Jump to content

REK

Biff Tannen

By Biff Tannen
in Music

 Share

Recommended Posts

Post Oak

Post Oak 20213

Posted
Posted
On 3/18/2022 at 10:33 AM, Trey3216 said:

The June 24th show in Waco is part of the Brazos Nights concert series in Downtown.  It is free to the public and is set right on the banks of the Brazos in Indian Springs Park.  It's a really neat setup and a solid place to watch an outdoor show.  It will be an absolute fucking zoo for REK.   

I'll be there.  Brazos Nights is a good set up if it's not too terribly hot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
deadshank

deadshank 24653

Posted
Posted

The guy was always a pleasure to see. Poor David’s Pub, Sons of  Hermann Hall, McGonigel’s Mucky Duck and a few other small joints were superb venues to see him.  Made my first show to see him in 1989. 
 

One day while making some sales calls in downtown Houston during My “other life” I saw a sign on an office door in the old Bank One Building.  
 

The sign simply displayed “Robert E. Keen, Sr.”  
 

I had to know so I popped my head in and asked the old fella in the two room  office suite if REK, Jr was his son.  
 

“That’s my boy” was the reply.  Told pops Keen I was a big fan. He replied “I am, too.” 

Old man Keen had no interest in what I was selling so I moved on. 

  • Hook 'Em 2
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
F250

F250 28776

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 1/15/2022 at 8:04 AM, ohchaucer said:

No2 Love Dinner doesn’t have a stinker on the whole album and I wore that thing out back in the day. Think I may fire up a little Gringo Honeymoon and Sonora’s Death Row this morning. His voice is both so bad and so undeniably infectious at the same time.

I was at this concert and made my way onto the album by yelling into a microphone. I told that story on ToS.

Other memorable event at this concert. When he mentions College Station a big aggy section cheers and the crowd hurls beer bottles at them and things start to get rowdy. REK says something like "I don't want no fights now."

We smoked a lot of weed at this concert.

Picked up some chicks after the concert and took them to Whataburger where it was revealed they were in high school.

 

Edited by F250
  • Hook 'Em 2
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
F250

F250 28776

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, Biff Tannen said:

By all means, tell it again.

When he is talking about forty cars burning down at the Willie Nelson 4th of July picnic, I jumped towards a mic near the stage and yelled "free love." Actually tried yelling in that thing a lot but the free love was the only yell to make it onto the album. My buddy actually yelled "Robert Earl!!" Into the mic while staring at REK and holding a joint up in the air. You can hear him do that before I do my yell.

 

 

  • Hook 'Em 1
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 45686

Posted
  • Author
Posted
1 hour ago, F250 said:

When he is talking about forty cars burning down at the Willie Nelson 4th of July picnic, I jumped towards a mic near the stage and yelled "free love." Actually tried yelling in that thing a lot but the free love was the only yell to make it onto the album. My buddy actually yelled "Robert Earl!!" Into the mic while staring at REK and holding a joint up in the air. You can hear him do that before I do my yell.

 

 

Awesome.  My buddy always loved that "free love!" yell in the intro.  It's hilarious that I've had an imaginary version of your face in my head for 20+ years because of that.  

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
F250

F250 28776

Posted
Posted

One other thing that always created a cognitive dissonance with me. I went to an REK concert at Luckenbach and my girlfriend drove. Apparently as I was getting out of her Jeep my wallet fell out of my pocket. We had to park far and we immediately started jogging to the concert to meet some friends.

When we walk into the concert this dude taps me on the shoulder and says "you dropped your wallet when you were getting out of that Jeep." He hands me my wallet and said he was trying to chase me down the whole way to the concert.

I thank this guy wearing an aggy shirt and his response was something like "This is just the aggy way." I was impressed all my cash was still in my wallet and while I was thinking what a nice thing he had done, I immediately thought "Fuck You agg for making me think nice things about aggy. Fucking asshole."

 

  • Like 1
  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
tejas60

tejas60 3533

Posted
Posted

csb/ was coming out of Home Depot early Sunday morning a few weeks ago. I was the only one in the store and as I head to my truck, I see REK walking into the place. said "hi Robert" and kept walking, but he stopped me and shot the shit for about 10 minutes. 

gonna make that Kerrville show and try for one of the Floore's. 

  • Hook 'Em 6
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 1 month later...
  • 3 months later...
  • 3 weeks later...
stc

stc 1462

Posted
Posted

I was unable to get away from loud drunks talking the entire show, otherwise a damn good time. Glad I was able to hear him play these songs one last time. Not sure when Rich Brotherton stopped touring with him but it was strange not seeing him up there...was nice having a fiddle back in the mix though.
d933ece4af0f55c507a7a736d3a90886.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites
smoky

smoky 840

Posted
Posted
I was unable to get away from loud drunks talking the entire show, otherwise a damn good time. Glad I was able to hear him play these songs one last time. Not sure when Rich Brotherton stopped touring with him but it was strange not seeing him up there...was nice having a fiddle back in the mix though.
d933ece4af0f55c507a7a736d3a90886.jpg
About what time did he go on last night?
Link to comment
Share on other sites
stc

stc 1462

Posted
Posted
28 minutes ago, smoky said:
43 minutes ago, stc said:
I was unable to get away from loud drunks talking the entire show, otherwise a damn good time. Glad I was able to hear him play these songs one last time. Not sure when Rich Brotherton stopped touring with him but it was strange not seeing him up there...was nice having a fiddle back in the mix though.
d933ece4af0f55c507a7a736d3a90886.jpg

About what time did he go on last night?

9:15 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
4th&Five

4th&Five 41552

Posted
Posted
46 minutes ago, Paul Wesley said:

My friend went mostly to see Todd Snider, and she was kind of pissed off how much the crowd totally disregarded him.  

Yeah, it was really bad. Todd isn’t great as an opener, imo because he can’t tell stories and talk as much as he usually does but the talking during his set made it pointless. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites
jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 45957

Posted
Posted

For those who were asking about Rich Brotherton, here's his Facebook post on REK's retirement:

Quote
Robert and I played music together for 25 years (to the day), and tonight I understand he played his last road-dog show in Helotes at Floore Country Store.
 
Robert, I wish you absolutely the very best, and thank you for years of wonderful music, camaraderie, and a life that included everything a working musician could ever dream of. Good luck with your life going forward, brother. We are amazingly lucky to have had lives that allowed us to live our dreams, and I’m immensely grateful that yours included me. Love to your whole family, and blessings for what’s to come.
 
This show, in retrospect, was a wonderful moment in my life. Thank you for including me.

 

  • Hook 'Em 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Masshole Horn

Masshole Horn 773

Posted
Posted

Got to see the Thursday show at Floore’s. Was awesome. Also recorded the live streams for the three shows and the fan appreciation show. So those will be fun to relive.

My gf is still up in MA, she saw REK when she visited for the rodeo, and we watched and texted during the Sunday night show. She then sent me a bunch of articles she found and read about him.

Does anyone know why Bryan Duckworth left the band? And when? It was weird seeing the band without Rich and Duck. Brian Beken was good; I always enjoyed South Austin Jug Band.

  • Hook 'Em 3
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
C-Man

C-Man 27227

Posted
Posted
On 8/22/2022 at 2:31 PM, jimmyjazz said:

I haven't been keeping up -- is there any underlying medical issue behind his retirement?

 

On 8/22/2022 at 2:50 PM, Post Oak said:

Man I hope not.

I didn't see it mentioned above but we went to the Saturday show it Floore's. He read a 7-minute statement before the show highlighting the reasons for hanging it up at this time. He developed excruciating back problems in the last couple of years and in the course of treating those, he developed Bell's palsy. Then he went through a laundry list of other maladies that have hit the band in the last couple of years, a lot of it recently, and they'd decided somebody was trying to tell them something basically.

I would expect REK will play some one-off gigs, charity events and the like down the road but perhaps his career as a touring musician is over. It was a hell of a night that we saw him. Thank God we were in VIP reserved as the venue was WAY oversold. A buddy was in GA with his wife and daughter and he said it was a total shit-show of drunks talking throughout, etc. It was wet and rainy so they started 30 mins late. He played until midnight, maybe 12:15.

James McMurtry opened and he was terrific. Eric Church came out and played an acoustic solo show and he was, well, he was Eric Church. Not enjoyable. He did say somewhere near the beginning of his set that REK had pulled him aside at the beginning of his career and told him, "Young buck, you need to do this and this and this if you want to be taken seriously as a country musician." My buddy and I looked at each other and said in unison, "And then didn't do any of that!" Or something like that.

 

On 9/9/2022 at 10:38 PM, Masshole Horn said:

Got to see the Thursday show at Floore’s. Was awesome. Also recorded the live streams for the three shows and the fan appreciation show. So those will be fun to relive.

My gf is still up in MA, she saw REK when she visited for the rodeo, and we watched and texted during the Sunday night show. She then sent me a bunch of articles she found and read about him.

Does anyone know why Bryan Duckworth left the band? And when? It was weird seeing the band without Rich and Duck. Brian Beken was good; I always enjoyed South Austin Jug Band.

Would love to listen to those if you can make them available.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 2 weeks later...
The Royal We

The Royal We 3072

Posted
Posted
On 9/12/2022 at 12:26 PM, C-Man said:

Thank God we were in VIP reserved as the venue was WAY oversold. A buddy was in GA with his wife and daughter and he said it was a total shit-show of drunks talking throughout, etc. It was wet and rainy so they started 30 mins late. He played until midnight, maybe 12:15.

Just saw this thread and was at the Saturday night show at Flores as well, but in GA.  I still managed to have a good time, but it was definitely oversold and there seemed to be a lot of people there who were there just to say they were there and not really to hear the show.  Pissed me off to not be able to even hear any of REK's rambling stories he was trying to tell.

I went with two of my best buddies from high school that I hardly ever get to see anymore.  The 3 of us went to see him in The Woodlands a few times and a few times in Austin together as well, so it was a treat to take in this last show with them.  I got a great t-shirt with nothing but a huge image of REK's chevy chase on it.

On 3/19/2022 at 10:00 PM, F250 said:

When he is talking about forty cars burning down at the Willie Nelson 4th of July picnic, I jumped towards a mic near the stage and yelled "free love." Actually tried yelling in that thing a lot but the free love was the only yell to make it onto the album. My buddy actually yelled "Robert Earl!!" Into the mic while staring at REK and holding a joint up in the air. You can hear him do that before I do my yell.

 

 

And HOLY SHIT if this is really you!  I don't know how many times during a drunken party back in the late 90's/early 00's me and the above mentioned friends would try to time yelling this along with you.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
F250

F250 28776

Posted
Posted
On 9/11/2022 at 11:21 AM, stc said:

Duckworth must have left the band 20 yrs ago now. I think gravitational forces might be the first album he wasn't on and that came out in 2001.

I think he started his exit in the late 90's. He wasn't on Picnic which was 1997 but recorded a couple of songs for Walking Distance in '98. I ran into him at a friend's BBQ in Seguin around that time and he was already working full time at his shop in New Braunfels by then.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • 1 month later...

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
 Share
Go to topic listing


Football ... Basketball ... Baseball ... Other Sports ... Futbol ... 🤫995🤫 ... Gambling ... Movies & TV ... Music ... Hobbies ... Lulz ... Food & Travel ... Daily Texan ... Business and Markets ... Cloak Room ... Help ... For Sale ... Board Discussion ... Subscribe!... Donate!... Advertise... COOKIE MONSTER!

×
×
  • Create New...