Michael Corcoran's Overserved

Thank you for making the correction/statement of fact that The Red Headed Stranger by Willie Nelson was recorded in GARLAND at Autumn Sound, and the ENTIRE Girls Go Wild LP by the Fabulous Thunderbirds was recorded at Sumet-Burnet Studios in DALLAS. And Freddy King lived in DALLAS and was managed by Jack Calmes at SHOWCO, in DALLAS. For more, check out WHEN DALLAS ROCKED for free, on YouTube. Don't take it wrong.

What are the 25 greatest albums ever recorded in the Austin area (in which I’m including Luckenbach)? I’m going to be working on that list for a couple weeks, at least, and I’ve got a lot of listening to to, so I made a playlist of songs from the albums to be considered. I can click on the album title when I want to go deeper. Care to listen along? If there are albums that seem ridiculously passed over here, they were most likely recorded elsewhere.

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The sad word comes today that Dr. James Polk, a major figure in the Austin jazz scene since he came up from Corpus Christi in 1959, has passed away at age 83. A keyboardist, also proficient on bass and sax, Polk was a born band leader whose proteges included members of Passenger, who backed Leonard Cohen on 1979’s Recent Songs and subsequent tours.

If I had to choose Dallas counterparts, I would go with Danny Eaton and Jimmy Page who ran and booked the now-defunct Palladium, then the Hot Klub. They brought the best new acts to Big D a few days before the act's first album broke. Like The B-52's, Dire Straits, Joe Jackson and The Police. Then they booked the Stray Cats (on their first tour) into the Hot Klub. Hot on their heels would be Bill Simonton who ran Mother Blues. There was simply NO club like that, in Austin, or anywhere.

Clubs come and go, but what’s always made the Austin community special are the folks who understand how lucky they are to be in the middle of all that music, and do what they can to make it better, easier, more fulfilling. CINDI C. LAZZARI 1955- 2007 Fueled by outrage, an advocate for musicians Watermelon Records was the dominant Austin label of the ‘90s, with career-making releases by Alejandro Escovedo, Don Walser, Tish Hinojosa, the Derailers and more.

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Updated ancient Protestant hymns- from “Amazing Grace” to “Oh Happy Day,” a 1969 pop hit for the Edwin Hawkins Singers, make up much of the contemporary gospel songbook, but there’s no way to overstate the influence of African American compositions of the 1800s. Enslaved people would hear stories of the Bible, but being forbidden to read, they would remember them by making work songs that we now call spirituals.

Back in my UT days (late 80's) and grad school breaks (early 90s) the HitW was the linchpin of my patented 'build your own triple header.' I'd work in the Bio labs til say 8-830 and scoot over to the Cactus Cafe. Then after that, move over to Hole in the Wall. Then finish up at Antone's for whoever was jamming after last call. And yes, i rigged my schedule to 'Fridays off, nothing before noon.' Good times.

Music was an afterthought at 2538 Guadalupe St., which had been Longhorn Cleaners for three decades before the Cuginis—Doug and his parents Orazio and Billie—got a five-year lease on a handshake deal and opened the Hole in the Wall June 15, 1974. They came down from Buffalo when Orazio got a job with defense contractor Tracor, the first Austin-based business to trade on the New York Stock Exchange.