Hoss’s June 2010 Hossey Award Picks
These are all the songs I’ve chosen for this month’s contest. I know thousands of independent musicians who are deserving of having their songs in this dang deal. So narrowing my picks down to just a few is always the hardest part of my month. Oh well. Such is life.
These guys have been rockin’ the UK since the 1970’s and that’s long enough to have earned themselves the adjective “legendary.” I’m really proud to be playin’ these guys on the dang station. Ya’ll better vote for them, dang it. If the very cool vocals intro from Roger James isn’t enough to catch your attention and earn your dang vote, your family might need to put in a call to the local funeral home before you start stinkin’ the place up. By the way… keeping with a very common HTB theme, no one in this dang band is named Buster. www.busterjames.com.
Chris Dair – Lost in Wasted Time
This recording just in from Chris is in keeping with our recent tradition of featuring brilliant guitar players from the UK on the dang show. Last time Chris was on the show, ya’ll didn’t give him as many dang votes as he deserved. So here he is again. Tell me he’s not rockin’ on this deal, dang it! www.myspace.com/chrisdair.
D.C. Bloom – Luby’s Sweet Tease
Not all that long ago, D.C. was writin’ speeches in Washington D.C. for people like the Director of the FBI. But now he’s finally found his way to Texas and a more useful life: writin’ songs in Kerrville. This dang song is as purty as they come. It might even make you tear up a little if you’re not careful. www.dcbloom.com.
Desyre Seal – Like a Pro
I’ll just let Desyre’s myspace page speak for itself here: “DeSyree is a remarkably talented young women who represents the power of female unity, passion, and pain, through her music while being sexy but classy with a touch of sophistication.” I don’t know about you, but I can feel the power of Superstardome starting coming out of Chicago as I read about this woman and listen to her music. www.myspace.com/whatsyourdesyre.
Freddy Koenig – Psychedelic Coon Sass
This song is off of Freddy’s CD paying tribute to the (much missed, as far as I’m concerned) psychedelic sound. He covers a number of American classics of from a variety of “genres” (from disco to jazz) with some psychedelic weirdness that I can’t stop listening too. This is the coolest song of the bunch. I doubt if anyone else has ever even thought of doing this kind of combination, but, knowing Freddy’s home town of West Columbia, Texas as I do –Mrs. Hoss grew up there, Mama Hoss was raised one town over, and I used to run a little newspaper about 30 miles away) — it certainly explains a lot. www.FreddyKoenig.com.
Kenley Young – Ghosts
Like Postcard Fiction, one of the big names from our April contest, Kenley Young is a regular on the Columbia, South Carolina scene (which I’m starting to discover has a lot in common with the much ballyhooed Austin, Texas music scene). Since I let Desyre’s web page do the talkin’ above, I think it’s only fair I do the same for Kenley. He seems to have the Hoss kind of attitude about the music biz: “What kind of music do you play?” It’s a vexing query. Musicians fear being pigeonholed, and there’s often no one good answer. I still struggle with the question. Luckily, someone else answered it for me a while back: “What does Kenley Young sound like?” asked the bass player for the headlining band that night. “Think back to the last time rock radio was enjoyable to listen to.” www.kenleyyoung.com
Rick Ryman – Why I Wave The Flag
Rick Ryman had some good success in this contest in 2009, and I was disappointed a couple of weeks ago when I realized that I hadn’t included anything else from his “Leg Man” CD in the contest in 2010. So… oversite corrected now, dang it. And the timing is great! This song is perfect to keep the patriotic spirit flowing as we transition this month from Memorial Day to the 4th of July. Rick lives in Nashville and has been trying his hand at non-corporate music there for several years, and I’m dang proud of him for it. And, speaking of Nashville, he sent me this in a recent email, and, if ya’ll vote him into the Top 10 this month, he and I will be sure to talk about it much more in the dang interview: “I was hoping you could give me a couple of minutes on the count down show, cause from what I hear, the National Media didn’t give the flood much coverage. Sorry to say, but it is worse than you see on TV. It didn’t just effect Nashville, but 49 counties in Middle Tennessee. We got anywhere from 12 to 20 inches of rain in two days. It was like having a Hurricane. The flood coverage was much worse than New Orleans, but since we didn’t have wide spread looting, rape, and other criminal acts, there seems not to be a story here. I myself live in a high area, so I was not effected. I but I was effected by the devastation when going to one of the hard hit areas to help with the clean up. That is when I got the idea about asking for your help from the station. I really don’t know what the public outside of Nashville knows, because of the continuing local coverage. Its like everyone around here keeps saying, its going to take a long time to recover from this, so don’t stop helping after a couple of weeks.” www.rickryman.com.
The Fossils – Whiskey and a Gun
This is a band out of Houston that also had some success in this contest in 2009. This is just a bad-ass song. Make sure you head to their website to get the details on how their sales of another song (one that we featured on the show last year) are helping the troops in Iraq. www.myspace.com/thefossils2.
Trey Gadler and Dead Man’s Hand – Last Goodbye
Trey has been rockin’ across America for years, playing with bands like Ugly Wanda and Azrael’s Bane, but now he has finally settled down with some of his buddies in Houston, recorded a few of his own songs, and started a little group that I think is the epitome of people around here call “Texas music.” This song if off their band new CD. www.treygadler.com.
Truax Brothers – Going to Hawaii
Gary and Barry Truax may be the coolest beach dudes in Port Aransas, Texas, the coolest beach town in America. (And, as a testament to HTB’s coolness, they can be found with our little station playing on one of their portable gadgets just about everywhere they go in town. They are, truly, some of Hoss’s biggest supporters!) This song is off the little CD they put together a few years back and that we’ve played the heck out of on the station since I started this deal. I picked it for this edition of the contest because the Truax boys just recently learned that this song appears on the sound track of a movied called Deadlands 2: Trapped. They’re kinda excited about it. Listening to this song as I have for years, though, I never would have pegged it as something that would end up in a zombie flick. Life can be weird sometimes — especially for the Truax boys (who have thousands of stories to tell. Their end-of-month interview will be a classic, I’m sure). www.truaxband.com.
See My Previous Picks
I just tried to order the movie Deadlands 2 from netflix, but they say it’s release date is unknown.