Deep Six

Waiting, waiting, waiting....

We're still trying to put in words how great the Deep Blues Festival was. It's hard to distill 5 days of great music, and even better people, into a pithy post.

We would be remiss if we didn't recognize Chris Johnson, the founder, for the passion, love, and heart he put into the festival. I've never been to an event before where every band made a point to thank and praise the man responsible for bringing them there. This happened at the Deep Blues Festival. Mr. Johnson is a visionary, and an example of how to put your soul into action.

And, we must also mention all the artist involved (70 bands, duos, and one-man bands), from T-Model Ford, Elmo Williams, and CeDell Davis to Pure Country Gold, Ten Foot Polecats, Bloody Ol' Mule, Black Diamond Heavies, and countless others. This was the type of festival where the artists roamed freely throughout the crowd, encouraging you to engage them in conversations, rabidly checking out other artists, and even sitting down for a beer with anyone who would ask. Such acknowledgment of fans is a rare thing indeed in the current music scene. But the Blues lend themselves to interaction, don't they?

We'll get to covering other music shortly, but for today we want to do a special edition of our Six Pack series, focusing on artists who played at the Festival.

We'd also like to announce, for the foreseeable future, a new series here at the Mountain. We're gonna call it Deep Blues Thursday (starting next week), and we'll be covering many of the artists who either played at the Festival, or whose brand of Hill Country Blues/Punk Blues/Hillbilly Blues, etc. matches the aesthetic forged and lovingly curated at the Fest. We'll being doing interviews with the artists, and offering special incentives and, yes, giveaways. Keep your eyes peeled to this site for more announcements. Things are afoot (which partly explains my posting delay).

So, today's Six Pack, featuring artists from the Deep Blues Festival. We've got The High Plane Drifters, Dooley Wilson, The Speaking Tongues, The Rue Moor Counts, Restavrant, and Pure Country Gold. Ass kickers, each and every one. And we've only just begun.

Remember, all songs are pulled from vinyl (in this case all 45's). Songs are not listed in order of greatness, so check 'em all out!


High Plane Drifters: Trouble In Mind (mp3)

Dooley Wilson: Easy When You Put It On Me (mp3)

The Speaking Tongues: Looking In Your Window (mp3)

The Rue Moor Counts: On The Run (mp3)

Restavrant: Bev D. (mp3)

Pure Country Gold: Setting Sun (mp3)

Please support your local, independent rock'n'roll hootchie coo.

Mule Kicker

Sorry for the delay in posting, folks. We're still recovering from the Deep Blues Festival. We'll have a full write-up of the fest on Monday, along with some other nifty announcements. You won't want to miss it.

For now, here's a couple of tunes from one of our fave raves from the fest, Bloody Ol' Mule. You'll be hearing more about him (and many, many others) down the line.

Enjoy.

Bloody Ol' Mule: BBQ Song (mp3)

Bloody Ol' Mule: Black Balled Peter (mp3)

Please support independent music when you can.

T-Model

Howdy from Minneapolis. We're posting on the fly, so pardon our grammar. That picture above is the legendary T-Model Ford playing an impromptu short acoustic set in the wee hours of the morning after the close of the first night of the Deep Blues Fest. He played to about 20-30 of us stragglers out on the smoking patio. At 89 years of age, the man can still kick ass and send chills down one's back. I think all of us standing there had a feeling we were witnessing something special. And it's just the first night. Should be a pretty interesting weekend.

We'll have more on the artists down the line, with tunes (I'm buying vinyl, so mp3's will have to wait...sorry), but if y'all get a chance check out the linked sites forBloody Ol' Mule and Restavrant, our new favorite artists, whose kick ass sets held us rapt with amazement. We'll get some tunes up by them soon, and an interview with at least one of 'em.

Stay tuned.

Satan Is Real

Well, we're off to The Deep Blues Festival. We've got some interviews set up for future posting, and hopefully we'll return with some more goodies and news for all y'all's enjoyment. Keep an eye to this space over the next five days, as we'll attempt some live blogging, if time and sobriety permits.

In the interim, we've got a super duper little mix for ya. As voted in the last poll, the forces of darkness won out over the competition. Satan takes over the Mountain. Watch out for lighting!

And yeah, we skipped some obvious choices (AC/DC, Charlie Daniels Band, Rolling Stones, Roky Erickson, etc.). Figgered those were too easy.


Does the Devil really have all the good music? Maybe we'll have to concoct another Sin and Salvation mix to decide.

Devil Horns! Devil Horns!

Big Rock Candy Mountain Presents: Satan Is Real(A Devilish mix)
(Link to mix follows track listing)

1. Satanville (The Gibson Brothers)
2. Devil Is Watching You (Lightning Hopkins)
3. Sinner's Dream (Eugene Fox)
4. Satan Is Real (The Louvin Brothers)
5. Devil Do (Holly Golightly and the Brokeoffs)
6. Idle Hands Are the Devil's Playtings (Palace Brothers)
7. Wrestling With Satan (Lightning Beat-Man)
8. Deacon Brown Vs. The Devil (The Holidays)
9. Chased Old Satan (The Woodie Brothers)
10. Race With The Devil (Gene Vincent)
11. Satan (The Dwarves)
12. Satan's River (Porter Wagoner)
13. Me and the Devil Blues (Robert Johnson)
14. Say No To the Devil (Rev. Gary Davis)
15. Go Away Devil (Little Axe)
16. I'll Never Let the Devil Win (Sleepy LaBeef)
17. She Belongs To the Devil (Wasboard Sam)
18. (censored)
19. Old Red Devil (Hollis Champion)
20. Devil's Gonna Get You (Bessie Smith)
21. Get Behind Me Satan and Push (Billie Jo Spears)
22. Devil Is Mad (Dorothea Fleming)
23. Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down (Uncle Tupelo)
24. We've Got the Devil On the Run (Elder Lightfoot)
25. Satan Sold Out (Them Ranch)
26. Workin' Like the Devil For the Lord (Del Reeves)
27. Send My Soul To the Devil (Frankie Lee Sims)
28. I've Got A Devil In Me (Big Foot Chester)
29. Satan Wears a Satin Gown (Frankie Laine)
30. Last Song About Satan (Slim Cessna's Auto Club)


Satan Is Real (mp3)

Please support your local, independent demon and/or coven.

Six Pack To Go

Hey, hey! Gonna pound on yr eardrums today with another exciting installment of our 6 Pack series. Six fantabulous tunes ripped from glorious vinyl for your enjoyment and consumer needs. What's this all about? Well check out our previous six pack post for the full skinny.

So, here's our vinyl stars for the day. Next time we do this it'll be an all 7" day, so let the ladies know (ah ha ha ha...ha...hee hee...oh, forget it).

First up is a slab of pre-punk, soul punk from the awe-inspiring, recently unearthed Death (not the death metal band) courtesy of Drag City Records. More on these guys later.

Hard to follow Death, but legend Jack Oblivian (nee Yarber) and his Tennessee Tearjerkers kick a sweet sweatboozemidnightramble tale from their new rekkid, The Disco Outlaw on (label of the year) Goner. Note that no disco, or anything remotely associated with it, actually appears on the rekkid. Jack Oblivian retrospective coming soon on this very site.

Lo-fi (don't hate the label, embrace it as a sign that no jackass producer mucked around with the proceedings) genius Bobby Ubangi clocks in next with a fast and furious little ditty that has us jumping around the living room in sheer bliss. Song's on "Inside The Mind of Bobby Ubangi" on Rob's House Records.

Halfway through we have an African groove courtesy of Mississippi Records' album Love Is Love. If you're not grabbing every release by this label, well, there might be something wrong with you. This might be our favorite song posted today.

For you sleaze-blooze-trash fans, The Touch-Me-Nots, a two piece husband and wife duo, take you to the darker side with a track off their killer Sheldon Munn 10" on Yakisakana Records.

And, finally, a little noirish, late-night drinking song from Country chanteuse Sammi Smith . From a record that's no longer in print, "The Toast of 45", but well worth hunting down.

As ever, the songs are not in any order of quality or greatness. We just lined 'em up in a convenient mix-tape sort of way. Grab 'em all, and support the artists if you can.


Death: Keep On Knockin' (mp3)

Jack O and the Tennessee Tearjerkers: Walk of Shame (mp3)

Bobby Ubangi: Another Girl Like You (mp3)

S.E. Rogers - Toomus Meremereh Nor Good (Sierra Leone) (mp3)

The Touch-Me-Nots: Imbe-Style (mp3)

Sammi Smith: The Toast of 45 (mp3)


Please support your local, independent record stores. Please.

Moan and Howl

With the Deep Blues Festival only a week and a half away, we figger you're either going or you're not. But, hell, I thought I'd give a last ditch effort. Independent music festivals are becoming harder to come by. The Deep Blues Festival represents all that's good about music festivals. A chance to check out legends and unsigned artists alike, minus the mega-corporate sponsors, 5 dollar bottles of water, sweaty frat boys, and trendy hype from hipster websites. It's all about the music and the love of a guitar, a trap set, and a voice howling in the dark.

We sort of figger that we haven't done our job properly around these parts in promoting the festival. We should have posted about it daily, or sumsuch. What could we have done better to spur yr interest beyond a casual looksee? The lineup is impeccable, and we're sure to return with a stack of records to share with y'all.

In this economy, it's surely hard to justify travel to a festival far from home. Hell, we're blowing our entire Spring/Summer budget on it. But we feel it's worth it, if only to support the concept, and rage, rage against the dying of great music for the sake of radio play list homogenization. Do you really want to overpay to see yet another Depressed Mode reunion or a Flaming Lips show where, I bet, they'll have balloons and bunny rabbits while working through a current prog-rock fascination? Maybe so. What the hell do we know? We'd rather see a band kicking out with the nasty in a small club or in a tiny outdoor stage ripping shreds of sonic desperation. We could be wrong here, and we often are. Maybe we don't know what we're talking about. Maybe the future of music is in easily categorized genres, and an artist only has to be "good enough" for it's intended demographic. We don't think so, though. We think there's plenty of folks out there looking for something a little more.

When music becomes safe, and functions as wallpaper for an SUV trip to the mall, it loses its power to move, maaaaannnn. And so, and verily, let it be.

The previous was just our opinion, and in no way reflects the views of the organizers of any festival or the artists involved.

But, yeah, we've got opinions. Why not?

The Deep Blues Festival features such luminaries as Elmo Williams, T-Model Ford, CeDell Davis, and Pure Country Gold. But here's some more of the artists that will be there that we're pretty enthused about. By the end of the festival, we'll probably have even more. Check 'em out, and let yr ass boogie the way to the promised land.


Black Smokers: Little Nasty Girl (mp3)

Left Lane Cruiser: Big Mama (mp3)

Reverend Deadeye: Pentecostal Rattlesnake Shake (mp3)

High Plane Drifters: I Her Moan and Howl (mp3)

Black River Bluesman: Cardboard and Plastic (mp3)

Honkeyfinger: Burning Skull Blues (mp3)

Chooglin': Hal's Haberdashery (mp3)

Left Lane Cruiser: Set Me Free (mp3)

Please support yr local independent music fests. Otherwise yr stuck with corporate-mandated music for the masses.

Drinkin' Thing

Been ignoring the Country, haven't we?

Well, in acknowledgment of this weekend, what could be more 'Merican than songs about drinking and cheating? Particularly if they take place in the same tune?

Gary Stewart, while beginning his arc in the 60's, really got his honky tonk ball rolling in the 70's, when Country became more explicit with it's demons. The decade of swingers, the Rhinestone Cowboy (the song and culture, not the movie) and Countrypolitan produced some of the most hedonistic music available. And all from the "family values" arm of Nashville, and dripped in saccharine instrumentation. (Someone should really write a book or essay on the whole 70's Country culture).

Into all this relativism Gary Stewart dropped some records of hardwood honky tonk, while still winking and nodding to the changing culture. Not quite an "Outlaw" alongside Willie, Johnny, Waylon, et al, Stewart still hewed to a traditional style, his voice sharing similarities with George Jones. Stewart got his start, like many in Nashville, as a songwriter, penning tunes for Stonewall Jackson, Billy Walker, and Cal Smith, among others. He's one of the last greats of the Music Row production line, penning classic songs that last beyond a three-month chart trajectory. Of course we have to deal with the label-mandated production and arrangement, which can get a bit much at times (much the way 80's pop suffered from a tin-eared flatness), but Stewart imposes his hardwood sensibility to each song imbuing his records with a classic sound and lyrical phrasing of a bygone time.


Loneliness is a recurring theme, even couched in the "good time" stompers, which makes Stewart's suicide less than a month after his losing his wife to pneumonia all the more telling.

It's his broad range of drinking songs that Stewart is most remembered for these days (and there's alot of them). "Drinkin' Thing" and "She's Actin' Single (I'm Drinking Doubles)" are acknowledged classics of the genre. Our favorite song by Stewart, though, is "In Some Room Above the Street", which borders on pure honky tonk poetry.

So how about letting Gary Stewart help you through your Holiday weekend. It's as American as apple pie, cheap beer, and infidelity.



Gary Stewart: Drinkin' Thing (mp3)

Gary Stewart: She's Actin' Single (I'm Drinkin' Doubles) (mp3)

Gary Stewart: In Some Room Above The Street (mp3)

Gary Stewart: Your Place Or Mine (mp3)

Please support your local, independent swingers bar and no-tell motel.