Category Archives: alt.country

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass – Saturday Picks

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this is a quick one; Sun Oct 3 (11am – 7pm)

Banjo Stage
•    12:35pm Hazel Dickens
•    1:45pm Earl Scruggs
•    3:00pm Doc Watson & David Holt
•    4:20pm The Del McCoury Band
•    5:45pm Emmylou Harris
Rooster Stage
•    11:00am Kevin Welch & Kieran Kane & Fats Kaplin
•    2:10pm Dave Alvin & The Guilty Women
•    3:25pm Rosanne Cash
•    5:55pm Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings
Star Stage
•    11:40am Martin Sexton
•    3:05pm Elvis Costello and The Sugarcanes
Towers of Gold Stage
•    11:00am Lucero
•    12:25pm James McMurtry
•    2:05pm Randy Newman
Arrow Stage
•    11:00am The Felice Brothers
•    1:30pm Railroad Earth
•    4:20pm Yonder Mountain String Band
•    5:45pm The Avett Brothers
Porch Stage
•    11:50am Citigrass
•    12:40pm Heidi Clare & AtaGallop
•    1:40pm Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer
•    4:35pm Kate Gaffney
•    5:35pm Wendy Bird
•    6:25pm Anderson Family Bluegrass

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass – Saturday Picks

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Sat Oct 2 (11:00am – 7:00pm)
Here’s where it gets tough….
11:45am – Towers Of Gold Stage: Jon Langford & Skull Orchard – Mekons front man’s current alt.country manifestation.
11:00am – Arrow Stage: Kelly Willis – Austin-based singer/songwriter with a voice as clear as a spring creek.
12:00pm – Porch Stage: David Olney with Sergio Webb – Olney is one of the best songwriters of our time and hos recent release Dutchman’s Curve is one of his best.
12:05pm – Rooster Stage: Jonathan Richman Feat. Tommy Larkins – Imagine Lou Reed if he did funny songs.
12:55pm – Banjo Stage: Carolina Chocolate Drops – This African American string band current big deal in Americana music, and for a damn good reason.
1:15pm – Rooster Stage: Guy Clark & Verlon Thompson – Guy Clark is a Texas treasure, and he makes his own guitars!
2:30pm – Rooster Stage: Songwriter Circle with Steve Earle, Robert Earl Keen, John Doe & David Olney – wow.
2:35pm – Arrow Stage: Kinky Friedman – He didn’t get to be Governor of Texas so we get to see him perform a selection of wry and hilarious songs!
3:30pm – Towers Of Gold Stage: Richard Thompson – If you’ve never seen him, SEE HIM!
3:55pm – Arrow Stage: Jerry Jeff Walker – Another Texas-based treasure.
4:15pm – Rooster Stage:  Buddy Miller – A member of Robert Plant’s Band of Joy and the man who appeared on the final printed issue of no Depression magazine. He’s sort of the Keven Bacon of Americana..no telling who will show up.
4:20pm – Banjo Stage: Gillian Welch – An O Brother, Where Art Thou? alum (associate producer, performer and film cameo) and her partner, guitarist David Rawlings perform beautifully somber tunes from the farthest Appalachia.
5:20pm – Arrow Stage: The Flatlanders feat. Joe Ely, Jimmie Dale Gilmore & Butch Hancock – in Texas this is what is known as an embarrassment of riches. A real Texas suprergroup.
5:45pm -Banjo Stage: Steve Earle & The Dukes & Rooster Stage: Robert Earl Keen – Flip a coin, friend-O

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass – Friday Picks

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If this years 10th annual Hardly Strictly Bluegrass is anything like last years it will be jammed with people. I guess the word got out that the best Americana and Roots music festival in the country was FREE!

As always there is no shortage of great live music to see, the only problem is getting from one of the 5stage to the other in time to see the. Sometimes an impossibility since performers like the Flatlanders, Steve Earle and Robert Earle Keen, are often playing opposite one another. What’s a Texan to do?!

Here’s my pass at who to see and when. There is some overlap or outright conflicts. i did this list believing that i could time travel and be at any stage at any time,blogger’s license. Look it up. Your mileage may vary so if this doesn’t lift your skirt head over to the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass and make your own damn list.

Fri Oct 1 (10:30am – Noon & 2pm – 7pm)

The early part of Friday on the Star stage PMW and MC Hammer will perform special educational program for local schools. My daughter is going to this. i hope she comes home singing “Can’t touch this.”

1:45 – Rooster Stage: Jerry Douglas w/ Omar Hakim & Viktor Krauss – A musician’s supergroup. Viktor Krauss (Lyle Lovett, Bill Frisell) on bass, Omar Hakim (Weather Report, Sting, Dire Straits) on drums and the man I consider the Jimi Hendrix on the Dobro Jerry Douglas (Ray Charles, Phish, Dolly Parton, Paul Simon, Ricky Skaggs, Elvis Costello, and Johnny Mathis, performed on the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack)
2:00pm – Banjo Stage: The Ebony Hillbillies – billed as the “Only New York City Black String Band.” Being Gotham-based may may not sound like a ringing endorsement for mountain music but this group delivers.
2:45pm – Rooster Stage: Patty Griffin – Fresh from Robert Plant’s Band of Joy where Griffen is pure joy to watch. Will Percy make an appearance?
3:00pm – Banjo Stage: Blue Highway – This band is one of the only real Bluegrass bands on the three-day bill. even though the band if based in East Tennessee heir hot-shot Dobro player,Rob Ickes, is from the Bay Area. Represent!
5:45pm – Arrow Stage: the subdudes – New Orleans’ R&B swamp boogie at its finest.
5:45pm – Rooster Stage: T Bone Burnett Feat. Punch Brothers & Special Guests Karen Elson and The Secret Sisters -  The reigning Americana producer brings a stripped-down version of his Talking Clock Review to the HSB stage.

Music Review: Joe Thompson – Yankee Twang (self-released)

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On his second release Joe Thompson takes us on a journey of a man caught between two worlds – the American northeast and the southwest. His birthplace of Western Pennsylvania,  his current residence of New York City and Texas, the source of his lineage (the birthplace of his parents if the narrative in Texas waltz is factual.)  All play a part in the shifting landscapes of Yankee Twang, but it appears that in this struggle of geographic and identity the main source of aesthetic inspiration is the Lone Star State.

With a barroom baritone that would truly make Randy Travis proud, Thompson opens Yankee Twang with Blue New York – a classic George Strait-like ballad of lonely nights and hard love in the city that refuses to let you sleep. The chorus calls out to Texas, Austin specifically, as remedy for the big city blues, but he sounds like a man that would cast his lot with any way out of Gotham –

Lucky Mistake is a Nashville hit as-yet not recorded by one of the CMA chosen hat-acts. Upbeat but not frothy and great to sing to at the top of your lungs. I hope Thompson is lucky enough to have Kenny Chensey pay him for the privilege of ruining it. Next is the song I hope to hear in every tequila bar in America – Luisa! Luisa! sounds has a Texas Tornadoes festive spirit that belies the sad story of the protagonist losing the song’s namesake. Tequila does that for you.

Sweet Texas Waltz is a gorgeous acoustic-led number that really being to bear the duality theme that runs throughout. “My Yankee blood’s rich with that black Texas mud, but a Yankee I am through and through.”  And this longing results  in “I wish I could dance that sweet Texas waltz, the way my mom and dad do.”

Summer ’93 reaches into West Texas and back in time to channel Buddy Holly’s rave-up rockabilly hiccup beat. I Could’ve Slept All Day is a damn fine lovely lament of tear-stained love and regret.

The song that stands out the most to be is the briefest on the release. At 2 minutes and 32 seconds Traction is a moody, menacing window into the heart of a man that gave all to love and recognizes his estranged reined back emotions seemingly in anticipation of, or causing, the end. It’s as stark edge of emotion in song as I’ve hard.

As a Texan that lived for five years in New York City I get a kind of reverse sense of cultural disassociation that Yankee Twang emits. Dirt and blood run thick as as Houston humidity and I feel a kinship to this generation-removed Texan brought up in the rust, instead of the Bible, belt. Thompson recently moved to Austin.  I hope he ventures outside that bubble and the reality matches the mythology this release is steeped in.

For fun Thompson has a cocktail companion to every song on the album.

Official Site | Facebook |  Buy

Announcing The Twang Nation Jamboree 8/25

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Twang Nation JamboreeIt’s been a long time coming but it’s finally ready to take off the wrapping. From the home of the premier Americana music event in the country, the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival, yours truly, Twang Nation  is proud to present the first ever Twang Nation Jamboree showcasing some of the best of local Americana and roots bands and performers. The fun begins on August 25th at 8:30 at the Red Devil Lounge. Yelp |  Facebook

Appearing live on stage:
…
Porkchop Express – is a San Francisco Bay Area alt country band that has been playing together since 2002. They take the gristly scraps from the American traditions of folk, outlaw country, and rock ‘n roll, push it through a meat grinder, give it a crash course in honky-tonk and put it on stage for all to enjoy. Their sound is made up of country vocal harmonies; soaring fiddle work; a punk inspired rhythm section; noisy, garage-rock guitars and a ukulele for that extra dash of machismo.

Mars Arizona - No, you can’t get there from here. You can stare at the map all you want and you won’t find it. Mars Arizona has a population of two, and is best apprehended with the ears.High Desert is the fourth album from Mars Arizona, the name Nicole Storto and Paul Knowles use when they’re fashioning their brew of country, rock, and roll. As a matter of practice they’re joined by some talented helpers including drummers Billy Block (Frank Black) and Ken Coomer (Uncle Tupelo and Wilco), fiddler Ollie O’Shea (Hank Williams III) and lap steel guitarist Paul Laques (I See Hawks In L.A.), and a host of others.

Jenny Kerr Band - A multi-instrumentalist as well as a poetic and passionate songwriter, Jenny Kerr is known for foot-stomping live shows and powerful, authentic voice. Her self-produced debut release, Itch drew critical acclaim as well as comparisons to Delbert McClinton and Janis Joplin. The album sold out during her first year of touring. Kerr is a skilled player of fingerstyle guitar, clawhammer banjo, harmonica, piano, and dobro. Together with her band of road-tested rogues, she delivers a seasoned yet spirited sound with forays into swamp rock, straight-up soul, backwater honky tonk, and old-time blues.

Red Devil Lounge
1695 Polk Street
San Francisco, CA

Ticket are $3 in advance, $5 at the door

New Round Up: Hardly Strictly Line-up Announced, Old 97s Rip It Up

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  • The Old 97s tore it up at Thursday’s free show to promote Texas travel. Under the Lone Star flag at San Francisco’s Justin Herman Plaza an enthusiastic crowd under sunny skies as the band worked through their extensive catalog,  played REM’s Driver 8 from a recent covers EP release, a song written especially for the event – A State of Texas. The band also played a new song, Champaign, Illinois, from an upcoming double album called The Grand Theatre.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AmPN9cnBfSQ[/youtube]

  • After much speculation on the line-up for this year’s Americana music ubber-festival, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival the official list is out. There was speculation that the list was held longer this year to help cut down on the massive crowd that showed up last year. I don’t see how holding the list back a week or so will help – perhaps if it weren’t completely free might help, but then it would be a lot less great. Some highlights: Earl Scruggs, Gillian Welch, Kelly Willis, Justin Townes Earle, Kinky Friedman, Lucero, Patty Griffin, T Bone Burnett and Friends, The Felice Brothers, The Flatlanders , James McMurtry and Richard Thompson and much, much more. The festival runs October 1-3 in Golden Gate Park. And like I mentioned it’s all free, thanks to the generosity of founder/billionaire/amateur banjo picker Mr. Warren Hellman.

News Round Up: Lucinda Williams Tweets New Album Title

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  • Lucinda Williams took to Twitter to announce the title of her forthcoming album. Continuing her recent theme of happiness and matrimonial bliss the title will be Blessed. I guess Lou got her Joy back.
  • Ms. Lucinda and other notable Americana music folks, Drive By Truckers, Todd Snider, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings, Rhett Miller, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Hayes Carll, became animated to appear in a special musical episode of Cartoon Network’s cartoon centered on hillbilly cephalopods -  Squidbillies.
  • Folk singer-songwriter Ana Egge has tapped Steve Earle as producer for her seventh solo album. The album will be recorded in Woodstock, New York in the fall to record at Levon Helm Studio.
  • Moody-Old time Americana band Black Prairie (a side project for three members of the Decemberists and other notable Portland, OR. musicians) has recently released two new songs they are giving away for free.

The Blackest Crow

Turn It Into Gold

Todd Snider, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings, Rhett Miller, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Hayes Carll

Music Review – Mat D’s: Plank Road Drag [self-released]

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Country and blues music has always mined the life’s mundane moments and extracted nuggets of domestic mythology shimmering with love, lust, booze, blood, tears, asphalt and diesel fuel.  With these elements masters like Hank Williams Sr., Neil Young, Townes Van Zandt and Bob Dylan – and latter day troubadours like Bruce Springsteen, Steve Earle and Chris Knight – transcend whatever genre they are bridled with and forge minor pedestrian masterpieces.

This second solo release from Sioux City, IA’s Mat D (Mat deRiso) draws from the same humanistic sources. Assuming a more Americana tone than the country-rock his Profane Saints offers, Plank Road Drag works a well-worn sonic landscape but still manages to uncover many dusty gems.

Resurrection Cadillac, the album opener is bathed in the sanctified blues of Leadbelly and Lightnin’ Hopkins as it lurches forward like a revved-up version of Led Zeppelin’s back-porch stomper Black Country Woman.

Street souls collide in Ford Marriage. Mat D colorfully throws his Born to Run-style tramps toward a ramshackle wedding  – “I’ll trade a fan belt and a hub cap for a suit-coat and a tie, we’ll use her panties a a veil and wrap an old rag around her thigh and make a bouquet out of tumbleweeds and hold on ‘til we die, my my.” – until passion’s heat burns away all that’s left is matrimonial ash – ”Turns out a house of love don’t run on truck-stop grease and gasoline.”

Doomed romance continues with Cannonball as family plight and hardship runs as rough as their path toward Texas. Three A.M. refuels the dirt-floor romance, gliding like a fever-dream vision of trailer-part trysts. 40 Watt Moon is the fever aftermath recounting beautiful memories and empty bottles.

Ribbon of Dirt uses the hard-bluegrass of Steve Earle’s Copperhead Road to tell another hard tale of the road’s siren call and Motorbelle is a beautiful, moody white-trash serenade “she was silver and gold from the trailer, she was sequins and jewels from the trash, she was flesh, she was blood,she was lonely, spilling out of old strapless dress with her big hair all pinned up and perfect all that Tammy Faye make-up a mess.”

The album closes with the bluegrass-tinted title song, where Mat d uses hillbilly poetry that could easily be inspired by watching the Coen brothers’ O Brother, Where Art Thou? with the sound down and Guy Clark on the turntable turned way up high.

Mat D’s Plank Road Drag is an ambitious record that hits on all cylinders to set a high water mark for any other contender for this year’s album of the year.

Official site | MySpace | Facebook | Buy

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewROFZPZMco[/youtube]

Suburban Home Records Mix Tape Vol. 5, Someone’s Gonna Die

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Denver, Colorado’s Suburban Home Records has released a fine compilation (Or for this roots music blogger, a convenient sonic crib sheet)  of new and classic roots rock and Americana music entitled Suburban Home Records Mix Tape Vol. 5, Someone’s Gonna Die. The title is inspired by I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch In the House’s new album, “The Sounds of Dying (featured here as the first two cuts as well as ICLASOBITH lead singer Micahel Dean Damron ballsy solo version of Townes Van Zandt’s Waiting Around to Die.) This mix was bound for greatness. How can you not trust this kind of music to a label owned by a guy named Virgil?

Go grab this release (via You Send It)  for some fine music for your next Summer cookout or that next riveting game of whiskey-fueled Russian roulette.

1. I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch in the House – Swear to God
2. I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch in the House – Postcards and Apologies (Two Cow Garage cover)
3. Two Cow Garage – Postcards and Apologies
4. Micahel Dean Damron – Waiting Around to Die (Townes Van Zandt cover)
5. Townes Van Zandt – Waiting Around to Die
6. Austin Lucas – Sleep Well (Demo)
7. Trampled By Turtles – Wait So Long
8. Oblio’s Arrow – End of the Burning Moon
9. Tim Barry – Exit Wounds.mp3
10. Slobberbone – Placemat Blues.mp3
11. John Moreland and the Black Gold Band – Bastards of the Highway
12. Jeff Rowe – Kate
13. The Replacements – Unsatisfied
14. Jon Snodgrass – Fast in Last
15. Arliss Nancy – Stella Lovely
16. Jr. Juggernaut – Another Two Weeks
17. Alexander Hudjohn – Down So Low
18. Calling Morocco – Break Your Heart
19. Tin Horn Prayer – Louis Collins
20. Jared Grabb – Devil Between
21. Lucky Old Sun – Back in Style
22. Armchair Martian – …Not Fine (Demo)
23. The Takers – Drift
24. Look Mexico – Take it Upstairs, Einstein
25. Geraldine Fibbers – Lilybelle
26. Pariah Beat – Elvis in Jerusulum
27. Drag the River – Beautiful and Damned
28. BEERS – I Love You (But I Don’t Trust You)
29. The Evening Rig – Half Asleep
30. Hank Williams, Jr. – If You Don’t Like Hank Williams.mp3

Post 4th of July Post

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I hope everyone had a great Independence Day. I spent America’s 234th birthday seeing some great music by Hang Jones, at the park with  family and friends eating, watching spectacular stuff bow up and watching Brock Lesnar stop being pummeled long enough to submit Shane Carwin with a arm-triangle choke. Ah, American values….I wanted to take some time to post some cool things I found around the web celebrating this great day.

S.P. Gass at NoDepression.com asked for recommendations for a Americana/roots Independence Day playlist. And the members (incl. yours truly) came up with a doozy.

Willie Nelson took his legendary picnic to Bee Cave, Texas’ Backyard  and featured Johnny Bush, Kris Kristofferson, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Leon Russell, Jody Nix and the Texas Cowboys Billy Joe Shaver canceled his showing at the picnic due to health reasons. We hope he ‘s doing well.

FrontLoader.com has posted some a mother load of independence goodness. MP3 outtakes from the quintessential American musician, Johnny Cash. These cuts are from his American recording sessions (of course) with Rick Rubin he did at the end of his life.

and s[peaking of the Man in Black…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ifeeqnrd6gA[/youtube]

Independence Day