After 50 years of service to country music, the 80-year-old George Jones has just announced that in 2013, he will be going on his final tour. “The Grand Tour” as it is being billed will include 60 dates. At this time, no dates or cities have been announced. “The Grand Tour” was also an album and song Jones released in 1974.

“It is tough to stop doing what I love, but the time has come,” Jones said in a press release, citing a desire to spend more time with his wife, children, and grandchildren.
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Rejoice saints and sinner alike! Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band is back and comin’atcha with their fif and newest album, Between The Ditches. For this latest chapter in the trio’s rich history, they have taken to White Arc Studio in Bloomington, Indiana, where they toiled (and probably tipped a few) under the watchful eye of producer Paul Mahern (John Mellencamp, Iggy Pop). The proof, as they say, is in the puddin’
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It’s great to hear this level of love and joy Blackberry Smoke brings to their music, a style that is obviously not a marketing contrivance. The album has just been officially released but has been available at their live shows for some time as a reward to their long-time fans. As Starr says “There is no way on God’s green earth that we are not going to put this in the hands of people who have spent their money night in and night out when we’re out doing shows. If we’ve got it, they are going to get it. I’d give them away, I don’t care. I didn’t want to make them wait another six months. They’ve been there for us, and we wanted them to have the music first.”
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Taken from: We Walk The Line: A Celebration Of The Music of Johnny Cash. On April 20, 2012, music stars and friends joined together to celebrate the life of Johnny Cash in Austin, TX

Her second LP, “Lift Your Eyes to the Hills,” was just released (April, 2012), and includes the single “The Bend” featured in Groninger Museum, The Netherlands. Listeners will find Lift Your Eyes to the Hills to be a dramatic shift from the aesthetic of King, leaving the lap steel and minimal drums behind for a pitch bending vintage organ, sub bass, warm mellotron string arrangements, vocal and guitar layers, and full band sound—with sparse and experimental moments still shining throughout the 10 tracks. Thayer sights having old friends Hank Sullivant (Kuroma, X-Whigs/MGMT) and Drew Vandenberg on board, as a big part of the production of this record.
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The Walkmen have spent the span of their career carefully nurturing, pruning and cross-pollinating their bittersweet fruits of sound until they get to the essence of their flavour. More surprisingly is that they appear to have found their niche far closer to the mainstream than anyone could ever have predicted. A record made by a band with utter confidence in their chemistry, Heaven takes another firm and measured stride forward in what is rapidly becoming a celebratory jog towards brilliance: a re-affirmation of what heart, skill, craft and guile can birth given time and experience.
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At its core Headwaters is about searching for the source of our desires, and the freedom that comes from understanding the ways in which the sources influence our directions. Rivers can’t change where they begin, or where they run, neither can we change our histories or escape their influence on us. Headwaters is a collection of parables, hymns and manifestos, stories of love and loss, sadness and joy, threaded together by the search for an ultimate source. Headwaters is my third record in four years, and I’m as excited about music and song-writing as I’ve ever been.
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they are continuing the australian invasion in the very best of ways, marrying snotty garage, melodic diy pop and lo-fi punk rock into one hell of a catchy fucking single–WAYS TO MAKE A LIVING, out now on ANTI FADE RECORDS, a label that you incidentally ought to check out now, LIVINGS EYES’ new 7 inch combines the classic guitar riffs of the 13th Floor Elevators and Kinks with the bounce of Ty Segall and The Oh Sees…….
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Just days after the announcement of a new Fleetwood Mac tribute album, fans can hear the first offering. ZZ Top‘s Billy Gibbons fronts a group that slows down and swampifies the 1969 hit ‘Oh Well.’
No one will accuse Gibbons, Matt Sweeney and Blake Mills of being intimidated by the already bluesy rock song. Their version is an original, born from the mud of Mississippi Delta.
This new power trio stretch a two or three minute cut (original version) to nearly five minutes of rootsy rambling with bare bones percussion and organ garnish. Gibbons is a burly behemoth on vocals, which don’t begin until almost 90 seconds into the song.
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Shovels & Rope is a Charleston, South Carolina-based duo consisting of Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent. They perform as an energetic two-piece band, stirring up a righteous racket with two old guitars, a handful of harmonicas, the occasional keyboard, and a junkyard drum kit harvested from an actual garbage heap and adorned with tambourines, flowers and kitchen rags.

The songs are the deadliest arrows in this bands quiver. Raw and imagined, effortless and insightful, the pair’s panoramic songwriting and raucous performances drive Shovels & Rope’s newest release O’ Be Joyful. Recorded in the twosome’s house, backyard and van, as well as various motel rooms across America, the 11-song set offers a compelling encapsulation of Hearst and Trent’s unique approach, channeling their creative chemistry.
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