From Alan Goldsmith, Ann Arbor Observer, 6/2001:

"Whether it's the Lennon-McCartney mix in the Beatles, the classically trained John Cale tossed together with garage poet Lou Reed in the Velvet Underground, or the brother-sister contrast of Sophia and Khalid Hanifi in the wondrous local 1980s pop band Map of the World, my favorite bands always seem to be shaped by contrasting musical focal points, which create something that is larger than the sum of its parts. I'm always attracted to voices that clash and blend, or songwriters who are at war with one another, in the same musical unit.

While singer-songwriters Kevin Brown and Jud Branam aren't Lennon and McCartney, I still get the same sort of buzz when listening to Corndaddy, one of the best bands to pop out of the local so-called alternative country scene. Branam has a classic country-rocker voice in the Buck Owens mold, lacking just enough vocal range to sound cool, and his singing has an invigorating smart-ass edge to it. The songs may be about lives and compelling moments, but Branam's overriding goal is to have a good time.

Kevin Brown, on the other hand, has a high, lonesome, lost-in-the-stars voice that is both a perfect harmony foil to Branam on duets and a sound that breaks your heart when he's singing lead on an original like "Daylight," which rejects the modern world for the pleasure of watching a sunrise. While it's apparent Brown loves Gram Parsons a great deal, he also draws on bluegrass, old-time country, and a number of Austin-based writers.

His roots go back not to last month but to the 1950s and the 1960s. This all sounds good on paper, and on the band's self-titled debut CD, but the true test of a country band is how they handle a crowd of beer drinkers.

Since Ann Arbor no longer has a place like Mr. Flood's Party, where country and rock went hand-in-hand (and where Brown and Corndaddy steel guitarist Alan Pagliere were both mainstays on the tiny stage), I drove to Plymouth to catch Corndaddy on a Friday night at the Lower Town Grill. Branam was the frontman on stage, joking between songs, handling a drunk in the front row who heckled the band between tunes, and tossing out a string of originals that mixed easily with the smoke and the crowd noise.

He traded lead and harmony vocals with Brown, switching between acoustic and Fender electric guitars, while drummer Will Stewart showed he knew how important it is, in a band with two strong songwriters, not to play too many notes. Bassist Jerry Hancock was rock solid, and Pagliere sounded like a hot Nashville session man straight from an old George Jones record. The band was tight and loud, the audience drank and smoked cartons of cigarettes, and country music, alternative or not, was given another few days of life. Who could ask for more?"

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