Flanfire

Watching the Indian Cowboys (with Jenny Obert on fiddle) at Threadgill's Old No. 1 last night, I thought I saw movement in that huge photo of old Kenneth Threadgill dancing at his club decades ago. He would have loved the show - 45 songs over 2-1/2 hours with lots of fiddle, guitar, dobro, and standup bass (provided by new Austinite and Ohio refugee Josh Hoag). Here's hoping chief Cowboys Leo Rondeau (who hails from North Dakota and can frequently be seen with the leggy Brennen Leigh) and Mike Cherry (the long tall dobro player who grew up everywhere in the US of A) can keep this lineup for a while - my wife loved the whole show!

Rondeau and Cherry are both singer songwriters - Leo's voice is somewhere between Jimmie Rodgers and Dwight Yoakum with a little of that George Strait smile, while Mike's resonates a little higher up the scale than his hero Johnny Cash but has that same cadence and tone. Both could use a little work on vocal consistency (hard to find time to do when working full-time jobs), and their playing is right up there - and if they can get Miss Jenny to sing more harmonies and lead vocals, we have the makings of a powerful combination.

Early on, Leo roused the crowd with Billy Joe Shaver's Omaha, and Mike followed with the classic Miller's Cave. Later, they shared lead lines on the Cash classic Delia, then Leo poured out his heart singing Townes Van Zandt's wonderul Tecumseh Valley. A highlight of the second set was a Mike and Jenny duet on Dim Lights, Thick Smoke and Loud Loud Music, but perhaps the hottest cover of the night (other than a host of fiddle solos by Miss Obert) was Leo's rendition of Hank Williams' Long Gone Lonesome Blues.

Mike's originals included Bury Me, Stumblin' On, Take Away (about the wide lonesome plains), and the old Dark Holler favorite No Asphalt in Heaven. Leo's included Breaking My Back, Louann, Life and Times, and my personal favorite You'd Be Wrong. In the house for the evening was Flatlander Butch Hancock, the father of two of Miss Jenny's fiddle students. Hmmmmm! Oh, by the way, my sleeping grandson woke up for just one song the entire night - Jenny sining I'm On To You. The boy has taste - and an eye for beauty - at age 2.

In other big news, Maria's Taco X-Press has its construction permit, and the new place should be going up quickly, because Walgreen's cannot start building their own new store until the old Maria's (and the boot store next door) has been knocked down and hauled away. Sunday we stopped by for some of the Imperial Golden Crown Harmonizers' set and encouraged Jud Newcomb and pals to get to work on a CD that features (relatively new to the band) singers Carolyn Wonderland and Shelley King -- a lineup sure to raise boxes of cash for local charities and thrill everyone lucky enough to obtain their own copy.

We're hoping to finally catch the Melody Mann band at the Alligator Grill on August 6, but there is a lot of music between here and then - including a benefit this Saturday out at Freedom Oaks featuring Toni Price, Shelley King, Leeann Atherton, Flounders Without Eyes, a host of others, and the fabulous BBQ of DT and the Club Chi-Wa-Wa team - all to help a woman whose children were taken from her by Kerr County in a heart-wrenching case that reminds me of the recent true story of a family whose children were taken away after police found a photo of the father giving his baby a raspberry kiss on the belly (and just got them back after a year-long ordeal).