Rattlesnake Confusion

2012-02-11T16:18:00.000-05:00

Jon Byrd

Down at the Well ofWishes

Longleaf Pine Records

www.jonbyrd.com

Alabama born Jon Byrd up and moved to Nashville by way ofAtlanta’s Redneck Underground and has since been loosely affiliated with atalented group of singer-songwriters based in East Nashville, and rightlyso. One of Byrd’s songs appeared on the RedBeet Records 2006 compilation Music FromEast Nashville Vol. 3 and he recently contributed vocals on a track forEric Brace and Peter Cooper’s Tom T. Hall tribute album I Love: Tom T. Hall's SongsOf Fox Hollow. But while many of the others in this collective areknown to dip a toe or two into the river of classic country, Byrd takes arunning leap and dives in head first. From the retro font across the front ofthe cover to the “stereo” banner along the top, this could have been a Capitolrelease in the late 60s or early 70s. The nine songs clocking in at 37 minuteswould have fit nicely on two sides of a vinyl record, too. But don’t get mewrong: this is no period piece. These tunes are as timeless as they are timely.Over a backing of pedal steel and twangy lead guitar, Byrd’s vocals are as warmas good bourbon and go down just as easy. All the songs are strong, wellconstructed pieces, but my favorite is AlabamaAsphalt, a bluesy, Jimmy Rodgers-style tune with slinky lap steel licks byPat Severs. For country music as it should be, give a listen to Down at the Well of Wishes.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

February 2012

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter 2011

2011-12-02T18:04:00.006-05:00

“Whatever satisfies the soul is truth.”― Walt Whitman

“All the shopping malls and restaurants and airports are riddled with low-fidelity loudspeakers, which apparently have developed the ability to reproduce by themselves; these are all connected to a special programming service called Music That Nobody Really Likes, and you cannot get away from it.” That’s from author/humorist Dave Barry, and we’ve all felt that way at one time or another. Fortunately, there’s a special programming service called TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter that can take care of that little problem for you.

With that, here are the records that satisfied my soul in 2011:

Record of the year:

I Love: Tom T Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow – Eric Brace and Peter Cooper & Various Artists. On this remake of Hall’s classic country album, Cooper and Brace have rediscovered the imagination of youth and reintroduced it to a new generation. Pick: Sneaky Snake by Buddy Miller and Duane Eddy.

Debut record of the year:

Alabama Shakes – EP – A refreshingly unassuming mix of retro-soul, blues and R&B. Buy their record. See them live. Now. Pick: any of the four songs on the EP.

Live record of the year:

Songs and Stories – Guy Clark –America’s finest living songwriter plays a set in your living room and brings his friends. Pick: L.A. Freeway.

Cover song of the year:

Go-Go Boots - Drive-by Truckers – The Muscle Shoals sound figures prominently on DBT’s new one as the band continues to make exciting, visceral music. Pick: Eddie Hinton’s Everybody Needs Love.

Car song of the year:

Dirty Jeans and Mudslide Hymns – John Hiatt – Hiatt continues to produce amazing roots music time after time. Best track: Detroit Made.

Best of the Rest:

Harlem River Blues - Justin Townes Earle - Wherein Justin finds his own voice. And it’s a good one. This record cuts across genres and generations, much like his dad and his namesake. Pick: Christchurch Woman.

The Lost Cause Minstrels - Grayson Capps - On Grayson’s best record yet, he spins tales gleaned from barrooms, bordellos and backwaters of Alabama, Mississippi and Florida. Pick: John the Dagger, Coconut Moonshine.

The Harrow and the Harvest - Gillian Welch – Her first record in eight years is also her finest, full of songs equally new and threadbare, comfortable and timeless, and each and every one a dusky, shadowy jewel. Pick: The Way It Goes.

A Pre-existing Condition – David Dondero – David’s deceptively simple mix of covers and his own quirky songs made this quiet, acoustic record one of my favorites. Pick: Not Everybody Loves Your Doggie Like You Do.

2011’s crop of music was some of the tastiest yet. I’m encouraged with the growth of the Americana genre and its inclusion in both the Grammys and the dictionary. Technology continues to evolve and expand the availability of artists to the public. I’ve had a great time building and sharing playlists with Spotify, for example. There’s still a long way to go, though. What passes for popular music in all the major formats is as exciting and innovative as dirt. Too often form and façade is substituted for heart and soul and we’re way too willing to sit back and take it. If you make resolutions, then resolve to find some new music and share it with friends. Get out and hear live music and support the artists. Forget Occupy Wall Street, let’s Occupy Abbey Road, Beale Street and Music Row!

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

December 2011

2011-11-15T21:11:00.018-05:00

Americana Music Festival and Conference

Nashville, Tennessee

October 12 – 15, 2011

If moments can be used to define events, then the sight of Buddy Miller in the middle of a sun splashed Saturday afternoon crowd in the tiny back parking lot of a used record store, would be it for the 2011 Americana Music Festival. Buddy, who two days before had just garnered Americana awards for Artist of the Year, Instrumentalist of the Year and as a member of Robert Plant’s Band of Joy, Album of the Year, was out enjoying himself. Because what’s happening here in Nashville isn’t American Idol histrionics or pop culture with a use-by date, this is, if I may borrow a line from my friend Ken Stahl, music that matters.

Four days, five clubs, over a hundred artists, and one goal – to promote, encourage and educate the public about that elusive genre, Americana. For me, it’s a chance to hear my favorite artists in a setting where they’re predisposed to excel. You just don’t give a bad performance in Nashville during the AMAs. Wildman Steve, Program Director at Wildman Steve Radio, a busy man during the conference, says “the AMAs are a fantastic experience for us. The access to ar

tists for interviews is unparalleled, the interaction with other radio, promotions, and industry folks of all types is educational, and the opportunity to see so many new and established acts in a four-day period is thrilling and enlightening.”

And for an artist like Lisa Oliver-Gray, (shown above with Tommy Womack) whose record Dedicated To Love will be released in November, she says “the AMA conference promotes community among the musicians, singers, stylists, and writers and excites the hostess, Music City! A general feeling of love is my perception. The audiences are truly engaged by their favorite artists but are full of complimentary energy about their "new favorites!" Being a part of it feels like a visit to your favorite childhood camp seeing your visiting friends except with dynamic performances, insightful Q & A's and a beautiful appreciation of the multitude and variety of talent!” Lisa has contributed backup vocals to many of my favorite Nashville artists and I’m looking forward to hearing her new release.

Grant Peeples, a very buzz-worthy artist, when not harassing country music legends in parking lots, spent his time at the conference networking with members of the radio industry and taking in a few of the showcases. And speaking of showcases, my short list of favorites starts with the very first night’s set from Marshall Chapman (shown below) and W ill Kimbrough at the Station Inn. Marshall sang, joked and read from her new book “They Came To Nashville.”

It was an intimate, warm performance that made you feel welcome. Next up was Jimmie Dale Gilmore and the Wronglers, featuring Warren Hellman of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival fame on banjo. Hayes Carll put on a scorching set at the Mercy Lounge; Athens was well represented with Packway Handle Band playing their unique brand of bluegrass for an appreciative crowd at the Station Inn and Ken Will Morton playing solo at the Listening Room. Kenny Vaughn and rockabilly trio Phil Hummer and the White Falcons played an eye-opening 9:30am set in the hotel lobby. Lisa Oliver-Gray sang with Tommy Womack and the Rush to Judgment at the Basement and with Will Kimbrough at the Rutledge, Eric Brace & Peter Cooper played a set together as well as a free afternoon show at Centennial Park highlighting their recent release, I Love: Tom T. Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow, a re-recording of the classic record.

David Olney performed at the Southern Festival of Books, being held concurrently with the AMAs, giving a dramatic reading of Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess ” and also played Americanarama IV, outside Grimey’s New and Preloved Records, this time with guitarist Sergio Webb, who uses his ten fingers and six strings to spin his own tales. Ken Will Morton (shown below) brought his Athens, Georgia brand of infectious Americana to a set at The Listening Room. The free Americanarama festival also featured Glossary and Hymn For Her. Roots rockers The Bottle Rockets sat themselves down and played an acoustic show, and the Muscle Shoals tribute at the Cannery featured Wet Willie’s Jack Hall, Webb Wilder, David Hood, Spooner Oldham and Billy Burnette.

I can’t say enough about the people who keep this thing running, especially Joyce, whose generosity and compassion truly make her a star in this town. For fans, for artists, for industry professionals, this convergence of talent and opportunity during the festival and conference presents a unique setting where a Buddy Miller sighting isn’t something unusual, it’s just Americana.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

November 2011

Katrina - Six Years Gone

2011-08-29T18:28:00.002-05:00

A bit of the Georgia Satellites from 2005 and a blog I wrote back in 2006:

It's been forever and a day since I felt like this

want a fifth of wild turkey and one little kiss

and I don't miss that girl

if I did I wouldn't let it show

I might go to the moon

might wind up dead

wake up in morning in a strangers bed

well I'm not concerned with any of that no more

----------------------------------

Things are not back to normal by any definition of the word, no matter how liberally that word is used in New Orleans. It will never be the same.

But one thing about New Orleans is that it will carry on, the spirit will prevail.

--------------------------------------------

Six Years Gone

water through my hands

2011-07-11T17:30:00.027-05:00

Willie Nelson’s Country Throwdown Tour

Coolray Field

Lawrenceville, Georgia

June 12, 2011

For all of Willie Nelson’s well documented, well deserved status as a country music outlaw, he is in fact a traditionalist in one very important way. Willie understands the role of the musician as a craftsman, as the practitioner of a trade: one that shows up on time, does what the people paid to see and then gets back on the bus with an assload of cash, on the road again to that next gig. But that’s what any big touring whale does; it shows up, dazzles the crowd and sets up down the line to do it again. Willie’s wake encompasses a large area and swamps fans of both modern and classic country along with those who like him because of his choice of smoking materials, and that should set the bar a bit higher. And yeah, this thing was one well-lubricated machine.

Lukas Nelson & The Promise of the Real

You can’t knock the setup or the people at the wheel of the Throwdown – it ran as smooth as Hank Aaron’s swing.

The warm up bands played behind the outfield wall, while the main stage was located behind second base. (Once we were allowed on the field, we secured prime general admission spots on the third base side of the pitcher’s mound.) There was also a singer-songwriter tent with a Bluebird Café brand slapped on it.

the singer-songwriters get their moment on the main stage.

The absolute highlight of the day was Lukas Nelson and the Promise of the Real, playing behind the right field wall. Willie’s son threw out plenty of high energy, crowd-pleasing guitar solos while fronting a blues rock outfit that had less in common with Waylon than it did with Santana.

you just can't tell 'em apart, can ya? that's Lee Brice and Randy Houser.

But still, it’s days like this that make me realize that today’s country music is the aural equivalent of olestra – slicker than goose snot, the manufacturer uses common materials to create something artificial and it lacks any real substance or importance and passes through you quickly . What fills this nutritional wasteland are backward hat wearing, posturing musicians who boast of their dirt road cred while cranking out tunes that have more in common with Don’t Stop Believin’ than Your Cheatin’ Heart. Indeed, Lee Brice came onstage to ACDC’s For Those About to Rock and that’s really what everyone did. If you believe that when confronted with unfamiliar bands and unfamiliar songs, you can tell a lot from their choices of covers, then Bob Seger’s Turn the Page, Muddy Waters’ Champagne and Reefer (served up in a blues rock style exactly how Texas guitar hero Ian Moore does it on the Hempilation compilation disc) and Skynyrd’s Simple Man (which, if you listen to the lyrics, is the defining, lasting Skynyrd legacy, not Free Bird) should tell you something about the day’s events.

Jamey Johnson.

For the record, Jamey Johnson had a solid set and Willie came out and did what Willie does, which is run through the songs you want to hear and he does it in style, with his impeccable guitar picking and vocals out in front of a veteran, family outfit that delivered at every turn.

Willie and son Lukas.

And yet, irony, thy name is Adam Hood.

During his turn at the songwriter in the round format on the main stage, he abruptly launched into his wry, eye rolling Play Something We Know (“Play somethin' we could sing to/Play somethin' we know/Man, play some Whiskey River man. Play somethin' we know.”) and I was the only one around me who knew the words.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

July 2011

Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers Rare Bird Alert

2011-05-18T19:31:00.012-05:00

Steve Martin and the Steep Canyon Rangers

Rare Bird Alert

Rounder Records

www.stevemartin.com

Steve Martin’s first foray into bluegrass, The Crow: New Songs for the Five-String Banjo, netted the comedian, writer and banjo picker a Grammy so it’s hard to imagine him topping that with his sophomore release, but this is absolutely a much better record in every way.

Teaming up with North Carolina’s Steep Canyon Rangers was an inspired move and this collaboration with of one of the finest bands in the genre today makes Rare Bird Alert a winner. The songwriting is lighthearted fare that continually brings a smile, from the fly-fishing song Yellow to a fast tune called Women Like to Slow Dance to Jubilation Day, which does the best job of blending Martin’s humor with a traditional bluegrass structure. There are guests: Paul McCartney takes a turn at the mike on Best Love and the Dixie Chicks warble sweetly on You, but the Rangers tie it all together over these thirteen tracks, the last two of which are live, and illustrate Martin’s ability to make people smile: the a cappella Atheists Don’t Have No Songs is my personal favorite but the hilarious, dead-on bluegrass take of Martin’s King Tut is a fitting end to this fine record, tying up loose ends nicely.

The Crow, with its many guest stars, was a fine, entertaining collection of bluegrass songs and Martin certainly knows his instrument, but with the solid underpinnings of the Steep Canyon Rangers, what we have here is a bluegrass record. And that makes all the difference in the world.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

May 2011

I Love: Tom T. Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow

2011-05-18T19:12:00.007-05:00

I Love

Tom T. Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow

Various Artists

Red Beet Records

www.songsoffoxhollow.com

Imagine a couple of kids roaming through Tennessee farmland one summer, learning about life and nature and asking those inevitable, innumerable questions to their uncle. Now imagine that their uncle is the legendary storyteller Tom T. Hall who took their questions and his answers, put them into song and in 1974, released Songs of Fox Hollow, a masterwork of simplicity in songwriting. Now further imagine that two current-day Nashville singers and writers set down to recreate this classic album with a little help from their friends and even from ol’ Tom T. himself. Co-producers Peter Cooper, Nashville’s own musical scribe and historian, and Eric Brace (Last Train Home) have been actively dipping into the traditional country well for a while now. Cooper’s recorded songs by many of the masters, from Kris Kristofferson and Tom T. Hall to more recent artists like Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris and Todd Snider. Most recently Cooper and Brace released Master Sessions with Lloyd Green and Mike Auldridge, two of country music’s most decorated talents. (Cooper also released a companion CD titled The Lloyd Green Album, well worth a listen.)

Brace and Cooper gathered a top-flight bunch at Hall’s studio at Fox Hollow and in a few days created a record that is full of such unabashed joy and love of life that you can’t help but smile as you listen. Patti Griffin’s lovely vocals and Cooper’s acoustic guitar on I Love start the record out nobly, followed by Buddy Miller’s take on Sneaky Snake with Duane Eddy adding his patented guitar twang. Each of the twelve songs feature a different lead vocalist including Elizabeth Cook, Jim Lauderdale, Gary Bennett (BR549), Jon Byrd, Bobby Bare (who admirably takes on Hall’s #1 hit I Care) and Fayssoux Starling McLean dueting with Tom T. on the record’s only new track. The excellent core band is well-known to those who follow Brace and Cooper’s work: Green on pedal steel, Jen Gunderman on keys, Mike Bub on bass and Mark Horn on drums. Lauderdale’s vocals on I Like to Feel Pretty Inside are sterling as always, while Mark and Mike’s hilarious rendition on The Song of the One-Legged Chicken remind me of Shel Silverstein. You’ll keep coming back to the endearing How To Talk to a Little Baby Goat with Jon Byrd on vocals and the The Mysterious Fox of Fox Hollow from Eric Brace and Last Train Home. With I Love: Tom T. Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow, Cooper and Brace have rediscovered the imagination of youth and reintroduced it to a new generation.

Imagine a time when your life was one big adventure, with wonder waiting over every hill and mystery behind every tree. Now imagine yourself getting a copy of I Love: Tom T. Hall’s Songs of Fox Hollow. You can thank me later.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

May 2011

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter – May Music Festivals

2011-05-18T18:42:00.007-05:00

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter – May Music Festivals

Blind Willie McTell Blues Festival

Thomson, Georgia

May 21, 2011

http://www.blindwillie.com/

For my money, it’s hard to beat the Blind Willie McTell Blues Festival in Thomson, Georgia on the 21^st of this month. With unfailingly well-booked lineups, this one-day event sits in a cow pasture just outside the town and is as friendly of a gathering as you could imagine. Although in the past, the festival has usually featured a classic blues act (Magic Slim, Hubert Sumlin, Willie “Big Eyes” Smith, Pinetop Perkins), this year’s lineup boasts a distinct post-Jazzfest, New Orleans feel with Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue, Marcia Ball and one of the most talented electric guitarists going, Sonny Landreth.

Twenty-five bucks ticket price, good food (especially the desserts!), great music, cold beer and an atmosphere that is intimate enough to let you walk right up front any time.

This festival holds a special place in my heart because it’s the last time I saw Sean Costello play and the last festival I had the privilege to attend with my friend, Patrick McGough.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

May 2011

2011-02-28T22:10:00.006-05:00

Grant Peeples

Okra and Ecclesiastes

Gatorbone Records

http://www.grantpeeples.com/

Every day, with the sun, millions of Americans rise up and leave their homes, some to jobs and some to sit and watch and wait for one. And each evening, many of those same millions grab a quart of beer and a lottery ticket or two. The former a purchase for short-term gain, the latter the kind of retirement plan that too many of us rely on, the only chance at an American dream that is doled out at too-steep odds.

That’s what Grant Peeples, equal parts troubadour and troublemaker, knows and writes about. And with Okra and Ecclesiastes, produced by Gurf Morlix and recorded in Austin, he has, right here, a pretty damn good record. Grant’s songwriting ability has solidified and as much as I liked his previous one, Pawnshop, the twelve tracks here tell his stories with more economy and confidence. The title comes from the opening track, My People Come From The Dirt, and from a place where clinging to guns and religion isn’t a derogatory remark. (“White bread and kerosene/Catfish and flatbeds, sweat stains and retreads, okra and Ecclesiastes”)

The strength of this record, however, is when Grant’s scathing social commentary blends with a genuine eye for the human condition, like the two married lovers who have no place to go except out underneath the Powerlines, a song that recalls Guy Clark. (“Signs are everywhere: “Danger Keep Away” Well….this looks like the perfect place”)

Grant Peeples sings about these people, because these people are our people. And our people? They come from the dirt.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

March 2011

PS: If you want this record, Grant trusts you. Write him and he’ll send you a copy, then he will trust you to pay him.

Government Cheese - Hey Hey My My

2011-02-28T21:43:00.015-05:00

Government Cheese

The Rutledge

Nashville, Tennessee

February 26, 2011

www.tommywomack.com

From the window of a downtown Nashville club, I watched a parade of four or five eighteen-wheelers tap their brakes and roll slowly forward, waiting to load out after the Brad Paisley mega-tour made its brief stop at the cavernous Bridgestone Arena. I turned around and waded back into a densely packed crowd that was stomping and swaying to the sound of resurrection.

Just why was the stone rolled away? In fact, it was because Government Cheese, a reborn band of post-punk ne’er-do-wells, were touring again. Sort of…this Nashville gig was not only the second gig of the tour, but it was also the last. It was also very fitting that their two-stop journey launched in their hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky and then splashed down in the current home of one of the group’s members and keeper of the sonic flame, Tommy Womack. It was Tommy’s drive and desire, his love of what he and his band mates did (and maybe a bit of wanting to finally hear some ackn

owledgement of their place in music history) that inspired him to write the incredibly funny and delightfully insightful Cheese Chronicles: The True Story of a Rock N Roll Band You've Never Heard Of and to pursue purchasing the original masters from ex-manager Scott Tutt (other authors have told tales of being screwed by managers or record companies, but Womack’s are a must-read), then re-mastering and re-releasing them as a two-disc compilation titled Government Cheese: 1985-1995.

I never saw the Cheese back in the day, when they were selling out clubs all over the South. I was content with the music that was blossoming in Athens and with the ones that came to play: REM was (in Womack’s words) “still kickin’ then” and when Jason and the Nashville Scorchers showed up to play The 40 Watt, I saw Peter Buck and Michael Stipe jump onstage and roar through Bully Holly’s Rave On. I kind of imagine that was what Government Cheese sounded like back then.

Not that they didn’t sound good now. They came onstage to an embrace from a crowd that was more family reunion than audience. Womack appeared with a hospital bracelet on his wrist: nothing serious, but serious enough to recruit Warner E Hodges, the Scorchers’ lead guitarist, to go from knowing one song in the set to possibly having to play all of them in case Tommy couldn’t take the stage. As it was, he stayed there through a bunch of songs, even though Tommy played and sang with fire and fever the whole night. After an introduction from Athens’ very own William Orton Carlton (better known as Ort and more than a story on his own), they plowed through about thirty songs, including fan favorites Camping On Acid, Mammaw Drives the Bus, Fish Stick Day, and Tim Krekel’s (and Scorcher cover) Help There’s a Fire. Skot Willis still had the pipes and the moves of a lead singer that had his share of lingerie launched in his direction, Chris “Viva Las Vegas” Becker sneered and stalked the stage (often making sure Hodges was on the same page during songs), Billy Mack Hill played bass and sang with fervor and drummer Joe “Elvis” King pounded the skins as hard as one would expect from someone wearing a Led Zep t-shirt.

As dozens of roadies labored to load tons of equipment into trailers a few blocks away, the Cheese just played on. Maybe, just maybe, the choice isn’t between whether to fade out or to rust.

Maybe you can just rave on.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

March 2011

Amos Lee "Mission Bell"

2011-02-03T20:11:00.005-05:00

Amos Lee

Mission Bell

Blue Note Records

http://amoslee.com/

My first brush with Amos Lee was with El Camino, the opening track here on Mission Bell. Although its not the paean to the late 60s-early 70s muscle-car/truck hybrid I was expecting, it’s still a road song, one that’s full of longing and wishing that’s set along El Camino Real, a historic California highway connecting several Spanish missions, and one that sets the stage for the rest of the record. The thirteen tracks that comprise the Philadelphia native’s fourth release are produced by Calexico’s Joey Burns and feature Lucinda Williams and Willie Nelson on vocals, along with members of Calexico and Sam Beam (Iron and Wine).

Although at times the tunes here sound a little too slick, as some of David Gray’s work does, mostly Lee maintains a soulful folkie tone that propels the songs along, from Jesus (written after the death of his grandfather), which carries an ethereal, Jim White vibe to Hello Again, a Stevie Wonder-infused, horn-tinged ballad. One cannot underestimate Lee’s soulful vocals, which are the strength and backbone of this record. That tragically overused word soulful is most often applied to Lee, but in this case it’s wholly appropriate: by raising his voice, he can raise our spirits, as he does on Flower and Windows Are Rolled Down, as well as on the two tracks where he shares lead vocals with his guests. Lucinda sings achingly on Clear Blue Eyes, while Willie lends his omnipresent voice to a reprise of El Camino. Lyrically, Lee may not turn a phrase as well as he bends a note, but the production and performances disguise that. Mission Bell is a very good record, one that shows Amos Lee has the potential to make a great one.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

February 2010

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter 2010 – Top 10 CDs

2010-12-31T21:21:00.010-05:00

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter 2010

“Where does it go? The good Lord only knows….seems like it was just the other day…”

Billie Joe Shaver sure knew what he was singing about, because 2010 got away from us pretty quick, didn’t it? I’m sure I’m stealing this from some forgotten comic’s stand up act, but did you ever notice that kids measure their ages with fractions while adults use decades? (“This is Alicia. She’s eleven.” “No I’m NOT. I’m eleven and a HALF.” “Hey, how old is your friend Ginger?” “Not sure, she’s in her thirties, I think.”)

I think that what I liked most about my favorite music this year is not so much that it was incrementally pulling me forward as much as it was wrapping me in some comforting layers of reassurance, so there’s nothing here that’s cutting edge or experimental, just some things that made me feel good. So in that sense, 2010 was less of a magic carpet than a slightly threadbare security blanket.

With that, here are some albums that kept me warm:

Jim Lauderdale - Patchwork River - With help from Al Perkins on dobro, E-Streeter Garry Tallent and James Burton on guitar, Lauderdale and Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter have the year’s most compelling record. Lauderdale serves up melodies and hooks while Hunter consistently delivers memorable lyrics like “If you’re looking for justice, what you doing in court?” This record spent more time in my head than any other on this list.

Darrell Scott – A Crooked Road – A very ambitious double album from one of the most talented songwriters and musicians working today, and each listen unveils a new level of complexity. In this case, words fail me, so just go get it and thank me later.

7 Walkers – 7 Walkers - An unfailingly delicious homage to the Crescent City courtesy of Papa Mali, Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann and Meters bassist George Porter Jr. The record is scattered with gris gris and absinthe and slathered with shifting textures and grit. 7 Walkers is one of the best things you’ll put in your ear all year.

Will Kimbrough –Wings – Will Kimbrough’s folksy Americana sound is spiced with pop and Memphis R&B and seasoned with his own banjo, mandolin, guitars and keys, but lyrically is very much rooted in his relationship with his family and with himself. With Wings, Kimbrough has crafted a record for grownups that doesn’t make you feel old.

Robert Plant – Band of Joy – Distinctly American in feel and tone, Plant is backed by some of the best musicians Nashville has to offer (Buddy Miller, Patti Griffin, Darrell Scott, Byron House), who tackle both traditional tunes as well as those by songwriters like Townes Van Zandt, David Hidalgo and Louis Perez (Los Lobos), and Richard Thompson.

Honey Island Swamp Band -Good To You – This New Orleans band comes on like some funky, blenderized mix of the Gourds, Little Feat, the subdudes, Mofro and Paul Thorn. Be good to yourself and get a copy of this one.

Packway Handle Band -What Are We Gonna Do Now? - You know what I say? The Athens-based Packway Handle Band can pretty much do whatever they want. This is easily their most accomplished and well-rounded, they seem poised to step things up a notch and stand toe-to-toe with the best folk/bluegrass bands around.

Ray Wylie Hubbard -A. Enlightenment B. Endarkenment (Hint: There Is No C) –Ray Wylie testifies that “Muddy Waters is as deep as William Blake” and churns out a mix of rural blues and poetic chaos as the backdrop for his fatalistic tales of death, dust and destruction.

Drive-By Truckers -The Big To-Do – Throughout these thirteen tracks of lap dances, alcoholism, tragedy, double crosses, solitude, duress, restraining orders, falls from grace and falls from high wires, the Truckers continue to produce the smartest, sharpest high body-count rock n’ roll to be found.

(tie)Peter Cooper -The Lloyd Green Album / Eric Brace & Peter Cooper - Master Sessions – Different sides of the same coin, these two records demonstrate Nashville’s future with Brace and Cooper’s songwriting skills while honoring the past with the striking presence of steel guitar legend Lloyd Green and covers by Tom T Hall, Kris Kristofferson, Don Schlitz and John Hiatt.

Nudged out of a crowded field: Paul Thorn – Pimps and Preachers, Carolina Chocolate Drops - Genuine Negro Jig, Peter Karp and Sue Foley - He Said She Said, Have Gun Will Travel - Postcards From The Friendly City.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine January 2011

2010-11-29T19:16:00.007-05:00

Eric Brace & Peter Cooper

Master Sessions

Peter Cooper

The Lloyd Green Album

Red Beet Records

www.redbeetrecords.com

You only have to go four songs and one verse into Peter Cooper’s The Lloyd Green Album to find the lines that comprise what might be the purest distillation of every perfect country song: “There’s gonna be some wreckage when your dreams and your habits collide” from “Gospel Song.” Cooper, a Nashville singer-songwriter and journalist, follows up his debut, 2008s Mission Door with a record of emotionally deft songs, life lessons and character sketches of sketchy characters, all punctuated with the elegant pedal steel work of the legendary Pedal Steel Hall of Famer, Lloyd Green.

The purest moments come when its just Cooper’s voice rising over his acoustic guitar with Green’s swirling, mewing, swooping leads darting in and out, punctuating the sound (check out “That Poor Guy” or “Mama, Bake a Pie” for examples), but the tunes aren’t all sparse arrangements. Guitarist Richard Bennett and keyboardist Jen Gunderman add much, as do guest vocalists Rodney Crowell (who sings on “Tulsa Queen,” a track he and Emmylou Harris wrote) and Kim Carnes. Most of the tracks are Cooper’s own, although he shares a credit with Todd Snider on “The Last Laugh” (also heard on Todd’s The Excitement Plan) and with Baker Maultsby on the clever “What Dub Does.” Covers are impeccably chosen – Kris Kristofferson, John Hiatt and Tom T. Hall are pretty good sources. In fact, Cooper and Green’s reading of Hall’s “Mama, Bake a Pie” might be the best song of the bunch; the pedal steel work is as haunting and as aching as the poignant lyrics require. Green’s work is integral to this record; taking the songs to places they would never find themselves without his amazing, graceful talent to guide them there. We are lucky to be along for that ride.

But that’s just the opening act of a twin-bill punch. Along with Cooper’s record, Red Beet Records simultaneously released Master Sessions, wherein Eric Brace & Peter Cooper grab Green and dobro ace Mike Auldridge (Seldom Scene) along with a few other friends, hole up in a Nashville studio and concoct a incredibly charming record of graceful Americana. On the opening song, Herb Petersen’s “Wait A Minute,” Eric’s earthy, humid vocals blend with Cooper’s plaintive ones, backed with harmony from Kenny Chesney to roll above the Green and Auldridge’s astounding instrumental work, and is one of the best individual tracks I’ve heard this year. The rest of the record is wonderfully crafted folk/country with songs by Brace and Cooper as well as Don Schlitz (who wrote “The Gambler” among others), Tom T. Hall and John Hartford.

By themselves, either of these records are essential listens to the state of modern Americana music; together, they celebrate the past and illuminate the future.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

November 2010

2010-06-16T11:47:00.002-05:00

Keller & The Keels
Thief
Sci Fidelity Records
http://www.kellerwilliams.net/

Keller Williams has been stretching out lately – on 2008’s Live, with Keith Moseley (String Cheese Incident) on bass, Gibb Droll on guitar and Jeff Sipe (Aquarium Rescue Unit) on drums, the guitarist shed his one man jamband persona for a slot in a more traditional lineup, with some pretty positive results. Now, Keller has hooked up with flatpicker extraordinaire Larry Keel and wife Jenny on bass to release Thief, an album of acoustic covers that harkens back to their previous 2006 collaboration, Grass.

With tracks by Amy Winehouse, the Grateful Dead, the Butthole Surfers and the Raconteurs, the selection can only be described as eclectic. For me, the songs that resonate are the ones most closely aligned with the acoustic framework of the record – the Kris Kristofferson tunes that bookend the CD (Don’t Cuss the Fiddle and The Year 2003 minus 25), Danny Barnes’ Get It While You Can, Yonder Mountain String Band’s Wind’s on Fire and especially Patterson Hood’s Uncle Disney, which benefits tremendously from the interpretation, adding harmonies and tasty acoustic guitar licks to take this tune to another level.

Does it all work? In a word, no. Rehab, Winehouse’s infamous hit, is good for little more than a laugh and perilously approaches the parody territory occupied by bluegrass jokesters Hayseed Dixie. Marcy Playground’s Sex and Candy fares only slightly better, although Cracker’s Teen Angst (“The world needs another folksinger like I need a hole in my head.”) translates nicely. Keller & The Keels generate plenty of sparks over the course of the thirteen tracks here, the outstanding playing of Keller and Larry is underpinned expertly by Jenny Keel, who plucks and slaps the acoustic bass with aplomb.

While Thief does occasionally feel like a self-indulgent attempt to let us know how wide-ranging Keller Williams’ taste is, for the most part, it succeeds as a record that blends multiple genres together with a wink and a nod and is something that doesn’t resemble thievery so much as some good-natured borrowing for a good reason.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
June 2010

AthFest 2010 Compilation

2010-06-16T11:15:00.005-05:00

AthFest 2010
Various Artists
Ghostmeat Records
http://www.athfest.com/

For music fans who like to explore new sounds, Athens, Georgia is the place to be. And if you want to dig into a bunch of new music in one weekend, then AthFest is what you’re looking for. AthFest compilations have always been something special for me… after listening to a number of them; I’ve been excited, enthralled, confused and bemused, but never bored. On this, the 13th AthFest compilation, the trend of offering something new continues: of the sixteen tracks, nine of them are previously unreleased.

This latest volume encompasses everything there is to like about walking through downtown Athens during AthFest, although it seems a bit more mainstream than previous releases. Then again, does mainstream even mean anything when it comes to Athens music? In the past we’ve had rap and blues and gospel and quirky experimental music, but this year the focus is rock and pop, with some country and Americana. Many of these bands have been around awhile, so the new and shiny factor is diminished. The quality, however, is not.

This is a fine group of songs that work and flow together in ways that many compilations can’t manage, from The Whigs garage-band raveup I Don’t Even Care About The One I Love to the new-wave pop of The Orkids or the speedy crunch of Pride Parade’s If You See Her, Say Hello.

The Packway Handle Band’s Outskirts, from their excellent What Are We Gonna Do Now? release, is a great addition, as is Five Eight’s The Ballad of Frankie Jr. and Timi Conley’s New Boyfriend. Also featured are Ken Will Morton, whose Tell It To The Wind quickly became one of my favorites, Venice Is Sinking, William Tonks, and The Incredible Sandwich.

Proceeds from the sale of this compilation benefit AthFest educational programs like AthFest InSchool, AthFest AfterSchool and Keys for Kids.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
June 2010

Big Sam's Funky Nation

2010-06-16T11:03:00.005-05:00

Big Sam’s Funky Nation
King of the Party
Hypersoul Records
http://www.bigsamsfunkynation.com/

The constituents of Big Sam’s Funky Nation know what they want and they know where to get it: direct from Big Sam Williams, former trombonist for the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and the leader of his own band since 2003’s Birth of a Nation. On this, their fourth release, they do what they do best; play a blend of New Orleans brass band, funk and R&B with some rock-n-roll teeth.

The party kicks off with Big Sam asserting himself as get-down royalty over a solid mix of massive drums, wailing guitars and blasting horns on the title track, and doesn’t really let up until the last track fades from the speakers. In between, you’re treated to flashes of James Brown funk, Parliament space-trips and vocal effects, second-line rhythms, and even a tasty cover Otis Redding’s “Hard to Handle.” Just as other New Orleans bands like the Dirty Dozen and Bonerama have worked to expand their musical boundaries outside the city’s confines, Big Sam’s Funky Nation have embraced the party-all-the-time dance machine ethos and work it until the sweat drips.

In short, Big Sam IS the King of the Party, and you’re invited.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
May 2010

A Preview of the Columbus Fall Line Trace

2010-04-30T21:42:00.029-05:00

Warm Springs Rd. Connector to Columbus State University

Friday, I turned a perfectly executed double play: I got off work early, loaded my bike into my truck and got to ride a bit on the still under construction Columbus Fall Line Trail rails-to-trails project.

I parked my truck at Cooper Creek Park and traversed the short distance up to where the trail crosses Warm Springs Rd. Connector, cutting through the vacant lot to avoid the traffic at the light. If plans don’t include a connecting bike path to the park, someone’s not only missing a great opportunity but also creating a safety issue.

For now, orange barrels and a sign hawking the federal stimulus package’s contribution mark the northernmost terminus of the current project. The path itself is asphalt, wide and flat, winding behind Milgen Rd. businesses before paralleling Manchester Expressway, then passing near a convenience store which, if it’s smart, should do well by virtue of its location.

On my trip, upon reaching the crossing at Reese Road, two big-ass holes were dead center of the trail on both sides of the street, a reminder that this thing is still under construction and requires some common sense when riding.

At this point, the path splits from the original tracks to come closer to the rest area that’s under construction. There will be restrooms and some type of retailing, and lots of parking. To me, it’s not that far to Cooper Creek Park, so why not utilize and upgrade an existing resource rather than building this?

The most scenic portion is up next, a canopy of mixed hardwoods and pines that bend over a short, shady stretch before rejoining the clanging, noisy world at University Ave. and Manchester Expressway.

Here, unfortunately, you must become a pedestrian and navigate the intersection’s islands and signals to rejoin the path in front of Burger King before this last section, which ends where Warm Springs Rd. meets Columbus State College. At this point, I doubled back to Cooper Creek Park.

The path itself is well graded, but shows signs of the heavy equipment needed to do the job – gashes and scrapes and wide tire tracks are embedded in the pavement. A few edges already show cracks. How well will this section hold up over time?

I am looking forward to the completion of the project, especially the section that will connect Flat Rock Park to Cooper Creek.

In 1999, we voted a tax on ourselves for this thing, trolley or not. And now, finally we are seeing it unfold thanks to a myriad of financing, lots of hard work and a ton of orange barrels.

Ride on, bikes.

2010-04-08T20:10:00.004-05:00

Boo Ray
Bad News Travels Fast
Independent Release
http://www.booraylive.com/

Boo Ray is a singer. And a songwriter. A singer-songwriter, for those of you who like things hyphenated. The songs he writes are loosely described as Americana. And the problem with being a singer-songwriter who writes in the Americana genre is that you can’t swing a singer-songwriter without hitting a banjo player and knocking him into a fiddle player. Yeah, it’s a combination shot, but it’s easier than it sounds.

Fortunately, Boo Ray is good songwriter. And a sneaky one. You’ll find yourself singing the hooks to songs like “Allez Allez” or “Six Weeks in a Motel” (where “we’ll do things we don’t tell”) and wondering how they insinuated themselves into your brain. The nine tracks here were recorded in Atlanta and in LA with a varied group of musicians including David Blackmon on fiddle and William Tonks on dobro (for the Atlanta half) and Steve Feronne (Tom Petty & The HeartBreakers) and Zander Schloss (Circle Jerks), who also co-produced the LA tracks. The album is bookended by the title track (co-written with Colin Linden), which wouldn’t be out of place on a Joe Ely record, and finishes with a stark cover of Dylan’s “Not Dark Yet.”

Bad News Travels Fast is a debut record that doesn’t sound like one and Boo Ray is a bit of good news that travels just as fast.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

April 2010

The Contribution - Which Way World

2010-04-08T19:47:00.006-05:00

The Contribution
Which Way World

SCI Fidelity Records
http://thecontribution.net/

The Contribution is a jamband supergroup. With New Monsoon’s Jeff Miller (guitar, mandolin, vocals) and Phil Ferlino (keyboards), Railroad Earth’s Tim Carbone (violin, vocals), and The String Cheese Incident’s Keith Moseley (bass) and Jason Hann (The String Cheese Incident) signed up, there’s no other way to describe it.

A jamband supergroup? Let me begin to list the ways that can go wrong. The jamband world is a family thing that stretches into the audience and in between bands, so it’s no surprise when it all starts to meld into one big gooey, swirling glob. And with supergroups, a penciled-in lineup of stars from various bands, well, too often those things can be a combination of what seems like essentially solo tracks sewed together into a cockeyed quilt. Each piece is fine on its own, but there’s nothing to tie them together other than the fragile string between them.

For the most part, The Contribution’s Which Way World manages to avoid both of those pitfalls over ten tracks of solidly constructed tunes that range from funky blues and energetic rock to country/bluegrass and they even throw in some classic pop influences. Miller’s guitar and Carbone’s fiddle dominate the color of the songs, but Ferlino’s keyboards are right there as well. Lyrically, the record is concerned with the world around us, especially the rockin’ blues of “Fear of Nothing” and the title track. No mere jamband recreation, Which Way World takes the best from each of its individual contributors and puts them to work as a team. This is one of those records you’ll listen to again and again and like it better each time.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine

April 2010

Delta Moon - Hell Bound Train

2010-04-08T18:00:00.006-05:00

Delta Moon
Hell Bound Train
Red Parlor Records
http://www.deltamoon.com/
http://www.redparlor.com/

I’ve been following Delta Moon since their first record in 2002 and before that, guitarist Tom Gray’s previous band The Brains, a group that fell under a new-wave umbrella that was opened so wide and so often in the 80s that even Tom Petty was underneath its shadow. Delta Moon, however, is a roots-blues band that has little to do with Tom Petty and even less to do with new-wave. After recording with a couple of female vocalists, the band settled in with Gray as lead vocalist and the current lineup, which has been together since 2007, has evolved into a searing roadhouse blues unit, capable of simmering as well as boiling.

Hell Bound Train, their seventh, is a white-knuckled ride through a Southern gothic landscape where the branches of family trees groan and strain under the weight of loss and tragedy, too often self-inflicted. Gray’s lap steel and Mark Johnson’s electric slide toss off tandem leads over drummer Darren Stanley and bassist Franher Joseph’s red-clay rhythms across the eleven tracks here (although the closer, “Plantation Song,” is Gray solo on dobro) and create their best record yet. And I emphasize “yet.” Because Delta Moon just keeps getting better.

When Hell Bound Train stops near you, jump on board.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
April 2010

Drive-By Truckers - Live from Austin TX

2010-03-16T18:28:00.006-05:00

Drive-By Truckers Live From Austin TX (DVD/CD)
New West Records
www.drivebytruckers.com

If you’re partial to analogies, let’s say the Drive-By Truckers’ 2009 compilation CD The Fine Print (A Collection Of Oddities And Rarities 2003-2008) was a super-8 home movie and the band members are your kids. And over the course of that record, you can watch them grow. That makes this dual DVD/CD live release a snapshot in 4/4 time, a musical Polaroid of a band touring behind an extremely strong record (Brighter Than Creations Dark) with a ton of great new songs. Shaking off the lineup changes that saw guitarist and songwriter Jason Isbell leave, keyboardist Spooner Oldham step in on The Dirt Underneath tour, the addition of Jay Gonzales on keys and a greater role for sideman John Neff, the band shows strength and resolve. The core remains the same, with Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley providing the vocals, guitars and stories, while Brad Morgan on drums and Shonna Tucker on bass have coalesced into a formidable rhythm section.

Appearing on Austin City Limits as a first timer, evidently the band wanted to showcase their songwriting talent as much as their reputation as a raucous rock band that slings sweat with the best of them, and as such we are treated to a fined honed set of music that is as solid as Morgan’s backbeat and as soaring as one of Neff’s pedal steel solos.

The same thirteen songs are on both DVD and CD, although the some of the stories and between-song banter are cut from the audio disc. The most compelling story is an updated tale of Hood’s momma Jan and her trucker husband, Chester, “Eighteen Wheels of Love,” first heard on the band’s 2002 live release, Alabama Ass Whuppin’. Patterson knows how to tell a story and this one is worth the price of the disc all by it’s own self. Luckily, the rest of the record is just as good. The Truckers like their alt-country and rock with a splash of soul and use this base to spin their tales of the down and out, dispossessed and dispirited with both passion and compassion. Mike Cooley’s countrified tunes “Perfect Timing,” “A Ghost To Most” and the acoustic, heartbreaking “Space City” sit well alongside his rockers “Marry Me,” the Stones-ish “3 Dimes Down” and “Zip City,” while Hood’s tales of life in the ragged Southern trenches “Puttin’ People On The Moon,” “Heathens” and “The Righteous Path” are balanced by celebratory “The Living Bubba” and “Let There Be Rock.” Shonna steps up to the mic with her lush “I’m Sorry Huston.”

The audio and video quality on both discs is stellar, befitting the performances. If you’re a fan of the Drive-By Truckers, this is what you’ll want to pull out when someone asks you about the band. If you’re not a fan, you will be after this one.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine March 2010
www.playgroundsmag.com

Will Kimbrough - Wings

2010-03-16T17:56:00.008-05:00

Will Kimbrough

Wings

Daphne Records

www.willkimbrough.com

There are lots of words you can use to describe Will Kimbrough: singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, award winner, and on and on. But if you asked Will, I’d bet that husband and father would beat those out hands down. On Wings, his fifth solo record, his relationship with his family and with himself form the core for many of the ten songs, none more so than the opening track, “Three Angels,” a love song to his wife and two daughters (“Everybody has an angel, I’ve got three.”).

DADDY bandmate Tommy Womack’s 2007 CD There…I Said It! was also a journal about what it means to be a grownup, although their visions differ. (Of course, that disparity between the two is what makes their band so special.) Where Tommy fought and scratched his way to adulthood, Will seems to embrace it warmly. Wings is an album of love and contentment, with an uplifting warmth that permeates each song.

But it wasn’t that long ago that Will was also railing at the world around him. On 2006’s Americanitis, Kimbrough was a rock, a smooth one for sure, but one that skipped across the water with force, kicking up spray as it hurled itself against a raging torrent. Now, on Wings, he is that same rock, only this time, it is sitting in the middle of the stream, enjoying the feel of the rushing water as it flows on by. Same rock. Different speed.

Kimbrough’s folksy Americana sound is spiced with pop and Memphis R&B, seasoned with his own banjo, mandolin, guitars and keys and gets plenty of help from Paul Griffith (DADDY) on drums, Tim Marks (Taylor Swift) on bass and Pat Buchanan on guitar. The title track, co-written with Jimmy Buffett, is one of my favorite songs so far in 2010. (The song also appears on Jimmy’s newest, Buffet Hotel, which features Kimbrough’s songs and guitars.) With Wings, Will Kimbrough has crafted a record for grownups that doesn’t make you feel old.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine March 2010

www.playgroundsmag.com

Timi Conley - Nerd Sexy

2010-02-08T19:54:00.003-05:00

Timi Conley
Nerd Sexy
Row Your Boat Records
www.rowyourboatrecords.com

Timi Conley bends it like Beck in a genre-blending exercise in which the longtime Athens musician comes across like the Prince of Clarke County, writing, recording, mastering and playing nearly every instrument on every track. Throughout the fifteen tracks on Nerd Sexy, Conley picks his way through acoustic blues, electro pop, hip-hop beats and new wave bleeps like he’s strolling down a buffet line.

Nerd Sexy, Timi’s first solo record, is a fun listen, messy and entertaining, strewn all over a musical map that encompasses everything from The Flaming Lips to Jim White.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
February 2010
www.playgroundsmag.com

Packway Handle Band - What Are We Gonna Do Now?

2010-02-08T19:48:00.004-05:00

Packway Handle Band
What Are We Gonna Do Now?
Self Released
www.packwayhandleband.com

You know what I say? The Packway Handle Band can pretty much do whatever they want. The Athens-based band is already lauded for their tightly spun harmonies, material that includes a growing batch of their own extremely well-written songs, quirky cover choices and a string of impressive live performances. And with What Are We Gonna Do Now? they seem poised to step things up a notch and stand toe-to-toe with the best folk/bluegrass bands around. This is their fourth full length studio release (there was also a 2007 live EP) and their consistency and quality has to be reckoned with. This one, self-produced and recorded at fiddler Andrew Heaton’s house, is a departure from their stage show, where the band crowds around twin condenser microphones, stepping up to add a lick or sing a line, because on this record, each member recorded their parts separately. A minor point perhaps, but to my ears, there’s a different sense of space and warmth, a depth that comes from extra brushstrokes courtesy of sax and flute on a couple of tunes.

Heaton’s wry songs, “What Is A Packway Handle?,” which does absolutely nothing to answer that question (which is of course the point), and “I’m Glad You’ve Got My Priorities So Straight” provide the winking, smiling counterpoint to Michael Paynter’s five contributions. Paynter’s “Off My Knees” has surging bluesy riffs that explode into a chorus of layered harmonies, while “Outskirts” sports emotionally expressive lyrics that for some reason remind me of Dylan, circa Blood on the Tracks. Guitarist Josh Erwin chips in with three tracks including the instrumental “Horse vs. Technology.” This release is easily their most accomplished and well-rounded and I’d put it up against anyone else in that vague Americana/folk/bluegrass category that people want to talk about.

What Are We Gonna Do Now? I don’t know; just let me know when you do it.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine
February 2010

Drive-By Truckers - The Fine Print (A Collection of Oddities And Rarities 2003-2008)

2010-01-03T20:10:00.002-05:00

Drive-By Truckers

The Fine Print (A Collection of Oddities And Rarities 2003-2008)

New West Records

www.drivebytruckers.com

Rock ‘n roll bands who embark on a recording career have a certain path they tend to follow: independent releases, major record deals, first releases, maybe a sophomore slump, a live record, rejection by their early fans who think they’ve sold out, lineup shuffles, (and if you’re lucky) a greatest hits CD, solo records, DVDs, and finally, after logging enough hours in the studio, they dump out an odds-n-sods compilation, which may or may not be worth a shit.

Friends, this one is worth at least one shit, maybe two.

Typically, these things are for the hard-core fans who want everything the band has ever done and while I’m not going to tell you its essential listening, I will say that it’s a representative sample of the band during this time, which spans the albums Decoration Day, The Dirty South, and A Blessing and a Curse. This is a period that follows their masterpiece Southern Rock Opera and includes the departure of guitarist, vocalist and writer Jason Isbell, who left the band after playing on the three DBT albums mentioned above. Isbell has two of the strongest tracks here: “TVA” and “When the Well Runs Dry. “ Patterson’s excellent and informative liner notes even say that the latter should have been on 2008’s A Blessing and a Curse and I agree. It would certainly have made for a stronger record, which in retrospect was not a high-water mark for the band. The other ten songs here consist of covers, unreleased and alternative versions.

The covers include Tom Petty’s “Rebels,” recorded for a King of the Hill episode, a truly inspired take on Tom T. Hall’s “Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken),” Warren Zevon’s “Play It All Night Long” (the chorus “Sweet Home Alabama/play that dead band’s song” mocks the Lynyrd Skynyrd /DBT comparisons), and the finale, “Like A Rolling Stone,” where each of the vocalists take turns on the verses (and features bassist Shonna Tucker’s first lead vocals with the band). The alternate take of “Goode’s Field Road” doesn’t convey the dark fatalism of the version that ended up on Brighter Than Creation’s Dark although Mike Cooley’s “Uncle Frank” (originally on Pizza Deliverance) makes for an interesting counterpoint to Isbell’s “TVA.” Hood’s liner notes mention that they had intended to release these as a two-sided single, but those plans never came to fruition.

The unreleased originals include a full band version of Hood’s “George Jones Talkin’ Cell Phone Blues,” “The Great Car Dealer War,” which is yet another tragically poetic southern tale that was left off of The Dirty South, and Mike Cooley’s acoustic “Little Pony and the Great Big Horse.” Of all the songs here, only “Mrs. Claus’ Kimono” leaves me lukewarm, and that’s a pretty good batting average. The Fine Print just proves that the stuff the Drive-By Truckers leave behind in the studio is better than the dreck that passes for rock-n-roll on the radio today.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine January 2010

www.playgroundsmag.com

Mission Door - Peter Cooper

2010-01-03T17:56:00.004-05:00

Mission Door
Peter Cooper
Red Beet Records
http://www.petercoopermusic.com

On “Thin Wild Mercury,” a song co-written with Todd Snider, Peter Cooper tells the story of how folksinger Phil Ochs gave Bob Dylan some honest feedback about his new sound and was summarily ejected from the star’s limo, along with the harshest insult Dylan could muster: “Phil, you’re not a writer, you’re a journalist.”

That he chooses to relate this tale is revealing – since Peter Cooper is both. As the music writer for Nashville’s daily paper, The Tennessean, he covers a scene that is too often over-covered and does it with style and simplicity. As a singer-songwriter, Cooper’s songs are eloquent without being stilted and manage to tug a heartstring just as easily as they can coax a smile.

Mission Door is the East Nashville resident’s first full-length album and he loads it up with friends like Snider, Nanci Griffith, Jason Ringenberg (Jason & The Scorchers), Dave Roe (Johnny Cash), Jan Gunderman (Jayhawks, Last Train Home), Paul Griffith (DADDY), and steel guitar impresario and Hall of Famer Lloyd Green, who also co-produces. Indeed, Green’s swoops and swells on the pedal steel permeate the record like a shot of moonshine – it takes your breath away, and then makes you feel warm all over.

Of the twelve tracks, Cooper wrote or co-wrote ten of them. The other two were written by Eric Taylor, a past award winner at the Kerrville Folk Festival. With a voice that’s softly worn around it’s perimeter, like the rounded edge of a bar, Cooper tells the stories of people who would, on the whole, rather not be in the situations they’re in. Check out the Charlie Rich fan who finds himself in the middle of a barroom shootout (Taylor’s “All The Way To Heaven”) or the poor guy who resorts to postulating that predestination is the reason he’s sitting at the bar getting drunk (“Sheboygan”). Amidst all that, he manages to sneak in two definitive songs about a couple of legends: Hank Aaron and Townes Van Zandt. First, I defy anyone to find a song about sports that is a truer blend of heroism, determination, racial mores and the confusing and often brutal attitutes of race in the South in the 60s and 70s than “715 (for Hank Aaron) or a take on Townes that cuts as close to the legendary bone as the line "after the show, if you could call it a show," from “Take Care.”

If Mission Door was a class, it would be Good Songwriting 101, and if Peter Cooper keeps this up, he’ll quickly be teaching on a graduate level. Bob Dylan and Phil Ochs would be proud.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine November 2009
www.playgroundsmag.com

Grant Peeples - Pawnshop

2010-01-03T17:42:00.003-05:00

Grant Peeples

Pawnshop

www.grantpeeples.com

This Floridian’s second release sounds like a rusty-hinged wooden gate swinging wildly, beating out a rhythm in the chaos of a hurricane, but unlike the fickle storm, Peeples knows where he’s going and what he’s after. Pawnshop is eleven extraordinary tunes (There’s alternate, FCC compliant versions of two tracks.) that are direct and intelligent. In fact, Peeple’s rough-edged drawl of a voice often hides the depth of his lyrics until you give the songs a couple of listens. But whether he’s railing against capital punishment, the economy and our apathetic society, or singing about trailer-park breakups (“Leaving her was easy once she’d done throw’d all my shit out in the yard”) or Real Country, (“it ain’t pretty.”), Grant Peeples is consistently entertaining, provocative and not afraid to shoot straight.

Curtis Lynch

Playgrounds Magazine July 2009

www.playgroundsmag.com

Jimmy Buffett - Buffet Hotel

2010-01-03T16:39:00.005-05:00

Jimmy Buffett
Buffet Hotel
Mailboat Records
www.margaritaville.com

With apologies to Forrest Gump, Jimmy Buffett is like the anti-box of chocolates – you know exactly what you’re going to get. With every CD bought and every live show attended, the paying customer is guaranteed a sun-drenched, salt-rimmed good time. There are other places you can go if you want to be challenged or astounded, but sometimes you just want that familiar, comfortable cheeseburger. This year’s cheeseburger turns out to be pretty tasty. Bufett Hotel, Jimmy’s 42nd release, is inspired by a trip to Mali and the title comes from a hotel in Timbuktu where many Mali musicians got their start. The twelve tracks here are co-produced by longtime bandmates Michael Utley and Mac McAnally and guests include slide guitarist extraordinaire Sonny Landreth, Cedric Burnside and Will Kimbrough, who co-wrote four of the tracks and plays guitar, harmonica, banjo and mandolin.

In fact, full disclosure compels me to divulge that Will Kimbrough and Tommy Womack’s band DADDY is one of my personal favorites and they grab the opening track here. “Nobody from Nowhere” is a song that doesn’t romanticize rural, small town life so much as it simply accepts it for what it is, where “waiting for a car to drive by, just so you can wave hello” is the highlight of your day, and that’s okay.

Drummer Roger Guth contributes “Big Top,” a tune that gently acknowledges that the circus that is the travelling Parrothead roadshow is a bit out of their control (“I’m an accessory in front of the pack.”) and Kimbrough chimes in again on “Surfing in a Hurricane,” which takes the opportunity to slap in a few surf-guitar licks for good measure. Otherwise, the rest of the record is a pretty standard selection of familiar ballads, a couple of uptempo tunes that are obviously slated for live shows, a decent cover of Jesse Winchester’s “Rhumba Man,” Bruce Cockburn’s wistful “Life Short Call Now” and “A Lot to Drink About,” a pretty clever, topical “high-speed drinking song.”
As Buffett says in the extensive liner notes (printed on recycled paper), “when you are lucky enough to get to a point in your life where you can basically do what you want, the trick is to be able to enjoy it.” This is not the Buffett of 1973, who indulged in penny-ante shoplifting (“Peanut Butter Conspiracy” from A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean), it’s been twenty years since this pirate looked at forty, and Buffet Hotel won’t garner him any new fans (not that he needs any), but it’s a pleasant enough listen. Buffett’s gift is making his enjoyment of life infectious, and on Buffet Hotel, he does just that.

Curtis Lynch
Playgrounds Magazine January 2010
www.playgroundsmag.com

TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter 2009’s Top Ten CDs

2010-01-03T14:44:00.003-05:00

Does the year you’ve had influence what you listen to, or is it the other way around? Do you listen to the blues because you have them or because you’re glad you don’t? And what about love songs? Or death metal? This year’s selections are even more heavily weighted toward the Americana genre than my normal listening habits, mainly because the songwriters here are unusually adept at surveying and communicating the human condition, and in my opinion, our condition in 2009 surely needs someone to explain it to the rest of us and put it in context. As Will Kimbrough says, “For balance, how about we take in a little Buddha…and Johnny Cash.” So with that in mind, here are the CDs that spoke to me in 2009, in no particular order.

Daddy –For A Second Time – finely crafted roots music from Will Kimbrough and Tommy Womack, two guys who know their way around a song. Best track: “Nobody From Nowhere,” also the opening track on Jimmy Buffett’s new release.

Grant Peeples -Pawnshop – Grant sounds like a rusty-hinged wooden gate swinging wildly, beating out a rhythm in the chaos of a hurricane, but whether he’s railing against capital punishment or singing about trailer-park breakups (“Leaving her was easy once she’d done throw’d all my shit out in the yard”), Peeples is consistently entertaining, provocative and not afraid to shoot straight. Best track: “Searching for a Sign” (“It’s hard to swallow the truth, but I sure could use a taste right now.”)

Peter Cooper – Mission Door – Cooper’s songs are eloquent without being stilted and manage to tug a heartstring just as easily as they coax a smile. Best Track: “715 (for Hank Aaron)” is the best song about sports ever. Ever.

Patterson Hood – Murdering Oscar (and other love songs) – Hood, the frontman for The Drive-By Truckers, has a second solo release is much more cohesive than his previous one, thanks to Scott Danborn and Will Johnson from Centro-Matic. Best track: “I Understand Now”

Todd Snider – The Excitement Plan –Todd successfully channels Randy Newman, wrings the most out of every line, and joins the ranks of Americana’s finest songwriters, maturity optional. Best track: “America’s Favorite Pastime,” the true story of Dock Ellis, the Pittsburgh Pirate who pitched a no-hitter on LSD.

Scott Miller & The Commonwealth – For Crying Out Loud – Rock n roll with a big heart and a sly grin. Best track: “Cheap Ain’t Cheap” – “the dollar’s weak but it’s stronger than me.”

Ryan Bingham – Roadhouse Sun – Rock n roll with a big heart and an upraised middle finger. Best track: “Dylan’s Hard Rain” - a scathing diatribe that would invite name-dropping if it wasn’t so sharply honed.

The Gourds – Haymaker! - Gleefully defying description, the Gourds play music for “well-read-necks.” This is a record for people who are okay with throwing the GPS out the window and taking a sudden left turn down a dirt road. Best track: “Shreveport” - a semi-tribute to a town filled with meth-addled, spandex-clad heavy metal rednecks.

Eric Brace and Peter Cooper - You Don't Have To Like Them Both - this duo release by Eric Brace (Last Train Home) and Peter Cooper is full of friendship, warmth and good times. And good tunes. Best track: Cooper’s bouncy travelogue “Denali, Not McKinley.” (co-written with Todd Snider)

The Drive-By Truckers – The Fine Print (A Collection of Oddities And Rarities 2003-2008) – Just what it says. The stuff the Drive-By Truckers leave behind in the studio is better than the most of the dreck that passes for rock-n-roll on the radio today. Best track: The cover of Tom T. Hall’s “Mama Bake A Pie (Daddy Kill A Chicken).”

I’m sure I left off several things, but such is the nature of these lists. What are your top ten CDs?

Curtis Lynch

Election Day 2008

2008-11-04T19:14:00.003-05:00

A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user.
Theodore Roosevelt

Okay, I like that quote...it implies that we need to have some reason for casting a vote one way or the other. Where do we point that gun? And why? Do our sights include race? Or gender? Today people of many colors walked into voting booths all over the country and cast their vote based solely on the color of a man's skin. And some people pushed some buttons or blackened a circle based on a candidate's gender.

I've never been a fan of those who think everyone should go vote. It's like singing, cooking or hitting a fastball: some are better at it than others. And why? Because they care. They take the time.

A crooked and corrupt man can not only drag a horse to water, but if the horse is thirsty enough, he can piss in his mouth and tell him it's champagne.

It is our job as citizens to be ever vigilant, to question those who want us to trust them with the power and authority that an elected position gives them, and not to blindly accept their slogans for truth. Mark Twain said that the government's function is "to obey orders, not originate them."

So no matter who you vote for, hold them accountable. Our opinion of our elected officials are at an all-time low, so don't let up.
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I am not a fan of putting political signs in my yard.

My wife put an Obama sign out this week. It was given to her by a friend we camped with at Magnolia Fest the other day, and my wife had promised to put it out. Why don't I like it? Because our current political culture has things broken down into soundbites. Hey, I have an Obama sign in my yard, so I've just allowed people to project their opinions about the presidential race onto me. Never mind that I may have some slightly nuanced beliefs that aren't captured in that blue piece of plastic stuck in the grass.

Oddly enough, I have no problem with the Bulldog banner outside.
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I voted early, at the rec center a few blocks from w&rk. It's across the street from the rocky moonscape that was a crime-ridden housing project and a stone's throw from a shuttered high school. While I was in line, I saw an elderly woman helped to the front of the line and I saw a blind man with his wife gently holding his arm as his cane tapped along the sidewalk. I saw a man with one leg use his crutches to navigate himself out of the building after casting his ballot.

I don't know who they voted for, but I do know this. If the person who leads our country for the next four years has half the character of his supporters, then we have a very useful rifle.

Rattlesnake Confusion - September 2008

2008-09-01T19:10:00.002-05:00

Rattlesnake Confusion
September 2008

There's something happening here

What it is ain't exactly clear

There's a man with a gun over there

Telling me I got to beware
Stephen Stills - “For What It’s Worth”

August 21, 1968 – The dramatic blossoming of democratic, cultural and social reforms in Czechoslovakia are squashed when 200,000 troops from the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Poland and Hungary invade and occupy the country. What became known as the Prague Spring was a testament to what happens when people are given the freedom to think as they wish, associate with like-minded individuals and criticize the government.

And it scared the hell out of those in power.

“The policeman isn’t there to create disorder; the policeman is there to preserve disorder.”
Chicago Mayor Richard Daley

In a land that's known as Freedom

How can such a thing be fair?
Graham Nash - “Chicago”

August 26-29, 1968 – Police clash with protestors at Chicago’s Democratic National Convention. A 17 year old shot dead by the police, nearly 700 arrested and almost 200 officers injured. Earlier that year, the country had suffered the assassinations of the Rev. Martin Luther King and then-presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy. Negative sentiment for the Vietnam War was growing.

And it would have scared the hell out of those in power, but three weeks earlier, Richard Nixon was declared the Republican nominee for President.

Because something is happening here but you don’t know what it is?
Do you, Mister Jones?
Bob Dylan - “Ballad of a Thin Man”

Well, I damn sure didn’t know what was happening. I was 8 and I had spent the summer reading comic books in my father’s upholstery shop. Hell, my first experience with what was “happening” came years later in my sixth grade class when the Savannah Police came in and passed around a small, smoldering mound of dry leaves on a small screen and told us that was the smell of marijuana. That and Three Dog Night’s “Joy to the World” are my main memories of sixth grade.

If I were the king of the world

Tell you what I'd do

I'd throw away the cars and the bars and the war
Hoyt Axton – “Joy To The World”

August 25-28 and September 1-4, 2008 – At both the Democratic and Republican National Conventions, protesters are once again corralled into “free-speech zones,” a grammatical constriction that even Orwell never imagined. They are set aside out of the view of the television cameras, the press and the world.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, is it still a constitutionally guaranteed right?

Ain’t that freedom for you, freedom American Style?
Todd Snider – “TV Guide”

And now, nothing scares those in power.

August 2008 CD reviews

2008-08-06T20:10:00.014-05:00

Here's the reviews you'll find in the August 2008 issue of Playgrounds Magazine:

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TybeeDawg’s Pick of the Litter
August 2008

Swampadelica
S’ac Passé?
Sidewards Records
http://www.swampadelica.com/

Their name is Swampadelica, and on their new release S’ac Passé? the New Jersey-based roots band unexpectedly whips up a cultural stew that includes the jamband influences of Deep Banana Blackout and Donna The Buffalo, but also ventures farther afield, dropping into ports of call like New Orleans, the Caribbean, San Francisco and Africa.

Lead vocalist Nadine LaFond, guitarist Brian Herkert, founding member Damian Calcagne on keyboards, bassist Paul Kuzik, and Bill Rust on drums unfailingly lock into the groove, whether it’s the sinewy rhythm of “Blueberry Street,” the languid sway of “Cloth of Time” or the bouncy title track. Recorded at Phish’s Trey Anastasio’s Vermont studio, the Barn, S’ac Passé? features twelve tracks that weave through soul, rock, funk and Cajun while maintaining an internal cohesiveness that is more difficult to achieve than you’d think, and it’s a compliment to the band’s talent that they do it so seamlessly.

The CD’s title is a Haitian Kreyol phrase that means “What’s going on?” and the response is “N’ap Boule!,” which means “Our fire is burning,” and in the case of Swampadelica, it couldn’t be more true.

This is a new feature, one designed to highlight the music that touched the Dawg in a special way…finding the spot that makes his hind leg start kicking and scratching behind his ear uncontrollably.

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Dan Adams Band
The Hard Way
http://www.danadamsband.com/index.html

In 1999, Dan Adams fronted a band called 1401 and in a review of their second release, Bittersweet Voyage, I described their music as “alternative…acoustic pop/rock.” Who knew that nine years later much the same style would be considered modern country music? That’s not to say that Adams has been recycling the same material. With the release of The Hard Way, Adams has only sharpened his skill, painting his character-driven songs with a finely bristled brush, and the tunes bear a more finely-honed edge because of it.

Most of the ten tracks here were written or co-written by Adams, who also produced the last six tunes. Whether it’s the rear-view philosophy of “One Too Many Times” or the outlaw imagery of “That’s How I’m Going Out” or the even the faded Naugahyde of the rockin’ “Green Couch”, Adams rolls through the songs effortlessly, recalling at times Edwin McCain, Shawn Mullins or Reckless Kelly. The single, “Drinkin Out Loud,” is a standout track and deserves a listen (Radio station programmers, are you paying attention?).

The Hard Way is available on iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, and eMusic.

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Lauderdale
Lauderdale
http://www.myspace.com/lauderdalemusic

Lauderdale hails from the musically fertile Muscle Shoals, Alabama area, a name that brings its own set of memories and influences, a melting pot that holds rock, R&B and country comfortably. And true to their roots, so do Lauderdale.

The band serves up fourteen muscular but tasty tracks on their self-titled debut, large helpings of well-marbled rock and roll mixed with country, blues and pop influences. The young band, vocalist/guitarist Niles Lee, drummer Patrick McDonald, Corey Hannah on bass and lead guitarist Daniel Stoddard, is flush with heart and talent, and could easily mature into an outstanding rock-n-roll outfit. Favorite tracks are “Take Me Home,” “Falling,” and “Wasted Life.” Fans of the Drive-By Truckers, the Drams and Jason Isbell already know who these guys are and with friends like that, what else do you need to know?

Grab some Lauderdale and dig in.

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Jason Beckham
Union Park and Magnolia Street
www.myspace.com/jasonbeckham

Sometimes you can’t define what makes a good rock n roll record, but I think we can all agree on some of the ingredients: It needs heart and soul in large quantities, as well as brains and balls, and Athens, Georgia-based singer/songwriter Jason Beckham has them all in just the right proportion on his first release Union Park and Magnolia Street.

Musically, Beckham works off from a blues/roots-rock base, combining insightful, Southern-tinged songwriting and humid vocals along with fine, expressive guitar work to pull it all together on ten tracks recorded at Pigpen Studios in Athens with Five-Eight’s Patrick Ferguson on drums. Think Shawn Mullins with a chip on his shoulder.

Union Park and Magnolia Street may be a fictitious intersection, but to me, it looks like a pretty good neighborhood. This is one of those records that you want to recommend to friends, and after a listen, I’ll bet you’ll feel the same way.

Rattlesnake Confusion - Alternative Energy Version

2008-06-11T06:12:00.002-05:00

Kind of like Phoenix radio

We used to listen. Where did it go?

It went off the air so

More Sheryl Crow could be on.

“East Nashville Skyline” – Todd Snider

There’s this one particular sort of people in our world and they have jobs that allow them to sit around and think of ways to screw other people. They gravitate to these jobs like scum finds a pond. These people cut across all socio-economic, racial and cultural lines, they could be thieves, or politicians…and in the case of the latter, very often both. But the people whose jobs are to sit around and think of new ways to screw struggling musicians deserve a special place in hell. I’m thinking front-row VIP seating at an eternal Kenny G show, however, I’m open to suggestions.

The musicians in question aren’t heard on the radio, because of restrictive, inbred formatting and least-common-denominator programming, but they are likely highly respected and wildly creative and influential songwriters.

The musicians in question aren’t on the lucrative corporate-branded shed circuit where they pimp out front row VIP tables at VIP prices where the big business tickets pay for the Eagles to re-re-re-unite or tell Jimmy Buffett to sway his fins to the left.

So if you can’t be heard and you can’t be seen, what can a poor boy to do ‘cept to sing for a rock and roll band? Lots of them loaded up the car or the van and rolled from town to town, playing gigs here and there in a bar or coffeehouse, an occasional house party or benefit and they were doing all right.

Until gas went to four dollars a gallon on every corner.

Now they’ve found a whole new way to screw with the musicians and, by extension, with us and our listening pleasures. Now they can’t afford to get to us and we can’t afford to get to them. Is this possibly the most sinister conspiracy since Chad and Jeremy left us hanging? Can this be a way to corral creativity? To saddle up individuality and reign it in? Or is it all horseshit?

Consider this: What if someone manipulated the global financial structure so that we couldn’t afford to go out to the clubs and hear live music, so that we couldn’t afford to do anything but listen to rotting and festering classic rock in the car on the way home and then settle onto the couch with our significant others to stare at the endless commercials that use those same damn songs to sell us insurance, tires, beer and sleep aids?

Viva Viagra, indeed.

Updating the ol' blog

2008-02-05T19:10:00.000-05:00

From October of '06 until late '07, I wrote a series of columns for Playgrounds Magazine gathered under the umbrella "Rattlesnake Confusion." It was intended to be more personal explorations than simply writing CD or performance reviews. I think for the most part, it succeeded, although I had a couple of hiccups along the way.

I just uploaded to this site all the Rattlesnakes that hadn't been posted already.

With any luck, in '08 I'll try to continue confusing those rattlesnakes.

(and I'm thinking about uploading my Y2KT10 columns from waybackwhen...my premise was that at the stroke of midnight 2001, all the world's music would cease to exist. Then I asked for input as to what ten CDs you would save. I had a blast doing it, and hope to post that soon. Yeah, it's derivitive of Desert Island Discs, but what the hell. It was fun.

Rattlesnake Confusion - Dec 2006

2008-02-05T19:07:00.000-05:00

I had another dream about the old home place last night. It was one of those typically disjointed sequences where familiar scenes are intercut with impossibly surreal situations. That’s what happens when the subconscious wrestles with Morpheus for the director’s chair. I’d like to say that Frank Capra, John Ford or Orson Welles wins, but inevitably my dreams are directed by either David Lynch or Tex Avery.

In this dream and in all my other dreams, the road that runs in front of the house is still dirt and the woods across the street have not yet been replaced with projects, losing lottery tickets and discarded fast-food wrappers didn’t swirl on the wind and then collect in the corner of the yard, and the kids on bikes weren’t runners for the crack dealer down the lane.

In these dreams, I am grown, yet the world around me is still that of my childhood. Albert Einstein believed that “the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion” and nowhere is this more evident than in dreams, where we slice open the past, insert the present and stir it with a spoon our subconscious picked randomly from the day’s events.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” George Santayana said it and everyone quotes it, but hardly anyone practices it. Those who willingly wallow in the past by constantly reliving it are just as wrong as those who think that in order to live for the future they need to deny their past. Where we come from is part of what we are, but it is not all we are.

So the next time I dream of the old home place, and I feel the rich black dirt between my toes and I grab a handful of muscadines growing in the woods and I smell the salt marsh two blocks away, I’ll enjoy it. I’ll revel in it. I’ll savor it. I’ll remember it.

But I won’t remain in it.

The past: a great place to visit but I wouldn’t want to live there.

For Yesterday is but a Dream, And Tomorrow is only a Vision; But Today well lived makes Every Yesterday a Dream of Happiness, And every Tomorrow a Vision of Hope.Look well therefore to this Day!Such is the Salutation of the Dawn!
--Kalidasa

Rattlesnake Confusion - November 2006

2008-02-05T19:05:00.001-05:00

I was 14 and we were in Macon to visit my mother’s sisters, Aunt Frank and Aunt Cooter. Their real names were Francis and Aileen, but no one called them that, it was always Frank and Cooter and my momma Wynokie. In those days, the trip from Savannah took awhile. I-16 hadn’t been completed all the way between the two cities, so you had to exit and take the two-lane till you could get back on the fancy new interstate. I don’t remember listening to any specific music on that long drive, but I’d be willing to bet it was country.

At home, there were few records. There was a Luke the Drifter record, with “Be Careful of Stones that You Throw,” a compilation that included Buck Owens singing “The Race is On” and an Elvis gospel album next to a Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack that the neighbors gave me, because they were too religious for it. So what little musical background I had did little to prepare me for a joy ride with one of my older cousins. I don’t remember where we went, what kind of car we were in, or any other detail except the music coming out of this 8-track player.

Friends, I’m talking about Heavy Metal: Superstars of the 70’s: Volume 2, a Warner Brothers product that not only introduced me to Jimi Hendrix, Black Sabbath, Alice Cooper, Led Zeppelin, Yes and the Doors, but also the Allman Brothers Band, Delaney and Bonnie, Dr. John, Van Morrison and the Grateful Dead. If there was a Rosetta stone, a ground zero, an A. afarensis, a gateway drug, this was it.

Spinning off from one record, I found the heavy metal sludge of Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man,” the slamming proto-punk garage rock of MC5’s “Kick Out the Jams,” the fabled power chords of “Smoke on the Water,” the funk of T. Rex’s “Bang a Gong,” “Give it to Me” (J. Geils Band), the swampy night-tripping music of Dr. John and Led Zeppelin’s “D’yer Mak’er.” Not only were there the big stars of the day, but I was also introduced to bands like Blues Image, War and Delaney & Bonnie. In a time before MTV and even widespread FM radio in Georgia, this was like shining a flashlight in a possum’s eyes; the reflection was luminous. This treasure map led me down so many paths, but each one was worth it. I was now condemned to a life of collecting records, reading liner notes to see who wrote a song, attending concerts, filling my brain with musical minutiae, haunting record stores and methodically searching through their bins for that one record I didn’t know I needed till I found it.

So, here’s what I want to know: any chance I can sue Warner Brothers for not putting a warning label on Heavy Metal: Superstars of the 70’s: Volume 2? I mean, it’s been 32 years and I still can’t give it up.

Rattlesnake Confusion - Oct 2006 Riverfest – MIA (Missing In April)

2008-02-05T19:02:00.000-05:00

She was dressed in her finest when she courted admirers numbering six figures. She was the hottest thing going and everyone wanted her phone number. Sure she’s 37, and people got used to her, but how can a festival that one year makes hundreds of thousands of dollars as a fundraiser for the Historic Columbus Foundation find herself without a date in 2007?

Dusty Nix, in a September 27 editorial in the Ledger-Enquirer, asked the question “Is Riverfest worth saving?” I agree with Mr. Nix that it is – and that changes need to be made. As Will Rogers said “If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.”

In the festival biz, you’re playing a game of chance. You roll the dice on weather, location, music, food and the local political climate. Riverfest has been dealt some crappy hands, and still persevered. Till now.

I’m not sure what the HCF board is going to do, but I do know that outdoor street festivals are integral to a city’s health, and if they decide not to continue, then someone else should step up and keep this celebration going. And I don’t know about fundraising, the political wranglings, or any back-room, behind the scenes stuff. But I’ve been to one or two festivals, and I know what I like and don’t like, and what works and what doesn’t.

Food: Not another corndog stand, please. And step away from the cotton candy machines. We have an annual fair if you have to have fair food. Stick to the BBQ competition, encourage local restaurants to vend, and have a variety of portion sizes and prices. Offer regional beer choices instead of plastic cups of warm Budweiser. I wouldn’t mind sipping a cold Red Jacket Ale from the Cannon Brewpub while watching the Chattahoochee roll by on a spring afternoon.

Music: Rather than present the same tired acts that use festivals as a convenient overnight stop and painless paycheck between casino gigs, offer local and regional bands with a following and some press behind them. If you have the cash, bring in a bigger name one night, but not a ringer band whose one remaining original member secured the rights to the name in nasty court skirmish. Build a reputation of bringing in artists that go on to have number one records (all together now: Dixie Chicks). A lot of people are going to come anyway, regardless of the lineup, so why not give them some quality, and they can say “we saw them when.”

The same buzz works for bands, the more respected your lineup, the easier it will be to attract better bands. Athens is full of talented bands that would love the chance to play on a large outdoor stage. Work with someone who has the contacts to bring in these bands and partner with the clubs and coffee shops downtown to book musicians as part of the celebration.

Children: Festivals should be for all ages, so make it exciting and unique for the kids. Forget the inflatable slides and castles. Interactive activities like painting, pottery, making music, and storytelling can be fun and educational. Focus on things they can’t get at the Greater Columbus Fair.

Location, Location, Location: True enough. Between the fine Phenix City Amphitheatre, both Riverwalks and downtown Columbus streets, there’s plenty of room to stretch out. Work with the city governments on both sides of the river to ensure consistency.

Explore alternatives. Are there private-public partnerships that haven’t been taken advantage of? What can Columbus State bring to the table? What makes Riverfest unique, what can differentiate it from other festivals in the state?

It’s a fallacy that you can be all things to all people. That’s an impossible compromise, where you agree to have, as Lyle Lovett says, “an acceptable level of ecstasy.” This is somewhat unavoidable in a street festival because you can’t narrowly focus on one group, but what you can do is present everyone with quality choices on every level.

I hope Riverfest resurfaces and reinvents itself as an event that will not only excite locals but draw in people from the surrounding region. She may be unavailable next year, but I hope she and I can hook up in ’08.

With luck, Rattlesnake Confusion will be a monthly column about various aspects of music, the people who make it and those of us lucky enough to listen. If you have any suggestions, I’d love to hear ‘em. - C

Last Call - Rattlesnake Confusion - September 2007

2008-02-05T19:00:00.000-05:00

Last Call

The band had played its last waltz and the dancers were finishing up their drinks, laughing and hugging their partners. She admired the way a Cajun band summoned up the music that held people in its sway, as if they were marionettes and the rhythm tugged the strings and spun them around. She was watching the last two dancers silently working out a two-step move when her view was suddenly obscured by a broad expanse of human sporting closely-cropped red hair and a LSU football jersey.

“Hey honey, I’m Taurus…like the bull…you know, in the Zodiac?” He looked at her blankly, wanting to make sure that she knew what the Zodiac was, and also that she wasn’t confusing him with a mid-size Ford.

Taurus took her silence as acquiescence and leaned over the bar to instruct a 22-year old chemistry major to bring him a bourbon and coke. “And when I say bourbon, I mean good bourbon; don’t be tryin’ no tricks back there, darlin’!” He settled his bulk against the bar and turned to her again. “You gotta watch ‘em, they’ll charge you for the top shelf and then pull the ol’ switcheroo on ya!”

She resolutely studied the beads of condensation sliding down her martini glass, quickly glancing sideways at the man next to her: mid-thirties, only slightly out of shape, he played some high school football but didn’t have the grades to stay in college, she’d seen his type before. Tonight, however, his playing field was Rooster’s Cajun Cabin and she knew he was thinking of her as the goal line.

His phone chirped. He studied the display for a moment, answered and barked “hold on” as he drained his glass. He gestured to the chemistry major and walked off toward the bathrooms as the bartender came up, winked at her and poured Taurus a well brand.

It wasn’t long before Taurus walked back up to her, leaning in even closer. In the glow of the video poker machine, he stared into his drink and swirled the glass, what he told himself was a thoughtful, refined gesture. He had palmed the pills while in the bathroom and now only had to distract her and slip them into her drink. He was actually getting good at this. He looked into her eyes and…

“Hey, where’d the big guy go?” the bartender asked, as she scooped up the bills under his half-empty glass.

“He asked me out.”

“And?”
“And I turned him down,” she paused as she ran a manicured fingernail around the edge of a flattened Red Bull can, “you know how guys like that are, their ego gets crushed SO easily.”

Rattlesnake Confusion - July 2007

2008-02-05T18:48:00.000-05:00

If I ever die of a heart attack, I hope it will be from playing my stereo too loud. ~Anonymous

Now there’s a quotation I whole-heartedly agree with! And in the interest of working toward that goal, I got myself a birthday present: The Logitech Wireless Music System for PC (http://www.logitech.com/), acquired through Amazon for forty-five bucks, is considerably less costly than any of the competing systems.

So what’s this thing do? Well, it wirelessly streams music from your PC or laptop to your home stereo system. This is important to me for two reasons: One, I download tons of music (all legal, thank you very much) and in order to listen to it in my living room, I have to burn a CD and cart it to the other side of the house just to blast it from decent speakers at the afore-mentioned heart attack inducing volume. And two, there are great radio stations out there that I listen to online, but I wanted the freedom to hear them throughout the house and in the backyard.

The gadget showed up on my doorstep one Friday afternoon and installation was so quick and simple even a Georgia boy could do it. There's a small transmitter that goes into a USB port and a receiver that plugs into the stereo. I used the tape input jacks. It fired right up and started working even without the included software. Using Winamp, I first cranked up some live Drive-By Truckers, and then I logged onto WWOZ from their website (http://www.wwoz.org/). It really sounded great, although there was some distortion at louder volumes. And when I say loud, I mean palpitation levels, although that could be due to several things, not necessarily my new toy.

Next, I installed the software, which is meant to offer an added degree of control. Specifically, this equipment hijacks your computer speakers and runs everything through to the stereo, including the Windows sounds, and the software lets you decide what goes to the speakers and what stays at the PC. However, after installing the software, it quit working! So after playing around with the controls a little, I uninstalled it and it worked fine. At some point, I may reinstall the software, but for now it does what I want it to do. I’ve had no problems with the sound dropping out and it doesn’t seem to interfere with the speed of my PC or my internet connection. There’s a kinda cheap looking remote control, and I’ve only had spotty success getting it to work. I’ve used Winamp and Windows Media Player to play several types of music files, including wav, flac, shn and MP3. Some people have complained about interference from cordless phones and microwaves as well as wireless internet, but I’ve had no issues at all.

Next step: getting my wireless outdoor speakers to work with it. They didn’t immediately talk to each other, so I played around with it and found that by moving the speakers’ transmitter from the tape out jacks to the VCR out jacks I was able to get them to play flawlessly and I'm here to tell you right now, brethren and cistern, I'm typing this on my laptop while listening to WWOZ in my very own backyard!

Anonymous, you got the right idea, my friend.

2/5/08 - update: the microwave and my wireless internet connection on my laptop both have effects on the signal.

Rattlesnake Confusion - June 2007

2008-02-05T18:47:00.000-05:00

“Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends…”
”Karn Evil 9” ~ Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Feels a bit pretentious to be using that as this month’s title, but as I’ve never been much for self-reflection and soul searching, I’m wondering why I’m starting now. Originally, it was going to be one of those “the more things change, the more they stay the same” rants about the death of Jerry Falwell, presidential candidates’ debates, and the Iraq War. I never made it there. The truth is that this didn’t start out to be about my birthday, but I’m writing part of it on that day, so I guess you’ll forgive me if I self-indulge. On this birthday that I share with Bob Dylan, I always listen to his music. I doubt he’s returning the favor by reading my stuff, but hey, he’s a busy guy.

Modern Times isn’t my favorite Dylan record by any means, but it was the only Dylan CD in my 200-CD changer. Nashville Skyline was sitting on my turntable, but I’ve already spun that one a few times because a friend recently sent me a pristine half-speed mastered vinyl copy (Thanks, Donelle!) so I sat in the backyard in the growing darkness and listened to Dylan’s newest record. The Dylan on Modern Times is a far, far cry from the young, angry poet-folkie who spat out his lyrics like he believed in the power of a fascist-killing machine, but you gotta admire someone who avoids burning out while figuring out new ways to sneak around the fading away part.

In his younger days, Dylan wrote that “he not busy being born is busy dying.” It’s not that you need to completely reinvent yourself, but why deny yourself the rush of pleasure that comes with a new experience? Aristotle said “wonder implies the desire to learn,” so use a sense of wonder to help keep a fresh viewpoint and an open mind while staying true to your roots. I have a few constants: family, Hank Williams, Levi’s and my library card, but a lot of the rest is negotiable. We should always strive to learn something new, from old farts like Aristotle or Dylan, or even me…and my lesson for you is:

Just because rust never sleeps doesn’t mean I can’t take a power nap, dammit!

Rattlesnake-recommended June events:
June 1 – Sean Costello & Precious Bryant – Uptown Concert Series, Columbus GA
June 2 – Paul Thorn, the Loft, Columbus GA
June 8 & 9 – Alex City Jazzfest, Alexander City AL
June 22-24 – Athfest, Athens GA

Rattlesnake Confusion January 2007

2008-02-05T18:41:00.000-05:00

Originally printed in Playgrounds Magazine - January 2007

Rattlesnake Confusion – 2007

By Curtis Lynch

Jeff Beck and Jimi Hendrix may be used to feedback, but I ain’t. To all y’all who said nice things about these first couple of Rattlesnakes, thank you. I wanted to try something a bit more personal and a bit more opinionated and I hope to keep that up in 2007.

This one, unfortunately, is going to be a quick regurgitation of what I liked this past year:

Best CDs 2006:

They’re sorta in order, but after the first three or four, it gets fuzzy for me.

Will Kimbrough – Americanitis – Easily my favorite record of the year. Kimbrough mixes humor and biting social commentary with a sensitivity for humanity that is too often lacking in today’s world.

Darrell Scott – The Invisible Man – This Nashville songwriter has recorded an amazing album of roots-rock that you really just need to hear to believe.

Drive-By Truckers - A Blessing And A Curse - America’s best live rock band trades sprawling Southern narrative for conciseness and maintains their integrity in the process.

T-Bone Burnette – The True False Identity – Burnette’s first record since 1992. Knife sharp lyrics over immaculate production.

The Mammals - Departure – Completely irresistible and infectious, the Mammals mix traditional instrumentation with forward-thinking songwriting to forge a sound somewhere between bluegrass and high-energy contemporary folk music.

The Drams – Jubilee Drive – A band comprised of 75% of Slobberbone has more balls and heart than 75% of all the other bands combined. The slight pop sheen does nothing to diminish the power of Brent Best’s music.

The Duhks – Migrations – Like the Mammals, the Duhks acoustically combine a world of influences and somehow garnered a Grammy nomination for “Best Country Performance by a Group or Duo” for a track from this one.

Todd Snider – The Devil You Know – Todd’s songwriting continues to get better. Three or four of these songs are among his best, but the whole album is a great listen.

Whigs – Give ‘Em All a Big Fat Lip – This Athens band’s combination of rock and pop with a slice of punk won’t insult your intelligence and will keep you intrigued.

Papa Grows Funk – Live At The Leaf – Sweaty funk recorded over three nights at the Maple Leaf in New Orleans. Pass it!

Best Festivals 2006:

Mucklewain, Harriman TN – A festival that focused on Southern roots-rock didn’t try to overachieve their first year, but they did anyway. It’ll be hard to top a one-day lineup that was as strong top-to-bottom as any festival (Steve Earle, Todd Snider, Jason Ringenberg, Tommy Womack and Will Kimbrough, Lucero, Caddle and Southern Bitch), but I’m going to be there next year to see if they can do it.

The New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, New Orleans LA – Bruce Springsteen and the Seeger Sessions Band brought a much-needed catharsis through music to the crowds. The crowds brought a much-needed influx of money and tourism back to the town that Katrina and FEMA couldn’t kill.

Blind Willie McTell Blues Festival, Thomson GA – Seems like we enjoyed the smaller festivals the best this year. This one had everything except overflowing crowds, overpriced beer, plastic food and anemic music.

Best Club Shows 2006:

Drive-By Truckers, 40 Watt Club, Athens GA – Two nights in Athens in January with this band is a tradition that’s probably taking a break in ’07. The sold-out, sweaty, appreciative hometown crowds won’t know what to do with themselves.

Caddle, SoHo, Columbus GA - These guys have country-rock swagger confidently nailed. Best band that makes regular stops in town.

I’m looking forward to 2007. Just like America, I’ll be another year older and deeper in debt.

What would I like to see around here next year? A radio station, either community or college based, that programs a wide variety of artists and local interests, a music festival that combines local and regional talent and makes people excited about coming back, a grass roots support for live music that goes beyond cover bands and open mic nights (there’s absolutely nothing wrong with either, by the way) and Sweetwater 420 on tap.

Oh, and that whole peace on earth thing.

Life is what Happens When you’re Busy Listening to Live Music - 2007

2007-12-30T15:58:00.000-05:00

January – New Year’s Eve with the Drive-By Truckers @ the Variety Playhouse – Okay, mostly 2006, but still a great rock show with lots of friends and Jason Isbell was still with the band.

February – Bela Fleck and Chick Corea sat down onstage at the Rivercenter and kept the audience spellbound for a couple of hours and could have done it all night. Glad to see the Rivercenter booking acts like this. Keep it up.

March – Tommy Womack @ Eddie’s Attic and Patterson Hood @ Andrew’s Upstairs in Buckhead…if you’re a fan of literate and visceral songwriting, it was one of the finest twofers you could hope for in one night. The end of the month was four days on the Suwannee for Springfest with Jorma Kaukonen, Darrell Scott, Ollabelle, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Dan Hicks, and Will Kimbrough. Springfest is the best festival on the planet.

April – If February’s Fleck/Corea show was the Rivercenter’s finest moment of the year, the Nickel Creek show was surely close. They are an inventive and talented band, and I can’t say enough about Chris Thile’s ability. First time at Waverly, Alabama’s Old 280 Boogie, but not the last. DBT @ The Georgia Theatre for the first show of their acoustic The Dirt Underneath Tour, which took the band in a new direction with the departure of Isbell.

May – We braved the smoke from the wildfires to take in Tampa’s Tropical Heatwave where we caught Paul Thorn, James McMurtry and Unknown Hinson. The frenetic Hackensaw Boys and ever-improving Packway Handle Band @ The Loft were a treat.

June – A trip to Athens for Athfest w/ the Drive-By Truckers, Dexateens, Sleepy Horses, Jack Logan, The Whigs, and Perpetual Groove. Athfest has a dizzying array of local music in a single weekend. The free Alex City Jazzfest featured Jon Cleary, the Lee Boys and Edwin McCain, and you can’t go wrong with Paul Thorn @ The Loft.

July – Newly relocated from Australia to Atlanta, Geoff Achison brought his blues guitar to The Loft and the Chattahoochee Folk Music Society hosted Rock Killough for a very special show.

August – Okay, I give up. It’s certainly possible I didn’t see any live music in August, but I won’t make that mistake in 2008.

September – We trekked all the way to Texas for the Austin City Limits festival to find Trucker Patterson Hood (anyone keeping track of DBT shows for me?) with members of Centro-Matic sitting in. Bela Fleck, Steve Earle, My Morning Jacket, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals and Mofro were among my favorites. Rhonda Vincent played the Phenix City Amphitheatre on a gorgeous fall night.

October - Autumn found us back on the Suwannee River for four days of Magnolia Fest featuring Donna the Buffalo, the Emmitt Nershi Band, Peter Rowan, the Duhks, Uncle Earl, and a reunited Snake Oil Medicine Show. I’ll say it again: there’s not a better music festival than Springfest. Well, except for Magfest.

November – While visiting family in Savannah, I realized that the bar I was watching the Georgia/Georgia Tech game at was hosting ex-Drive-By Trucker Jason Isbell’s band the 400 Unit that very same night. Between the game and the show, I spent about fourteen hours in that bar.

December – The Mosier Brothers brought some blueground undergrass to The Loft, and Delta Moon closed out 2007’s year in live music with the one-two punch of guitarists Tom Gray and Mark Johnson.

I already can’t wait for 2008, so join me by getting our lazy asses up off the couch, putting down the remote and getting out to hear some live music.

Pick of the Litter – 2007

2007-12-19T17:42:00.000-05:00

I’m sure there are some records that should be on this list that I never got a chance to check out (Lucinda Williams’ West, Bettye LaVette’s Scene of the Crime, Levon Helm’s Dirt Farmer and Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky come to mind), but these are the discs that spent the most time in my CD player during 2007:

1. Tommy Womack - There! I Said it! – Womack lets it bleed all over this record, detailing his existential crisis (or nervous breakdown, depending on your terminology) and scrapes the thin covering of his life wide-ass open. “Alpha Male and the Canine Mystery Blood” is this year’s best song.

2. Delta Moon - Clear Blue Flame – Possibly their finest record yet. It’s focused and packed full of dual slide guitar goodness.

3. Jason Isbell - Sirens of the Ditch – Ex-DBT guitarist breaks out with his own roots-rock record. “Dress Blues” is THE definitive song about the human consequences of war, but the rest is sheer Muscles Shoals soulful southern rock.

4. Glossary - The Better Angels of our Nature – Who gives away one of the best rock records of the year? Glossary does. Download it here: http://glossary.us/

5. Todd Snider - Peace, Love and Anarchy -- How many rarities and B-sides compilations make year-end best of lists? This one does because Todd Snider is a singer-songwriter who is hopefully just hitting his stride.

6. Infamous Stringdusters - Fork in the Road – Shimmering bluegrass that’s at once meticulously constructed and loose enough for some white-hot picking in between the lines.

7. Dexateens - Hardwire Healing – Smart pop and rock from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Cracker meets T.Rex and the Faces for bourbon drinks.

8. Tom Waits – Orphans – Sprawling is an overused adjective when it comes to multi-disc sets, but it applies here. Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards are the individual titles of the three discs, the 54 songs are amazing and the sequencing is immaculate. You know what I said earlier about compilations?

9. Mavis Staples – We’ll Never Turn Back – A powerful, moving statement of humanity and freedom courtesy of one of the great soul/R&B voices and producer Ry Cooder.

Rattlesnake Confustion - August 2007

2007-07-22T18:13:00.000-05:00

Rattlesnake Confusion

A white-haired, skinny black man precariously balances a cane pole and a five-gallon bucket on his bike as he wobbles toward the river. He knows the fish aren’t safe to eat, but he figures starving ain’t healthy either.

An upwardly mobile, fast-moving lawyer in freshly shined shoes and a three-hundred dollar suit gives a homeless Vietnam vet with two Purple Hearts and a Silver Star seventy-eight cents and a disgusted glare. He can now buy nutritionally bankrupt pre-packaged food, a lottery ticket, or a beer. He weighs his odds and opts for the latter.

A thirty-eight year old waitress surrenders her body in exchange for drugs and thinks that’s a fair trade.

The man behind the counter is the best mechanical engineer in three states. He can listen to a million-dollar machine and tell you exactly what is wrong with it. Since the mill closed he works third shift behind bulletproof glass, making change for street people buying cigarettes.

A middle-aged middle manager finds comfort in a bottle and a bottled blonde.

The woman closes her eyes tight and pretends to smile as she dances under multi-colored lights to a heavy metal song that’s older than she is. She loathes her job and the people, but the money’s good and the daycare bill for her two daughters is past due. Happy twenty-first birthday, girl, keep your eyes closed and make a wish.

A young priest wakes up in the middle of the night, slick with sweat, and prays.

Comics Curmudgeon

2007-05-23T11:20:00.000-05:00

The Comics Curmedgeon is a pretty neat blog that comments on daily comic strips, doing so in a snarky, smart-assed way...which of course, is right up my alley.

I never cared much for Mark Trail until reading this blog (which I found via wonkette, another fine blog), which pointed out the startling, head-shaking, truly bizarre happenings therein. The current "plotline" involves crooked county commissioners, an airport, and some ne'er-do-well named "Buzzard" and will most likely end with Mark breaking out the fisticuffs to solve the problem.

Oh, you can read most of the comics online at the Houston Chronicle's website. You can also set up a customizable page with just your favorite comics, too.

Drive-By Truckers The Dirt Underneath Tour 4/28/07

2007-05-01T09:19:00.000-05:00

This past Saturday night, I was witness to the rebirth and the rededication of a band of scruffy, rock and roll musicians. It was the second show of a two-night, sold-out stand for the Drive-By Truckers at the Georgia Theatre in their adopted hometown of Athens, Georgia. Outside, spandex-clad bicyclists were careening around the corner of N. Lumpkin and Clayton at crazy speeds, vying for position in the Twilight Criterion. Inside, fans in denim and black t-shirts were trying to find seats, something a bit unusual for followers of a band that thrives on the visceral chaos of rock and roll.

Patterson Hood, just one of three songwriter/guitarists in the band but the most articulate advocate of the redemptive power of rock and roll since Springsteen, had already kicked around the idea of doing a few stripped down shows that got back to the intimacy of playing for people who cared about the songs. The fact that these shows, christened The Dirt Underneath Tour (after a line in “Bulldozers and Dirt” on Pizza Deliverance) were talked about before guitarist Jason Isbell inevitably left the band to pursue a solo career didn’t deter the rest of the boys (and girl, bassist Shonna Tucker) from moving forward with the idea. So not only were they already looking to try something different with a more acoustic based approach, they were also faced with a lineup change. Without Jason, the band went in two directions: backwards and forwards. They played old songs; they played brand-spanking new songs. But mostly, they enjoyed being on stage in front of a friendly, if sometimes boisterous, crowd. Longtime sideman and pedal steel wizard John Neff assumed a greater role, and they reached back into their Muscle Shoals lineage to draft keyboard legend Spooner Oldham into the band for this excursion.

The Friday and Saturday night shows were different, as are all of their sets: they work from no setlist, just nodding at each other and following along, but in this case, there was at least a framework. Both nights started with “Bulldozers and Dirt” and ended with the elegiac “Angels and Fuselage” from Southern Rock Opera. I’m sure that the latter song was chosen with a purpose, because in the context of SRO, it signals an end, but I believe that the line “I’m scared shitless of what’s coming next” is a lie.

The Drive-By Truckers ain’t afraid of nothing.

Lucky You...

2007-04-17T20:23:00.000-05:00

...is NOT an adaptation of the Hiaasen book dammit.

instead, its a f*cking poker movie, like we don't see enough poker on TV now?

ok its got Drew Barrymore in it, so I'll probably see it, but still...

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338216/

they list a lot of actors as poker players...hmmm that's clever casting....but I'm thinking

Michelle Hummel
...
Woman carrying shoes

will steal the flick...unless

JD Piché
...
Chain-smoking casino patron

has a star-making turn.

you never know.

Rattlesnake Confusion - April 2007

2007-04-16T15:16:00.000-05:00

Radio Radio

They say you better listen to the voice of reason

But they don't give you any choice 'cause they think that it's treason.

So you had better do as you are told. You better listen to the radio.
And the radio is in the hands of such a lot of fools

tryin' to anaesthetise the way that you feel
– Elvis Costello

Elvis angrily spit out those words way back in 1978, but they are even more relevant in 2007. The control of the airwaves is in the hands of fewer and fewer people every day. Decisions are made about what you will listen to by people who think that music is simply something to occupy you between commercials. These are the people who think that even the lowest common denominator is too diverse. The “product” needs to come in easily digestible, American Idol-style segments. (See? It’s not even art, it’s a “product,” a commodity.) At first, these corporate executives thought that the worst thing that could happen was that you change the channel. But then they got smart: They said if we own all the channels, it doesn’t matter which one you listen to, and they won’t turn us off because we won’t give them an alternative! I can just hear the gleeful cackles and greedy hand-rubbing now.

So how do they keep listeners hooked on their unique brand of blandness? By squashing anything that is new or different, or outside of what they consider to be palatable by the masses. Water is one of the most wondrous things on the planet, a substance responsible for the miracle of life, and everyone likes water. Everyone doesn’t like espresso, or chocolate milk, or tequila. What’s the difference? Each of those last three liquids are distinctive and appeal to something inside us. We appreciate a quality about it and it doesn’t matter that someone else may not.

However, this is a flawed analogy: the difference between water and modern radio is that water gives life, and the radio sucks it out of us.

Luckily, there are ways to discover music outside of the present monopoly. The internet has allowed bands to market their music outside of Clear Channel’s stranglehold of radio markets, booking companies, and ownership of auditoriums around the country. But at every turn, someone tries to thwart that access. Low power radio stations, internet radio, bit torrent trading, at every turn the FCC has been a tool of the corporations, attacking small community radio stations for perceived profanity violations or devising creativity-crushing regulations. Most recently, internet radio has been assaulted by the Copyright Royalty Board, which has the power to set royalty rates. This three-judge board, appointed by the Library of Congress, is wielding an increase in rates the result of which will force many small internet radio stations out of business.

By the way, Clear Channel is not the only culprit, just the largest and most visible.

If I were getting paid for this shit, I’d have done some research, listening to the radio three or four hours a day, but I know what’s there, or better yet, I know what’s not there. And what’s not there in our community is community radio.

Some of the best radio stations on the planet are community radio stations. These locally autonomous, non-profit, non-commercial stations are supported by listeners and with donations from businesses. WRFG in Atlanta, WWOZ in New Orleans and Tampa’s WMNF are all examples of how exciting, innovative music can be heard. Community radio can also promote local artists and get them some otherwise impossible airplay.

I don’t know what it would take to start a community radio station in Columbus, but given our success at public-private partnerships, the expansion of CSU’s music department downtown, and the proximity of Auburn University, it is certainly an idea within our means.

For your Rattlesnake homework, compare and contrast the stations below with what you’re listening to now. I’ll expect a plan for a Columbus community radio station on my desk in the morning.

http://www.wrfg.org/
http://www.wwoz.org/
http://www.wmnf.org/

Dream on, y'all

2007-02-24T12:30:00.000-05:00

Rattlesnake Confusion

There are dreams that sail away to sea
And some that stay at home
There are dreams in need of company
And some that stand alone.

-- Stephen Geyer

UPDATE: After last month’s Rattlesnake (“The Ballad of Hurricane Jimmy”) was completed, a mutual friend put me in touch with Jimmy. Seems he cut his hair, is looking for work as a Certified Court Reporter, and never picks up the guitar.

And that got me thinking about our dreams. Dreams imagined, dreams realized, dreams forsaken and abandoned.

And that got me thinking about a photograph.

It was the first thing I looked at each morning when I got to work and the last thing I saw when I left. It was tacked to a crappy shelf above my crappy desk, in my crappy office stuck in the back of a crappy loan business in downtown Savannah, where I held a crappy job. It was a photo of Five Falls, a spot on the Chattooga River in north Georgia, where I had been backpacking and camping a few times my senior year. After graduating, the best job prospect using my major was a CNN internship I couldn’t afford to take, so I moved back into momma’s house and hoped something worthwhile would turn up. It didn’t.

I ended up with a job thumbing through a box of well-worn 3X5 cards and calling people who were behind in paying a loan that they couldn’t get anywhere else and really couldn’t afford in the first place. When I wasn’t hassling poor folks, I stared at that picture. And I dreamed. My dream was a dream of freedom, of being someplace other than where I was.

One Saturday afternoon, after visiting a woman at her housekeeping job at a downtown hotel to collect her monthly payment, I went back to that crappy office, took my dream down from the shelf, and walked out.

Otis Redding had dreams to remember, Gregg Allman had dreams I’ll never see and The Drive-By Truckers’ Mike Cooley somewhat cynically remarked that “dreams are given to you when you’re young enough to dream them, before they can do you any harm.”

The dreams we have when we’re young can’t all come true; otherwise, the world would be full of football players, rap stars, princesses, cowboys, pirates and astronauts. I mean, does anyone really dream of growing up to be a middle manager or a plumber?

But dreams are realized in other ways. We can embody the daring of pirates, the valor of astronauts and the wild, brave freedom of cowboys in our everyday lives. If you are a loving parent, a caregiver or a volunteer, you are living your dream. If you give blood, if you give a thousand dollars to charity or if you give a dollar to the homeless guy sitting outside the convenience store, you are living your dream.

Dream on.

An Open Letter to Music Lovers - Jazzfest

2007-02-10T14:37:00.000-05:00

I’m currently reading The Great Deluge, a frustratingly accurate portrayal of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and its devastating effects on the Gulf Coast. Historian Douglas Brinkley painstakingly shows us the pain and suffering of Katrina’s victims, and how the government, at all levels, failed to protect those who needed it most.

In that light, and since Mardi Gras is upon us, and after that, Jazzfest, I thought I would bring back an open letter to music lovers I wrote that was printed in the April 2006 issue of Playgrounds Magazine.

One last thought: Does anyone else find it unsurprising that President Bush didn’t even acknowledge the issue of Katrina in his State of the Union address? Out of sight, out of mind is his motto apparently.

This is just as relevant now as it was a year ago. Unfortunately.

New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival

April 28-30 & May 5-7, 2006

www.nojazzfest.com

An open letter to fellow music lovers:

Katrina was a bitch. She was a hurricane that finally, inevitably, brought her horrific force to bear down on the Gulf Coast, destroying lives by the thousands, and yet, even after her apocalyptic aftermath was fully realized, the first thing I heard was… “Well, I guess you won’t be going to Jazzfest this year, huh?”

Never mind that my enjoyment was the least of my worries, but I will admit that I’ve been considering taking a break from the New Orleans festival after going every year since 1990 or thereabouts. The early spring brings out music festivals as thick as the pollen on our cars, and many conflict with Jazzfest. I had been eyeing Merlefest (www.merlefest.org) in North Carolina, for example, but post-Katrina, I knew I had to go back this year. For the city, for the residents, for the merchants, for myself.

After landfall, I watched the levees break, and I kept watching as the news channels broadcast hours and hours and scene after scene of destruction and rescue and despair, and finally, as I watched the dissolution of an entire city, I watched myself sink into a kind of walking daze of depression where I shielded myself from the truth that this could happen in a city in the United States of America. Where were the people I knew? Were they okay? After many phone calls, emails and message board postings, one by one they got back in contact with each other. Some were in the Northeast; one couple was in a hotel somewhere in North Mississippi. One photographer stayed behind, but he was finally, thankfully, located. My friends escaped without harm to anything but their property, but I can’t say the same for the friends of my friends. I do know the first time I saw a “504” area code on my cell phone, I about ripped the cover off trying to answer it!

Things are not back to normal by any definition of the word, no matter how liberally that word is used in New Orleans. It will never be the same.

But one thing about New Orleans is that it will carry on, the spirit will prevail. Mardi Gras was by all counts a success. People came, people partied, and people spent money. And the locals needed that.

And now they need Jazzfest.

This year, the festival has been scaled back by one day, some of the stages have been rearranged, and corporate sponsors have jumped in to an unprecedented degree. The promoters aimed with a shotgun, scattering several large draws over the two weekends, including Dave Matthews (who brought in the largest ever single-day Jazzfest crowd), Jimmy Buffett, Bob Dylan, rapper Juvenile, Bruce Springsteen (in his first Jazzfest appearance), Keith Urban, Lionel Richie and Paul Simon. And although most of the treasured Louisiana artists are playing, the quintessential New Orleans band The Neville Brothers will not be closing out the final Sunday night.

Will things be different? Without a doubt.

But for those of us who have adopted New Orleans as a spiritual and musical home, how can you not go back and partake of the amazing sounds, the wondrous array of food, and reconnect with the people who feel the same way?

Come to Jazzfest. Spend money. Talk to people. Donate your time, money or energy to help out.

New Orleans needs us. And we need New Orleans.

Sincerely,

Curtis Lynch

Music Lover

Wait Till the Drugs Kick In

2007-02-03T08:03:00.000-05:00

A little sumthin' I came up with the other night while walking at Britt David Park...not that that has anything to do with anything ;)

Wait Till the Drugs Kick In

The band is trippin, you know they ain’t rehearsed

The singer stumbled all through the second verse

Just when you’re thinking it can’t get any worse

That’s when the drugs kick in.

Chorus:

Wait till the drugs kick in

They wrap around you just like an old friend

(They whisper)

Wait till the drugs kick in.

You got two kids and they’re driving you mad

You’re thinking back on the old life that you had

But then again, this really ain’t that bad

That’s ‘cause the drugs kicked in.

You and your buddies are sprawled out on the floor

Cartoons are over, you can’t find any more

That’s when the police are knocking on your door

Damn, why’d those drugs kick in?

You’re standing at the bar, on your nineteenth beer

She’s smiling at you, your vision ain’t too clear

And now you’re thinking, as she gets real near

I hope those drugs kick in.

The Ballad of Hurricane Jimmy

2007-01-28T17:48:00.000-05:00

Familiar music floats through the open windows, beckoning the bustling tourists to step inside. The bar is comfortably dark and shabby, with a concrete floor and a few weary tables and rickety, mismatched chairs. The bar has taps that promise Michelob Light but dispense…well, who really knows? It’s cold, it’s cheap and the out-of-towners and the rowdy Rangers don’t care. The crowd, such that it is, is peppered with a few locals, some friends of the bartender and a couple of gift shop employees trying to sneak a drink on their break. A large black Lab stretches out beneath one table.

Backed into a corner of the former cotton warehouse sits a man with long black curly hair stuffed under a doo-rag, playing guitar and yelling out the windows to passers-by. His drum machine keeps the beat while a baseball game silently plays on the TV behind him. He’s halfway through “Cheeseburger in Paradise” when the crowd’s attention shifts. The guitar player looks over his shoulder as Braves outfielder Otis Nixon climbs the wall and makes a spectacular catch. The singer turns back around, flashes a crooked smile and finishes the song, never missing a lick.

Such is the life of a musician in a bar on River St. Such is the life of Hurricane Jimmy.

Scrambling for gigs, Jimmy plays several sets a week downtown for the tourists, picks up a few shows on Tybee Island in the summer and an occasional trip down to St. Simon’s Island when he’s lucky. He knows that the rent’s due, and he knows what fills the tip jar, so “Come Monday” and “Brown Eyed Girl” are trotted out every set. To feed his pirate persona, “Why Don’t We Get Drunk (And Screw)” and “The Asshole Song” show up so salesmen from Missouri can take a story back to the home office.

Over several years, a half-dozen original songs emerge, mostly derivative of a certain island-hopping, margarita swilling singer, but the songs are often clever (“I’ll be the captain, you’ll be the crew/we’ll get a Boston Whaler with an Evinrude”), sometimes self-serving (the pass the hat tune “Gimme Some Money”) and even includes a blatant attempt to get radio airplay by shilling a local station in the chorus. By and large though, the sets are filled with good-time covers so the tourists can drunkenly sing along, because that’s what keeps the crowds buying beers, and that’s the name of that game.

That’s the life of a working musician. That’s the life of Hurricane Jimmy.

Jimmy is his own boss, and entertaining a crowd, having a good time and partying till dawn is his job description. Playing a gig at Teeple’s in Thunderbolt, running his PA off his van’s battery because the restaurant’s power was out, that’s all part of a day’s work. You don’t play, you don’t get the pay is his mission statement.

Here in the 21st century, the lovable, scruffy musician who plays for tequila shots, tips and the sheer fun of it is an endangered species. His habitat has been replaced with karaoke nights and digital satellite jukeboxes, and there is little hope for his survival.

But once, just once, I wish you could walk into a bar, grab a cold beer and have Hurricane Jimmy tune up his guitar and play you side two of “A-1-A” straight through.

That’s the life.