The Latest Shows We've Recorded

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Hayes Carll @ Threadgill's on 2009.05.24

Here's the audio from Hayes Carll's (site, myspace) recent appearance at Threadgills (South) in Austin on the Sunday before Memorial Day. He's backed by a slightly revamped Gulf Coast Orchestra featuring Scott Davis (electric guitar, banjo, lap steel), Kenny Smith (drums), John Michael Schoepf (bass) and latest addition Ricky Ray Jackson (electric guitar, pedal steel).

The highlights for us are the new "Stomp And Holler" and the rocked up Scott Nolan tune "Bad Liver And A Broken Heart".

Enjoy and support live music.


Thursday, May 21, 2009

Mike And The Moonpies -- Free Record Download

We were listening to this record last night on the way back from Cheatham Street (after $1 Shiner happy hour pints) and realized that we needed to hip you to this.

Say hello to Mike and the Moonpies (myspace). Our friends over at austinsound.net hipped us to their single Tape Machine back in February and we've been fans ever since. They also have a nice writeup that gives you a good bit of background on M&MPs.

Anyway, you can download their record Lyin' from the links below. The highlights for us are the aforementioned Tape Machine, Hell In Jubilee, Betty Ford and Washburn Blues. Especially Washburn Blues. We've been there.

You can also check out a live performance of theirs from KAOS Radio here.




Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Johnny Cash Birthday Bash with Reid Wilson & His So-Called Friends feat/ Earle Poole Ball

Quite honestly, this show is in the early running for Best Show of 2009. The packed house at the Mean Eyed Cat was into the whole show. The band was on and Earl played with the So-Called Friends as if they'd been practicing for months.

Lots of great Johnny Cash covers featuring Earl's honky tonk piano. Lots of great Reid Wilson originals. Enjoy.

http://www.archive.org/details/reidwilson2009-02-26.matrix.flac























2009.05.20 Update: Adding some of the video clips from the show.

Dark Angels of Los Angeles




Tanner Hyde




Girls With Tattoos






One Piece At A Time


Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Memorial Day Weekend (and Prior) in the ATX

If yer in the ATX any time between now and Sunday, there's a good bit of excellent musical happenings to check out.

-Danny Schmidt is back in Austin after two months on the road and playing at the Saxon on Thursday from 8p-930p.
-Adam Carroll (with a little help from his friends) is recording a live CD at Flipnotics Barton Springs Friday at 8p and 10p.
-Adam is also doing a rehearsal gig Wednesday at Cheatham Street Warehouse from 5p-730p with Scrappy Jud.
-Damon Bramblett is doing the Friday sundown show at the Dry Creek around 8p.
-Hayes Carll is at Threadgill's South Sunday with the Sideshow Tramps starting at 8p.

Check out our calendar above, the Concert Co-Op's Austin section or the Chronicle's music listings for other stuff.

Mean Eyed Cat Songwriter Night Part 2

Here's the second installment of the Mean Eyed Cat's Songwriter Night hosted by Lew Card from the Gunhands.  Performing here are Betty Soo, Jenny Parrott (of Shotgun Party), Joey Thompson (of the Archibalds) and Jubal Lee Young.

We really liked this installment of the Songwriter Night.  There's a good deal of versatility among the songwriters in this recording ranging the gamut from serious to humorous to thought provoking and everything in between.  Enjoy this.



Jason Eady & The Wayward Apostles At Momo's

Here's some audio from a recent Jason Eady (site, myspace) show here in Austin at Momo's from April.  He's got some newer Apostles including Brian Rung, Cody Foote (from the Gougers) and and Wes Holtsford (picked up the night before at the LJT festival) in addition to traditional Apostles Scott Davis and Kenny Smith.  

Check out the archive.org page here.

He even does White Freightliner!  [That is meant to be ironic.]


Friday, May 1, 2009

Mean Eyed Cat Songwriter Night Part 2 -- Check It Out -- Monday May 4th

If you've got nothing going on Monday, check out the Mean Eyed Cat's Songwriter Night this coming Monday, May 4th.

Featured this month are Betty Soo, Joey Thompson (of the Archibalds), Jenny Parrott (of Shotgun Party), Jubal Lee Young and your host, Dr. Lewis Card III.

Check out the audio from the debut of the MEC Songwriter Night.

White Freightliner Blues -- Can We All Agree To Stop Covering This Song? [Opinion]

[Note: This is not to be taken personally.  The folks at alt512 love the artists we mention in this post.  We're trying to help.  Honest.]

A while back, we here at the alt512 tried to urge that artists stop covering a few songs that we felt had been overworked and deserved a break for a few years.  The brief list was only these ten songs.

Truck Drivin' Man
Six Days On The Road
White Freightliner Blues
Hey Good Lookin'
Folsom Prison Blues
Rock Island Line
Good Old Boys (Dukes Of Hazzard theme song)
Whiskey River
Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain
Wagon Wheel

We are writing again to re-request that we put just one of these songs out to pasture.  We have seen no fewer than three covers of Townes' White Freighliner Blues in the last week featuring the following artists in various configurations: Jason Eady, Joe Ely, Ryan Bingham, Hayes Carll and Jonny Burke.

Make no mistake.  White Freightliner Blues is a great song.   Classic certainly.  Country standard for sure.  Unfortunately, it's vernturing into Will The Circle Be Unbroken territory in that it's the defacto end-of-the-show jam to which everybody knows a verse.  In the interest of fairness, we would also like to see Wil The Circle Be Unbroken retired.  But our complaint isn't the song.  It isn't the artists.  Not at all.  We love them all.  It's the frequency with which we hear this particular song.  There is no other song by TVZ or anyone else that has the draw of WFB that so many artists end up covering it.

If it's Townes you want to pay tribute to, buy a copy of Live at the Old Quarter and learn Tecumseh Valley, Loretta, Mr. Mudd & Mr. Gold or Fraternity Blues or Waiting Around To Die and starting covering that.  If I Needed You?  Heavenly Houseboat Blues?  No Lonesome Tune?  Pancho And Lefty?  Don't You Take It Too Bad?  Two Girls?  Rex's Blues?  They all work.  They're all brilliant.

When everybody covers a particular song, it starts to lose its luster because every-fucking-body is doing it.  Doing a cover that everybody does fails to show the depth or breath of musical knowledge that you hope to convey by doing a cover in the first place [at least not to us here at alt512].  It shows that you can pick off the top of the musical stack.  When we're at a show, we want the covers that show you love Townes (or whomever) and that you love his deep back catalog or at the very least the songs that aren't waaay overplayed like WFB.  [Thank you, Dedringers, for dusting off Black Jack Mama.]

Dedringers doing Black Jack Mama from June 27, 2006 at the Carousel Lounge in Austin.


Maybe it's us.  Maybe Austin has such a rich musical tapestry that it's spoiled us.  Maybe we're missing the point.  Maybe not.  If you search youtube or archive.org for "White Freighliner Blues" you will see videos / hear recordings of Redbird, Woody & Paul, Max Creek, The Tuttles, Stoney Mountain Ramblers, Sam Bush, Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Steel Creek Bluegrass, Joe Ely, Joel Guzman, Lloyd Maines, Porter Davis, The Siver Family, Stringcheese Incident, Cornmeal, Greensky Bluegrass, Leftover Salmon, Drew Emmit and Brock Zeman all doing this song.  EVERYBODY.

Folk/Country music standard or not, we now stand by what we said over a year ago more than ever before.  It's time.  Give this song a break.

My point is simply that there are hundreds of thousands of songs out there to cover. 
You don't have pick a song off the top of the pile. Especially if you've heard someone 
else cover it already. I am available to give council to anyone needing help selecting a cover.

ps, If this blog appeal doesn't take, we'll be the folks at the next show, not with the "JOHN 3:16" banner but rather an "Anything But White Freightliner" banner.  And maybe a "Serenity Now" banner for when WFB is being covered.

pps, Maybe the underlying message here isn't that we want you to stop playing WFB.  Maybe it's that we're done with WFB.  Maybe we'll just step outside or head to the bar while it's going on hence forth.  Hearing it covered less would also help to that end.

Brock Zeman, Dan Walsh & Blair Hogan doing WFB from November 16, 2008 at the old Gruene Hall in New Braunfels.