Very exciting news!  Brent Best, frontman and songwriter for The Drams and Slobberbone, is working on a solo CD.  And for those of us who like to give our money directly to the artist, here’s our chance.  Mr. Best is going to be his own record company – just needs a little (very little) cash up front to get the operation up and running.  You can read about it here.

But let me summarize.  The suggestion is that people who are interested send him $10 now and by the end of the summer, he will send a limited edition, personalized record with his solo material on it.

Here’s what he says about the music:  “A few of these songs you might have heard me perform live the last few years, some I’ve never played outside my house and some have never left their hard drive. They’ve marinated long enough, methinks. With that in mind, I’ve decided they should be recorded all proper-like, in a real studio.”

That’s just like two grande cappuccinos from you-know-where but the buzz you get will be so much better and last so much longer.  Pretty sure he’ll deliver too.  He’s never let me down.  And I can’t wait.

I can’t believe this has never been released on an album. . .

Click Gumdrop to download . . .

“How do you like my new favorite song?:” I ask him.

“It’s good!” he says.  ‘Is that Jeff Tweedy?”

“Nope,” I reply, smugly.  “It’s someone you’ve never heard of.”

“Yeah?” he says.  “Sure about that?  ‘Cause it sounds like Pre-

Wanker Wilco.”   Or Tweedy with Uncle Tupelo.

This is high praise from Bucky.  Just saying.

So yeah, neither Bucky nor I had heard of Ronnie Fauss but, one quick listen later, we’re both fans.  Listen here and you’ll see why.

Upon further research, we see some familiar names associated with the disc.  It’s produced by Brent Best (The Drams, Slobberbone).   And Jess Barr (The Drams, Slobberbone) plays some sweet banjo.  There’s also Chad Stockslager (The Drams, The King Bucks) on keyboards.  That one was hard to figure because his name is covered by the spindle for the disc but you can see a tiny picture of Chad and his keyboard.

To round it out, Joe Butcher  (The King Bucks) plays pedal steel, Darren Dement plays mandolin, Gary Rivers (Preston Grey) plays bass, and Bill Spellman (Slider Pines) is on drums.  Buncha Dallas guys.

The “Americana” style folk songs have an intimate feel and sound as if they might have been recorded live.  Well recorded, lightly produced, beautifully performed.  It works.

Fauss, of course, does the singing and songwriting and that’s him on the guitar, harmonica, and accordion.   And he does a damn fine job.

His voice is rough and unpolished.  My favorite kind.  The lyrics are interesting.  Stories are being told and I can tell I’m going to enjoy fleshing out those stories in my own mind.

Like someone dies in a bad way in “With Love.”  It is its own murder mystery – the picture is vivid but the story is unclear.  I’ll have to listen it to a few more times before I decide what I think really happened.  “The Last” is a love song.  Kind of sweet with nice tingly piano in the background and harmonica bridges.

Kinda sucks that the EP is only six songs, though.  Hopefully, we’ll hear some more from Mr. Fauss in the near future.

But wait, there’s more!

Fauss tells us he actually did release a 3 song follow up to this EP, available only as digital download . . .  So there’s that.

Stay tuned for another 6 song EP from Mr. Fauss to be released spring 2010.

And you could make the argument that they didn’t really break up at all, just went through another personnell change, changed their name to The Drams and tweaked their sound a little.

So why did Tuesdsay night’s show at Dan’s seem like such a return to a time long ago?

They were billed as Whiskey Glass Eye, the world’s premiere Slobberbone tribute band but there wasn’t a person in the jam packed club that night that didn’t know it was a reunion show. Brent Brest, Jess Barr, Tony Harper and the return of Brian Lane (with Scott Danbaum sitting in on about half the set.)

And there I was feeling all nostalgic and shit.

They went way back and played lots of old stuff. Stuff I haven’t heard them play in a long time. They even resurrected the banjo, which Brent Best explained was the real reason they broke up. He said when you make the decision to tour with a banjo there’s no going back. And a banjo will fuck you up. Every night it will say “you just try and make me work,” so when you finally decide it would be a lot easier to tour without the banjo everyone gets all pissed off.

The band seemed as excited about the whole thing as the crowd. Brent was in full out rock mode- throwing his head around, wailing out the old songs and tearing up the guitar.

Brian Lane, still standing about seventeen and a half feet tall was all but unrecognizable in a haircut that would pass any military inspection. He  looked like he was  thrilled  to be up there with his old bandmates.

And they killed. Seriously.

There was lots of Pabst Blue Ribbons and shots of whiskey on the stage with lots of “drinking breaks” between songs but it was still a more focused performance than their last show a couple years ago. Or maybe I just wasn’t as drunk, it was a Tuesday night.

They played for about 2 hours.

There were two opening acts, Glossary and The Magpies. Originally it was just gonna be the Magpies but Glossary was in town opening for Lucero on Sunday night and they managed to get a night off from the tour and secure a spot on the bill.  So that made for a night that got progressively better as it went on.  Glossary is a six  piece band from Murphreesboro, Tennessee that’s probably one to watch. Scratch the probably.

The Magpies, formerly The Whiskeyhounds, from Cleveland is definitely one to put at the top of your “to see” list.  If you’ve heard the Whiskeyhounds then you know they do solid, twangy, well written rock and roll.  Even though I’d heard their discs, I had no idea they were as rockin’ as they were live. The keyboard player could be described as something like Jerry Lee Lewis hopped up on speed and maybe a little pissed off about something. He pounded the living hell out of the keys- with his fingers, his fist and even his elbows.  His glasses kept flying off his face. And you should see what he does with a tamborine.

I had a feeling while I was watching them that Slobberbone, or Whiskey Glass Eye, or whatever they want to  call themselves were going to seriously rock if they had to follow these guys.

I wasn’t disappointed either.

Here’s Slobberbone’s setlist :

Barrel Chested
Lame
That Is All
Stumblin’
Front Porch
Find The Out
Sober Song
Gimme Back My Dog
Billy Pritchard
Engine Joe
Lumberlung
Meltdown
Lazy Guy
Pinball Song
Your Excuse
Placemat Blues
I’ll Be Damned
Whiskey Glass Eye
Springfield, IL
Can’t Hardly Wait (Replacements)
Get Gone Again
Haze Of Drink
I Can’t Get Sober
Big Time  (Neil Young)

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What can I say- that Tequila Brad sure knows how to throw a damn party.  Saturday night at Dan’s Silverleaf was a total liquor fueled, pull-out-all-the-stops, crank it up and rock this place throw down. With cake.  Todd Mankin and his band started things off.  We got there in the middle of his set and he was already in full rockin’ mode.  He’s got a great voice, some good songs and a kickin’ band behind him. He closed his set with Ted Nugent’s Stranglehold.  Austin’s Band of Heathens were up next. I’ve heard their fine debut CD, Live At Momo’s- and it’s good, but I was still surprised by the full force of their set.They won the “Best New Band” at this year’s Austin Music Awards and it’s easy to see why. They’ve got three singer/songwriters trading leads, Colin Brooks, Ed Jurdi and Gordy Quist and each of them have enough talent to front your average band all by himself.  Together, they blend into something pretty exceptional.  They played the best stuff from Live At Momo’s plus a few new songs from their Ray Wylie Hubbard produced, soon to be released studio album.

On first hearing their CD I thought they sounded a lot like the Subdudes- with lots of that New Orleans R&B shuffle thing going on.  And any band that does a Tom Waits cover (Anywhere I Lay My Head) gets extra bonus props in my book.  Saturday night they had more than that going on; nicely blending in country, soul and rock.  They tore the place down and had the crowd on their feet throughout the whole set, which they closed with Cane On The Brazos, an old Texas prison chain gang song made famous by The Band.

Apparently a lot of people came just to hear them. One person had driven all they way from Norman Oklahoma and I think she left early in The Drams‘ set. That’s too bad because The Drams played the best show I’ve yet seen them play- and that’s not just the whiskey talking. . .

I knew it was going to be special when, two songs in, they tore into Gimme Back My Dog. In fact they played lots of Slobberbone songs, mostly from Everything You Thought Was Right Was Wrong Today, my own personal favorite Bone album.

It was a party and I was partying so I didn’t get a setlist- but I heard:  That Is All, Trust Jesus, Dunk You In The River, Placemat Blues, Billy Pritchard, Love Is Waning and even that BeeGees cover they did on their last record.

They also did Budapest One‘s Homemade Biscuits and The Band’s The Shape I’m In and a couple of new songs, one featuring Keith Killoren on vocals.  And, of course, a few from Jubilee Dive.

Tequila Brad videoed the whole thing and says he’s gonna post it in it’s entirety, so keep an eye on this space and we’ll link it when he does.

Cheers!

Brent Best’s show at the Barley House Sunday night was heavy on audience participation even if it was a little light on audience. While it was a pretty sparse crowd that showed up at least it had the advantage of being a pretty attentive group.

While his bandmates Jess Barr and Tony Harper worked the bar, Brent engaged the faithful with lots of banter, played a surprising mix of covers and originals and slammed down a few drinks.

Seeing Brent play solo, I’m always a little curious whether the focus will be more on the old Slobberbone or the newer Drams material. Who would’ve thought that Sunday night would be all about The Jayhawks?

They seemed to be on his mind anyway. After playing a great cover of “Martin’s Song” in the first set, it looked like he might actually play “Blue” in the second. He didn’t, but he did strum the intro.
He also pointed out the saddest line of any song ever written:

Angeline forgive me, we threw it all away.
I could never fit into your plans.
I’m nobody’s man.

from the Jayhawk’s “Angeline”- he sang it a few times, in falsetto even, to drive home the point.

While it may be debatable whether that’s the saddest line ever, it was a nice fit with the somewhat wistful tone of the covers he did play: A beautiful rendition of Gillian Welch’s “Annabelle” and, most surprisingly, Neil Young’s “Albuquerque.”

The show was a mix of a few Drams songs and a lot of old Slobberbone favorites like “Love Is Waning,” “Dunk You In The River” and “One Rung.”

He previewed a song he said he’s still working on called “Footnote.” He wanted to see how it would work as a call and response- so if you’re ever at a Drams show and they play it- you’re supposed to yell “footnote- footnote” after he sings a line. It actually sounded a lot better than it looks on paper.

He was joined onstage by a woman (didn’t get her name) for a duet of “To Love Somebody.” He graciously (if a bit reluctantly) played “I’ll Be Damned” and “Pinball Song” as requests and even did a pretty impressive first verse and chorus of “Whiskey Glass Eye.”

By that time he was “hammered” and searching for the perfect song to close the show with. He considered and dismissed a few audience suggestions before calling his friend back up for a great closing duet on “Des Moines.”

For the dedicated few who did show up, the whole thing was well worth a Monday morning hangover.
At least it was for me, anyway.

For those who don’t know, The Drams are Brent Best (lead vocals, guitar,  harmonica), Jess Barr (guitar), Keith Killoren (bass), Chad Stockslager (keyboard), and Tony Harper (drums).  This band combines three of the original Slobberbone members (Best, Barr, and Harper) with Killoren and Stockslager from the Dallas-area band Budapest One.  The music is still written by Best so, yeah, the similarities are there but you get the idea they are trying to take it to the next level.  And from what I saw, Killoren and Stockslager have a lot to bring to the table.  You can read and hear more about the formation of The Drams here.

I was lucky enough to spend a little time with The Drams and – I know this is a cliché – but they are not only a lot of fun but just genuinely nice guys. Keith let me have all (well, most) of the pictures on his camera at the time and all the guys said it was okay to post them but, you know, like I said, they are genuinely nice guys, super polite, as a matter of fact.  Charming, even.  And I noticed they just have a hard time saying no.  So I’ll leave the incriminating stuff out of this . . . Let’s just say that Chad is a very good sport and can take a lot of teasing.  

Any fears I had that the transition from Slobberbone to The Drams was a misguided attempt to be more grown up (I hate that stupid beer commercial) were allayed by observing these boys doing shots and just goofing.  You can tell The Drams love being around each other.  They told me that even if they weren’t in a band, they’d be sitting in a bar hanging out with each other.  I can see why.  And it says a lot about the kind of people they are because, the way they tour, they get to know one another, well, intimately.

The Friday night show is a blur to me.  The crowd was decent even though the temperatures were sub-zero that night and the snow was blowing all over the road, making it icy and hard to see and overall, pretty dang scary.  The Drams delivered a blistering set of Drams and Slobberbone tunes, kicking it off with “Gimme Back My Dog” and followed that with a bunch of the songs from “Jubilee Dive” (I remember “Unhinged” and “Hummalong”) as well as the Slobberbone standard, “I Can Tell Your Love Is Waning” and their energy level was high.  Unfortunately, the set, although not short, seemed to fly by and then Will Hoge, the headliner, took the stage.  I was not familiar with his work but had sampled some from his website and was pleasantly surprised by his live performance.  The highlight of his show for me, however, was the encore, “Ooh La La,” by The Faces, where he was joined on stage by Stockslager and a very hyper Killoren.

The next day, the Drams and Hoge headed up across a snowy Divide to Breckenridge for a night at Sherpa and Yeti’s. I missed that one but was primed for their return to Denver for their Monday night performance at Bender’s Tavern. This time, I took notes (well, sorta – actually I swiped the set list).

The Bender’s show was killer.  Not nearly enough people there since it was a Monday night and the Drams took the stage after two other performers but they rocked like the place was packed to the gills.  And even though I knew the altitude was not good to The Drams and even though Keith seemed a bit bothered by the sandwich he ate before the show and even though the audience at Bender’s on a Monday night was way sparser than The Drams deserved, none of that seemed to matter from the minute they took the stage.  Rock gods.  Unbelievable.

Best was incredible, howling and growling his songs into the mike with his long hair all hanging down in his face, looking even better than you figure he’s going to look when you’re listening to him on CD.  Barr was more laid back – just cool and mysterious standing there and playing. Killoren was all bass-player charisma, with Chad getting up and down over there on the keyboards and Tony strictly business on the drums, banging away and sweating up a storm.  Much of the evening is lost in a haze of drink but I can tell you it was amazing.  Or something.

So, let’s see. They played most of the tracks from The Drams’ “Jubilee Dive” -“Unhinged,” “Hummalong,” “Shortsighted,” “Des Moines,” “Make A Book,”- as well as Slobberbone’s very popular “Gimme Back My Dog” and ”Billy Pritchart.”  Brent played some sweet harmonica on “I Can Tell Your Love Is Waning.”  Chad treated us to a rendition of the Budapest One song “Homemade Biscuits.”

Brent broke out the harmonica again (love that harmonica) for the final song, “Robert Cole,” a coming of age ballad about a boy far too young to come of age.  This is the kind of song that reminds you that Best has a lot going on under the surface – he can rock and be rowdy but he can think.  And he’s thinking some dark thoughts, a lot of the time.  Look for “Robert Cole” on Bloodshot Records’ soon to be released tribute album to author Larry Brown.

I had read – and Brent said it again at Bender’s – that the guys started Slobberbone as a way to get free beer.  Yeah, well maybe.  It’s a cute story but I think it’s only half true.  He has songs and stories fighting to get out.  And I can’t say enough about Best’s songwriting.  It’s phenomenal.  In “Gimme Back My Dog,” he gave me one of my favorite metaphors.  If you don’t know what I mean, check out the lyrics.  With a few words, some killer chords, changes, and riffs, and a melody you can’t forget, he can paint a picture so vivid, it comes back to you in your dreams.  Makes you wonder how he’d be at writing fiction.  Let’s hope he never really gets tired of writing songs about screwing up.

Sometimes it takes me a while to warm up to something new. I was major bummed when Slobberbone broke up before I ever got to see them.  But now I’ve seen The Drams live and watched them in action, I’m hearing stuff I didn’t hear before. So those of you that are still bitching about the demise of Slobberbone, listen up. Go see The Drams. They aren’t done yet. And I think the best is yet to come.

P.S.  Anyone have a nice banjo they want to give Jess????  I guarantee he’ll make it look good and sound better . . .

I’ve been watching The Drams progress steadily from that first Dallas show at their home-base, The Barley House, up to a recent Labor Day appearance in a crowded, trendy uptown pub and there’s been a definite arc to their sound that bears noting.

I had gotten pretty familiar with the songs through the shows and bootlegs of the shows long before Jubilee Dive was released. I even dug out some old Slobberbone show recordings and CDs for comparison.

That seems to be the best place to start – with the comparisons.

As has been noted before, a “dram” is one eighth of an ounce of whiskey. That makes the name fitting – The Drams being a less drinking-song oriented band. Slobberbone drank and sang about their whiskey by the bottle (those big jug bottles- to be sure). That’s one way they earned the deserved reputation of “Texas best bar band.”

The other way was by rocking the house.

The songs on Jubilee Dive have the distinct sound of Brent Best trying to break out of the “bar band” mold. He’s reaching further, expanding his style and trying to do something new and different and that’s led to some controversy among many of his long time fans.

(You know who you are)

His greatest strength with Slobberbone was always his dead on observations of drunks, misfits and obsessives, coupled with a self deprecating sense of humor put to a hard rocking, grungy alt country backdrop. When he was writing Slobberbone’s songs, he was best compared to Drive By Truckers’ Patterson Hood. They both do similarly great songs about a particular sub-sect of Southern, rural America. And they both really rock when they do it.

There are still traces of all that on Jubilee Dive, but for the most part, just traces.

There’s not much in the way of humor, nothing as immediately catchy and compelling as “Trust Jesus” or “Give Me Back My Dog.” There’s no wallowing in the hung-over depression of “16 Days,” no epic storytelling along the lines of “Billy Pritchett” or “Little Sister,” no banjos or fiddles or as one commenter on The Dram’s message board so concisely put it: “no drunken anthems about killing a girl.”

There is a lighter, more pop-oriented approach that doesn’t always play to his strengths.

Songs like “Hummalong” and the circa-1990’s REM like “Fireflies” have an optimistic feel to them that really doesn’t sound like anything you’ve heard from Brent Best before.

Where Slobberbone made a lot of Jesus references, “Holy Moses” is a prayer to, well Moses.

I’m not really sure where that comes from. Do people even pray to Moses?

The most pop sounding track, “You Wont Forget” has a Sixties Buffalo Springfield meets Burt Bacharach kind of groove to it and sounds like Brent reflecting on his old band and where it was all heading. The bouncy electric piano and vocal bops at the end made it the most surprising thing they played at their shows before JD’s release. At the same time, it was kind of like seeing Polyphonic Spree, in that I just didn’t know what to make of it all.

The best tracks are the opener “Truth Lies Low,” a song allegedly inspired from watching too much CNN and a not-too-bad attempt at political-media commentary. “Unhinged” and “Make A Book” both pick up the pace nicely. Plus the two most Slobberbone-like songs: “When You’re Tired” and, my favorite Drams song yet, “Des Moines.”

“Des Moines” proves Brent still has the songwriting chops- for those of you who think he’s gone soft – a song about trying to connect with a significant other on a cell phone that drops the call:

“What a fool I was to trust
Words so critical to say
To a wireless phone call
From 800 miles away”

He then takes the familiar (and oh-so-annoying) marketing slogan “Can you hear me now?” and turns it into a desperate and frustrated plea.

It sounds a lot like the old Brent. That funny-sad situation observed through alcoholic cynicism with a suddenly sober self awareness. Or something.

You can actually get a little more of that on the album’s excellent closer “A Wonderous Life,” a slowed down, more produced re-visit of “Haze Of Drink” type sentiment.

The band sounds good, the playing is tight and precise and Brent still maintains his distinct drawl at times. Jess Barr is as great a guitarist as ever and the Best-Barr guitar duels are there. Tony Harper still maintains a great beat. A lot of the new sound has been attributed to the addition of keyboardist Chad Stockslager – which may or may not be the case.

When they first started playing live, the keyboards were a little too out front and seemed jarring. Recent shows have found a better balance and the band’s constant playing has honed them into a more cohesive unit. Stockslager and new bassist Keith Killoren are both better vocalists than SB’s Brian Lane was.

Now, rather than sounding just a little like they’re trying to make sure they play all the notes right, they rock with the kind of abandon Best, Barr and Harper (and Lane) were almost famous for.

If you’re among those that worry that Best has strayed too far off field . . . relax. Go see them play. The covers they’ve been playing on this tour: The Band’s “The Shape I’m In,” Neil Young’s “Burned,” and even a really great rendition of Gram Parson’s “Blue Eyes” return Brent and company to familiar sounding territory.

Catch the clip of “Unhinged” for a good idea of what to expect.

There’s still a lot of complaining that they aren’t doing Slobberbone songs, but a recording of a recent show in Iowa finds them playing “Trust Jesus.”

Ironically, it was the least rehearsed sounding and most dissonant song in the set.

Jubilee Dive sounds like a fresh start for a (sort of) old act. It has pretty good stuff to dig into and a few things to ignore.

All in all, it’s a good debut- and if you’re a long time fan of the Bone, I’m willing to bet you’ll find some of that old rock and roll magic you crave at a live Drams show.

You just might not get quite as drunk.

The result was an unabashed rock and roll record that left many long time fans scratching their heads. While the record sounded different, the live shows still sounded like the old Slobberbone.

So when Brent Best unveiled his latest band, The Drams, which includes Jess Barr and Tony Harper, you would be forgiven if you showed up expecting to hear Slobberbone Redux. 

That wasn’t the case Wednesday night at The Barley House in Dallas.

In front of an impressively large crowd, especially for a weeknight, and with no more fanfare than “Good evening, We’re The Drams,” Best and company launched into a set of all new songs that took the progression from alt country to more pop-oriented rock on to the next level. 

Even the look was different.  Best was sporting a new haircut and beard and there were no acoustic guitars or banjos cluttering the stage. 

The new band’s sound is very different.  Electric guitars and keyboards driving rock songs without any pretense of country, save for the familiar twangy growl of Best’s vocals. 

Slobberbone made a reputation as a live band before they released any records, forging their idiosyncratic style on stage.  They built a following the old fashioned way, playing constantly and fine tuning their sound. 

From what I saw last night, The Drams may be following the same formula. 

It’s apparent that Best has been busy writing songs.  And the band has obviously been rehearsing.  They played very well together without anyone but Best taking center stage.

It may be too early to tell, but if last night’s show was any indication, The Drams may well be in it for the long haul.  Hopefully they are.

They resurrected a “Barrel Chested” era documentary film to kick off the night, standing quietly onstage while the film rolled on a screen set up near the entrance.  Then they played for a little over two hours.  While the album of the night seemed to be their second release, “Barrel Chested”, they managed to cover their entire career, but went sparingly on their last and most over-produced record, “Slippage”.

Fittingly enough, the crowd seemed drunker than usual, even for a Slobberbone show. So while the beer and whiskey soaked crowd raised their bottles and glasses, the band kept playing songs about, mostly, drinking.

When they first emerged on the scene way back in the early to mid 90s, they were compared to Uncle Tupelo, just like every other “alt country” rock band at the time; only these guys not only had a sense of humor, they, at least to this observer, didn’t take themselves quite as seriously as that by-then-defunct Illinois band.  And like UT in the early days, their songs were part punk-rock, part southern-rock and part country. They mixed banjos and fiddles with the blaring electric guitars and channeled the feedback into glorious melodic anthems to lost love, lost dreams, and whiskey.  Over the years, it became apparent that they probably owed more in the way of influence to Neil Young and Crazy Horse than to Uncle Tupelo. 

And now that it’s all over, it looks like frontman Brent Best will continue to play the occasional solo show and the rest of us, at least locally, can wait for the inevitable reunion shows.  As far as bands go, it was a great run. 

Here’s to them!