Category Archives: News

Scott H. Biram on Tour This Summer

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

The Dirty Old One Man Band from Austin, TX, Bloodshot Records recording artist and friend of the House of Twang here, Scott H. Biram is taking time away from working in the studio and raising his chickens to bring his First Church of The Ultimate Fanaticism to a town near you. The tour includes a gig with fellow Texas hero Dale Watson at the Rhythm Room Phoenix, AZ. and a show with Nashville Pussy in Asbury Park, NJ.

Check the man out, and tell him Twang Nation sent you.

Tour Dates & Newsletter Summer 2007

Jul 21 2007- Riley’s Tavern Hunter, Texas
Jul 24 2007- Rhythm Room Phoenix, Arizona w/ Dale Watson
Aug 3 2007- Hole In The Wall Austin, Texas
Aug 8 2007- Martin’s Downtown Bar and Grill Roanoke, Virginia
Aug 9 2007- Ottobar Baltimore, Maryland
Aug 10 2007- Asbury Lanes Asbury Park, New Jersey w/ Nashville Pussy
Aug 11 2007- Luna Lounge Brooklyn, New York
Aug 13 2007- Mohawk Place Buffalo, New York
Aug 14 2007- Smiling Moose Bar Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Aug 15 2007- Beachland Ballroom Cleveland, Ohio
Aug 16 2007- Lager House Detroit, Michigan
Aug 17 2007- Schubas Chicago, Illinois
Aug 18 2007- Deep Blues Fest River Falls, Wisconsin
Aug 19 2007- 7th Street Entry Minneapolis, Minnesota
Aug 20 2007- The Waiting Room Omaha, Nebraska
Aug 22 2007- Davey’s Uptown Kansas City, Missouri
Aug 23 2007- Off Broadway St. Louis, Missouri
Aug 24 2007- Sticky Fingerz Chicken Shack Little Rock, Arkansas
Aug 25 2007- Rubber Gloves Denton, Texas
Aug 31 2007- Continental Club Austin, Texas
Sep 1 2007- Continental Club Houston, Texas

There’s no earthly way of knowing / Which direction we are going

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

I never thought about it before, but once I got notice that Lost Highway was giving away two golden tickets in select copies of Ryan Adams new release Easy Tiger (6/25) in copies sold around the New York area (winners get to attend a concert the Ryan Adams show that night at the Hiro Ballroom) I now see the remarkable similarities between Willy Wonka and Ryan Adams.

No word yet on if the Oompa-Loompas will be opening the show.

New Yorkers try your luck at either Vintage Vinyl in Fords, NJ or Looney Tunes in West Babylon, Long Island.

Hey, you never know….

Steve Earle To Host Sirius Radio Show

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

From Harp.com – SIRIUS satellite radio has just announced that country-rock legend Steve Earle will host a weekly show on the Outlaw Country station, channel 63.

The Steve Earle Show: Hard Core Troubadour Radio will be a one hour program featuring Earle’s personal music selections as well as on-air interviews with special guests. In more than thirty years of music-making, Earle has been nominated 11 times for a Grammy award, and has one win for The Revolution Starts Now in 2005. Earle has recently been in the studio recording his upcoming album on New West Records, with producer John King of The Dust Brothers, and also had a weekly show on Air America which he is leaving for his new gig at SIRIUS.

Outlaw Country was created by Little Steven Van Zandt and is home to the equally maverick likes of Shooter Jennings and Cowboy Jack Clement. Earle’s program will be broadcast Saturdays at 8pm ET and can also be heard Sundays at 1am and 9am and Monday nights at midnight.

I wonder if Sirius will give Earle the long leash that Air America did when he goes off on the powers that be. They will if they’re smart. Steve Earle’s politics are as much a part of what results in his extraordinary talent as his heroin use and obnoxious attitude. Let Earle be Earle. Let him rant and rave about the carpetbagger boy-king W and play some of the best music ever to travel the galaxy.

Austin’s Mean Eyed Cat needs your help

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

Thanks to the 9513 for putting this on my radar. Inspired by the Johnny Cash song of the same name, Austin’s one-of-a-kind Mean Eyed Cat bar is facing possible closure.

The property that the bar occupies is zoned as a retail space and thus is required to earn 51 percent of its revenue from food sales – The space has no kitchen so that’spretty much out of the question.

Owner Chris Marsh has taken the issue to the city council to ask that the property be rezoned. The council is set to vote on June 21.

Go to the Mean Eyed Cat and spend your hard-earned cash.

Go here to support the rezoning.

Porter Wagoner Opens for White Stripes at the Garden

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

From Country Standard Time – Wednesday, June 6, 2007 – Fresh off his just released brand new CD, “Wagonmaster,” Porter Wagoner can look forward to playing Madison Square Garden in July. With a band featuring Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives, Wagoner will open for White Stripes July 24.

Stuart produced Wagoner’s new release for L.A.s Anti-label. His video for the Johnny Cash-penned “Committed To Parkview” is getting some play on CMT. He also recently celebrated his 50th anniversary as a member of the Grand Ole Opry with Dolly Parton and Patty Loveless participating.

New York Upcoming Concerts – Elizebeth Cook, Drive By Truckers and Jason Isbell

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

For all you hillbillys in and around New York City (they’re out there!) there’s some fine summer music coming your way.

The lovely and talented Elizebeth Cook will bring her brand of sass and twang to the Living Room, Tuesday, June 26th – 8pm

And the mighty Drive By Truckers will be at Castle Clinton National Monument for a FREE SHOW, Thursday, July 19th – 7pm
And speaking of the Drive By Truckers, ex-trucker Jason Isbell will be playing at the Mercury Lounge on the same night,
with Steve Earle’s boy Justin Townes Earle opening the show. I can only hope that some truckers and somebody’s daddy shows up to the show.

See you at the show!

Ryan Adams Readies Box Set

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

Billboard.com – The ever-prolific Ryan Adams has more in store for fans this year than “Easy Tiger,” a new studio album due June 26 via Lost Highway. The artist is plotting a multi-disc boxed set of odds-and-ends, which will cull from his extensive back catalog.

According to a label spokesperson, the set may include live tracks, the fabled unreleased albums “48 Hours” and “The Suicide Handbook,” the oft-bootlegged “Bedhead” series and leftover songs from the “Easy Tiger” sessions.

Moonshine Willy’s Nancy Tannenbaum Dies

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

From the Bloodshot Records web site: On Sunday May 13th, Nancy Tannenbaum, aka Nancy Rideout, original guitarist in Moonshine Willy was killed in a motorcycle accident in New York City. She swerved to avoid a pedestrian who mysteriously ran onto the West Side highway, was thrown from her bike and died at the scene.

There will be a Memorial Service this Friday, May 18 at 3:30 at Temple Sholom, 3480 N. Lake Shore Drive., in Chicago

If you’ve got photos/stories/etc you want to send Bloodshot, they will send them along. Please send them to: mdinou@grisko.com

18 Wheels (mp3)

Emmylou Harris Prepares Box Set / New Release

Posted on by — 5 Comments ↓

From Billboard.com – Emmylou Harris is preparing a 80-song boxed set due Sept. 18 via Rhino, which features two discs of obscure studio work and two additional CDs of rarities, many of them previously unreleased.

“For the most part, none of these songs have ever been on a compilation before,” Harris tells Billboard.com. “They’re kind of favorites — I call them my orphans, songs that maybe I didn’t even perform that much but I loved enough to record in the studio. They didn’t quite fit either the Hot Band or whatever I was doing. Things like ‘Coat of Many Colors,’ which was one of my favorite songs of all time, or ‘Ballad of a Runaway Horse’ and ‘1917.’”

Also included are several unreleased recordings with her Trio, which also featured Dolly Parton and Linda Ronstadt. “There’s an outtake from the aborted Trio album that we did in 1978, a Carter Family song called ‘Palms of Victory’ that’s just live off the floor,” Harris says. “There’s not even a solo on it — it’s just the band and the three women singing and I sound like I’m channeling Sara Carter. I wish — in my dreams!”

The second two discs boast numerous tracks Harris has recorded for tribute albums to such acts as Gram Parsons, Merle Haggard and Townes Van Zandt, as well as the original demo for “All I Left Behind” with Kate and Anna McGarrigle.

Harris put her next studio effort on hold to finish the boxed set, but is making progress on a new Nonesuch album with assistance from the McGarrigle sisters and Seldom Scene lead singer John Starling. Harris duets with the latter on “Old Five and Dimers” (“I finally decided that I was old enough to cut that song, reaching the grand ole age of 60,” she laughs).

“It’s kind of a combination of some of my own songs, some songs that I’ve wanted to record for a long time and some new things that I came across,” she offers of the effort. “You’ll get obth Emmylou the interpreter and Emmylou the songwriter.”

Harris, who will also tour heavily into the fall, has recently recorded guest spots for Parton’s next studio album, an Anne Murray duets album and old friend Danny Flowers’ “Tools for the Soul.”

Emmylou Harris – Making Believe

CMT on Gruene Hall

Posted on by — No Comments ↓

In its continuing quest not to completely suck CMT has a nice write up on Gruene Hall in Gruene, Texas. Gruene Hall, Texas’ oldest dance hall, was opened by Pat Molak in1974 and then featured a young unknown named George Strait and his Ace in the Hole band who played one or two shows a month there starting in 1975.

“I have many great memories of playing at Gruene Hall,” Strait says. “It was definitely one of the highlights of my early career. Pat Molak, who owns it and I still consider a friend, let us play there one Sunday afternoon for, I think, 50 cents at the door. He had never heard us and wanted to check us out before he let us do a weekend night. This led to many great nights at one of Texas’ greatest dancehalls.”