Gerry House

Gerry House spent many years inside the country-music establishment in Nashville, both as a songwriter of hits for big stars and as a popular radio deejay whose show frequently hosted many of those same big stars. In other words, he is perfectly situated to know all the juiciest gossip and behind-the-scenes details of what often seems more like a small town than a multi-billion dollar industry.

Alas, House is probably a little too closely associated with the movers and shakers in today's country music scene to write the kind of book that truly breaks new ground. Never mind not dishing the dirt; House barely has anything even slightly critical to say about anyone who is still alive. A couple of mildly scandalous stories are told as anonymous fables, and it wasn't even worth the time to try to figure out who they might be referring to.

I was also annoyed that he takes a swipe at the Americana genre (or, as I like to call it, country music that's too good to get played on the radio) by referring to artists in that genre as people who aren't good enough to get a record deal; in addition to being surprisingly mean-spirited for a guy in whose mouth butter seemingly wouldn't melt, he's just flat-out wrong. Those little digs made me think that House is well aware of the artistic deficiencies in today's brand of radio-friendly country music but you'll never get him to admit it, apparently. And that's a shame. A book that offered a thoughtful critique of the state of the genre wouldn't have had to slander anyone to make its points, and it would have been a heck of a lot more readable than this frothy mash note.

If you're interested in a truly insightful behind-the-scenes look at country music, I recommend Three Chords and the Truth: Hope, Heartbreak and Changing Fortunes in Nashville. It was published in 1997 but I think it holds up well. It's a good honest look at how the musical sausage gets made in Music City.… (meer)