Sort of, maybe in the country music blogs would be more accurate.
And finially here is some video of Eleven Hundred Springs from the last time I saw live in February.
Friday night The Gourdsplayed Gruene Hall with Shinyribs opening. I was especially looking forward to this since Kevin Russell - vocalist, guitarist, and mandolinist - is in, is, I should say Shinyribs.
I guess I was expecting a full band, nonetheless, I was not dissappointed. Kevin belted out great songs for over an hour on a big stage by himself. It had to be the most entertaining show done by one person I have ever seen, and better than many full bands that I have seen.
After Kevin finished up, thanked the gourds for letting him open, and an hour break The Gourds took the stage.
Every time I see them sheir shows are better and better and this was no exception. The audience was on and they were on even though the crowd was smaller than I have seen.
The Dr Pepper Museum in Waco has a podcast. That brings me up to 44 podcasts that I am subscribed to. They are doing some videos on youtube as well.
I drove from Houston to Austin to catch yet another Dale Watson christmas show at the Continental Club. This would be the fourth straight year I went. I think there have been six in all. Just like years past the place was at capacity and unless you showed up before 9:45 you were waiting in line to get in. Dale started off with Christmas with you followed by a bunch of Christmas songs.
At one point a random woman wanted to get on stage and sing. It went something like this:
Dale: What key do you want
Random Woman: I don’t know I am just going to sing
Dale: Ok start singing
Random Woman sings off mic
Dale plays a few notes on his guitar
Dale to band: B-flat guys
Song gets played
That should give you a bit of an idea how good these musicians are.
Luckily the whole night was not dedicated to christmas songs and they played songs from the normal set list.
The Holidays brought me to Houston and as usual I found myself at the Continental Club. Sunday December 23rd had Disco Expressions on stage. This would be my second time to see the band and while disco music is not what I am looking for on the radio and can’t be found in my music collection, live and with as much energy these guys have you cannot help but have a good time. Rather than try to explain what the hell was going on I have a few videos.
Abigail Washburn recently sent out an email announcing that one of the bands she is in, Uncle Earl, has put together a music video. This is how she describes it:
with our keen sense for advancing our careers as mainstream crossover artists, we chose the Georgia fiddle tune, “Streak o’Lean, Streak o’Fat,” wrote some Chinese lyrics, and staged a kungfu clogging battle in a Chinese restaurant…
I received an email from David Beebe about a Doug Sahm show at Casbeers which was last night. David Beebe doing Doug Sahm songs, that is something to see.The lineup for the tribute was The Swindles, Larry Lange and his Lonely Nights, True Stories, The Krayolas, and The Conrads.
I got there as Larry Lange was setting up and realized that I missed The Swindles, sorry Mitch. The Larry Lange set was really good. Take your standard 4 piece band and add two saxaphones and you get some great gulf coast rock and blues.
I didn’t get a chance to see much of True Stories. They were the only band of the night with an accordion, channeling the Texas Tornados. What I did catch was a little bit rough. The could have used more vocals.
Next up was the Krayolas with Jim Beal on bass with a very cool set.
Joe King Carrasco made a surprise appearance and David Beebe joined him on keyboards.
They did a great cover of Audios Mexico
and 96 Tears
The last band up was David Beebe sporting his Taco Land t-shirt leading the Conrads. Al Gomez of the West Side Horns joined in for a few songs. It is truly mind boggling how many Doug Sahm songs David Beebe knows.
Last Saturday I went up to Austin to catch Dale Watson at the Continental Club. I arrived a good bit before Dale was set to start and was able to catch the last few songs of the James Hand set. I was pleased to see Cindy Cashdollar sitting in on Steel Guitar.
Instead of the foreign coin studded electric that I have never seen Dale without he was playing an acoustic. He also had Redd Volkaert on electric, and Nate Row of Paris49 on upright bass to join him. I was hoping Cindy would sit in for this set as well but it didn’t happen. It took a few songs for the audience to get used to Dale in this configuration but once they did the dancing up front started.
Over at the 95 13 they have a great entry entitled “Did Country Music Re Elect The President.” It is based on work that David J. Firestein had done. Firestein examines the correlation of red and blue states in the 2004 election versus number of country radio stations. What I found interesting:
a Republican cannot win a state with less than one country radio station per 293,432 people, while a Democrat cannot win a state with more than one country radio station per 61,911 people. Predictably, those states in which country radio density was closest to the national average were “swing states.”
I don’t know if those numbers are just related to the 2004 election or if he gathered information from previous elections but either way. Wow.
Fresh Air has a review of the new Kelly Willis album. What I found to be very interesting was the cover of an Iggy Pop/David Bowie Success with The Gourds backing her. My first thought on hearing it was Texas Tornados. The reviewer, Ken Tucker, nailed it with dropping Sir Douglas Quintet. I can take solace in the fact that the Tornados and Sir Douglas Quintet both had Doug Sahm and Augie Meyers.
