I just bought a Charlie Feathers CD (His Complete King Recordings) and I love it. It’s only eight tracks, true, but it certainly gives me someone to look for in the future and it inspired this thread.
Why the hell isn’t Charlie Feathers, or any other non-Rock’n’Roll rockabilly, played on oldies radio? He’s certainly able to hold his own against Elvis and Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis, but they are all Rock’n’Roll pretty much by definition, given that they are always credited along with others with inventing the genre.
I’m certainly aware of how radio completely ignores specific acts. But this is something a bit more. This is ignoring a whole subgenre, and an important one at that. Rockabilly formed a bridge between country and bluegrass on one hand and R&B and gospel on the other, between hillbilly music and race records. I don’t need to mention the Rock’n’Roll acts that got their start in rockabilly.
Plus, of course, it’s damned fine music to anyone who enjoys old country from before it got ‘produced’ and old Rock’n’Roll from before it was Rock.
What gives?