DAVE'S DIARY - 19/1/2015 - PREVIEW OF EPISODE 8 -SERIES 25
GRAMMY ACE STEVE MARTIN HEADLINES NU COUNTRY TV
Five time Grammy winner and singing actor, comedian and screenwriter Steve Martin headlines Nu Country TV Monday January 26 at 2.30 pm on Channel 31, Digital 44.
Nu Country will premiere Mondays at 2.30 pm for the next two weeks during the Channel's festival
Martin is joined in Behind Bars by Edie Brickell and his bluegrass band Steep Canyon Rangers on a show repeated Monday 5.30 am, Thursday at 2.30 am and Saturday at 11.30 pm.
Michigan group Greensky Bluegrass also appears in Behind Bars and Kentuckian Pistol Annies singer Angaleena Presley debuts a double shot of her songs in the program filmed and edited by Laith Graham.
Dual Grammy nominee Brandy Clark also returns with Cannons Creek dairy farmer and Shed Festival promoter Turk Tresize.
And we also feature a snippet of singing Texan crime novelist Kinky Friedman's classic They Ain't Making Jews Like Jesus Anymore on the eve of his return to Caravan Club , Oakleigh, on January 23 and 24
Nu Country TV is a highlight of the C 31 streaming list on Digital 44.
Just follow this link on your computer or mobile phone - http://www.c31.org.au/program/view/program/nu-country-tv
EDIE BRICKELL DUET WITH STEEP CANYON RANGERS
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Waco born Steve Martin evoked humour in the video for Pretty Little One with fellow actor and duet partner Edie Brickell and The Steep Canyon Rangers in our Behind Bars bluegrass special. The mirthful murder ballad is on Steep Canyon Rangers live CD - their 10th album. |
Fellow Texan Edie - 48 and long-time wife of Paul Simon - is a fellow Grammy winner with Martin for 2014 duet album Love Has Come For You .
Banjo ace Steve has appeared in 52 movies, more than 100 TV shows and writes screenplays and books when not performing 50 dates a year with Steep Canyon Rangers .
After meeting at a party, twice wed Martin invited them to tour and record with him - they joined up on Prairie Home Companion radio and TV shows in 2009.
His eighth album Rare Bird Alert - also featuring Dixie Chicks and Paul McCartney - was nominated for a Grammy and won IBMA's Entertainer of Year Award.
In 1978 and 1979 he won Grammys for best comedy with albums Let's Get Small and A Wild and Crazy Guy .
In 2001 Martin, who has also written movie screenplays and books, won another when an all-star rendition of Foggy Mountain Breakdown scored best country instrumental.
Martin, an exceptional banjo player, shared it with musical icon, Earl Scruggs, Scruggs' sons and Jerry Douglas, Vince Gill and more A-list collaborators.
Martin's comedy thrived as The Crow: New Songs for the Five-String Banjo won the 2009 award for best bluegrass recording.
Love Has Come for You by Martin and New Bohemians singer Brickell was also nominated for best 2014 Americana album and best Americana roots song.
Further info - www.stevemartin.com
GREENSKY BLUEGRASS
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Michigan quintet Greensky Bluegrass debuts in Behind Bars at Telluride in Colorado with their video for Burn Them from their eighth album If Sorrows Swim .
“There was something on This American Life ,” mandolinist, vocalist, and songwriter Paul Hoffman says of Burn Them that also inspired the album title.
“Someone was talking about just how upset and sad they were. They were drinking a lot, but they just couldn't drink that pain away. When I heard that, I thought to myself, ‘What if sorrows swim?' I couldn't get that thought out of my mind.”
The band was formed in Kalamazoo - home of the original Gibson Mandolin-Guitar factory - in 2000.
They released debut album Less than Supper in 2004, second disc Tuesday Letter in 2006 and Live At Bell 's , documenting two shows at Bell's Brewery in Kalamazoo in 2007.
In August 2008 they released third studio album Five Interstates followed by live series , All Access , in 2010 with Volumes 1 & 2, featuring live performances in their entirety.
Their fourth album Handguns debuted on Billboard at #3 in October 2011 and spent nine weeks on the chart.
Further info - http://greenskybluegrass.com/
KINKY LEAVES UTOPIA FOR OAKLEIGH CARAVAN
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Singing Texan crime novelist Kinky Friedman reprises a live snatch of classic They Ain't Making Jews Like Jesus Anymore on the eve of his return to Caravan Club in Oakleigh on January 23 and 24. The Kinkster, now 69, was returned to the private sector after running for Texas Agricultural Commissioner in last year's Lone Star State elections. Kinky promised to legalise marijuana as a cash crop for medicinal purposes - a campaign that suffered similar fate to his run for JP at Kerrville in 1986 and Texas Governor in 2006. The defeat freed the singer up to finish a new novel The Detective In The Hard Boiled Computer that is now at the printers but not likely to be on sale here for his Journey In Time Misunderstood Genius tour. |
Instead the Kinkster, who runs the Utopia animal shelter on his Echo Hill ranch in the Texas hill country, is touring to promote rare recording relics, now available on CD.
“But anyway, politics' loss has been literature's gain, and I'm back to writing again for the first time in about eight years,” the legend revealed.
“I did a Victory Tour on the East Coast of the U.S. and a Bipolar Tour in Europe last year. A Bipolar Tour is an idea that Willie Nelson gave me, which is very practical. You never take a night off. You push yourself until you're running on pure adrenaline. I did thirty-four shows consecutively in seven different countries.”
The Kinkster is philosophical about his political defeats.
“And remember, there was a guy in the State Department in Pakistan that contacted me when I lost the race for governor in 2006 and he said, "Don't feel bad, the crowd always picks Barabas." That's a biblical reference, the crowd always says, "Free Barabas, kill Jesus." I think Willie Nelson is probably correct again when he says, "If you fail at something long enough, you become a legend."
The Kinkster also performs Vanguard Hotel , Sydney , on January 16 & 18 and New Globe Theatre , Fortitude Valley , Brisbane on January 22 en route to Oakleigh.
CLICK HERE for our Caravan Club review in our Concerts section on November 28, 2013.
CLICK HERE for our feature on the Kinky-Van Dyke Parks tour in the Diary on June 28, 2011.
CLICK HERE for our exclusive Kinky interview in The Diary on May 18, 2011.
ANGALEENA PRESLEY PAIN PILLS
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Singer-songwriter Angaleena Presley lives up to the famed family name with a double shot of videos from debut solo album American Middle Class . The Kentucky Coal-Miner's Daughter exercised a wry sense of humour in her title track that features her coal-miner father. Jimmy Presley also appears talking about life as a coal miner with the comment "it ain't no life, really." |
Angaleena, 38, grew up at Beauty near the Van Lear coal mines made famous by Loretta Lynn.
Another Kentucky coal-miner's daughter Patty Loveless sang on the title track of the album produced by Angaleena's husband Jordan Powell.
“That was a combination of things,” Presley said of Jimmy's cameo.
“I sat down and recorded him and let him talk for two hours one day. So I wrote the song after I had documented all of these stories. For part of it, there's a sadness to it because you spend your whole life underground, and you know you've sacrificed a lot. There were times I didn't even see my dad except for Sundays. And he didn't see the light of day except for Sunday because when he would go in, it was dark. When he would come out, it was dark. And it was dark in the mines. So, he would literally only see the sunshine on Sundays.
Presley also warned of medication misuse in Pain Pills that she wrote after a funeral in her home state.
“I started that song as I was on my way home from a funeral,” Presley revealed.
“A friend of mine from high school OD'd, and at the funeral, the mom was walking in going, ‘Oh, they had a heart problem. It was a heart issue.' We knew what was going on. This is when I realised, this is starting to become a problem.”
Pistol Annies singer Holler Annie admits it's also a personal issue.
“Addiction has really changed the face of my personal life and a lot of things in my family,” she added.
“If there's anything I would get up on a soapbox for, it's prescription medication. I just think it's a travesty how careless doctors are with that stuff. Let's start talking about it, let's get some resources. Let's get some help.”
Pain Pills is just one of 12 personal tracks on American Middle Class .
“It's like my autobiography - each of the songs is a chapter of my life. I've literally lived every minute of this record,” Presley explained.
“My mama ain't none too happy about me spreading my business around, but I have to do it. It's the experience of my life from birth to now.”
Presley shot the video in Nashville with Jimmy in key roles.
“He's in the video and plays the part of the undertaker and the evil doctor. He was so cute and took direction so well and was so tickled to be a part of it,” Presley revealed.
“That song is special to me because my hometown has been ravaged by this epidemic, so to have something for people to see, maybe they will not be afraid to try to find an Al-Anon meeting or, heaven forbid, start a group - an Al-Anon group or a NA Narcotics Anonymous group. There's not really a lot of resources, and rural America needs it worse than anyone. So my goal is just put it out there and get people talking about it.”
Angaleena also wrote hits for Ashton Shepherd, Heidi Newfield, Texan Sunny Sweeney, fellow Pistol Annies singer Miranda Lambert and both Pistol Annies albums
She penned Knocked Up, the Territory and Little Things for Hunter Valley singer Kirsty Lee Akers, Look It Up for Fawkner singer Jasmine Rae and songs for other Australian singers.
Further info - http://www.angaleenapresley.com/
BRANDY CLARK TAKES A LITTLE PILL
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Dual Grammy nominee and Washington born singer-songwriter Brandy Clark continued the medication theme with her satiric video for Take A Little Pill from her debut album 12 Stories . Brandy has written hits for Miranda Lambert and fellow Texan Kacey Musgraves who plays CMC Rocks Queensland at Ipswich in March. Clark, now 37, has lived in Nashville for 16 years and co-wrote Miranda Lambert's #1 hit Mama's Broken Heart and Band Perry chart-topper Better Dig Two. |
She also landed her songs on albums by artists diverse as Gretchen Wilson, Ashton Shepherd, Reba McEntire, Sheryl Crow, Keith Urban and Darius Rucker.
Clark won 2014 CMA Awards for Song of Year for Musgraves hit Follow Your Arrow .
Brandy was reared in Morton , Washington - a logging town of only 900 people in shadows of Mount St. Helens .
Her indie album features Vince Gill on background vocals and debuted at #28 on Billboard .
On January 6 this year Clark made her network TV debut with Stripes on The Late Show With David Letterman .
Clark opened for Sugarland singer Jennifer Nettles on her 2014 tour and wrote satiric Songs About Trucks for Waco country singer Wade Bowen.
Further Info - http://brandyclarkmusic.com/
TURK TRESIZE PATERNAL PRIMER FOR SHED FESTIVAL
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Cannons Creek singer-songwriter Turk Tresize returns to Nu Country with his video fora song we will hear on his January tour with Georgian Eric Lee Beddingfield. Daddy Was A Roller is on Turk's 2013 album Soul Casino. Tresize works with Aussie musos who performed in England with him as Skippy's Nightmare. |
Turk didn't begin playing music until 20 when his mother gave him his first guitar - his friend in moments of solace since.
Like many rural rooted Australians he found truth and comfort in music while watching his family fight to keep their farm.
He built a recording studio in his farm milking shed, aptly called The Shed .
The soundproofed studio provided Tresize means to explore his passion for song-writing and laying down demos.
But Tresize travelled to Music City to record his debut album, Soul Casino at The Bomb Shelter in East Nashville .
That studio specialises in recording and mixing entirely to tape.
After a long flight, a meeting and a few drinks he decided the final version of Soul Casino would be recorded and produced in Tennessee - with no Pro Tools or Auto-Tune.
Soul Casino was released in October 2013 under Turk's label, Dairy Shed Records .
The album is a healthy hybrid of southern rock, roots rock, blues, alternative country and Americana .
Turk took his show on the road in New York, Nashville, Atlanta, Alabama, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Connecticut and Whiskey a u Go-Go in Los Angeles.
Turk has since played festivals and clubs in and around Melbourne to showcase new single Daddy Wazza Roller that scored exposure on Pandora and terrestrial radio stations.
CLICK HERE for tour dates in Tonkgirl's Gig Guide.
FURTHER INFO - http://turktresize.com/
FURTHER INFO - http://www.elbrocks.com/
HOW TO KEEP NU COUNTRY ON AIR
We need your support as we celebrate the 25th series of Nu Country TV.
Australian record companies and artists have joined forces to ensure our survival.
We have new CDS by major artists you can win by becoming a Nu Country TV member or renewing your membership.
They include singing actors Willie Nelson and Tim McGraw, Voice judge Blake Shelton, Ashley Monroe, Brad Paisley, Gary Allan, Toby Keith, Dierks Bentley, Eric Church, Chris Young, Charley Pride, Slim Dusty, Kacey Jones, Rosanne Cash and more.
We also have DVDS by Lady Antebellum.
CLICK HERE for our Membership Page for full details.