Well we at LittleRockLiveMusic.net got split up Friday Night. I knew Big Smith was in town but I decided to keep things local, and in the family, with Kat Hood and The Good Time Ramblers. Read about G's night out on the opposite side of town with Big Smith in his blog above.
My night started with Kat Hood and Chuck Gilbert, putting on an awesome show at Studio Joe's at 7pm. The place was packed and definitely filled out well over the venue's 65 person capacity. That morning, Kat played "Back Home Again" on Good Morning Arkansas. That song along with "Fences" and "Back When" are my three personal favorites she both wrote and recorded with Chuck Gilbert and Eric Nolen as the Kat Hood Trio. "Back Home Again" has been featured on a promotional spot on AETN and also helped earn the band top honors at 2002's Arkansas Acoustic Festival. Never a bad thing, Kat and Chuck played many John Prine songs scattered throughout the show. Her and Chuck did an especially great job covering Prine's "Killing The Blues" recently made popular by Alison Krauss and Robert Plant. I would highly recommend downloading the free music available on her web site and buying her cd. Her and Chuck have decided to branch off as a duo and continue to make new music together. She is an incredibly gifted songwriter and vocalist. Her and Chuck are both incredibly nice people and are going to try and schedule a concert somewhere in town each month. We will keep you posted with when and where. I was bummed that I had to leave at the start of their second set but The Good Time Ramblers were about to take the stage at Grumpy's at 9pm.
Grumpy's was absolutely packed and GTR rocked three sets for almost four hours. The band played through all the songs off their current cd and many more off their new one due out in the Fall. From the sampling of new songs I have heard at the band's last two shows, "Bigelow Strange" is going to be every bit as incredible as "Sinners Welcome". Gillian Welch, Springsteen, Skynyrd, The Band, Haggard and Willie Nelson were all covered expertly throughout the band's performance and kept people shouting out the familiar lyrics and the waitresses and bartender's very busy.
After completely amping up the hardly dispersed group of loyal fans, still singing and tapping their feet to "Maggie's Farm" at 1:30 am, Jeff Coleman came up to do his instantly classic song, "All The Whisky In Texas". It was encouraging to see the Mother of lead singer John Lefler, and for my second time of the night, Kat Hood show up with her family and make it out to support her son and his band. She came up earlier in the night to do a few songs and sang John Prine's "Angel From Montgomery" with her son and his band. The band added a great new song to their incredibly long list of live music, "Seminole Wind". I just started listening to Donna the Buffalo over the past few months and the song was instantly recognizable from their album "Rockin' In The Weary Land". I really can't emphasize enough how good these guys are live. They have been playing all over town for the past three years and have recently gained some new found momentum. Everytime I see them they are more and more solid. No matter the venue, they always draw a huge crowd and never fail to impress. If you have not seen them live, or bought their cd, you are truly missing out on one of Little Rock's great local acts.
For me, even more than the music, I could not be more impressed by the sincerity and humbleness of both Kat Hood and Chuck Gilbert, the members of GTR, and their incredibly large group of friends, family and fans. They are truly some of the nicest people I have met since moving out here two years ago and Little Rock could not be more lucky to have them.
http://www.myspace.com/goodtimeramblers
http://www.kathood.com
-T
Little Rock can't seem to get enough of The Good Time Ramblers lately. I don't know what rock I was living under the last couple years. It's either I just missed them or this band has just completely exploded onto the LR local music scene. Solid songwriting, great vocals, and an array of impressive instrumentation, there are truly no weak links. They have been writing music since the summer of 2005 and just released an EP last year. In preparation for last weeks run of concerts I checked them out on their Myspace page and was blown away. I marked their White Water show that week on the LRLM concerts page. Originally scheduled to be the opener they unexpectedly headlined that night for American Aquarium and Nathan Singleton. After an incredible performance by the two opening bands from Raleigh and Austin, Little Rock's GTR went toe to toe and played late into the night.
Part traditional country, alternative country, and southern rock, GTR have a passion for music that is widely apparent from their live shows. The band is one of the most solid performing acts I have seen in recent years. Lead vocalist John Lefler and bass guitarist Rich Dwiggins harmonize perfectly, Alex Piazza is an amazingly talented lead guitar and pedal steel player, and Brooks Browning keeps the beat and the energy flowing.
I normally don't go to shows by myself but Thursday night was a big exception. Everybody else from LRLM was out of town so it was just me. I showed up at Sticky Fingerz at around 9:30 just as GTR were getting into their sound check. Sticky Fingerz was jammed packed. Now at first I thought maybe it was the $2 Coronas (beer of the month) or the free cover charge. I was proved wrong when the crowd stuck around for the entire 2 1/2 hour show and judging by their response, became obvious everybody was there for the band. I think the band was even slightly surprised by such a large turnout. Last week at White Water Lefler asked the very welcoming and energetic crowd where they had been for the past three years. Obviously a little taken back by their recent success, this band is definitely going somewhere. With an even larger audience at Sticky Fingerz Thursday night the band fed off of their quickly expanding fan base through the early morning hours.
The band played through their entire EP released last year and several new songs from the tentatively titled Bigelow Strange album due out in the fall. The band has almost completed the album and just needs to spend some more time, and money, in post production. Rich sang lead on several songs including a new one he wrote while hanging out at Tootsie's in Nashville. Another one "Coming Back Home Again" was introduced to the audience that sounds great live. Brooks kicked into the two-step and Alex played an awesome guitar riff that had people instantly hooked.
The band paid tribute to some of their early influences and played through songs by Johnny Cash, Gillian Welch, Jimi Hendrix, The Band, Willie Nelson and a host of others. The band really got the party started and the dance floor hopping when they ripped into their version of "Mississippi Queen". Sticky Fingerz lighting and sound guy, Maestro, worked the lighting controls to make GTR look like something right out of Guitar Hero. I think the most impressive moment of the night came when the band covered Springsteen's "Atlantic City" They covered the legendary song perfectly and transitioned in to my favorite song off their EP "Gotta Get Back". The most unexpected moment came when later in the second half Jeff Coleman from "Jeff Coleman and the Feeders fame" joined the band on stage to play a thunderous version of his awesome song "All The Whiskey In Texas" In case the audience was still not convinced, the band played the most impressive version of Dylan's "Maggie's Farm" I think I have ever heard. Another couple songs off their EP, "Roland Lilly" (written about Lefler's wife) and "Carolina County" had the band's friends the "Saline County Boys" and group from Buffalo Grill stomping to the beat.
If you haven't seen them live yet, you will undoubtedly have plenty of opportunity. The band has a quickly expanding group of fans and are gaining extraordinary momentum. I quite honestly don't know where we have "all been the past three years", but we are all here now, and the Good Time Ramblers freakin' rock.
http://www.myspace.com/goodtimeramblers
-T
Honestly, today I didn't feel like going through this weeks list of concerts and events. It's hard to justify spending several hours a weekend sifting through countless bands passing through Little Rock when your site is hardly getting any hits. That is... until I heard Travis Linville from Norman, OK and The Good Time Ramblers from right here in Little Rock.
Hearing their music on their Myspace pages completely reminded me why I started this in the first place.
For the music.....
That's right, not for the thousands of viewers, advertising revenue, or hits on the Myspace page. -G and I started this site in order to force ourselves to get out and listen to some unheard of artists that we never would have given the time of day before. Travis Linville is one of those artists. There is no way I would have stumbled upon him by reading Sync or the Arkansas Times. There is no excuse for The Good Time Ramblers. Unless I missed something they are a local band that also do not receive a bunch of much needed exposure.
Little Rock has a music scene that showcases most of its talent during the work week. Let's face it, when you are only getting 200 or so people for a weekend show, most respectable bands are going to drive straight on through. Over the past month or so I have begun to realize that Monday-Wednesday shows are typically the best. Claire Holley, Ryan Bingham and Band of Annuals are the three best acts I have seen since I moved here 2 years ago. All three shows were on either a Monday or a Wednesday. I realized unless you actually go out of your way and actually give some of these artists a listen there is no way you are going to show up for their gig.
Anyways, today I was slowly getting ready to throw in the towel. My thanks to Travis Linville and The Good Time Ramblers for their incredible music and reminding me why this site still matters. :)
-T
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