Jim Lauderdale
Jim Lauderdale’s conundrum is a timeless one. Though he’s no stranger to the country music charts, the fans know him only by proxy–his songs have been recorded by George Strait, Patty Loveless, Doug Supernaw, Vince Gill, Mark Chesnutt, Mandy Barnett, and Kelly Willis, among others. The closest Lauderdale has come to making himself famous was in 1989, when “Stay Out of My Arms,” a single from his aborted first album for Epic (and later a big hit for Strait), reached 86th.
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Back in the 60s an artist like Lauderdale wouldn’t have been anathema to country radio. There was room enough for the high gloss of Connie Smith, the modernist honky-tonk of Loretta Lynn, the cranky hillbilly strains of Merle Haggard, and the Bakersfield stomp of Buck Owens. Now idiosyncratic artists like Lauderdale, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, and Iris DeMent and even traditionalist newcomers like Dale Watson are held to the fringes. Eclectic country acts like the Mavericks and Dwight Yoakam rarely succeed at the same level as hokum peddlers like Shania Twain, Garth Brooks, and Neal McCoy. Country radio is the least adventurous of all radio formats, a true analogue to Christian Coalition values, and that makes a Jim Lauderdale a stinking liberal.
Lauderdale appeared on one of producer Pete Anderson’s mid-80s A Town South of Bakersfield compilations (the first of which launched Yoakam’s career), and before long returned to Nashville with a record contract. In 1987 Anderson produced his ominously titled Point of No Return; Epic released a couple of singles, including “Stay Out of My Arms,” but canned the album and dropped Lauderdale.
Lauderdale produced Persimmons himself, and for the resulting rawness he’s traded the sympathetic framework of Planet and Pretty Close. His glorious tunefulness isn’t buried, but it’s not accented to maximal effect either. Ultimately, though, it’s Upstart’s distance from Nashville, both geographically and stylistically, that guarantees the record’s death on country radio right out of the gate–and ultimately, that’s what’s driven Lauderdale, whose RCA debut is due next spring, back into the fold. While fellow alt-country types content themselves with success in the margins–Lucinda Williams on non-Nashville major American and Dale Watson on the wily indie Hightone–Lauderdale is still hell-bent on making Nashville see things his way.
