Angaleena Presley Gets ‘Wrangled’ With Chris Stapleton, Miranda Lambert, Ashley Monroe, Wanda Jackson and Guy Clark

Angaleena Presley - 'Wrangled'

On April 21 honky-tonk songstress, and one-third of the country super-group Pistol Annies, Angaleena Presley will release her sophomore solo album ‘Wrangled’ April 21 on Mining Light/Thirty Tigers records.

‘Wrangled’ ‘s the 12-track has Presley once again at the co-production helm with Oran Thornton (Eric Church, David Nail) and was recording at famed “Ronnie’s Place” in Nashville.

There’s also an impressive list of co-writers on ‘Wrangled.’

From the press release:

One of the album’s many highlights is “Cheer Up Little Darling” — which Angaleena co-wrote with her dear friend Guy Clark. This is the last song completed by Guy before his death and features Shawn Camp playing Guy’s No. 10 guitar, which was used to write the song with Guy, and Guy’s mandola, which he had been learning to play during the last year of his life.

Another spotlight track is “Dreams Don’t Come True,” written with Pistol Annie sisters, Miranda Lambert and Ashley Monroe.

“Only Blood” was written with fellow East Kentuckian, Chris Stapleton and features Morgane Stapleton’s unmistakable vocals, while “Good Girl Down” yielded unforgettable moments with the legendary Wanda Jackson.

Of ‘Wrangled’ Presley says:

“Wrangled is an explicitly forthright journey through my experience in the business of Country Music. I tried to tackle uncomfortable realities like the discrimination against female artists at the height of Bro-Country, the high school mentality of Music Row and the pain that’s just beneath the surface of the road to stardom,” says Angaleena.

“Covered in elbow grease and sacrifice, I set out to shed the skin of my ‘dream’ Nashville by painting a musical picture of loss, surrender, resurrection, redemption, and connection with real people who make and support honest music.”

Angaleena will debut many of these new songs on the road, including during the Cayamo Cruise, Feb. 19-26, and will announce tour dates for the Spring and Summer in coming weeks.

Check out a liver performance of ‘Dreams Don’t Come True’ below.

The Wrangled track listing is below, with songwriters in parenthesis.

1. Dreams Don’t Come True (Angaleena Presley, Miranda Lambert, Ashley Monroe)
2. High School (Angaleena Presley, Ivy Walker, Sophie Walker)
3. Only Blood (Featuring Morgane Stapleton) / (Angaleena Presley, Chris Stapleton )
4. Country (Featuring Yelawolf) / (Angaleena Presley, Michael Wayne Atha)
5. Wrangled (Angaleena Presley)
6. Bless My Heart (Angaleena Presley)
7. Outlaw (Angaleena Presley)
8. Mama I Tried (Angaleena Presley, Oran Thornton)
9. Cheer Up Little Darling (Angaleena Presley, Guy Clark)
10. Groundswell (Angaleena Presley, Ian Fitchuk)
11. Good Girl Down (Angaleena Presley, Wanda Jackson, Vanessa Olavarez)
12. Motel Bible (Angaleena Presley, Oran Thornton, Trevor Thornton)

Listen Up! Shovels and Rope Cover Bruce Springsteen and Tom Waits for Jack White’s Third Man Records

Shovels and Rope Johnny 99It looks like Jack White;s adopted home of Nashville is starting to reflect in the music being released by his Third Man Records label.

The latest is from Charleston indie-folk duo Shovels and Rope. The 7-inch will be released on April 2nd and features a jaunty cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “Johnny 99” (off the extraordinary Nebraska, hear it below) on the A side, with a version of Tom Waits’ “Bad As Me” on the B.

The release is on on Third Man’s Blue Series, where singers and bands traveling through Nashville are invited to stop by to record one or two songs at Third Man Studio produced by White. The songs are then, as soon as possible, made available on 7” vinyl and digitally on itunes. The series also includes releases by Brittany Howard and Ruby Amanfu, Seasick Steve, Chris Thile with Micheal Daves , The Secret Sisters, Wanda Jackson and others.

The release will be available on iTunes and vinyl. It;s a measly $6 and you can pre-order here.

Video Feature: Wanda Jackson & Justin Townes Earle – “Am I Even a Memory? ”

Melancholy doesn’t even begin to describe this new video of  Greg Garing’s  “Am I Even a Memory? ” This barroom weeper comes from the legendary rockabilly queen Wanda Jackson’s newest Justin Townes Earle produced full length LP, “Unfinished Business.”  The video is the second released from the album and follows the excellently retro video for the Freddie King cover “Tore Down,”

The video was shot in wonderfully moody black-and-white in Nashville hip dive Santa’s Pub by Cream contributor Seth Graves, who also directed “Tore Down.” The video shows Jackson singing a karaoke version of “Memory” to indifferent patrons. JTE shooting is pool and then visits the head to be haunted by a past love. The lanky Earle and gloriously aging Jackson partaking in a forlorn croon is beautiful as well a s haunting.

Ms. Jackson will appear on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno Nov. 20, and she’ll play 3rd & Lindsley on Dec. 7.

Twang Nation Podcast Episode 8 – Derek Hoke, Malcolm Holcolmb, My Darling Clementine, Waylon Jennings & Wanda Jackson

Here it is folks. Podcast  #8 is hot off the press and ready for your listening enjoyment.

This is my pre-Americana Conference and Festival episode and several performers featured - Derek Hoke, Darrell Scott , Amy Black and the legendary Wanda Jackson will be appearing at the event. Malcolm Holcolmb attended last year and I interviewed him at the event in 2009.

There’s also some great music from some notable newcomers. The golden area heartache from My Darling Clementine  and the twang pop from Trapper Schoepp & The Shades and Skyline Drive.

Then there’s the gritty soul from the sophomore effort by Dallas’ Somebody’s Darling.  Also on the list is an unreleased song by the late, great Waylon Jennings, reminding us all what greatness really sounds like.

I hope you all enjoy the great Americana and roots music featured in this and all the podcasts, and hope you seek out the musicians and buy their music, merch and , most importantly, take all your friends and see them live. Remember you can leave requests or feedback below or email me at baron(at)twangnation(dot)com. All you feedback , good and bad, is appreciated.

1. Derek Hoke – song: “Mean Mama” – Album: “Waiting All Night”  ( Electric Western Records / Thirty Tigers )
2. Tim O’Brien and Darrell Scott – song: “Long Time Gone” – Album:  We’re Usually A Lot Better Than This  ( Full Light Records)
3. Amy Black – song: “Whiskey & Wine”  – Album:  One Time  (Self -Released)
4. Malcolm Holcomb – song: “Gone Away at Last” – Album: “Down the River”  ( Gypsyeyes Music)
5. Guy Forsyth – song: “Red Dirt” – Album: “The Freedom To Fail”  ( Blue Corn Music)
6. My Darling Clementine – song: “Departure Lounge” – Album: “How Do You Plead”  ( Drumfire Records)
7. Somebody’s Darling  song: “Back to the Bottle” – Album: Jank City Shackdown”  (Self -Released)
8. Trapper Schoepp & The Shades  song: “Tracks” – Album: “Run, Engine, Run”  ( SideOneDummy Records)
9.  Skyline Drive song: “Nothing Like You” – Album Topanga Canyon Ranch Motel” (Self -Released)
10. Waylon Jennings  song: Goin’ Down Rockin – Album: “Goin’ Down Rockin‘”  (Saguaro Road Records)
11.Wanda Jackson – song: “I’m Tore Down” – Album: “Unfinished Business” (Sugar Hill Records)

 

Americana Music Conference & Festival Picks

Below you’ll find my picks for the 2012 Americana Music Conference showcases. This was one of the the toughest  years to winnow down the performances I’m going to attend. And I still did a poor job! There is too many great acts playing at the same time. Such an embarrassment of riches!

But there is hope! Unlike the misery of traversing the stages at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass where you’re lucky to catch parts of shows at more than one stage, and or even to make it alive in some cases, the Americana Festival has buses to get us to the venues.

Of course I can’t make all the shows unless am able top perfect that time bending and beer making contraption I’ve been working on (SOON!) but you van catch any of these performances and not go wrong.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday, September 11

The 5 Spot
$2 TUESDAYS /Twang Nation Social Club -  Hosted by Derek Hoke : feat.Melody WalkerAlanna ,
Royale Joshua Black Wilkins, Marsha & The Martians (Angel Snow & Robby Hecht) Late Night with Los Colones9pm
$2 cover/$2 Yazoo pints #UnofficialAMA

Mercy Lounge
Somebody’s Darling w/ Buffalo Clover – The High Watt #UnofficialAMA
The Billy Block Show featuring Yo Ma Ma, Erica Nicole, Chelle Rose, Allie Farris, Caroline Rose and The Cumberland Collective  #UnofficialAMA

Two Old Hippies 401 12th Ave. South
The Alternate Root Presents a Pre-AMA Triple-Play of Music with Amelia White, Julie Christensen and Tommy  Womack & The Rush To Judgment #UnofficialAMA
Showtime: 6:00-8:00 pm
No Cover ~ Special Treats
615-254-7999

Wednesday, September 12

Puckett’sGrocery, 5th & Church

5pm & 7pm Allen Thompson Band CD Release Party,
Dinner & show before the AMA Awards at 5 . Later show 7 #UnofficialAMA

The Basement
11:00 Blue Mountain
12:00 Shovels and Rope

The Station Inn
11:30 Kasey Chambers & Shane Nicholson

The Rutledge
10:00 Gretchen Peters
12:00 Delta Rae

Mercy Lounge
10:00 Corb Lund
11:00 This Wheel’s On Fire: A Tribute to Levon Helm

The High Watt
10:30 Whitehorse

Cannery Ballroom
10:00 Star Anna
Thursday, September 13

The Basement
8:00 Lydia Loveless
9:00 Angel Snow
10:00 Sons of Fathers
11:00 The Deep Dark Woods
12:00 Black Lillies

The Station Inn
10:00 Mary Gauthier
11:00 Richard Thompson

Mercy Lounge
8:00 Turnpike Troubadours
9:00 Billy Joe Shaver
10:00 Steve Forbert
11:00 John Fullbright
12:00 Jason Boland & The Stragglers

The High Watt
10:30 Eilen Jewell
11:30 Julie Lee
Cannery Ballroom
8:00 Blue Highway
9:00 Sara Watkins
10:00 Paul Thorn
11:00 Punch Brothers (with a Sara Watkins cameo?)

Friday, September 14

Sheraton Hotel lobby – 623 Union St.
Wanda Jackson
12:30-1:10pm

Amy Black,  Susan Cattaneo, Rose Cousins and Rod Picott
2:00 pm – 3:30 pm

The Basement
9:00 American Aquarium
11:00 Chuck Mead and His Grassy Knoll Boys

The Station Inn
8:00 Red June
9:00 Della Mae
10:00 McCrary Sisters
11:00 Steep Canyon Rangers
12:00 Humming House

The Rutledge
8:00 Mandolin Orange
9:00 Mindy Smith
11:00 Belle Starr

Mercy Lounge
8:00 Jimbo Mathus & The Tri-State Coalition
9:00 Holy Ghost Tent Revival
10:00 Dylan LeBlanc
11:00 Darrell Scott
12:00 Reckless Kelly

The High Watt
9:30 Two Gallants

Cannery Ballroom
9:00  Amanda Shires
10:00 Robert Ellis
11:00 John Hiatt

Saturday, September 15

The Basement
9:00 Chastity Brown
11:00 The Pines
12:00 Chris Scruggs

The Station Inn
8:00 Brennen Leigh
9:00 Phoebe Hunt
10:00 Marvin Etzioni
11:00 Rodney Crowell

The Rutledge
8:00 Felicity Urquhart
9:00 The Wood Brothers
10:00 Kevin Gordon
12:00 The Trishas

Mercy Lounge
8:00 Lera Lynn
9:00 honeyhoney
10:00 Tift Merritt
11:00 Buddy Miller & Lee Ann Womack

The High Watt
8:00 Jill Andrews
9:00 Derek Hoke

Wanda Jackson’s Next Release Produced by Justin Townes Earle

According to RollingStone.com the next release by rockabilly legend Wanda Jackson, “Unfinished Business,” will be produced by none other than Justin Townes Earle. Look for this 31st release from Jackson to come out October 9th on Sugar Hill Records.

Jackson says that Earle had encouraged her to “get back to her roots” of country, blues, and rockabilly. Earle steps into producer and music accompaniment shoes previously filled by Jack White on 2011’s “The Party Ain’t Over.” Personally, I think with his mastery of early roots and folk forms that Earle will be a better fit than White was to tap into Jackson’s greatness. What do you think?

Track list for “Unfinished Business:”

“I’m Tore Down”
“The Graveyard Shift”
“Am I Even a Memory” (feat. Justin Townes Earle)
“Pushover”
“It’s All Over Now”
“Two Hands”
“Old Weakness”
“What Do You Do When You’re Lonesome”
“Down Past the Bottom”
“California Stars”

Music Review: Gillian Welch – The Harrow & the Harvest [Acony]

If there is such a thing as a superstar in the Americana genre then Gillian Welch is one. Her debut album, Revival, came out in the height of Nashville stylized indulgence – hitherto known as the Garth years – and reached so far back in style and subject matter that it couldn’t be called old school, it predated the school itself. This New York City born and Berklee College of Music educated woman became a gabardine-clad personification mountain holler laments and sepia drenched Dust Bowl yarns. Like Duluth, Minnesota’s Bob Zimmerman she embodied the ancestral ghosts of mythology and willed herself into a contemporary symbol of a bygone era by exhibiting a respect for the cultural legacy and  ingenuity to work within the confines to create music that sounds not only timeless but new.

To further distinguish herself , at the time of her debut many of Welch’s contemporaries were approaching their work from a folky, more Lilith-like, direction. Welch was rougher, darker, and delivered her talws with grit. Like Loretta Lynn and Wanda Jackson, she appeared to be a woman that could drink you under the table and hold herself in a fight.

After an 8-year stretch, where Welch battled writer’s block and provided a supporting role for performing partner David Rawlings solo undertaking, By plan or happenstance The Harrow & the Harvest has been released  to coincide with the tenth anniversary of the Coen Brothers O Brother, Where Art Thou?, a move that in many ways reflects to neo-rustic forms crafted by Welch. The movie’s multi-platinum soundtrack was a watershed moment for the Americana music genre and featured Welch performing alongside better-known contemporaries Alison Krauss and Emmylou Harris. Welch also has a cameo in the film requesting a copy of the best-selling single from the movies fictitious group Soggy Bottom Boys.

On The Harrow & the Harvest Welch heeds timeless advice and doesn’t try and fix what’s not broken by offering up 10 songs of want and worry in many varieties. Scarlet Town opens with the protagonist visiting a town calamity and deception that would make Dr. Ralph Stanley bow his head in woe. The darkness of the songs subject is countered dazzlingly by David Rawlings deft guitar picking.

The murder ballad Dark Turn Of Mind carries a sinister undercurrent that belies it’s lulling cadence with a come-on / threat “take me and love me if you want me, but don’t ever treat me unkind. ‘cause I had bad trouble already, and he left me with a dark turn of mind”

The Way It Will Be is a smooth-folk Crosby, Stills and Nash-like that takes the associated SoCal groove to darker regions and The Way It Goes is a jaunty ode to weary fatalism that comes from a worn soul.

Tennessee is a character study in temptation and willful sin in the best Puritan tradition of the Southern Gothic form. The arch leads us from Sunday School to carousing, dancing and gambling all leading to the sweet bye and bye. The Way The Whole Thing Ends fittingly as it saunters and offers up hillbilly existential nuggets like “That’s the way the cornbread crumbles. That’s the way the whole thing ends.”

All in all The Harrow & the Harvest is a, paraphrasing from the song Scarlet Town , a deep well and a dark grave of an album brimming with hard truths as plainly told stiff as a pull of mash. It’s a fine return to form from an crafts-person that has been sorely missed.  It’s the feel bad album of the summer

official site | buy

[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xjlgyy_gillian-welch-the-way-it-goes-conan-2011_music[/dailymotion]

News Round Up: Steve Earle Talks “I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive”

  • Steve Earle talks to Billboard about his upcoming T Bone Burnett produced album I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive (titled from Hank Williams’ posthumous single) featuring Nickel Creek’s Sara Watkins and, his novel of the same name and working on HBO’s ‘Treme.
  • Punk honky-tonk sweethearts Those Darlins are set to release their sophomore album, Screws Get Loose, on March 29. Ahead of that they are releasing a vinyl 7-inch featuring album tracks Be Your Bro and Let U Down on Feb 1st. The Murfreesboro-bred band will be test-driving  songs from the album on a long run of dates that keeps them busy into June, performing alongside Dallas alt-country rockers Old 97’s and rising blues-rock outfit Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears.
  • Country music  legends George Jones, Oak Ridge Boys, Charlie Daniels, Josh Turner, Heidi Newfield, Chuck Wicks, Jack Ingram and many more are participating on The Boot Campaign to help Americans give back and say thanks you to the armed forces.
  • The New York Times talks to Wanda Jackson about her storied career as the queen of rockabilly and her new Jack White produced album The Party Ain’t Over.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoAQz4KLa2g&feature=fvst[/youtube]

News Round Up: Ryan Bingham Wins For Best Song and Artist of the Year at the Americana Awards

Ryan Bigham has come a long way in a short time. From bull rider, to opening for the Drive By Truckers, to getting the Golden Globe and Academy Award for The Weary Kind, the theme to film Crazy Heart – a song that he and T Bone Burnett wrote together.  He can now add the song of the year won at the  Americana Awards Thursday night during a rousing show at the Ryman Auditorium. “Man, I don’t know if I really deserve this,” Bingham said. “Everyone on the list are all people I’ve looked up to and admired for a long time.” Other nominees were Patty Griffin, Levon Helm, Steve Earle and Ray Wylie Hubbard. Suitably humble and damn fine company to keep. Bingham also won the award for artist of the year that. with the year he’s had, he justifiably deserves.

Other 2010 Americana Honors and Awards recipients

Album of the year: The List Rosanne Cash
Instrumentalist of the year:  Buddy Miller
New /Emerging artists of the year:  Hayes Carll
Duo/Group of the year: The Avett Brothers

Jack Emerson Lifetime Achievement Award for Executive:  Highway Records founder Luke Lewis
Lifetime Achievement Award for Instrumentalist:  Greg Leisz
Lifetime Achievement Award for Performance:  Wanda Jackson
Lifetime Achievement Award for Producer/Engineer:  Brian Ahern
Lifetime Achievement Award for Songwriter:  John Mellencamp

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwwkqABItLA[/youtube]

Americana Awards

Music Review: Mandy Marie and the Cool Hand Lukes – $600. Boots

mm coverThe Internet not only allows this site to exist but it makes discovering bands (and my work) a lot easier. I discovered Mandy Marie and the Cool Hand Lukes after coming across a featured review of their new release $600. Boots over at the the No Depression site (are you a member? You should be)  written by the good folks over at hyperbolium.com. The part of the review that caught my eye was the comparison with Ms. Mandy Marie and Ms. Wanda Jackson. After listening to $600. Boots and hearing Ms. Morris bet out her songs, rip her tele her and her Cool Hand Lukes (Morrison Foster – upright bass, Eric Grimmitt – Telecaster numero dos, Lewis Scott Jones – drums) I do believe that Ms. Jackson would be proud (and might jump on the stage with them.)

This is the wrong side of the Americana tracks. Evoking barrooms with chicken-wire caged stages, wood shavings on the dance floor, good-natured brawls, whiskey-fueled tears, Saturday nights with little thought to Sunday morning. Stories of sin, salvation, cheating, fighting, wayward youth, hot-roding, all-night trucking, doping and boozing spiked with an amped-up hillbilly Rockabilly/Bakersfield style that makes all that suffering sound like a grand old time.

Dresser Drawer Bible is a motel room honky-tonk Gospel-tinged number sang by a gal at the end of her rope and the title cut train-chugs Cash style road-weary tales that proclaims in the chorus “We’re too dumb for New York. Too ugly for L.A.”

Booze and broken heats are on fill display with This Old Tattoo, is a boot-skooting broken hearted tale of emotional and skin-art regret, and  (I’m Gonna) Drink You Out Of My Mind a high-gear jaunt on forgetting. For pure honky-tonk-girl-had-enough goodness you could do any better than Leave Me baby, Leave Me be, which sounds like a Loretta Lynn song written on meth.

Like a shot of good whiskey $600. Boots ends with a smooth burn, a blazing version of Jimmie Roger’s classic Mule Sinner Blues complete with Ms. Marie’s dead-on yelping yodel.

four-half-rate

MySpace | Buy

(I’m Gonna) Drink You Out Of My Mind (mp3)

Rose Maddox