April, 2007

Until you've experienced Michael 'Pa' Coates, from the Unwanted Men in Black and a Lady, leading a packed Port Fairy Folk Festival Shebeen Bar audience in a group sing-along to the Monster Mash, you haven't really lived life to the full.

And so it is with sadness that we learn that Bobby Pickett, the creator of the Monster Mash, has died aged 69. Pa Coates will now carry the burden of love of keeping Bobby's memory alive by always performing The Monster Mash, whenever three or more drunken people are gathered in his presence. Well, he's been doing a fine job of this for many years already, so it shouldn't be too difficult. We owe it to Bobby.

From CBC News:  read more »

At the recent fiddlers' convention, I was fortunate to encounter Rob Lewis, fellow flatpicker from Melbourne way. As a result of our common interest in the flatpickin' arts we have performed a couple of times since, most recently at Pickin' at the Piggery - at the Footscray Arts Centre on the banks of the Maribyrnong.

We were fortunate enough to have our amiable friend Greg Bartlett along to record the event. Unfortunately the recording of the perfomance has been lost due to technical difficulties, but we do have a record of the rehearsal! Attached is a sample of 'Blackberry Blossoms' – sorry about all the sound in the background, but we were in a room full of people who were chatting!

Hopefully you get the idea...

Chips

High & Lonesome return for a Sunday night of post-session Folk'n'Good Country renditions of their favourite Celtic, Blues, Country, Blues, Rock and Bluegrass repertoire.

High & Lonesome will be back for another Thursday night of classic covers, folk, country and bluegrass done as only they can.

High & Lonesome are back for a Sunday night gig straight after the regular Irish Murphys session. The boys are looking forward to seeing some of the old Sunday night crew and play the best of their Celtic, country, blues and rock covers in the old school Folk'n'Good Country style!

OK, so it's only the download charts at www.mp3.com.au and the tracks are free, but at least they're not sending them back!

Slim recently updated the High & Lonesome Artist page at the Australian music download site and added 7 new tracks recorded as a demo for the Maldon Folk Festival.

The charts today put High & Lonesome at #1 on the alt country chart, and #2 on the country chart.

Old Home Place is #1 on the Bluegrass chart and San Antonio Rose #2 on the Country and Western chart. The perennial Broken Wheel Cafe title track is back at #3 on the alt country chart.

The wonder of the modern interwebs!

If Dani is up to it (baby number 2 due in early May) The Cornhuskers will be performing at the Deans Marsh Pioneer Festival, otherwise as High & Lonesome.

The Pie 'n Beer festival is one of a kind. It features dog trials, wood-chopping, local musicians, food, gumboot tossing competitions, vintage cars and farming equipment, and lots more besides.

A great family day. Get there if you can!

With the Woodshed Session freshly produced, Slim checked out mp3.com.au with a view to upload some new material. High & Lonesome's debut CD, Broken Wheel Cafe, was made available there for free streaming and downloading, about two years back. At the time, some of the tracks charted quite well, with an occasional top ten for their alt country genre.

Slim was surprised to find that High & Lonesome were still charting as #3 band in alt country, and nearly fell out of his armchair when the statistics showed that there were 279 downloads in the previous 30 days. Unbelievable! Incredible!  read more »

The High & Lonesome Sinnbeck Experience gathered last week in Chips' Woodshed to whip up a demo of the cream of the Tassie Tour for a Maldon Folk Festival application.

The recordings were made using an Edirol R-09 digital recorder with built-in studio quality mini-condenser microphones (it looks like, and is about the size of, an electric razor). It records better than CD quality at 48Khz and 24-bit. Slim has been keen to try using what Steve Earle called the 'One Mic No Shit' recording technique, much favoured by Bluegrass performers.  read more »