Texas Part IV

Thursday i woke up surprisingly early, for me anyway
and i made some good coffee i had left over from camping in New Braunfels, and brought a cup over to Jeff Mack who was already hard at work a couple hours

making sure the video for the day was prepared. I was anxious to see what i got the night before so i worked on some photos and made my way to the Allsup's acoustic stage to see Max Stalling

and Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis. The crowd grew larger as the day progressed and by the time Kyle Park opened up the main stage they were expanding to the left and right of the stage and back and the beer was flowing. Kyle's music is something i have never really paid any attention too, nothing ground breaking but enjoyable and listenable Texas country.

I already knew the rest of the day was gonna rock With the Departed, Josh Abbott, Wade Bowen and Randy Rogers closing out the evening.

Cody Canada and the Departed face the task of ask of shaking off the old and bringing on the new with their decidedly more mature approach.

Fans of old

Cross Canadian Ragweed need to realize people grow

up, the party songs

have outgrown

themselves and a new band of five rejuvenated serious musicians has arrived,

it is obvious that the Departed

is full of new life and new found energy and they are doing what they love to do again. The songs

may not be familiar right now unless you grew up with or explored Oklahoma music but they are a look back at the rich history of what the

state where red dirt music originally came from

has contributed over all. The hecklers will find someone else to

complain about

and new

fans will be taken in. I can't wait for "This is Indian Land" to come out in a couple weeks, i pre ordered my copy a month ago and i can't wait to see what they do when

Cody Canada & the Departed

becomes just the Departed and also becomes

the full fledged

rock & Roll monster they set out to be. One of the bigge

st drawing bands currently

in the state of Texas, the Josh Abbott band was on stage next. Josh has risen to the top at a head spinning rate, comparisons to other top acts in the Lone Star state seem to have faded and Josh has a firm command of a huge audience with his infectious melodies and entertaining sets. A beer bong was passed to the stage and Josh slammed a couple beers with it, Charla Corn made an appearance to sing a song too. He has become a favorite all over the state and is making good headway elsewhere. Josh has been debuting new songs and has a new album in the works and he has even organized his own festival, JAB fest is in Lubbock June 18th.

Wade Bowen was on next and by this time the sun was down, the lights were up and the beer was going everywhere including towards the stage, i had to keep my camera in mind while i was shooting so that it didn't get as soaked as i was, someone threw nearly a full beer and it hit me on the head and it fell at my feet. I remembered seeing signs stating that anyone throwing objects will be removed from the festival but how do you point out who threw what in a crowd of 20,000 people? Well i didn't remember that sign myself because i picked up the beer at my feet and tossed it over my shoulder back into the crowd, i didn't intentionally throw it, i tossed it high into the air and then realized i shouldn't have done that. It got the other photographers talking but i never heard anything later so i guess i was alright and i did get hit again later, when Randy Rogers was on and Brady Black being the stand up guy he is, walked over to the sound board and tossed me a towel, thanks Brady! The Randy Rogers band were having fun with the crowd, coming out to the edge of the stage, Randy was trying on hats passed up to him and smiling, having a good time and later shared the stage with band members from the acts who played earlier in the day. After the show i stumbled around for a while and ended up in front of Stoney LaRue's bus listening to him and Larry Joe Taylor trade dirty jokes and i got to meet Ben Dorcy otherwise known as "Lovey". Ben is known as the worlds oldest roadie, having gotten his start in 1950 he has worked and is still working with the biggest names in Texas and Nashville country music. A documentary about his life and the true and not so true stories of the road has been produced and is set for release soon. A few minutes later i was invited to go on a hayride with the Randy Rogers band, Wade Bowen and Josh Abbott and friends, guitars in hand we rode around through the camp sites and made our way to the stage where Radney Foster and it all started on Tuesday night for a song swap with Matt Wayne, Kyle Park, Josh and Wade and a few other singer songwriters. I think i finally turned in around 4 am even though i knew i had to drive to east Texas for another festival in the morning and it wasn't long before i was questioning why i ever left.