Back in the USA

I'm back in the States after a gap of three years taking in festivals in Austin and Nashville and the first few pre-festival evenings have been great. There are six of us - John Howard, Dave Carroll, Alan Lloyd, Lee Wilkinson, Nick Tancock and myself - which is slightly more than normal, but so far so good. The first evening took us to the Continental Club where we caught the regular Monday night show by Austin legend Dale Watson. What a great show it was with a seamless mixture of Americana, Country and rockabilly numbers with regular calls by Dale to drink Lone Star beer, which he has been promoting for years. Highlights included 'Ring Of Fire', 'Is Anyone Going To San Antone' and 'Jambalaya' and there were a couple of numbers by, I think, James Penrose including 'From A Jack To A King'. Dale's shows are seemingly endless and we baled out after about 90 minutes but it was a fantastic start to the trip. Next day we had a wander around Austin during the day but it was pretty dead. Not so in the evening when we went to Antones to see another Austin legend Lou Ann Barton. backed by the Moeller Brothers, who have spent time in the Fabulous Thunderbirds, This was another brilliant show despite there being a very thin crowd. The Moellers set the ball rolling with the trio producing excellent versions of blues classics such as 'Pretty Thing' and 'It Hurts Me So'. Lou Ann more than lived up to expectations with moody plaintive versions of blues numbers by Slim Harpo ('Baby Scratch My Back' and 'Shake Your Hips' for example), Hank Ballard and others, including 'Stop These Teardrops'. It was a fairly short set but really top drawer. The support act later Sarah Barton and the Heat, also came across well. We decided to rent a car for a couple of days after numerous Uber trips and drove out to the Texas Hill Country. We had lunch in Blanco and stopped off in Gruene, home of the oldest dance hall in Texas. The evening's entertainment was beyond brilliant , a celebration of Buddy Holly' birthday at the Sagebrush in South Austin featuring an all star cast. The band, led by Colin Gilmore, played all Buddy's timeless songs with different artists contributing. Rosie Flores sang 'Heartbeat', BettySoo led on 'Words Of Love', Jimmie Dale Gilmore on 'Oh Boy', Pat Byrne on 'Well Alright', Kimmie Rhodes on 'Midnight Shift', Julian Neil on 'That's My Desire'. And there was 'Peggy Sue', with a tribute to co-writer Jerry Allison who died last week, 'It's So Easy', 'True Love Ways', 'Not Fade Away', 'Raining In My Heart', with everyone joining in on 'That'll Be The Day'. It was a truly joyous occasion with a birthday cake and fond memories of Buddy. The Buddy Holly Story was the first LP I owned and I, along with countless others, sang along throughout. Tomorrow is the start of the Eastside Kings Festival the reason we are here, but what a great trip it has been so far. I will put photos on the Vinyl Word when I get home.