Category Archives: Legends

Grinderman – Nick Cave, Bad Seeds Members

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From Pitchfork – Nick Cave and three members of his Bad Seeds– Warren Ellis (also of Dirty Three), Martyn Casey, and Jim Sclavunos– will release their as-yet-untitled debut album as Grinderman on March 5 via Mute in the UK.

Grinderman’s music is “an instinctual yawlp that…resurrects the demons of each musician’s past: the trashcan proselytizing of Birthday Party-era Nick; Jim Sclavunos’ late 70s New York no-wave noise wisdom; Martyn Casey’s ominous Triffids bass reverb; plus Ellis’ avant-garde soundtrack work and his teenage love of Black Sabbath,” according to a press release.

“No Pussy Blues”– the song streaming from the band’s MySpace page– could be mistaken for a track from the Stooges’ reunion album, or at least what we hope that record will sound like. It’s noisy, funny, raw, and totally cathartic.

As previously reported, Dirty Three’s ATP in April will include sets from Grinderman and Nick Cave solo. Cave also has some European solo dates scheduled for the rest of November.

Finally, Cave has re-teamed with John Hillcoat, director of 2005’s Cave-written film The Proposition, for the next installment in Cave’s screenwriting career: Death of a Ladies’ Man. According to various reports, The Proposition‘s Ray Winstone plays the film’s protagonist, a sex-addicted traveling salesman who takes his son on a road trip after his wife commits suicide. Cheery! Production began in September.

Nick Cave dates:

11-09 Nurnberg, Germany – Meister
11-10 Stuttgart, Germany – Liederhalle
11-11 Mainz, Germany – Phoenixhalle
11-13 Vienna, Austria – Konzerthaus
11-14 Bonn, Germany – Beethovenhalle
11-17 Zurich, Switzerland – Kongresshaus
11-19 Helsinki, Finland – Finlandia Hall
11-20 Riga, Latvia – Arena
11-22 Dresden, Germany – Kulturplast
Stream: Grinderman: No Pussy Blues [MySpace]

Johnny Cash At San Quentin (Legacy Edition) – Pitchfork Review

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The fine folks at Pitchfork have posted a really nice review of the Legacy 2-CD 1-DVD release of Johnny Cash’s performance at California’s oldest state prison, San Quentin.

An excerpt: Cash’s decision to strum up a jail probably had as much to do with his own burgeoning mythology– the Man in Black, the cold-blooded killer, the anti-Nashville rebel– than any desire to remedy the U.S. prison system (although Cash did eventually actively advocate prison reform, meeting with President Richard Nixon in July 1972). All the ethical snafus inherent to the deed– it’s easy to argue that Cash exploited the convicts’ plight to buoy his own rep, or to sympathize with the families of the prisoners’ victims, who might not want to see their loved ones’ killer clapping his hands to “A Boy Named Sue”– are hard to dismiss, but At San Quentin is still a spectacular musical performance, one of the most mesmerizing live records in American history.

Dwight Yoakam – Concert Hall at The New York Society for Ethical Culture (10/12)

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Dwight Yoakam mosied into the sold out show on this brisk October night on Central Park’s upper west side as naturally as if he were playing at a State Fairgrounds or a Texas honky-tonk. The adoring crowd of big-buckle Yankees, pretty ladies in tight shirts and tattoos dancing in front of the stage hoping to catch the Honky-tonk man, in his stylish dudes, eye and there was a smattering of Southerners, like myself, appreciative to have a cultural diplomat of this talent stopping in town.
Tift Merritt was a surprise opener for the show and show and she charmed and wowed the crowd with her passionate voice and goofy jokes.

Yoakam’s sharp dressed band hit the stage at about 9:50 in his trademark off-white Stetson set over his eyes, and after a quick “Thanks ya’ll!” they break into “She’ll Remember” the toe-tapping rave-up from his latest release for New West records “Blame the Vain.” The nearly three-hour set was brimming with an embarrassment of riches, “Turn It On, Turn It Up, Turn Me Loose,” “This Time,” Jume Carter’s “Ring of Fire,” – Johnny Horton‘s “Honky Tonk Man,” “Stop the World (And Let Me Off),” “A Thousand Miles from Nowhere,” “Little Sister” as well as “Guitars, Cadillacs” — the song that startled the Nashville brass who had written Yoakam off when he was living in Nashvile in the early 80’s.

Yoakam also paid tribute to his late friend and Bakersfield style mentor, Buck Owens by covering his classics “Act Naturally,” “Cryin’ Time” and “Together Again”. The tribute ended with the duet the pair recorded in the 1990s, “Streets of Bakersfield.” I’m sure Owens was smiling down at the performance that night.

After a few minites off stage the band came back out to close things out with Queen’s “Crazy Little Thing Called Love” and the great song of spurned female commupance “Intentional Heartache.”

When he’s in the spotlight, Dwight Yoakam ranks with just a handful of country singers that make it all seem effortless.

November Vanity Fair Country Music Spread

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The November issues of Vanity Fair magazine has a pretty decent spread on country artists. There’s obvious -Cheesney, Hall and Oates…er…I mean Brooks and Dunn- the legends, Willie, George Jones, Merle Haggard, Kris Kristofferson, Dolly Parton, I still get a heat flush looking at that woman! Then there’s the presence of Mr. Who Cares…Kid Rock? How does this no-talent yankee still get play. I guess there’s a lot of people that want to get to Pam…
Shooter, Shelby Lynn, Dwight, Rosanne, Lyle….all there. I could squabble about the obvious omissions (Hank III, Scott H. Biram, Gary Allen, Old Crow Medicine Show) but whatever…it’s a nice feature.

George Jones, Kris Kristofferson to Play Carnegie Hall

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I feel like a boob. I’m just learning about this and now have to scatter for a freakin ticket! If you have an extra drop the Twang a line.

From CMT – George Jones and special guest Kris Kristofferson will perform at Carnegie Hall in New York City on Oct. 31. Jones last played the famous venue in 1962 when he appeared with Johnny Cash, Mother Maybelle and the Carter Family and Tompall and the Glaser Brothers. “I think we were one of the first, if not first, country shows to go in there. … We had a great time. The place was packed and sold out,” Jones said.

Edit: I got a great ticket from the box office. They still have some on sale for the show.

Waylon Jennings Featured on Popmatters

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There’s a great article/review on Waylon Jennings and the newly released box set, Nashville Rebel, At PopMatters.com.  From the article:

The “outlaw country” thing was always as much about camaraderie as anything else. It was a reason to stick with his pals, to make music with those who understood. And that feeling of walking in the same footsteps as other like-minded musicians stretched back to the past, as all of these outlaws wore on their sleeves their debt to the giants of country music. In the mid-’70s two Waylon Jennings singles, written by the man himself, made this point clear as day. First “Bob Wills Is Still the King”, a tribute that puts Wills on the highest pedestal (“it don’t matter who’s in Austin / Bob Wills is still the king”) while also declaring Waylon’s own love for the Texas tradition of honky-tonks and western music. And then its flip side, the lament “Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way”. As an anti-Nashville-showbiz statement it set up Jennings as an outlaw, but it’s also a statement of solidarity with the simple, from-the-gut approach of Hank Williams.
 

Rhino to Release Deluxe Dwight Yoakam’s ‘Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc.’

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Rhino celebrates the 20th anniversary of Dwight Yoakam’s ‘Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc.’ with a remastered version of his 1986 debut expanded with demos for the album recorded five years earlier. The double-disc set also features a live recording of Yoakam playing the Roxy shortly after the album’s release and includes several unreleased live cuts. The deluxe edition  of ‘Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc.’ will be available October 17th for a suggested list price of $24.98.  A digital version of the album will also be available for download at all digital outlets.

Dwight Yoakam will play at the Concert Hall at the New York
Society for Ethical Culture, New York, NY on Thusday Oct 12, 2006 08:00PM