March 18, 2008
Just back from two
performances at SXSW
in Austin, Texas – the world's largest music
festival. The laid back city of Austin seems to
handle the influx of thousands of bands
remarkably well. I opened the
Rankoutsider Records showcase at Room 710
on Red River Street in Austin and performed at
Kick Butt Coffee the following day. In
addition we were able to see quite a bit of
music and one of the highlights was AKA COD, a
new band from ex-Morphine sax player Dana
Colley, really quite remarkable with the
addition of Monique Ortiz on bass and vocals.
Also caught Bobby
Bare, Jr. and a very good young band on
Bloodshot Records called Ha Ha
Tonka from Springfield, Missouri.
Februrary 10, 2008 Truth Is Stranger
Than Fiction? You bet, that's why we make
the CDs we do. No one could make up the story of
the Old Slave House or Cairo, Illinois.
In a quite strange and true twist
journalist/music critic Dylan Gibbs
writes a review of Salt Sex Slaves, and it turns
out he is a direct descendant of
John Crenshaw, the Salt King.
See it here.
The reviews of Jason Ringenberg's Best
Tracks and Side Tracks are starting to roll in
and they are universally stellar, as they should
be (4 stars in UK's Uncut for example). I
have the honor of being mentioned in quite few
of them including the review in
Billboard and
Americana Roots, click on the links to
see them. For a devout Christian, Jason is
does a remarkable job of spreading good karma
all over the globe.
January 24, 2008 Give Me Liberty
or Give Me Death! The Jason
Ringenberg/Woodbox
Gang show at Liberty Theatre was
one for the ages and I will let others comment
and write about it, but suffice to say a good
time was had by all. If you weren't there you
missed something special and important, and I
bet these guys are on stage together again
sometime this year.
"I've Got 935 I'm a Penny Short Again Satan."
And I trust the Woodbox Gang and their fans will
forgive me for bastardizing a line from their
great CD Born
With a Tail, but as a person who works
with statistics every day I was interested to
see someone assemble the numbers on selling the
three trillion dollar never ending Iraq
adventure. Specifically the Center for Public
Integrity (a pipedream of a title for an
organization) reports that Bush Administration
officials made
935 "false public statements" in
their successful efforts to sell the war. Here
in Little Egypt, false public statements are
known as lies.
Most egregious were rhetorically skillful (and
successful) attempts to link Iraq to 911 (28
false statements by Bush himself)
resulting in 69% of dumbass America
believing the ludicrous assertion that Osama Bin
Laden was in cahoots with the infidel Saddam
Hussein.
Forty one percent still believe it, an
encouraging 28 point improvement in dumbassness. Bush
himself was forced
refute the idiocy as far back as 2003 but
with no consequence, the suggestion planted with a
traumatized nation willing to follow had already
served its purpose. Maybe it's simply
psychological cover for those that have hung
with the President all the way, just like the
"died fighting for freedom" tag figuratively embroidered
on every occupied body bag shipped home. Only the families of those heroes are at liberty to engage in such tragic rationalization. I would do same.
God be with them.
It is mind numbingly common for elected
officials of both parties to abuse the public
trust (Clinton's
FBI filegate also comes to mind) – we now
expect it – but what I continue to find
absolutely frightening is the remarkably easy
time they have manipulating public opinion. Even
after the bloody, unnecessary disaster in Iraq
52% of Americans supported air strikes on Iran
in October 2007 after listening to the exact
same sales pitch from most of the exact same
discredited sales people using equally
discredited information. Perhaps the long
vanquished liberal media wasn't such a bad thing
after all.
January 12, 2008 . . . I will send
you to Pharaoh that you may bring My people, the
children of Israel, "into" Egypt? I
was asked to comment recently by the
St. Louis Post Dispatch (my thoughts did
not make the final piece) on the fascinating,
absolutely astonishing story of fifty five
African American residents of Cairo converting
to Judaism. Their remarkable odyssey of travel
to St. Louis and Memphis for study, instruction
and conversion is making headlines around the
world. This is a song worthy story for sure,
see it here.
It's nice when we get nods at sites like
Americana UK. But back home for us
in Egypt (personally I've dropped the
Little because there's nothing small about
this place) The Salt Kings received two
local honors,
CD of the Year in The Southern's
Flipside entertainment publication, and
also at
Nightlife joint honors for
Best Local CD of 2007 with
Skinny Jim and the Number 9 Black Tops
great HorsePower! Horse Power!
produced by Southern Culture on the Skids' Rick
Miller. We also get a nod as runners up
Musicians of The Year behind
Woodbox Gang and it is a high honor for
us to mentioned in the same breath as both of
these acts. Click all the above links to
see the the various write ups.
And I have been remiss in mentioning our delight
at having singer extraordinaire Chris
McKinley joining us for upcoming live shows;
this sweet heart of a human being has got some
remarkable pipes.
December 22, 2007
Oceans Eleven.
Salt Sex Slaves shows up as
number 11 on the European
Americana and Roots Top 13 in December
along with artists with, ah hem, slightly larger
promotional budgets. Our enormous thanks
to all our friends overseas for their remarkable
support.
See it here.
And for those back
home in Little Egypt mark your calendars for one
of the most significant shows in years, the
Jason Ringenberg/Woodbox Gang concert at
Liberty Theatre in Murphysboro on Saturday,
January 19. Jason, the father/creator of
the alt-country genre, got his musical
start right here in Egypt. The event is
the national CD release show for his new CD,
Best Tracks and Side Tracks, a
remarkable collection of his best post Scorchers
work. BT & ST has numerous southern
Illinois connections; a new
Woodbox Gangrecording of
Broken Whiskey Glass (the most beloved
song in the Scorchers cannon) done at
Misunderstudio,
Prosperity Train from my last CD,
Greetings From Cairo, Illinois, a
Shakespeare's Riot recording, one of Jason's
Carbondale bands from around 1980 and his Buckminster
Fuller song recorded at Bucky's dome
home in Carbondale.
See more info about the show here.
All this, plus the
Salt Kings will be playing an after show
party in full rock glory . . . come on out and
hang with the glitterati . . .
November
25, 2007
La Cappella
Sistina è bello.
Back from Italy now and still sufficiently
jet lagged but a good time was had by all. We
think the cleaning of the
Sistine Chapel was a good thing, and
I'll say it again,
Michelangelo's David, housed in
Florence, is one hell of a statue . . .
And on Saturday, December 1 if you're in the
southern Illinois region please join us for a
much anticipated performance at Pizza King
in Carbondale, one of most genuine bars in the
United States. In all my years here I have never
played PKs, but I did record a song
called PKs about the bar about 1995. Maybe we'll
dust if off for the performance. We open for the
great Jackhead, the primary band of our
equally great guitarist Charlie Tabing.
Cheap beer and no cover, and smoke 'em if you've
got 'em . . . until January 1.
November 6, 2007
"On" The Chart.
Salt Sex Slaves checks in at Number 6
on the Euro
Americana Chart for November, and we
find ourselves in some pretty good company. The
Chart is compiled by DJs, journalists,
retailers, promoters and others interested in
Americana music from all over Europe. Our
enormous thanks to Robbie Klanderman for getting
the CD to the right ears and all our industry
friends overseas for such a high honor. See it
here.
November 3, 2007
Bright Antenna
Bristle With The Energy.
Thanks to our many DJ and radio programmer
friends in Europe for great activity in the last
two weeks, especially in Holland, where SSS
landed on the Dutch Roots Radio Top 20 this week. We
appreciate the support from Paul Van Gelder at
VARA, Johanna Bodde at Radio
Winschoten, Roel Stäbler at Havenstad FM, and
Flying Shoes Radio in the UK among many
others. Thomas Kaldijk at Radio
Parkstad also gives us CD
of the Week honors at on his show in
Veendam, Holland. Jacques Spiry at Americana
Music Club on the RCF Network
in France even gives us a spin.
Collectively a nice launch in the region for our
November 13 release date and greatly
appreciated.
October 27, 2007
Benelux Redux.
The Salt Kings get a couple of pre-release nods in Holland and Belgium
this week, first a nice review from Freddy Celis
at Rootstime and some airplay from Thomas
Kaldijk's great Blueprint show on
Radio
Parkstad. Both were big supporters
of our Cairo CD. Our thanks to both,
playlist here.
October 19, 2007
Mall of America. While the mall is about my least favorite place on earth there are exceptions. The traveling New Harmonies: Celebrating American Roots Music exhibit from the Smithsonian, currently at University Mall in Carbondale, Illinois is absolutely terrific. Watch for this exhibit when it’s in your town and if you’re in southern Illinois you should definitely pay a visit. The Salt Kings will be playing in the exhibit space on November 9 at 7:00 p.m. It’s a double treat as the African American Museum just a few store fronts down has it’s own great music exhibit now with a focus on blues and soul, the Stax stuff alone makes it worth stopping by.
There was a great opinion piece in the Edwardsville Journal this week that does a nice job of telling the salt production/Illinois slavery story, see it here.
September 23, 2007
Our enormous
thanks to everyone who made it out to Hangar in
Carbondale, Illinois on 9-21 for our local CD
show, and special thanks to our friends
Woodbox Gang for including us on the
bill. Those unfamiliar with Woodbox Gang should
seek their CDs out immediately, post haste.
There are a ton of jug punk, washboard using
Americana acts traveling the country (if you can
even classify WB into something) but none, and I
mean NONE with the lyrical power and
brilliance of this band. And family patriarch
Gary DeNeal gives us the skinny on the band
name at his
Springhouse Magazine site, always
figured it was something like this and nice to
know the story.
We also want to
thank Brent Stewart at Flipside and Dianna Glenn
at Nightlife for the great press this week, you
can read those articles at our
Press Linkhere.
For those in the region please get out Friday,
September 28 to see the great
Jackhead, the primary band of our
fabulous guitarist Charlie Tabing -
they're at Hangar in Carbondale.
And the
New York Times article on Cairo that
mentions our Cairo CD is now available on line
without charge,
see it here.
September 14, 2007
No
Lights, Camera, Action. A very interesting
day for yours truly back in Cairo to film a
segment for Wales based
Green Bay Media's Rivers of Life series
Mississippi River segment. The series will focus
how various river systems affect the lives of
residents along them and the camera crew had
already been to China, India and Brazil for
other work. The Mississippi segment has a music
focus which is how I got asked to participate.
I was interviewed by
Cerys Matthews from Wales, former singer
of the UK band Catatonia which scored a
number of top ten hits in the late '90's and
early this decade, and she even had a hit duet
with Tom Jones. Mathews has lived in
Nashville for several years but her UK solo
career is on an upswing she is moving back soon.
Cerys and the entire crew were professional and
charming, and it was certainly a new experience
for me to be on a 6+ hour shoot with real
professionals. It appears the television
documentary will be aired in the UK and France.
We're unsure if the film will ever be available
in the states but would certainly like to see
the finished product. My thanks to Greenbay
Media for including me.
September 6, 2007
Salt Sex
Slaves Now Available Here! It's our
pleasure to make special pre-release copies of
our new CD Salt Sex Slaves available on
this website only. Get yours now before
our official November 13 street date and all
purchase money goes directly to the band.
Heck, we'll even autograph it. Go to our
Buy Link to get yours and listen to a
few tracks
here.
August 20, 2007
Green Bay
On The Mississippi. Wales, U.K, based
Green Bay Media has asked me to appear
in a documentary about the Mississippi River
from Cairo to New Orleans; my portion will be
filmed on September 13 in Cairo and include an
interview and acoustic performance. The six hour
program is slated to air on Wales BBC 1 and then
other European channels. The series, Rivers of
Life, will feature other rivers around the globe
including the Amazon, Nile, Rhine, Ganges and
Yangtze.
July
22, 2007
It's
a Date.
The official national release date for our new
CD Salt Sex Slaves is November 13, 2007.
The CD will be released in the US on Los Angeles
based
Rankoutsider Records (our new home) and
distributed by Burnside Distribution
Corporation.
We'll likely do something in southern Illinois a
little before that so those in the region can
watch for an official CD show Septemberish;
we’ll keep you posted.
July
10, 2007
"Emmylou who? It's my
great pleasure to report that vocalist extraordinaire Wil
Maring recently sang on our track Shawneetown and to
say we're delighted would be a dramatic
understatement. I would never run out of superlatives to describe Wil's voice, but a few
are evocative, gorgeous, willowy . . . I've said for years
it's a voice that can melt glass. This high honor turned into
a 2 fer when her colleague Robert Bowlin, widely known in
Nashville circles, came along and put down guitar and fiddle with
exquisite tone. This along with Lee Brothers' pedal steel has
turned ST into a great track. So our thanks to all for
taking time out of very busy recording and touring schedules to
brighten our lives. You can listen to a rough mix of the song
on our MySpace page
here.
And New Yorker has the best piece I've read on the bizarre
Dick
Cheney presidency, I knew I had odd empathy
for Harriet Miers for some
reason, as the decider is not the
Decider.
June
5, 2007 "Hot Nights In Nashville".
We've returned from our performance at the Jason
and the Scorchers reunion show in
Nashville, Tennessee – what a remarkable night
which just kept getting better and better.
Charlie Tabing, Ron Johnson and I
opened the sold out show at Exit In
at 8:30 p.m. to an almost full and appreciative
house. We even made it through a credible version of
the song I'd written about the band called
Rock and Roll Must Be Dead, with the crowd
singing along on the choruses. I felt it next to
impossible to win over The Scorchers home crowd
with two guitars, no bass and no drums but we
seemed to pull it off, and I've gotten numerous
requests for the song to be recorded.
Right after our performance JATS drummer
Perry Baggs appeared to a heroes welcome
with his bluegrass group and energetically
burned though some classic gospel songs. Then
the Scorchers took the stage, and well, my God -
unless you've seen this band you have no idea of
the energy and power they unleash. The first set
was quite good, but during set two they hit that
mystical zone attained by a tiny handful of
bands in the history of rock music, where no one
could touch them. It was similar to a religious
experience for many - the crowd was in a state
of rapture, alternatively cheering and weeping;
just a remarkable thing to witness I have
trouble putting into words.
The evening was a rare Scorchers performance;
Perry is in need of a kidney transplant and the
night was a benefit to help defray medical
costs. Baggs held is own during the whole
evening, playing on about 50% of the songs. What
an honor for us on the most memorable night of
my entire music career. On top of all that, the
famous
Hatch Show Print on Broadway in
Nashville printed show posters with the words (among others) Jason
and the
Scorchers, Sold Out and, Stace
England
.
Unforgettable in every sense of the word and our
thoughts are with Perry as he faces the battles
ahead. See some of the many picture postings by
fans
here.
May 20, 2007 "The Gift That Keeps On Giving." A
direct quote from Greetings From Cairo,
Illinois co-producer Mike Lescelius
after learning I'd been contacted by Pulitzer
Price winning columnist
Dan Barry from the New York Times
for a story in today's Sunday edition
(circulation 1.8 million). Barry now does a
travel column every Sunday on weird, oddball
places around the United States. Barry called me
midweek and indicated he started out doing a
story on river flooding, took a "fateful left
turn off I-57 into Cairo" and he and his
photographer found themselves amazed and
fascinated (happens to the best of us). He said
they seek out obscure odd stories then said,
"we've been here for two days and cannot get our
brains around it." I told him he'd stumbled in
the Cairo conundrum.
The story appeared in the Times front section on
page 15, the lead story in the National
Report.
You can read it and see a great
multimedia presentation
here, but you must sign up for the New
York Times Select, as their best columnists like Barry and David
Brooks are not part of the free website. There is a 14 day free
trial and it is well worth doing to view the multimedia content,
which includes photos and an audio clip from our version of Cairo
Blues.
April 23, 2007 Jason Ringenberg Confirmed As CD
Participant. Well, it goes without saying
that we're delighted about this; alt-country
legend (and all around good guy) Jason
Ringenberg will officially sing a track
on the new CD. JR will be doing Freedom's
Star, an old abolitionist song dating from
the 1840's which we think will be a good fit for
the project. We'll be recording the song with
Mike Lescelius at
Misunderstudio in Murphysboro around
Memorial Day weekend, and I'm just as excited
about mandolin player extraordinaire
Mark Stoffel playing on the track as
well.
Both Jason
and Mark are taking time out from incredibly busy schedules to do
this, including trips overseas and we really appreciate them signing
on. GFCI listeners will recall Jason's vocal on a storming
Prosperity Train, but this particular track will be much more
delicate and show that side of his talent.
April 19, 2007 A Good Day. It's my pleasure to report that
Friday last I was able to visit
Hickory Hill, now known as the Crenshaw
House and my enormous gratitude to those who
made this rare, authorized visit possible. I
won't post the persons involved or path taken to
secure the visit out of respect for them, as
they receive numerous requests, but suffice to
say they were very gracious and are trying to do
the right things to restore the house and
re-open it to the public.
Whew! The house is a cross section of where
unbelievable history, mythology and hucksterism
all converge and it's all so thick it just about
knocks you over when you step on the grounds. In
some ways it feels like a living organism. It
was wonderful to be able to reabsorb it all and
I came away from the visit even more fascinated
by the place, if that's possible.
And how wonderful to reconnect with George
Sisk, former owner of the property and
current resident caretaker. Sisk is an
immediately likable, gregarious man with a
charming P.T. Barnum quality and gave me some
rare newspapers and articles about the house
including an issue of
Iliniwek from 1972, which is the best
piece I've ever read on the history of salt
production in the region and the Crenshaw story.
You can read the Iliniwek article
here (be advised it's a large .pdf
file if you use dial up).
My great thanks to George and others involved in
securing my visit. We have resumed recording and
can report we are re-energized by my resent
visit to "The Old Slave House" in southern Illinois.
March 24, 2007 Our thanks to
Pat Todd, founder of
Rankousider Records, for having us play
at the Rankousider Records showcase at SXSW
in Austin last week. A good time as had by all,
and we saw some remarkable music from Pat and
his band, other Rankoutsider acts like Gravy
Boat and the Born Liars, Buddy
Miller over at the New West Records
showcase, Peter Case and one diva train
wreck, Rickie Lee Jones who was probably
the most ungracious, unprofessional performer
I've ever seen.
The Jason and The Scorchers show we're
doing on June 2 in Nashville is already
sold out. We're glad to be on the bill
just to get to see them perform.
March 3, 2007 The Salt Kings have been busy
preparing new songs for our trip to SXSW
in Austin on March 14. We're playing at a
showcase event for our new US label,
Rankoutsider Records, and hanging around
with the glitterati for a few days. Yes, SXSW is
a totally ridiculous meat market, but we'll make
a good time out of the trip.
I've also just received an invitation to play at
the Jason and The Scorchers reunion show
in Nashville on June 2nd, and can say without
question this is the highest musical honor of my
entire life. The show is a benefit for Scorchers
drummer Perry Baggs, who is in poor heath
and in need of a kidney transplant. I was
approached by Jason Ringenberg on this
and asked about doing a solo acoustic set to
open the show. I never, ever get nervous about
any performance, but frankly, I don't have the
cojones to get on stage, by myself, just before
The Scorchers destroy the building. So the show
producer, guitarist Warner Hodges, agreed
to let me do it as a duo, and Salt Kings
guitarist Charlie Tabing will be joining me on lap steel. I now have some back up,
and my thanks to Warner for acquiescing.
Please join us at
the Yellow Moon Cafe on Friday, March 9
for our first show in southern Illinois in quite
some time, it's free.
February 4, 2007 Music critic Richard Marcus
references GFCI this month in a review of
a high profile Virgin Records release in the US
and Britain from
The Good, The Bad and The Queen,
featuring former Blur and current Gorillaz
frontman Damon Albarn and Clash bassist
Paul Simonon. It's nice to be a small
touchstone on something,
read it here.
January 8, 2007 "We're gonna need a montage, even Rocky
had a montage." Thanks to our drummer
Dane Spalt for putting together a bit of
video from our Holland trip. The clip contains some performance video, trains, radio
show etc. Click the viewer below to take look.
December 21, 2006 Our thanks to Gardenia Albrecht at FEMUZ Your
Festival & Musiczine for posting a great
review of our show at
Crossing Border. The review is in
Dutch but we'll post a translation soon and also have a video clip
greeting on site in a few days.
See the review here.
December 5, 2006 We have posted a track from the new CD
on our
Myspace page,
listen here.
We've also shown
up on longtime Village Voice (now Rolling Stone)
music critic Robert Christgau's 2005 A
List on Emusic in some pretty good
company,
see it here.
November 22, 2006 Dutch Treat. We've
returned from our trip to The Netherlands and
can say without equivocation that - a good time
was had by all.
Where to start?
Probably with the Dutch people themselves who we found to be very
gracious and friendly everywhere we went.
Crossing Border
Festival in The Hague was enormous fun on
many fronts. We met and hung out with musicians
we respect and admire, including
Jon
Langford and
Sally Timms from The
Waco Brothers, Willy Vlautin from
Richmond Fontaine, and John
Wesley Harding. Langford pulled off a remarkable multimedia
performance called The Executioner’s Last Songs in two parts like
the seasoned pro he is. And Harding, who's real name is Wesley
Stace, told me how he'd wanted to meet me after
seeing my name in the European press and learn more about our CD and
show. He went on to explain how most people had the surname of Stace
in his village in England. Slobberbone
fans had better check out The
Drams because they were remarkable.
Our own performance at
Crossing
Borderon
November 17 was a sold out night and well received (see
VPRO show review). Festival organizers made
a giant screen available behind the stage for our multimedia.
In Enschede near the
German border our club set went great, then a local we were hanging
with picked up my acoustic guitar and staring playing Woody Guthrie
songs, which everyone knew. Before long we had a priceless late
night semi-drunken sing along going with most of the bar patrons,
passing the guitar around to the willing until the wee hours.
The whole band played
well, but our versatile guitarist Charlie
Tabing drew roars of approval from appreciative
audiences at the mere mention of his name, and rightfully so.
We also had the
pleasure of having Mike Lescelius from
Misunderstudio along for the ride. And I will
again publicly state in addition to Charlie it was my high honor to
share those European stages with bassist Ron
Johnsonand drummer
Dane
Spalt.
As we flew back
to the US our flight path to Memphis passed near the confluence of
the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, giving us a spectacular view of
Cairo and the southern tip of Illinois, which looked like a living
map illuminated by the setting sun. It was a remarkable close to a
great trip, and impossible at that moment not to be in awe of the
fact that the little, struggling town below had taken our entire
band across the big pond for such a great adventure. Thank you
Cairo, you’re one hell of a town and we are in your debt.
Now some rest
over the holidays before we resume recording.
October 31,
2006 We have been
ramping up our multimedia for our shows in The Netherlands and
preparing for the trip. Lot's to do when you have no Tour Manager,
and everyone over the seems to assume we do. Dutch accounts,
exchange rates, hotels, backline and other stuff is just part of the
planning stages. We leave on November 14 and look forward to a
productive trip.
Plus, we have started recording the next CD
about
Hickory Hill. I think we're all quite pleased
with how the tracks are developing. Part of the need to record was
to have a very good demo of some of the tracks to take to Europe
with us. So far so good with Mike
Lescelius at Misunderstudio doing his normal
superb job at the board and great back up vocals on one track from
Chris McKinley.
Please join us for our
last US show for awhile at Starview Vineyards east of Cobden on
Saturday, November 4 with show time about 3:00
p.m.
Townsend was born in
Mississippi but raised in Cairo. His bio indicates he ran away from
home at age nine and ended up in St. Louis, learning both piano and
guitar. Townsend evolved into a powerhouse and recorded music in
eight different decades beginning in the 1920's, an accomplishment
no other blues musician has matched according to numerous sources.
One of my most
cherished Cairo memories is seeing Townsend perform in Cairo at the
Jenn Jam Blues Festival several years ago. He had not played in
Cairo in decades and his appearance and remarks were very touching.
Henry was ninety two at the time and was brought on stage in a
wheelchair, where he sat barely tapping his foot as his band
started. No one knew what was going to happen with his performance,
but once he started he attacked the piano and guitar like a young
man. At one point Henry asked his "boy" to get him some "throat
juice" which turned out to be whiskey. This young kid about fourteen
years old walks on stage and delivers the juice, and we all assumed
he was a grandson, or even great grandson. Henry's band clarifies it
was actually Henry's own son, and
invites us to do the math. Ah, the sexual power of the blues.
Our recorded version
of Cairo Blues mimics Townsend's classic recording and he was
an inspiration during the entire recording process. Godspeed sir,
see his obit
here.
September 22,
2006 It’s our great pleasure to
report some very positive news out of Cairo for the first time in
years.
Bunge Ltd. in partnership with
Renewable Energy
Group of Ralston, Iowa has announced its intent to
build a $60 million dollar biodiesel plant in Cairo which will
create 30 permanent jobs when operational. Officials from both
companies cited the rail, interstate and river transportation links
as a major factor in their decision. This is particularly sweet news
as Bunge debated the idea some years ago of closing all operations
in Cairo. Our congratulations to the people of Cairo on this great
news and we hope this sets an example of Cairo’s promise to other
businesses.
September 19,
2006 This is a music blog/diary but
I can't help but drop in some thoughts about the bizarre landscape
we now inhabit in this country under the very, very curious
leadership of George W. Bush. For me
there have been many surreal moments during his presidency, the most
memorable being the awarding of the
Today Mr. Bush
topped the remarkable Presidential Medal of Freedom ceremony in surrealishness, a feat I formerly thought
impossible for him, or even Mr. Rove. In a speech to the United
Nations General Assembly Mr. Bush lectured the Syrian government
about its behavior stating, "Syria's leaders have made their country
a crossroads for terrorism" one day after a Canadian government
commission confirmed the accuracy of, and its culpability in the
saga of Maher Arar, an innocent Canadian citizen "rendered" by Mr. Bush's own CIA operatives without charge from JFK
airport in New York and transferred by them to that same
Syria, where he was tortured and held in a "coffin size dungeon" for
over two years according to dozens of mainstream media sources
including Fox News.
Well done sir.
Generic conservative/liberal tags now have
little relevance in the United States, and have been reduced to
exclusive use in boring, feigned arguments on cable news shows,
newspaper columns by profoundly embarrassing, well paid hacks of all
stripes and tired slogans at election time. In true to curious form
we have Mr. Bush to thank substantially for the destruction of those
labels. We can hope that over the long haul, and in his odd way,
he's a uniter after all.
Of course, Mr. Bush is no conservative – he's
an evangelical, and an evangelical leader without equivalent wisdom
represents a significant danger to any society, free or otherwise.
Alas, Mr. Bush has repeatedly demonstrated he lacks the necessary
balance. The world, especially the Mideast, is full of
evangelicals in many flavors. Mr. Bush should meet with Iranian
president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in New
York this week. Mr. Bush does not have the intellectual capacity to
recognize a kindred spirit. Ahmadinejad, to his wild-eyed credit,
does.
As for real
conservatives, I know many, they're my friends and I agree with them
on numerous issues. They are men and women of honor, scientific
explorers, fiscally responsible, good conversationalists and honest
– regrettably Mr. Bush is none of those things. Forgive me for being
quite nostalgic for the comparatively light reading of the Ken Starr
report.
I'm no
particular fan of Keith Olbermann, but I
am of fan of intellectual honesty. It's in short supply in the
United States these days but occurs on both sides of the political
spectrum for those willing to hunt for it, and few Americans have
the inclination. I have been a fan of William F. Buckley for decades. True
conservatives, like Buckley have already voiced what Olbermann said
recently about Mr. Bush; Buckley just received fewer kindergardenish
emails/blog posts. I applaud them both. You can watch their
commentaries below. After that, back to the music . .
.
September 6,
2006
Our
thanks to Tom Irwin for setting up our
joint show in August at Underground City Tavern in Springfield,
Illinois. Tom is real wordsmith; a farmboy with an eye for detail. I
particularly enjoyed a song about his father - writing such a thing
is almost impossible to do properly and his seemed effortless. We'll
get him down this way ASAP.
We also want to thank our European agent Bas Flesseman at Belmont for his efforts in securing a
show at Crossing Borders this year in The
Hague and nice mention on his website, see it
here.
August
18,
2006 Our
thanks to writer/musician Tom Irwin for
his nice mention of our upcoming Springfield, Illinois show at
Underground City Tavern on Saturday in The Illinois
Times.
We have the pleasure of sharing this bill with Tom and are working
to get him down this way too. See it here.
August
14, 2006 A Job Well Done.
Our congratulations and thanks to Kevin
Scharer from the Delta
Center in Cairo and his wonderful staff of high
school students for a successful Cairo Music Festival at Box Field
Saturday night. It was well attended, well organized and a very
positive event for the community.
As we begin to change musical directions a bit
playing the festival was a nice semi conclusion to our Cairo musical
journey, and what a journey it has been. It was our honor to play
and we hope the city can make this an annual event.
July
21,
2006 Well
folks, as much as we love Cairo,
Illinois and as much has we have enjoyed performing this show
any musician will tell you they get bored after awhile with the
material and are ready to move on. Even though we look forward to
taking Cairo to Europe in the fall we are ready start playing some
new material and are rehearsing new songs for our next CD, which
will be another historical project about Hickory Hill, or "The Old Slave House" near Shawneetown, Illinois.
Why Hickory Hill? Dozens of reasons, but the
main one is that it's a fascinating place with the same
through-the-looking glass qualities as Cairo, Illinois. The house
was built in 1842 by John Crenshaw, known as the Salt
King for his production of salt on the local "salines." Although not
salt mines, the production of salt here was done under hellish
conditions, requiring slave labor to keep fires and furnaces burning
to boil the salt brine water down to dry salt. Crenshaw owned
slaves, leased slaves, sold free blacks for profit and in general
profited from numerous despicable practices. The stories surrounding
the home, which is still standing, are important and remarkable.
Our approach will be
quite different this time. Instead of using numerous bands and
dozens of musicians the core group, now the Cairo Project, will be
renamed and record most of the songs. The music itself will be more
groove rock and seems to be taking on an Exile On Mainstreet feel. It's fun to play these
songs and flesh out the arrangements. And let me again state it is
my high honor and privilege to play with this band, drummer
Dane Spalt, bassist Ron Johnson and guitarist Charlie Tabing. This time around these
talented guys will be an important part of song composition and
production. We'll keep you posted on our progress.
July 14,
2006
We were
honored recently by the purchase of GFCI
by the library at Columbia
College in Chicago. Columbia College is Chicago’s
visual, performing, media and communications arts college and its
our pleasure to have the CD available to students and staff.
Resource listing here.
July
7,
2006 Death
Valley Radio in New Jersey gives Prosperity Train a spin last week and we
appreciate their continued support of the CD. Playlist here.
Speaking of
Prosperity Train we had the pleasure of visiting the Honorable
Jason
Ringenberg on his farm in Tennessee on July 4th. In
addition to hearing the new Farmer Jason CD
(which will be released by Rhino Kids in
September) and seeing the rough cut of the first video, a spirited
croquet match ensued with JR, his spouse and two children. A good
time was had by all . . .
June
21,
2006 Our
thanks to Kate and Scott Sensmeier at
Starview Vineyards near Cobden, Illinois for
having our band last Saturday. This is the first winery we have
played, mainly because their festivals are usually five hour gigs,
and as we do mostly original material we've never had enough songs.
But Scott and Kate accommodated that and everyone had a great time.
Let us say unequivocally this is a beautiful place that fits very
well with the landscape and region, and everyone needs to visit.
Their product is excellent too, quite impressive for a new
winery.
In other news,
critically acclaimed New England poet Martha
Collins has a new book of poetry out called
Blue Front, about the Will James/Henry
Salzner lynching in Cairo in 1909. GFCI
listeners will recognize this as the subject of the song Equal Opportunity Lynch Mob.
Incredibly,
Collins' father witnessed the James lynching as young boy in Cairo
and it left an indelible impression. Collins heard the story over
the years and began investigating herself, which lead to this
remarkable book. Martha bought our CD before her book was released,
then her publicist at Graywolf Publishing was nice enough to send me
a copy, which has been greatly enjoyed. This is very high profile
literary release from a great publishing house and Blue Front is
highly recommended by this group of musicians.
June
16, 2006 Our thanks to Ron
Arden at Death
Valley Radio on WNTI in
Hackettstown, New Jersey for airing "The North Starts In Cairo" last
week. We were on his play list with some greats including one of my
favorite songs ever, Glen Campbell's Wichita
Lineman. Play list here.
June
10, 2006 We've
learned that former Cairo resident and long time broadcaster Bill Page has died at age 39 in Kennett,
Missouri. Bill was a huge supporter of our CD and even played tracks
on his news program on KBOA down in the
Missouri boot heel. He called me one day out of the blue after
getting a copy of GFCI and after
introducing himself on the phone said, "you absolutely nailed the
story of my hometown." Bill was from a prominent Cairo radio family,
knew everything about Cairo, and regaled me with many remarkable
stories from a news perspective, confirming many things I'd heard on
the street. Godspeed Mr. Page.
May 21,
2006 Our thanks to writer and
sometimes DJ Roy Kasten for airing "The
North Starts In Cairo" on his
Feels Like Going Home program on KDHXin St. Louis. Roy was kind enough
to describe GFCI as "wonderful"; high
praise indeed from a writer of his caliber. Roy also did a review of
the CD in No Depression which we really appreciated - see his play list here.
May 12,
2006 In the double edged sword
category the recent AP story about Cairo which featured our CD was
picked up across the United States and by some international papers,
including the influential
The
Guardian in the United Kingdom. While I
appreciate mentions of the CD in the press it’s always tinged with
some sadness that a town I love gets such bad press. See The Guardian
mention here.
We're also
pleased to learn that GFCI is now
available in Japan via our European distributor. Priced at 2596 Yen
or about $23 US we're glad to see it available in another market.
GFCI in Associated Press Story. In what
seems to be a reoccurring theme the CD and final track, Can't We All Get Along, is mentioned in an
AP story about the situation in Cairo. I'm glad reporter Jim Suhr included my affection for the
people of Cairo in the article and not just all the discord. He did
get my name wrong, although Shane England has a nice ring to it if I
ever enter the Witness Protection Program. Our thanks to Jim for
including us and see his story here.
April
23,
2006
On
Thursday, April 20th I had the honor of playing my first true
educational performance at the Teen Reach after school program in Cairo. Program
Coordinator Kevin Schraer invited me down and it was a pleasure
spending some time with these great kids.
I was struck by two
things during the evening - the kids' lack of knowledge about their
history and heritage, and more importantly, their desire to learn.
Many had great questions and at times seemed transfixed by the
photos I displayed during the performance. Kevin and I discussed the
fact that Cairo has an enormous opportunity to instill pride and a
sense of community in the younger generation by simply talking about
Cairo's amazing history and its importance to our country. It is my
sincere and passionate hope that civic, church and school leaders
embrace this notion and start showing these kids why they should be
proud of being from Cairo, Illinois. Maybe some of that pride will
rub off on the adults.
Mayor Farris and
members of the City Council – give these
kids a safe building and turn 'em loose; let them build a Cairo African American Heritage Museum or
other appropriate enterprise. You'll be amazed at what they can
accomplish for themselves and your city.
April
17,
2006
Our music
in Republican politics? Proving the old adage "truth is stranger
than fiction" we find that a Republican candidate for Governor of
Idaho, Dan Adamson, is featuring the
song "She Loves Kurt Cobain" from my CD
Lovey Dovey ALL The Time on his My Idaho Rocks campaign site. We're not
sure if he's angling for the Cobain worshiper vote or Cobain
detractor vote, as email about the song was about 50/50, "the song
is brilliant satire" or "it's sacrilegious." Adamson was polling
about 10% for the May primary at last count, but maybe "She Loves
Kurt Cobain" will put him over the top. See it here.
Speaking of Lovey Dovey ALL The Time, the CD
has gained a second life in the download world, with my top selling
song from any CD being the afore mentioned Cobain track, followed in
a close second by my cover of The Association's "Never My Love", with Dan Fox on piano.
April 5,
2006 GFCI
In Chicago Tribune Again. Our thanks to reporter Ed Torriero for a mention of GFCI and some quotes from yours truly in an
expansive front page article in Monday’s
Chicago Tribune about the unfortunate political dysfunction in
Cairo. I’m quite confident it’s the only time I will mention Dr. Phil in a high profile newspaper
article. Ed compared Cairo to Baghdad in my phone conversation with
him, as he had just returned from Iraq; smart guy but I hope he’s
wrong. See the Trib article here.
March
21,
2006
GFCI Live Across the Pond. It's official:
The Cairo Project will be doing its
first European shows in November 2006. We've just been booked into
the famous Crossing Borders Festival in The Hague, The Netherlands which is perfect
for our Cairo show. Crossing Borders is one of the premier European
multimedia festivals and includes music, film, spoken word and other
media over four busy days.
We plan to do five + shows in the region on
this trip and ask our European friends to check our Shows tab for updates as dates are
added. We look forward to seeing you all this fall.
March
12,
2006
Our
thanks to Luke Torn at
Pop
Culture Press in Austin, Texas for his great review of GFCI in Issue #61. Any time our CD is
compared to something from the great Johnny Horton we say, we musta done
something right . . . see it here.
March 5,
2006 GFCI
Reviewed in No Depression. Our thanks to writer Roy Kasten for his extremely cool review of
GFCI in the March/April issue of
Our
versatile guitarist, Charlie Tabing,
recently uploaded some performance video from our show at the
Yellow
Moon Cafe of the song Dust On
The Water, a tune written by my friend Dave Schultz. As hard as it might be to
believe, other songwriters have written tunes about Cairo in the
last decade.
For
my money Dave, and Hugh DeNeal from
Woodbox Gang, are the two finest
songwriters to ever emerge from the region. Schultz's back catalog
is incredible, and his band Octobers
Child, later re-christened Bucktown, was at the forefront of the
modern alt-country/Americana movement. It was later my high honor to
play with Dave in his new creation called Jubilee Songbirds, and the bands' one CD,
Birds of North
America, featuring all but one track by Dave is
thought by many to be a criminally overlooked gem. I learned a lot
about songwriting from Dave including perhaps his best lesson,
"never waste a line." Amen.
I had the good fortune to see Dave play on our
Chicago trip at Horseshoe the night
before our show there, and he continues to amaze and inspire. Our
thanks to him for use of the song which is a nice interlude in our
set. See the video
here.
February
20,
2006
Our
maiden voyage to Chicago was great - the Horseshoe was packed and both bands played
well. Jackhead sounded great as usual and we appreciate them
making the pilgrimage with us.
We have two prominent Chicago music journalists
to thank. First, Andy Downing at the
Chicago Tribune for his excellent piece
on GFCI in Fridays On The Town
entertainment section. This is probably the best article written
about the project to date, and in one of the America's great
newspapers. See it here.
Also, writer Mary
Houlihan gave our gig recommended show status in the Club Hopping section of the Chicago Sun Times Friday weekend pullout section.
We were hugely honored to be in that group with Rascal Flatts, Buckwheat Zydeco, The Undertow Orchestra and one of the great
American (and unknown) bands, Marah.
Both articles featured a photo of the band taken by Elaina Spalt. See the Sun Times mention
here, and our thanks to Mary.
February
13,
2006
Our
thanks to Jill Haverkamp at Chicago
based Illinois Entertainer for a brief mention of our CD in their local
Around Here column for the month of
February, and we look forward to our show in the city on Saturday
with Jackhead. I did an interview with the
Chicago Tribune which is supposed
run Friday, but I'm not sure if it will appear in downstate
editions.
Many
thanks to the Yellow
Moon Cafe and
Gypsie Huggers for a thoroughly
enjoyable Friday evening. The Moon was crowded and a good time was
had by all. David More gives us nice
kudos too in his always readable Carbondaley Dispatch. We also posted a few photos of
the performance in the Photos area of this
website.
February
11,
2006
GFCI on Greil Marcus Top Ten in Village Voice
Critics Poll. We've had some interesting developments with the
CD since its release in April 2005 but the one I personally find
most remarkable is its appearance on rock critic Greil Marcus' Top Ten in the 2005 Village Voice
Pazz and Jop Critics Poll.
Although Robert Christgau tags himself
the Dean of American Rock Critics many would give that nod to
Marcus. One of the original writers for Rolling Stone, Marcus has
gone on to write some of the definitive books on rock music and
American culture including his most recent, Like A Rolling Stone:
Bob Dylan at the Crossroads.
We are of course
grateful to Christgau for giving the CD
Marcus dropped a note to a colleague months ago
and described GFCI as "amazing," but since he now concentrates on
books and lecture tours we'd seen nothing in print and hadn't
expected to. It's truly an honor to get this mention by Greil and
our thanks to him for including us. See it here.
February 7, 2006
It's our great
pleasure to announce an addition to our show this Friday at the
Yellow Moon Cafe in Cobden. A new acoustic group from Carbondale
will open the show called Gypsie
Huggers. This is another band from Mortimer of the Bourbon Knights- I don't know how this guy does it but every
one one of his bands has been extremely interesting and we're sure Gypsie Huggers will be no exception. Mort
describes their sound as dark acoustic with interesting harmony so
we're really looking forward to this.
Besides The Bourbon
Knights is one of our our favorite bands from
anywhere, not just southern Illinois so Gypsie Huggers get big bonus points for any
association. They'll start at 8:00 or so - come on by.
February 4,
2006 GFCI
on MySpace. We've finally gotten around to setting up a
MySpace
account but have not done much to promote it - we have found it
invaluable for networking with other bands. Hey, if it's good enough
for Billy Corgan it's good enough for us.
See
ours here.
Also our thanks to David More for mentioning our project and
show at the Yellow Moon in Cobden on February 10 in his always
interesting Carbondaley Dispatch Blog, which we're told is
quite popular and for obvious reasons. See his recent entry
here.
January 28, 2006
Notes about GFCI have appeared in some odd places,
including Cairo, Egypt news websites, but perhaps the oddest is at
Thanh Nien NEWS.com, a site based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
with information about business, politics and entertainment in that
country. We appear in an article on concept/historical albums along
with Sufjan Stevens and Ry Cooder. See it here.
January 21, 2006
GFCI appears on another 2005 Best CD list; this time at Belgium's
Radio
1. Our thanks to Mark Lefever for including us on his year
end list along with Bright Eyes, Ry Cooder and Bettye Lavette, see it here.
