MAGGIE STOKES
Cunnamulla Girl
Three Rivers Hotel – Behind the Boundary
Gate – When The Rain Tumbles Down In July – Cunnamulla Dust Storm –
Channel Country Ground – Way Out West – Grandfather Johnson – Black Soil
Plains of the Outback – Let the Canefields Burn – Deadly Decline
Gate – When The Rain Tumbles Down In July – Cunnamulla Dust Storm –
Channel Country Ground – Way Out West – Grandfather Johnson – Black Soil
Plains of the Outback – Let the Canefields Burn – Deadly Decline
This must be international day for me to review CD’s. I
just did a super good one from Japan, and now we have one from
Australia, from an equally talented lady singer. Maggie is well know in
Australia, and this first song starts out with a 12-string guitar. How
could I not like that? This particular CD is devoted to Maggie’s dad,
John Joseph Carmody. She also has two originals on this CD, both of them
very interesting. She’s been singing since 2008, learned how to play
the guitar, and is trying her hand at songwriting, and I’d have to say
if these two are examples, she’s going to do just fine. She grew up in
Cunnamulla, which she so adequately describes in the song ‘Cunnamulla
Dust Storm.’ I find Australia’s traditional country music sound very
interesting and very easy to listen to. It has the same ‘story song’
approach that Hank Sasaki from Japan uses to actually ‘tell’ a story,
and in the case of both of these songwriters, they write about ‘real’
things, events, happenings, and feelings. Very unlike so-called country
music in America these days. Maggie is an attractive woman who has an
interesting voice, and she knows how to put ‘feeling’ in what she is
singing about. The ‘dust storms’ she writes about, must have been very
much like our own ‘Okie” experience. The Grapes of Wrath exist in
Australia too, and Maggie tells it like it is. She had a lot of help
from Malcolm Miller on this CD, and it is recorded, mixed, produced and
directed very well. I like the ‘lead guitar’ runs, very nice old-time
and traditional country sounding. Like Mr. Sasaki’s CD, I am
immediately sending this CD off to the Rural Roots Music Commission. I
know how difficult it must be to make arrangements to come to America,
and then find your way into the most agricultural state in the union to
join company with like-minded country music performers and fans, but
that is exactly what I hope Maggie Stokes might try to do. Call it a
vacation Maggie, a once in a lifetime opportunity to join forces with
equal-minded folks who dearly love what you are doing with your music.
just did a super good one from Japan, and now we have one from
Australia, from an equally talented lady singer. Maggie is well know in
Australia, and this first song starts out with a 12-string guitar. How
could I not like that? This particular CD is devoted to Maggie’s dad,
John Joseph Carmody. She also has two originals on this CD, both of them
very interesting. She’s been singing since 2008, learned how to play
the guitar, and is trying her hand at songwriting, and I’d have to say
if these two are examples, she’s going to do just fine. She grew up in
Cunnamulla, which she so adequately describes in the song ‘Cunnamulla
Dust Storm.’ I find Australia’s traditional country music sound very
interesting and very easy to listen to. It has the same ‘story song’
approach that Hank Sasaki from Japan uses to actually ‘tell’ a story,
and in the case of both of these songwriters, they write about ‘real’
things, events, happenings, and feelings. Very unlike so-called country
music in America these days. Maggie is an attractive woman who has an
interesting voice, and she knows how to put ‘feeling’ in what she is
singing about. The ‘dust storms’ she writes about, must have been very
much like our own ‘Okie” experience. The Grapes of Wrath exist in
Australia too, and Maggie tells it like it is. She had a lot of help
from Malcolm Miller on this CD, and it is recorded, mixed, produced and
directed very well. I like the ‘lead guitar’ runs, very nice old-time
and traditional country sounding. Like Mr. Sasaki’s CD, I am
immediately sending this CD off to the Rural Roots Music Commission. I
know how difficult it must be to make arrangements to come to America,
and then find your way into the most agricultural state in the union to
join company with like-minded country music performers and fans, but
that is exactly what I hope Maggie Stokes might try to do. Call it a
vacation Maggie, a once in a lifetime opportunity to join forces with
equal-minded folks who dearly love what you are doing with your music.
Maggie Stokes, P O Box 97, Allora Q 4362, Australia – maggiestokes@harboursat.com.au
REVIEW BY BOB EVERHART, NTCMA – www.ntcma.net
for Country Music News International Magazine