• Lucinda Williams took to Twitter to announce the title of her forthcoming album. Continuing her recent theme of happiness and matrimonial bliss the title will be Blessed. I guess Lou got her Joy back.

• Ms. Lucinda and other notable Americana music folks, Drive By Truckers, Todd Snider, Gillian Welch, David Rawlings, Rhett Miller, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Hayes Carll, became animated to appear in a special musical episode of Cartoon Network’s cartoon centered on hillbilly cephalopods -  Squidbillies.

• Folk singer-songwriter Ana Egge has tapped Steve Earle as producer for her seventh solo album. The album will be recorded in Woodstock, New York in the fall to record at Levon Helm Studio.

• Moody-Old time Americana band Black Prairie (a side project for three members of the Decemberists and other notable Portland, OR. musicians) has recently released two new songs they are giving away for free.

The Blackest Crow

Turn It Into Gold

I know I haven’t been posting much lately. Besides the uptick in my  frequency of the Twang Nation twitter feed and preparing for a move (down the street) but I wanted to do a quick list for Fathers Day. Being a dad it’s close to my heart and there are some great songs out there. Please I saw Darrell Scott  is giving away a free download of his song, A Father’s Song for the occasion so It moved me to get something done. Here’s some of my favorites, got one of your own? Post it below. Thanks for reading.

The Drive By Truckers : Oufit – Jason Isbell shows Southern soul telling a tale of a  man giving sage advice to his son.

Drive-By Truckers: Daddy Needs A Drink – Yeah, I’m showing my DBT bias here, but great songs are where you find them. Patterson Hood embodys a man worn out by life and seeking liquid refuge.

Dixie Chicks: Godspeed (Sweet Dreams) – Sure Natalie Maines sings this beautiful song, written by Austin legend Radney Foster, but the sentiment of parental love is transcendent. Emmylou Harris ‘ vocals near the end seal the deal.

Elton John: My Father’s Gun – From the excellent Americana classic Tumbleweed Connection. A boy inherits his father’s firearm as well as his hatred of the Yanks.

Lee Canner: Distant Father – One of my twitter followers sent me this as an anti-Father’s Day song from the Victor Mourning’s Stephen Lee Canner. Chilling and lovely Gothic Americana.

Michael Dean Damron: Father’s Day – Love this guy and this song from his latest.

A Boy Names Sue – Johnny Cash sings Shel Silverstein’s wry tale about a father’s peculiar form of character development.

• In true DIY fashion The Johnny Cash Project is a “global collective art project” that allows fans from all over the world to contribute to a arrogated, user-generated video for the title track from the latest Johnny Cash recording American VI: Ain’t No Grave. The single images are then threaded together into a one-of-a-kind labor of love. I only wish the Man in Black has lived to see this.

• John Prine fans are about to hit pay-dirt. On May 25th, 2010, Oh Boy Records (founded in 1981 by Prine and manager Al Bunetta) will release the live In Person & On Stage, which will draw from performances spanning the past several years and covering songs from as far back as Prine’s 1971 debut and as recently as 2005′s acclaimed Fair & Square. Then Broken Hearts & Dirty Windows: Songs of John Prine will be released on on June 22nd (Oh Boy) and will feature Prine compositions interpreted by devotees such as My Morning Jacket, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, The Avett Brothers, Conor Oberst and The Mystic Valley Band, Old Crow Medicine Show, Lambchop, Drive-By Truckers, Deer Tick featuring Liz Isenberg, Justin Townes Earle, Those Darlins, and, reprising their respective tracks from In Person & On Stage, Nickel Creek’s Sara Watkins and Josh Ritter. Oh Boy will begin a pre-sale for In Person & On Stage on April 20thand for Broken Hearts & Dirty Windows on April 27th at www.musicfansdirect.com.

• The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum has announced it will pay tribute to the legendary Tammy Wynette with an exhibit titled Tammy Wynette: First Lady of Country Music. Presented by Great American Country (GAC) the exhibit will open in the Museum’s East Gallery on August 20, 2010, and run through June 2011.

• More news from the The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. An upgrade to the Hall’s core collection, Sing Me Back Home: A Journey Through Country Music, are expected to be completed next month. The updates, which focus on country music’s last five decades, will bring the story of country music forward in time and conclude with a glimpse of the future. They will highlight the country-rock, pop-country, southern rock, full-strength classic country and the “Urban Cowboy” craze. The upgrade includes new oversized portraits, video clips and artifacts such as Dolly Parton’s handwritten lyrics to Jolene, Tom T. Hall’s acoustic guitar he purchased from songwriter Merle Kilgore, and items from Ronnie Milsap, Kenny Rogers, Mel Tillis, and Tanya Tucker. Other updates focus on the mid-1980s arrival of artists like Dwight Yoakam, Rosanne Cash, Rodney Crowell, Randy Travis and Steve Earle. New exhibits celebrate contemporary bluegrass and Americana artists, ranging from Alison Krauss and Del McCoury to Buddy Miller and Jim Lauderdale.

One of the forebearers of the old school alt.country work ethic of play hard, play often, and play well.

The Bottle Rockets still contain the DNA of thier earlier incarnation of Chicken Truck, a straight up honky-tonk band that preceded the Rockets, and from their relationship with Uncle Tupelo in the 90′s. But while many of thier contemporaries  have either crashed and burned or abandoned the alt.country genre altogether for indy-rock cross-market gold (I’m  looking at you Tweedy!), guitarist/singer Brian Henneman,  guitarist John Horton, drummer Mark Ortmann and bassist Keith Voegele found their groove and honed their craft from years together and miles on the road.

Lean Forward is really two records in one. If you give it a casual spin it’s a tight and powerful rock and roll record that belies the craftsmanship by hitting you in the gut. On closer inspection the deceptively straightforward songs tell of everyday troubles while displaying a smart silver lining.

Wrong turns on tour are serendipitous events (The Long Way), Rolling-Stoned swaggering blues embrace inevitability in the face of good intentions (Shame On Me) and a Bo Diddley stomp-rocker about either a repo-man or a car thief (Nothin’ But A Driver) takes pride in his work.

Hard Times serves up a tasty slice of Southern funk and strikes a working-class Zen view of life – “Hard times, that’s nothin’. Hard times pass” and ending in resolve “I’m not broke down. I’m just out of gas.” Kid Next Door goes up with the Drive By Truckers’ Dress Blues and the Dixie Chicks Traveling Soldier as great slice-of-life songs that show the cost of war from a main street view.

The Bottle Rockets have been a criminally overlooked American rock band for seventeen years now and judging by Lean Forward it hasn’t bothered or slowed them down one bit

Official Site | MySpace | Buy

Portland Oregon’s Michael Dean Damron, or Mike D. as he was known when fronting his former hell-raising roots-rock band I Can Lick Any Sonofabitch in the House, isn’t your garden variety sensitive, market tested, conveyor belt type of singer/songwriter. The emotion, fear and anger is laid out on his third solo release Father’s Day for all to feel. He’s not just singing, he’s testifying.

The youthful flame-thrower intensity of ICLASOBITH has been condensed into a focused,  welding torch constructing a dark and twisted terrain of one mans life and soul.

The lost love songs here – Dead Days, Boy With A Car and the provocatively titled I Hope Your New Boyfriend Gives You Aids (do NOT judge the album based on the title of this song, it doesn’t show up once in this beautifully heart wrenching cut.) display just as much defiance as they do remorse. Love songs are welcome, whining is not.

The specter of the Damron family patriarch is summoned and exorcised in the title track. The song tells of Damron’s father’s life as a hard, violent, and lonely one. The song is both a celebration and an unflinchingly cautionary tale. The excellent Angels Fly Up carries on the divisional theme, devils and angels, suicide and celebration- that seems to run through Fathers Day.

Tornado Song is a chugging blues-Gospel number veined with wailing harmonica and I’m A Bastard has Damron unmitigated affirmation of his place among the best of the worst in the troubadour trade.

As if the original songs weren’t enough to make this a fine album the three covers Damron has chosen to include speak volumes, fit nicely and are done with deftness and deference. Drag the River’s Beautiful And Damned is a solemn pedal-steel laced number and a ’round the campfire treatment of Thin Lizzy’s Dancing In The Moonlight are wonderful. The real courage, as with anyone willing to cover the Late Great Townes Van Zandt, comes with the inclusion of an accomplished rendition of Towne’s bleak tale of perseverance Waiting Around To Die.

Damron’s whiskey-and-dust vocals  brings to mind modern day contemporaries like Ryan Bingham, Drive By Truckers’ Patterson Hood, William Elliot Whitmore and Lucero’s Ben Nichols. The worn nature of the delivery adds another depth of ragged beauty to each of these gems. Damron sites Steve Earle, Alejandro Escovedo, Townes Van Zant and Waylon Jennings as heroes. But I believe that the true Patron Saint to his unique style of edgy storytelling, with a penchant for tenderness might well be David Allen Coe.

Sure Father’s Day is not a sunny Summer party album, who cares. It’s a great example of a  mature and excellent singer/songwriter venting his own private Winter.

Official Site | MySpace | Facebook | Buy

Father’s Day mp3

Drive By Truckers – Daddy Needs a Drink

Over their 13 years performing together the Drive By Truckers have produced a mess of great music, but not all of it made it onto their final 7 studio albums. The mighty DBT and their soon to be ex-label New West Records dug into the vaults and with guidance from longtime producer Dave Barbe, put finishing touches on a selection of songs that were never quite completed. “For me, it’s been a fun stroll through memory lane and a chance to tie up some loose ends” says Patterson Hood.

The result of the collaboration is The Fine Print (A Collection Of Oddities and Rarities 2003-2008) featuring songs written by band members past and present, including Patterson Hood, Mike Cooley and Jason Isbell. 7 of the twelve songs come from The Dirty South era… a highly creative time for DBT. Hood explains “That was an especially fertile period for the band, as we more or less wrote that album and the one before it, Decoration Day, as well as my first solo album all in a three year period as we were recording and touring behind Southern Rock Opera.”

The record also contains four covers including “Rebels” by Tom Petty, which the band recorded originally for the TV show “King Of The Hill” and “Like A Rolling Stone” by Bob Dylan which provided Shonna Tucker with her first ever lead vocal performance on a DBT recording. The Fine Print  will be available September 1, 2009.

This summer New West will also release Drive-By Trucker’s entire Austin City Limits performance as a CD / DVD combination pack as a part of the Live From Austin, TX line. The Drive-By Truckers graced the Austin City Limits stage on September 26, 2008 while touring for their last studio album Brighter Than Creation’s Dark.

A CD/DVD combination package featuring the entire performance will be available on July 7th, 2009. The 13 songs, which were filmed in Hi-Def and recorded in 5.1 Surround Sound for the critically acclaimed PBS show, include a mix of new songs from Brighter Than Creation’s Dark alongside the classics “Let There Be Rock” and “18 Wheels Of Love” (off their second album Gangstabilly) and “Marry Me” (from Decoration Day). The band line-up featured is Patterson Hood, Mike Cooley, Shonna Tucker, John Neff, Brad Morgan and Jay Gonzalez.

The DBT are currently in the studio working on the next album for an early 2010 release.

THE FINE PRINT TRACK LIST:
1. George Jones Talkin’ Cell Phone Blues
2. Rebels
3. Uncle Frank (alternate version)
4. TVA
5. Goode’s Field Road (alternate version)
6. The Great Car Dealer War
7. Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken)
8. When The Well Runs Dry
9. Mrs. Claus’ Kimono
10. Play It All Night Long
11. Little Pony And The Great Big Horse
12. Like A Rolling Stone

LIVE FROM AUSTIN, TX Track List:
1. Perfect Timing
2. Heathens
3. A Ghost To Most
4. The Righteous Path
5. I’m Sorry Huston
6. 3 Dimes Down
7. Puttin’ People On The Moon
8. Space City
9. The Living Bubba
10. Zip City
11. 18 Wheels Of Love
12. Let There Be Rock
13. Marry Me

Remember those that gave all.

• The fine folks at the 9513 brought to my attention the sorry news that Kris Kristofferson’s longtime guitarist Stephen Bruton has succumbed to throat cancer.

• More details on Stephen Bruton at Billboard.com.

• More sad news, Lynyrd Skynyrd Bassist Donald “Ean” Evan dies At 48 after a battle with cancer.

• Country music legends Charley Pride and Marty Stuart and bluesman Pinetop Perkins will headline the third annual Mississippi Grammy gala.

• Recycle your cell phones to support Nuci’s Space and get free merch coupons from the Drive-By Truckers official Store!

• The New York Times has a piece on Steve Earle and his course in recording his trubute to his mentor Texas singer/songwriter Townes Van Zandt.

So how do you know you’ve arrived? When talentless, sweaty geeks manipulate plastic instruments to music you’ve worked your butt off to create and hope will be taken seriously. Wooo hooo!

Harmonix and MTV Games today announced the debut of five alternative country acts to the Rock Band Music Store catalog of downloadable content including artists Neko Case, Steve Earle, Lucinda Williams, Drive-By Truckers and Old 97’s.

“Alt Country 01” 5-pack features a signature mix of alternative country sounds from bluegrass and rockabilly to honky-tonk rock. The 5-pack includes “People Got A Lotta Nerve” from Neko Case’s soon-to-be released album Middle Cyclone (March 3, 2009), “Can’t Let Go” by Grammy winning singer/songwriter Lucinda Williams from her album Car Wheels On A Gravel Road (1998) and Steve Earl’s “Satellite Radio” from his album Washington Square Serenade (2007). The 5-pack also features “Three Dimes Down” from southern rock band Drive-By Truckers featured on the Brighter Than Creation’s Dark (2008) album and the Old 97’s live recording “Timebomb” from the band’s Alive & Wired (2005) album.

Release Date: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 (Xbox LIVE Marketplace for Xbox 360®)
Thursday, February 26, 2009 (PlayStation®Store)

** Dates for Rock Band game tracks are tentative and subject to change **