Butch Hancock "Boxcars"

It feels like I haven't been out in Austin in ages! On Wednesday night, I noticed the buildings seemed to have different colored lights than I remembered. I don't know if that's true, but it felt like I was seeing everything with new eyes. Plus, the skyline - and lights - were beautiful, pristine, glowing. I was heading to the after-party for Hayes Carll, to celebrate his just completed taping of Austin City Limits. Congrats to Hayes, so well deserved for him to appear on that illustrious TV show! We can't wait for it to air.

I hope Music Fog gets to catch up with Hayes on camera at the Americana Music Association's Festival and Conference, coming up September 8th through 11th in Nashville. Here's a link to sign up for that, whether to attend the whole conference, or just get a wristband so you can see all the music. And don't forget tickets to see the Americana Honors and Awards at the Ryman Auditorium!

This year is the first that it will be held at the Sheraton Nashville Downtown where the conference rate is $169 a night, plus tax. The hotel is completing a multi-million dollar renovation that will be finished in time for the Americana Music Festival and Conference to be the first group in the “new” hotel. The rooms are amazing! It will be a hot time in Nashville, for sure!

I am so looking forward, but also really glad I live in Austin, as there is always something going on here too. Our own Denise went to the Flatlanders show last weekend at The Paramount. Not only was she blown away by it, but there was a moment when Joe Ely and Jimmie Dale Gilmore sat and watched Butch Hancock in awe. He performed a haiku, a cappella, that he had just written about a dead owl he found on his property in Terlingua. Butch is one third of The Flatlanders, a magnificent singer/songwriter on his own, and part of the Lubbock Mafia. What is it about Lubbock that has bred such individual artists? Look at this list!

Catch Butch, with various special guests, at the Cactus Cafe in Austin during a five-night stand, August 10th through the 14th, as he revisits his legendary No Two Alike series...not repeating a single song during the run. This is Butch's way of celebrating the past 30 years of the venue, as they enter a new era, and closing out the "original" Cactus. Meanwhile, Music Fog brings you a classic from Butch that we recorded in Okemah, OK during WoodyFest last month. "Boxcars."

- Jessie Scott

Butch Hancock - Eats Away the Night

David Olney & Sergio Webb "Postcard from Mexico"

It's all about the megaphone. I can share stories with you about the recording of this session...how David and Sergio powered onto the Celebrity Coaches bus with determination and grit in their step, or the strange and entrancing memory David coughed up when Beans questioned a line from the song...but all you're going to focus on is the megaphone. Yes, this glorious piece of pressed plastic and electronics has been mesmerizing Americans for years. It's the audio version of a sci-fi tractor beam. It just sucks you into its grip, while you drool in its inferior sonic beauty. The only thing more fun than listening to one (when used by a professional, and especially in music) is actually playing with it yourself. But, while you're watching Sergio master his craft, and wishing you were speaking into the machine, take a gander at his guitar playing, too. That's right. Left hand only on the guitar. You are not worthy. Don't even look at the megaphone.

-Aaron

Aaron Beavers "Country Just Ain't Country"

Man, where did this decade go? I am taking stock, thinking about the kaleidoscope of music I got turned onto these past ten years. And sometimes it just happens so randomly!

I had been hearing about the band Shurman since their Vanguard Records days. The amount of CDs that would wind up on my desk every week was overwhelming. And so I wasn't even able to LISTEN to it all in a timely fashion. And off I went to the Americana Music Festival and Conference a few years ago. Hanging out at Third and Lindsley, watching the amazing Stacie Collins blow harp, and someone said Jesse Dayton was about to go on at The Mercy. So I went outside with them, and tried to get into a taxi, which thankfully was a van, to make the short hop. When the door slid opened, it was sardine packed. Not even a sliver of seat for me, so I "stage dove" in across the laps, and rode "in style" to the next club. One of those laps belonged to Aaron Beavers, and I am happy to now count him as a dear friend.

Aaron moved to Austin from LA a few years ago. Shurman's music totally resonates here. The album Still Waiting For The Sunset is about to be re-released on January 26, but if you can't wait, the downloads have already been made available, with vinyl coming on January 12th. Looking forward, we bring you a stripped down version of one of my favs from the CD, "Country Just Ain't Country."

-Jessie