VA - Dim Lights, Thick Smoke And Hillbilly Music 1948 (2008)

Germany's Bear Family is well known for its stellar box set reissues of country, rock, and rhythm & blues recordings, as well as for single titles by deserving if not necessarily remembered American artists. Their mastering, production, and packaging set the industry standard for excellence. The six-volume Dim Lights, Thick Smoke series was released on CD in December of 2008 and covered the years 1945-1950, a strange and wonderful time in country music history born from of the end of the War Department's restrictions on shellac and the end of the recording ban, all near the end of the second world war. These discs all contain either 27 or 28 tracks, and are lavishly annotated with historical essays and track by track annotation by the esteemed Colin Escott, and contain with photographs of performers and record sleeves where available. 1948 was a real transitional year in country music. This was the beginning of the period where Western swing had begun to fade, hillbilly boogie took to the center, and honky tonk as a style began to emerge. This volume in the Dim Lights, Thick Smoke series offers the first proof of that from the singles of the period. Performers like Bob Wills and Spade Cooley, who had been so prevalent on the first three volumes, are all but absent here ("Bubbles in My Beer" is included). We also see the emergence of Hawkshaw Hawkins, Johnny Bond, and Leon Payne as real players on the scene here. This is the year Payne's version of "Lost Highway" charted, and the original reading of "Bartender's Blues (by Bond) became ubiquitous on jukeboxes. Jimmy Work's "Tennessee Border," Jimmie Skinner's "Muleskinner's Blues," and T. Texas Tyler's "Deck of Cards," are indicative of the music being made and sold during the year. There are 28 tracks in all, and while the material here concentrates on uptempo numbers, there are a number of fine ballads as well, such as Eddie Hill's "You'll Call My Name," to select just one.