My fist trip to Berkley since moving to the Bay Area was a great introduction to the town. After the beautiful, if congested, drive over the Bay Bridge at dusk, I headed to the Berkeley branch of Texas-based Half-Price Books (where I purchased a used copy of Gail Folkins' excellent Texas Dance Halls: A Two-Step [...]
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best line:She was a penitentNow she's a debutanton Ash Wednesday.
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I've been visited by 4 of them so far...From wikipedia:Thomas George "Tom" Russell (born 5 March 1950[1] in Los Angeles) is an American singer-songwriter. Although most identified with the country music tradition, his music also incorporates elements of folk, Tex-Mex and the cowboy music of the American West. His songs have been recorded by artists such as Johnny Cash, Nanci Griffith, Dave Alvi...
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All I can say about Tom Russell is WOW! I am extremely late to the party on Tom but consider me a huge fan! I had heard versions of his songs by other favorite artists, like Doug Sahm's version of St. Olav's Gate, and Johnny Cash's version of Veteran's Day but those versions are no match for Tom's. His latest album Blood and Candlesmoke (more on that coming up) is a modern masterpiece, and ...
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Unknown, underrated, underdog (except to Johnny Cash, Doug Sahm, Nancy Griffith, Joe Ely, Iris Dement, Ian Tyson, KD Lang, Suzy Bogguss, Ramblin´ Jack Elliott, Jeff Walker and Dave Van Ron, all of whom have recorded his songs). Tom Russell has long made brilliant music.
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Tom Russell [photo by Colin Young Wolff]My girlfriend and I were sitting around yesterday evening talking about singer-songwriter Tom Russell, when we started playing a word association game that went something like this: "When you think of Tom Russell's music, what words or images come to mind"? Here's what we came up with:"Dusty roads, the American Southwest, deserts, smoke, gone America, t...
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Forgive me for going a little lazy with the blog lately, but it happens.Here are a bunch of videos of bands I've seen over the last three weeks (one hell of a great run, I have to say. It's been a bit hard to wrap my head around it all, especially coming on the hells of the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival). The videos are in a reverse chronological order based on when I saw the bands:Tom
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LET IT POWDER, LET IT POWDER, LET IT POWDER Our snowbelt inhabiting friend, Whiteray over at Echoes In The Wind will find this one amusing: they canceled school today in the greater Portland area because of snow. All TWO INCHES of it! The kids, of course, are ecstatic, bundled up in snow pants and hats and mittens, [...]
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Cut from the same cloth as songwriting alchemists Kris Kristofferson and Guy Clark, Russell's evocative portraits of everyday life draw as much from Graham Green as they do Johnny Cash.Tom Russell is not your average contemporary Americana artist. To the best of my knowledge, neither Toby Keith nor Kenny Chesney maintains a degree in Criminology. Odds are also pretty good that neither of those ...
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Anyone who regularly reads this blog knows that I’m a huge fan of Tom Russell. L.A. born with a degree in criminology from the U of California, Russell also taught school in Nigeria during the Biafran War. He began his musical career in the early 70’s in Vancouver BC playing strip bars. He later drove [...]Related posts:Tom Russell Blogs on New ReleaseTom Russell and Gretchen Peters to Relea
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