Am just back from two great music festivals. Apollo Bay in Victoria and Byron Bay in NSW. It rained in both places but fortunately this didn’t spoil the show!! Apollo Bay is great for venues around the town and it’s right on the coast. Highlights for me included the Live to Air broadcast of Twang by 3RRR FM. Denise Hylands interviewed all my favourites – the Willson Pickers, Chris Smithers, and The Flatlanders. Byron highlights were Lyle Lovett, Old Crow Medicine Show, The Greencards, The Wagons, Kev Carmody and Friends, The Willson Pickers, Patty Larkin and Justin Townes Earle. Unfortunately at times you could hear the music leaking from the other venues and maybe they could have turned down the volume a touch, but all up a great week of live music.

Thought it was a about time I put a post on the website. Ove the last month I’ve been featuring a few new names. Jordie Lane was playing at the Norfolk Hotel in Fremantle recently and I just happened to be there! So I bought a copy of his new CD called Sleeping Patterns and I’ve been playing it ever since. He’s young but he sounds and writes like an old soul. He also produced a great album with a Canadian gal, Tracy McNeil under the band name Fireside Bellows. So listeners have been hearing this album over the last month or so. Also Buddy and Julie Miller’s new album, “Written in Chalk” featuring guest appearances from Emmylou Harris, Robert Plant and Patty Griffin. I still haven’t tired of Teddy Thompson’s ”Upfront and Down Low” or Eilen Jewell’s “Sea of Tears”. Today I played Justin Townes Earle just to get in the mood for his Australian tour starting next week. I’ll be in Melbourne for next Friday’s gig at the Thornbury Theatre. I saw him last year at the Grace Emily in Adelaide and have been talking about him ever since. A show not to be missed!! It’s a pity these gigs are a bit more costly these days when you live in Alice Springs. I ordered a copy of JTE’s new album “Midnight at the movies and it still “hasn’t arrived. So that will be the feature of next week’s show. Hopefully a signed copy!

Today’s show featured Eilen Jewell’s new album ‘Sea of Tears’ and Teddy Thompson’s Upfront and Down Low. I’ve been a fan since I heard his version of King of the Road sung with Rufus Wainright and then heard him belt out a beautiful rendition of the Leonard Cohen song “Tonight will be Fine”. Eilen Jewell’s music is kinda country swing and rockabililly. I love her voice and different style. So in there as well were some old tracks of Chris Isaak who fits with alternative country and Dwight Yoakam too. All great singers with modern day crooner voices. And I ended with Neil Murray singing Coolamon Moon becasue he was here in Alice Springs the other night – a very short notice gig at Olive Pink Botanic Gardens and Sammy Butcher came late and played guitar alongside him. Old mates from their days in the Warumpi Band from Papunya. A great night of dancing in the dust!

Playlist

1. Huckleberry Suedes – Wild Peach
2. Huckleberry Suedes – Black Gold
3. Huckleberry Suedes – Hair Trigger
4. Paul Kelly – Pretty Place
5. The Audreys – Oh Honey
6. Sara Storer – Won’t Give In
7. Geoffrey Gurramul Yanupingu – Marwurunburr
8. Townes Van Zandt – Pancho and Lefty
9. Guy Clarke – Nickel for the Fiddler
10. Corb Lund – Horse Soldier, Horse Soldier
11. Kasey Chambers and Shane Nicholson – Devil’s Inside My Head
12. Corb Lund – I want to be in the Calvery
13. Kasey Chambers an Shane Nicholson – Once in a While
14. The Greencards – Who Knows
15. The Greencards – Bordered on a Breakdown
    
16. The Greencards – Shinin’ in the Dark
17. Old Crow Medicine Show – Alabama High Test
18. Gatorbait – Poor Boy Blues
19. Old Crow Medicine Show – Alabama High Test
20. Begonias – Something Less is Something More
21. Begonias – Gone
22. Robert Plant and Alison Krauss – Gone, Gone, gone
23. Fred Eaglesmith – Tinderbox