Mike Cooley - Live at The 40 Watt (2/25/2005)

So, here we have the third main songwriter of the Drive By Truckers, and the only one who doesn't have any kind of solo album. Listening to this makes you wonder why. Here Cooley is alone with his acoustic guitar playing whatever the crowd wants to hear. He runs through many Truckers' favorites, old and new, and even a few unreleased tracks. A couple of the songs like "Little Pony and The Great Big Horse" and an alternate version of "Uncle Frank" can be heard on the excellent new odds and ends album The Fine Print (have I said that enough across these last three posts?). This is a real treasure, and getting almost all of Cooley's songs together only cements the fact that he is an amazing songwriter and singer. My favorite tracks on here are of course the new ones I had never heard before, the drunk driving ballad "Three On The Tree", "Pulaski Tennessee", and my favorite unreleased one "Weakest Man". Also of interest is an early version of "Bob". The show ends with a killer one-two-three acoustic punch of "Marry Me", "Where The Devil Don't Stay" and "Daddy's Cup". Sound is a solid A-, not to be missed.

And a bonus for you Cooley fans, here is an interesting and insightful interview (because we rarely get to hear from the man) from when his song was featured in Rock Band. Check out this interesting quote: "I make more money off t-shirts. If you rip it, burn it, give it to somebody, and they come to a show and buy a ticket and a t-shirt, I profit more that way anyway, and then I've got a fan. Records are promotional items these days anyway"

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Mike Cooley - Live At The 40 Watt

Patterson Hood - Onward Out The Window (Caledonia Lounge 11/4/2009)

Who likes theme posts? Do you like theme posts? Well lucky for you, you're in the middle of a string of them. This one is simply incredible! Perfect fucking sound, great stories, and very interesting setlist. In fact, this is the first of 3 weekly shows hood is currently performing at The Caledonia Lounge in Athens, GA. This one he billed as "Onward Out The Window (new and used songs stripped down to piano and guitar)", and that's exactly what you get. Stripped down familiar songs, and a few new ones. This is really a can't miss for Patterson fans and Drive-By Truckers fans. Some amazing renditions on here, perfectly augmented by simply an acoustic guitar and piano/organ while Patterson embellishes each song with stories and anecdotes he has become famous for. A really intimate show.

Patterson currently has a new album out called Murding Oscar, and this wednesday at The Caledonia he will be performing his 3rd show, the "rock show" with his backing band The Belvederes. If you are in the area I would make sure not to miss it.

Also don't forget about the new DBT odds & ends album The Fine Print

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Patterson Hood - Onward Out The Window

An Acoustic Evening With Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit (8/4/2009)

By request here, a Jason Isbell show from this past august. This is all acoustic, and it's damn good. Sound is a B+ because there is some low level chatter throughout, but really nothing to make this unlistenable. Performance is a solid A+. A Very good evening of acoustic music from Mr. Isbell and his 400 Unit. Includes extended cuts of Danko/Manuel, Goddamn Lonely Love (an amazingly soulful version I might add...a must hear), Decoration Day and Thank God For The TVA (which was recently released on the killer DBT odd's & ends album The Fine Print). Now that was all said to lure you DBT fans in who might be on the fence about Isbell's solo career. I will say this, his latest self titled album is one of the finest albums I've heard this year. It's definitely a slow grower.....but it sticks with you and reveals an album that will be listened to for many years to come.

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An Acoustic Evening with Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit

Merle Haggard - Opryland 1981

well, I feel like 9 kinds of shit right now, but not to let you folks down....I shall persevere. Luckily what I'm posting here is a killer Merle Haggard radio broadcast from 1981 that needs little explanation. All you need to know is it's Merle Haggard, and it's killer!

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Merle Haggard - Opryland 1981

Tom Russell - Veteran's Day (Vid)

Pretty self explanatory, not much of a vid, but great song. Don't miss the post over at Ninebullets about Kasey Anderson's fantastic "I Was A Photograph"

Collaborations you would like to see

Earlier today I was listening to the new Kristofferson album Closer To The Bone and it struck me how stylistically similar it is to Todd Snider's latest album The Excitement Plan. Couple that with some other recent listens that include the excellent collaborative albums of Carolyn Mark & NQ Arbuckle, and the Gretchen Peters & Tom Russell album One To The Heart, One To The Head (which are both fantastic albums BTW). That got me to thinking about how killer it would be if Kris Kristofferson and Todd Snider made a collaborative album together. Man I would love to hear that.

What are some of your favorite collaborative albums, or ones you'd like to see happen?

Album Review: Jimbo Mathus - Jimmy The Kid

I've talked about Jimbo Mathus on here before, but never at any length. He's one of my favorite artists simply for the fact that he is so multi-talented and unpredictable. He is a virtual chameleon of american music releasing albums that shift from jazz, ragtime, blues, country, southern rock, swamp rock, blues rock, pre-war blues, gospel....basically if it was ever sang near the Mississippi river he is a master of it. Most folks may not recognize his name, but they have surely heard his voice back in the 90's when his band the Squirrell Nut Zippers had a runaway hit with the song Hell. I will touch more on that in a later post, and for now just focus on his latest album.

Now, if you have preconceived notions that this is going to be some kind of swing band album....throw those thoughts right out the damn window. As I alluded to earlier, Jimbo's solo career has been hard to pigeonhole into any one specific genre, and most of it has much more to do with the R.L Burnside and Charlie Patton than any kind of Count Basie or Bryan Setzer. This album here, happens to be his most country sounding album to date. With liberal flourishes of pedal steel, twangy licks, and heartbreak throughout.

The Album starts out with Good Old Time, which let's you know right off the bat what kind of album this is going to be....a COUNTRY album. Not to worry though, there are a couple splashes of blues and rock on here too. Such as the title track, the southern boogie of Tell It To The Judge, and the almost rockabilly Little Hand Big Gun. This album makes a very satisfying listen in the way it blends together perfectly like a whiskey on the rocks. The album as a whole is framed by some pretty solid country ballads such as Fallen Angel, Check Out Time, and Hiway At Night. My favorite song on here though has to be Tennessee Walker Mare. Which is a welcome addition to other horse songs in the genre such as Tennessee Stud, Chestnut Mare, and Caballo Diablo for those keeping track.

Buy Jimmy The Kid here

Myspace

Listen to Fallen Angel here

Listen to Tennessee Walker Mare here

Listen to Tell It To The Judge here

The Texas Sweet-Hot Trio - Q-Bus City, Leiden, Holland 11/3/2009

Got a heads up about this from an email from a reader the other day and I just had to post it up here. The Texas Sweet-Hot Trio is made up of 3 lovely Texan ladies who live up to their sweet-hot moniker. Sweet with there oh so sweet voices, and hot with their......hot.....lyrics. Seriously now, these girls can sing the hell out of a song, they can play the hell out of a song, and most important of all they can write the hell out of a song. So who are the ladies of The Texas Sweet-Hot Trio? Well one familiar name my readers might recognize is my latest musical obsession Bettysoo. Also here are Charlie Faye, and Abi Tapia. Now I will admit, I had never heard of Charlie Faye and Abi Tapia before this, but they are most certainly on my radar now of artists to check out. The Texas Sweet-Hot trio are just today wrapping up their European tour, no word yet whether they will be doing any more touring. Here's hoping there is more to this project.

Sound on this is a B+ only because there is some annoying mic noise during a couple of the tracks. If it wasn't for that, would be a solid A sound quality.

This show is also available in video form if you are interested (I haven't actually watched the vids yet)

Bettysoo - Charlie Faye - Abi Tapia

@Bettysoo - @CharlieFaye - @AbiTapia

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Texas Sweet-Hot Trio - Q-Bus City

Random Records: The Marshall Tucker Band - Searchin' For A Rainbow

Oh man....I LOVE this album. I remember stealing the cassette (one of the many) from my parents and listening to it endlessly on my dual deck tape player in the headboard of my bed, and later in my '86 Ford LTD tearing up the back roads and hollers of Floyd County and Allegheny Springs.

Now I realize a lot of folks probably don't like Marshall Tucker Band at all, and that can be understood if all they have ever heard is "Heard It In A Love Song". While not the worst song out there, it was certainly horribly overplayed. Fear not brave reader, cause Heard It In A Love song is NOT on this album. No that song came a few years later.

This album was released in 1975 and starts out with my two favorite Marshall Tucker Band songs....wait, first let's get something out of the way first. Marshall Tucker was not the name of any of it's band members rather a name the band members found on the key of their practice space and liked the sound of so much they named their band that. What was with 70's bands naming themselves after people? Ok, so back to what I was saying, this album starts with my favorite two Marshall Tucker Band songs. They are "Fire On The Mountain", and "Searchin' For A Rainbow". Fire kicks off the album with a mournful and huge pedal steel lick before kicking into the song which features some of my favorite pedal steel work throughout. The song reads like an episode synopsis of HBO's Deadwood series. With a man who takes his family away from his Carolina home in search of gold out west. What he finds is a place where "sin is the big thing", and "folks are shot down for sake of fun" or "just to hear the sound of their .44 guns". This is the song I'm featuring as a download cause I love it. Also features a flute solo, which is a trend that Marshall Tucker really tried to get going in country rock but thankfully never did. It's not really bad just different....I mean, makes you wonder why more country songs don't feature flute solos. Ahh but I guess Tull and Tucker are alone in their flute endeavors.

"Searchin' For Rainbow" is the follow up, and a slightly more upbeat song than "Fire" was. Searchin' feels like a look at the thought patterns from the character we got to know in Fire On The Mountain, here we get the tale of a man who is searching for his metaphorical pot of gold, an endless search that possibly drove him to the events that took place in Fire. At least that's my take on it. I'm probably way wrong on that :-P

Some other great songs on this album are the laid back "Virginia", the even more laid back western swing ode to the poor man's meditation that is fishing, "Bob Away My Blues", and the love ballad "Keep Me From All Wrong". Some of the other songs on this album tend to lean a little more to the jazz country side, but they are certainly in the minority, and even then they keep it reigned in. Also included is the live version of classic rock staple "Can't You See" tagged on at the end that is probably the best recorded version of that song. Overall I love this album (did I already say that?), and think it should be included with other great country rock albums of the 70's though I doubt it ever will.

Listen to Marshall Tucker Band - Fire On The Mountain here

Album Review: Prison Book Club - Required Reading

Here is a killer little album I have been diggin' the hell out of lately. Prison Book Club are a West Virginia super group of sorts, comprised of John Miller from The Fox Hunt, Tucker Riggleman & Adam Meisterhans of The Demon Beat, and drummer Jeff Birdsall. Now you folks should be familiar with the unique brand of mountain music the Fox Hunt dishes out, but you may not be familar with The Demon Beat. The Demon Beat are a full steam ahead, damn the torpedos rock band who would not be out of place on a bill with Jon Spencer, The Black Keys, or The White Stripes to name a few. That is to say, while they are not really as blues centric as those bands, they have a fresh take on traditional rock with a healthy twist or two of punk thrown in. So what does it sound like when the two bands mix...well exactly what you think it might sound like, a rowdy rock band with lots of twang sounding like neither of the bands which make up it's sum. Remember back in the early 90's when punk and twang were being mixed together to create an exciting new sound we didn't know what to call....that's what Prison Book Club sounds like.

The easiest comparison I can make to Prison Book club however, is early Lucero. More specifically the first self titled Lucero album. Lots of twang, lots of guitar, lots of self reflecting whiskey soaked lyrics that just beg you to sing along. My favorite songs on this album are the ones sung by Fox Hunt's John Miller which I think are the strongest. That's not to say that Riggleman's songs are bad, no they are good too, but this type of music better suites Miller's vocal style is all. Prison Book Club is best when it combines the best of both bands, the singing and songwriting of Miller, and the thumping bass & passionate lead guitar of Riggleman & Meisterhan respectively. No song is this more evident than my favorite song on this album, the epic "When I Go", which reminds me why I fell in love with this type of music in the first place.

This album is recommended for anyone who likes their twang served with a healthy portion of rock....or vice versa. Either way, this is the album you want to turn up to 11, rip the knob off (as Patterson Hood says), and pour a shot or 5 of the cheap stuff.

Prison Book Club are currently playing shows around their hometown of Shepherdstown, West Virginia and if your in the area you don't want to miss what the band describes as PBR-mageddon.

Required Reading can be ordered straight from the band for a measly 8 bucks here. Also visit the Big Bullet Record's site for more info of both Prison Book Club and The Demon Beat

Listen to Prison Book Club - Everything's Fine

Listen to Prison Book Club - When I Go