Flanfire

Upon the recommendation of my pal James Bruce, I trundled over to Threadgill's North Lamar tonight to catch Woody Russell - and got a whole lot more than I had bargained for. Okay, I had also agreed to meet my friend Tahni Handal, a California songwriter who has been in Austin a couple of years now, to discuss ideas for her CD release party (which is still a ways down the road). Russell is producing her CD - for the record. Tahni brought her whole extended family, including Rabbi Monte and her three-and-a-half year old daughter Emmy Lou. My has the little girl grown! Not content just to enjoy the music of Woody (on resonator guitar) and pal Danny Bennett (on lap steel), Emmy Lou decided she needed to sing for a few of us - popping out versions of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the alphabet song and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (for starters). She danced, too! And to think her mom had thought she was tired!

Listening to Woody, who is also part of Deb Yager and the Boys (yes, Deb and hubby Bo Reynolds were there - after all, Bo is Woody's manager), quickly reminded me of Elvis Costello and Richard Thompson with a little of Keb Mo's phrasings to boot. On a song that may be titled "Dead Man Walking," Woody sings, "She's the roots of my tree, the salt in my sea, and I won't let her down." On "In the Middle of the Fringe," he is looking for "some place I fit in." Born and reared in Montana, Woody spent his formative years as a street musician in Seattle before relocating to Austin two years ago. Bo Reynolds played during Woody's break - and charmed everyone who listened.

While hanging out at Threadgill's, I ran into my pal Winker, and HE said he was headed over to the Cactus to catch Gurf Morlix and Jeff Plankenhorn - so I decided to hitch a ride (as I live around the corner from Threadgill's, I had let the frau take the car home). Talk about glad I did - both Gurf and Jeff have brand-new CD's out - Gurf's is called "Cut 'n Shoot" and features our boy himself on a tractor at a farm in Canada with a scythe in hand on the front and a rifle in hand on the back cover (photos by wife Brende, I think) and includes some of the coolest country tunes I have heard in quite a while. Plus a song, which must have been written at four am, called (I guess I'll have to sleep with) "Your Sister." The gravel-voiced Gurf was on fire during a solo set, sharing Mary Gautier's "Christmas in Paradise," a song he says left him in tears the first time he performed it on stage in Canada. And no wonder, with lyrics like "Christmas in Paradise, where the warm breeze feels so nice, where the landlord forgives...." This was followed by "Without You" from Cut 'n Shoot, in which he asks, "without you, what good is my heart?" Gurf closed out the set with a stirring rendition of the decades-old yet still pertinent "With God on Our Side."

I got to know Gurf largely through his work with the Imperial Golden Crown Harmonizers and his fabulous guitar work as a side man and through his work as a producer. Rarely have I had the chance to hear him sing his own songs. Over the years, I have learned to appreciate not just his talent, but also his willingness to play whatever instrument, whatever role, is needed at the time for the band. Gurf fans - JUST GO OUT AND BUY THIS CD!

I had last seen Jeff Plankenhorn opening for Slaid Cleaves at the Ginger Man (he also played on Slaid's tour as a member of Slaid's band). Of course, that was the night I ended up with beer in my lap (an OOPS! before anyone had had too much) and had to run home and change into something drier and miss half of Jeff's set. So it was especially good to see the Wimberley Wizard before he runs off next week to Amsterdam and the British Isles with Eliza Gilkyson. His new CD, Plank, features his own material and samplings of singer-songwriters as notable as Blaze Foley. Plank has long been known locally as one of the most incredible pickers around, and now he is making fans around the world with his songs, his vocals, his picking, and his full head of hair and such stuff.

The boys - backed by percussionist Jon Hahn (more to come) - traded guitar licks on such songs as "Killing Time in Texas," which Gurf co-wrote with Troy Campell, Lyin Down off Gurf's new CD, a brand-new Plank song, "The Truth in Me," which he sprang on his buds unrehearsed and told the audience, "They're such pros," they'll catch on. And, of course, they did. Hahn said that Jeff has been doing this to them for a couple of weeks now, as new songs keep pouring out of his head. So to stump Plank, Morlix pulls a chestnut out of the fire -- Merle Travis' "Dark as a Dungeon"(way down in the mines). Plank was wholly stumped. I think I got the joke - but what a great song.

My typical Jon Hahn experience has him playing drums for female country singers - Karen Poston, Suzanna van Tassel, Penny Jo Pullus or even traveling musicians during SXSW at Jovita's. Of course, he also plays with Ray Wylie Hubbard and Jim Stringer and so forth -- but tonight, he brought out his percussionist skills and toys and made what must have been 15 or 20 different sounds with his various paraphrenalia. Every touch added to the song -- he IS a pro, and one of my longtime favorites. Oh yeah, it was Gurf Morlix and the Harmonizers who first introduced me to Jon, years ago.