Rocky Mountain Kool-Aid

Vacation time. I'm off to the tropical climes of Denver for a week and a half. The usual sporadic posting will resume sometime the week after next. (it'll kinda be like I'm still here, only longer).

To celebrate my brief return to the Mile High (heh) City, a couple of my favorite bands from thereabouts.

While back in Denver, I'm gonna try to catch my favorite band, Halden Wofford and the Hi-Beams . For my money, they're still the best "unknown" traditional Country & Western bands around. I'm biased, of course, having spent a good portion of the time I lived in Denver watching them play, singing along a bit too loudly. They play the best kind of old-timey music, mixing in their own originals alongside all the best classics, transforming them into their own. Every show is a raucous Barn Dance, with folks from 18 to 80 drinkin', dancin', hootin', and hookin' up. God, I've missed them. Someone needs to sign this band yesterday. Below is one of their best songs, and a perfect singalong song.

Denver's got a shithot country music scene, with too many good bands to cover in this brief post. And more popping up, apparently. One of the original legends (and a sort of warped Flatlanders...more a legend...) was The Denver Gentlemen, featuring, among others, the talents of David Eugene Edwards,later of 16 Horsepower, and one Mr. Slim Cessna, now the namesake of the delightfully wrong Slim Cessna' Auto Club.
Cessna's music is at once hallowed and perverse, poking at the sacred and the obvious. It's music for worship of the Divine, and it's church is the local dive. And how can one not love a band where the accordion is one of the featured instruments. So, below is one of my favorite tunes, an ode to lost friends, removed from Denver, but coming home. And, yes, The 404 is a real bar, and Nonny's a real lady.

See ya when I get back.

Halden Wofford and the Hi-Beams: Yodelin' Rhythm and Blues (mp3)

Slim Cessna's Auto Club: Kristin and Billy (mp3)

I don't work for an Independent record store. I just really like them. Not so keen on Chains, though. Too sterile. No vinyl. Clerks don't know shit. You know the shtick.