the hum / By Bob Doran

Red Hot Country

Rooster McClintock’s new CD, plus a busy Saturday night and jazz at Benbow

(Aug. 20, 2009)  Humboldt County is a rural sort of place and as such, there’s a fair amount of country music hereabouts … whatever that means. For some — fans of Big Red Country KRED for example — that might mean the latest from some mainstream Nashville artist like Taylor Swift or Brad Paisley. Then you have musicians the local band Rooster McClintock, who count among their influences deep country old timers like Hank Williams, Bob Wills, George Jones, Johnny Cash, Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Doc Watson and Earl Scruggs, along with current alt. country stars like Dwight Yoakam, Wayne “the Train ” Hancock and Hank Williams III.

The McClintock boys might have KRED set as one of the buttons on the radio in their beat-up truck, but as R.M. rhythm guitarist Jereme Stinespring writes in his song, “Trouble,” they get tired of waiting for the “damn pop country deejay to play a real country song.” In the song, the bad radio solution shifts from the relatively mild (“Turn the radio off, roll the windows down; gonna sing them old tunes all the way to town”) to the extreme (“Gonna burn that station — there’s gonna be some trouble tonight”).

GALLERY >

The song is one of a dozen twang-laden tracks on Rooster McClintock’s fine new album Gold Teeth for a Dead Horse. (You’ll have to ask them what that title means. I have no clue.)

R.M. lead guitarist Jake Wiegandt supplied details on a celebration of the record’s completion: “We are so happy that this day is finally here! It’s been three years in the making. We ran into so many kinks and log jams along the way — fitting for the kind of music we play. But anyways, we will be having our CD release party on Saturday, Aug. 22, at the Portuguese Hall. The Delta Nationals will be there playing an all-country set, but will be missing Dave Ryan on keys. In his place they got Michael Proctor on pedal steel. That’s right buddy, two pedal steels, one night! It’s going to be a hoot.”

Showtime is 9 p.m., but they’ll open a couple of hours early for some barbecue and beer with bar proceeds going to Humboldt Surfrider Foundation.

Speaking of D-Nat Dave Ryan, he called today seeking semi-official confirmation of the cancellation of the Dimmick Ranch’s Live on the County Line alt. country fest with Dwight Yoakam, etc. It seems the Delta Nationals had been enlisted to serve as back-up band for one of the other acts, rockabilly star Wanda Jackson. (They turned down a gig playing at the big beer fest in Fortuna that weekend to take the job.) They’d heard rumors that the organizers pulled the plug, but had not heard from them. In fact, said Ryan, when they told Wendell Goodman, Jackson’s husband/manager, yesterday, he knew nothing about the cancellation and said “that’s news to me.”

A band called Tribute to War plays Friday at Six Rivers, but it’s “not another tribute band” (as they note on their MySpace) and thus has nothing whatsoever to do with the SoCal funk band of All Day Music fame. Instead it’s a three-piece playing rather generic alt. rock.

On the other hand, San Francisco’s Dead Soulsis a tribute band, one focusing on music by ~~~70s Brit post-punk band Joy Division. The band, which includes members of two earlier Joy Division tributes (Leaders of Men and The Ghost of Curtis) plays Saturday night at the Alibi with San Diego gal garage rockers The Glossines.

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