Hear Dave Alvin & The Guilty Women live on Etown Oct. 14-20

Click here to find a station near you:
http://www.Etown.org/listen.summary.php?id=289&air_date=2009-10-14

AMY FARRIS (violin, viola and harmony vocals for Dave Alvin & The Guilty Women) passed away Saturday, Sept 26th after battling a long illness.



A native of Austin, Texas, Amy started playing violin at age ten. She is a vet of the Austin music scene, playing with artists such as Ray Price, Alejandro Escovedo, Kelly Willis, Bruce Robison and Ray Wylie Hubbard.

Amy moved to Los Angeles when Dave offered to produce her first solo CD Anyway, released by Yep Roc in 2004. Along with Dave Alvin and Kelly Willis, Miss Farris has also performed and/or recorded with Brian Wilson, John Doe, Exene Cervenka, Stan Ridgway, Greg Dulli, Peter Case, and many others.

In lieu of flowers, the family encourages you to send a donation in her honor to Hungry For Music, Inc, a nonprofit effort to provide musical instruments to underprivileged children with a hunger to play.

Hungry For Music website
 Or send checks to:
Hungry for Music
6 Grant Ave. Suite 3
Takoma Park, MD  20912

YepRoc News

"GREAT show last night. Besides the stellar musicianship (Amy Farris - hokey smokes!) of the band, and the wonderful songs, Dave's stage presence was low key and self-effacing ("After 30 years of performing, for the first time I'm the best looking man in the band!") and downright funny (he kept riffing on the Regatta part of Regattabar)."

Richard at Dyno Records


Copy and paste the following links to read some more of our band reviews from the current tour

http://www.metrosantacruz.com/metro-santa-cruz/06.17.09/a&e2music-0924.html


http://www.independent.com/news/2009/jun/16/dave-alvin-heads-live-oak/


http://www.straight.com/article-223440/dave-alvin-and-guilty-women


http://www.countrystandardtime.com/d/article.asp?xid=1085


http://cahlsjukejoint.blogspot.com/2009/05/dave-alvin-and-guilty-women.html


http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/46767827.html


http://bakersfieldandbeyond.wordpress.com/2009/06/12/dave-alvin-interview/01-dave-alvin-interview/


http://www.chicoer.com/entertainment/ci_12562769

click on image to make bigger Rantoul & Die Benefit Performance Website

Walking With Mr. Lee AVAILABLE HERE!!

WALKING WITH MR.LEE
(Lee Allen - Angel Music BMI)

"David, the saxophone may not be your instrument."

With those gentle words, Lee Allen convinced me to try playing guitar or harmonica or piano or kazoo, anything but the tenor sax. I was about 15 and Lee had already given me a couple of sax lessons when at the end of our last lesson he made his pronouncement on my saxophone abilities. I was a bit crushed to have my sax hero tell me that I stunk but seeing how Lee was one of the greatest R+B/rock and roll sax players ever, how could I argue with him. Eventually I found my way to the electric guitar and have been happy ever since.

For those of you who've never heard the name Lee Allen, you have certainly heard his saxophone artistry for the past several decades on the radio and anywhere else music is played. Lee played the wonderful, melodic sax solos on most of the classic hits by Fats Domino and Little Richard as well as legendary recordings by R+B luminaries like Professor Longhair, Dr. John, Huey "Piano" Smith, Lloyd Price, Smiley Lewis, Big Joe Turner, Etta James, Amos Milburn, Shirley & Lee, and just about anyone else who passed through New Orleans in the 1950s and the early 60s. Along with fellow saxmen King Curtis and Sam "The Man" Taylor, Lee was one the founding fathers of rock and roll saxophone. If there's any justice, Lee Allen will someday be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame where he deserves to be as much as any of the other inductees.

In honor of my old saxophone teacher, I recently went into Craig Parker Adams' Winslow Court Studio in Hollywood and recorded a guitar version of Lee's 1957 sax instrumental hit, WALKING WITH MR.LEE. Besides the always tough Guilty Men rhythm section of Steve Mugalian on drums and Gregory Boaz on bass, I was very happy to be joined on the recording by keyboard whiz Skip Edwards (some of you may know Skip from his work with Dwight Yoakam, Johnny Rivers and on my King Of California CD). I tried my best to do a note for note version of Lee's song but in a couple of spots a few of my own licks popped up but I don't think Lee would be too upset. If you dig this song, I highly recommend searching for Lee's original recording as well as checking out the many tracks he recorded with countless artists over the years. You'll hear the art of a true American Music original.

It's a very long story, that I don't have space to go into here, about how Lee came to be living in Los Angeles and then how he became a mentor, role model, teacher and life-long friend to my brother Phil and me. From our early teenage days through our adult years, when we were blessed to have him as a member of our band The Blasters, Lee did his best to instruct us not only musically but also in the hard realities of surviving the treacherous music business. For all that I'm forever in his debt. I'm also eternally in his debt for getting me to stop trying play tenor sax. Lord knows where I would have wound up if I followed that road. Probably pumping gas somewhere.

Dave Alvin - Jan 6, 2009

Amanda Available Here!!

A few years back, knowing full well that I couldn't come anywhere near Waylon Jennings classic original, I agreed to to record a version of "Amanda" for a Waylon tribute CD. Maybe for private sentimental reasons or maybe because the bittersweet, middle-aged angst lyrics of the song have always appealed to me, I went into the studio and gave it a shot.

"Amanda" was written by Bob McDill, a successful, transplanted Texas songwriter in Nashville. Although, throughout his long songwriting career, many of Bob McDill's songs have been covered by such stars as Don Williams, Jerry Lee Lewis, Pam Tillis, Alan Jackson, Mickey Gilley, Crystal Gayle and even Sam The Sham And The Pharaohs, "Amanda" is perhaps his most famous composition due to the huge hit recording by Waylon. I don't that much about Mr. McDill's other songs but if I had written "Amanda", I might just quit songwriting because I may not be able to write anything as good again.

I played acoustic guitar and sang as best as I could as some old friends joined me for the session; Chris Gaffney (accordion and harmony vocals), Greg Leisz (electric guitar) and Don Heffington (drums), while Mark Linett recorded the basic track at his Your Place Or Mine Studio in Glendale, California. In an odd twist to the recording, Paul Gannon later recorded some overdubs in Nashville at Big Ears Studio that featured Dave Roe on bass, Mike Daly on steel guitar and Chuck Mead on guitar. This impersonal, transcontinental approach was an unorthodox way of recording a song, and I don't normally recommend it, but I think it came out all right in the end.

Even though his songs are more famous than he is, maybe someday someone will do tribute record to Bob McDill. If they ever do, tell them to give me a call.

Dave Alvin - November 13, 2008

SEEDS - written by Bruce Springsteen

Seeds AVAILABLE HERE!!

Well, what can you say about Bruce Springsteen that hasn't been said?
Looking past his iconic status, massive success and legendary live
performances, I guess the only thing I can say that really matters is that
he is simply a great damn songwriter. For us songwriters that is ultimately
the only thing that counts.

Back in 1997, I was in Austin producing one of the Derailers records (a
great Bakersfield styled country-rock band) when Cheryl Pawelski asked me to
contribute a performance to a Bruce Springsteen tribute she was producing
for Capitol Records. I was hesitant at first because Bruce Springsteen's
recordings of his own songs are pretty much THE definitive versions and I
didn't think I could possibly bring anything new or unique to any of his
songs. Cheryl was gently persistent though and eventually I agreed to record
a little known Springsteen song called SEEDS.

Springsteen's recording of SEEDS was only issued on one of his live records
(as far as I know - maybe all you Springsteen experts know different) and it
wasn't anywhere near as well known as most of his material. That made me
feel a bit more comfortable doing it because it was a song I could easily
bend and shape to fit my own style. Springsteen's version is sort of a loud
rocker while my approach was to make into a swampy blues song. I also liked
the lyrics that tell one side story of what was going on down in southeast
Texas during the rough times of the 1980's. Back then a lot of people
ventured down to Houston and similar oil towns looking for work and were
often disappointed by what they found. If that isn't a good subject for a
blues song I don't what is.

A recording session (at Arlyn Studios with the superb engineer Stewart
Sullivan twisting the dials) was quickly planned around the Derailers
sessions and I gathered some of my favorite musicians in Austin to cut the
track. Joining me for the first time in the studio was future Guilty Men
guitarist, Chris Miller, on the snaky lap steel while future Guilty Women
bassist, the extraordinary Sarah Brown, and harmonica virtuoso Ted Roddy
added their great talents. Sadly, it was my last recording session with an
old friend, the late Donald Lindley, on drums. Donald played drums on my
BLUE BOULEVARD and MUSUEM OF HEART albums and you may know him from his
memorable work with Lucinda Williams, Buddy Miller, Joe Ely and Jim
Lauderdale, among others. Like so many other of my friends who've now moved
on, I miss Donald very much.

We only had a couple of hours of studio time to record SEEDS so we didn't
have the luxury of fretting about our arrangement or performance too much.
We just gathered in a circle in the studio, played it through once for
rehearsal and then cut it live in one take. Some songwriters don't mind when
someone changes one of their songs while other songwriters can get a little
upset if too much liberty is taken with their material. I don't know if
Bruce Springsteen ever heard our version of SEEDS but I hope that he'd kind
of dig it. I hope that you dig it too.

Dave Alvin - October 27, 2008

BOSS written by J. Wenzel - Downey Music BMI

BOSS! Available for download here!

While the Carpenters are the most famous musical group to come from my
hometown of Downey, California, I have to admit they aren't my favorite.
Through the years I've come to appreciate Karen's melancholy vocals and
admire Richard's arranging chops but, none the less, to me the greatest band
to have risen up from Downey's old orange groves and new tract homes of the
early 1960's were The Rumblers. And their signature song was the tough
instrumental, BOSS!

Often classified as a "surf" band, The Rumblers were actually a hard
rocking, sharp dressing R+B combo who were described by their original
bassist, Wayne Matteson, as "a black band with white skin." The Rumblers
recorded BOSS in the backroom of a Downey record store called Wenzel's Music
and it was first released in 1962 on the Downey Records label (A small label
run by the record shop owner Bill Wenzel with his son Jack, who had their
biggest success with the surf classic PIPELINE by the Chantays as well as
cutting other great surf, R+B, blues, rockabilly sides through the late
fifties and sixties). BOSS was a fairly big regional hit in California (it
even charted to some extent nationally) and is now considered one of the
essential early surf rock records. Despite recording some fantastic R+B,
surf and proto-garage-punk instrumental follow ups, The Rumblers never had
another hit and disbanded in 1965.

Bill Wenzel's other son, Tom (along with Tom's lovely wife Maxine), kept the
record store going as an "oldies" store long after the glory days of the
Downey Records label. When my brother Phil and I were kids we considered it
a Mecca of sorts. It was the place where we could find old, rare blues,
country, rockabilly and do-wop 45s, 78s and LPs. After I grew up and moved
out of town, I'd still drive back to Wenzel's to see what "new old records"
they had in stock. One day at Wenzel's, after The Blasters started getting
well known, I was lucky enough to meet one of the original Rumblers,
guitarist Johnny Kirkland, who just happened to have stopped by that day.
Well, to say that I gushed over him like a kid meeting Santa Claus would be
an understatement. He just smiled as this wild young guy with a pompadour
raved on and on about The Rumblers and how raw and powerful their records
were. He was extremely kind and patient with me (as is another Rumbler I
still cross paths with, saxophonist/philosopher Rex De Long). Sadly, Johnny
Kirkland passed away a few years after that and Wenzel's Music finally
closed it's doors in 2002.

My version of BOSS was recorded a couple years ago as a bonus track for my
WEST OF THE WEST tribute to California songwriters CD. While I crank up my
electric guitars, my fellow Downey guy and Rumblers connoisseur, Blaster
Bill Bateman pounds out the big BOSS beat on the drums along with long time
Guilty Man and long board surfer, Gregory Boaz, who does his always expert
job on the throbbing electric bass. The superb engineer Craig Parker Adams
recorded us at his Winslow Court Studio in Los Angeles. I had a ball finally
recording a song that meant a lot to me growing up and I hope you get a kick
out of it. If you do, I then suggest you look for some of the Rumblers
tracks that are available on a variety of surf and instrumental rock and
roll reissue CDs. Even better, go looking for some of those old Downey
Records 45s. You might even like them more than The Carpenters.

Dave Alvin - Sept 23, 2008