Hank Williams, Jr. has had a lot to long for–a dead famous father, an accident that left him scarred and forced to wear his trademark beard, hat, and sunglasses at all times, and he must be upset that all his “rowdy friends” in country music are actually liberal pinkos who love prisoners, government programs, and true American freedoms, i.e. Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, the late Johnny Cash, you name it.

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Deer Tick is meant to be a traveling band and country is just traveling music. Let’s cross out the labels they’ve been stamped with—freak-folk, alt-country, indie rock, and the like. Let the music (and John McCauley) do the talking. This interview by Ilyse Kaplan.

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Tall and courtly like some 1950s Nashville idol, Earle’s brand of C&W insurgency is highlighted by a knack for raising the ghosts of traditional America inside a context colored by our 21st-century blues. Our chat finds him dealing well with being a Southern boy in the East Village. This interview by Ron Garmon.

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Country-clad strangers huddled around the bar and red-lit couches, holding beers and cookies rather than guns. The DJ played Hank Williams between bands until they ran out of his material, then Loretta Lynn took over. Chilling on the tiered chairs within The Cowboy Show’s intimate vibe, the audience sat rapt, almost hypnotized, every time a band took stage.

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Screaming Females fire right down the middle between Husker Du, Damaged Black Flag and Teenage Jesus and the Jerks and occupy more psychic space as an irreducibly solid three-piece than bands several times their age and weight combined. There are many gerunds that begin with ‘S in English and they use the ten best in every set. Their newest Power Move is out now on Don Giovanni. This interview by Chris Ziegler.

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Elaine’s Hella Hipster Hoedown has become a welcome quarterly distraction—I’d be happy if she staged one every weekend. An indie-rock barn dance held the first Saturday this month at Pehrspace in hella non-bucolic South Echo Park, this happening was packed to the paint with veal-eyed darlings of the Eastside rock scene. I could scarce wedge my lean geezer’s carcass into the room, much less commandeer one of the authentic hay bales strewn about the room as bovine bric-a-brac, so I tarried outside and talked to the hostess. Being a Dixie lady herself, she was pretty impressed to meet a (half) authentic Tazewell Co., VA, hillbilly and I found myself unaccustomedly bashful. (About in the only other social advantage my heritage is usually good for is informing the occasional obnoxious fuck he owns a real purdy mouf’ with just the right inflection, so this kind of approval is unusual.)

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