Rock me Momma like a Wagon Wheel
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Artist:
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Album:O.C.M.S.
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Elvis is long dead and Memphis is now not much more than a dilapidating graveyard of old recording studios and neon-lit chain restaurants with over-sized Elvis beer mugs. No offense to you Southerners out there- I love the quiet serenity but it's quite a transition from NY horn-honking and 100 miles per hour living. So when I went to visit my brother at Ole Miss, save the football games, we found solace in long drives on winding roads (I miss car drives in NYC)- watching the leaves turn golden brown. While on one of these brother-sister treks, a song came on to which my lil brother and I actually agreed on (though I love the little tyke, my prepster, frat-loving brother and I typically critically disagree on music as much as politics so this was huge). The song's called "Wagon Wheel" by Old Crow Medicine Show. With its soulful, back-porch mellow bluegrass flare, quick hook, banjo, and the addictive twang of a fiddle, it has become a requisite cover for most newbie fiddlers to learn(according to the fiddler I sat next to on the plane home). Don't you love when younger siblings teach you stuff you never would have known.So rumor is Bob Dylan actually wrote the chorus of this song -during the recording of the soundtrack for the film Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid; rumor also says it was never released except on a rare Dylan outtakes bootleg. So hotshot lead singer Ketch Secor (you've got to appreciate his name. and the spelling.) finished the music and wrote the verses for Old Crow Medicine Show.More grub on the band? With its tongue-twisting name, O.C.M.S first met in NY-state (shout out NY), before heading to Nashville, and opening for Dolly Parton at the Grand Ole Opry, amongst others. They've got some street rock edge to their image as well, which you can pick up in the attached video (it's funny and cool and impressive as a video actually- looks right out of Coen Brother's Brother Where Art Tho, no?). Though this song is from their self-titled album, after fifteen months of touring in support of their newest album Big Iron World (2006), Old Crow website says they're taking a breather. However, I'd check em out any day, on any back road or dim-lit concert venue. Can't believe my ears had missed em thus far. I figured I should let any of you still in the dark in on it too :) It mellows out a Monday. cheers.
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