This article by Mick Farren, David Redshaw and Chalkie Davies was first published in NME April 24, 1976, pp. 20-21.

Funtopia has posted this as a companion piece, if you like, to Mick Farren's later country & western article "Live From Nashville: A Limey At Large In Music City USA" originally published in NME, November 13 1976, and recently re-published (May 2003) in The Sound And The Fury :40Years Of Classic Rock Journalism - A Rock's Back Pages Reader:, edited by Barney Hoskyns.

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Orville Stetson, manufacturer of the world's most absurd hat would've creamed hisself at Easter week-end Wembley gargantuan hoot-in, where the LOst Tribes of Nashville gathered together to git down at the hoe-down. We sent Mick Farren (in his gunfighter suit), David Redshaw (in his Number 2 denims) and Chalkie Davies (in his disgusting green baseball boots) to slap leather at Hah Noon on Main Street, send them owlhoots to Boot Hill and get their copy and pics in on time. WHOOO-hah!

THERE WERE more Stetson hats than you could shake a stick at in Wembley last weekend.
   They crowded the pavements and mingled with the weekend shoppers like gangs of invading, but unnaturally orderly cowboys. Middle-aged couples in fringed jackets and Frye boots. Instamatics hung round their necks, strolled in the dusty spring sunshine. More sat in rows on just about every available low wall and wayside bench.
  You could be forgiven for thinking this horde had alt come in on a chartered Jumbo from Nashville, Tennessee.   You could be forgiven that is. until you catch their accents. Then it xxxxxCarl Perkinsxxxxxxxx becomes clear that they've actually come in on a chartered coach from Manchester.
   These are British country music enthusiasts, dressed in their best to celebrate their big weekend.
  There's something a little unnerving about hard core enthusiasts, especially the kind who feet the need to dress up to celebrate their particular obsession. Admittedly, they don't have quite the air of menace of say rockers, or the kind of Scottish football fans who dress up in kilts and silly hats and consume whisky by the pint.
  On the whole, they're a quiet orderly bunch, but they still have that kind of other worldliness that is the distinguishing mark of the dedicated fan.
  The place where whisky is being consumed by the pint is in the CBS records hospitality suite on the top floor of the Esso hotel, a modest ten storey cube that is a recent addition to the Stadium Empire pool fun complex.
  CBS have quite a stake in Saturday's part of the Country Music Festival. Tammy Wynette, their "first lady of country", is topping the bill. This would seem to merit a penthouse Suite overlooking the ugly sprawl of North London suburbia, slowly curling ham and cheese sandwiches, and masses and masses of alcohol.
  Simon, the CBS hospitality man, greets us warmly. The binge is hardly underway yet. A small group in one corner in executive casuals, and even L.A. tans, swap tales of
Tammy Wynette in excelsis...xxthe road. They could be any group of successful. international media hustlers, Only theirxtwanging, down-home accents mark them as big time good ol' boys, the ones who do the deals that oil the wheels that keep hillybillydom in the supertax bracket.
  Right now, they seem intent on oiling their own wheels. They are packing away the Johnnie Walker Black Label as though Scotland was burning.
  Somebody asks me if I'd like a drink: I smile politely and ask for a brandy and ice. I'm handed a tumbler, It's full almost to the top with a rich golden liquid. A single ice cube bobs about on the swell, It's all brandy. Could this be southern hospitality come to North London? The idea hasn't quite formulated itself, but later I will realise that booze and religion are the twin motifs of country and western. What you might call the yin and yang of Grand Ol' Oprey.
  David Redshaw, Chalkie Davies and I work out our approach to the gig. David is doing the bulk of the musical reportage, This leaves me free to soak up the atmosphere and concentrate on the
two big ladies at the show, Tammy and xxxxxxxxxxxx...and in curlers.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxWanda Jackson.
  Someone tells us that we ought to go down
and pick up our tickets. There's a minor rush to the door, Absentmindedly, I swallow the half tumbler full of brandy as though it was a Pepsi, It's only when I'm in the lift that I realise what I've done. I take a deep breath. This show could turn out to be rugged, but what the hell? What's a country festival unless it strains the machismo a little?
  One of the most delightful features of the festival is the exhibition. Those grim concrete areas below the side hem at the Empire Pool that, at most rock concerts, look like a act for "Riot In Cell Block Number Nine", have been converted into a noisy, bustling music affair. 'Record companies, stores. T-shirt badge and souvenir vendors are all making their pitch to the accompaniment of nasal vocal and whining pedal steel. They compete with the importers of boots, cowboy hats and the publishers of specialist magazines.
  Once we've got our tickets, passes and little press cards pinned to our lapels ("Hi. I'm Micky, fly me!"), we discover that things haven't really got underway in the arena. A listless, English carbon copy outfit is playing to a handful of people. The arena is not yet open to the public. David sticks around to see the opening of the show. The rest of us head back to hospitality.
  BACK ON THE tenth floor, Tammy Wynette is holding court. The only people sot pouring booze down themselves are Tammy and Anthea Joseph, the redoubtable CBS Artist Liaison trouble-shooter. Another toothglass of brandy is placed in my hand. Chalkie Davies seems to have become acting bartender.
  I join the ring of supplicants around Ms Wynette. You can immediately see why she carries the title
of First LadyxxxxxxNutt meets Farren. Farren meets Nutt. Did Nutt nut
of Country. xThe xxxxxxxx Farren? Did Farren nut Nutt? Are we going nuts?
people around her don't ask questions. She talks, and they flatter.
  Whatever you do, don't get the impression that Tammy Wynette is simply a somewhat mature Barbi doll held together by Pan Stic and hair spray. You might think it from a casual look at her photos, and album covers, but under the immaculate blonde coiffure and make-up is a shrewd and I suspect, very tough individual. Her eyes are sharp and intelligent and she is very much in control of the situation,
  I'm interested in finding out how the lady feels about her rather strange role as the emancipator of lonely housewives, but Tammy seems to talk about what Tammy wants to talk about. As I lower myself into an Esso hotel armchair the lady is recounting her horror at finding one of George Jones's daughters is to be a mother.
  "That makes me a step-Grandmother,"
  The conversation moves around children for a while and then progresses to a robbery at the Wynette home in Nashville.   "I was upstairs, while they were going throughout eh place. I could hear them moving around. I was scared, I can tell you. It wasn't only getting robbed. They spray-painted all this stuff over the walls."
  "What kind of stuff?"
  "You know. SMUT, TRASH. obscene stuff."
  "Nasty."
  "Yeah, I keep scan of Mace (nerve gas) around now."
  Another country lady offers some down home advice.
  "You want to get yourself a shotgun, honey You don't have to fire it, just pull back the hammer and any burglar's going to just take off."
  I make a mental note never to go housebreaking in Nashville.
  On the subject of ex-husband George Jones, Tammy is a little more forthright than her press releases.
  "We used to have these recording sessions. I'd have to tell him right out, 'If you're going to be drinkin', George, I ain't going to be going'." (As you'll notice, it's the motif again.) Another glass full of motif has been handed to me. It seems to be time to ask Tammy some questions before things get out of hand. In fact, they get out of hand faster than I expected. Wayne Nutt sits down in the group around the first lady.
  Wayne Null is from Texas, an oil rigger and singer/songwriter hewn out of similar rock to Johnny Cash. He isn't appearing on the show, but is down there soaking up the CBS hospitality and making his presence fell.
  Null is currently the company's great hope for a kind of North Sea Oil macho balladeer. You get the feeling that he thinks this party is an ideal place to promote himself.
  From what seems like out of nowhere he starts a discussion about what's "true country" and what isn't, with set piece asides to Ms. Wynette like ", . . and this lady here is true country, and that's why they call her the first lady of country music."
  Tammy looks like she's getting ready to leave. The conversation swings between the true country theme and how "ails man needs is the love of a good woman."
  Nutt does most of the talking, but the first lady does manage the occasional wry one liner.
  "It's great to stand by your man if you've got a man to stand by."
  The defining of "true country" goes on. Wayne Null doesn't seem to have a very high opinion of, among others, Emmylou Harris. Tammy is definitely going and I'm getting pissed off.
  "Don't you think these definitions are kind of redundant?"
  "You've got to have them. You've got lobe in one category or another."
  "When you've got Johnny Cash singing with Bob Dylan?"
  "Correction. Bob Dylan singing with Johnny Cash. Johnny just turned that boy on to country. If you heard real country, boy, it'd fry your hair."
  This is all getting too hostile. Tammy Wynette has gone and I seem to be the target for some kind of masculine display by Wayne Nuts. Despite his scarfaced muscle and blood frame, and publicised fondness for fistfights, I am not going to back down.
  "What about Elvis Presley? Doesn't he span a whole lot of categories? He's rock and roll. He took country and put a beat into it, but he's rock and roll." It doesn't sound as though Nutt appreciates either Elvis or rock and roll. I realise that the lady who suggested Tammy should get a shotgun is Mrs Null. She's telling a group of people behind me that "you shouldn't mess with Wayne when he's had a few vodkas."
  I lean back in my chair to consider the next move, and the damn thing falls over. As I get up from the floor Wayne Nutt seems delighted. He starts enthusiastically telling me that I'm real people. Falling over gets you accepted.
  Oh, strange are country ways.
  There was a time when Wanda Jackson was a creditable rock and roll singer. She sounded for all the world like Elvis Presley turned up 1045rpm. her cover of "Party" was somewhere between a curio and a little gem. Between then and now she discovered true country and true religion, and developed a style of somewhat bovine lamenting ballads.
  Up on stage she came on in what appeared to be a bright orange. Organdie Christmas tree. We were treated to a couple of the aforementioned laments, and then a high speed version of "Party" that must have lasted for all of 40 seconds.
  "Party" did a little to revive some of Wanda's past glory, but that was almost immediately destroyed by her inspiration hit, "Jesus Put A Yodel In My Soul."
  You have to hear it to believe it.
  A single mercy was that we were spared her five minute evangelical speech. Apparently she had done her god bit in the previous festival. Back. stage rumour claimed that Mervyn Cons had warned her personally not to repeat it.
  When Vernon Oxford made way for Tammy Wynette it was obvious that this was a vast section of the audience had been waiting for all evening. She made her triumphal entrance in regal splendour. In her long, white virginal dress, she appeared to glide rather than walk. There's something compelling about Tammy Wynette, and it's not exactly sex. Sex on it's own cat/I lift an audience the way she does. It's like it's the Queen singing, except Tammy Wynette has a hundred times the presence and power of H.M. Brenda.
  It's corn, that's for sure, but the lady manages to overcome the hick mythology and, without seeming to. get down and actually move the audience. Last lime I saw her, the P.A. left a lot lobe desired. At Wembley all worked perfectly. The climax, "Stand By Your Man", soared like an anthem up to the iron and glass roof.
  I went away unable lo absorb anything more. By some strange subconscious instinct I found a cab to take me home I  In the morning, the hangover was like something off a Johnny Cash album.
Mick Farren

DID FARREN realise what he had coming to him?
  "Does Wanda Jackson still do "Let's Have A Party"? he enquired innocently.
  Curling up the side of my mouth enigmatically I allowed him a fleeting glimpse of the torrid bayou beanfeast ahead.
  "She's into religion now," I lobbed casually.
  "Whaaat?" he roared, his Aleister Crowley cool disintegrating suddenly and frighteningly.
  And true to form Wanda sprung the spiritual on him.
  But the liveliest action on Saturday, the first night, was a confrontation in the CBS Wanda Jackson: I was a trim xxhospitality suite between said Farces,
youthful size eight until I xxx Great Beast of W. 11, and Wayne Nutt, a
discovered Jesus. xxxxxxxxxby-God oil rigging country singer.
  The resulting joust has already become Festival folklore.
  This is the fourth year I've covered Wembley and the old Deja vu's hit me this time.
  It may have had something to do with the fact that most journalists this year found themselves seated at the far extremity of Wembley. What an eye opener it turned out to be.
  My ticket would have cost me £3.25 and for that I would have had the privilege of witnessing: a bill of mostly run of the mill country acts at barely adequate volume and the whole thing being enacted a football field away. A comparable sensation would have been that of watching a reserve fixture from high up on the Stretford end.
  After two hours a check around my neighbours revealed that the older stalwarts were still attentive but that many of the younger fans were yawning and looking around.
  In the event the British acts did commendably well.
  British country artists generally perform at a competent level although there is much criticism currently of the fact that rarely do they write original material.
  Jeannie Denver, a Yorkshire lass who is gaining in popularity on the British circuit, opened the show and featured a neat version of a song she has made her own, Porter 'n' Dolly's "Jeannie's Afraid Of The Dark".
  1975 OppKnocks winners, The Frank Jennings Syndicate were well received. Jennings stoutly maintains professional standards, refusing to work the country pub circuits and cleaving instead to cabaret type clubs where, he says, you gel properly paid and get the chance of a crossover audience.
  This band is better heard at club level since they feature a lot of musical versatility but Jennings' OppKnocks winning song, "Heaven Is My Woman's Love" and the excellent fiddle playing of Drew Taylor contrived to get across.
  By contrast, Tex Withers is an untramelled beer cellar artist, and none the worse for it.
Withers is the proverbial trouper, no less; about 4ft tall, done up in red cowboy costume, speaking in a mid-Atlantic accent and hamming like a Buck Owens.
  Once you've got over that, he's fun to watch because he's nothing if not a projector, strutting the stage, twirling his cowboy hat and making to wind up the musicians. Also he's got probably the most authentic country voice this side of the Atlantic.
  Connie Smith, standard Nashville weepie artiste, honey blond and sporting a line in religious devotion swept on in a white gown. Her music sounds like that of a hundred others of her ilk, and is distinguished only by the religious plug (Connie was saved some years hack), and the dramatic rendition of "How Great Thou Art" from the fool of the stage. The sanctity of this moment was a cross between a "Ten Commandments" review clip and a Dorothy Squires curtain call.
  At this point I decide to make an assault on the honeyed climes of the "Special Enclosure", an oasis, stage left, where tables are available to write on, food and drink is available and the sound system actually makes its presence felt. Also, where po-faced religious pronouncements are met with yahoo industry guffaws instead of dutiful applause.
  Ironically, my wanderings have caused me to miss the evening's best' received act, Don Williams.
  Williams, once a member of the folky Pozo Seco singers, is Nashville's flavour of the moment.
BBC2's David Allan last year played a Williams single on the late night Closedown spot and received about 50 enquiries for the record, a phenomenal occurrence says Allan since hardly anyone is thought to listen to the Closedown.
  Williams' ABC album releases here no far have all revealed a deep rich voice with a down-home delivery, a sticking point somewhere between Charlie Rich and Kris Kristofferson.
  The man is pictured on the front of his album sleeves looking like a ranch hand. He appeared in London still looking like one and came on stage in the familiar stetson and denims.
  Which is just where his appeal lies. The audience perceive him to be one of their own, an unpretentious man who sings to them as he's actually in their living room.
  From what I heard of his long set (scrambling an I was twixt bleachers, bar and royal box) he wan playing a tasteful, if deliberately low-key, acoustic set, using only hit own guitar plus one other and bass. Thus he didn't feature the usual Nashville Sound backing of his records but his decision to keep things simple was obviously a welcome one, a salve for the program. med slickness of 70% of Wembley.
  The reception happens again for Jim and Jesse and the Virginia Boys, a bluegrass unit with a Grand Ol' Opry pedigree.
  Theirs is a pure mountain sound, delicately balanced and finely woven together. A little too finely perhaps because white it's easy on the ear tout in the Enclosure, those poor sods back where I was sitting half an hour ago must be straining to hear property.
  The deranged Farren has, I note, scored a prime position in the photographer's pit and is even now sitting slumped against the barrier, shouting for Wanda Jackson to do "Party". Boy, is he in for a surprise,.
SUNDAY.
IT'S BECOMING obvious that the more unorthodox acts are culling the most applause.
  Sunday night sees a succession of country ladies who are more or less forgettable.
  Jeannie Pruett makes a bit more impact. She's professional, has a straightforward country voice and scores with that standby weepie of hers, "Satin Sheets".
  There is, of course, Ms Dolly.
  All the ingredients of last year are apparent in abundance, only more so. More breathless rap, more fits of giggles, the back catalogue of selfpenned hits, the very ordinary backing band, the pink suit of unimaginable tahtness.
  The instrumental talents of fiddler Johnny Gimble and steel player Lloyd Green went down so well that the two immediately promised to do a tour later in the year. I'd spoken to Lloyd Green earlier in the day and he'd proved to be refreshingly open, speaking frankly about Nashville and its current musical changes and actually liking Altman's film. He'd felt that the events portrayed were not necessarily blown up and he rated Altman generally as a director.
  Surprise of the night was no less than "Little Arrows" man Leapy Lee!
  Camply showbiz in sharp white Suit and with a line in East End chirpiness that was a great relief from the applause-seeking bullshit of many of the Americans, Lee launched into a tight act that was nominally country but was aggressively punched home.
  Lee and his lively little band, The Stud, were possibly not as well received as they might have been. I don't think the Wembley audience is ready yet for the Steve Marriott of Country and British.
  In their respective ways, both Jimmy Payne and Red Sovine also stood out.
  Payne for his simple presentation and direct songs, and Sovine for being different - an authentic singer of truck songs who quaintly combines a short haircut and horn-rimmed glasses with a glitter c. & w. suit and pointed silver boots. After "Phantom 309" you can forget C. W. McCall.
  The bluegrass presentation of East Anglian act Pete Sayers went down well. Sayers is a popular figure on the British scene who does much to presenting country over here with the dignity it would hope for.
  Of course the showstopper was going to be Marty Robbins.
  Robbins didn't leave a stone unturned, from his exaggerated entrance right down to the pseudo-redneck piss-take of his imported Japanese steel player.
  He has an outrageous bragging routine which, coupled with a series of dramatic "gunfighter" songs, leaves the faithful clamouring and shouting. Building up to his hit songs, "My Woman, My Wife", "Streets Of Laredo" and "El Paso" he strutted the stage triumphantly, exciting, guitar aloft to the repeated "El Paso" riff.

MONDAY.
PHEW!
  After a slow Monday start the whole festival caught tight, and it was possible to pin it on one artist-La Buff.
  Kenny Johnson's Northwind, who hail from Liverpool, started the evening off neatly with a sort of neo-Eagles sound, only minus any steel guitar.
  Things continued in moderate vein with Dick Damron, Canadian singer/ writer, and Country Express, a Finnish country rock group.
  Then came the ever popular Country Gazette, back to what is really something of an original line-up, with Roger Bush, Roland White, Alan Munde and Kenny Wertz (who went in for a leather shop in California but found the call of the road too strong again).Gazette's music is wide ranging although of course it's all adapted to that impeccable modern bluegrass style of theirs. They mixed favourites like "Keep On Pushing" and "Swing Low Sweet Chariot" with newies such as Waylon's "Sure Didn't Take Him Long."
  Only problem on the horizon was the lack of a good resounding bass in the balance. Kenny Wertz claimed that the mikes were not of sufficient quality to pick up Roger Bush's upright bass without causing excess rumble.
  John Hartford, composer of "Gentle On My Mind" (which he didn't sing) came on and put up an amazing performance.
  Amazing because many people stilt don't know quite what to make of the humming, whispering, stamping on an amplified board and versatile display on various esoteric instruments (including voice) which passes for Hartford's show. Whatever, it went down well with the audience. Very well in fact. Like I said, the evening caught fire with Buffy, radiant in backless white number.
  The band's sound was really solid, Buffy's voice was all we had hoped for and she simply filled Wembley with joyous and emotional music-"Sweet America," "Soldier Blue,:' "Universal Soldier," and many more. She radiates warmth for her audience and for


Buffy Sainte-Marie: The mouth -bow is an instrument used xxthe first time in
by many primitive tribes.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx the whole festival I
felt genuinely moved by someone's music. Can we have a tour soon please?
  The Dillards followed and continued to stoke it up.xxxxx  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
  A good balance again, some finely and cleanly executed electric blue. gram and the audience stomping and hollering for more along the lines of "Redbone Hound," "Falling" and "Big Bayou." Rarely has country met rock with such zing.
  But it got better.
  Every rock n roller worth his sail knows how Carl Perkins nearly became the second Elvis of the Sun stable before he got badly injured in a car smash.
  Well here was the legend of rockabilly, looking healthier than ever, sporting a sharp line in early guitar hero suits and executing a few southern boogie steps to go with his ethnic Memphis hot licks.
  No one could believe their tuck. The old magic was all there, on Matchbox," "Bopping The Blues," 'Honey Don't" and "Blue Suede Shoes." There was really nothing more to say except that Perkins hopes to be back in September for a tour that for once in his journalistic life your reporter forgot his supposedly detached status and asked for an autograph.
  The Ozark Mountain Daredevils had the misfortune to close the show at a time when many people were making for the last train.
  After the fizz that had gone before, their undeniably impressive rock country style went down Just a little bit leaden.
  They come in on a note of high camp and continue with a heavier style of what the Dillards are doing. They are upfront, versatile, musically a bit different, and on their own show (coming soon) they should be great fun. But the audience was whacked, and along with the rest I wasn't really taking it all in.
  It remains to say that Mervyn Conn, after what at one stage looked like suspiciously odd programming for this third day, may have tapped a new source. There were still 5,000 people in the half-full Wembley on Monday and the bill was by no means strong as hell. People seemed to be accepting music for what it was - Andy Fairweather-Low went down very well indeed doing his usual programme of old favourites and material from "La Booga Booga."
  The first two days of orthodox country were, frankly, ordinary and my blood didn't start to run until Buffy arrived on stage on the Monday.
  At one point that day, when everyone; cowboys, families, freaks and plain ol' music fans were shouting and stomping to the Dillards, I got a tingle of something in the air. Dare I say there was a tiny smattering , a sorts kinda hint of Woodstock in the air? A Roots of American Music Appreciation Society.
  For me, it all came right in the end, and Mervyn, you may have something to build on.
  Go see Willie Nelson Friday, yall.