Columbia, MO Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ Festival

RBBBQ Festival Friday September ,25 & Saturday, September 26:

Although the lineup was terrific, due to some family problems, I was not able to attend all the stuff I wanted to. I did get to go both days though before leaving Columbia, MO for Toledo, OH. First of all, let me say, I think this venue in Columbia known as the Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ is one of the best festivals in the country. Okay, it's not Kerrville or The Merle Fest or Newport Folk Festival...but...it is a fine, fine festival where you can see a great deal of the cross-section of music that I mine so much of in my musical pursuits. At the right of the blog are links to various things and the RBBBQ link is there too so you can see the lineup of this year's acts and the past two.

First of all they charged this year, which was fine. I had the mon(ey) so I had some fun. Friday night I caught one of my favorite live acts ever, Southern Culture On The Skids. May penis was laying on the ground because it got rocked off. This southern mixture of blues, funk, country, R&B, surfabilly/rockabilly and whatever else they throw in that gumbo actually overshadows their white trash shtick, which is entertaining in and of itself. I haven't seen them in 11 years. But this is probably the 6th or 7th time I have seen them. They did in fact throw out the chicken and from an 'eight piece box' and they also did The Great Santo Mexican Wrestler gag. It never gets old for me.

I also saw the great old-timey band out of Kansas City, The Wilders. This is hoe-down tuneage at its best. Makes you want to drink and dance. They range from Ozark style fiddle tunes to Southeast Appalachian folk stuff. The Wilders are very comparable to the Avett Brothers, Old Crow Medicine Show, The Freight Hoppers, The Stanley Brothers and the Carter Family. They can also do a gospel song like no body's business. Pick up their gospel album and you will be justified in the blood of the lamb. The fiddle player Betse Ellis also has a new solo album featuring her awesome fiddling. She is very adept at that Ozark fiddle playing in the vein of Bob Holt. If you ever pick up their albums they print extensive song by song liner notes on the style of the early Americana they perform. It's as good as anything that Smithsonian Folkways Records or Rounder's Deep River series puts in as annotated bibliographies. Oh yeah, and they are great live. That's all I got to hear and see on Friday.

Saturday had great acts too. I see the great Country & Western Modern Traditionalist James "Slim" Hand every year. It's so hard to find and see real live country and western. He puts on a great show always. This year it rained, but Mr. Hand stopped the show not because of the rain, but to come down in the crowd, shake hands and hug all the concert goers that braved the rain for his show. He is an outstanding showman and he did all his great material. On the other stage was C & W/Jazz/Rockabilly legend Junior Brown playing his guit-steel. A guitar and steel guitar on one instrument. He can maneuver from playing a hard pipe-hitting country truck-driving tune to Dick Dale-style surfabilly. He is one hell of a guitar and steel player and a crowd pleaser to say the least.

I am not a pure Reggae fan, but I got to hear the cool stylings of the traditional reggae band The Itals. Standard stuff, but great to see legends playing in the style of reggae I prefer mixed with lots of R & B. And on the other stage was legendary acoustic blues performer Rory Block. Now I love blues music, but I am burned out on the electric stuff. So I was happy to see this acoustic Delta Blues preservationist. Phenomenal! She stayed completely in the folk and country blues standard of Robert Johnson, early acoustic John Lee Hooker, and host of other Delta Blues styles. Her guitar playing is just absolutely haunting in how pure it is to the tradition...plus she's cute as hell.

I was disappointed to miss the likes of The Steeldrivers (bluegrass), Booker T. (blues and R & B), Backyard Tire Fire (indie rock and alt-country), The Blind Boys of Alabama (gospel, blues, R & B), The Perfect Age of Rock & Roll Blues Band (self-explanatory but featured Pinetop Perkins and Hubert Sumlin), The Carlolina Choclate Drops (saw them last year though, they are a black string band...banjo fiddle etc.) and Dan Tyminski cancelled. Well can't wait until next year!

John Doe And The Sadies

I am a huge X fan and I have had The Knitters brilliant eponymous album (X playing Country & Western) for many years. John Doe, Xene Cervenka, and Dave Alvin, whom are alumni of X and the Knitters, went on with solo careers that ended up heading for country, americana, folk, or singer/songwriter styles betraying their hard punk roots (that's not a bad thing at all).

John Doe with the Canadian surfabilly outfit, The Sadies, have made a very nice paean to Bakersfield Country & Western in this 2009 release called Country Club. John Doe's voice is sooo built for this stuff. It is very polished for a Bakersfield type sound. Let's say it is Bakersfield meets Billy Sherrill's Nashville via Studio B. On Yep Roc records, this wonderful album includes 15 tracks of Country & Western standards. John Doe and The Sadies do a wonderful job of making these classics their own. John Doe sings in a soft style with consummate musicians doing such classic titles as Ray Price's Night Life (written by Willie Nelson), Bobby Bare's Detroit City, and classic country fair such as Stop The World And Let Me Off and Help Me Make It Through The Night. Wonderful stuff and a very strong album. Good for the old punk or any country fan's album collection...go ahead and pick it up.

Melancholy Fall Albums cont'd.

Totally forgot Big Star #1 Record and Big Star Radio City. Tremendously great pop albums that just make me really melancholy.

Friday Vintage Vinyl Excursion

My job let's me travel to St. Louis frequently. I lived there for over 17 years. Anyway the big nice independent record store there is Vintage Vinyl. Great place. Plenty of surly music snob record store employees too. Anyway, still one of my favorite places in the world. I picked up a used copy of The Band's Jericho. It is a post-Robbie Robertson album. It puts Levon Helm back in the driver's seat of band leader...a role that he originally had back in the day. I listen to Don Imus via RFD TV. Imus, who adores Levon Helm, often uses as his bumper music the cover of Bruce Springsteen's Atlantic City which is from this album. It is stunning. Besides drums, Levon's instrument is the mandolin, which is the lead instrument on this tune's version.

I grabbed up Drive-By Trucker's new album which is an outtake album (in the vein of Dead Letter Office). I will review it once I have listened to it.

I also got local St. Louis musician Bob Reuter's album Thee Dirty South. I really like this guy. Nuff said for now, I'll review it eventually too. Good finds at Vintage Vinyl today. I am satisfied.

More Autumn and a question

More albums for the Fall
1) Tom Petty-Damn The Torpedoes
2) Let's Active-Cypress/Afoot (both albums in other words)
3) R. E. M. -Fables Of The Reconstruction


Here's the question: What is the difference really between the Monkees "I'm Not Your Stepping Stone" and Let's Active "Every Word Means No?"

Favorite Autumn Albums

In the Fall I get really melancholy and listen to a lot of mid-eighties stuff. Not all of it is mid-eighties but several are. Here is a list of my favorite albums that I really like a lot and still break out every Autumn.

1). R. E. M.-Life's Rich Pageant
2) R. E. M.-Reckoning
3) XTC-Lemons & Oranges
4) The Velvet Underground-Loaded
5) The Talking Heads-Speaking In Tongues
6) The Pretenders-Learning To Crawl
7) Guadalcanal Diary-Jamboree
8) The Smiths-The Queen Is Dead
9) British Sea Power-The Decline of British Sea Power
10) Dire Straits-Brothers In Arms
11) Yes-Close To The Edge
12) The Wrens-The Meadowlands
13) Midlake-The Trials Of Van Ocupanther
14) The Thrills-So Much For The City
15) Uncle Tupelo-Still Feel Gone
16) Built To Spill-Keep It Like A Secret
17) The Replacements-Let It Be
18) Luna-Lunapark
19) Yo La Tengo-Painful
20) Neil Young-American Stars 'n' Bars
21) O Positive-Only Breathing/Cloud Factory
22) The Beatles-Revolver
23) King Crimson-Discipline
24) The New Pornographers-Mass Romantic
25) Richard Shindell-Courier

New Prog Rock for Old Dogs

One of the cool albums I got for my birthday was Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion. For old timers like me who, when young, ate up Prog Rock like nobody's business. For the last few years I have been able to find updated sounds of Prog Rock through the likes of Built To Spill, The Halo Benders, The Decembrists, and others. Imagine again my happiness to add to the list, the tight, yet dreamy, dope-smokin' sounds of Animal Collective. This is a great song cycle of actually fairly short songs (maybe 6 minutes on average). It reminds me a lot of Yes via their Fragile period. Animal Collective is not real heavy on guitar, but the bass is pretty up-front in that Chris Squire Rickenbacker style jazz playing. It has that nice ringy low tone. There are plenty of polyrythms here too. The other thing that's pretty cool about any of the new Prog Rock sounds of the aforementioned bands including Animal Collective is the indie feel to it. The production standards have the classic indie/punk feel of the DIY attitude. For instance, Animal Collective has that great fuzzy guitar sound I've come to adore in indie rock over the last 20+ years. Lastly, it is imperative to have great album art inner/outer cover and everywhere else (they do). Grab it up, smoke it up, play it up and enjoy yourself.