IMMORTALS

I'm stealing this from NewMexiKen:

Four American Immortals
… died young on this date.

Robert Johnson in 1938 at age 27.
Babe Ruth in 1948 at age 53.
Margaret Mitchell in 1949 at age 48.
Elvis Presley in 1977 at age 42.

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, August 13, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M.
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Let it Out (Let it All Hang Out) by The Hombres
Greasebox by TAD
Private Hell by Iggy Pop & Green Day
Two Timing Touch and Broken Bones by The Hives
Store Bought Bones by The Raconteurs
Stack Shot Billy by The Black Keys
Room 213 by Dead Moon
Forty Dollars by The Twilight Singers
What's Left of the Flag by Flogging Molly

Thank You Lord by Hellwood
Secrets by The Mekons
Lost in Music by The Fall
Sheriff of Hong Kong by Captain Beefheart
Drove Up From Pedro by Mike Watt with Carla Bozulich
Call the Doctor by Sleater-Kinney
You're Nobody Til Somebody Loves You by Dean Martin

Crackpot Baby by L7
Black Mask by International Noise Conspiracy
My Sweet Angel and I Considered the Asthetics of The Black Pen by Bleach 03
Did You See Me? by The BusBoys
Between You and Me Kid by Mudhoney
Waves of Fear by Lou Reed
Burning Down the House by Talking Heads
Tapioca Tundra by The Monkees

Living Room by Carl Hancok Rux
Let Me Down Easy by Bettye Lavette
John Henry by Van Morrison
We Still Got It by Redneck Manifesto
It's the Day of Atonement 2001 by Dayna Kurtz
Our Day Will Come by NRBQ
CLOSING THEME: Over the Rainbow by Jerry Lee Lewis

eMUSIC AUGUST

Here's my allotted 90 downloads from eMusic this month:

*Minimum Wage Rock & Roll (plus stray cuts from other albums) by The BusBoys I snared MWR&R just just in time. Just a day or two later it disappeared from eMusic.

I hadn't thought of The BusBoys in years. But last month when I was working on my column about coon songs and minstrel shows I recalled the band stirred controversy by messing with Steppin Fetchin shuck 'n' jive stereotypes with their moves, facial expressions and other antics in their stage show. "Hey! Can I shine ya'll's shoes? I just loves to shine ya'll's shoes ..." At the same time they directly confronted racial issues in their songs. "There Goes the Neighborhood" talks about how "the whites are movin' in." Back then it just seemed funny and ironic. Now it's obvious that it was one of the first rock songs about gentrification.

They also talked about segregation in rock, which was at it's worse in the early '80s, those strange days before Prince. Rock was for whites, funk and soul was for blacks. But in the BusBoys, the twain met. "I bet you never heard music like this by spades," singer Kevin O'Neil says in the Devo-like "Did You See Me."

More than 20 years ago I interviewed O'Neil after a show at the honky tonkin' Golden Inn. He was one of the first musicians I ever interviewed who was brutally honest about how downright grueling show biz can be. He was exhausted, cynical and by his account near broke -- and this was at the height of their short-lived popularity.

But it was a hell of a show. While fooling around on Amazon.com I was delighted to stumble across another person who had been there. She says she saw Willie, Waylon and Jessie there that night. I didn't see them, but I wasn't really paying attention to the audience.

*Broken Boy Soldiers by The Raconteurs. I mainly got this one -- White Stripe Jack White's latest musical project -- for my son, who has repaid me by constantly humming "Steady As She Goes" for the past week. I do like it, though not as much as The Stripes.

*Good Bread Alley by Carl Hancock Rux I first heard Rux on Bob Edwards Weekend a few weeks ago. Rux is a poet, playwrite and photographer, but veers into music when his art calls for it. His bio says he's been commissioned for a couple of operas. This album is mainly art-damaged, literate blues. My favorite track here are the title song and "Living Room," which is a mutated "Gimme Some Lovin'." There's also a song for Kurt Cobain.

*Live from Mountain Stage by NRBQ. Maybe this isn't NRBQ's best live album, but it's a darn good one. It has songs from two shows, one before the departure of Big Al, one after. I love Al's "What a Nice Way to Go," ("Let's play some stripper music, boys," he drawls at the outset of the instrumental section). Also there's a good sleazy take on "Our Day Will Come." Who among us doesn't like Ruby & The Romantics?

*Hardwired in Ljubljana and Live at The Casbah 10/21/2004 by Dead Moon
With the zeal of a new convert. I downloaded not one but two live albums from this Portland garage/punk/psycheledelic/whatever band. Ljubljana is the better of these two, but Casbah has a version of "You Must Be a Witch."

At first I just assumed it was just a cover of the '60s garage classic (included in Rhino's Nuggets box set), but reading up on Dead Moon, I learned that singer Fred Cole actually was a member of The Lollipop Shoppe, which originally did the song. But I still want to know why Toody Cole always skips the second verse of The Rolling Stones' "Play With Fire."

The above accounts for 89 tracks: For my final track I chose to expand my modest but growing eMusic Cab Calloway collection and download "Kicking the Gong Around" (one of Cab's "Minnie the Moocher" sequels. I previously downloaded "Minnie the Moocher's Wedding Day.")

THE SANTA FE OPRY PLAYLIST

Friday, August 11, 2006
KSFR, Santa Fe, NM
Webcasting!
10 p.m. to midnight Fridays Mountain Time
Host: Steve Terrell

OPENING THEME: Buckaroo by Buck Owens & The Buckaroos
I Wanna Be Sedated by Two Tons of Steel
Please Stop Playing That Didgeridoo by Jono Manson
Nuthin' Much by Doug Spartz
Have You Had Enough? by Ricki Lee Jones
Big Bad Bill is Sweet William Now by Ry Cooder
Oklahoma Waltz by Acie Cargill
American Pagaent by The Sadies with Jon Langford
Farther on Down the Road by Eric Hisaw
Mary Lou, Good Time Gal by Kell Robertson

Cookeville Kid by Porter Wagoner
Jesus Was a Capricorn by Marshall Chapman
Forest Fire by Mark Pickerel
Worthless by Tony Gilkyson
Please Don't Tell Me How the Story Ends by Kris Kristofferson
What a Nice Way to Go by NRBQ
Sins of a Family by P.F. Sloan with Lucinda Williams

Gun Show by Bobby Bare, Jr.
Highway to Lowdown by Frank Black
Never Gonna Be Your Bride by Carrie Rodriguez
Unglorious Hallelujah by Chip Taylor
If I Ever Get To Heaven by Kate Campbell with Spooner Oldham
Wild Wild Women of the Wild Wild West by Lynn Anderson
99 Friends of Mine by Dan Reeder
The Way of the Fallen by Ray Wylie Hubbard

Mighty Sweet Watermelon by Greg Brown
Kansas by Fred Eaglesmith
Look What Thoughts Will Do by Merle Haggard
The Maker by Willie Nelson with Emmylou Harris
In the Middle of It by Irma Thomas
Dreaming My Dreams with You by Waylon Jennings
Wings of a Dove by Dolly, Tammy & Loretta
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: PORTER, ACIE & KRIS

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
August 11, 2006

Porter Wagoner has always held a special place in my musical heart. With his electrifying sequined jackets and his most pomp-worthy pompadour, Wagoner turned his syndicated TV show in the 1960s and ’70s into a classic.

While many think of Dolly Parton as a glitzy superstar, I still remember her stunning harmonies with Wagoner. Also unforgettable are those soap commercials in which the duo pulled dish towels out of boxes of Breeze.

In recent decades, Wagoner’s musical output has been negligible. However, his recently released CD, The Versatile Porter Wagoner, is pleasantly surprising. If you like your country music spooky and mysterioso, you have to check this one out.

While the CD has some predictable, modern, Branson-ready country-and-western filler, some of the tunes on Versatile remind me of Wagoner’s weirdest song ever, “The Rubber Room.”

On “Indian Creek,” Wagoner teams up with John Anderson with a musical backdrop of heavy tom-toms and Native American flute as well as a Cherokee fiddle and “Kaw-Liga” steel guitar.

“Sometimes, the water gets crimson red/From the battles they fought and the blood they shed/If you look real close, you can almost see the ghosts and hear the mournful sound of their retreat,” Wagoner sings. The song ends with Wagoner praying to the Great Spirit.

In “Mystery Mountain,” Wagoner challenges the haints and hostile critters on a forbidding landmark, while “Divers Are Out Tonight” is a tale of crime, punishment, and hidden treasure. “Cookeville Kid” is a twangy outlaw/gambler ballad in which Wagoner speaks the lyrics (“Here lies the Cookeville Kid/He bought one too many queens/so said Judge Roy Bean”). Wagoner duets with Pam Gadd on a sweet version of the old folk song “Mary of the Wild Moor.”

You can get the Versatile album for a mere $7.97 on Wagoner’s Web site,

Also recommended:

* In Old Oklahoma, by Acie Cargill and The Coyote Kick Band. Cargill isn’t really an Okie — he lives in Illinois and has roots in Kentucky — but he’s got some kin in the Sooner state. After this album, as a born Oklahoman myself, I’d be the first to nominate him for honorary Okiehood.

“I can always tell an Okie,” Cargill says in one song. “They treat you like we’re all in the same boat, nobody’s special. They hold up their end, and they expect the same from you/And they’re not afraid to be friendly.”

This pretty much sums up the spirit of this album, which celebrates the history of Oklahoma, from the Indian migrations up to the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building bombing in 1995.

The album starts off with a seven-and-a-half-minute history lesson called “In Old Oklahoma,” featuring a spoken-word recitation by Cargill in his folksy drawl backed by a jaunty country instrumental. Cargill’s Coyote Kick Band does some convincing Western swing on “Okies,” another spoken-word piece, this one concerning the Dust Bowl.

As he’s done on some of his past records, Cargill, who wrote nearly all the tunes on this album, turns over the microphone to various relatives and friends, giving the effort a homey, homemade feel. Standouts include celebrated singer-songwriter James Talley, whose “Oklahoma, You’re OK” is a moving ballad about the 1995 bombing. It reminds me of another recent Talley song, “I Saw the Buildings,” which is about September 11.

I’m also fond of cowgirl singer Mary Minton’s contributions in “Pawnee Bill” and “Tom Mix and Lucille Mulhall.”

In Old Oklahoma is part of a planned trilogy of Cargill albums honoring Oklahoma’s statehood centennial, to be observed in 2007. Red Dirt, which isn’t available yet, features Cargill, his uncle Henson (“Skip a Rope”) Cargill, Talley, Byron Berline, and others doing original tunes plus covers of Okie giants such as Woody Guthrie, Spade Cooley, and J.J. Cale. Also in the works is Oklahoma Roots, featuring Cargill and his pals.

*The Pilgrim: A Celebration of Kris Kristofferson This is the third tribute album to the old lion in recent years. Perhaps it makes sense that Kristofferson would inspire so many people to want to cover his tunes. After all, most of us old fans were introduced to his songs through interpretations of others. “Me and Bobby McGee” was first recorded by Roger Miller but made famous by Janis Joplin; Johnny Cash had a hit with “Sunday Morning Coming Down”; Ray Price recorded “For the Good Times,” to which Al Green later would add soulful new dimensions; and one-hit-wonder Sammi Smith’s soulful country/pop cover of “Help Me Make It Through the Night” is the version we remember.

The previous tributes, Don’t Let The Bastards Get You Down and Nothing Left to Lose (both released in 2002), consisted mostly of alt rockers and alt-country types. Pilgrim, on the other hand, is more mainstream, with singers such as Emmylou Harris; Willie Nelson; Waylon Jennings’ widow, Jessi Colter, and their son, Shooter Jennings; Roseanne Cash; and Rodney Crowell.

Among my favorite songs on Pilgrim are Crowell’s two-steppin’, honky-tonk version of “Come Sundown” and Gretchen Wilson’s properly aching “Sunday Morning Coming Down.”

I can’t forget Todd Snider’s convincing version of a relatively obscure song called “Maybe You Heard,” written after Kristofferson and Rita Coolidge divorced. The song angrily blasts friends who took sides in the aftermath of the breakup. Snider sounds like he’s taking it personally as he sings the final refrain, “Don’t turn away, hey goddamn you, you used to love her ... don’t you condemn her.”

The album has a couple of clunkers though. Brian McKnight’s overwrought, middle-of-the-road, soul/samba version of “Me and Bobby McGee” makes me yearn for Janis. Also, if the producers wanted someone to sound like Claudine Longet, why didn’t they just hire Claudine Longet instead of Jill Sobule, who duets with Lloyd Cole on a forgettable “For the Good Times”?

RICHARDSON TO LIEBERMAN: QUIT!

Gov. Bill Richardson just added his thoughts on the Lamont/Lieberman race.

“Joe Lieberman is a good friend of mine, a true public servant who has served his constituents and the Democratic Party well. However, after a hard-fought race Connecticut's Democratic voters chose Ned Lamont as their candidate for US Senate. I look forward to supporting Ned as he fights to help Democrats take back the Senate, and I call on Joe Lieberman to respect the will of the voters and step aside.”

ROUNDHOUSE ROUNDUP: OIL MONEY

A version of this was published in The Santa Fe New Mexican
August 10, 2006

Early this week, Gov. Bill Richardson’s re-election campaign released a statement blasting Republican opponent John Dendahl for not filing his July campaign-finance report on time.

Besides implying that Dendahl was trying to hide something, Richardson campaign chairman Dave Contarino commented on what the GOP candidate had said was his major source of contributions — the oil and gas industry.

“At a time when big oil companies are reaping record profits and New Mexican families are struggling to pay $3 per gallon,” Contarino was quoted, “the public deserves to know whether or not he’s received a large percentage of his contributions from these large oil and gas corporations.”

Right on, Dave! It’s about time someone stood up to the oil barons. It’s good to know that our governor would never touch their filthy lucre.

Oh, wait a minute ...

According to Followthemoney.org, the Web site of the Institute on Money in State Politics, Richardson’s campaign, as of the end of May, had pumped the oil and gas industry for $234,263. Only three other sectors have contributed more to Richardson: lobbyists and lawyers; real estate; and his own now-defunct political action committee, Moving America Forward.

In his 2002 campaign, according to Followthemoney.org, the Richardson campaign took in $201,558 from the oil and gas industry.

To be fair, most of these contributions aren’t from “these large oil and gas corporations” Contarino was lambasting. Many are from businesses that service the oil and gas companies. His biggest single oil-and-gas contributor in this election cycle was Calloway Safety Equipment Co. of Hobbs, which gave two checks totaling $30,000.

Major multinational oil and gas producers don’t contribute that much to New Mexico politicians. But Richardson has received more money from the big boys than any other candidate in the state: $5,000 from Alon USA (which produces Fina gasoline), $4,000 from Chevron and two contributions totaling $3,000 from Conoco-Phillips.

Dendahl who finally submitted his finance report Wednesday, didn’t show any money from major oil companies.

The Cargo wing of the GOP?: I received an e-mail from a New Mexico congressional candidate Wednesday who declared that antiwar candidate Ned Lamont’s victory over incumbent U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman in Tuesday’s Connecticut Democratic primary was “a victory for all Americans.”

No, it wasn’t Rep. Tom Udall, a progressive Democrat who voted against the Iraq war. It was his Republican opponent, Ron Dolin.

And no, Dolin wasn’t coming from a “yippee-the-Democrats-are-divided” point of view.

“We witnessed the birth of a movement,” Dolin said in his news release. “Grass-roots Americans, tired of professional politicians who have forgotten the people they represent, are taking back their government. ...”

“I believe Americans want a return to a citizen-based form of government,” Dolin wrote. “Incumbents in Congress no longer represent the people. Incumbents view politics as a career not as a service. Thomas Jefferson would be pleased to see a common citizen topple an entrenched incumbent.”

This goes against the typical Republican line of praising Lieberman and using Lamont’s victory as evidence the Democrats have been taken over by left-wing weirdoes.

Indeed, Dolin, a homeland-security expert with Los Alamos National Laboratory, seems to be a different kind of Republican — perhaps a “Lonesome” Dave Cargo for the new century.

A few weeks ago, Dolin attacked Udall for voting for a telecommunications bill opponents say jeopardizes the concept of “net neutrality” and an open, democratic Internet.

Later on Wednesday, Dolin unleashed another e-mail, this one blasting Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman for refusing to endorse the Republican candidate in the Connecticut Senate race.

“This is one of the most upsetting political betrayals I have ever witnessed,” Dolin wrote. “I feel bad for Republican candidates across America who have the courage to stand for election against an incumbent.”

(Dolin never mentioned his name in his statement, but the Connecticut candidate is Alan Schlesinger.)

Nobody’s expecting Udall to have any real trouble in this election. But Dolin’s making the race a lot more interesting than I expected.