Songwriter icon Harlan Howard came to love country music as a kid listening to the Grand Ole Opry on the radio. When he came up with the phrase, “three chords and the truth”, the truth he was referring to was that life in rural America was hard. World War II was over, but prosperity was […]
Thomas Csorba on Truck-Camping and Memorializing Moments in Time
Texas singer-songwriter Thomas Csorba talks about what he does to keep busy in the sometimes-boring greenrooms far from home, a fan-favorite EP that can no longer be found, and experience gained working as a talent buyer for a Texas venue owner / promoter.
Monday Morning Video – Gabe Lee
Gabe Lee arrived at New York City’s Cafe Wha? this past weekend with more than songs. What he put together was a one-man Off-Broadway show — stories and music woven together into a look at what it’s like to chase songs — and a songwriting career — in Nashville. The pain was real, the humor […]
Steep Canyon Rangers – Next Act
You’ve no doubt heard the saying, popularized by author Thomas Wolfe, “you can’t go home again.” There are an endless number of dissections about what that really means, but the gist is that nostalgia has colored memories enough that the home you remember wasn’t exactly like that. So it was with some curiosity I listened […]
Marley’s Ghost – Honky Tonk
If you follow the Americana music genre, in all its facets, it’s not long before you become a fan of one or more regional bands. It’s not that they don’t have fans around the country or internationally, but rather they’ve found a community, their community, that supports them financially and emotionally. Even without new music […]
Twangville Celebrates the Bottle Rockets in NYC
Welfare Music: A Tribute to the Bottle RocketsThursday, June 11Lucinda’s, East Village, NYCShowtime: 7 PM GET TICKETS Before Americana became a catch-all term, The Bottle Rockets helped give it shape: loud guitars, sharp stories, Midwestern grit, and songs about everyday lives that somehow felt bigger than everyday life. Formed in Missouri in the early 1990s, […]
Justin Osborne from Susto on Tour Van Preferences and Keeping an Open Mind
Singer-songwriter Justin Osborne, from Susto and Susto Stringband, talks about the greatest source of joy in him musical journey and what happened at his first gig.
Monday Morning Video – Joe Strummer
Joe Strummer never stopped being Joe Strummer. Long after the Clash, long after the revolution was supposed to have been televised and filed away, he kept showing up — in dive bars, on festival stages, at record stores in lower Manhattan — still swinging. This 2001 clip finds him in a New York record store […]
Reckless Kelly – Alternate Routes
Thirty years ago in a wide-spot-in-the-road Idaho town 300 miles west of Yellowstone, Willy and Cody Braun formed their first band. As the sons and grandsons of professional musicians, their knowledge about how to do that was ahead of most of their garage band peers. One of their first decisions was to relocate to Austin. […]
Good Taste and Short Songs: Teddy Thompson on Influence, Restraint, and Never Be The Same
Teddy Thompson doesn’t talk about influence so much as drift—what finds its way in early, what stays, and what quietly shapes a life without ever announcing itself. On his new album Never Be The Same, Thompson returns to original material after a stretch of country covers records, this time working with producer David Mansfield. The […]