Record Recipes #37
Desert eagles.
A selection of analog recommendations for your listening pleasure. Pulled from my personal collection. Today’s issue: when you only like a particular kind of country music.
Johnny Cash - Live at Folsom Prison. The first time I played guitar for an audience was in a backyard somewhere in Ventura, California. I was 17 years old, visiting the neighborhood one year after shooting an indie film there. Watching a garage band rehearsal of a bunch of locals, the bass player turned to me and asked if I was interested in playing. I asked how he knew I was a musician at all, I didn’t have my guitar with me. He said he could just tell. That turned out to be Nick St. Nicholas, founding member of Steppenwolf. That night, on someone’s back deck, I played and sang Folsom Prison Blues while Nick held down the low end. The hard drive bearing photographic evidence of this is lost to time. You’ll just have to take my word for it.
The Cactus Blossoms - You’re Dreaming. I got my western phase out of my system in an apartment I ambivalently called The Roadhouse. A comfortable place to stop in, but not to stay for too long. The only other comparable Roadhouse is not of the Patrick Swayze variety, but of Twin Peaks: red velvet curtains, a lonely microphone, and somebody crooning Blue Velvet while the bartender wipes your tears. Roy Orbison would be into it, probably. He’s easily the blueprint for this one. Powder Blue
Emily Rose & the Rounders - Self Titled. Would you believe me if I told you I have a love for line dancing? That a short time ago, I was asked to substitute teach a night of line dancing in WeHo, that close to 100 people showed up (Maggie Rogers among them) and followed my instruction to learn the full speed choreography to Footloose? You might never see me at the Cowboy Palace, but trust and believe you don’t want to. Wildfire
Bonus: that’s me dancing in Emily Rose’s video for Wildfire. I came up with the choreography in the parking lot at Zebulon, 20 minutes before taking the stage.
Keep listening.