Monday, May 19, 2008

A Little Bit Alt.Country

In the May 9 issue of Entertainment Weekly magazine, horror writer Stephen King lists the 20 songs from his iTunes library that he plays the most often. Alt.country music features heavily, including three artists off the Bloodshot label: "La Cienega Just Smiled," by Ryan Adams, at 16, "CB Song," by Th' Legendary Shack Shakers at number 5, and "Castanets," by Alejandro Escovedo at number 4.

At number 8, he has one my favourite songs of all time, the wonderful "California Stars," a Woody Guthrie song performed by Billy Bragg and Wilco from the album Mermaid Avenue. One of the happiest, most sublime experiences of my life included a late-night performance of this song by Edward Burch and LeRoy Bach in back of The Hideout after a long, sunny day's boozing. You can watch it being performed here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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Anonymous said...

Huge fan of Mermaid Avenue too... v. good...