The record boasted an abundance of genre signifiers, from sludgy riffs and shapeless solos to frontman Hardy Morris’ strained, warbled yelps. While Dead Confederate’s alt-country leanings were audible in flourishes, the band seemed far more interested in kickstarting a grunge revival on their debut. Also worth noting: Young wrote the title track for Harris’ Wrecking Ball (released the same year). It’s worth noting, however, that a germ of this hybrid can be found on Neil Young’s similarly titled 1995 collaboration with Pearl Jam, Mirror Ball. (Obviously, the album has yet to spark the crossover trend Mincher predicted.) Club’s Chris Mincher as the birth of an exciting new sub-genre that merged alternative country with grunge. Just as critics were overeager in discrediting Welch, they were a tad premature in declaring Athens’ Dead Confederate a “next big thing.” Wrecking Ball, the band’s 2008 debut, was hailed by the A.V. “Wrecking Ball” is Welch’s reaction to Herrington: a rollicking, new-time song in which she describes her “sheltered life” with arduous detail. In a review of her 1998 album, Hell Among the Yearlings, City Pages’ Chris Herrington remarked, “Welch is someone who discovered old-time music in college and decided that her own sheltered life could never be worth writing about.” Like Bob Dylan and Uncle Tupelo before her, Welch was deemed “inauthentic” early in her career by critics who found the Los Angeles native’s rural themes and rustic stylings disingenuous. The song is a driving, electric rocker– miles divorced from the delicate, Appalachian lullabies that made her a Starbucks fixture. Though sonically, it’s the most “un-Welch” thing the singer has ever produced. The inclusion of all of this minutia helps paint a vivid self-portrait of Welch. We learn that she played bass under a pseudonym as a teen, attended college on a scholarship and drank a Jack and Coke one morning in San Joaquin. The song’s lyrics offer a chronological account of Welch’s formative years, with emphasis placed on very minor details. Seven years after the release of Harris’ record, a newly established Welch would end her 2003 album, Soul Journey, with an autobiographical tune also titled “Wrecking Ball.” One of the highlights on Harris’ Wrecking Ball is “Orphan Girl,” a track penned by an aspiring West Coast folksinger named Gillian Welch. Today, the record is widely regarded as a high-water mark for modern country and has impacted artists ranging from My Morning Jacket to Neko Case. Characterized by its dreamy tone and murky textures, Wrecking Ball sounded unlike anything else emerging from Nashville at the time. With the aid of producer Daniel Lanois and fellow country outsiders Steve Earle and Lucinda Williams, Harris crafted an atmospheric, reverb-laden masterpiece that would eventually net a Grammy for Best Contemporary Folk Album. “I’ve always had one foot in left field, so I just decided to plant the other one there.” “It’s pretty obvious to me that I’m not going to be played on country radio, so why not just go to that other place that I’ve always been, anyway?” Harris told the Chicago Tribune around the time of Wrecking Ball’s release. Furthermore, America’s regrettable obsession with line-dancing hit its peak during this time, leaving little room on country radio for the plaintive torch singers of yesteryear. Bubbly, easygoing, free-spirited: these firebrands bore little resemblance to their introspective and comparatively dignified predecessors. The mid-nineties marked a rough period for country’s elder stateswomen. Partly inspired by the singer’s growing estrangement from mainstream country, Harris underwent a stylistic deconstruction on Wrecking Ball- making her application of the term a decidedly literal one. It’s a tradition that began in 1995, when country legend Emmylou Harris employed the title on an album that would signify a major turning point in her career.
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