Head up Northern Californians, the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival is on for this weekend (Fri, Oct 3rd - 10:30am - Noon & 2:30pm - 6:45pm & Sat Oct 4th 10:45am - 7:15pm - Sun Oct 5th, 2008 - 11am - 7pm) at the Speedway, Lindley & Marx meadows in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA.

The three day event has 5 stages featuring artists like Jimmie Dale Gilmore,  the Waco Brothers, Richard Thompson, Three Girls & Their Buddy (Emmylou Harris, Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin & Buddy Miller), The Del McCoury Band, Steve Earle & The Bluegrass Dukes, Guy Clark & Verlon Thompson, Robert Earl Keen, Jerry Jeff Walker, Ralph Stanley & The Clinch Mountain Boys, Elvis Costello’s High Whines & Spirits, Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder, The Infamous Stringdusters, Alison Brown Quartet with Joe Craven, Justin Townes Earle and so much more!

If you see mw at the show make sure t say “Hi” and save me a spot near the stage!

• Christmas is not too far away, and the perfect gift for your Country Music aficionado (ah hem) is the Johnny Cash Folsom Prison Show Deluxe Box Set. This Legacy Edition will feature a 2CD/1 DVD will feature the entire two Cash 1968 concerts from the California prison, totaling in 31 previously-unreleased tracks, including songs like “Blue Suede Shoes,” “I’m Here to Get My Baby Out of Jail,” “This Ole House” and even more duets with his wife June Carter Cash. The DVD contains footage from the shows, plus interviews with Merle Haggard, Roseanne Cash and inmates who witnessed Cash’s Folsom concerts. Also featured are liner notes penned by both Cash biographer Michael Streissguth, Steve Earle and Cash himself, which he wrote in 1999. Out October 14th via Columbia/Legacy.

• The Prophets of Country Doom Those Poor Bastards new release “Satan Is Watching” will be available (fittingly) on October 31st. on CD and Vinyl.

• Get over to ebay and buy up all the It Burns When I Pee goodies! Norma Jean’s panties aren’t going to be up there forever people!

• And lastly a little video from the Americana Music Conference:

Glen Campbell - Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)

From the Associated Press: WACO, Texas (AP) — A McLennan County grand jury has indicted country singer Billy Joe Shaver on felony charges for his alleged role in an April 2007 shooting at a Lorena bar.

Shaver, 69, is charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, a second-degree felony, and a charge of unlawful carrying of a handgun by a licensed holder on a licensed premises, a third-degree felony, the Waco Tribune-Herald reported in its online edition Wednesday.

An official at the McLennan County Jail in Waco told The Associated Press that Shaver had not turned himself in Wednesday night.

Messages left by the AP for Shaver’s last known attorney and to his representative seeking comment after business hours weren’t immediately returned.

One witness said Shaver followed the victim, Billy B. Coker, out of Papa Joe’s Texas Saloon in Lorena on April 1, 2007, and asked, “Where do you want it?” before shooting him in the face, according to an arrest warrant affidavit filed last year.

Another witness said that after hearing gunfire, she went outside and heard Shaver say to Coker, “Tell me you are sorry,” and “Nobody tells me to shut up,” according to the affidavit signed by then-acting Lorena Police Chief John Moran.

Coker, who was treated and released, told police last year that the shooting was unprovoked.

An attorney for Shaver said at the time that Coker was drunk, aggressive and had a knife and that he followed Shaver outside.

End Associated Press. My take? Mr. Coker is looking to make his mistake into a pay bay.

When Bob Lefsetz, of the online music industry screed the Lefsetz Letter, writes about you positively you’re
probably doing something really cool. This is just what he has done after listening to the Americana Music Awards on XM Radio while driving in his home town of Los Angeles. I was in attendance at the Nashville’s Historic Ryman Auditorium and though his angel was on Robert Plant;s involvement with the Americana movement his point is an importmnat one, it’s about something all but lost in today’s culture, authenticity.

Sitting in the Ryman is to a country music fan as close to a secular sense of the divine there is to be had. Add a live performances by Ryan Bingham and Joe Ely (together with band leader Buddy Miller), an appearance by Alison Krauss, Robert Plant, Levon Helm, Joan Baez, Steve Earle, James McMurtry and John Hiatt and you’ve achieved, in my opinion, musical nirvana.

Alison Krauss and Robert Plant took top honors with Album of the Year with Raising Sand. The Band’s drummer/singer,now solo artist, Levon Helm won Artist of the Year. The award was presented by Billy Bob Thorton, who was on hand to promote his Americana/Country band The Boxmasters and thier new self-titled release. I caught Billy Bob and the Boxmasters at at the Cannery last night and was surpirised at how well done the music was and how fully invested he is in this musical endevor. Billy Bob also eaned my repect when he invited Charlie Louvin on stage for al acapella duet of the old Louvin Brothers murder ballad “KnoxvIlle Girl.”

A quick shout out to some of my fellow bloggers I caught up with -  Larry Karnowski at Hickory Wind, Greg Geil at AmericanaRoots.com, Justin Gage at Aquarium Drunkard.com and Dodge at My Old Kentucky Blog.com.

Here’s a list of the winners from the awards show …

Album of the Year: Raising Sand, Alison Krauss and Robert Plant
Artist of the Year: Levon Helm
Duo/Group of the Year: Alison Krauss and Robert Plant
Instrumentalist of the Year: Buddy Miller
New Emerging Artist of the Year: Mike Farris
Song of the Year: “She Left Me for Jesus,” Hayes Carll and Brian Keane (songwriters)

Awards were also given, including …

Spirit of Americana Free Speech in Music: Joan Baez
Lifetime Achievement (Songwriting): John Hiatt
Jack Emerson Lifetime Achievement (Executive): Terry Lickona
Lifetime Achievement (Performance): Jason & The Scorchers
Lifetime Achievement (Instrumentalist): Larry Campbell
Trailblazer Award: Nanci Griffith
Lifetime Achievement (Producer/Engineer): Tony Brown

Billy Bob Thorton and Charlie Louvin - Knoxville Girl

I’m in Nashville for the Americana Music Association Conference which starts full steam tomorrow so today I had time to stop by the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum to check out their new exhibit Family Tradition: The Williams Family Legacy featuring Hank Sr. and Hank Jr. I was perusing this great exhibit and reading the history of Hank Sr.’s life and it dawned on me. It’s Hanks 85th birthday  today (as well as my Sister’s, not 85 though) !

As well as being the birthday of George Jones, Sept. 12th is also the shared date of the death of a country legend, Johnny Cash. RIP J.R., there will never be another like you.

Johnny Cash - Folsom Prison Blues - 1959

Saratoga, Texas’ (but broUght up in Vidor) very own George Glenn Jones (AKA the Possum) is a living
embodiment of country music.

Jones’ bouts with the demon rum led to periods where Jones was too incapacitated to play shows and was branded “No Show Jones.” When his second wife, Shirley Ann Corley, hid the keys to every car they owned to keep Jones from traveling to the liquor store to buy booze Jones resorted to the only mode of transportation
available to a desperate man, a ten-horsepower rotary engine lawnmower. It took Jones the better part of an hour and a half to make it the whole 8 miles to the liquor store but get there he did.

But Jones is on his fourth wife, Nancy Sepulvado, and been sober for many fruitful years. I had the pleasure of seeing the him two Halloweens ago at New York’s Carnegie Hall (Kris Kristofferson opened) and he was as smooth and brilliant as you might imagine. Jones is also up for a Kennedy Center Honor for lifetime achievements in the performing arts this year and recently released a CD of unreleased duets, “Burn Your Playhouse Down.”

In tribute to George Jone’s 77th birthday New Yorks WFMU 91.1 fm has posted some tribute mp3s to celibrate.

George Jones - Too Much Water

It was quite a treat for me to see Willie Nelson perform under the Saratoga stars the other night. The Texas Yoda and “the family” played the beautiful Mountain Winery to an a rousingly adoring crowd.  At one point he traded his signature red bandanna for heavy worn and button adorned straw cowboy hat that an elderly gentleman on crutches offered at the foot of the stage.  I can now claim to have seen Willie on all three coasts (Texas, New York and California)!

The fine folks at the 9513 brought my attention to a great piece by Chris Willman, author of the excellent book Rednecks & Bluenecks: The Politics of Country Music, on the use of the formally exclusive use of Brooks & Dunn’s “Only In America” by the Democrats to cap Obama’s speech at the Democratic convention. Whatever your political stripe, it’s interesting to watch all parties vie for the cultural pulse and show love for the Twang.

Rosie Flores “The Rockabilly Filly” turns 58 years young and will be celebrating this Wednesday, Sept 10th at Antone’s in Austin. Playing the celebration will be the Bastard Sons of Johnny Cash (8:00) James Intveld (9:00) the lady Rosie Flores herself (10:00) and Two Hoots and a Holler (11:00). Doors open at 7:00

Justin Townes Earle’s excellent release “The Good Life” is available today a vinyl limited edition of 1000 from Bloodshot Records.

Country Music Hall of Famer and half of the legendary country duo The Louvin Brothers,  Charlie Louvin will release two new albums on New York City’s Tompkins Square label.

Steps to Heaven, due September 16th, 2008, features ten traditional gospel classics including two Louvin Brothers songs. The release will be followed by Charlie Louvin Sings Murder Ballads & Disaster Songs, out December 9, 2008. Both albums were produced, recorded and mixed by Mark Nevers (Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Andrew Bird, Bobby Bare Sr.)

Charlie Louvin’s upcoming tour dates:

Sept 16th - Grand Ole Opry
Sept 19th – Grimey’s in store 5:30 during AMA convention
Oct 14 – Lucinda Williams album released w/ Charlie guesting
Oct 25th – Woodstock NY Levon Helm’s Ramble

***On tour with Old 97’s – October 1-12
Oct 1 Athens GA Georgia Theater
Oct 2 Knoxville TN Bijou Theater
Oct 3 Carrboro NC Cat’s Cradle
Oct 4 Lancaster PA Chameleon Club
Oct 5 Boston MA Wilbur Theatre
Oct 6 S. Burlington VT Higher Ground
Oct 8 Buffalo NY Town Ballroom
Oct 9 Pittsburgh PA Diesel
Oct 10 Cleveland OH Beachland Ballroom
Oct 11 Detroit St. Andrews Hall
Oct 12 Newport KY Southgate House

Charlie Louvin - “Ira”