Doomsday Outlaw Hard Times

Sown from the seeds of two midlands bands, Finders Keepers, featuring Mel Galley (guitar/vocals), Dave Holland (drums) and Glenn Hughes (bass/vocals), plus the Montanas’ John Jones (vocals/trumpet) and Terry Rowley (keyboards/guitar/flute), Trapeze were discovered by 60s beat supremos The Moody Blues, and snapped up for their own label, Threshold Records.

This off-beat western provides a darker view of the Old West. It is set in the ramshackle town of Hard Times, which is run by a weak-willed mayor who is bullied by a murderous outlaw. After the villain burns down the town, a hero rides in to set things right.

Our favorite songs are like one-night stands: passionate or sad, capable of recalling moments with Proustian power. Our favorite artists are lifelong companions: fixtures we turn to for comfort and highs. Over the last two decades, Jason Boland and the Stragglers have delivered and become both. With their new record, Hard Times Are Relative, Boland and the Stragglers stack the smart, road-ready outlaw country longtime fans have come to expect alongside creative risks that flirt with punk and psychedelic sounds. The 10-song collection is a rare blend of instantly gratifying and rewarding of closer listens – a definitively Stragglers accomplishment. ''It's an upbeat album – a lot of fast songs, but it doesn't try to be fast,'' Boland says with characteristic insight. ''It just sits in the pocket.''

Although he resides in the automotive capital of Flint, MI, vocalist/guitarist Whitey Morgan (real name Eric Allen) is a country boy through and through – and one particularly beholden to Waylon Jennings and his fellow outlaw country posse – David Allan Coe, Willie Nelson, Billy Joe Shaver, and Ray Wylie Hubbard, as well as country traditionalists Merle Haggard and Johnny Cash. In 2005, Morgan began assembling a group of sympathetic Motor City musicians to become his 78's, these being guitarists Jeremy "Leroy" Biltz and Benny James, bassist Jeremy Mackinder, and drummer Mike "Pops" Popovich.

Following the end of the Stormwatch tour in early 1980, Jethro Tull would undergo its largest line-up shuffle to date, resulting in Barriemore Barlow, John Evan and Dee Palmer all leaving the band. Jethro Tull was left with Anderson (the only original member), Martin Barre and Dave Pegg.

It is said that “everything is bigger in Texas,” and with a talent as large as the state itself, musician Randy Pavlock easily breathes new life into the legend. Musically based in Austin, Randy proudly hails from Navasota, “The Blues Capital of Texas.” Together with the band, Twenty Four Seven, this brilliant young guitar slinger delivers the very best in hard-driving, yet heartfelt original Texas blues rock!A self-taught and multi-dimensional guitarist, singer, songwriter, recording artist, and engineer, Randy has displayed his enormous wealth of talents throughout the globe…..