Kell Robertson Tribute Streaming Live

The Kell Robertson tribute at the Mine Shaft is streaming online.





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THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, Feb. 10, 2012 
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM 
Webcasting! 
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time 
Host: Steve Terrell 
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Big Balls in Cowtown by Waylon Jennings
Honky Tonk Merry Go Round by The Stumbleweeds
Down Down Down Down Down by Dale Watson & The Texas Two
Tennessee Rooster Fight by The Howington Brothers
Beautiful Blue Eyes by Red Allen & The Kentuckians
Pass the Peacepipe by Peter Stampfel
Chinese Honeymoon by The Great Recession Orchestra
Dirty Dog Blues by The Modern Mountaineers
Oklahoma Hills by Jack Guthrie & His Oklahomans
High by Zeno Tornado & The Boney Google Brothers
String's Mountain Dew by Stringbean
I Like Drinking by The Gourds

Live Set (Pickers Remember Kell Robertson)
When You Come Off of the Mountain by Mike Good
Mr. Guitar by Kevin Hayes
Great Big Donut by Tom Irwin
Madonna on the Billboard by Bob Hill
I'll Probably Live by Jason Eklund

Julie's Neon Shoes by Mike Good
Prison Walls by Kevin Hayes
Me and You and The Wind by Jason Eklund
Writing it Down in the Rain by Mike Good
Junkie Eyes by Bob Hill
(CD break) As Long As You've Still Got a Song by Kell Robertson
Tell 'em What I Was by the whole crew
Dust off Them Old Songs by Jason Eklund, Mike Good & Tom Irwin (recorded)

When a House is Not a Home by Roger Miller
Old Rattler by Grandpa Jones
Santa Cruz by The Imperial Rooster
Roll in My Sweet Baby's Arms by Buster Carter & Preston Young
A Woman's Intuition by Johnny Paycheck
What Do I Care by Eddie Spaghetti
Road to Hattiesburg by Robert Earl Reed
One Has My Name, One Has My Heart by Jimmy Wakely
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

Music Guests Tonight on Santa Fe Opry

Blonde Boy Grunt (Mike Good) and a whole gaggle of his musical cronies will be joining me tonight on The Santa Fe Opry.

The show starts at 10 p.m. tonight on KSFR, 101.1 FM -- or listen to the live stream HERE.

They're all in town for the Kell Robertson tribute Saturday night at the Mine Shaft in Madrid. That show starts at 7 p.m.

TERRELL'S TUNEUP: I Got It Covered

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican 
Feb. 10 2012

Almost all bands and singers on the face of this Earth do cover songs. Some are interesting at best, but more frequently they are mediocre. (Sometimes they’re horrifying, but I think I’ll save those for a future column.)

But every so often, a cover version will be better than the original — because of a stronger vocal performance like, say, Prince’s version of Joan Osborne’s “One of Us”; or a more soulful performance like Gram Parsons’ cover of Roy Orbison’s “Love Hurts” (and being more soulful than Orbison isn’t easy); or having higher energy, like about half the covers that The Cramps ever recorded. Sometimes a cover will barely resemble the original — good examples being the Elvis songs that The Residents recorded on their 1989 tribute album, The King & Eye.

What makes a cover memorable? For starters, it has to add some new dimension or have a different angle from the original. It could be a new context or maybe done in a different genre. Humor usually helps, and in my book, bizarre is a bonus.

Here are my top 10 favorite cover songs of all time until the end of history (until maybe I think of some others).

1. “Goldfinger” by Peter Stampfel from the album You Must Remember This. The 70-something founding member of The Holy Modal Rounders recorded his daffy version of the classic James Bond movie theme just a few years ago. It features Stampfel on the banjo and his signature cartoonlike vocals, backed by what sounds like a tuba, a sax in the closing moments, and is that steel drums I hear in there?

2. “Stairway to Heaven” by Tiny Tim & Brave Combo from the album Girl. When I reviewed this album in the ’90s, I noted that if Van Morrison heard this, he’d be jealous that he didn’t cover “Stairway” with an arrangement like this.

Dr. Chadbourne in Albuquerque2007

3. “I’m the Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised” by Eugene Chadbourne from the album There’ll Be No Tears Tonight. Chadbourne is known for his wild improvisational acoustic-guitar playing and taking familiar songs into unfamiliar territory. At the beginning of this track, he announces that Johnny Paycheck is one of his favorite country singers. I believe him, and I believe the man loves country music. But unless you’re already a Chadbourne fan, you’ve probably never heard Paycheck done like this before. He sings the lyrics like he means them and plays guitar like a space alien on trucker’s crank. This album is full of covers of honky-tonk classics done in Chadbourne’s own peculiar way, including Paycheck’s hit “Take This Job and Shove It.”

4. “Stormy Weather” by Reigning Sound from the album Time Bomb High School. I don’t think Judy Garland did it this way, but Greg Cartwright’s exuberant take on this chestnut is irresistible This isn’t the first time this song appeared in the world of rock ’n’ roll. A vocal group called The Five Sharps did a doo-wop version in the 1950s.

5. “Surf’s Up” by David Thomas and Two Pale Boys from the album Surf’s Up. I believe in my heart that this song is Brian Wilson’s greatest moment. It’s so dark and full of lyrical enigmas that if the current nostalgia-act version of the Beach Boys attempted to play the song in concert, half of their audience would bolt in fear and revulsion. And if they heard Thomas warbling this meandering eight-minute version, there would be blood. This avant-garde deconstructed dirge is a commendable attempt to plumb the depths of Wilson’s melancholic masterpiece. But in the end, despite the inspired weirdness of this version, Wilson’s original still remains more mysterious and powerful.

The Dickies look pretty much like this too

6. “Banana Splits (the Tra La La Song)” by The Dickies from the album The Incredible Shrinking Dickies (though I first heard it on their live album We Aren’t the World). I was too old to really get into The Banana Splits Adventure Hour when that Saturday morning show started twisting young minds in the late ’60s. But something tells me Dickies frontman Leonard Grave Phillips watched it every week. The show starred four people in funny animal costumes — a dog, a gorilla, a lion, and an elephant, kind of like a live-action cartoon or human-scale puppet show. I think they were supposed to be some kind of rock band. I believe the same thing is true of The Dickies. In fact, they’re one of the longest-lasting Los Angeles punk bands ever to crawl out of the gutter. Phillips and his pals took the Banana Splits theme song up to warp speed.

7. “I Wanna Be Sedated” by Two Tons of Steel from the album King of a One Horse Town. I don’t know much about this turn-of-the-century country rock band, but for years this has been my favorite Ramones cover. I’ve always thought that The Ramones should have done a cover of Garth Brooks’ “Friends in Low Places.”

8. “Little Rug Bug” by NRBQ from the album Dummy. This one’s for the late NRBQ drummer Tom Ardolino, who died early this year. Andolino was a connoisseur of song poems — songs with lyrics written by some wanna-be songwriter who responded to one of those “Put Your Poems to Music” ads and had his work recorded (at a price) by an overworked crew of studio musicians and singers.

9. “One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)” by Iggy Pop, from the album Party (2000 CD reissue ). This version of the smoky Johnny Mercer/Harold Arlen classic barroom ballad is good, but my favorite is still the one I got in the early ’90s on a bootleg called We Are Not Talking About Commercial Shit, on which Mr. Pop berates and curses an unruly crowd for several minutes until he finally croons the slow, slinky song in his bruised baritone.

10. “Sugar Sugar” by Wilson Pickett from the album Right On. Nobody covered The Archies like the wicked Pickett.

Blog Bonus: Here are some of those songs










 






And here's the original "Little Rug Bug"

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, Feb. 5, 2012 
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M. 
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time 
Host: Steve Terrell
Webcasting!
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

 OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Dropkick Me Jesus by Bobby Bare
We Gettin' Naked for the Super Bowl by The Swank Brothers
The Great Jie Bib by Terry Allen
You Are Not Your Job by Gas Huffer
Hot Smoke and Sassafras by Bubble Puppy
High on the Hog by TAD
You Broke My Mood Ring by Root Boy Slim & His Sex Change Band
Log Bomb by Bob Log III
Laugh at Me by The Devil Dogs

Everything I Do Is Wrong by The Reigning Sound
Hard Way by Andre Williams & The Goldstars
Treat Her Right by Roy Head
I Got Love by The King Khan Experience
Tobacco Road by The Blues Magoos
Do You Swing by The Fleshtones
Bobo Boogey by Kid Congo Powers & The Pink Monkeybirds
Man on Mars by Harry Perry
Rocket Man Blues by Edison Rocket Train

Remembering Lux Interior
All songs by The Cramps!
Goo Goo Muck
Bend Over I'll Drive
Psychotic Reaction
Heartbreak Hotel
Mad Daddy
Get Off the Road
Bikini Girls with Machine Guns
Rockin' Bones

Where'd You Go by J. Mascis & The Fog
Windy City by Delaney Davidson
Jumper Hangin' on the Line by R.L. Burnside
Big Boss Man by Jimmy Reed
St. James Infirmary by Bobby "Blue" Bland
Nudist Camp by Ross Jonson
Requiem for the Masses by The Association
I Saw Her First by Bruce & Jerry
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis
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THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, Feb. 3, 2012 
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM 
Webcasting! 
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time 
Host: Steve Terrell 
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrel(at)ksfr.org
 OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Oklahoma Hills by Jack Guthrie & The Oklahomans
Defibulator by The Defibulators
Why Baby Why by George Jones with Ricky Skaggs
Shout Sister Shout by Ray Condo & His Ricochets
Crazy Things by Jason Arnold
Boney Fingers by Hoyt Axton
Elbow Grease, Spackle and Pine Sol by Dale Watson & The Texas Two
Truck Driver's Woman by Nancy Apple
Temptation (Tim-Tayshun) by Red Ingle & The Natural Seven
I've Got A Bimbo Down On Bamboo Isle by The Hoosier Hot Shots

Soldier Boy Johnny by The Imperial Rooster
Don't Let Your Deal Go Down by Chris Darrow
Sadie Green (The Vamp of New Orleans) by Roy Newman & His Boys
That's What I Like About the South by Hank Thompson
Rhonda Rose by Jason Eklund
Get Out of My Car by Hasil Adkins
The Little Girl And The Dreadful Snake by Red Allen & Frank Wakefield
The School House Fire by The Dixon Brothers

Buddy Holly

Buddy, Bopper & Richie 
Midnight Shift by Buddy Holly
Begger to a King by The Big Bopper
Rockin' All Night by Richie Valens
When Sin Stops by Waylon Jennings with Buddy Holly
Crying, Waiting Hoping by Steve Earle & Marty Stuart
White Lightning by The Waco Brothers
Come on Let's Go by Los Lobos
That'll Be the Day by The Flamin' Groovies
Changing All Those Changes by Buddy Holly
La Bamba by Richie Valens

Halden is (Hell-Raisin' Town) by Rick Broussard & Two Hoots and a Holler
Little Glass of Wine by Paul Burch
I'll Be Glad When You're Dead by The Great Recession Orchestra
Lonesome Side Of Town by Johnny Dilks & His Visitacion Valley Boys
The Way You're Treating Me by Jim Gatlin
Dark Hollow by Benny Martin
Would You Die For Love by Stevie Tombstone
I'll Walk Around Heaven with You by Blonde Boy Grunt & The Groans
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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Steve Terrell is proud to report to the monthly Freeform American Roots Radio list

TERRELL'S TUNEUP: Some Texas Honky Tonk Sounds

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican 
Feb. 3, 2012


Texas country singer Dale Watson’s latest album, The Sun Sessions, has a funny backstory. Watson had been booked at a bar in Memphis, Tennessee. Or at least he thought he had a gig there. Somewhere between Austin and Memphis he learned there was a misunderstanding. “No, we have a DJ on Tuesdays, and we don’t have you booked,” someone at the club told him.

“After feeling awful that a music town with such a history would rather have a dance DJ than live music, I thought, ‘What the hell. I got lemons. Let’s make lemonade,’” Watson writes in the CD liner notes.

Dale Watson last year at the Broken Spoke

So he called Sun Studio — the funky little magic factory in Memphis that gave birth to rockabilly and launched the careers of Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash — and asked to book some time. He was in luck. And so were fans of Watson’s music.


Watson almost always plays country music in a basic, understated way — steel, fiddle, guitar, bass, drums, and not much else.

But for this album, he strips it down even more. In honor of Cash’s Tennessee Two, Watson calls the backup band on this record The Texas Two. They are stand-up bassist Chris Crepps and a drummer, Mike Bernal, who just hits the snare. Watson only plays his acoustic guitar. Together they celebrate the signature sound of Sun.

To Watson’s credit, even though this is something of a “tribute” album, he didn’t play the hits of the ascended masters that we’ve all heard a zillion times before. He wrote all these tunes — six of them on the bus to Memphis after he booked his session time at Sun. Watson’s baritone sounds more like Cash’s voice than the voices of the other Sun titans, so this album might be viewed as more of an alternative-reality tribute to the Man in Black.

The album starts out with a jittery little tune called “Down Down Down Down Down.” With Crepps’ urgent bass doing most of the work, Watson spins a tale of a man about to sink. “Well I had my first taste of whiskey/I had my first taste of love/Both got me high and twisted up inside/Only one way to go after up.”

No, this isn’t the beginning of some gigantic bummer. It has fun and good times, too.

For instance, “My Baby Makes Me Gravy” is a happy song of good country cookin’ and sex. “Drive Drive Drive” sounds a lot like Cash’s “Cry Cry Cry,” and “Gothenburg Train” has the feel of a classic train song.

Big Daddy

Watson also does several character sketches. “George O’Dwyer” is the story of a hell-raising buddy of Watson’s who owned a recording studio in Austin. “Jonny at the Door” is a salute to a barroom bouncer, and “Big Daddy” is about a shoeshine man in Austin. (I got my shoes shined by Big Daddy when I was at the Broken Spoke for a Watson show last year.)

My favorite song on The Sun Sessions is “Elbow Grease, Spackle and Pine Sol.” The narrator is served his divorce papers, and he’s in his empty house, apologizing to his ex about holes in the wall and stains on the carpet.

At first a listener might think he’s regretting being a sloppy and possibly violent husband. But — in one of those wonderful twists you find in country-music classics like Leon Ashley’s “Laura (What’s He Got That I Ain’t Got)” and Willie Nelson’s “I Just Can’t Let You Say Goodbye” — you realize the narrator is holding a gun, and he’s apologizing for the mess he’s about to leave his former Mrs. to clean up.

One amazing thing about this album is that none of the 14 songs here reaches the three-minute mark. Nearly half of them are under two minutes. Watson knows that brevity sometimes packs a harder punch.

Also recommended:

RB & Two Hoots at Threadgill's last year

*  Come and Take It by Rick Broussard’s Two Hoots and a Holler. I know Matt Brooks, the guitar player for this band, through an online music-discussion board that I used to belong to starting back in the 1990s. I had never met him face to face, but for years he had been trying to get me to see his band when I went to Austin.

Somehow I never was able to arrange that — until last August, when I was at the Live Music Capital of the World and Matt’s band was playing a gig at Threadgill’s World Headquarters.

I was impressed. Broussard is a fine singer and songwriter, and the Hoots are a mighty tight country-rock band. They ought to be by now. Broussard started the group back in 1984. Members have changed and shuffled through the years, but Broussard has been at it long enough to know what he wants from his players. (And, showing what a small world it is, I learned that the fiddle player, Sean Orr, used to play with Joe West’s band when the pride of Lone Butte lived in Austin.)

Many of the songs they played the night I saw them are on this album. Among them are the Mexican-flavored opening cut, “I Cried and Cried the Day Doug Sahm Died.” It’s Broussard’s heartfelt tribute to a fellow San Antonio native.

There are some excellent honky-tonkers here, such as “Me Not Calling” and “Every Bit as Proud.” Maybe you haven’t heard of them, but Rick and the boys are big in Norway — at least the town of Halden, to which they pay a rocking tribute in “Halden (Is a Hell Raisin’ Town).” In an obscure historical reference to a Swedish monarch who was killed in battle there in 1718, Broussard sings, “Those people never go to bed/They shot King Karl in the head.”

With the help of fiddler Amy Farris, Broussard delivers a bluegrass sound on “Over My Head in Blue.” It’s a shift from the song that precedes it, “Love Me Truly,” a honky-tonk tune with echoes of British Invasion-era rock. But it works.

This group also plays one of the best Bob Dylan covers recorded in recent years. I didn’t think there was much else anyone could do with the song “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” but Broussard and the band rip through it with abandon, like a fun cross between The Pogues and Jason & The Scorchers.

I’m hoping Two Hoots and a Holler are playing next time I’m in Austin.