Austin Sound

2/25/08
This past weekend, Jackass took over MTV for a whole 24 hours - we’re sure you were as glued to your TVs as we were. We do have to admit though, that Johnny Knoxville has some great country cred. Last year, he lent his Tennessee cabin (formerly owned by Johnny Cash) to Dale Watson for the recording of From the Cradle to the Grave, and Watson penned the ode “Hollywood Hillbilly” in his honor. Now as part of Jackass’ hostile takeover, he had a segment featuring Willie and family and friends gathering in Luck, TX for a lawnmower race and the recording of his video for “You Don’t Think I’m Funny Anymore.”

As we mentioned back in May, Denton lo-fi experimental duo Shiny Around the Edges recorded a cover of Willie Nelson’s “I Just Can’t Let You Say Goodbye,” with the Castanets’ Ray Raposa. The eerie drone given to the song is unsettling and hypnotic. Now the group has released the song on a 7″ b/w “Applied Quantum Physics,” which features Sean Kirkpatrick of the pAper chAse.

The band also recently did a video for the song, made by Austin production company Grandma, Inc. You can check it out below, and pick up the 7″ from their website.

5/9/07
Last week the Dallas Blog We Shot JR posted up a new song from Denton’s Shiny Around the Edges. The group, built around the duo of Michael and Jennifer Seman, delves through trance-like textures with a foreboding density, and their recently recorded cover of Willie Nelson’s “I Just Can’t Let You Say Goodbye” is predictably dark and haunted. With a minimal, lo-fi buzz, the song takes on a whole new feeling.

The song will reportedly be on their upcoming album, which the duo recorded with Ray Raposa of the Castenets, who contributes keys and distorted back up vocals to the cover. The group will also be participating again in Dead Echoes, the Texas Drone Fest held in Denton on July 20th at the House of Tinnitus. You can find out more information about getting your drone on here.

Willie Nelson needs no introduction, especially to Austin. (Perhaps to Louisiana Troopers though). The career of the red-headed stranger has spanned over half a century, and in that time he has produced one of the most impressive, and broadest, catalogues of hits in music. Austin Powell had the opportunity to speak with Willie just before the ACL festival and contributed the interview from his site Austin in Austin.

Austin in Austin: Why did you choose Cindy Walker and those songs in particular to cover for your latest album (You Don’t Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker)?
Willie Nelson: I’d been singing Cindy Walker songs practically my whole life, not knowing who Cindy Walker was. I just knew everything that Bob Wills had ever done and sung all his songs. It just so happened that all of his songs and albums were actually Cindy Walker’s songs. I found that out later and then even later in life I met Cindy Walker and her mom. They used to come to the disc jockey conventions in Nashville every year and we’d have a good time - talk, and play or sing whatever we’d written recently – we got to be good friends. And I started finding out more and more about what she had written, “Dusty Skies” and all of those great songs that she had written and I realized I’d been singing a whole lot of them throughout the years. I knew she wasn’t getting along that well and was deteriorating in health and I just thought what a good tribute it would be to do an album of her songs.