Peter Case "House Rent Party"

It has been a long hard road, but one that has stretched from New Wave to Folk Rock, and from Buffalo to the West Coast. His 1976 band The Nerves gave way to The Plimsouls in 1980. He headed out on his own in 1986, with T Bone Burnett producing his first solo album. More solo projects followed. Peter Case, who is also an avid musicologist, curated the musical program for the Getty Museum in LA in the late 90's. In 2001, he organized, produced, and performed on Avalon Blues, which was a tribute to Mississippi John Hurt. It was nominated for the 2002 Grammy award for Best Traditional Folk Album. In February 2006, a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC called Hungry For Music paid homage to Case, releasing a three-disc tribute called A Case for Case, with John Prine, Dave Alvin, and Joe Ely, among many others, doing his tunes.

In 2006 Case began blogging what was to become his first memoir As Far As You Can Get Without a Passport, which was published in January 2007, covering his early days of being a music man. Peter continues to write and post autobiographical blogs. Case's Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John CD was nominated for a Grammy award in the Best Traditional Folk Album category in 2007. Then it got very scary, as in January 2009, Case underwent heart surgery, leading to fund raising efforts by other musicians to help defray his medical costs. He battled back to health, and we are happy to report that his latest project, Wig!, was released this summer.

We were over the moon to welcome him in front of the Music Fog cameras during the Americana Fest. A life of giving has yielded giving back to him. Here is one of the tunes we recorded with Peter, "House Rent Party." The lyrics can be found here, and unfortunately are all too familiar to those who are jobless these days!

- Jessie Scott

Shawn Camp "The Grandpa That I Know"

Marty Fitzpatrick and I got the opportunity to work together after a two year absence, to host the Folk Alley webcast of the Americana Honors & Awards Show from The Ryman Auditorium a couple of weeks back. It felt like old times, as he was the Music Director, and I was the Program Director at X Country on XM. But in an even earlier incarnation, Marty and I used to meet every week to produce the syndicated show "This Week In Americana," which I hosted and he produced. We got together at his studio in Nashville to construct the one hour weekly show. Marty and I are both from New York originally, but heard the muse calling, and we both wound up gravitating to Nashville. Marty says proudly that Shawn Camp was one of the first friends he made as a newcomer to town. That's hitting the ball out of the park! During our tenure at XM, we loved having a home for Shawn, as he is somewhat of an unsung hero.

Sixteen years ago, Shawn Camp recorded his second CD, having had a first blush of success with his self titled debut. Back in those days the conventional wisdom was that you had to deliver a similar sounding record. The label wanted him to retool album number two in the image of the first, taking off the fiddles and dobros in favor of electric guitars. He didn't, and the album got shunted away to the "no zip sorting bin." Last year, Warner Music Nashville President John Esposito happened into an impromptu guitar pull with Shawn Camp. Afterwards, he facilitated the vault being unlocked, and the dust being blown off, and the issuing at last of the newly renamed CD 1994. Shawn comments, "This is an unchanged snapshot of that moment 16 years ago." The album contains A-list collaborations with Bill Monroe, Jerry Douglas, Patty Loveless, and his earliest tete-a-tete with Guy Clark in "Stop, Look And Listen." Speaking of snapshots, that is what Marty Fitzpatrick is doing these days...he's a professional photographer.

Photo Credit: Marty FitzpatrickWhen Shawn visited us during the Americana Music Festival, he shared this song, which will be on the "new" album being released tomorrow. "The Grandpa That I Know." Amen.

- Jessie Scott

Hans Rotenberry "Blew It"

A rule to live by: It is always important to allow some sunlight in, to allow for some random act to occur that you haven't planned. I button us down pretty tight with artists when we are on location, but when Theresa K came by and asked if we had room, I was able to figure out a mutually agreeable time. Then she came back to our Sweet Suite at the Sheraton Nashville Downtown, bringing Hans Rotenberry, a mysterious looking cat with thick hair and dark glasses, you know, the ones where you have no idea whether the person is even looking at you. Theresa and he were companionably talking and hanging in the back of our room, and I ventured over to say hi...not sure who was hiding behind the Foster Grants, and still not able to get a read if he was happy or unhappy to be in the space. Whatever. Eye contact always helps in the ability to gage someone's interest or acceptance, but he was still a total mystery.

It turns out that back when I was programming Nashville's Lightning 100, in the 90's, I got to play his band, The Shazam, on the radio. This year's Americana Festival marked the first live collaboration between The Shazam's guiding light Hans Rotenberry and the man who produced their first four albums, Nashville's legendary producer Brad Jones. The two long-time friends performed and shared lead vocals. Their collaboration results in a unique pop meets Americana sound that surprised the audience on that Saturday night, September 11th, at the Mercy Lounge. We were hanging backstage, and the sunglasses were off. We had a blast with Hans, so much fun getting to know him. When we were recording him, the craft of his songs was a revelation. They come from another place, and were engaging and fresh. It was yet another of those moments where you are thinking, how did we not meet before? The Shazam were a progenitor of the indie spirit that is becoming the way the new music biz functions today, as they released five albums on their own, without the aid of a label, starting in the mid 90's.

Here is Hans, solo acoustic, with a great tune called "Blew It," from The Shazam's first album. Of course, this version was recorded during the Music Fog Sessions at the 2010 Americana Music Festival.

- Jessie Scott