Friday, Nov. 11, 2016 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
Here's my playlist :
OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens
Friend of the Common Man by The Blasters
Amos Moses by Dale Watson
Wear Out Your Welcome by Wayne Hancock
Purple Rain by Dwight Yoakam
Hard Times by Martha Fields
This Town Gets Around by Margo Price
Train Kept a Rollin' by The Royal Hounds
Looking at the Moon, Wishing on a Star by Charline Arthur
Slowly Losing My Mind by Southern Culture on the Skids
Sweet Betsy from Pike by BR-549
Dixie Fried by Carl Perkins
Why Does the Wind Blow So Wild by Washboard Hank
Meet You Down South by Reverse Cowgirls
Old Joe Clark by Dustbowl Revival
Gonna Love My Baby Now by T. Tex Edwards & The Swingin' Kornflake Killers
Rosie the Riveter by Susie Bogguss
Keep it Clean by Charley Jordan
Bird on a Wire by Johnny Cash
Winter Lady by Palace Songs
Leonard Cohen's Day Job by The Austin Lounge Lizards
The Red Door by The Handsome Family
A Girl Don't Have to Drink to Have Fun by The Stumbleweeds
A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican Nov.11, 2016
I’ve said it before: If you think they ain’t making country music like they used to, you’re just not looking hard enough. You won’t find much of it on so-called “country” radio, but it’s out there. This week I look at a bunch of recent country albums I’ve been playing the holy heck out of on KSFR’s The Santa Fe Opry (101.1 FM, Fridays 10 p.m.-midnight) in recent weeks.
* Slingin’ Rhythm by Wayne Hancock. Wayne the Train is back with a fistful of mostly original, good, solid honky-tonkin’ songs with lyrics full of wicked wit and heartache — often in the same song — and lots of impressive picking. Hancock’s got a new band, including an impressive new steel guitarist, Rose Sinclair, and not one but two electric guitarists, Bart Weinburg and Greg Harkins. As usual, Hancock gives his bandmates plenty of room to stretch, while their producer, Lubbock string-titan Lloyd Maines, captures the sound that some call retro, but I call timeless.
Things falling apart seem to be a general theme here with tunes like “Dirty House Blues,” “Two String Boogie,” and “Wear Out Your Welcome,” about a love that’s disintegrated.
My immediate favorite song on Slingin’ is a brand new murder ballad — actually, a double-homicide fantasy — in the great tradition of Leon Ashley’s “Laura (What’s He Got That I Ain’t Got),” Porter Wagoner’s “The Cold Hard Facts of Life,” and Johnny Paycheck’s “(Pardon Me) I’ve Got Someone to Kill.”
Hancock’s song is called “Killed Them Both,” and that’s just what he does to his cheating sweetheart and some funky dude. Hancock sings, “Somebody heard the shots and called 911/The law’s outside to ruin all my fun …” Now that’s what I call country music!
* Live at the Big T Roadhouse, Chicken S#!+ Bingo Sunday and Under the Influence by Dale Watson. Dale Watson may be the hardest working honky-tonker in Texas. He’s known to play gigs without taking a single break. He even works holidays. I saw him play the Continental Club in Austin last Christmas — and he’s scheduled to play there on Thanksgiving this month.
Watson always seems to have a new album. In fact, he’s released not one but two in recent weeks.
One album is a live show from his favorite Hedwig, Texas, haunt, known for bingo games that use live poultry instead of balls to determine the numbers being called.
The other is an album full of cover songs made famous by the musicians who most influenced him.
Big T Roadhouse features a bunch of old Watson tunes, including ought-to-be classics like “I Lie When I Drink,” “Where Do You Want It” (an ode to Billy Joe Shaver’s infamous shooting incident), and one of his best trucker songs, “Birmingham Breakdown.” There area couple of Merle Haggard favorites, “The Bottle Let Me Down” and “The Fugitive,” plus my personal favorite here, a spirited cover of Jerry Reed’s “Amos Moses.”
And speaking of covers, Under the Influence is a true treat. Watson performs Bob Wills’ “That’s What I Like About the South,” Buck Owens’ “Made in Japan,” and two relative Haggard obscurities: “Here in Frisco” and “If You Want to Be My Woman.”
My favorites are Watson’s version of “You’re Humbuggin’ Me,” a classic recorded by Lefty Frizzell, Rocket Morgan, Ronnie Dawson, and others, and Danny Dill’s “Long Black Veil.” That’s a well-worn chestnut first made famous by Frizzell. But Dale’s treatment is unique. He actually makes this ghostly murder story swing.
* Swimmin’ Pools, Movie Stars … by Dwight Yoakam. Yoakam undoubtedly was the best-known neo-honky-tonker of the 1980s.
Though he’s dabbled in bluegrass before, this is Kentucky-born Yoakam’s first all-bluegrass album. All the songs are new acoustic versions of old Yoakam originals, including the title song of his first album, “Guitars, Cadillacs,” refitted with fiddles and banjos.
All but one, that is.
The album ends with Prince’s “Purple Rain.” And while a lot of people chuckle at the thought of a bluegrass rendition of Prince, this is nothing to snicker at. Yoakam kills it. Without a trace of irony he finds the soul of the song and makes it into the perfect hillbilly tribute to the ascended master from Minneapolis.
* Southern White Lies by Martha Fields. She has roots in Texas and Oklahoma, though these days Fields is living part-time in Bordeaux, France.
But just because she’s across the ocean doesn’t mean she’s forgotten her musical roots. Last year, with a band of Frenchmen called House of Twang, she released an album full of rocking country boogie called Long Way From Home. But while that one was fun, her new acoustic banjo- and dobro-driven record is much deeper and hits much harder.
With a strong, throaty voice, Fields sings about her Southern heritage with stark honesty. A major theme running through several songs on Southern White Lies is how poor, rural people are manipulated by politicians and big business to keep them poor and ignorant for the sake of keeping up the supply of cheap labor and soldiers for wars.
There’s a real current of righteous anger running through many of these songs. Fields sums it up in “American Hologram,” singing, “No pot to piss in, believe in that trickle down/Snake handlers and TV tellin’ ‘em it’s for the best ... No need for education, no money for schools/Easier for Limbaugh, to play ‘em like the fool.”
A tasteful handful of covers like Woody Guthrie’s “Lonesome Road Blues” — better known as “Going Down That Road Feelin’ Bad” — and Janis Joplin’s “What Good Can Drinkin’ Do” adds a little levity to the album. “Pandering politicians, we need more musicians,” Fields sings in the title song.
I didn't know former Attorney General Janet Reno. But I know her niece Jane and Jane's husband Ed. And I learned about her death this week via a sweet eulogy to her that Ed posted on his Facebook page Monday.
Reading Ed's tribute reminded me of this a cool music project that Reno had envisioned and Ed, a musician in Nashville, co-produced. Released in early 2008, the double-disc collection was called Song of America.
And it was, in the words of a wise old journalist, "a big, old, various-artist collection of songs outlining the strange and complicated history of this great land — both the official version and various alternate views that go beyond the wars, political campaigns, and other stuff they teach in school. There are patriotic tunes, protest songs, musical re-tellings of historic events, and songs about changes in our society."
Below is a Good Morning America feature on Song for America.
Below are a few tracks from Song of America.
This one, by Suzy Bogus, is really snazzy!
And here is a rocking version of a Johnny Cash song, "Apache Tears" by Scott kempner, formerly pf The Dictators and The Del-Lords
So rest in peace, Janet Reno. Thank you for your song.
Sunday, Nov. 6, 2016 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
Here's the playlist
OPENING THEME: Let It Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Liar Liar by The Castaways
G-D Liars by Chuck E. Weiss
Dead in a Motel Room by Hickoids
I Don't Mind by The Angry Dead Pirates
Losing My Mind by Alien Space Kitchen
Tore Up by The Cryin' Jags
Ride With Me by Sulphur City
Dog on a Leash by The Badass Motherfuzzers
I Can Hear Her Fighting With Herself by Jonathan Richman
The Crusher by The Cramps
Kremlin Dogs by Gregg Turner
White Faces by Roky Erikson & The Aliens
Raw Power by Iggy & The Stooges
Not a Sausage by The Mobbs
Pony Tail and a Black Cadillac by Roy & The Devil's Motorcycle
Elected by Alice Cooper
Hallelujah by Churchwood
I Made a Mistake by James Williamson & MAIA
I Don't Want You Anymore by The Monsters
Follow Me Home by The Mystery Lights
White Glove Service by The Grannies
Analia by The King Khan & BBQ Show
It's Mighty Crazy by Barrence Whitfield & The Savages
When Fate Deals Its Mortal Blow by Meet Your Death
200 Years Old by Frank Zappa & The Mothers & Captain Beefheart
Mesopotamia by The B52s
Down on Me by Big Brother & The Holding Company
Plastic Fantastic Lover by The Jefferson Airplane
Autumn Leaves by Bob Dylan
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis
