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Americana and Roots Music Videos: RPM 6

Photo from Custom Rodder website

An occasional series of Americana and roots music videos. Sharing new discoveries, and revisiting old friends.

Like a prospector panning for gold, I usually spend an hour each night looking for live performance videos on YouTube that I can share with y’all. Sometimes it leads to a column featuring one artist or just a particular topic, and other times it gets tucked away for a rainy day … a euphemism for not being able to meet a deadline on time. But my time management failure this week is your win, because there are a few things I think you’ll enjoy checking out. Mostly roots music, a few not. Old or new, there’s a musical fortune to be found on the digital lost highway.

Hayes Carll

It’s been a few years since the Texas troubadour’s last album, and now Carll is set to release What It Is on Feb. 15, which is also the first date of his tour. Fiancée Allison Moorer co-produced the 12-song collection with Brad Jones, and she helped co-write a number of the songs. Carll told Rolling Stone Country that “She’s wildly eloquent but sometimes uses her own made-up language. She’s really practical, but will do things like paint the front porch ceiling turquoise because she believes it keeps the evil spirits out. She’s a unicorn and I just try to enjoy her magic and not screw it up.”

The Handsome Family

For over three years the Milwaukee Record has been hosting Public Domain. The music video series features musicians setting up at Colectivo Coffee Roasters to adapt some of the world’s best-known songs in ways never been heard before. “Home on the Range” was originally a poem written by Dr. Brewster Higley in 1872 and put to music by a friend of his named Daniel Kelley. It became popular in 1933 after crooner Bing Crosby released it, and it’s been covered endlessly and taught in schools and camps. Brett and Rennie Sparks do a fine job.

Eva Cassidy

Although I knew her name, I’d never listened to Cassidy or knew much about her other than she had passed away at a very young age from cancer. When I recently was doing research for a column about cover songs, I thought about a Cyndi Lauper song I’ve always loved but thought should have been produced completely differently than the hit single. This is what came up when I poked around. Eva Cassidy’s performance of “Time After Time” took place at the Blues Alley jazz supper club in DC’s Georgetown neighborhood on the Jan. 3, 1996. Ten months later, she passed.

Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper

Back in 1964 a film was released that was financed and produced by Hank Williams’ widow, Audrey. Country Music on Broadway was distributed by Howco International and packed with stars. Filmed in Nashville rather than New York, here’s a clip featuring Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, one of West Virginia’s best-known husband-and-wife country music teams. They performed for a decade on radio station WWVA’s Wheeling Jamboree USA, followed by 20 years at the Grand Ole Opry with their band the Clinch Mountain Clan.

Vivian Leva and Riley Calcagno

One of my favorite albums from last year was Vivian Leva‘s Time is Everything. With the exception of two songs, everything was written by her between the ages of 14 to 19. Joined by her music partner Riley Calcagno, a talented multi-instrumentalist, she recruited others to add fiddle, banjo, pedal steel, and percussion. As Calcagno explains it, “We started and ended the session as a duo but it was her vision and material that completely drove the process.” It created enough of a buzz that Leva was named one of Rolling Stone Country’s “10 New Artists You Need to Know” for 2018.

While both Vivian and Rileyare still in college and separated by a couple thousand miles, they spend their time off traveling across the country together and playing dates in living rooms and concert halls as well as old-time and traditional music festivals, workshops, and camps. Leva also accepted an invitation to join The Onlies, a trio from the Pacific Northwest that got together in 2005 when they were only seven years old featuring Calcagno, Sami Braman, and Leo Shannon.

“We met Vivian at Voice Works, a great camp in Port Townsend Washington, and hit it off, playing late into the night a couple nights in a row,” says Calcagno. “We started playing with her more and more, and she really has brought something special and fresh to the group.” Although scattered around the country for now, they’re working on plans for the summer. In the meantime, here’s another from Leva’s album.

Molly Tuttle

After last year’s debut EP Rise, Molly Tuttle took home a bucketful of awards. Her song “You Didn’t Call My Name” was Folk Alliance International’s Song of the Year, took home the Americana Music Award for Instrumentalist of the Year, and was the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Guitar Player of the Year. She’s one of the brightest stars on the “this ain’t your grandfather’s bluegrass” scene today and will be releasing her first album, When You’re Ready, in April. Before she took off from her home in California to Berklee College of Music in Boston, and then Nashville, where she currently lives, she played in her family’s band, The Tuttles, featuring AJ Lee. Here’s an instrumental from 2010 showing off the talents of all three Tuttle kids, and I believe Molly is only 17.

So You Wanna Be a Rock ‘n’ Roll Star?

This was originally published online as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column at No Depression: The Roots Music Journal.

Many of my past columns, articles, and essays can be accessed here at my own site, therealeasyed.com. I also aggregate news and videos on both Flipboard and Facebook as The Real Easy Ed: Americana and Roots Music Daily. My Twitter handle is @therealeasyed and my email address is easyed@therealeasyed.com .

Life and Death From Hank Williams to Townes Van Zandt

Hank Williams and Townes Van Zandt

I didn’t plan to submit a column on this topic, but then again I rarely know what will spill out of my slightly scorched and damaged brain cells until I fire up the old 11” MacBook Air, turn up the music, and let my fingers fly. It was actually Christmas Day that seemed most likely to be up for discussion, since I noticed that so many musicians have died on that date through the years. Vic Chesnutt, Eartha Kitt, bluesman Robert Ward, James Brown, Bryan “Snoopy” MacClean from the band Love, Damita Jo, Dean Martin, and Johnny Ace, who shot himself in the head. On the plus side, it’s also a pretty good day for being born: Jimmy Buffett, Merry Clayton, Barbara Mandrell, Dido, Chris Kenner, Tony Martin, and, way back in 1907, Cab Calloway.

Just for kicks I did a fast forward to the first day of the year and lo and behold if there weren’t quite a few musical oddities on New Year’s Day. For example, in 1773 the hymn that became known as “Amazing Grace” was first used to accompany a sermon led by John Newton in the town of Olney in England. It’s the birthday of bandleader Xavier Cugat – that’ll take you back, especially if y’all can remember his wife Charo, who was 41 years younger than him and a regular guest on the Merv Griffin Show – and also Joe McDonald from Country Joe and The Fish.

Things turn dark in 1953 when at age 29 Hiram King “Hank” Williams died right after midnight on New Year’s Day of a heart attack in the backseat of a Cadillac, likely brought on by a lethal cocktail of pills and alcohol. He was transported back to Montgomery, Alabama, in a silver coffin, placed onstage at the municipal auditorium, and it’s estimated that somewhere between 15,000 and 25,000 mourners passed through. His last single, released in November before his death, was “I’ll Never Get Out Of This World Alive.”

Carl Perkins put out “Blue Suede Shoes” three years later on the same date, and in 1959 Bill Haley and The Comets’ “Rock Around The Clock” soared to number one after it was used in the film Blackboard Jungle. This is the second time the song topped the charts, and although the record business used fuzzy math back then – and probably still does – it’s said it sold over 25 million singles. In that same year, Johnny Cash made his first of several trips to San Quentin prison to perform and was seen by a 19-year-old Merle Haggard, who was serving time for grand theft auto and armed robbery.

On Jan. 1, 1962, The Beatles auditioned for Dick Rowe, head of A&R for Decca Records. He turned them down in what is considered one of the biggest mistakes in music industry history, selecting instead another band who also tried out that day, Brian Poole and the Tremeloes. BBC-TV debuted Top Of The Pops in 1964 with the Rolling Stones, Dusty Springfield, Dave Clark Five, The Hollies, and Swinging Blue Jeans. In the United States, in 1965, The Beatles had three albums in Billboard Magazine‘s top ten from Capitol Records.

On the first of January in 1967, the Hell’s Angels put on a concert in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Called the “New Years Wail,” it featured Big Brother and The Holding Company and the Grateful Dead. In 1975, Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham joined Fleetwood Mac, Nirvana signed a one-year deal with Sub Pop in 1989, and the following year radio station WKRL in Clearwater, Florida, played Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven” over and over for 24 hours.

Townes Van Zandt died on the morning of Jan.1,1997, at 52 years old of a fatal heart attack. The son of a prominent oil family, he endured poverty for much of his life and suffered from mental illness, addiction, and alcoholism. He drifted around from his home state of Texas to Tennessee and Colorado. In a New York Times article published in May 2009, they wrote that “on good nights he seemed to disappear into chronicles of existential joy and agony” and “on bad nights he would fall off his stool onstage, too drunk or high to get through a set.”

In the article Steve Earle, who released a tribute to his mentor titled simply Townes, said “I met him at his absolute peak artistically. He had a really horrible reputation because of his behavior, but I also knew that he had made a decision to write songs at a certain level, that how good the songs were was primarily important to him. I committed to making art whether I ever got rich or not by Townes’s example.”

When Earle himself was sliding deep into his own addiction problems, Townes came to visit and Earle recalls he told him “I must be in trouble if they’re sending you.”

This article was originally published as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column over at No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music.

How I Picked My Favorite Albums of 2018

Creative Commons 2.0

A week ago, give or take, the columnists and reviewers of No Depression received a note from Stacy Chandler, our chief for all things web related and self-described “killer of spam, keeper of the style guide, friend of good music and the good people who make it and listen to it,” letting us know that if we wanted to send her a top ten list of our favorite roots music titles for 2018, she’d be pleased to do something with them. What exactly she planned to do with them I didn’t know, and since I normally don’t participate in such things because I covet my status as the world’s largest collector of half-empty glasses, I deleted the email. Then I changed my mind.

Many of you know that in addition to writing for this website I also aggregate articles primarily about roots music and its weak-kneed country cousin Americana, posting several times each day on multiple platforms. Over the past few weeks I’ve stumbled upon and read endless lists for best rock, folk, indie, Americana, roots, blues, jazz, country, K-pop, hip-hop, live, and reissued albums of the year. While in the past I’ve just skipped or skimmed over them, this year was different.

While new album releases have dipped from a previous high of 130,000 titles per year to a more manageable 75,000 in 2018, when you’re not actually purchasing music because you’re accessing it through the stream at $9.99 per month, the act of finding and listening to new stuff is like having a giant crack addiction. After you the fill up the tank you still want more. And you can have it. Which leads me to why I’ve been searching through all these lists for things I’ve missed or never knew existed, and then adding them into my library with facial recognition and the flick of a thumb.

I’m not just looking for new music, but also books, films, Scandinavian television series on Netflix, the latest discounts on electronic gadgets that I have zero interest in ever buying, celebrity hairstyle transformations and facts about Dove Cameron, whose first kiss at age 17 was with Luke Benward. Not a clue as to who either of them are, but they must be important. I’ve also come across the ten best record stores in America, the best all-in-one turntables, the 13 best blues guitarists in the world, best concerts of the year, ten best music festivals of the year, seven English classic songs to sing out loud with children, and the best song from every Journey album (which is a bit presumptuous if you ask me).

Publishing your own personal list for other people to see and judge, unlike casting a vote in a poll by secret ballot, seems akin to standing naked in front of your tenth-grade public speaking class, and that just sucks. As you can tell by the photo above, I chose to utilize a rather simple system that I discovered on a Pinterest list of ‘easy home projects for the indecisive person’. And that’s me. Because in the day to day and by and by, my favorite music is usually whatever I’m listening to in the moment. So with that said, and in absolutely no particular order, here are a few of my favorite albums for 2018.

Sarah Shook and The Disarmers – Years

John Prine – Tree of Forgiveness

Pharis and Jason Romero – Sweet Old Religion

Joshua Hedley – Mr. Jukebox

Marissa Nadler – For My Crimes

I See Hawks In L.A. – Live and Never Learn

Milk Carton Kids – All The Things That I Did and All The Things I Didn’t Do

Lindi Ortega – Liberty

The Jayhawks – Back Roads and Abandoned Motels

Brandi Carlile- By The Way, I Forgive You

This article was originally published as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column over at No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music.

The Youngbloods’ Earth Music: A 1967 Flashback

The Youngbloods – Earth Music/RCA Victor

Last summer I saw Dave Alvin and Jimmie Dale Gilmore in concert before I had a chance to listen to their Downey to Lubbock album, and I was pretty surprised when they pulled out an artifact from the ’60s, well known as a hit for The Youngbloods. The late Chet Powers (aka Dino Valenti) was a folk musician who played on both sides of the country, and sometime around 1963 he wrote “Let’s Get Together,” which eventually lost the first word to its title. Over the next few years it was covered by a number of groups including The Kingston Trio, Jefferson Airplane, Dave Clark Five, H.P. Lovecraft, and We Five.

In late 1966 The Youngbloods recorded the song, but it wasn’t until two years later that it was picked up to be used in a series of television and radio commercials promoting brotherhood, which launched it into the top ten and to the status of generational anthem. But it was their next album that was recorded and released in 1967, titled Earth Music, that caught my attention, and primarily because of this song.

“Sugar Babe” still jumps out of my speakers today with a crisp vocal by bass player and lead singer Jesse Colin Young and great pedal steel playing from Lowell “Banana” Levinger. On my first listen it was as if someone pumped steroids into a folk song while mainlining blues, jug band, country, and rock. Along with The Lovin’ Spoonful, The Youngbloods were among the early adopters on the East Coast to swap out their acoustics for electric, and I played that album to death, as well as the follow-up that came out two years later, Elephant Mountain.

By 1965 Young had already released two solo albums — The Soul of a City Boy and Young Blood— before hooking up with Jerry Corbitt, who came out of the bluegrass scene, such as it was back then for a 22-year-old kid. They kicked around clubs in New England and Canada as a duo before adding Banana, who at 19 was already accomplished in playing banjo, bass, guitar, mandola, mandolin, and piano and skilled in multiple genres. With Joe Bauer joining the band on drums, they became the house band at Greenwich Village’s Cafe Au Go Go and were soon signed by RCA Victor Records.

Earth Music featured about a half-dozen original songs and also covers of songs by Chuck Berry, The Holy Modal Rounders, and Tim Hardin. It was produced by Felix Pappalardi, another Village folk musician who transitioned to the soundboards in the studio. After working with Joan Baez and The Youngbloods, Pappalardi went to England and produced the second Cream album, Disraeli Gears,and wrote their hit “Strange Brew” with his wife, Gail Collins, and Eric Clapton.

Meanwhile, back in the USA, Earth Music got great reviews but little airplay and didn’t even come close to the expected sales potential. Just before they recorded Elephant Mountain, Jerry Corbitt left to pursue a solo career and the rest of the band moved to Marin County in Northern California. They began to expand their sound into a more country vibe, and also experimented with improvisational jazz with Banana stretching out on the keyboards.

In 1970 the aforementioned “Sugar Babe” from Earth Music became a relatively minor, but international, hit when it was included in the soundtrack to Zabriskie Point. The film was an overwhelming commercial failure that has morphed into a cult classic, and the music is the epitome of diversity, with Jerry Garcia, Pink Floyd, Patti Page, David Lindley, Roscoe Holcomb, and John Fahey.

This year Banana has been out on tour with Little Steven And The Disciples Of Soul. Jesse Colin Young has been living on his coffee plantation in Hawaii for many years, and he still occasionally tours. Joe Bauer passed away from a brain tumor in 1982, and Jerry Corbitt died of lung cancer in Texas in 2014. The Youngbloods are one of those “gateway” pre-Americana bands whose music not only still stands up well over time, but has aged to near perfection.

This article was originally published as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column over at No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music.

The Yearlings: Americana Lost and Found

Last week my local library was the recipient of about 500 barely, hardly, or never played compact discs that have made their way to my mailbox over the past couple of years. There were also a few boxes of recent books that have all been read and kept in excellent condition. They were my donations to the annual sale that will raise money to help fill the library’s shelves with new stuff. I’m really not much of a philanthropist, but hopefully the effort will bring in some money to an underfunded public institution, and admittedly it’s already done wonders for decluttering my apartment.

While it is indeed my good fortune to write a weekly column for this esteemed website, it is also both a curse and blessing that I am inundated every day with letters, emails, and packages trying to bring to my attention something new that I may choose to bring to your attention. Most come from marketing companies, managers, and public relations people, and as much as I’ve asked them to save the cost of paper, plastic, and postage since I’m an all- digital-all-the-time type dude, it just seems to be in their DNA to send me boxes and padded envelopes. So I guess on behalf of the public library, thanks for supporting reading and education.

Not to solicit or open the flood gates – repeat often: Ed does not write reviews – but what I prefer is when I get a note directly from the musicians. Like this one from a couple of weeks ago:

Dear Easy Ed,

The Yearlings are an alt-country band from The Netherlands. In November we released our album called Skywriting. Being a fan of your columns, we are very curious of what you think of it. Would you like to give it a listen?

With kind regards,

Niels Goudswaard
The Yearlings

Notice the subtle flattery? Very effective. Niels wisely included a link to a streaming service to make it easy for me, and I added it to a playlist that I call “Listen To This New Stuff Now” and wrote back:

Thanks. Just sampled and added it to my playlist. Sounds real nice with an R.E.M. and Jayhawks vibe to it. Lots of jingle jangle guitar work. Here’s a question…why sing in English instead of Dutch?

The next day Niels replied:

Good question. I grew up listening to English and American Music. Neil Young, The Band, The Beatles. Later on as teenagers we mostly listened to, indeed, REM, Uncle Tupelo, Wilco etc. The same for my friend Olaf, the other lead singer, who by the way works as a university teacher in English linguistics. When we started making music, it just felt natural to do it in English.

Thanks for listening! Its just nice to know that someone likes what we are making.

So, thanks a lot for your response!

Niels

The Yearlings formed in 1999 and they performed over 200 shows and released two albums before parting ways six years later. In 2014 Niels and Olaf Koeneman began exchanging musical ideas and writing again. With enough material for an album, the original lineup came back together — Herman Gaaff, Léon Geuyen, and Bertram Mourits — and they headed back into the studio along with René van Barneveld on pedal steel. Skywriting was released in November and is available in all the places you’d expect it to be, and they are touring throughout the Netherlands to support it.

Over on their website they’ve got about a dozen reviews posted already, mostly in Dutch, which really doesn’t help much when you’re trying to dig for more information but you only read English. But Keith Hargreaves over at one of my favorite sites, Americana UK, posted this review, and I’ll close it out by sharing a few of his words:

Hailing from that mecca of Americana …..Utrecht. Not an obvious location for an album chockful of big songs that speak of big skies and carry breezy melodies by the score. These are Pettyesque songs played with brio and verve and the harmonies really chime. This is an album of influences constructed in a loving way to celebrate a particular genre and it works in its own joyous way.

But wait … there’s more…there isn’t just one Yearlings, but two!

Several thousand miles away, down in Australia, there is another band called The Yearlings, which features the folk and alt-country sound of Chris Parkinson and Robyn Chalklen. Together since 2000, they have released five studio albums and toured internationally. Although their last album, All The Wandering, is already almost five years old, they are indeed alive, well, and performing with their incredible collection of vintage instruments.

Y’all can consider this last clip a bonus: You’re getting two Yearling bands for the price of one. Don’t forget to support your local library and go out to hear live music whenever you can.

This article was originally published as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column over at No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music.

If You Could Name Just One Album

Moby Grape Debut Album / Columbia Records

Many of you who have been reading my articles over the past almost-ten years also follow my Facebook page, Americana and Roots Music Daily. I started it up about three years ago and it can best be described as an aggregation of news stories, art and photography, historical notations, my own writing, and music videos, as well as a place where people can connect and have conversations about music. It’s not a business venture, but just a hobby that has slowly grown from some of my friends to a couple of thousand people from all over the world.

Earlier this week, on a slow news day when I really couldn’t find much to post, I decided to put up a picture of a 51-year-old album that has meant a lot to me and posed this question:

If you could name just one album that has had a major impact on your musical interests and appreciation … damn this is hard. Go. (For you youngsters who don’t recognize my choice, it’s the first Moby Grape, in mono.)

It’s really an unanswerable question to ask of someone, since we maintain a huge jukebox inside our brains that is acquired over time, triggering our memories and creating a baseline of shifting interests and taste. It’s nether a fair assessment to choose one over another, nor does it say much about anything. I could have easily chosen any of a couple dozen if I gave it more thought, yet this is the one that first popped into my mind.

Without spending too much time explaining my choice, I’ll just say that Moby Grape released this self-titled album when I was 15 and there has not been a span of more than a couple of weeks that has since passed where I don’t listen to at least one or two of the 13 tracks. I stared at and studied the cover photo by Jim Marshall endlessly, alone in my bedroom, fascinated and enchanted with the band members’ hair, facial expressions, Don’s finger on the washboard, and the scarf wrapped around Skip’s neck. It came with a free poster that I hung on the wall and it was my go-to album cover for rolling joints. The music featured a rarely heard three-guitar attack, every member was a songwriter, each took turns singing lead vocals, and the production was crisp. They were rock, country, blues, jazz, and soul … often with all five elements surfacing in less than three minutes. Before they self-destructed a few years later, I got to see them live on three occasions. They were my guys.

Over on Facebook people began responding to my question, and within a few hours it was seen by thousands of people, many of whom shared their own choices. Here’s just a few of them:

Nitty Gritty Dirt Band – Will the Circle Be Unbroken
Flying Burrito Brothers – Gilded Palace of Sin
Little Feat – Dixie Chicken
The Beatles –White Album, Sgt. Pepper’s, Revolver, and Rubber Soul
The Paul Butterfield Blues Band – East West
Uncle Tupelo – Anodyne
Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bullocks
The Velvet Underground – The Velvet Underground
Grateful Dead – Workingman’s Dead
J.J. Cale – Naturally
Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited and The Basement Tapes
R.E.M. – Reckoning
John Fahey – The Legend of Blind Joe Death
Gillian Welch – Time (The Revelator)
Golden Smog – Down by the Old Mainstream
Various Artists –The Rock Machine Turns You On (Columbia Records sampler)
Elton John – Elton John
Bruce Springsteen –Nebraska and Born to Run
Terry Allen – Lubbock On Everything
Steve Earle – Guitar Town
Fred Neil – Bleeker and MacDougal
The Byrds – Fifth Dimension and Sweetheart of the Rodeo
Paul Revere and The Raiders – Greatest Hits
Delaney and Bonnie – Accept No Substitute
Mothers of Invention – We’re Only in It For the Money
Herb Alpert and The Tijuana Brass – Whipped Cream and Other Delights
Tom Petty – Wildflowers
The Band – Music from Big Pink
Arlo Guthrie – Last of the Brooklyn Cowboys
Buffalo Springfield – Retrospective
Simon and Garfunkel – Bridge Over Troubled Waters
Hiatus Kaiyote –Tawk Tomahawk
Camper Van Beethoven –Our Beloved Revolutionary Sweetheart
Neil Young –Everybody Knows This is Nowhere
Tim Buckley – Blue Afternoon

Other albums mentioned were by Ella Fitzgerald, Waylon Jennings, Jackson Browne, Jean Ritchie, Frank Zappa, Captain Beefheart, NRBQ, The Mahavishnu Orchestra, Keith Jarrett, Dave Brubeck, Sly and The Family Stone, Duane Allman, John Coltrane, Beach Boys, Linda Ronstadt, Led Zeppelin and The Rolling Stones.

With the exception of my friend and surrogate daughter Charly, a 23-year-old woman from Germany who listed Hiatus Kaiyote (great name!) as her choice, you could conclude that we fans of roots music are getting up in years. As more than one noted, it seems that we are most connected to the music from our youth. And so despite a slow news day, it brought about an interesting moment of reflection, and a helluva good list of music.

Many of my past columns, articles, and essays can be accessed at my own site, therealeasyed.com. I also aggregate news and videos on both Flipboardand Facebook as The Real Easy Ed: Americana and Roots Music Daily. My Twitter handle is @therealeasyed and my email address is easyed@therealeasyed.com.

Americana and Roots Music Videos: RPM 5

An occasional series of Americana and roots music videos. Sharing new discoveries, and revisiting old friends.

This started out as a story about my travels throughout the world in a quest to find hidden and long forgotten places of pleasure, often called record stores. Getting down on my hands and knees, pushing through cobwebs and kicking away a dead rodent or two in order to find those elusive hidden musical artifacts that I take home, place on my turntable while pouring myself two fingers of a fine whiskey, and then let the sweet sounds baptize my body and soothe my searing soul.

So that didn’t happen. I’m on the wagon, haven’t stepped on a winged vessel for over six years, and my turntable awaits my oldest son’s ability to rent a van, enlist a helper, and transport it to Brooklyn, where such things are cherished. I surf in the stream and scour YouTube.

Here’s a few things that caught my eyes and ears this season.

There Is Nothing Like Jason Isbell and an Acoustic Guitar

This should hardly be a surprise, as Isbell has been consistently putting out incredible music from back in his days with the Drive-By Truckers, followed by his first solo album in 2007 and those that followed with his band The 400 Unit, named for the psychiatric ward of Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital in Florence, Alabama. His wife, Amanda Shires, manager Traci Thomas, and Ryan Adams assisted in getting Isbell into treatment for alcohol and cocaine addiction in early 2012 and he now speaks openly about it. He’s intelligent, street smart, has a sharp wit, runs one of the best Twitter accounts you’ll ever follow, he was married to Shires by musician Todd Snider, is a fanatic fan of the beleaguered Atlanta Braves — and I’ll stand on Steve Earle’s coffee table and tell you he is currently the best songwriter we’ve seen since Dylan’s most prolific period, whenever that was. While I prefer him alone with his acoustic, this year I’ve gone back into his catalog from the past ten years, and if you’re a Jason-come-lately, you’d be well served to do the same.

This Is the Dawning of the Age of Geriatrics

The other night I went to see Bob Weir and The Wolf Brothers here in NYC, and as I stepped off the subway and headed up Broadway toward the theater, it was if somebody freeze-dried 1967. People of a certain age were decked out in tie dye or wearing faded concert tees across large stomachs, and as I made my way to the loge I saw one poor soul suffering from an overdose of stool softeners. But the music? First rate and as rockin’ and rollin’ as you might not have expected, but Bobby stretched out on his guitar and sang like I’ve never heard him before. It was truly a wonder to behold.

Along with John Prine, who will likely top every person’s end of the year poll, there has been an avalanche of older musicians who’ve either gone out on tour for the first time in years or written and recorded some great music. Examples would include Willie and Dylan, who never seem to stop touring, the Sweetheart of The Rodeo show which allowed Roger McGuinn and Chris Hillman to show that they still have the chops, and Steve Earle, Lucinda Williams, and Dwight Yoakam criss-crossed the country. Paul McCartney has his first number one album in 36 years, and Diana Ross is killing it in Vegas. Paul Simon went around the world one last time, and I think by now you get the idea: It’s better to burn out than to fade away.

The Year That Americana Music Died

Not that anybody, but a few, cares about such things, but when was the last time you looked at Billboard magazine’s Americana/Folk chart? A few years ago everyone made a big fuss that not only did “our music” warrant a Grammy award (never televised, of course, and who can forget Linda Chorney?), but we also got our own official chart. As I wrote this Simon and Garfunkel’s Greatest Hitsis number nine, followed by Ed Sheeran, John Mayer, Jack Johnson, John Denver, James Taylor, and Jim Croce. Sure, Chris Stapleton occupies both the number one and three spots, but if this is the best we have to show for it — schlock pop and geriatric redux — I’m outta here.

These are the musicians who came out with some kick-ass music this year, in no particular order, and, for at least this week, aren’t on the Americana chart: Dave Alvin and Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Malcolm Holcombe, Lindi Ortega, St. Paul and The Broken Bones, Lula Wiles, I See Hawks In L.A., Laura Veirs, Milk Carton Kids, The Rails, Eliza Gilkyson, Mary Gauthier, The Jayhawks, Modern Mal, Clay Parker and Jodi James, Brandi Carlile, Shemekia Copeland, The Earls of Leicester, Pharis and Jason Romero, Tim Easton, Ry Cooder, Sarah Shook and The Disarmers, The Mammals, John Hiatt, Ed Romanoff, Jules Shear, Hayes Carll, Whitey Morgan, Rosanne Cash, and Colter Wall, to name but a few.

And now the real craziness: Of the top ten albums on this week’s chart from the Americana Music Association, not even one made it on Billboard‘s chart. Thank god for Dale Watson’s Ameripolitan music association or whatever he calls it … they’re gettin’ it right.

Why Ska and Rocksteady Have Gotten My Attention

I haven’t inhaled for over 23 years, have no hair left even if I wanted to grow it out, and never went to Jamaica. But for reasons unknown even to me, this was the year I began to get absorbed into the roots of reggae. Blame it on a small radio station in NYC with the call letters WVIP that spends much of the day hawking vitamin supplements and selling help for your damaged credit reports. But every so often they break out the music, and it’s worth the wait. I’m a white boy who can’t even begin to explain it, but here are a few albums that shouldn’t be too hard to find if you want to dip your toes into the water. Start with Lee “Scratch” Perry and Friends – The Black Ark Years, Everything Crash: The Best of The Ethiopians and then The Story of Rocksteady: 1966-1968.

Video Killed the Radio Star

When was the last time you pulled out your old Low Anthem albums? It’s amazing how great this band is, and after opening on the Lucinda Williams’ tour last year, they recorded and released The Salt Doll Went To Measure the Depth of the Sea. Best album title of the year and just a wonderful group of writers and players.

Anybody who has been paying attention these past ten years knows that I keep going back to Marissa Nadler, the Boston-based singer-songwriter-guitarist-artist who can sing about ex-Byrd Gene Clark, cover a Townes Van Zandt song, and just as easily open for a death metal band in a small club in Germany at three in the morning. When her new album For My Crimes was recently released, it coincided with this nice mention from Richard Thompson in The Quietist:

“My youngest son, Jack, introduced me to Marissa Nadler. Her music is really strange, lovely stuff. I think it’s a little bit linked to shoegazing, or that sound, although I don’t know a lot about that. I find it very mesmerising and very dreamy, especially the way she harmonises with herself. I’m also never quite sure what she’s talking about – there’s lots of ambiguity in her lyrics, which I like. Songs and stories don’t always have to be straight.”

King of The Road: Tribute to Roger Miller is a two-disc album showcasing the songwriting of Miller through artists that span all corners, from Ringo Starr to Asleep At The Wheel, Lyle Lovett to Loretta Lynn. It’s a bit uneven and sadly they really missed the mark on “Husbands and Wives,” one of my favorites. Instead of using the great Jules Shear version above (video from Sherry Wallace), they teamed a mismatched Jamey Johnson with Emmylou Harris and murdered it. Despite that, you can cull a number of great performances here if you pick and choose.

And That’s All There Is Folks … It’s Cartoon Time

This article was originally published as an Easy Ed’s Broadside column over at No Depression: The Journal of Roots Music.