| The 4-on-the-floor Country Shuffle as exemplified by Ray Price's version of Roger Miller's "Invitation to the Blues" or Johhny Paycheck's version of "A-11" is, in my opinion, a musical "Biological Imperative." The perfect combination of a quarter-note walking bass line with a "just behind the beat" snare on the two & four, the keening steel guitar of Jimmy Day or Buddy Emmons, twin fiddles with tons of reverb...It joins other primal musical statements (the opening bars of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, Bach's "Toccatta and Fuque in D Minor," Gene Krupa's solo in "Sing Sing Sing" from the 1938 Carnegie Hall concert, the Knack's "My Sharona" are but a few *) that reach beyond the scope of intellect, musical analysis, and even conscious thought into the realm of music that bypasses the brain and goes straight to the body, causing nerves and muscles to respond on their own. |
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