It’s time to start planing on this Summer’s musical festivals and this strikes me as two of the more interesting ones.

The 2nd annual Deep Blues Musicland Film Festival seems to do for blues what alt.country did for country music. Taking place July 18-20, 2008 and offering bands from 18 states, Italy, Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom - the festival will take place on the East side of Minneapolis/St Paul to the Washington County Fairgrounds by Lake Elmo, MN. The lineup offers 45 band including Richard Johnston, Th’ Legendary Shack*Shakers, T-Model Ford, Scissormen, Black-Eyed Snakes, Black Diamond Heavies, Bob Log III, Scott H. Biram, Left Lane Cruiser, Hillstomp and Charlie Parr.

The Deep Blues Festival prides itself in being a”fan friendly” event. Free parking, affordable ticket prices and concessions, no ticket services fees, and plenty of room for the fans are guaranteed. A film festival will feature dozens of music related films and will be free and open to the public at the fairgrounds throughout the weekend.

A limited quantity of discount advance three day passes for this 21+ show are available at the two festival websites deepbluesfestival.com and myspace.com/deepbluesfestival for $45. Daily tickets will be available at the event for $30. Under 21 are free, but must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian. Gates open at 10:00am, rain or shine.

BamaJam Music & Arts Festival is a three-day event in Enterprise, AL. - June 5-7 - and offers a nice lineup of country, Southern rock, folk and bluegrass acts. The fest will present 30 acts on three stages, including Hank Williams Jr., Trace Adkins, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Nanci Griffith, Ralph Stanley, ZZ Top, Randy Owen, Ricky Skaggs, Little Big Town, Miranda Lambert, Del McCoury Band, Tracy Lawrence, Darryl Worley, the Duhks, Dan Tyminski, Eric Church, Claire Lynch and Railroad Earth.

Ticket prices range from $39.50 to $99.50 for general admission, $149.50 to $309.50 for VIP.

The New York Times has a nice piece on something I’ve seen first hand. the rising popularity of Roots Music here in New York. The city that gave you the smoky Greenwich Village folk clubs from the 60’s seems posed to offer the same proving ground for roots and Americana music.

From the article: “There’s another generation of people who want to hear music that’s accessible, that’s not a prefab product, that’s lyric based but not preachy,” said Adam Levy, a guitarist and singer-songwriter who has played on all of Ms. (Norah) Jones’s albums. “If there’s a roots movement in New York now, I think of it in those terms.”

Bluegrass supergroup “Cadillac Sky” has some great performances over at CMT Unplugged at Studio 330.  Go watch ‘em over there and then go see them on the road as they come to a town near you

Happy Friday!

Country music has some great male/female duos - Tammy Wynette & George Jones, Dolly Parton & Porter Wagoner and now… Robert Plant and Alison Krauss? No really, let me ‘splain.

While Mssr. Plant and his partner in sonic larceny Jimmy Page spent most of their time pilfering Robert Johnson’s crossroads they never left the dirt roads to traverse the back woods and smokey mountains where Americana, country and roots music flourished. In plant’s own words “I completely missed a whole other area of amazing American music.”

The collaboration between the blonde bluegrass angel and blonde rock god was set in motion seven years ago when the two sang together at a 2004 Leadbelly tribute concert. The conduit to the to bring the project together came in the form of producer and musician T-Bone Burnett (’O Brother, Where Are Thou’ and ‘Walk The Line’.)

The result is a moody hushed world where sepia tinted country, fringe-folk and swaggering rockabilly fuse into a surprisingly cohesive whole. Like an unlikely collaboration between Angelo Badalamenti and Sam Phillips the alchemy on these thirteen sparsely-arranged cover versions is raw and mesmerizing - Krauss sings like a shimmering Nightingale, and sets a perfect counterpoint to Plant purr and growl. In tandem, they frequently reach moments of true transcendence last heard when Plant dueted with Sandy Denny on Zappelin 4’s (or Zoso) haunting mandolin-driven folk ballad “The Battle of Evermore.”

As you might expect of a recording of this pedigree the musicians are top of the line. Burnett’s hired guns Marc Ribot (guitar), Dennis Crouch (bass), Jay Bellarose (drums) and Norman Blake (acoustic guitar) are solid but restrained. Burnett has a knack for perfecting the early country and roots high lonesomeness that conjures hard fate and hone-spun menace that can only be labeled dark Americana.

The covers are picked with care with attention to diversity and songwriting mastery. Doc Watson’s “Your Long Journey”, Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan’s “Trampled Rose”, Gene Clark waltz “Through the Morning, Everly Brothers’ “Gone, Gone, Gone (Done Moved On)” and, most impressive, a discordant rendering of Townes Van Zandt’s “Nothing”and a Plant and Page number Please Read The Letter.”

Krauss and Plant trade solo and duet in deliriously beautiful harmony. I haven’t heard a duet release this good since Caitlin Cary and Thad Cockrell’s 2005’s release “Begonias.

Well, Thanksgivings over and I’m out of excuses for not posting a new My Space Showcase…so here goes, and I’ve got a nice treat for all you bluegrass fans. I’m breaking the rules somewhat because these boys already have a record deal, but they’re my rules to break, and I can’t keep them under my Stetson.

Ft. Worth Based progressive Bluegrass phenomenon Cadillac Sky is the most recent signing to Skaggs Family Records. I allways thought that bluegrass is prog-hillbilly music and Cadillac Sky just reaffirms my brilliant (you heard me!) hypothesis.

Cadillac Sky is made up of two national champion pickers, a respected guitar veteran, an upright bass prodigy and an award winning songwriter and have built a reputation as an amazing live band - leaving fans, as well as fellow musicians clamoring for more at every performance. Cadillac Sky will make their first big splash onto the progressive Bluegrass scene when their debut Skaggs Family full-length “Blind Man Walking” lands in stores on January 23, 2007.

Twang says check ‘em out!

It was a cold and bittersweet day this Saturday, Nov. 4th, it was the day of Bloodshot’s Annual CMJ (weasels!) Showcase. Yes it was a great day-long party and BBQ at Union Pool in Brooklyn featuring the Scotland Yard Gospel Choir, Mark Pickerel, The Silos, the Deadsting Brothers, Austin’s own Scott H. Biram, Bobby Bare Jr.’s Young Starvation League and, sadly, Austin’s own Meat Purveyors where to be performing their last show as their bass player, Miss Cherilyn DiMond, has decided to get married and move on to other pastures in Maine. I missed most of the shows due shooting the shit and catching up with old friends and making some new ones.

But I got to make time for my homeboy Scott H. and his crazy grease-soaked stomp-blues revival and the very last show of the Purvs. Scott did his best in the 45 min allotted for him but c’mon! He’s just getting the crowd hoping, hollering and speaking in drunken tongues.

I skipped on Bobby Bare Jr. (yeah, I know) but I was near the front of the masses for the Purvs.

Taking the stage at 5:30 and a few moments of reflection from lead singer Jo Walston the band tore into an hour-and-a-half of thrash-grass sampler from their ten year career. “TMP Smackdown”, “Pain By Numbers”, “I’d Rather Be Your Enemy,” “Truckers Speed,” “Tallboy”, “Working on a Building” it was a trip down memory lane in a meth-fueled trailer park. The band then threw in killer covers of Ratts “Round and Round” and Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” and “Lucky Star” just to top of the night right.

There were tears, laughs and discussion of weed-induced hetro and or lesbian sex by Jo as she up-ended a stiff shot of whisky. The rest of the Purvs, Cherilyn DiMond on stand-up bass (and the instigator of the Purvs demise due to that aforementioned marital commitment (Damn woman, where your priorities?!), guitarist extraordinaire Bill Anderson and on speed-metal mandolin Peter Stiles, gave the rabidly-rowdy and adoring crowd (some of which had traveled all the way from Austin to catch the show) the red Meat they came to hear.

More tears, more denial and two encores I was too drunk to recall the details of..if it had to end this is the way it should have gone.

Thanks to the Meat Purveyors for then great years and to Bloodshot for being cool to me and putting on such a great shindig,

Yeah those weasels at the CMJ denied yours truly a press pass to attend their precious conference (don’t they know that tens of people worldwide read this blog?!) but who cares there’s only one show I want to  go to anyway and it’s open to the public and CHEAP! from the label:

BLOODSHOT 11th annual CMJ BBQ
Saturday, November 4th @ Union Pool in Brooklyn (Williamsburg)
Sponsored by KDHX, eMusic, and Oskar Blues Brewery.

Tickets $10 or $7 with a CMJ badge.
Public welcomed and encouraged.  No invite needed!!!
Beer, BBQ and goodies provided
Doors at noon, music PROMPTLY AT NOON!!

Scotland Yard Gospel Choir (Chicago IL) (chamber folk punk)
Mark Pickerel (Seattle WA)
The Silos (NYC)  New CD in Feb 2007
Deadstring Brothers   (Detroit MI)
Scott H Biram   (Austin TX) (That dirty ‘ol one-man band-Twang)
Bobby Bare Jr  (Nashville TN) 
THE MEAT PURVEYORS  (Austin TX)   LAST SHOW EVER!!!!!(RIP dammit-Twang)

From the Merlefest press release: Wilkes Community College will present MerleFest 2007, the 20th annual festival in celebration of the music of the late Merle Watson and his father Doc Watson, on its campus in Wilkesboro, NC on April 26 - 29, 2007. Those joining Doc Watson and Merle’s son Richard Watson for MerleFest 2007 will include:

Blue Highway; Sam Bush; Cherryholmes; Elvis Costello; John Cowan Band; Donna The Buffalo; Jerry Douglas; The Duhks; Béla Fleck; Paul Geremia; John Hammond; Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver; Del McCoury Band; Nitty Gritty Dirt Band; Peter Rowan & Tony Rice Quartet; Darrell Scott; the Legendary Earl Scruggs with Family & Friends; Marty Stuart & His Fabulous Superlatives; Pam Tillis; The Waybacks; and many others.

MerleFest 2007 has also confirmed appearances by Susana & Timmy Abell;
RG Absher & Extra Measure; Alberti Flea Circus; The Belleville Outfit
(formerly DesChamps Band); Ira Bernstein; Spencer Bohren; Roy Book Binder;
Laura Boosinger; The Carolina Chocolate Drops; T Michael Coleman; Crooked
Still; Deer Clan Singers; Dixie Dawn; Robert Dotson; Benton Flippen Band;
The Flowers Family; Pat Flynn; Forget-Me-Nots; Ruthie Foster; Gospel Jubilators; Mitch Greenhill; Buddy Greene; Dianne Hackworth; George Hamilton IV; Ginny Hawker & Tracy Schwarz; Orville Hicks; Bob Hill; Willette Hinton & the Hinton Family Band; Clint Howard; The Infamous Stringdusters; The InterACTive Theater of Jef; Reverend Robert Jones; Jim Lauderdale; Jack Lawrence; Mark Lippard; Jeff Little; Brack Llewellyn; The Local Boys; The Lonesome Sisters; The Lovell Sisters; Bill Mathis; Thomas Maupin; Andy May; Curly Miller & Carole Ann Rose; NC Thumb and Finger Style Guitar Players, Inc.; Nashville Bluegrass Band; Dirk Powell Band; Red Stick Ramblers; Roan Mountain Hilltoppers; Robinella; Jim Rooney; Tom Sauber; Shana Banana; Larry Skipper; Joe Smothers; Steep Canyon Rangers; Tut Taylor; Joe Thompson & Bob Carlin; Toubab Krewe; Happy Traum; Uncle Earl; The Waybacks; Charles Welch; Pete & Joan Wernick; Cyndi Wheeler; Wilkes Playmakers; Tony Williamson; and The Worthless Son-In-Laws. All bookings are subject to change without notice due to circumstances beyond the control of the festival.

Tickets go on sale on November 14th!