It took me a while to come around to country music on the whole. Sure, I had some questionable dalliances with country artists in my youth. You would have found Oak Ridge Boys and Randy Travis tapes stacked in with my Duran Duran and Depeche Mode tapes. And my mother’s housework was often accompanied by Kenny, Dolly and Alabama when she wasn’t playing the Rolling Stones, Pat Benatar and the Pointer Sisters. But I soon became the kind of person who, when asked what kind of music she listened to, answered, “Almost everything… except country.”
Then, eventually, I was turned on to the country music of the 1940s and ’50s. Ernest Tubb, Hank Sr., Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash… you know the bunch I’m talking about.
On her second solo album, Down in the Barnyard, Rachel Brooke’s music hearkens back to this time in country music when the keys to success were a steady rhythm, a clear and honest voice and a good story. But, like myself – and like many of you reading this, Brooke has probably spent a little more time in her life cozied up to Joy Division than kicking back with Merle Haggard, and this adds a quirky edge to her songs. With her eyeliner, black bob haircut and murder ballads, she appeals just as well to goths as to lonesome cowboys. Had she been recording when I was discovering classic country, younger me would have wanted to be her. Hell, current me kind of wants to be her.
Check out a couple of her songs below, then check her out live.
Rachel Brooke – The Barnyard
Rachel Brooke – City of Shame
Rachel Brooke Official Website
