Yoakam



By ROBERT DiGIACOMO, For At the Shore

Posted: Thursday, January 7, 2010




Dwight Yoakam is preparing to release his first album of new material in five years. The singer’s last disc was a 2007 tribute to Buck Owens.


The album's still the thing for Dwight Yoakam. The veteran country singer and songwriter, who is preparing for a return to the studio, isn't ready to give up on the long-playing format yet.

"Albums are still albums - I take exception to folks saying they don't make albums anymore," says Yoakam, who performs at 9 p.m. Friday, Jan. 8, at Caesars Atlantic City.
"A record literally means a record of music. We're still making records and still making albums, if the individual artist working still merits it.

"If you're doing a bunch of filler ... people didn't want that when we were buying vinyl albums."
Yoakam, who during his long career has updated the traditional honky-tonk style of country without ever going pop, is prepping his first album of original material in five years. Giving shape to a collection of music is just as important to him now as it was when he made his critically acclaimed debut in 1986 with "Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc."

The Kentucky-native has since gone on to make more than a dozen studio albums, winning two Grammys and selling some 25 million albums in the process.

"I still believe it's not just turned into singles and downloads, and I don't think downloads are where it's going to end up," Yoakam says.
"I think streaming is the way all of us will (access music), not today or tomorrow, but it's moving more quickly that way than we think."

The new project follows a 2007 album of covers of songs written by Buck Owens, a purveyor of the so-called Bakersfield Sound that was popularized in the mid-1960s, and who was a major influence on Yoakam.

For Yoakam, "the raw succinctness" of the Bakersfield Sound has provided a link between the mountain music of the '20s and '30s and rock 'n' roll of the '60s and '70s.

"There are things about how Buck wrote [his] music that are still impacting me," Yoakam says. "It's the purity and simplicity of what he wrote.
"From '64 to '72, there was great pop rock and early country-rock. I produced that (Buck Owens cover) album myself. I think that affected how I approach the learning curve of what I do now."

That learning curve means Yoakam has cut back on his touring to mainly weekend shows, including his first Atlantic City appearance since 2005, to focus on songwriting and preproduction for the new release.

But not being on tour has made his recent shows that much more enjoyable.
"Standing there with a band - and not feeling the pressure of touring - it's almost a throwback to the frivolity of having fun with music for the sake of the fun in music," he says.
"Each night, I have a moment where I'm able to say to the audience thank you for coming out and spending the money on tickets, because I know it's tough.
"For that hour-and-a-half or two hours, let's just forget about everything else and have fun. And that's what I'm doing - I'm fortunate to be able to do it and have fun."

Source: http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/life/article_548420be-fb03-11de-928e-001cc4c03286.html