MIKE BEHNK – What A Way To Live

MIKE BEHNK – What A Way To Live
 

One More Drink – The House Down The Block –
Three Chord Country Song – Daddy’s Gone Crazy – What A Way To Live – Mr.
Recordman – I Never Pass There Anymore – I’ll Be Dropping Out of Sight –
Amanda – Undo The Right – Lonesome 77203 – Farewell Party – You’re
Stronger Than Me – Think I’ll Just Stay Here And Drink
 
     From the list of songs Mike Behnk picked for this
recording, it’s immediately apparent that he’s going to do some
‘classic’ country music from the git-go.  And he does.  Behnk is one of
those true-blue country vocalists who lives out in the great Sandhills
of Nebraska.  This is the kind of vocalist it takes today to do ‘real’
country music.  It’s necessary.  You have to grow up with it.  You have
to have experienced it.  You have to be committed and devoted. You have
to love it.  You have to be good enough at it to make a recording real,
not just for yourself, but for everyone that listens to it.  That’s what
Mike Behnk does with this remarkable ‘real country’ CD.  All of those
necessaries are what makes a country music CD.  These are the same
‘necessaries’ that are so very plainly and obviously missing in today’s
little rich kids that pretend to be country music stars.  Mike Behnk
might not ever see that ‘country music star’ status, quite simply
because he’s first off, not a pretender, and second off he doesn’t have
the million dollars the cute little ‘let’s pretend we’re country’
artists have today to make them stars.  One comparison listening to Mike
Behnk and any one of the top-ten today would put the two country music
styles in immediate contrast, totally.  And, it would immediately put
the listener onto what is ‘real country’ and what isn’t,’ and where is
it today?
     Mike is also smart enough to know that the trek to
Nashville, to record, might absolutely not give him the ‘real’ deal.
 Instead, he teamed up with Sharon Kenaston who is the producer of this
CD, as well as harmony vocals, drums, and bass fiddle.  Sharon is also
the master mind behind World Famous Records who put this project out. 
Sharon was also the deciding factor to put her husband Roger Kenaston on
lead guitar.  Add to that Dave Elifrits on rhythm guitar and Blaine
Garrelts on steel guitar and Kevin Blom on fiddle, and you have the
makings of a down-to-earth ‘real-deal’ country CD.
     Anyone who is wishing for, looking for, wondering
where it all went wrong with country music today, Mike Behnk should be
the number one stop on your shopping list.  You can also usually see him
in person at the Wahoo Country Music Festival in Nebraska that takes
place the last full weekend of June.  Not just Mike Behnk, but many of
the musicians that not only backed him on this recording, but also play
classic and traditional country music throughout the upper midwest.
     This CD has a lot of those famous ‘cryin’ in my beer’
songs that were so famous, not so long ago, and Mike Behnk has brought
them back to life in black tie and tuxedo style.  5-star thumbs up from
this reviewer.

BOB EVERHART

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