Picture this. The heart of the Texas panhandle, late 1940s. We are driving up a dirt road. The heat is suffocating, moving in dusty waves through the car windows to settle against our mouths. But the humidity is slowly lifting, […]
Picture this. The heart of the Texas panhandle, late 1940s. We are driving up a dirt road. The heat is suffocating, moving in dusty waves through the car windows to settle against our mouths. But the humidity is slowly lifting, […]
When Gary and Roberta first met, it wasn’t twang at first sight. It was rock. The British Invasion was just mopping up country music’s teen appeal, and the two kids, who grew up together in the farming country of Southern […]
The Hackensaw Boys have the Blue Ridge Mountains in their DNA. An acoustic aggregation — upright bass, fiddles, banjos, guitars, harmonica, charismo, dobro, mandolin — the Hackensaws make primitive American music, born of specific place. Their songs are steeped in […]
You know Nashville as Music City USA? Not us. We think of our Tennessee home as Hot Chicken Epicenter of the Known Universe. Most any chain or mom and pop joint will give you the option of take-out chicken in […]
In 1995, singer-songwriter John Bunzow seemed on the verge of a career breakthrough. After years touring the rough-and-tumble bars of the northeastern United States, he’d moved to Nashville, inked a major-label deal, and was about to release his debut recording, […]
Take I-23 north from Kingsport, Tennessee, or south from Wise, Virginia, and you’ll find more or less the same mix of old and new Appalachia: roadside flea markets within sight of Wal-Mart Supercenters, generations-old strip mining operations alongside latter-day pulp […]
The title of Johnny Gimble’s newest CD, Just For Fun, goes a long way toward explaining the man and his music. It would be naive to say that the money hasn’t been important to him; Gimble, after all, has been […]
Maybe all Kim Richey wants to do is have some fun. She’s contended that her 1995 self-titled debut, produced by Steve Earle collaborator Richard Bennett, was considered a country album only because she was signed to a country label — […]
Given the uncertainties of the music business, it’s wise for a singer-songwriter to have something to fall back on. Though Kimmie Rhodes began singing at the age of 6 in her family’s gospel trio, she never dreamed of making her […]
“The dancing stops, but the music goes on.” In the deepest blue of night, in the wee hours of September 29th, Mickey Newbury drifted off to dream at his home in rural Oregon, and never came back. His passing was […]
FRESH TRACK: Matt Andersen – “Magnolia”Check it out
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