My year had a few smiles.  Ronnie Fauss put on quite a show at our place.  He’s a treasure both musically and personally.  He has great EPs, too.  Check out Naomi’s review of Mulligan and if you haven’t heard him before, you’re missing out.

My buddy, Jon Durham, sent me a couple of his new and improved CDs (by way of Puddin’haid from Little Rock!).  I can’t decide.  I love the new Good Dogs and Bad Weather, but the 2008 Roots and Wings really still sticks with me in a big, bad way.  Something about those wings unfolding in this new year resonates.

My friend, Shady, who hosts a best-kept-secret radio show in New Zealand, of all places, turned me on to Barry Saunders with “Far As The Eye Can See”.  This guy is amazing.  I had to do a quarter-turn auditory adjustment, my ears being tuned to twang ranging only from Texas to Tennessee, but his beautiful, effortless voice evaporated all my preconceived notions and transported me right into the smack-dab middle of each song.  Listen to some Barry Saunders, maybe Black-eyed Girl and let me know…..Thanks, Shady, for the radio shout-outs and this gorgeous CD, even though I was a little taken aback at first,,,I thought that was Keith Richards on the cover!

I had the extreme pleasure of doing a hootenanny with Kevin Montgomery and Sean Snook in the fall, as they traveled the country promoting the Orange Duffel Bag project.  They played 50 states in 50 days, raising some awareness of a problem nobody thinks much about, so congratulations to them on a difficult job well done.  I hope foster kids everywhere get a little more help than just an orange duffel bag when they’re turned loose in this cold, harsh world.  Most all of them have had rough times.  Go be nice to a kid with no home and listen to some Kevin and Sean.

I can’t start 2011 without my warmest thanks to Naomi, for all she does and for putting up with my shit for another damn year.

And, Jitter, man, what can I say?  Y’all are simply the best.

Love on ya!

I’m a big Drive By Truckers fanatic and I can never wait for the next show or the next album.  A live Trucker show is like a shot in the arm, and not in that bad way . . . The new CD is like reading a good book.  Lots of story-songs on this one.  Patterson tells smutty tales of some bad-ass characters and Cooley sings about hookers and being jobless.  You know, everyday life stuff.

Townes Van Zandt reportedly said he didn’t like circus songs much, and I tend to agree with him.  So, “The Flying Wallendas” will never be one of my favorites, but, that said . . this is not an album with a theme like that.  Variety is the spice here.  Finally, I have a studio cut of “After the Scene Dies.”  Strike the set and cue the wrap party!  I love this song.

Mad love to Shonna Tucker!  She has really proven herself as a singer and songwriter on this one.  I can see the day when Truckers’ shows will feature a lot of Shonna.  (I’m still waiting to hear Purgatory Line live, but that’s a whole ‘nother album.)  Hearing “You Got Another” was a beautiful thing.  I like “I Told You So” even more.  It’s a rocking, dancing number.  This is unusual and catchy.  Good goin’, woman!

Patterson Hood has been following the news and waxing prolific again, but you will never hear me complain about that.  If you buy one song from this release, it’ll be “The Wig He Made Her Wear”, I’ll bet.  It’s a fascinating story and you just can’t quite look away.  “He made her do things that made her feel so ashamed.”  So, she shot him.

I think my favorite Cooley cut on this one is “Get Downtown.”  Put your face in somebody’s that ain’t mine. That’s just so Cooley!

Check it out.  This ain’t no band full of slackers, here.  They keep me entertained year after year after year after year.

You all know by now my penchant for owning the physical disc.  Even when times are hard.  I’d love to tell you it’s because my high morals won’t allow me to copy OPD’s (other people’s discs) but, well, I just really like to peel off the wrappers and pop out the pretty inserts and stuff. 

And, I do like to cuss the postal system when it’s late, cuss the state of our society because there are no independent music stores – you know, get myself a little worked up.  Then, when I finally get my hands on the actual item, I run my fingers over the lyrics booklet, read the dedication and thank yous and all before I listen from track one to the very end.

From the moment I sussed out the info that Steve Earle was releasing "Townes", I knew I’d have to have that one.  It’s a forever keeper.  And, Guy Clark’s "Sometimes the Song Writes You" was getting multiple rave reviews before I’d ever heard of it, so I internet-ordered that.  Kris Kristofferson’s "Closer to the Bone" kept me camped out by the mailbox for a while.  Well worth the frostbite, though. 

Guy’s song "The Guitar" gets my vote for song of the year.  I’ve played it for everyone I know.  I ordered the double-disc-deal of Kristofferson.  I knew I’d beat myself up if I didn’t and sure enough, the live bonus disc was a delightful trip through an Ireland concert and Silver Tongued Devil tripped me all the way back to the seventies.  And Kris commented (I love to hear him talk) that his very young son had told him that was NOT a good song.  "Why?"  "You’re just blaming your problems on somebody else!"  Brilliant kid!  Yes, that IS what the 70′s were all about!

Digress?  No, details are important.  Ask Simone Felice.  Keep an eye on those Felice boys.  I think they’re up to something.  Check out The Duke and The King’s "Nothing Gold Can Stay."  Then find the backstory on that.  Simone was one sad mofo when he wrote some of these songs.  The other Felice Brothers put out "Yonder is the Clock" this year.  I like every album they’ve released and this one was no exception.  It’s fantastic.  I picked up a copy for a friend.  If you miss the opportunity to see this band live, you might die with an incomplete musical education.  Kinda like the live George Thorogood show, only not.  Not at all.  Just go see them.  Then all the songs make sense.

Hey, that Roseanne Cash chick is serious!  What a voice!  “The List” is a gently put together album of oldies that her daddy said should be saved.  She saved them.  Really nicely.  And, her harmony singers are no slouches, either.

Ah, what else?  Them Truckers!  On Austin City Limits!  What about that, huh?  And the release of The Fine Print was a delight.  Finally!  Beautiful!  And Wes Freed’s artwork rocks.  Read the reviews of The Fine Print on this site and a hundred others and you won’t find anything but praise for this perfectly lined-up collection of DBT songs old and new – funny (Mrs. Klaus’ Kimono-Patterson) and sad (Uncle Frank-Cooley) and touching (Thank God for the TVA-Jason Isbell). 

And speaking of which, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit’s self-titled, self-artworked CD/Album deal at the first of this year was a super standard-setter for all that followed.  What a pretty piece of work this is! 

2009 also brought the previously threatened Murdering Oscar by Patterson Hood..  He puts his all into all he does and does it with a devilish, literate sweetness that you just don’t accidently acquire.  Nobody had to teach Patterson how to don the rock star attitude.  He throws himself into the songs like real rock is his to save and his alone.  He’s up on that stage championing his cause more nights of the year than not and still knocks you upside the head with one brilliant song after another that he somehow finds time to scribble between his entertaining updates on the websites (alabamaasswhuppin.com and ninebullets.org) and all the worthy causes he supports..  (see Nuci’s Space).

Okay, what else?  The Gourds "Haymaker!.  And don’t miss Ryan Bingham’s Roadhouse Sun or anything that Gordy Quist and his Band of Heathens put out.  Oh, yeah, and Todd Snider’s new "Excitement Plan".  He should really be our national ambassador of good sense.  Him and McMurtry.

Y’all keep rockin’ on for another year.  I hear Deer Tick’s puttin’ out something good.  And Slobberbone is apt to make an appearance….somewhere…
I’m going to put on this new Drive By Truckers on Austin City Limits in 2009 CD and tell myself "it’s good to be alive", even though the economy sucks and we’re all eating Ramen way too often.  

So the Drive-By Truckers have another release and another triumph.  The Fine Print (A Collection Of Oddities And Rarities 2003-2008) is a collection of alternate takes, covers made for tribute albums, and stuff that just plain never made it on a legitimate DBT disc.  If you are like me, you may have already heard some of this stuff in your tremendous collection of live DBT shows generously made available on the internets but there were a couple of very pleasant surprises for me.   Plus, this is worth buying just for Patterson Hood’s liner notes. . .  I won’t spoil the surprise by quoting too extensively but they had me laughing and thinking at the same time.

So, the covers.  Four out of the twelve tracks on this disc are covers.  I will admit to being surprised that  “Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken)”, is a Tom T. Hall song, written during the Vietnam war.  This could easily be a DBT song and it rings true with today’s headlines.

The versions of Tom Petty’s “Rebels” and  Warren Zevon’s “Play It All Night Long”  are both great.  And here, I’ll have to admit not immediately recognizing the Petty tune and thinking, “Oh, this is going to be one of DBT’s stand-out songs.”   And it is – they just didn’t happen to write this one.  And the Zevon tune ends up bringing in more than just the one Zevon song.  Nice tribute.

So many of Bob Dylan’s songs sound better when covered by others and the one here is no exception. The cover of Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” might be the best take of that song. Ever.  Each member of the band circa 2005 (meaning Jason Isbell is still there) sang a verse for this and I agree with Patterson here – it’s magical.

And now for the actual DBT songs. “Uncle Frank” and “TVA” written by Mike Cooley and Jason Isbell, respectively, give two different takes on the impact of the Tennessee Valley Authority on the people of the Southeast.  TVA giveth and TVA taketh away.   Cheap power and jobs vs. environmental damage and broken promises.  For those of you who don’t know about TVA, it’s just a little government project that completely changed the face of the South in the mid-20th century.

My current favorite, though, is “Mrs. Claus’ Kimono.”  No surprise if you know me.  It’s a twisted little tune by Hood about an elf with designs on Santa’s old lady and a plan for getting what he wants.  Really really sick.  I love it.

According to the liner notes, Cooley’s “Little Pony and the Great Big Horse” apparently had its start as a dirty joke.  You have to read the fine print, though, to get that as it turns out to be a really sweet ballad about kids growing up and parents getting old.  Yeah, I said sweet.  The joke is kind of cute, too.

Okay, I could keep writing but you guys get the picture, right?

This caused us to do some serious soul-searching because, really, we slackers (especially me and Gracey) are borderline obsessed with DBT and play them pretty much ALL THE TIME.  We’ve all been to see them at least once (twice, three times) in the past year – basically anytime they are in the neighborhood.  Much of Gracey’s conversation revolves around things she has read on the DBT fan board. . . . And then there is the whole problem of keeping Gracey from stalking the tour bus.

So yeah, we love the Drive-By Truckers.  Then why, you may ask,  is their tag so small?  Uh, ‘cause we haven’t written that many reviews about them.  Why is that?  Uh,  ‘cause I think we maybe tend to drink too much at their shows.  Well, Gracey and Jitter do, anyway.

So there is that.  We’ll try to do better though.  In the meantime, if you get a chance to see them, make sure you go.  And make sure you stand down in front where it’s really loud and you get the full rock show experience.  But if you see a little person in a Cooley/Hood For President t-shirt jumping around in front of Cooley, keep a safe distance.

Just saying.

I’ve been pretty much obsessed with this band since I first heard them on a scratchy cassette tape on a road trip in ’04. Got home and quickly educated myself on Southern Rock Opera (I grew up down there; it wasn’t hard to grasp!). I marinated in The Dirty South and Decoration Day and all those educational little ditties for a year or two until I emerged to A Blessing And A Curse, two nervous breakdowns, only one of which was mine, then a Rock Show, The Dirt Underneath Tour, a couple of t-shirts and I’m okay now.

The first cut on this album, Two Daughters and a Beautiful Wife, finds Patterson Hood musing about the afterlife in a brokenhearted song about another senseless murder, in this case, the brutal killing of a musician and his family. What happens “when you reach the gates of heaven”? “Is there vengeance up in heaven?” “Maybe every day’s like Saturday morning.”

Patterson gets dirty and gritty sometimes, but never fails to deliver the story. Like Goode’s Field Road – it’s mysterious, but dark and ugly, for sure. It may be the story of the sorry ending to the life of a good man. Maybe it’ll mean something else next time I listen. Patterson said that this one is a ‘grower’. Maybe that’s what he meant by that. I liked all the songs from the first listen, but each listen brings me to new realizations. That Man I Shot is a glimpse into the life of an American soldier just doing his job and trying to stay alive. (“I did not hate him. I still don’t hate him.” “Did he have little ones that he was so proud of?”).

And, the Mike Cooley songs are, well, c’mon, this is what you’ve been waiting for, right? He is cool personified. “Here I am again – perfect timing.” He makes me grin out loud. “Twenty-five cents shy of a slice of the Double-Mint twins.” Heheh. Three Dimes Down is a riot. (Tell me he’s not talking about what I think he’s talking about here.) And, It’s Always Lisa’s Birthday is great, but, man, if he never wrote another song, Ghost To Most should get him some ‘little gold paperweight’ or something. I mean if he weren’t too cool to need such. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. That song’s toward the end of the album. There are seven Cooley songs on this album! Unbelievable! We’re not WORTHY!!!!

Bass player Shonna Tucker has stepped up to the mike on this album and let loose with three of her own songs and she does not disappoint. I’d listen to a whole lot more of that sweet voice. She’s so down-home and lonesome sounding. And so damned believable. She really does feel like her feet are both on fire standing in that Purgatory Line. I know it. Hell, I had to take off MY shoes! I don’t know why she’s apologizing to Huston or why he needs a horse, but I feel terribly sad about the whole thing anyway. But, then, she turns right around and rocks us hard on Home Field Advantage and John Neff brings in the pedal steel perfectly, as always.

Shonna, John Neff and Spooner Oldham just seem to mesh beautifully here. You’d think they’d been playing together as long as Cooley and Hood have. Spooner has played keyboards with everybody and their sister, though. He’s not exactly having to struggle to keep up. I love Spooner. How could you not?

I’m so impressed with this incarnation of this band. I’d love this album even if it didn’t have any words. And I’m a lyrics fanatic! It’s that good musically. It’s so complete. And,,, dare I say,,, polished(!?) Yet, still, so rough and raw and real, as we’ve come to expect. David Barbe produces again and Patterson thanks him every chance he gets and says he considers him one of the band. Whatever they’re doing, it’s workin’. I’m just sayin’…..

Go get this one, folks! It’s on New West Records on CD or vinyl. And go buy your own, because you’re going to want the cover art and the liner notes and all. Patterson’s thank yous alone are worth the price of admission. And speaking of admissions, this is where it’s written in print that Scott Baxendale, the guitar-maker from Denver, inspired Mike Cooley’s crowd-pleaser Checkout Time in Vegas. Well? We want to hear the rest of THAT story……

If nobody you know is talking about the Drive By Truckers yet, go now and tell ALL your friends. They’ll thank you and you’ll be the cool kid for finding them first.

Ahhh,,,,, I can’t wait until the concert this weekend in Boulder. Saturday night. It’s going to rock. I bet it will be crowded. Can we get down front? Will they sell out? Can we come backstage, guys? Naomi, can we trash your house after?

You might if you go to certain shows in the Dallas area or you visit certain discussion boards (The Drams, The DriveBy Truckers, for example).

Well, even if you don’t, you just might want to check out Brad’s birthday party this weekend (Saturday, November 17, 9:00) at Dan’s Silverleaf in Denton, Texas.

See, Brad had this great idea. What if he got three of his favorite bands and had them all play at the same venue for him as a birthday present for himself??? He figures there is not a lot of overlap between the fan bases for these three groups and he might be doing some people some favors by introducing them to more good music. So, these Texas bands, not necessarily in this order are: The Drams out of Denton, Band of Heathens out of Austin, and Todd Mankin out of Fort Worth.

I guess it’s not a secret that we SlackerCountry folk love the Drams so I’ll leave it at that. But we know Brad and we know he also likes another of our favorite bands, Scott Miller and the Commonwealth, and that makes us wanna go to his party and listen to his music. The cover is $10 and Brad says, please don’t bring him a birthday present but think about buying band merchandise to support his favorite bands (’cause he is not only Tequila Brad, he is a patron of the arts – and, if you appreciate irony and the way things all come together and you know Slobberbone like we know Slobberbone, look up Patron of the Arts on Wikipedia for an eerie coincidence – e-mail us if you get it – no prizes in it for ya but we’ll be impressed).