THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, July 16, 2010
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
Billy the Kid by Ry Cooder
Billy the Kid by John Hartford
Ice Water by Glenn Barber
'Cause I'm Crazy by Kell Robertson

KELL ROBERTSON
Interview

Naked Girls by Stephen W. Terrell
Maria Elena by Kell Robertson
Kell Live
My Baby Ate Every Taco in Town
I'll Walk Around Heaven With You
Mary Lou (Good Time Gal)

Uh-Huh-Honey by Autry Inman
You Don't Have To Do It by Reverend Beat-Man & The Un-Believers
It Ain't Nobody's Biz'ness What I Do by The Hoosier Hot Shots
Hog-Tied Over You by Tennessee Ernie Ford & Ella May Morse
Little Dog Blues by Mel Price
Oil Tanker Train by Merle Haggard
Don't You Think This Outlaw Bit's Done Got Out Of Hand by Waylon Jennings
Oak Tree Hangin' by Gary Gorence

Lackie's Men by Delaney Davidson
John Hardy by The Sixtyniners
Xoe's Favorite Honkey Tonk by Xoe Fitzgerald
Moonshiner's Life by Hank III
Bring 'em Home by Tao Seeger
Weary Blues From Waitin' by Big Sandy & His Fly-Rite Boys
Red Velvet by The Kirby Sisters
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets

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

Hurricane Warning for Santa Fe

Al Hurricane that is.

The Godfather of New Mexico music and his son Al Hurricane, Jr., will perform 7:30 pm, Saturday, August 7 Santa Fe Community Convention Center at a benefit dance for the Santa Fe Fiesta Council.

Al the Elder released his first album in 1967. Hurricane has released 29 more albums with his latest in 2007.

CLICK HERE and scroll down to find my 1998 profile of Al, Sr.

Tickets are $15 per person or $25 per couple and can be purchased at the Lensic Peforming Arts Box Offfice, by phone at (505) 988-1234 or online.

XOE LANDS AT TINY's

The lovely Xoe Fitzgerald, Santa Fe's Favorite time-traveling transvestite is having his/her CD release party Friday at Tiny's.

In case you haven't heard this legend, Xoe is allegedly the offspring of David Bowie's Man Who fell to Earth and some hippie girl from Madrid, N.M.

This glam-rock, honky-tonk spectacular starts at 8:30 p.m. Admission is free and the first 50 who show up get a Xoe bumpersticker.

Joe West is allegedly involved with this. He's has been working on this concept for a few years. By some weird coincidence, Thursday is Joe's birthday. But I doubt that he shows. He's never has been seen at the same time and place with Xoe.

THE BEAT-MAN WAY

Once again, Reverend Beat-Man and his pal Delaney Davidson amazed and delighted in Santa Fe rocking a hopped-up crowd at Little Wing.

Instead of doing an opening-act/star-time arrangement, Beat-Man and Davidson played together both doubling on guitar and drums and trading off on lead vocals.

Like last year's show at Corazon, the set leaned heavy on Beat-Man's Surreal Folk Blues Gospel Trash (Volumes 1 and 2) and Get On Your Knees. as well as Davidson's Self-Decapitation. A lion's share of the songs deal with God, the Devil, Hell and salvation

While not as charismatic as the reverend, Davidson is a remarkable performer. The New Zealand native uses tape loops to subtly and almost seamlessly create a multi-layered sound. He'll be singing a part then all of a sudden you hear harmonies and wonder for a few seconds "how's he doing that?" And even though I'd thought that Nirvana had taken the song "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" to its ultimate level, Davidson's interpretation of "In the Pines" (a very close cousin of "Sleep") shows the song still has strange corridors to explore.

Beat-Man and Davidson are playing in Denver tonight, then on to Austin, New Orleans, Memphis and Nashville next week.

Is Nashville ready for Rev. Beat-Man?

More snapshots from the Santa Fe show are HERE.

TERRELL'S TUNE-UP: GUNS, GUITARS & KELL

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
July 16, 2010

With all due respect to Funky Donnie Fritts, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, and all those other icons of guitars, grit, and dusty glory that Kris Kristofferson names in the introduction to “The Pilgrim: Chapter 33,” Santa Fe’s Kell Robertson should have been on that list, somewhere near the top.

He’s a poet. He’s a picker. He’s a prophet. You know the rest. Robertson, who is somewhere in the vicinity of 80 years old, just released his latest album, ’Cause I’m Crazy, his first in nearly seven years.

Like his previous CDs, Crazy is a lo-fi, warts-and-all effort, deftly underproduced by Robertson’s cohort Mike Good, a musician who records under the name Blonde Boy Grunt. Kell cusses and fusses and clears his throat. It’s clearly not ready for modern country radio or any other civilized medium (I’ve been playing it on my show and have no intention of stopping).

Living the life: I interviewed the singer for a short profile in No Depression magazine in 2004. (For that story I also went to one of his local gigs where he intimidated some patrons of a now-defunct hippie café by growling, “I’m gonna take all your organic sandwiches and throw ’em in the woods and make you eat bologna/Because I’m evil,” as the climax to a blues song he performed.)

Robertson was born in Kansas, and, according to him, his stepfather kicked him out of the house at age 13, launching his years of rambling. He has worked as an usher in a movie theater, a fruit picker, a dishwasher, a soldier during the Korean War, a DJ at country and jazz stations, a bartender, and — this is the only one I have trouble believing — an insurance salesman. Robertson said that he considered a career in law enforcement and even took some classes at a police academy in California.

But poetry and music are his passions. Seeing a Hank Williams show in Louisiana was a turning point in his life, he said. But Robertson is far better known in poetry circles than he is in the music world. He published a mimeograph poetry magazine called Desperado in the ’60s and has issued 17 books of poetry. The liner notes of his previous album, When You Come Down Off the Mountain, contained a quote from Lawrence Ferlinghetti: “I would say Kell Robertson is one fine cowboy-poet, worth a dozen New Yorker poetasters. Let them listen and hear the voice of the real America out there.”

Robertson landed in Santa Fe sometime around the turn of the century and has been here since.
’Cause he’s crazy: The new album starts out with some classic outlaw bravado. In the title track, Robertson sings about being compelled to go into a tavern, even though “every time I go in there, they throw me out.” (It’s ’cause he’s crazy, and he’s in love.)

The next song, “Guns, Guitars, and Women,” celebrates a long life of trouble: “First man I killed was down in Dallas/I was only 21.” Later in the album there’s “Down the Bar From Me,” which is about some of his fellow saloon denizens. “There’s one old lady showin’ her bullet scar,” he sings, a hint of lust in his voice.

“Migrant Farm Worker” sounds like a modern Woodie Guthrie song. It’s about the toil and trouble of field workers with their “overalls trimmed in manure.” The chorus speaks not only to a feeling of anonymity but also a fear of being trapped in some bad karmic Möbius strip: “Who will remember me when I am gone/Who will remember me then/When they bury me ’neath that cottonwood tree/Will I have to start over again?”

Robertson offers his take on religion on a few songs. “Singin’ for Jesus” is about a street preacher. “I’m screamin at them sinners to come back to Jesus ... but he’s gonna pay me back some day. ... I’m down on skid row selling salvation ... but you know, boys, salvation is free.”

In “Jesus Christ Is Dead,” Robertson sings: “They nailed him to a tree/And the only way he can live again is inside you and me.” “Great Big Donut,” a song he says was inspired while sitting on the can watching the spiders on the wall, is a shaggy-dog parable about God trying to save the world by sending us a mysterious rolling pastry.

With “Lookin’ For Somebody to Kill,” you know you’re in for trouble from the first line, “I lost my heart in a barroom in Juárez.” Indeed, he’s looking for someone to kill, but when you learn who his victim is in the last verse, you may be shocked.

Actually this song seems to be the third part of a trilogy of songs about drug addicts. “Maria Elena” is about a doomed woman: “The powder they gave you is mixed up with death/You’re finding it harder to catch up with your breath.” The next song, “Junkie Eyes,” is about an encounter with a strung-out prostitute: “Lord, lord, them junkie eyes/Everytime you see them something dies/Something may be crawlin’ around inside/what’s left are them ravin’ junkie eyes.”

There are a couple of new versions of songs from previous albums — “Madonna on the Billboard” and “Mary Lou” (the tale of a “good-time gal”). The new versions don’t add that much to the old takes, and I’m not quite sure why they’re here. But both are fine songs, and they do fit in with the others.

The official conclusion of ’Cause I’m Crazy is “As You Still Got a Song.” Robertson sings again about getting kicked out of bars, but like the refrain says, “As long as you’ve still got a song, everything is all right.”

I’m glad Kell’s still got these great songs.

Kell on the radio: Kell Robertson plays live on The Santa Fe Opry tonight. The show starts at 10 p.m on KSFR-FM 101.1

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, July 11, 2010
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
Love by Country Joe & The Fish
Big Mamou by Barrence Whitfield & The Savages
Mosquito Stomp by Gas Huffer
Pyscho by Nick Curran & The Lowlifes
I Need Your Lovin' by Wolfman Jack
Rock 'n' Roll Fever by Willie Egans
Keep on Rubbing by Capt. Beefheart
Soba Song by 3 Mustaphas 3
Shave My Soul by The Come N' Go
I Need Somebody by Manby's Head
Pencil Neck Geek by Fred Blassie

Come Back Lord by Rev. Beat-Man
Back in Hell by Delaney Davidson
Dram Shopper by The Scrams
Demolicion by Waugh y Los Arrrghs!!!
Bitch, I Love You by Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears
40 Birds by King Khan & The Shrines
Memphis Creep by The Oblivions
Skippy Is A Sissy by Roy Gaines
The Wakin' Blues (Walk Right In, Walk Right Out) by The Jessie Powell Orchestra with Fluffy Hunter

Wine, Wine Wine/2,000 Pound Bee by Bobby Fuller
Bye Bye by The Friends
R.L. Got Soul by The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Snakedrive by R.L. Burnside
Wolf Call by The Dots
Shout Bama Lama by Otis Redding & The Pinetoppers

Jeepster by T. Rex
Bikini by The Bikinis
You Got Good Taste by The Cramps
With the Idiots by Urban Junior
Poison Tree by Movie Star Junkies
Velvet Touch by Figures of Light
Low Down Dog by Joe Turner & Pete Johnson
It's Only Make Believe by Screamin' Jay Hawkins
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, July 9, 2010
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
Blue Moon of Kentucky by Rev. Beat-Man
Drinkin' Wine Spo Dee o Dee by Malcom Yelvin
Busy Body Boogie by The Carlisles
Callin' in Twisted by Rev. Horton Heat
Too Many Rivers by Webb Wilder
Loco by D.M. Bob & The Deficits
A Girl in the Night by Ray Price
How Cold Hearted Can You Get by Hank Thompson
Tennessee Rooster Fight by The Howington Brothers
Magpie Song by Delaney Davidson

New Orleans/Little Bitty Pretty One by Bobby Fuller
I Fought the Law by Sonny Curtis
Muswell Hillbillies by Southern Culture on the Skids
Dixieland Boogie by Hardrock Gunter
Nails In My Coffin by Jerry Irby & His Texas Ranchers
Hot Rod Lincoln by Johnny Bond
Always Late with Your Kisses by Lefty Frizzell
Nobody Here But Me, Lord by Kell Robertson

Xoe Fitzgerald by Joe West
Wild West Huapango by Tara Linda
Strut My Stuff by Slim Redman, Donnie Bowshier & The Junior Melody Boys
Devilsong by Shinyribs
Meadowlark Boogie by Buck Griffin
Mental Cruelty by Buck Owens & Rose Maddox
Too Drunk to Truck by The Sixtyniners
Who Walks In When I Walk Out by Bob Wills & His Texas Playboys
Too Much Month at the End of The Money by Marty Stuart

You Want to Give Me a Lift by Eilen Jewell
I'd Come Back To Me by Johnny Paycheck
Shelley's Winter Love by Bill Kirchen With Paul Carrack & Nick Lowe
Better Than Bein Alone by Joe Swank And The Zen Pirates
Into the Big Fire by Kris Hollis Key
You've Never Been This Far Before Conway Twitty
Treasures Untold by Doc & Merle Watson
CLOSING THEME: Comin' Down by The Meat Puppets


Subscribe to The Big Enchilada Podcast! CLICK HERE

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