Category Archives: Bands

Drive By Truckers / The Hold Steady Co-Headlining Tour

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Straight from the Truckers:

The Drive-By Truckers are pleased to announce a 23-date co-headlining tour with their friends The Hold Steady. The bands will alternate who closes the shows throughout the tour, pre-sale begins Tuesday, August 19 (http://rockandrollmeanswell.frontgatetickets.com) and the public on-sale starts Friday, August 22.


The tour is aptly named the Rock and Roll Means well tour. The name of the tour is taken from a lyric of one of Mike Cooley’s songs, “Marry Me.” The line is one of Craig Finn’s favorite lyrics (which he often quotes) “rock and roll means well but can’t help telling young boys lies.”

“We’re all really excited to tour with The Hold Steady. They’re one of the greatest bands out there now and their new album is amazing. Craig writes songs I wish I’d written,” says Patterson Hood. Finn credits seeing DBT live on their Southern Rock Opera tour as the inspiration for him to start playing music again. USA Today rec ently called Southern Rock Opera “this century’s best rock album.”

The Drive-By Truckers have just wrapped a sold out tour of Europe and will play the Outside Lands Music Festival this weekend in San Francisco. Their latest album, Brighter Than Creations Dark was released in January and debuted at #37 on the Billboard Top 200 Chart.


Drive-By Truckers & The Hold Steady – Fall Tour Dates

Thu    30-Oct    Louisville, KY    Coyotes @ City Block    
Fri    31-Oct    Nashville, TN    Ryman

Auditorium

Sat    1-Nov    Atlanta, GA        Tabernacle

Sun    2-Nov    Tallahassee, FL    The Moon @ FSU

Mon    3-Nov    Raleigh, NC        Lincoln Theater

Wed    5-Nov    State College, PA    The State Theatre

Thu    6-Nov    New York, NY    Terminal 5

Fri    7-Nov    New York, NY    Terminal 5

Sat    8-Nov    Philadelphia, PA    Electric Factory

Sun    9-Nov    Boston, MA        Orpheum Theater

Tue    11-Nov    Toronto, ON        Phoenix Theater

Wed    12-Nov    Pittsburgh, PA    Carnegie Music Hall

Thu    13-Nov    Bloomington, IN    Bluebird

Fri    14-Nov    Chicago, IL        Riviera Theater

Sat    15-Nov    Minneapolis, MN    First Avenue

Sun    16-Nov    Minneapolis, MN    First Avenue                    
Wed    19-Nov    Boise, ID        Big Easy    
Thu    20-Nov    Seattle, WA        Showbox            
Fri    21-Nov    Seattle, WA        Showbox     
Sat    22-Nov    Portland, OR        Crystal Ballroom        
Sun    23-Nov    San Francisco, CA    The Fillmore    
Mon    24-Nov    San Francisco, CA    The Fillmore            
Tue    25-Nov    Los Angeles, CA    Wiltern

Cadillac Sky Announces “Gravity’s Our Enemy” Listening Parties

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To celebrate the August 19th release of “Gravity’s Our Enemy” Cadillac Sky and Skaggs Family Records will be holding two, count ’em, two release parties.

The first takes place in  Nashville, Tennessee where those C-Sky’s boys will take the stage at the prestigious Grand Ole Opry. The show starts at 9pm. The second will take place Wednesday, August 20th in Fort Worth, Texas, hometown of the band, at Lola’s.  The party gets started at 7:30pm (admission is free with purchase of the cd), so get there early to get your place in line!

If you can’t make it to a show in person Cadillac Sky will bring the party to you. Just log on to www.skaggsfamilyrecords.com on Tuesday at 9:00pm (Central) and witness the birth of “Gravity’s Our Enemy” live on the webcast as it happens.

Cadillac Sky – “Born Lonesome”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXrblHqXod8[/youtube]

Those Poor Bastards To Release “Satan is Watching”

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Hot on the heels of “The Plague” which was released just last March Madison, WI based Gothic-Country band Those Poor Bastards will release “Satan is Watching” this October. Just in time for All Hallows Eve, kiddies.

For the vinylphiles among you, this will be the first TPB release offered as a limited edition 12″. Track liting will be released when the final release date is ironed out.

Those Poor Bastards – Pills I Took

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z7TuBqeaO0[/youtube]

Review – The Weight – The Weight Are Men (The Colonel Records)

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The Weight are a Brooklyn, NY based country rock band that, in spite of it’s North-Eastern local, delivers the Southern-fried goods. The band was beget by singer/songwriter and veteran of the Atlanta, GA, punk rock scene Joseph Plunket who began dabbled in country music and recorded several EPs and one long-player with a revolving cast of musicians as he tapped his inner hillbilly.

Now blessed with a stable and top-notch line up Plunket, along with Fletcher “Poor Boy” Johnson on guitar, piano, and harmonica, Will Noland on bass, Jay Ellis on drums and Johnny Carpenter on pedal steel, has recorded an album of shear authentic and audacious country-rock, stripped clean of post-whatever and 100% free of ironic smugness. Imagine as the 60’s came to a close that back off in the woods of Saugerties, NY the Band had hung out with Gram Parsons instead of Dylan cutting tracks in the basement of Big Pink, that alternate history it might have sounded something like this.

The Weight’s newest release “The Weight Are Men” kicks off with a gentle strumming of “Like Me Better,” a bittersweet barroom testament to love gone wrong delivered by Plunket in his earnestly gruff vocal style. The highway rave-up “Had It Made” follows with its Southern boogie roots planted firmly in Chuck Berry’s territory.

“Johnny’s Song” is a lulling tune on life and love that builds to a big singalong finale and “Talkin” is a tune taken right from the Neil Young book of groove-roots compositions (complete with yawning harmonica) and offers one of my favorite lines from the album – “Give me a lady and rent control, it might take one, it might take both, to satisfy my soul.”

“Sunday Driver”  is reminiscent of the best of The Band’s bittersweet compositions. It’s a slow-moving, pedal-steel laced gem that really showcases Plunket’s voice. “Hillbilly Highway” is a traveling man’s fiddle-laced yearn to come back to his love that should be on mainstream country radio (it won’t be, mainstream country is too rigid and short-sighted.) “A Day In The Sun” is a harmonica fueled Southern boogie gives a the release a woozy “Sticky Fingers” send off.

Bottom line, “The Weight Are Men” is one of the best roots-rock releases of 2008.

The Weight – Had It Made (mp3)

Congratulations to Eleven Hundred Springs

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Congratulations to Dallas’ hottest honky-tonk band Eleven Hundred Springs for sweeping every category they were up for in the Dallas Observer Music Awards – Best Band, Best Album, Best Country/Roots Act and EHS lead vocalist/songwriter Matt Hillyer winning for Best Male Vocalist. I can’t say enough great things about Eleven Hundred Springs and you need to check these guys out if you love genuine country music with heart and soul.

Jackson Cage – Belfast, Northern Ireland

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I’m always fascinated when country music is honored and performed by folks overseas. I’m also interested in how new bands are able to use the web to do much of the heavy lifting traditionally done in the past by big labels with big money and a large staff. I get both of these plus great music with Belfast Ireland’s country rock band Jackson Cage. The Jackson Cage I’m most familiar with is a dour song about suburban futility by Bruce Springsteen on his release “The River.”  Jackson Cage the band do exhibit some of New Jersey’s most famous hillbilly’s knack for narrative, but only inasmuch as he was willing to channel Dylan, Woody Guthrie and The Band to tell a compellingly stark tale.

Jackson Cage’s self-funded, self-released, self-promoted and self-titled debut album managed to hit #1 on the most popular Alt Country Albums on Amazon MP3 (it currently sits at #5 just after Ryan Bingham’s Mescalito.) What makes all this more impressive is that Amazon only sells MP3s to US customers.

Jackson Cage is one of those rare cases where a band exhibits a skillful grasp of great music roots while working contemporrary technology just as adeptly. Keep your eye on Jackson Cage.

Jackson Cage – Taste the Moon(mp3)

Jackson Cage – White Line(mp3)

Jackson Cage  – I ain’t gonna waste my time(mp3)

The Bittersweets Readies “Goodnight, San Francisco,” Offers Free Download

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  • Nashville Tennessee’s The Bittersweets – Chris Meyers (guitar, keyboards, vocals), Hannah Prater (vocals, guitar) and Steve Bowman (drums) – are offering a song “Wreck” from their upcoming release “Goodnight, San Francisco” ( 9/9/08)  produced by Lex Price, Mindy Smith. Personally I take the title of their new release as a good omen for my new home.

“Wreck” mp3

  • The Americana Music Association has announced that Austin City Limits producer Terry Lickona will be their recipient of their Lifetime Achievement Award.
  • Not sure how I feel about Johnny Cash Remixed (10/14.) If it’s anything like the Nina Simone or Blue Note remix releases it could be cool. Featuring Buck 65 and Moceon Worker and John Carter Cash involvement in the project makes me think it’s a step in the direction of very cool. Cash often jumped and defied genres his entire career so this release could make a certain amount of sense.
  • Right now I’m watching “The Last Waltz,” the Martin Scorsese’s film of the final concert of The Band, 1978, Thanksgiving Day in San Francisco. Featuring guest appearances by Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Emmylou Harris, Neil Young, Muddy Waters, The Staples Singers, Dr. John and many more. Can muisc ever be this essential again? I doubt it.

Carrie Rodriguez’s New Release to Drop 8/5

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  • Austin-born, Berklee trained violinist-turned-fiddler/singer/song writer, and Chip Taylor protege, Carrie Rodriguez will release her second solo album “She Aint Me.” (8/5) The album is produced Malcolm Burn (Emmylou Harris, Kaki King) and wrote with Gary Louris of the Jayhawks as well as Mary Gauthier, Dan Wilson and Jim Boquist
  • The 10th Annual Pickathon Roots Music Festival (August 1-3, at Pendarvis Farm on Mt Scott near Portland, OR.) will feature35+ artists appearing on five stages, including two late-night venues. Some artists featured are Justin Townes Earle, a reunited Bad Livers, The Gourds, Hackensaw Boys and Wayne “The Train” Hancock.
  • According to Billboard.com ZZ Top has inked a deal with Rick Rubin’s American Recordings imprint through Columbia. The veteran rock trio is planning to hit the studio with Rubin (Johnny Cash, Neil Diamond,  Slayer) producing, for an album more in keeping with “La Grange”-era ZZ Top than its pop-friendly ’80s sound, according to manager Carl Stubner. I can’t begin to express how happy this makes me!
  • Since I’ve been here in the scorched shit-hole that is Irving Texas (but hey, it’s my native shit hole) I’ve tuned into the Clear Channel owned Dallas KZPS – Lone Star 92.5 and found it’s almost completely reverted back to it’s classic rock format it had abandoned to experiment in the alt.country/roots format. So much for experimentation and those great Willie Nelson promos they recorded. Nevertheless I found my solice in the excellent KHYI 95.3 The Range. In one sitting I heard Chris Knight, George Jones. Eleven Hundred Springs. Yeah I know I’m a little late to this party but, hell, I’m just tickled to be here.

Hank III’s New Album Gets a Release Date

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  • I’ve heard it said, and agree, that alt.country and Americana is country music for liberals. Todd Snider is once again reinforcing that idea for me. “Peace Queer” is the name of the new Snider’s new release and it is being touted as “his most political record yet.” You can hear the first track off the album “Mission Accomplished.”
  • NineBullets.net has posted some tasty cuts from Chris Knight’s upcoming album, Heart of Stone (8/19.)
  • Hank III’s site has posted release date for his upcoming release “Damn Right & Rebel Proud” – October 21, 2008 From the III site: The album is again self produced and will shake the guns right offa your rack!  The first single will be “Long Hauls and Close Calls” – for which a video has also been produced that is full of muddin’, truckin’ and gunnin’! We thank our dysfunctional family for all of its support and patience in the release of this album.  Always get comfortable here, and the official Myspace site for all the news you really need.

Tracklist:

The Grand Ole Opry Ain’t So Grand / Wild & Free / Me and My Friends /6 Pack of Beer / I Wish I Knew / If You         Can’t Help Your Own /Candidate for Suicide / H8 Line / Long Hauls and Close Calls / Stoned and Alone / P.F.F. / 3  Shades of Black / Workin Man