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Texas country/folk/singer song writer thread

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Looking for discussion re shows, albums new and old and all relevant information.... inspiration tonight - listening to Together at the Bluebird Cafe with Townes, Guy and Steve Earle - might be the best album of all time.

 

Didn’t see a thread and I’d be hard pressed to find a genre of music more important and enjoyable in my life than this, so let’s get it going ...

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Ollie Slatt

Ollie Slatt 289

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^^

We may have a winner.  Lubbock on Everything is hard to top. 

 

First two Guy Clark records are insanely good.  Anything Willie put out in the first half of the 70s should be on the list as well.   Flatlanders' "More a Legend Than A Band" should be mandatory listening as well.  

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Listening to levelland by James McMurtry today. Bad ass song. Slid my hand up my girl’s thigh for the first time listening to REK’s version the first time I heard it. So it has special meaning to me.

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Lazarus Bocanegra

Lazarus Bocanegra 304

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Self-promoting threadjack, but I co-hosted the Americana Cafe on 90.1 KPFT this afternoon and my playlist included some of the aforementioned Texas Country/folk singer songwriters.  Any some North Carolingians.  And a brit.  give a listen

Please come back to Texas, Mike Nicolai

Also, the Avett Brothers are honorary Texans now.  I was there and seent it happen

 

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Mr.Hovis

Mr.Hovis 70

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20 hours ago, Llano Estacado said:

Crowell, Rodney

 

 

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ETA - I’ve been listening to more Vince Gill lately and this w/ Notorious Cherry Bombs just came up while I was scrolling. Audio sucks, but I could listen to Gill perform a phone book.

 

 

I have been a Rodney Crowell fan since the early 80's, seen him live multiple times including a couple with the Cherry Bombs as his band. My favorite might be the singer songwriter show at the old Austin Opera House with him, Roseanne Cash and Guy Clark. Just took turns playing their songs, no backing band needed. Also saw Roseanne in Denver when Vince Gill was still her lead guitar player, when she introduced the band she made mention that he just signed his own record deal and was moving on up. There are a lot of solid musicians that run in those circles and I love listening to a ton of them. Sorry, this got awful wordy but it's a favorite topic of mine. And Rodney Crowell song list is damned impressive.

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Nightfly

Nightfly 61

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Love all the classic folks. In terms of the current generation, I've been following Robert Ellis (lives in Austin, tours globally) the past few years and have really enjoyed where he has been going. 

Most recently saw him doing a duet at Cactus Cafe. Just one condenser mic for two guitars + two vocals and was blown away by the intimacy that a low volume show provided. Fantastic with the full band (Houston guys) as well. 

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2 hours ago, Nightfly said:

Love all the classic folks. In terms of the current generation, I've been following Robert Ellis (lives in Austin, tours globally) the past few years and have really enjoyed where he has been going. 

Most recently saw him doing a duet at Cactus Cafe. Just one condenser mic for two guitars + two vocals and was blown away by the intimacy that a low volume show provided. Fantastic with the full band (Houston guys) as well. 

man the cactus cafe is an absolutely amazing venue.  I need to get over there more but I'll admit I don't recognize the names much these days.  I'm gonna check out Robert Ellis though.

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jimmyjazz

jimmyjazz 45888

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I have no idea who Jane Ellen Bryant is, and I certainly don't know if she can write for shit (which ultimately doesn't matter all THAT much), but if covering somebody's song with this backing band isn't a few legs up then I don't know what is:

David Grissom

Cindy Cashdollar

Yoggie Musgrove

Brannen Temple

Joel Guzman

Sarah Sharp

Malford Milligan

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jimmyjazz

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My brother-in-law went to high school with Walt, and last year dragged me to a "house" concert at a church near the UT campus.  I was quite stunned  . . . Walt was nothing like I expected, and while that sounds bad, I mean it in exactly the opposite manner.  He was fantastic.

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Seasick Sailor

Seasick Sailor 3747

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42 minutes ago, Elvis Presto said:

i like to listen to this while i drink miller lite in my backyard

A truly amazing song. I used to work at the Mucky Duck in Houston. I wasn't a huge Charlie fan when Life of the Party was released (I still prefer Bruce). But after seeing him play this live, I found a new appreciation for him. 

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MaybeACoordinator

MaybeACoordinator 8349

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I was a rugrat underfoot of Townes, Steve, and Guy...My dad was good friends with all of them, and my mom was a drug buddy of theirs. She named my little half-brother after Steve and Uncle Seymour, the old black man from Clarksville in the video weeping with Townes. I knew them as people with all their flaws but their music still stands up even if my childhood was kinda horrific because of those hellions. 

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I was a rugrat underfoot of Townes, Steve, and Guy...My dad was good friends with all of them, and my mom was a drug buddy of theirs. She named my little half-brother after Steve and Uncle Seymour, the old black man from Clarksville in the video weeping with Townes. I knew them as people with all their flaws but their music still stands up even if my childhood was kinda horrific because of those hellions. 


Awesome story. I actually love Guy Clark’s music — the optimistic and romantic stuff the most — because they were hellions and far from perfect. It’s how I relate to their stories because well, I imagine I’m quite the hellion romantic myself. Seeing life in all its imperfections and with my own faults on display as something worthy and noble and beautiful is the key to a happy life imo. Something in their music connects me to that idea.
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MaybeACoordinator

MaybeACoordinator 8349

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10 minutes ago, troph said:

 


Awesome story. I actually love Guy Clark’s music — the optimistic and romantic stuff the most — because they were hellions and far from perfect. It’s how I relate to their stories because well, I imagine I’m quite the hellion romantic myself. Seeing life in all its imperfections and with my own faults on display as something worthy and noble and beautiful is the key to a happy life imo. Something in their music connects me to that idea.

 

I was kind of terrified of Guy as a kid, even while I had a little pre-K boner for Susanna. She was so sexy and sweet and smart -- she pretty much defined what I wanted out of a woman once I got old enough to do something about it. Guy though -- man he was a badass. Like Clint Eastwood: gruff and tough. He could walk through the doors of our house in suburban Nashville and he would make it seem like he was pushing open swinging saloon doors and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly would come on. He wrote about desperados and gunfighters, and he was a combination of both in real life. 

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I was kind of terrified of Guy as a kid, even while I had a little pre-K boner for Susanna. She was so sexy and sweet and smart -- she pretty much defined what I wanted out of a woman once I got old enough to do something about it. Guy though -- man he was a badass. Like Clint Eastwood: gruff and tough. He could walk through the doors of our house in suburban Nashville and he would make it seem like he was pushing open swinging saloon doors and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly would come on. He wrote about desperados and gunfighters, and he was a combination of both in real life. 

 

More stories please

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DalTxHornFan

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4 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

I have no idea who Jane Ellen Bryant is, and I certainly don't know if she can write for shit (which ultimately doesn't matter all THAT much), but if covering somebody's song with this backing band isn't a few legs up then I don't know what is:

David Grissom

Cindy Cashdollar

Yoggie Musgrove

Brannen Temple

Joel Guzman

Sarah Sharp

Malford Milligan

That is a great line-up!  Her Road to Austin single is the only cover I've ever seen her do.

 

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MaybeACoordinator

MaybeACoordinator 8349

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Another story: I was about 7 or 8, and Townes was living in that tin-roofed shack in that holler south of Nashville. I am not sure if it had lights (other than lanterns), and I think there was a sink, but I know it was heated by a stove and you had to shit in an outhouse. People just pissed wherever. At the time, he was with his teenaged bride Cynthia, who was closer in age to me than he was her, and I was even more in love with her than I had been with Susanna, and she kind of saw me as a little brother / ally. She had fallen in love with Colorado Townes: sober, mystical, horse-riding traveler...But she ended up with Tennessee Townes who was surly, cynical and very rarely sober. Like most posters here.

Anyway, he had a few neighbors. One of them was a half-Japanese, half American Indian maniac named Bobby Iwa. That dude made Townes look like Billy Graham when it came to chemicals. He lived in the shack nearest to Townes, and oddly enough it was more technologically advanced. I think it had a toilet. Anyway, I viewed him about the same way Huck Finn did Injun Joe. I was convinced he was gonna throw a Bowie knife at me and kill me some day.

And there were always lots of visitors out there. Guy. Richard Dobson, criminally unknown and recently departed. And Steve Earle, who around that time was like a big brother to me. 

My dad has said that after he left my heroin-addicted mom, and couldn't get custody of me, he engineered it so that Steve would move in to his former home as a day to day positive influence on me. Yes. Steve fucking Earle was viewed as a stabilizing influence on me...And to be fair, his addictions at that time were far less advanced that my mom's, and he was a good influence. He is about 15 years older than me and I can remember him treating me like a pesky little brother. We'd even wrestle and shit, and I remember him pinning me and giving me what he called "Texas titty twisters." He was only mildly sadistic. And he had that cackling laugh. Nobody has a laugh exactly like Steve's...He lived in our treehouse for a while and then moved in to the regular house when the weather got cold. And my mom hooked up with one of his San Antonio runnin' buddies, got knocked up, and eventually married him, and had a total of three kids with him before her life spiraled out of control again decades later.

Getting ahead of myself...Like Cynthia and me, Steve and I had a borderline sibling relationship and sometimes the craziness of the older crowd out at Townes's shack would make us both want to take a breather. Guy and Townes would haze him unmercifully sometimes, and if I was around, he would take me on a walk like a pet dog. And one day he brought his pistol with him. Or one of his pistols. He had a mess of them in those days. I think this was the replica cap n' ball Colt he sings about in "Devil's Right Hand." And he told me he was gonna let me shoot it.

Fuckin' A right, Bubba. I was gonna get to toss some lead. I'd never even shot a BB gun up to that point. 

So we got a safe distance from the vodka and heroin party roiling up at Chez Van Zandt and went down the holler where even my second-grade ass couldn't do much damage. He told me about the safety and the chamber and all that shit and handed me the gun, and it was so much heavier than any of the toy pistols I'd ever held. The grip sure did feel good though. He put a can on top of a fencepost and then told me how to sight and aim. I nodded solemnly, raised the pistol, and pulled the trigger.

FUCKING KA BOOM. I'd never heard anything so loud. The recoil jerked the gun past my right ear. That can sat up there, unmoved. 

Steve was over there cackling like a hyena. 

"Dirty Harry you ain't, boy," he said. And he was right. 

 

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noharleyyet

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16 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

My brother-in-law went to high school with Walt, and last year dragged me to a "house" concert at a church near the UT campus.  I was quite stunned  . . . Walt was nothing like I expected, and while that sounds bad, I mean it in exactly the opposite manner.  He was fantastic.

I saw Wilkins for the first time last September at MIchael Hearne's Big Barn Dance Festival in Taos. Fantastic is correct...

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24 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Yeah, we're gonna need a LOT more of these.

MOAR !!!!! 

 

Seriously I love reading them coord!  I imagine living around them was pretty damn harrowing too.  When you said you were afraid of Guy I believe it.  I think a lot of men are down right frightening to young lads - I have my stories of fear too - but I only knew GC as a fan and even then he was a grumpy old man.  Some combo of entering adult hood and they enter old age evens out the fear factor.  I still can see a younger GC that would freak me the eff out too though, maybe moreso than normal.

 

thanks for sharing and I’m pretty sure I speak for everyone — you can share as much as you want to share here!!

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MaybeACoordinator

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3 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

I wonder if Guy Clark and Billy Joe Shaver were friends?  They seem like they were cut from the same cloth.  Hell, they even looked similar.

I think they were....They surely would have run into each other alot in Nashville in the '70s. 

Speaking of Billy Joe, one of the last conversations I ever had with my mom came when she was smashed on box wine and in a confessional mood. She claimed to have cheated on my dad with Billy Joe at some point. I love my dad, but I knew their marriage was hopeless around that time -- only existed on paper, really -- so I was like "Rock on, mama." Years later I asked Billy Joe about it and he seemed to have even remembered her and has always been nothing but nice to me ever since...And some crazy woman in Nashville told me that my mother had served as Eddy's "wet nurse" but the timeline for that is all wrong. Eddy was almost certainly too old to have been draggin' on anyone's tit, his mama's or mine, at that time. 

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jimmyjazz

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My dad was an engineering prof and we would typically sponsor 2-3 foreign exchange students.  So, you know, I spent a lot of time underfoot while Dad, Rajesh and Nguyen would argue about whether the slope-deflection or Rayleigh-Ritz method was more appropriate for solving real-world statically-indeterminate structural problems.  It's crazy how similar our upbringings were.

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Gil Bang

Gil Bang 25920

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On 5/8/2018 at 7:08 PM, OWLVIS said:

Lyle Lovett

Bob Schneider

Kris Kristofferson

 

to name a few

Kristofferson was born in Texas, but I don't think he ever spent any significant time there.  Most of his youth (through college) in California I believe. 

He may very well consider himself a "Texan" though, I'm not sure. 

 

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