Here at Casa Twang we make it no secret that we are big fans of Nikki Lane. The comely raven-haired chanteuse might be only 28 but she delivers a classic country sound with a modern twist that belies her South Carolina upbringing and current home of Los Angeles.
Since her release of her first full-length, Walk of Shame, last year Lane has been busier than a long-tail cat in a room full of rockers. She played two showcases at last year’s Americana Music Association Festival (which I was lucky enough to catch), toured with Noah & The Whale and the mighty Drive-By Truckers, played NPR’s “Mountain Stage†and recorded a session for the always excellent Daytrotter site. If that wasn’t enough the bustling Ms. Lane has opened High Class Hillbilly a Nashville vintage boutique.
Nikki has also found time to finish a new video for Walk of Shame’s “Lies,†directed by Jared Eberhardt, who also directed the “Gone, Gone, Gone†video. (Watch it below.)
The song has a classic reverbed 70s classic revived by Tarantino films depicting Nikki walking in the desert, signing while lounging in front of a fireplace, lying in a bed, and driving a Trans-Am that was probably manufactured the year she was born. And she makes every frame of it look good.
As a part of what Steve Earle called “Nashville’s great credibility scare of the mid ’80s.” Lyle Lovett, along with Earle, k.d. Lang, Dwight Yoakam and others took up the traditionalist Outlaw mantel of the 70’s and reinvigorated country music from it’s soft-rock and Urban Cowboy influence the times.
Lyle Lovett’s new album “Release me,” exhibits pun in name as well as aesthetic. The album is the last for the Curb Records, the label for his entire 26-year. 11-album, career. And in case you missed that the cover art depicts Lyle tied up head-to-ankle in a lariat.
Though Lovett continues a late career trend of including cover songs. But this adios to Curb raises the stakes as it contains only two Lovett originals among the album’s 14 tunes. You might conclude that this last release would be a weakened collection to meet contractual obligations. You would be wrong in that assessment.
Sure Lovett may not be the most prolific songwriter on the planet but he is one of the best interpreters of classic country. There is no one fit to polish Lovett’s boots when it comes close to serving as a diplomat for the eclectic music styles of the Lone Star State.
“Release me” wastes no time offering a burning interpretation of the classic instrumental breakdown of “Garfield’s Blackberry Blossom.” The number made popular in the 1930s by Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith sounds both timeless and spirited in the hands of Lovett and his band.
The title track became a hit for both Jimmy Heap and Ray Price, both in 1954. Here it’s done as a duet with Lovett and k.d. lang, who is so far down in themix her soaring vocals are lost. That quibble aside it’s a great tear-in-my-beer standard well done.
The cover of Michael Franks’ “White Boy Lost in the Blues” slinks in with the funky blues accentuated by Arnold McCuller harmony vocals.The gospel/R&B and Memphis horn-sound of “Isn’t That So” works to a rousing effect and will probably kill live.
Understand You channels beautifully the tender-hearted cowboy Lovett has portrayed many time in his career. The cover of Brown Eyed is looser that Chuck Berry’s original or the covers by covered by many including fellow Texans Buddy Holly and Waylon Jennings. But the song still carries the weight Berry intended after being inspired by witnessing a Hispanic man being arrested by a policeman.
The Ragtime-inspired “Keep It Clean” dares you not to cut a rug and William Moore’s One Way Gal is a fine-time front porch testament to a good woman.
“Dress of Laces” is an achingly lovely Daughter-Father twist on the classic murder ballad. White Freightliner Blues is one of the few up-tempo songs penned by the late, great Townes Van Zandt and Lovett plays it to it’s full open-road greatness.
The two originals Lovett contributes to the album, The first is “The Girl With the Holiday Smile” (also on his 2011 holiday EP “Songs For the Season;”) came from a real-life 1978 encounter young lady hiding out from the cops inside a Houston 7-11. This is my second favorite Christmas/hooker song (Tom Waits’ Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis being the first.) The second cut “Night’s Lullaby,” which features Nickel Creek’s Sara and Sean Watkins, was penned for a 2011 run in the Shakespeare Center Los Angeles’ production of “Much Ado About Nothing” that the three appeared in.
I look forward to the work Lovett is free to explore in his new world as a free agent and am thankful he has left us with something this great to tide us over until the nest batch of surprises comes along.
The Great American Music Hall is a post-earthquake 105 year-old 5,000-square-foot, guilded French motif performance hall that has
been a restaurant, a bordello and a host to fan dancers and a stage for golden Jazz era greats like Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan and Count Basie and relative newcomers Van Morrison and the Grateful Dead.
But on this night the back stage of the great American is more like a living room at a friends or relatives’ house. I came to meet Jake Smith, who performs solo and with a band under the moniker The White Buffalo. There in the dimly lit room Smith along with Matt Lynott (drums) and Tommy Andrews (bass) offer smiles, handshakes and beverages. After the hellos and intros the talk moves to influences. I tell Smith about a video I saw on You Tube of him covering the Highwaymen’s theme of world adventure  “Highwayman.” “Oh yeah.” Smith cracks a smile “Waylon, Willie, Kristofferson and Cash. You can’t do any better than those guys.” He then tells me about the music of his Southern California childhood. “We listened to a lot of things. Country, like Loretta, classic rock I guess they call it now. Blues. Gospel.”
The influences show on Smith’s songs if you look for them. Like the best craftsman of songs he makes them sound easy. Effortless. Like they couldn’t be any other way then the way he’s spinning them out. Then I bait him with the question most musicians hate to answer, “How would you label your music.” “I don’t” he says straight. “I spend my time writing them and that’s hard enough. If I spend time on “Is this country” or “if the Americana” I think the song will suffer.”
Smith and the band then starts to list up the night’s songs. Three musicians, three clean, white sheets of paper. One sharpie. then the discussion begins. “What about the Pilot?” “How about Darkside of Town?” “Might be too slow and bring things down.” “How about Love Song #2.” “Okay but you’ll need to sing backup in my mic.” The process is reminiscent of charting an emotional course of stage logistics,crowd physiology and sonic dynamics. What will take them where we want them to go?
The moniker came about through need and happenstance. Smith once wore a sweat shirt that had the title emblazoned on it and some his friends recalled it when he emailed them ideas for a name. White buffalo are extremely rare. The National Bison Association (yes, there is such a thing) has estimated that a White buffalo only occur in approximately one out of every 10 million births. Smith is a living testament to his moniker standing around 6′ 2″ , solid as a wall and stylistically embodying a rare mix of grit and nuance that you couldn’t squeeze out of a dozen neo-folk acts.
Born in Oregon and raised in Southern California, he moved to the Bay area from Huntington Beach to pursue college on an athletic scholarship. He then made his way to L.A. where he now calls home. Because of his local Smith has had his songs crop up in movies and T.V. A bootleg tape of his music made it into the hands of pro surfer Chris Malloy, and his song, “Wrong,†was featured in his surf movie, Shelter. That led to further film scoring and composing work, with three of his songs featured in FX’s Sons of Anarchy and HBO’s Californication.
With 3 EPs and one fill-length out and one more , Once Upon a Time in the West , set to release February 28th Smith has seen thousands of miles over the last few years opening for acts like Ziggy Marley, and Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, and tonight the Texas blues man Gary Clark Jr. His brooding songs of America’s topological and emotional landscape, “mini-movies” he calls them, transforms on the stage. The darkness, whiskey and gunpowder is still there in narrative but the sound shifts to urgency and electricity. Lynott and Andrews expand the dynamics and work off Smith like a fright train veering off the tracks. They are one of the best rhythm sections I’ve seen live.
Over a beer after the show I ask Smith about his fans and whether online piracy worries a working man with a wife and two kids. “People are buying ticket and I’m selling merch. I can’t do anything about the new world I am working in. I have to trust people.”
In true DIY fashion they set their own gear on stage, sell their own merchandise and pack it all up in a van at the end of the night. Off to the nest show miles away across the dark night of America.
I didn’t take, nor did I find, clips from this show. But I couldn’t post without a taste of what I saw. Here The White Buffalo at Bonaroo.
The Secret Sisters announced this morning via their Facebook page that their song “Tomorrow Will Be Kinder” (below) would be included on the soundtrack to the upcoming film The Hunger Games. I had known about (and more surprisingly actually enjoy) the song “Safe & Sound” with The Civil Wars and Taylor Swift. Two songs hardly make a theme so I looked up the soundtracks track list on MTV.com ans was pleased to have my suspicions verified. Miranda Lambert with the Pistol Annies, Carolina Chocolate Drops and Neko Case shows a hearty helping of Americana/Country music represented (0r as MTV.com describes it “…the album is bursting with twang!) I haven’t read the books but will definitely be getting the soundtrack when it’s released on March 20th.
1. “Safe & Sound” (feat. The Civil Wars) by Taylor Swift
2. “Eyes Wide Open” by Taylor Swift
3. “Abraham’s Daughter” by Arcade Fire
4. “The Ruler & The Killer” by Kid Cudi
5. “Run Daddy Run” (feat. Pistol Annies) by Miranda Lambert
6. “Kingdom Come” by The Civil Wars
7. “One Engine” by The Decemberists
8. “Take The Heartland” by Glen Hansard
9. “Lover Is Childlike” by The Low Anthem
10. “Dark Days” by Punch Brothers
11. “Tomorrow Will Be Kinder” by The Secret Sisters
12. “Just a Game” by Birdy
13. “Oh Come & Sing” by Ella Mae Bowen
14. “Rules” by Jayme Dee
15. “Reaping Day” by Carolina Chocolate Drops
16. “Give Me Something” I’ll Remember by Neko Case
17. Video “Safe & Sound” (Bonus Video) by Taylor Swift
One of the highlights of attending the GRAMMYs this year was meeting the country legend Glen Campbell after seeing him rewarded the Recording Academy Lifetime Achievement Award. I was also fortunate enough to see him perform on the telecast and see Paul McCartney jam to his Rhinestone Cowboy during rehearsals. So when I was approached by Capitol/EMI to give away two copies of the expanded version of 2008’s Meet Glen Campbell.
Campbell’s legendary music career that spans more than five decades and has achieved chart-topping, platinum-selling pop and country success singing everyday tales of life, love, work, and heartache. He has been honored with five GRAMMY Awards and trophies for Male Vocalist Of The Year from both the Country Music Association (CMA) and the Academy Of Country Music (ACM). In addition to being inducted into the CMA’s Hall Of Fame, he has been awarded its top Entertainer Of The Year honors, and the ACM has honored him with its prestigious Pioneer Award.
Recorded at The Recording Studio and Jim Henson Studios in Los Angeles, Meet Glen Campbell was produced by Julian Raymond (Rosanne Cash, Fastball, Shawn Mullins, Wallflowers) with engineer/co-producer Howard Willing. The album features musical contributions by Campbell contemporaries as well as younger rock and alt-country artists who joined him in the studio, including Cheap Trick’s Robin Zander, Roger Joseph Manning, Jr. and Jason Faulkner from Jellyfish, and Chris Chaney from Jane’s Addiction. Campbell’s sons and daughters, who regularly perform with their father, recorded backing vocals for the tracks.
This expanded edition adds performances of Wichita Lineman†and “Rhinestone Cowboy,†and U2’s “All I Want Is You†from the “AOL Sessions†concert as well as remixes of “Gentle On My Mind†and “Galveston.â€(see the full playlist below)
It’s easy to enter to win; be over 18 and leave a comment below letting me know your favorite Glenn Campbell song. Two winners will be selected at random on Sunday the 19th, at 8pm PST, Be sure to leave your email or twitter handle and I’ll contact the winners. Good luck!
Meet Glen Campbell Playlist
1. Sing                                                  (Travis)
2. Walls                                                (Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers)
3. Angel Dream                                  (Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers)
4. Times Like These                           (Foo Fighters)
5. These Days                                     (Jackson Browne)
6. Sadly Beautiful                                (The Replacements)
7. All I Want Is You                              (U2)
8. Jesus                                                (Velvet Underground)
9. Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)  (Green Day)
10. Grow Old With Me                           (John Lennon)
EXCLUSIVE BONUS TRACKS
11. Gentle On My Mind (2008 Remix)
12. Galveston (2008 Remix)
13. Wichita Lineman (AOL Sessions, 2008)
14. Rhinestone Cowboy (AOL Sessions, 2008)
A quick update for those not following me over in twitter (@twangnation ). I have had the privilege of seeing scores of legends. From Neil Young and Paul McCartney to Allison Krauss and Joe Walsh at the GRAMMYS Person of the Year/Music Cares benefit. I also met two living legends yesterday at the Special Merit Awards, Glenn Campbell and George Jones! . On top of this already daunting bounty of riches I met up with Shooter Jennings and found him to be a hell of a nice guy with a broad knowledge of musical history and the business.
This is a music fan’s dream realized! I will do a more thorough post when I get back from the event tommorow.
I became aware of Gretchen Peters when I heard One to the Heart, One to the Head , a covers album she released with one of my favorite singer/songwriters Tom Russell. I was impressed by their take on many great country-folk songs, from Bob Dylan to Townes Van Zandt, and Peters’ smoky vocals contrasting with Russell’s dusty growl.
While reviewing the album I became aware of Peters’ past life as a New York-born, Nashville-based songwriter for Music City country, pop and soul. Martina McBride, Trisha Yearwood, Patty Loveless, George Strait, Neil Diamond and the late Etta James She also won the 1995 Country Music Association Song Of The Year award and turned some heads with her unflinching view of a woman’s domestic abuse with McBride’s Independence Day.
These song-craft skills, and the courage that maturity affords you to speak fearlessly, have resulted in Gretchen Peters’New release of darkly engaging Americana-pop Hello Cruel World. Recent trials and revelations in her life provide fertile soil for an collection of songs that look into the abyss and dares to laugh. Dares to love. What could have been a very bleak album transforms brutality, indifference and the absurdity of life into jagged gems that makes you want to sing along and occasionally tap a toe. Peters co-produces along with husband Barry Walsh and Doug Lancio. they use sparse arrangements and atmosphere that made One to the Heart, One to the Head such a pleasure.
The self-titled opener is a moody study of contrast and personal perseverance. “I’m not dead but I’m damaged goods, and it’s getting late.†Followed by a chorus of “I’m a very lucky girl†sung with beautifully weary resignation backed by minor-chord strings. St. Francis was  inspired by the Gulf oil spill and co-written by Tom Russell, who often employs Catholic symbols and analogies to make corporeal points. The song engages St. Francis of Assisi to show how the divine is often overlooked or, when recognized, taken for granted.
Torn allegiances dominate The Matador as the thrill and drama of a bull ring serves as a metaphor for passion and conflict. Ordained minister Rodney Corwell performed the matrimonial ceremony for Peters’ and Walsh in 2010, on Dark Angel, Corwell plays the foil of love in a tale of dangerous attraction and certain demise. Camille shares co-writing credits with Peters’ “Wine, Women, and Song†members Matraca Berg and Suzy Bogguss, is smoky loneliness and sweet despair shepherded by trumpet and barroom piano. Paradise Found has a hot summer day simmer that references Steinbeck and a play on Milton where the song derives it’s title.
From the Stevie Nicks-like album cover Peters stares at you from the dusky cool-colored cover with an orb that looks like a globe or a crystal ball. It serves as both metaphors here. These are adult songs about adult situations that in lesser hands would result in a very dull listening. In Peter’s hands poetry and the profane is balanced in a way that reminds us we are not alone and that beauty and hope, as well as songwriting that engages instead of panders, still exists.
Here it is folks, the first Twang Nation Podcast for 2012. This episode features cuts from upcoming albums by Justin Townes Earle, Shooter Jennings, The White Buffalo, James Low Western Front, Darrell Scott as well as excellent cuts from current releases by Charlie Parr, Mississippi Live & The Dirty Dirty and Liz Frame And The Kickers. On the occasion of his birthday I have included a song by the man that amounts to the patron saint of the Americana genre T. Bone Burnett conclude the episode.
I hope you all enjoy the music featured in this and all the podcasts I bring you and hope you seek out the musicians and buy their music, merch and , most importantly, take all your friends and see them live. Remember you can leave requests or feedback below or email me at baron(at)twangnation(dot)com.
1. Justin Townes Earle – Song: Nothing’s Gonna Change The Way You Feel About Me Now – Album: Nothing’s Gonna Change The Way You Feel About Me Now (Bloodshot Records)
2. Charlie Parr – Song: God Moves on the Water – Album: Keep Your Hands On The plow (Independent)
3. The White Buffalo – Song: How the West Was Won  Album: Victims, Enemies, & Old Friends  (Unison Music Group)
4. Lincoln Durham – Song:Â Love Letters – Â Album: The Shovel vs. The Howling Bones (Independent)
5 Shooter Jennings – Song: The Deed and the Dollar Album: Family Man (Entertainment One)
6. James Low Western Front – Song: Thinkin’ California – Album: Whiskey Farmer ( Union made Records)
7. Mississippi Live & The Dirty Dirty – Song: The Devil Lives In The T.V. – Album: Way Down Here (Independent )
8. Liz Frame And The Kickers – Song: God Doesn’t Like His Women Left Alone – Album: first full-length “Sooner†(Air Age Sound Records)
9. Darrell Scott  - Song: Hopskinville – Album: Long Ride Home (Full Light)
10. T. Bone Burnett - Song: Primitives – Album: Criminal Under My Own Hat (Sony)
The aptly named, and visually unassuming Portland singer/songwriter James Low’s venture The James Low Western Front (Tim Huggins, bass/vocals; Dave Camp, guitar/vocals; Joe Mengis, drums) has released a video that sets the tone for their upcoming release “Whiskey Farmer.”
The moody, urban look echos the visual style of Micheal Mann and follows an everyman (played by James Low) on a journey to a sunnier place (as depicted on the sign) and one of existential self-discovery. On the surface “Thinking California” concerns the most obvious journey, the geographic variety. But as the title suggests Low evokes forlorn vocals to traverse physical geography as a metaphor for emotional and physiological climes.
The lonely western style of the song song stands in contrast to Low’s image in the video. I imagine a Stetson-sporting, dusty, bearded hardscrabble sort playing his acoustic in the back of a classic Ford truck not the invisible man shown here. I believe it extends this kind of music back to it’s folk, music for all, roots.
This is not what most people think of when the words pop-country are applied, but that’s what it is. Somewhere the ghosts of Gram Parsons and Mickey Newbury haunt the edges of the song.
It’s only been 6 years since the release of his Bloodshot Records debut, Yuma, but in the brief time Justin Townes Earle has stepped outside the formidable, shadows of his Father , Steve Earle, and his namesake, Townes Van Zandt, to carve out his own path as a torchbearer for the Americana movement.
Earle’s new release for Bloodshot Records Nothing’s Gonna Change the Way You Feel About Me Now, his follow-up to 2010’s Harlem River Blues, will be released on March 27th.
The video below by Joshua Black Wilkins was filmed during the recording process at the converted church studio of Echo Mountain Studios in Asheville NC. The video shows a live feel of the recording (with Justin making changes on the fly) and features Amanda Shires. The 10-track album was recorded with no overdubs over the course of just 4 days
Describing the the new album Justin describes the sounds as “1960s-era Muscle Shoals sound accompanied by lots of brass.â€Â and that it’s “completely different†than last year’s Harlem River Blues. “This time I’ve gone in a Memphis-soul direction.â€
Download the title track in trade for your email address from the song title link below.
Nothing’s Gonna Change the Way You Feel About Me Now track list
01. “Am I That Lonely Tonight?â€
02. “Look the Other Wayâ€
03. “Nothing’s Gonna Change the Way You Feel About Me Nowâ€
04. “Baby’s Got a Bad Ideaâ€
05. “Mariaâ€
06. “Down on the Lower East Sideâ€
07. “Won’t Be the Last Timeâ€
08. “Memphis in the Rainâ€
09. “Unfortunately, Annaâ€
10. “Movin’ Onâ€
Here at Casa Twang we make it no secret that we are big fans of Nikki Lane. The comely raven-haired chanteuse might be only 28 but she delivers a classic country sound with a modern twist that belies her South Carolina upbringing and current home of Los Angeles.
