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Ronnie Fauss Honors Songwriting Heroes

November 15, 2011 by 1 Comment
ronnie fauss any lovin way

For anyone paying attention, the clues were there. Shades of Kristofferson showed up in "The Saddest Love That's Ever Been Made" on 2009's New Songs for the Old Frontier. On Mulligan one year later, "It's a Long, Long Way" recalled Todd Snider's "My Generation, Part II." Sadly humorous character sketch "Tia Maria" (also on Mulligan) seemed torn from the shared notebook of John Prine and Blaze Foley. I'll bet you didn't even know they shared a notebook. You'll find all of the above … [Read more...]

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Album Review: Justin Haigh – People Like Me

July 6, 2011 by 9 Comments
haigh cover

If you missed Justin Haigh's first album -- and possibly even if you didn't -- People Like Me is liable to set your head spinning. Sophomore albums by little-known artists on small-time Texas indie labels (Apache Ranch Records' only other act is Nashville Star Season 1 runner-up John Arthur Martinez) aren't supposed to be this consistently wonderful. From the first few lines of self-penned album opener "All My Best Friends (Are Behind Bars)," it's clear that Haigh is working in the same Texas … [Read more...]

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Exclusive: An Excerpt from Patrick Wensink’s Black Hole Blues

June 7, 2011 by 1 Comment
Black Hole Blues

Self-described as "a hilarious double helix of country music and physics," Black Hole Blues is the outlandish debut novel of Kentucky-based writer Patrick Wensink. Sample the first chapter below. Someone once said: “Being a genius is a real shot in the nuts. Shit’s exhausting as all hell.” That someone was country music legend J. Claude Caruthers. When said philosophical nugget was scratched into his autobiography, Nashville’s Shakespeare, Caruthers had no idea how true it … [Read more...]

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Golf and Guitars 2011: A Chilly Acoustic Triumph

May 20, 2011 by 4 Comments
Pop Country Soul Faces

Everything is better acoustic. Although that statement is as susceptible to exception as any other generalization, it held mostly true at Tuesday night's Golf and Guitars charity concert at Haggin Oaks Golf Course in Sacramento, California. Preceded by a full day of golfing with -- or, for those on a tighter budget, watching people golf with -- celebrities in the rain, the mostly-acoustic concert started at 6pm and ran until almost 11. In that time, no fewer than fifteen Nashville acts … [Read more...]

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Marty Stuart and Brennen Leigh: Alive with the Spirit of Country

September 8, 2010 by 4 Comments
stuartghosttrain

If you haven't been finding enough good traditional country music to suit your fancy lately, you haven't been paying much attention. There's plenty of it coming out all the time. Here are two of my recent favorites: Recorded at Nashville's historic RCA Studio B with a band built around his Fabulous Superlatives, Ghost Train: The Studio B Sessions is ostensibly Marty Stuart's love letter to traditional country music, but it also serves as a handy distillation of everything lovable about the … [Read more...]

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On Rosanne Cash’s Memoir, Composed

August 11, 2010 by 2 Comments
rosanne cash

Music biographies and autobiographies are often dry, stubbornly factual affairs, impenetrable to all but the most dedicated fans. Composed isn't that way at all. Cash herself prepares us for the difference in the introduction: "This is not a chronological fact-check of my life, and I am sure my sisters or my husband or my children remember some of these events very differently. I have abandoned my reliance on the external facts to support an individual truth, and everyone is entitled to his or … [Read more...]

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Succinct Album Reviews: Blake Shelton, All About Tonight

August 10, 2010 by 3 Comments
IMG_7084 (Custom)

I think we might be due for more Adventures with Fake Jamey Johnson pretty soon... but for now, here's our cardboard friend weighing in on Blake Shelton's new EP (yeah, I said it), All About Tonight. … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Album Reviews
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