Rock Review – The Rolling Stones – “Hackney Diamonds”
Since the Kennedy Administration and for going on seven decades since, Mick, Keith, Charlie, Bill, and later Ronnie have been defining what rock and roll music is at its kernel root.
Since the Kennedy Administration and for going on seven decades since, Mick, Keith, Charlie, Bill, and later Ronnie have been defining what rock and roll music is at its kernel root.
Country music is country music, and the best definition of what country music is, is that you know it when you hear it. It’s self-evident. But the genre has birthed many subgenres, many stylistic movements over the years, and at times has seen a splintering and Balkanization.
He was the envy of every other rock band—a drummer that didn’t perpetually harbor envy for more attention, and seize every opportunity to receive it. He made an art form out of not complimenting a song, but completing it. He was the consummate back line musician.
Fiddler Byron Berline lived many lives in one, and now it’s all come to a close, but not before leaving an impact that stretches from being a genuine Bill Monroe Bluegrass Boy, to being flown out to California to record with The Rolling Stones.
Here 50 years after its original release, it remains one of the most influential and relevant albums ever recorded in popular music. From the songwriting, to the guitar tones, to the overall style and vibe, artists in country and rock and everything in between have been trying to capture it.
The positive news for the Texas-based Southern Rock band Whiskey Myers just keeps coming. Announced Wednesday (6-5), Whiskey Myers has been bestowed the opportunity to open for The Rolling Stones on their massive and recently-rescheduled “No Filter” North American tour. Their music will also appear again in “Yellowstone.”
Part rockabilly maven, part honky tonk shit kicker, part heroin-era Rolling Stones Sticky Fingers revivalist, for going on 16 years now the moniker ‘Moot Davis’ has been synonymous with the top shelf of cool in the underground country and roots scene with those smart enough to know where to look to find the best stuff.
Last week the current King of Americana Music Jason Isbell got fans jazzed by releasing a 30-second teaser video (see below) for his upcoming, but still-unannounced Dave Cobb-produced album that promises to feature a bit more of a rock vibe than previous efforts. Though we have no hard release date or title yet, we have both for a live studio album.
Fear and Saturday Night might be Bingham’s best album yet. This is an album of all peaks and no valleys. As the perfect experience for the classic rock buff hiding in every country and Americana fan, Bingham scrapes the grime off the sweaty denim of 70’s Stones and douses it with a little Dylan poetry set to grooves left in the residue of a Faces studio session and articulated with riffs that awaken the spirit of a freer time.
In the fall of 2012 when Ronnie Dunn (of Brooks & Dunn) was looking to write and record material for his upcoming album, he reached out to Texas music songwriting guru Ray Wylie Hubbard after falling in love with the gritty sound Hubbard imbibes on all his records. Dunn flew into Austin as Ray Wylie wrangled up an A-list of Austin musicians to to participate in a recording session.
Near the end of 2013, Saving Country Music rewarded Jason Isbell’s live streaming set on August 13th from the Austin City Limit’s stage as the #2 live event in all of 2013. Now Jason Isbell’s entire Austin City Limits set will be released to DVD on November 24th via Isbell’s Southeastern Records, and will include his entire 15-song performance.
Tom Petty has been known to speak his mind from time to time, including in August of 2013 when he criticized modern country as “Bad rock with a fiddle.” Now in a new interview with Canada’s CBC news organization, Petty has relayed some pointed opinions about what he characterizes as stars that have “won a game show” and that make “plastic computer music.”
Where most musicians might peak in their 20’s, Ray Wylie Hubbard seems to be hitting his stride in his 60’s. Since the release of his latest album The Grifter’s Hymal, he’s been asked to play David Letterman, and write and record with Ronnie Dunn of Brooks & Dunn fame. But he’s taking time out of his busy schedule to put on a festival of the music he likes.
These songs are tributes to American decay, depravity, excess, and unfairness, with starkly honest lyrics not dulled one bit by subtly, or sullied by the need for explanation or imagination. Burn. Flicker. Die is not an artistic interpretation of American Aquarium’s struggles, it is a Polaroid. You’re supposed to listen to songs, and feel music. With American Aquarium, you do both.
Her immeasurable influence spanning country, rockabilly, and rock and roll is undeniable. As far as I’m concerned, Wanda Jackson has no “unfinished business” to attend to. She’s given her heart and soul to the music, and the music is better off because of it. She’s got nothing to prove, but she proves it anyway in Unfinished Business. And so does producer Justin Townes Earle.
This is an explosively-energetic album with influences and styles pulling from a wide range of American music. Lee Bains is well-versed in Southern modes from both sides of the tracks, and shows tremendous versatility in being able to conjure up the smoky mood of a blues singer, and the sweaty twang of a Southern rocker in the space of a breath, with The Glory Fires right on his heels with their authentic interpretations.
Take the insane punk blues of the two-piece Left Lane Cruiser, add the shirtless, sweat-drenched James Leg from the Black Diamond Heavies, and then put them in charge of reviving some of the most legendary songs in blues music, and you’ve got an album dangerous enough to require a prescription. Painkillers, the new cover album due out 6/26/12 on Alive Natural Sound Records.
One of the reasons the the Country Music Hall of Fame is one of the most revered and respected Halls in all the land and specifically in music is because it is so hard to get into. It is always better that you look at a list of Hall inductees and wonder why certain names are not in, instead of looking and wondering why certain names are.
On February 22, 1956, Elvis Presley played a concert at the City Auditorium in Waycross, GA. Opening for Elvis that night were two brothers, Charlie and Ira, a gospel duo called The Louvin Brothers. In the crowd was a 9-year-old boy, a native of Georgia, born and raised in Waycross. How that boy felt about Elvis that night is uncertain, but The Louvin Brothers left an indelible mark on him that he would carry for the rest of his life.
Warren Zevon at first glance would not strike you as one to have a lot of “influence” in the realm of country music. I always knew him through his bit songs like “Werewolves of London,” which became an immediate punch out after years of being tirelessly run into the ground through Clear Channel’s shallow song […]
Say what you want about the man, or even his music, but it is hard to make the case that anybody has been a bigger ambassador for country music than Gram Parsons. Gram Parsons showed millions of non-country fans that country music could be cool. He turned The Rolling Stones into country fans. He discovered […]
This is a dude I probably would not write about under normal circumstances. I think he did have a huge influence on the Outlaw Country movement, but it would be a stretch to call him an Outlaw. But I’ve had numerous requests for a Gram Parsons blog, so here we go. This isn’t gonna be […]