Columns & Opinions

Polka Date October 2021. This is the second half of the column that began in last month's issue.

Polka Date September 2021. Polka Music came into my life on a jukebox at the Lakeside Café in Schulenburg. I was of bicycle age and taking a break from fishing in the lake next to the café when someone put a coin in the jukebox and played Peanuts. I was instantly mesmerized and rushed to see the name of the music which was so energetic. Being raised in a non-polka household, this was like music from another planet, the monies scrounged from picking bottles along the way to Lakeside went directly into the jukebox to hear Peanuts. My parents and I traveled in a roadside diner’s era. A good many of them had remote jukeboxes at each table and it was magic when Dad gave me a coin to put in it and from the big jukebox in the corner Bob Wills would come blaring out. I was mesmerized by flipping the little arms back and forth to change the pages of the selections, also the Bakelite buttons to push for the song, sometimes they glowed.

Over the past years, some country music has changed so much that one wouldn't even be able to identify it as country. With Brandon Hodde's new song, "Backroad," that is certainly not the case.