Cocaine & Rhinestones: The History of Country Music

BOOK NEWS: Signed Pre-Orders, Wayne White Art Giveaway & Sept. 14th Live Event in Nashville

Please select "BOOK" from the main menu on the C&R website for more info on any of these things.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Book Adaptation of Season 2

Season 2 has been adapted into a book from Simon & Schuster, available now

CR032/PH18 - Glenn

The end of one story is just the beginning of another.

CR031/PH17 - Choices: George Jones' Last Run

At least this whole story has a happy ending, right? Of course, whether or not that's true depends a lot on your personal definitions of both "happy ending" and "whole st

CR030/PH16 - Another Lonely Song: The Tammy Wynette & George Richey Story

Oh, you thought Jones had a hard time dealing with George Richey? Imagine being married to the guy. Today we say one of the saddest and most infuriating goodbyes we'll ev

CR029/PH15 - Hell Stays Open All Night Long: George Jones, Phase III

Oh, you're back to hear more things that will chill you to the bone? Then we can talk about what George Jones' life was like in the period leading up to and through the b

CR028/PH14 - Divorce/Death: He Stopped Loving Her Today, The Grand Tour & A Good Year for the Roses

It's a known fact that "He Stopped Loving Her Today" is the best and saddest country song of all time. But... is it?

CR027/PH13 - Billy Sherrill's Nashville Sound

What if the first serious opinions that millions of rock music fans formed about country music were based on a few massive errors which then got passed down to future gen

CR026/PH12 - Loved It Away: Tammy Wynette, On Her Own

Following her breakup with George Jones, many people had many questions for Tammy Wynette. Well, they had questions for George, too, but he was a little harder to get in

CR025/PH11 - Being Together: The George Jones & Tammy Wynette Story

Though they were married to each other for little more than five years, the legacies of George Jones and Tammy Wynette are forever inseparable. This is partly due to thei

CR024/PH10 - Stand by Your Man: The Anti-Feminist Manifesto

Tammy Wynette's "Stand by Your Man" is one of the most well-known recordings in the English language. It was also a plastic explosive detonated at a sea change moment in

CR023/PH09 - Loneliness Surrounds: Virginia Wynette Pugh

Country music is full of rags-to-riches stories, like the one about how Virginia Wynette Pugh became Tammy Wynette. In a way, it's true. Even after becoming the most succ

CR022/PH08 - Dallas Frazier: Can't Get There From Here

Some of the best songs you've ever heard were written by Dallas Frazier. Don't recognize the name? Don't worry. You'll remember it forever after this episode, especially

CR021/PH07 - Pappy Daily, Gene Pitney and How George Jones Came to Be on Musicor

This whole story began with a pinball machine and jukebox mogul in Texas jumping over to the independent record business of the 1950s. When he hitched his wagon to a Sing

CR020/PH06 - All to Pieces: George Jones, Phase II

In the early 1960s, George Jones had a huge hit record featuring such a phenomenal vocal performance it instantly turned him into a living legend. He didn't handle it wel

CR019/PH05 - Wandering Soul: George Jones, Starday Recording Artist

There are some personalities who would embrace being called The Greatest Country Singer Ever or, at least, settle into the role once it became clear the brand was eternal

CR018/PH04 - White Lightning

In North Carolina, way back in the hills, there's a centuries-old tradition of cooking illegal liquor. Whether you feel that's right or wrong, good or bad, may be determi

CR017/PH03 - The Nashville A Team

Now that we've established Owen Bradley as the single most important producer in the history of Nashville, let's take it further and acknowledge he's one of the most impo

CR016/PH02 – Owen Bradley's Nashville Sound

What if the first serious books about country music contained a few massive errors which were then repeated by nearly everyone who's since used those books as a source? H

CR015/PH01 - Starday Records: The Anti-Nashville Sound

The story of a little independent record label in Texas becoming "a force" in the Nashville country music industry brings an outsider's perspective to the anatomy of a ma