BRAD GOOD BAND

Dave Pilot
ALBUM REVIEW: THIRD GENERATION ONLY SON
Published on May 19th, 2014
Brad Good

Third Generation Only Son





Most times when a record comes through the mail slot, what it really entails is a collection of fairly recently written songs and maybe a cover or two that touched the composer’s heart and seemed to fit with the story he or she was trying to tell. So as a rule, what I wind up listening to really boils down to the last year or two in somebody’s life. Maybe it includes a nod to way back and the roots and memories that formed the writer, but still, even those were usually written not long ago and the reflection of who they are these days on their path to wherever they’re going is still pretty accurate.

None of that applies with Brad Good’s debut release. What’s here is a collection of stories put to song at widely varied points over the past two decades. Some of them were born when Good was a part of the nascent Red Dirt explosion in Stillwater. Back when Boland and McClure were just starting out. Brad was friends with, played with, worked with all of that crowd back then. Had the chops to stick with them, too, and be a part of it all.

Life happened, though, and as is so often the story, music went to the back burner for a while. A rather long while as it turned out. Good never put the guitar down completely, never stopped writing songs. But getting out and gigging, honing the craft in front of an audience and then after hours with peers? That stuff took a serious hiatus.

Now he’s back, and he’s released an album composed of some of the best of those songs written over the years. You’d think that means there’s no theme here, no easily defined sort of guardrails for a particular story the record might be intended to tell. But that’s not the case. The beating heart of Third Generation Only Son is the same heart that beats in every small town country boy who wants to get out and see the world on the other side of whatever hill is next. Good’s gift to us here is that while he climbed up some hills and fell down some others he managed to take notes with a songwriter’s heart and eye.



‘Round here we ain’t got a lot

But we earned every last penny that we got

Them kids all drive them Chevrolets

Aww, what I’d give to be seventeen

We grow cotton and we raise Cain

We spend our Sundays praying for rain…

Those lines, from “Round Here,” the current radio single, set the stage for an awful lot of what’s at the core of Brad Good’s music. Penned all the way back in 2001, the song paints a picture of small town America, its passions, and its angst in a manner Johnny Cougar would be proud of. Good’s voice has a big helping of Mellencamp’s rawness, by the way, and couples it with that sort of haunting, evocative timbre that Mike McClure’s possesses. Not a combination I would have thought of or looked for, but one I’m thoroughly glad found its way into my world. There’s a power and an authenticity underlying each lyric that is mighty difficult to deny.

Good can do good-time goofball fun (“The Trip Song”) in a way that makes every road run you made with your buddies back in the day come springing back to life. And when he turns to more serious and introspective topics, he can display a literary sensibility not commonly found in song. You wouldn’t expect an Oklahoma boy to understand much about Mother Ocean, but as noted above, Brad observes with a songwriter’s heart. In “A Sailor’s Tale” perhaps the wanderlust isn’t that of the small town country boy. But its siren’s call strikes the same chords as an old sailor born of the bayou tells his tale in a seaside dive.



We sat there as time went marching into the waves on the coast

And into the sky went that old man’s eyes

All the widowed brides he did toast

Here’s to all of those that have fallen

Here’s to all of those that have died

Here’s to all of those that have not returned

Here’s to all of those that have cried



He said I’ve seen the world through a looking glass

And I’ve seen the fire in the sky

I have seen men make it past and I have seen men die

From the Southern Cross to the Northern Lights, and everywhere in between

These are the things that I have seen as I have sailed the seas….

Ultimately what’s here is a record with a satisfying, at times quite crunchy, full band sound that can rock and console as required by each song. All overlaid with the handiwork of an artist who is much more lyricist than simply a writer. Given the album’s genesis, frankly, it probably shouldn’t work. Go find somebody else who just penned some songs here and there for twenty years and didn’t do anything with them. At a minimum, you’d expect a huge disparity in maturity of the content. But that’s not at all how it plays out here. Themes both complex and simple are explored in thoughtful fashion, and every single song plays well wherever you queue it up.

It will be intriguing to see what else Good has in store. He’s back to performing on a regular basis these days, back into the life of a musician. Part of me wonders what would have been if life had not intruded and we were talking here about his tenth release rather than his first. My gut says we might be including his names with those of the greats from the early days of the Red Dirt road, and that it might be near impossible to catch him at a solo acoustic show somewhere. The rest of me is just glad that he’s back at it now. It’ll be interesting to see what Good has in the tank. For the moment, these songs from the past two decades have been newly recorded and expertly delivered. Each of them has a story to tell, and I think you’ll find that they strike some very deep chords within your breast. For now, that’s more than enough.

Find Brad on ReverbNation, where you can purchase some singles if the urge strikes. And pester him on Facebook to see where you can get a copy of the full CD.



Dave Pilot lives in north Texas with his first good wife (don’t ask about the other one), seven horses, and five dogs. When his wife’s not looking, he tries to figure out ways to feed the 987 or so cats to the coyotes out behind the fenceline. When he’s not trying to raise his kids to turn out better than he did, he’s hitting historical sites on his way to honky-tonks from Denton to Port Aransas. Visit Dave Pilot on Facebook.

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www.OutlawMagazine.com - — Dave Pilot, Outlaw Magazine

Apache native Brad Good is nominated for a Texas Music Award as a “Rising Star,” and your vote can help him reach that honor. Good, now based in McKinney,Texas, still returns to the local stages frequently to perform. He is riding a swell of growing respect for his 2013 release, “Third Generation Son.”
Apache Native Nominee For Texas Music Award
Thu, 02/06/2014 - 11:41pm Scott Rains
An Apache-born musician is making "good" on the promise of his 2013 release, "Third Generation Son," and the "ears of Texas" have taken notice.
Country singer/songwriter Brad Good is a nominee for the 12th Annual Texas Music Awards "Rising Star" ballot. Now based out of McKinney, Texas, Good has been playing as many stages on either side of the Red River he can. The hard work has paid off.
"We're really proud of the product we're putting on stage," Good said. "We're making progress and having a blast."
Good is nominated along with Julia Beers, Emily Grace Berry, Troy Cartwright, Kenny Harrell, Cody Joe Hodges, Jeremy Phifer, Heather Roberts, Wally West & Them, and the Zach Seth Band. Winners are selected via online voting and you have until midnight Sunday to help out the local singer. You can cast ballots at www.texasmusicawards.org as well as on the event's Facebook page.
"This is such an exciting time for the Texas music-loving public and the musicians who create that music," said Lucky Boyd, president of the Academy of Texas Music Inc. "Being able to reach an unlimited number of fans around the globe was quite a thrill, and being able to personally watch the responses from Facebook visitors was exceptional."
The awards show, which will be March 22 at The Texas Music Barn, the venue inside the World Headquarters of the Academy of Texas Music Inc., 301 E. Houston in Linden, Texas, is presented by MyTexasMusic.com, the retail partner of the Texas Music Awards and the show's production company, Payline Productions.
The annual event is a fundraiser for the nonprofit Academy of Texas Music Inc. which seeks sponsorships and donations to help fund music education programs, scholarships, recognition projects and benevolence programs for musicians in need.
Jinelle Boyd, producer of the Texas Music Awards, said the awards offer a lot to the nominees, not just the winners.
"These outstanding artists need something to bring them recognition for their regional success and help them gain the national attention they deserve," Boyd said. "Even though some of our nominees are already quite popular in the music world, the Texas Music Awards serve to give many of the newer artists a stepping stone to bigger and better things."
Good recorded the eponymous release with musicians Matt Gaskins, Milo Deering and Raegan Felker, as well as guitarist Daniel Hines from the Dallas band Left Arm Tan. His storytelling style speaks volumes for any of us growing up in Oklahoma. Connected firmly with his roots, Good will still be telling Oklahoma stories whether he's in Timbuktu or Tucson.
By being nominated for the Texas Music Award, Good said he already feels like a winner. That said, he's encouraging his fans and supporters to go online and, as the old adage goes: "Vote early, vote often." He said he's filled with gratitude to many.
"We're thankful to the academy, all of the friends we've made and, of course, my business partner (and girlfriend) Tiffany Elliott for convincing me to move down here and give it a whirl," Good said. "Everyone has been very welcoming and I'm grateful to them as well as to all of our Oklahoma friends." - — Scott Raines, Lawton Constitution

“Ft. Worth, TX, December 6, 2013 The 2nd Annual Acoustic Drive Records Listen for Charity Campaign set a new record this year and has named Brad Good’s “Sailor’s Tale” as the winning song in 2013. The Listen for Charity Campaign selected ten top artists in the industry and allowed them to submit a song, which fans then voted on by playing the song to select the winner. “Sailors Tale” received the top number of plays, which earned Good a $1,000 prize that was donated to his chosen charity. Jon Laureles and the team at Acoustic Drive Records established this event to “provide a way for everyone involved to benefit.” The artists would be able to express their passion for their cause. Listeners would learn about these great causes, and be able to support them just by listening to a song. Good selected the Snowball Express as his charity.” - — Academy of Texas Music

It must come with the territory. Red Dirt country is a sound steeped in tradition and firmly planted in the southwestern soil from which the genre gets its name. Several local musicians have gone on to interpret the essence of the southwest in their art.

One musician who intuitively knows what this spirit sounds like is Brad Good.

Originally from Apache, Brad Good has been making his mark by playing shows at venues across Oklahoma, Texas, Kansas, Arkansas, and Missouri for several years.

He graduated from Oklahoma State University in Stillwater and got his start in music sometime about 1993 when his friend Shane McGrew was looking for a bassist and harmony singer in Stillwater. Good went in to audition and the two formed a band with guitarist Rocky Sutton and drummer Tom Privett. With a soulful, raspy voice and plenty of stories to tell, he began branching out as his own artist with their encouragement.“Those guys kinda took me under their wing, and brought me along on bass — and then eventually guitar — and the writing developed after that. It was just something somebody told me I was good at, so I kept doing it,” he said.

His own sound rests comfortably among music by American rock legend Bruce Springsteen and critically-acclaimed singer-songwriter John Mellencamp as well as Texas country artists like Robert Earl Keen. Good cites those influences, along with a kinship shared with other artists like Cross Canadian Ragweed, Jason Boland & the Stragglers, The Great Divide, No Justice and Stoney Larue, as the source for his sound.

“It was a cool time to ‘cut my teeth’ in Stillwater when there was a lot of music happening there,” he said. “The Red Dirt movement there at the time kinda shaped us all to an extent. I grew up listening to southern rock and country and then with the red dirt influence — it all molded me.”

After years of forging his sound and establishing a strong presence in the scene, Good is releasing his first radio single and record this spring.

He went in to record and produce his single, “’Round Here,” with Mike McClure at The Boohatch studio in Ada, and after releasing the song as a single on iTunes and Amazon, Good went on to record and produce a batch of ten more original songs with Salim Nourallah and Matt Gaskins at Pleasantry Lane Studio in Dallas. With a voice tinged by nostalgia, he makes it clear that his roots are integral to his identity. “We grow cotton and we raise cane; we spend our Sundays prayin’ for rain,” he asserts. “Just look at my hands — see them red dirt stains. Anywhere else it wouldn’t be the same.”
The tentative title of the album, “Third Generation Son,” comes from a lyric embedded in “Highway Headed Home,” a retrospective tune that rejoices in finding his way back again. Violins murmur before Good begins to sing. Feather-light guitar riffs wrap the track in feelings of security, making it the perfect song for cruising some back roads in any state you pick.

Each song tells a story, and these tales run the gamut. Some are lighthearted, some are serious, and some are true stories set to a tune. According to Good, each member of the production trio had something to contribute during studio sessions.

“Salim has awesome ideas. He would bounce them off of me, and he and I either agreed or didn’t, and Matt Gaskins was kinda the tie breaker when it came to that. We all had input. They were awesome, and always willing to let my identity come through as an artist without letting me mess things up too bad.”

Good said he gets his inspiration from various places; the fate of a relationship, an instance from his childhood, something that made him laugh or just scenery that captures his attention.

“There’s several of my songs that are definitely autobiographical, and some that are biographical from a friend’s perspective. A couple are straight up fiction, but for the most part, you gotta know it to write it. At least for me.”

He assumes another perspective in “Rich Man,” a timeless cautionary tale that sizzles with battling guitar harmonies and bass lines. Raw and startling, Good warns about living in loneliness — the kind of poverty that can come when priorities are skewed and twisted beyond recognition. “He don’t get no richer, just gets real cold,” Good observes. “Try as he may he cannot make change, and his life unchanged it will remain the same.”

Good also made the record by teaming with musicians Matt Gaskins, Milo Deering, Raegan Felker, and backup vocalist Beverly Perry as well as guitarist Daniel Hines from the Dallas band Left Arm Tan. They fused each part of every song together and Good said he could not be happier with the results.

“We really just pieced it together a little at a time,” he said. “They were great to always make sure my identity came through. I listen to most of the tracks, and think “man, that couldn’t have been any closer to what I had in mind.” And then there’s been some ideas that developed during the process as well.

Some of the material on the record has been incubating for some time, and Good said the songs that have stuck with him have finally manifested on the record.

“Some of that stuff has been floating around in my head for ten years. Some of it came together in five minutes,” he said. “There’s always something I’m working on even though no one knows it usually until I have it done.”

He loves what he does, and his art certainly imitates life — inspiration strikes Good at all hours, and when it does, he is quick to record a few lyrics or a tune that lingers with him even when he less than fully conscious.

“A couple of my songs have been written in my sleep too, actually,” he said. “Just woke up with the whole thing in my head, got up, wrote it down, and went back to sleep — that’s happened — so it comes from all angles, really.”

An audience knows when an artist is in it for the love of the game, and Good said the best part of playing gigs and making music is seeing his work resonates with listeners.

“It’s just a lot of fun — work too, but fun — and when you hit a good lick at a show, and people are diggin’ your stuff and having a good time, it’s really cool. And seeing people singing along to songs you wrote and knowing they relate to them — that’s really cool.

Last month, the Texas Regional Radio Music Awards named Good a future face to look for in 2013. He played a showcase at The Thirsty Armadillo in Fort Worth on April 20 with the other artists and said he was glad to have met these talented singers and songwriters. He also said he is thankful to have made a lasting impression with his music.

“Over the years, writing and singing songs has become what I do,” Good said, “and I feel really blessed to have the opportunity to share my music with folks, and hopefully they’ll keep coming back.” - “Article from Sarah Brewer with Okie Magazine”