I was planning on doing this last week, but better late than never.  Here's some video and musical accompaniment to my Texas post:

Benevolent sovereign:



Fort Worth was significant for something:



The definitive version of "Dead Flowers":



My favorite Billy Joe Shaver tune:

I once saw Townes Van Zandt perform when I was seventeen. I had some older friends, the kind of friends that liked to expose art to us younger folks. They took me and my friend Tamala, who was the same age as me, to see a revue done by Peter Case and Victoria Williams at McCabe’s Guitar Shop. All that folky shit was foreign to me, so naturally, I wanted to go to the show. The show was an old fashion folk revue. Each artist did a few songs on their own before coming all together to perform. First up was Victoria Williams, with her southern charm and squeaky voice. Former Dream Syndicate leader Steve Wynn followed her. I remember thinking Steve Wynn was boring, but that was a few years before I heard The Days Of Wine And Roses, which is one of L.A.’s finest albums and a personal favorite of mine much later in life.  Actor Harry Dean Stanton followed and played a few songs, including a haunting version of "Cancion Mixteca," a song from the movie, Paris, Texas. It tripped me out that the actor was singing in Spanish. Of course, a few years later when I actually saw the movie Paris, Texas, I thought that the song, the soundtrack, the movie and Harry Dean Stanton were all brilliant.

After a brief set by Peter Case, everyone started performing songs together. Then Peter Case  announced that he had a big surprise. As the rest of the musicians left the stage, he introduced Townes Van Zandt . Townes came on stage with his guitar and a suitcase. He had a show the next night at the same place and the promoters had just picked him up from the airport. I, of course, did not know who he was, but my older friends were about the crap in their pants.

I feel like I am turning into a PG version of Elvis....

Coffee in the morning to wake up, Tylenol PM in the evening to fall asleep....it's the cycle of life at the moment.  And since it's rated PG, I don't think I will end up dying on the toilet or anything anytime soon at least.

But I digress.....

Speaking of R-Rated drug/alcohol habits, after about 6 months of picking it up and putting it down again, I finally finished the biography of Townes Van Zandt I've been reading.  It's called To Live's To Fly, and it just came out this March after almost a year's delay.


As far as interesting lives go, Townes is right up there with Roland Kirk and Brian Wilson.  He went through it all.

Born into a family so well off in the oil business it had an entire county in Texas named after it, Townes shunned his family's wealth and took to a life of alcoholism, rambling and flawless song writing.  I love that in the summers he would take off for Colorado with just a horse and a pack.  I've written about him on this blog before, so I won't go through his whole life history and bore all y'all, but if you have ever heard one of his records, like really listened to it, chances are it stuck with you.  So you probably don't need an explanation from me.

I've been waiting for years for someone out there to research and write a great bio of Townes cause his life was so crazy and lived to the fullest.  Last year's well made documentary Be Here To Love Me  contains beautiful shots and interviews but ultimately scratches the surface of Townes' life and leaves rabid fans like myself with even more unanswered questions than before. 

this weekend i re-watched a favorite of mine, Heartworn Highways.  it's a documentary about the Austin Music Scene in the 1970s.  it came out on DVD only a couple of years ago and the DVD comes with over an hour of extras, all of which are well worthwhile. 

My favorite parts of the movie all involve Mr. Townes Van Zandt.  Van Zandt was a folk singer from Texas who wrote some of (as far as i am concerned) the finest songs around.  he was also a total character, a total alcoholic/addict and a total genius.  i am sure i will devote some other blog to the life and times of TVZ, but for now, you should check out his song, "Waitin' Around to Die" as performed in Heartworn Highways:



it's pretty heartbreaking for me, with Townes' blacksmith neighbor Uncle Seymour Washington crumpling and crying just listening to Townes' song. the film is mainly made up of moments that feel close at least to something authentic and real, and this performance is really the pinnacle moment of the film for me.

Townes is also shown in the film hanging out near his trailer with the essentials: his gun, his dogs, his whiskey and his girl Cindy.  good times.

some of the other musicians in the film include Guy Clark, Steve Young, Steve Earle, Rodney Crowell, and, hilariously, David Allan Coe, who rocks a prison in his complete Rhinestone Cowboy garb. (speaking of moments that are real and true and all that...) there he is, playing in the penitentiary in front of all these inmates dressed in nothing but their prison jumpsuits, and he's decked in rhinestone bedazzled EVERTHING, complete with huge earrings and a gigantor belt that says his name in sparkling diamonds.  he spends a good amount of time trying to relate to the inmates, telling them about his brief prison stay when he was 18 and trying to rally their ire toward the guards by telling them how the guards all drive Cadillacs.  it's pretty over the top, to say the least.  he's like Marky Mark, i mean, serious actor Mark Wahlberg, trying to convince the homies he's hard cause he stayed in the pen for a couple of days.....geez.  oh and speaking of being hard, David Allan Coe has that hipster star tattoo right on his neck.  he predated all y'all!