THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, December 18, 2009
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell@ksfr.org

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
Move it on Over by The Maddox Brothers & Rose
Living With the Animals by Mother Earth
Hard Luck and Old Dogs by Nancy Apple
There Goes the Bride by The Derailers
A Mess o Blues by The Starline Rhythm Boys
A Fool Such as I by John Doe & The Sadies
Down by The Riverside by The Million Dollar Quartet
My Boy Elvis by Janis Martin
This Cat's in the Doghouse by Rosie Flores & The Pine Valley Cosmonats

Whoop and Holler by Ray Wylie Hubbard
Brimstone Rock by 16 Horsepower
The Hammer Came Down by House of Freaks
I Know I Got Religion by Angola Vocal Group
How Dark My Shadow's Grown by The Bad Livers
Just Like Geronimo by The Dashboard Saviors
Santa Bring My Baby Back by The Rev. Horton Heat
Old Toy Trains by Roger Miller

Ants on the Melon by The Gourds
Pissin' in the Wind by Simon Stokes with Texas Terri
The Fame of Lofty Deeds by Jon Langford
Moonglow, Lamp Low by Eleni Mandell
Round-Eye Blues by Marah
My Eyes by Tony Gilkyson
Like a Rolling Stone by Drive-By Truckers

Santa Can't Stay by Dwight Yoakam
Artificial Flowers by Cornell Hurd
Hanging Dog by Jacques & The Shakey Boys
Satin Sheets by Jeannie Pruett
I Push Right Over by Robbie Fulks
You've Got to Walk That Lonesome Valley by Luther Dickson & The Sons of Mudboy
Don't Let the Devil Ride by Clarence Fountain & Sam Butler
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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

TERRELL'S TUNEUP: ROSIE'S GONE ROCKIN'

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
December 18, 2009
In the realm of rockabilly and rocking country, one major underappreciated voice is that of Rosie Flores. Though she’s never enjoyed much fame of her own, Flores — who’s spent most of her life between Texas and California — did a lot to resurrect the careers of rockabilly pioneers Wanda Jackson and Janis Martin. Flores convinced both to come out of retirement to help out on her album Rockabilly Filly back in 1995.

And Flores’ version of “Red Red Robin,” which appeared on a Bloodshot Records children’s album a few years ago, is not only the greatest version of that song I’ve ever heard, but it’s also the definitive song of spring.

It’s been too many years since sweet Rosie has graced us with an album of new material. Except for a Christmas record and a live album, her new one, Girl of the Century, is her first since 2001’s Speed of Sound. She’s got one fine band behind her — The Pine Valley Cosmonauts, led by Jon Langford (The Mekons, The Waco Brothers) and featuring Jon Rice on pedal steel, fiddle, and other stringed instruments and Tom Ray on stand-up bass.

There’s some solid rockabilly here with Johnny Cash’s “Get Rhythm,” “This Little Girl’s Gone Rockin’,” and “This Cat’s in the Doghouse.” Flores sings a couple of Langford tunes — “Halfway Home” and “Last Song” — both of which sound like the type of ballads The Waco Brothers favor when they do slower songs.

But my favorite track is “Who’s Gonna Take Your Garbage Out,” a duet with Langford that was originally recorded by Ernest Tubb and Loretta Lynn. There’s some classic hillbilly humor here. The best line is “Callin’ a man like you a husband is just like callin’ old wild cat a pet.”

Another classy Flores/Langford duet is “Little Bells,” a song written by alt-country honky-tonker Paul Burch (from his recent album Still Your Man). It’s the type of tune Ray Price would have killed back in his early days.

The album ends with the title song, a slow tune featuring a Spanish guitar. As far as slow ones go, I vastly prefer the sexy, jazzy “Dark Enough at Midnight.”
Also recommended:

* Honey Moon by The Handsome Family This latest album by The Handsome Family, released earlier this year, is actually a theme album. As the title implies, the theme is love.

It’s basically Brett and Rennie Sparks’ anniversary gift to themselves, as they have been married 20 years. It’s not that they haven’t tackled the subject of love in the past — just never in such a concentrated form and never so sincerely. As Brett’s baritone strains for the high notes in the refrain of “My Friend” and in “The Loneliness of Magnets,” he sounds as if he’s embodying the lovesick blues.

The Handsomes — who have lived in Albuquerque for the past several years and have played here a couple of times (including a Plaza Bandstand gig in 2007) — are known for dark and twisted tunes (lyrics all by Rennie) that feature mythological motifs often wrapped in mundane, modern imagery.

The Honey Moon tunes are lighter in spirit but no less poetic than their songs on previous albums. Take the first verse of “A Thousand Diamond Rings”:

“A smashed windshield, the dust of a pickup truck/ Shining with silver secrets in the Albuquerque sun/The light makes jewels of pawn shops and drive-through banks/Wrinkled faces staring out of the laundromat/;And even the broken glass in the street/Shines like a thousand diamond rings.”

But don’t worry, Handsome fans. The sweet weirdness of Mr. and Mrs. Sparks hasn’t vanished. It’s not all sweetness and light on this Honeymoon.

For one thing, this album is full of bugs. There’s a “cloud of honey bees” in “Down in the Winding Corn Maze.” And “June Bugs” is a slow country waltz full of huggy, kissy lyrics in which springtime and reawakening love are symbolized by June bugs and hawk moths returning to the yard.

But the greatest bug song of all is “Darling, My Darling,” which is sung from the perspective of a lusty male insect willing to give all to the gnawing fangs of a female insect lover.

Now that’s true love!

* Shine by Nancy Apple. This Memphis country singer hasn’t done an album with a full band in several years. With this one — recorded at Sun Studio in her hometown and produced by Keith Sykes — she’s back with a vengeance.

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The album starts out with a Ronny Elliott song, the slow, pretty “Creole Boy With a Spanish Guitar.” But just when you think this is going to be a strictly mellow affair, Apple slaps you in the back of the head with “Voodoo Woman,” a bluesy romp featuring a wild harmonica (by Robert “Nighthawk” Tooms).

Another wild ride is “Rockin’ Granny,” a song for Apple’s friend Cordell Jackson, a crazy rocker during her lifetime. (True story: Apple was in New Mexico, appearing on my radio show The Santa Fe Opry, the day she got word of Jackson’s death in 2004. She had to cut her trip short, returning to Memphis to sing at Jackson’s funeral.)

A couple of my favorite Apple songs are on this CD. “Cathead Biscuits and Gravy,” which first appeared on a duet album with singer-songwriter Rob McNurlin, gets a full country-band treatment here, with McNurlin sharing the vocals. The album ends with “Moonlight Over Memphis,” a soulful ballad that Apple wrote, inspired by moonlight over the Jémez Mountains on one of her trips to New Mexico.

* Hear songs from these albums on The Santa Fe Opry: 10 p.m. Friday on KSFR-FM 101.1 and streaming live HERE. And don’t forget Terrell’s Sound World, same time, same station on Sunday.

* Christmas Enchilada: Red and green podcast featuring some of my favorite Christmas songs, available for free HERE.


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TERRY ALLEN WINS FELLOWSHIP

Santa Fe musician/artist/barroom philosopher Terry Allen is one of six New Mexicans to be awarded a $50,000 fellowship from United States Artists, the state Department of Cultural Affairs announced today.

Allen, originally from Lubbock, Texas, is responsible for albums including Lubbock on Everything, Juarez, Human Remains, and The Silent Majority. Needless to say he's a Santa Fe Opry favorite. I did a profile of him (along with The Handsome Family and Joe West) in New Mexico Magazine a few years ago. A version of that can be found HERE. (Scroll down quite a ways.)

The others from this state to be awarded were musician Rahim AlHaj of Albuquerque; author Antonya Nelson of Las Cruces; glass artist Mary Shaffer of Taos; and the team of Delores Garcia and Emma Mitchell of San Fidel, who learned the craft of pottery from their mother Lucy Lewis of Acoma Pueblo.

SICK AS A CAT

Former Stray Cats singer Brian Setzer collapsed during a performance at Isleta Pueblo last night. According to this report from KOB TV, he was about two songs into his set with the Brian Setzer Orchesta.

Here's the Associated Press story. which blames "dehydration, high-altitude sickness and vertigo."

Nothing about hairballs.

Reportedly he's OK now and will play a show in Phoenix tonight.

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, December 13, 2009
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell@ksfr.org

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Paranoia by Pierced Arrows
Where the Flavor is by Mudhoney
Low Budget Life by J.J. & The Real Jerks
Goin' Down South by Paul "Wine" Jones
The Clown of the Town by Rev. Beat-Man
Melvin by Thee Headcoatees
I Need Your Lovin' by Wolfman Jack & The Wolfpack
Little Drummer Boy by Joan Jett

Wowsville by Bob Taylor
Worried About My Baby by Howlin' Wolf
Wear Your Red Dress by Barrence Whitfield
I Won $400 by The Raniers
Stormy Monday by Question Mark & The Mysterians
Let it Grow by The Black Lips
I'll Be Loving You by The King Khan & BBQ Show
Jihad Blues by The Allmighty Defenders
Mercy Mercy by The Remains
Eggnog by The Rockin' Guys

Inca Roads by Frank Zappa
God Box by The Fall
Ice Nine Hop by Tin Huey
Booze, Tobacco, Dope, Pussy, Cars by The Butthole Surfers
Sue Egypt by Captain Beefheart
There's No Truth in the Night by King Automatic
Exploder by Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Chestnuts Roasting by Rick King

Transparent Life by The Chesterfield Kings
Amnesia by The Mekons
Heart Full of Soul by The Yardbirds
Ruins of Berlin by The Dex Romweber Duo
Wanderlust King by Gogol Bordello
Wasn't That Good by Wynonie Harris
Fairytale of New York by The Pogues with Kirsty McColl
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis