Seeing And Hearing A Breakthrough Country Album

When is the last time you sat down and listened to a full album? Part of one? Maybe just the favorite songs cherry-picked? How often have you sat in one place for 61 or so minutes of music in the order determined by the artist? Probably not in a very long time.

On your most favorite albums (in my case, The Beatles), I bet you can name every track on the album and maybe do that in order? I can't remember everything about those days, but I remember it was "Taxman" followed by "Eleanor Rigby" on Revolver and "Sgt. Pepper" followed by "With A Little Help From My Friends."

These days we pick and choose and create lists. Buying a full album is not everybody's every-time musical experience.

This last week Brad Paisley unveiled his new project Love & War. I was still trying to process the album's many different musical moods and flavors when I saw his long-form Love & War visual album. Longform Music Video would be the classification in the Grammy world.

I saw it in full over the course of several days three times ... Two of those times in a theater with an audience. Several applause moments after the songs/videos "Today," "Love & War" and "Dying To See You Again." Applause during an album. Unusual.\

Listening to an album ... I mean seeing an album with others laughing ("Selfie," "One Beer Can") and some tears from those sitting near you. I've never had a musical experience like that. It's not a concert. It was music ... some familiar, mostly not ... that you saw/heard for the first time. It was emotional in every regard.

The styles of video ranged from animation on "Solar Powered Girl" to performances in front of a burned-out church, in a town square and inside the recording cabin of Johnny Cash. If you were one of those in the audience, it had to be one of your most unique musical experiences as well.

I'm still trying to process Brad Paisley's new album, Love & War. The album was a wide variety of tempos and styles. Some special guests like Mick Jagger and John Fogerty. The video intensifies and magnifies the music ... inducing tears and laughter ... applause ... open expression of your feelings.

How many times have you let music in the motion picture world take you into space and everywhere else? One or the other ... the film or the music they would be good ... together they are magical ... in another world altogether.

The song "Today" went to the top of the chart and the video for the song has 7.3 million views on You Tube. 7.3 million views in addition to the radio spins. A distraction or a compliment? Of course, it's a compliment.

For professional reasons at least, you have to take this Love & War ride. Seeing it in your home will probably not have the same effect as watching with an audience. But who knows? My first time was on a big TV screen with good home theater audio. I enjoyed it ... Seeing that visual album with a movie like audience was yet another feeling altogether. And what an unusual way to introduce new Country music!

LaLa Land ... Phantom of the Opera, Starlight Express are three of the times I couldn't wait to find the soundtracks. Saturday Night Fever, Urban Cowboy you can go one and on.

Marrying music and the visual is hardly earth-shaking ... It's been done in theater for centuries on screen for decades.

But no one has tried this in Country music for sure. (Beyonce took a shot with Formation on the pop side.)

Someone needs to save the album in general. The cherry-picking makes albums just a collection of singles. I guess that is a WAY, but some artists want to see their new work as a collection of their current art. Don't you think that's true about your favorite album? Hotel California?

This isn't the '60s or '70s ... We live in a Facetime, Facebook Live world. MTV in the '80s had the idea but it died out.

I can't wait to have someone on 16th Avenue take a shot at this. It can be done! A great album made better by a matching long-form video. Not just sitting on a stool and playing the album. Boring. Creating a visual partner for the music. Creating a ride. Really cool!