Man, there’s nothing better to get your country music pants going crazy like a good ol’ supergroup, and it appears we got a new one that’s formed right under our noses. Called The Panhandlers, it’s not in reference to vagrants, it pertains to that flat-ass piece of land in West Texas that sticks up like a chimney pipe on the map.
The original Willis Alan Ramsey album released in 1972 is the stuff of legend. Considered one of the very foundations of the Austin music scene that was just starting to emerge as a point of national interest at the time, the enigmatic songwriter recorded 11 original songs for Leon Russell’s Shelter label, and they would go on to be covered…
Some great new songs have just been recruited for the Saving Country Music Top 25 Playlist meant to keep you up to date with the latest songs and album releases. Starting us off is the First Couple of Texas Country Bruce Robison and Kelly Wills putting their spin on the old country class “One Dime At A Time.”
How hard could songwriting really be? You learned a few chords on the guitar in college, and if you had some more free time you could probably gnaw on rhyming a few lines of verse … or so you tell yourself. Then you hear an album like ‘Beautiful Lie’ from the First Couple of Texas Country, and it’s so enriching, you’re immediately demoralized.
A new album by the Dixie Chicks is on the way, and it’s no longer a matter of “if,” but “when.” Recent social media posts confirm the trio is working in the studio with super producer Jack Antonoff, and that a new record is coming “someday.” If they’re teasing us on social media already, that “someday” is more likely to be counted in months.
30 minutes before Texas music legend Charlie Robison was scheduled to be paid tribute by his fellow Texas and Red Dirt artists, a line 400 deep snaked around the block of the 200-capacity Key West Theater as part of the 2019 Mile 0 Fest. Some folks had shown up hours before.
Texas music legend Charlie Robison will be making a rare public appearance since retiring from music in September of 2018 as part of a special tribute being put together at this week’s Mile 0 Fest in Key West, Florida. Mile 0 Fest also addresses the Turnpike Troubadours cancellation.
One of the members of the First Family of Texas Music—and a landmark musician and songwriter for a quarter century—shocked and saddened fans on Monday (9/24) evening when he announced that he’s calling it quits. In a short note to fans, Charlie Robison let it be known that he will no longer be pursuing music.
There is a strange project that is preparing to be released on September 7th by a pair of country music performers called The Stryker Brothers that has folks trying to figure out what the hell is going on, and who the hell is behind it all.
It’s funny. You mention Lee Ann Womack to certain segments of traditional country music fans, and you’re liable to get a sideways glance, or downright gruff. Little do they know the leadership Lee Ann has exhibited over the last decade plus in keeping the roots of country music alive.
Strap yourself in, buckle up, and mentally prepare yourself as best you can, because there isn’t anywhere Robyn Ludwick won’t go on ‘This Tall To Ride.’ Unabashedly exploring the dark underbelly of life where cocaine and sex are the ruling currency, and creatures of the night cuddle up with each other for comfort…
With 75 years of history hanging thick in the air, Floore’s Country Store booked two nights of stellar talent Easter weekend to celebrate their 75th Anniversary. Friday and Saturday evening saw Robert Earl Keen and the Randy Rogers Band taking the stage, with Bruce Robison joining them on Friday, and Red Shahan opening the show on Saturday.
Strait played his first show at Gruene Hall on Saturday, February 21st, 1976—five years before releasing his first record, and only a few months removed from being honorably discharged from the Army. For his first gig, they charged $0.25 at the door, and according to Strait from the Gruene Hall stage Wednesday night, he made $7.00 total.
If you want your musical experience in life to be the most fulfilling and enjoyable, then you have to be without prejudice when approaching music. There are many reasons on paper that one might decide they would never like the country music of the Staind frontman turned occasional country crooner Aaron Lewis.
“I knew I wanted to record in this old fashioned way, that that was going to be the way to capture this music,” says Robison. “It’s real simple how we do it in here, which is pre-Beatles, where people used to be on the road, and they’d just take their new song into a real simple recording studio or a radio station, and they would just put the song down.”
Aaron Lewis, the frontman for the emo noise band Staind, whose been dabbling in country music for years now, has just signed to Dot records—a division of the Big Machine Label Group—and will be releasing a new record called Sinner on September 16th. And as part of the announcement, Aaron has released a country protest song called “That Ain’t Country.”
We’ve all heard of the “Class of ’89” in country music, right? That was the year that Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson, Clint Black, Travis Tritt, and others came to power. Well have you ever heard of the “Class of ’87”? That was the year Todd Snider, James McMurtry, Bruce Robison, Hal Ketchum, and Terri Hendrix all played regularly at an old wooden music venue in San Marcos, Texas called the Cheatham Street Warehouse.
Many of your favorite Austin, TX musicians who list their hometown as Austin actually live in a small community south and west of the city in the panoramic Texas Hill Country called Wimberley. About a 45-minute drive from Austin, the small town of less than 3,000 sits on the banks of the Blanco River, and is a favorite day trip for many central Texas residents.
Almost a month removed now from Sony Nashville CEO Gary Overton declaring to The Tennessean of “If you’re not on country radio, you don’t exist,” and the shock waves are still resonating on Music Row and beyond. Taking the point, or becoming the rally cry for the opposition to Gary’s comments was Texas country artist Charlie Robison. Now that Gary Overton is gone, I asked Charlie Robison, is the result is satisfying?
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.
This isn’t just your average album release, or even your average album release from Lee Ann Womack. This one has a little more special meaning for Womack since it is her first release without a major label, and a release that helps rate of progress for both women and traditional country artists looking to revitalize their place to a wider audience.
So who could step up of in the country music vocal duo space who could duel with the heavyweights of the mainstream, and offer more substance to that category like The Civil Wars did? Of course there will only be one Civil Wars and nobody will be able to replace them completely, but here are some ideas who could have a similar impact.
Take a Pacific Northwest songwriting gem and refine her with the finest of care by some of Austin, TX’s best master craftsmen, and the result is the 3rd and defining studio album from Seattle-based songbird Zoe Muth called World of Strangers. Backed by her touring band The Lost High Rollers on her two previous releases, Zoe ratcheted up the game with the new album….
Fans of Lee Ann Womack have been waiting not-so-patiently since 2008’s Call Me Crazy for new music from the multi-Grammy and multi-CMA Award winner, and on September 23rd they’ll finally get their wish. After years on major labels, Womack has teamed up with renown label Sugar Hill Records to release The Way I’m Livin’ this fall.