ERNIE CONSTANCE
The Songs I Wrote For Slim
Things I See Around
Me – The Annual Rodeo Ball – Like A Family To Me – Fill Er’ Up – Saddle
Up And Ride – Just Can’t Miss It Mate – When The Currawongs Come Down –
Tonight The Woolshed Swings – A Dinkum Bushmans Hands – Joe Palmers
Ghost – Breakaway – The Bogong – Old Dingo – The Bush Has Had Enough –
Banjos Man – Three Hundred Horses – I Worship The Water He Walked On
Today’s my day to listen to ‘real’
music. From T.J. Casey, without a doubt one of Montana’s ‘real’
cowboys who still sings and writes his own great cowboy and country
western songs, to Ernie Constance who raises cattle in the Snowy
Mountains of New South Wales, Australia. I would hazard a guess that
‘real’ country and western music is more popular in foreign countries
than it is in the USA. Just plain good ‘country’ music is without a
doubt more popular in foreign countries than it is in the USA. Slim
Dusty, Australia’s most famous and most successful country music star
recorded well over 100 albums in his lifetime. That required a large
number of original songs, and this album by Ernie Constance, the
songwriter, provided 17 of those songs, the same songs Ernie is doing on
this album. Ernie is more than a songwriter, he’s a very good country
singer, even sounds a bit like Slim Dusty on this very well
done project. “Things I See Around Me” was the first song of Ernie’s
that Slim recorded. It is a ‘gem’ of writing. Ernie writes about the
typical things a man experiences in the ‘country.’ It is such a vastly
different lifestyle from those who live in the huge urban areas. It’s a
closer walk with Jesus, and it’s a more relaxed and easier life to
live. For this remarkable recording, Ernie gathered together some of the
musicians Slim Dusty used, so that makes it even more special. Ernie’s
enunciation is equally special, we can hear his songs, his stories, his
personality without strain. There’s even a couple of ‘truck-driver’
songs on this very well done CD, but mostly it’s about the things Ernie
sees around him, placing those experiences in rhyming patterns that make
for exceptional listening. This is another CD sent to me by the
Newfoundlander Michael T Wall, and I’m keeping it in my own private
collection, it’s great! But first, off it goes to the Rural Roots Music
Commission.
RECORD REVIEW BY BOB EVERHART – www.ntcma.net
for Country Music News International Magazine