Country Music Time was a series of 15-minute radio shows distributed by the United States Air Force. Each show featured a "name" country artist, who would perform three songs, and a guest artist, who would perform a fourth song. About halfway through, a recruiter would talk about the opportunities to be had in "today's Air Force." The shows were sent out to radio stations on transcription discs, which often found their way into private collections after being broadcast. Along about 1963, a boy who was dating my sister handed me a half-dozen of these records (possibly to make me go away), including this one by Hank Snow. I was mesmerized. Snow's commercial records at that time featured background singers and Floyd Cramer's piano work, so it was a revelation that he still performed "live" with his Rainbow Ranch Boys: fiddle, steel, "sock rhythm" guitar and bass. Then there were the songs. "My Two-Timin' Woman" was one of Snow's older Canadian recordings. It had made a big impression on Johnny Cash (who recorded it for Sun) and Buddy Holly, who made a home recording of the piece -- including the guitar break -- when he was 13. "Little Buddy" is a heart-breaking recitation about a little boy whose dog is beaten to death by a drunkard, and "These Things Shall Pass" is a solemn-but-optimistic inspirational number. I learned all three of these songs and sang them often, but no usable recordings have surfaced. No matter -- these are the versions to hear. They still sound as good as they did 45 years ago, which was, as Mr. Snow would say, "so fur back I hate to think it was a matter of fact."
