{"id":76,"date":"2022-03-05T21:28:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-05T21:28:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/?p=76"},"modified":"2023-03-10T12:38:00","modified_gmt":"2023-03-10T12:38:00","slug":"new-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/?p=76","title":{"rendered":"New Deal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Lyrics<\/strong><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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New Deal<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

2002<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Tracklist:<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Poison
No Heart
In The Honky Tonk Shadows
Johnson To Jones
Blink Of An Eye
New Moon
Better Everyday
Just No Way
Afc Song
New Deal Blues
I’m A Ghost
The Lie<\/p>\n\n\n

\"\"<\/div><\/div>
\"\"<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n

Reviews:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.ink19.com\/issues\/october2002\/musicReviews\/musicW\/wacoBrothers.htm<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

For nearly a decade the spirits of Johnny Cash and Hank Williams have been riding aboard the runaway Waco express. Resurrecting all that was good about classic country and recasting it in an idiom of their, the Waco Brothers corroborate that a rich tradition has not fallen on deaf ears. With New Deal, they have again deftly juxtaposed sociopolitical consciousness with joviality, engendering more of the most rockin\u2019 gallows humor for which the band has come to be known. Their raging, foot-thumping honky tonk take on the whimsical \u201cJohnson To Jones,\u201d a song about cradle-robbing (or, rather old-folks\u2019 home robbing), is uproarious. Yet, as the deceptively somber \u201cNew Deal Blues\u201d evinces, central is the concern for the common man: \u201cIt\u2019s an early retirement\/With cake and balloons\/See no one here is sure just exactly what you do.\u201d Similar themes are evoked in \u201cThe Lie,\u201d whose solemnity is underscored by the wail of the pedal steel. It is this urgency of the human condition that has been long ignored by the glittery inanity of Nashville country\u2026 I mean pop.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers refuse to play by the rules of the industry, whether mainstream or underground. In fact, it was this shared disillusionment with the rules of the game that propagated the band. While \u201calt.country\u201d has become a generic signifier that encapsulates almost any band that proffers punk attitude with country sensibilities, the Waco Brothers seem a bit suspicious of such pigeonholing. In order to be even somewhat convincing, it takes a little more than a cowboy hat and some \u201cyee-ha.\u201d Unlike many of their contemporaries, the Waco Brothers make use of a more diverse musical palette, invoking the roots of tradition without being derivative or maudlin. \u201cNew Moon\u201d is a straight up blues tune that keeps the listener\u2019s head steadily nodding to its languid tempo. As the album\u2019s first song<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPoison\u201d (which features the \u201cstrident\u201d vocal harmonies of Stacy Earle) avows: \u201cWell, it\u2019s time to pour poison where the crystal waters flow\/Time to break wind where your shrinking violets grow\u2026\u201d Or, as what could easily be the band\u2019s mission statement, \u201cAFC\u201d proclaims: \u201cAlcohol, Freedom and a country song\/I\u2019ve been waiting way too long.\u201d With country music (alt.country included) in such a dire state, New Deal offers a honky tonk interpretation of Cartesian theory: tear it down, only to build it up again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rob Walsh<\/p>\n\n\n\n

pop matters:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

JON LANGFORD\u2019S DEAL<\/p>\n\n\n\n

by Jesse Fox Mayshark<\/p>\n\n\n\n

PopMatters Music Critic<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.popmatters.com\/music\/interviews\/langfordjon-021104.shtml<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In some ways, it\u2019s a lousy time to be a politically astute left-wing rock \u2018n\u2019 roller. Even in the wake of the biggest corporate meltdowns in history, the money men are still driving everything from fuel efficiency standards to foreign policy to the Top 40. The only honest liberal left in the United States Senate just died in a plane crash. John Ashcroft is reading your e-mail. Yup, things are grim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that doesn\u2019t mean it\u2019s a bad time to be Jon Langford. At once the most committed and least didactic of agit-rockers, the burly Welshman has responded to the gloom of 2002 with customary brio. He doesn\u2019t mind cursing the darkness, but he\u2019s also lit enough candles for a midnight Mass. He followed this summer\u2019s release of the anti-death-penalty compilation Executioner Songs, which he produced, with OOOH!, the latest release from his longtime outfit the Mekons. And on the heels of a celebrated 25th anniversary Mekons tour (culminating in a three-night stand in New York City, with every night dedicated to a different phase of the band\u2019s meandering career), he\u2019s back with his other band, the Waco Brothers. Their sixth album, New Deal Blues, landed in late October to some of the best<\/p>\n\n\n\n

reviews of the Wacos\u2019 career. So how does he do it all?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking by phone from the Chicago studio where he paints (he paints too, did I mention that?), Langford gives the verbal equivalent of a shrug. \u201cIt\u2019s<\/p>\n\n\n\n

what I do, for one thing,\u201d he says. \u201cAnd we didn\u2019t have an album out for about 18 months. We didn\u2019t have anything out from September 2000 on.\u201d He\u2019s also quick to point out that, despite the tendency to see him as first among equals, all of his projects are full collaborations. There are three other singer-writers in the Mekons (Tom Greenhalgh, Rico Bell and the magnificent Sally Timms), and two in the Waco Brothers (Deano Schlabowske and Tracey Dear). And given the cult status of both, Langford\u2019s hardly worried about flooding the market. \u201cI don\u2019t really think about that,\u201d he says \u2014 albums are done when they\u2019re done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers have often been seen as a hobby band, but it\u2019s a view Langford resists \u2014 not least because he actually spends more time with the Wacos than the Mekons. \u201cIt\u2019s my Chicago band, you know,\u201d he says, referring to his adopted hometown. \u201cIt\u2019s the main thing we do in town. The Mekons don\u2019t get together more than once a year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since their 1995 debut, the Waco Brothers have become a Windy City mainstay \u2014 they were one of the charter bands on the alt.country indie label Bloodshot (one of the most important stables for that ill-defined genre), and Langford has served as an affable mentor to a number of regional acts. On a recent episode of public radio\u2019s This American Life (also based in Chicago) Langford used the \u201cmusicians wanted\u201d classified ads in a local paper to put together an impromptu band (including a theremin player) and recorded a cover of Elton John\u2019s \u201cRocket Man.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His congenital prankishness notwithstanding, Langford takes his music seriously \u2014 including the music of the Waco Brothers, who have been around long enough now to shake off any notions of honkytonk novelty. Langford sounds pleased to note that prominent critics like Robert Christgau and Greil Marcus (both longtime Mekons fans) have praised the Wacos. \u201cOver the last few albums, I think people have taken us more seriously as a band, and not just a side project with me and a couple of my stooges in Chicago,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He\u2019s especially glad for attention paid to Schlabowske, whose Stonesy swagger provides some of the high points on New Deal. \u201cI find his songs endless fascinating,\u201d Langford says. \u201cHe comes up with stuff I don\u2019t expect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The album is a ragged, rollicking slab of gristle and sawdust, with \u2014 as the title indicates \u2014 a keen sense of its time and place. The de facto title track, \u201cNew Deal Blues,\u201d surveys the current economic landscape with a withering eye. The song starts out with the lines, \u201cGoing out of business \/ Everything must go\u201d, and it only gets more dire from there. \u201cWe\u2019ve got another New Deal now,\u201d Langford says, \u201cbut it\u2019s not like the old New Deal.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This time around, the cards aren\u2019t evenly distributed. \u201cAmerica, I don\u2019t know,\u201d he continues, \u201cfor reasons I don\u2019t understand it seems to be surging back to the right. How Bush can be so popular at a time when his cronies have been bleeding the fucking country dry . . . \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not all the tracks on New Deal are so pointed; there are lost loves and new moons and towns with no heart. But there is an overall sense of defiance. If<\/p>\n\n\n\n

the clampdown is coming, the Wacos aren\u2019t going quietly. \u201cTime to break wind where your shrinking violets grow,\u201d Langford sneers on the conservative-baiting \u201cPoison\u201d. Elsewhere, the Wacos promise to \u201cpump some new blood through the veins \/ Of cowboy hats and leather boys\u201d. That effort is helped considerably by freewheeling performances and production that gets close to sounding like a juke-joint P.A. system. Langford says most of the songs were done in one or two takes. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot about the band as a live band that I think is one of our strengths,\u201d he says. \u201cI think people have<\/p>\n\n\n\n

sometimes been a little disappointed with our records, because they haven\u2019t felt that excitement that comes through in the live show. It\u2019s a difficult<\/p>\n\n\n\n

thing to capture.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This time out, the band also sidestepped as much as possible any genre limitations. Although there\u2019s plenty of honky-tonkin\u2019, and one track yearns for \u201calcohol, freedom and a country song\u201d, the Waco Brothers are really a flat-out rock \u2018n\u2019 roll band. \u201cWe got a bit bored with the alternative-country thing,\u201d Langford says. \u201cThe whole \u2018Waco Brothers booze-tinged blah blah blah.\u2019\u201d At the end of the day, Langford seems less interested in what people call the band, or what they hear in the lyrics, than how much fun the whole thing is. \u201cI don\u2019t see the band as really a big message band,\u201d he says. \u201cI think it\u2019s a very entertaining band, and if<\/p>\n\n\n\n

people want more, there\u2019s more there.\u201d Even if we\u2019re all going to hell in a sports utility vehicle, Langford maintains a rugged pragmatism about how much you can expect from rock \u2018n\u2019 roll. \u201cYou have to be realistic about what a pop group can achieve,\u201d he says. \u201cHow much good did Live Aid really do in the end? You know, except to rekindle a lot of people\u2019s fucking careers . .<\/p>\n\n\n\n

. \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Old Dogs, New Deal<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers are almost impossible to resist. Their rambling, shambling honky-tonk rock \u2018n\u2019 roll is so unapologetically derivative and at the same time so heartfelt, all you can do is hoist a longneck beer in appreciation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The on-again off-again band, one of several projects of Mekons co-founder Jon Langford, is on again with New Deal, their sixth release. As before, we get a collection of Saturday night lives \u2014 people down on their luck, up a creek, and trying to make it by on \u201calcohol, freedom, and a country song\u201d. If anything\u2019s changed, it\u2019s a simple matter of age: where Langford and company\u2019s rawhide rock might have once seemed a tad affected (Langford is, after all, a former art student punk, and Welsh to boot), they now inhabit this domain with the grizzled assurance of a thousand sozzled nights in sawdust bars. They\u2019ve even been declared the unofficial house band of Austin\u2019s SXSW festival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The astoundingly prolific Langford is much in evidence on New Deal (this is his third album of the year, following the Mekons\u2019 OOOH and an anti-death-penalty compilation under the Pine Valley Cosmonauts rubric \u2014 and that\u2019s not counting his painting and art exhibits). But his cohorts Deano Schlabowske and Tracey Dear also chip in with hell-raising tunes and whiskey-tinged vocals. Mekons drummer Steve Goulding is along as usual, and he and bass player Alan Doughty (of Jesus Jones \u2014 yes, that Jesus Jones) provide relentless chug-a-lug rhythm. Meanwhile, Mark Durante\u2019s pedal steel makes the weepers weep<\/p>\n\n\n\n

like they oughta.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s striking about New Deal is how often the Wacos not only call to mind their influences but actually do them proud. Their several Stones rips (\u201dNew Moon\u201d, \u201cThe Lie\u201d, \u201cNew Deal Blues\u201d) are much more convincing descendants of Exile on Main Street than anything Jagger and Richards have written in 20 years. And much of the rest is the kind of punky roots music Joe Strummer has been trying and failing to perfect ever since the Clash imploded. It\u2019s enough to make you wonder if one of the things that has kept Langford and the rest of Mekons\u2019 extended family so energetic for so long is their relative obscurity \u2014 success never had a chance to spoil them. (The Mekons\u2019 recent 25th anniversary tour certainly seemed to bear that out \u2014 the band may be \u201cold and fat\u201d as<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Langford proudly proclaimed from the stage, but they still rock with a conviction that puts most of the junior generation to shame.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And this being Langford, the raucous sing-alongs on New Deal can\u2019t help but include a little more than your average somebody-done-somebody-wrong songs. The opener, \u201cPoison\u201d, is a shot across the bow of smug techo-conservatism. Langford cannily critiques the insularity of cyber-culture, the way it allows people to hole up in their homes and only communicate with like minds. \u201cCultures clash and the rules all break and bend\u201d, Langford snarls, \u201cYou\u2019re sharing false<\/p>\n\n\n\n

notions with your new conservative friends \/ Riding out on-line from the corner you defend\u201d. His remedy is agreeably uncouth: \u201cTime to break wind where your shrinking violets grow \/ You\u2019ve got a one-party state of mind \/ It\u2019s your party, but I don\u2019t want to go\u201d. \u201cNew Deal Blues\u201d is a timely tabulation of recessionary hardships, and \u201cThe Lie\u201d sounds like it might be about a certain leader of the free world (\u201dA builder of bridges to nowhere \/ First puppet on the moon \/ They all call you junior\u201d). Elsewhere, the fare is more traditional: \u201chonky tonk shadows\u201d, ghosts of past loves, losers, and losses. The bottom line is,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

there are a lot of people out there in the alt-country realm trying to do this stuff, but few who do it with as much brains or heart as the Waco Brothers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2014 18 October 2002<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From: <\/strong>http:\/\/blogcritics.org\/archives\/2002\/11\/22\/131909.php<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Waco Brothers, New Deal<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even if I wasn\u2019t predisposed toward \u2018em, I\u2019d probably cozy up to the Waco Brothers\u2019 new CD release, New Deal (Bloodshot), after hearing its opening cut. Set to an insistent country blues rhythm, \u201cPoison\u201d contains what can only be a telling put-down of insular blog life:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou want to make friends but you never leave your home Tapping out a message in the corner on your own. . . You\u2019re sharing false notions with your new conservative friends Riding out on-line from the corner you defend.\u201d Enjoy yer new sheltered life, head Waco Jon Langford is saying to a former club-goer. But none for me, thanx. \u201cIt\u2019s your party, but I don\u2019t wanna go. . .\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m uncritically fond of the Waco Bros. Three guitarists (Langford, Dean Schlabowske & Mark Durante), mandolin player Tracy Dear and pub rock vet Steve Goulding: true heirs to the wasted rock\/country promise of Workingman\u2019s Pigpen, Beggars Banquet Stones plus early Burrito Bros. Look at their tiny pics in the CD booklet and you see a buncha middle-aged wrecks, yowling into their mikes w.\/ the unrepentant rage of lefties who\u2019ve made it into adulthood neither compromising their beliefs nor their humanity. Just the fact that these guys keep going is enough to make me smile. That they keep getting better \u2018n\u2019 better at<\/p>\n\n\n\n

their wracked-up squalling is a minor miracle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though New Deal opens and closes w.\/ country poliscreeds – finale \u201cThe Lie\u201d would seem to be taking on G.W., the privileged politico (\u201dA builder of bridges to nowhere . . . They all call you junior\u201d) – much of the disc is devoted to the more trad hard times themes of mainstream c-&-w, skewed thru the Wacos\u2019 p.o.ed punk perspective, of course. \u201cNew Deal Blues\u201d evokes the new recession: rough and rueful, full of sinuous guitarwork, angry and barely controlled, the kind of song that tells you why onetime punks like Langford would gravitate to this music. \u201cNo Heart\u201d is a rockin\u2019 plaint (great pedal steel from Durante) about<\/p>\n\n\n\n

struggling in Chicago, the city that\u2019s been the Wacos\u2019 home base from the beginning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even the group\u2019s shambollic cover of the Wiley Brothers\u2019 \u201cJohnson to Jones\u201d (first heard by me on Marshall Crenshaw\u2019s seminal anthology, Hillbilly Music, Thank God!) is about marrying someone older for money. Where the original version was smoothly and matter-of-factly sung, the words of a country gigolo, as Deano sings \u2018em you can hear the desperation. This guy, you just know, is getting hitched so he can cover a passel of bad checks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other offerings, like \u201cGone In A Blink of An Eye\u201d (happily reminiscent of the Standells\u2019 \u201cWhy Pick On Me\u201d), are more obliquely pissed, while a few cuts even venture into busted romanceville (e.g., \u201cI\u2019m A Ghost,\u201d which manages to combine self-pity and Robyn Hitchcockian gothic imagery without compromising either). Through it all, the Wacos\u2019 off-kilter take on 21st century life remains, niggling in the listener\u2019s ear. Even a seemingly innocuous drunkard\u2019s song like \u201cHonky Tonk Shadows\u201d seems to be about more than the usual self-pitying lament thanks to Langford\u2019s Strummer-esque moaning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Midpoint into the disc, our boys offer a small nugget of cautious optimism, \u201cBetter Everyday,\u201d a bouncy country tune w.\/ a chorus that asserts how much better things have been getting for the singer. Good for you, you think, \u2019til you realize that the narrator in the song is probably singing from beyond the grave (\u201dGood, better, best\/Time I laid this world to rest.\u201d) Ah, those wacky Wacos. Keep on a-rantin\u2019, boys – these days we need ya more than ever!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.powerpop.org\/shakeitup\/reviews\/wacobrothers.htm<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Everyone\u2019s favourite socialist honky-tonkers are back with New Deal (I guess they don\u2019t have a whole lot of competition in that category) and while it may seem like more of the same, they nevertheless continue to satisfy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of us already know the story – about the Waco Brothers being misplaced Englishmen that somehow found their country hearts in Chicago, Illinois. We all may have expected ruthless parody, but<\/p>\n\n\n\n

instead the Wacos have put their political beat to a reverent brand of country that is as earnest as it is accomplished, hitting a high point with 2000\u2019s Electric Waco Chair (an end to the death penalty is a cause close to the band). I mean, hey, they practically invented the notion of insurgent country music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The band continues to marry their bold statements to musical expertise with New Deal, and prove this right out of the gate with the swaying Poison and with their rollicking statement of purpose in the AFC Song (that would be alcohol, freedom, and a country song of course). To keep things interesting, the Wacos bring an eastern Europe feel to Blink Of<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An Eye to great effect and No Heart could very well be the downright catchiest thing the band has ever done.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The band clearly has some fun on their rendition of Johnson To Jones continuing to showcase what a plain-old-good-time the band can be. More arresting, however, is the funky vibe of Just No Way with it\u2019s choppy rhythm and busy bass. The Waco Brothers are simply great musicians, and they can pull such excursions off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Essential country that\u2019ll hit the spot every time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.jsonline.com\/onwisconsin\/music\/nov02\/93639.asp<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jon Langford is one of the most prolific artists working in alt-country today. His latest effort with the Waco Brothers, \u201cNew Deal,\u201d marks the third album he has released this year, along with the Pine Valley Cosmonauts\u2019 \u201cThe Executioner\u2019s Last Songs\u201d and \u201cOOOH!\u201d by the Mekons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Don\u2019t be fooled into thinking that Langford substitutes quality for quantity, though – the Waco Brothers are as dependable as any act in rock when it comes to delivering the goods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every Waco Brothers album is full of songs loosely divided into two categories: those about drinking and loneliness, and those about murder and politics. \u201cNew Deal\u201d is no exception, and every song is a<\/p>\n\n\n\n

toe-tapper to boot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The rollicking hoedown of \u201cIn the Honky Tonk Shadows\u201d and the pedal-steel lament of \u201cNew Moon\u201d satisfy the drunk-and-lonely quotient, while Langford and co-lead singer (and Muskego native) Dean Schlabowske use \u201cBlink of an Eye\u201d and \u201cThe Lie\u201d to criticize the current presidential administration and invoke the murder ballads found on the Cosmonauts\u2019 \u201cThe Executioner\u2019s Last Songs.\u201d \u201cJust No Way\u201d is one of the Wacos\u2019 pop detours – Langford seems to be channeling Paul McCartney – and his voice nearly hides the fact that the narrator is a schizophrenic murderer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a year when a number of established alt-country acts expanded the genre, with fine results (Wilco, Neko Case, to name two), the Waco Brothers reinforce the if-it-ain\u2019t-broke maxim. \u201cNew Deal\u201d is the real deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Stephen Haag, Hartford Courant<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s this all about???<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/cuantoyporquetanto.com\/elproyecto\/musica\/resenas\/wacobrothers.htm<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

nte todo hay que ser sinceros, en nuestro pa\u00eds el country nos importa un pimiento, a excepci\u00f3n de la \u00e9poca en que nos metieron hasta en la sopa al vaquero Garth Brooks, pocos artistas \u00f3 grupos han triunfado por nuestras tierras. Basta fijarnos en los pocos grupos espa\u00f1oles que se han influenciado de este estilo musical, y cuando alguno lo hace parece que es de cachondeo, hablo por ejemplo de Coyote Dax y su canci\u00f3n del verano \u201d No rompas mas mi pobre coraz\u00f3n..\u201d con la que la mayor\u00eda de consumidores de m\u00fasica de terracita de verano, se pon\u00edan las manos enganchadas en los cinturones y meneaban el culito cual gallinas ponedoras, lo m\u00e1s triste es que seguro que se pensar\u00edan que el tema era del \u201cgran artista\u201d Coyote, cuando era una versi\u00f3n de un cl\u00e1sico en Estados Unidos como Billy Ray Cyrus\u2026 \u00a1lamentable!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNew Deal\u201d de los Waco Brothers es puro country, aunque a medida que avanza el trabajo se notan otras influencias que van desde la tradici\u00f3n americana, pasando por folk y acabando incluso en rock.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

La primera parte del trabajo esta ba\u00f1ada por influencias Nashville pero seg\u00fan van pasando las canciones al Sr. Langford se le va viendo la vena rockera, no en vano empez\u00f3 en esto con un grupo punk, llamado los Mekons; As\u00ed que en \u201cBlink of an eye\u201d, notamos un poco de rock en nuestros o\u00eddos, es el caso tambi\u00e9n de \u201cAFC Song\u201d con cambio de voces y un ritmo mucho m\u00e1s pegadizo, y en \u201cNew deal song\u201d que incluso nos recuerda por su voz al mism\u00edsimo Mick Jagger, y la composici\u00f3n la podr\u00eda firmar el gran Tom Petty y es que nos recuerda a la Am\u00e9rica mas profunda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

El disco te traslada a escenarios de famosas pel\u00edculas americanas, te puedes imaginar dentro de sus bares de carretera, al estilo de \u201cOh Brothers\u201d \u00f3 \u201cThelma y Louise\u201d, porque hay estilos muy variados, y es<\/p>\n\n\n\n

que \u201cNew Moan\u201d es un blues autentico y \u201cJust no way\u201d parece un tema de los brit\u00e1nicos Beautiful South, con ramalazos Housemartins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Por lo tanto, aunque no te guste el country, este disco lo puedes escuchar tranquilamente porque contiene muchas mas cosas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.dreamwater.com\/blueelf\/tuneup112202.htm<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

BY STEVE TERRELL<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Originally published in The Santa Fe New Mexican on 11\/22\/2002<\/p>\n\n\n\n

New Deal by The Waco Brothers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Only a couple of months after Jon Langford\u2019s \u201cmain band\u201d The Mekons released their finest album in who knows how many years \u2014 OOOH! (Out of Our Heads), Langford\u2019s \u201cside band\u201d The Waco Brothers have come out with their strongest album since 1997\u2019s Cowboy in Flames.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Langford may be the prime spiritual force behind the group, the Wacos feature two other good vocalists, Tracy Dear (\u201cThe world\u2019s greatest living Englishman\u201d) and Dean Schlabowske and a high-octane band that never ceases to amaze.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Wacos\u2019 fierce sets at South by Southwest in the past six years have earned them the reputation as an essential part of that spring festival, and in fact one of the finest live bands of this troubled<\/p>\n\n\n\n

era. Plus they\u2019ve got to be the world\u2019s most loveable debauched communists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Like any great live group the Wacos sometimes have difficulty translating their live energy onto studio tracks. However that doesn\u2019t seem to be the case on New Deal. They\u2019re playing like they mean it here and each player is in top form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Steel guitarist Mark Durante and, on many cuts a guest fiddler identified only as Celine, stand out, emphasizing the \u201ccountry\u201d in \u201cinsurgent country\u201d \u2014 a tag coined by Langford.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the lyrics go in one song, \u201cIn the honky tonk shadows, there\u2019s a gleam of light.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also Langford and the lads are articulating their political outrage more clearly than they have in years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Depression era title implies there are images of economic despair throughout – \u201cpaper in the windows, boards across the doors,\u201d Also environmental ruin (\u201cWell it\u2019s time to pour poison where the<\/p>\n\n\n\n

crystal waters flow\u201d Langford sings in \u201cPoison\u201d), yuppie arogance and political repression. \u201cThere ain\u2019t no heart left in this town,\u201d Deano laments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some songs are aimed directly at another \u201cWaco brother\u201d of sorts, the currrent resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe president\u2019s just half a man, riding in some giant hand,\u201d Langford spits in \u201cBlink of an Eye.\u201d Even more damning is \u201cThe Lie\u201d in which Deano sings, \u201cTo the manor born\/A silver spoon in your nose\/ \u2026 A builder of bridges to nowhere \u2026 They all call you `junior\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(The Wacos never have been easy on U.S. presidents. Remember \u201cDollar Bill the Cowboy\u201d and \u201cSee Willie Fly By\u201d \u2014 still my favorite Waco tune \u2014 from the Clinton era?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But there\u2019s hints of redemption here \u2014 \u201cThe AFC Song\u201d not only praises the liberating salve of \u201cAlcohol, freedom and a country song,\u201d but raises the possibility that there is the potential for subversion<\/p>\n\n\n\n

therein. \u201cFile those old teeth down to little points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These old teeth are still mighty sharp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/www.galleryofsound.com\/pages\/type1u.asp?StoryID=1248&GENRE=2<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Saving Country Music From Itself<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers steel themselves to resurrect the traditions of<\/p>\n\n\n\n

American country music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

by J. Poet<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chicago\u2019s Bloodshot Records bills itself as the \u201cHome of Insurgent Country Music,\u201d and The Waco Brothers may be the most insurgent act on the label. The Wacos\u2019 latest offering, New Deal, is a searing combination of drunken Saturday night rave up music and dark Woody-Guthrie-on-belladonna lyrics that go straight to the secret heart of darkness in America\u2019s bosom. The fact that four of the Wacos-including songwriter, guitarist and frequent spokesperson Jon Langford-grew up in England may be partially responsible for their keen appreciation of the hard-core, honky tonk sound that fuels their high energy Cash-meets-Clash approach to one of America\u2019s most unique art forms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI never heard real country music-George Jones, Buck Owens-growing up in England,\u201d Langford recalled. \u201cWhen I did it was a real shock. They were like punks; they didn\u2019t put a barrier between themselves and their audience. They sang real songs about real people in real situations. The best punk and the best country addresses the lives of the working class peer groups that helped create and support it. Country had a working class feel that you didn \u2018t get in English music, at least before punk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAfter moving to America, I felt that understanding the soul of Hank Williams was crucial to understanding the American psyche. Hank, Merle Haggard, Johnny Paycheck, Ernest Tubb and others wrote about the everyday lives of everyday people in a way that was quite radical, and took those ideas to the mainstream. But by the \u201990s they\u2019d been replaced by white suburban rock musicians wearing cowboy hats. Today\u2019s country music is fantasy music, like most pop.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was a desire to hear and play real-i.e. pre-Garth-country music that led Langford to form The Waco Brothers with drummer Steve Goulding, bass player Alan Doughty, guitarists Dean Schlabowske and Mark Durante and mandolin player Tracy Dear. Langford and Goulding had been founding members of the Mekons, a punk band with country\/Americana leanings, but the Wacos were honed in on traditional country, partially because it enhanced their ability to earn beer money, or so the story goes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t all that serious at first,\u201d Langford confessed. \u201cWe were doing mostly covers of songs we liked, and changing the name of the band every time we played. The Waco Brothers was the name we used the first time we drew a decent crowd that seemed to like us, so we thought we\u2019d keep that name for a while. We didn\u2019t think of it as having anything to do with [the 1993 Branch Davidian confrontation with the FBI in Waco, Texas]. The darker, sicker members of the band may have thought about it, but [Waco Brothers] wasn\u2019t a comment on a shameful event, it was just a name that sounded like Texas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Bloodshot offered them a record deal, the band got serious and started producing originals that combined the manic twang of Bakersfield with lyrics that had a distinctly Brit-punk approach. \u201cWe\u2019re attuned to the politics of everyday life,\u201d Langford admits, \u201cbut in songwriting there\u2019s a line you can\u2019t step over without the music sounding ugly and futile. A discrete approach is better; describe the situation-no matter how hopeless-without saying \u2018You have to smash the system,\u2019 which gets into fantasy music.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

http:\/\/pulse.towerrecords.com\/contentStory.asp?contentId=5899<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Wacos include Mekons Jon Langford and Steve Goulding, former Jesus Jones bass player Alan Doughty, guitarists Dean Schlabowske and Mark Durante, and British mandolin player Tracey Dear. On New Deal, they give us another batch of tunes that marry the manic twang of Bakersfield with lyrics that sport a decidedly Brit-punk approach. There\u2019s a little more cow and a little less punk this time out; fiddle and pedal steel come through in the mix, but the raging energy and in-your-face delivery remain intact. The vitriolic \u201cPoison\u201d could be a message to the Nashville establishment, its criticism leavened by its over-the-top humor. \u201cNew Deal Blues,\u201d \u201cThe Lie\u201d and \u201cBlink of an Eye\u201d deal with the current business downturn through the eyes of the<\/p>\n\n\n\n

working class blokes who always bear the brunt of every market crash, while \u201cI\u2019m a Ghost\u201d and \u201cBetter Everyday\u201d sound like Johnny Paycheck on a punk bender.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By j. poet<<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Washington Post on the Wacos<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Quick Spin<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wednesday, October 30, 2002; Page C05<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NEW DEAL<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Waco Brothers are not from that infamous Texas town, nor are they brothers. What we have here is a band of post-punk Chicagoans led by Brit Jon Langford, lead singer of the still-viable and as-acerbic-as-always Mekons. Langford started the Wacos to satisfy his sincere fondness for American roots music, and these days it\u2019s getting harder to tell which is his side gig. \u201cNew Deal,\u201d the Wacos\u2019 sixth album since 1995, finds the loose and ragged band in high spirits, with guitars and pedal steels a-blazing on some of their best songs yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of the songs seem to be about living the renegade life, although \u201cJohnson to Jones\u201d is a whimsical punk-country description of a December-May relationship<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(she\u2019s 65, he\u2019s 23), and \u201cI\u2019m a Ghost\u201d somewhat traditionally addresses the passing of a relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The diverse instrumentation on \u201cNew Deal\u201d enlivens things immensely.It\u2019s clear most of the players are from rock bands. A lilting piano opens \u201cPoison,\u201d but by the song\u2019s end a sneaky and propulsive brass section has taken over; mandolin and fiddle easily snake in and out of songs, always in welcome support. Sometimes the Wacos suggest a horseback-borne \u201cSticky Fingers\u201d-era Rolling Stones \u2014 the bluesy, steel-drenched \u201cNew Moon\u201d is a cousin of \u201cDead Flowers\u201d \u2014 but \u201cBlink of an Eye\u201d sounds like the Clash channeled through Cash.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNew Deal\u201d is the real deal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Buzz McClain<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Philadelphia Weekly – pick of the week (Feb 1st 2003)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jon Langford & His Sadies, Waco Brothers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Longtime Mekons ringmaster Jon Langford doesn\u2019t fancy rest-cures. Close on the heels of that group\u2019s 100th record, OOOH! (or Out of Our Heads), Langford returns with new records from two of his extracurricular pursuits. The Mayors of the Moon, recorded with Toronto band the Sadies, is a winning collection of folk and galloping rockabilly. Langford\u2019s sawdust voice can make a word as awkward as \u201cpedantic\u201d fit snugly inside a pop song, and songs like the blistering \u201cAmerican Pageant\u201d have all the sweat and swagger of the Clash. New Deal, Langford\u2019s sixth album with his group Waco Brothers, is even brasher\u2013full of stomp, growl, square-dance violin and rodeo bass. Langford will be fronting both bands at a spectacular double-bill at the North Star, making for an evening that merges punk bravado with the grit of Americana. (J. Edward Keyes)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Uncle Dave<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dave Herndon is an itinerant journalist who\u2019s been knocking around New York for decades. Most of the songs on \u201cNine Slices of My Midlife Crisis\u201d grew like fungus on the walls of Dave\u2019s Cave, an undisclosed location that over the years provided several hundred bednights for touring Mekons and Waco Brothers; Dave was always a dutiful Mekoncierge. Someplace along in the early \u201990s, Lonesome Bob taught Dave the rudiments (\u201dTable for One\u201d is the strange fruit of one of the Loner\u2019s weekly homework assignments), and the debt of influence is obvious: name another twanger who talks about couples therapy. So it\u2019s largely Bob\u2019s fault. But mainly it\u2019s Jon Langford\u2019s. Every so often when the circus was in town, Dave would scrape a new tune off the walls, and one day Jonboy said something deep and thought out like, \u201cWe ought to record this shit.\u201d So over the course of a few sessions in Chicago in 2002-3, Dave and Jon recorded the basic tracks, and then the Waco Brothers each added their own voices: Deano\u2019s and Durante\u2019s guitars took things in a Southern rock direction; Alan Daughty set some sort of record by putting down his bass parts in one two-hour blurt; Tracey \u201cFuture\u201d Dear chirped like an insane chicken; and the drumming duties were shared by the Wacos\u2019 Chicago-New York tag team of Joe Camarillo and Steve Goulding. Dave asked Jon to find a Charlie Rich piano for \u201cOnly Star,\u201d and Barcley McKay delivered it. Sally Timms broke the gender barrier by dropping in and chirping a few lines to close out \u201cFace of the Earth.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throw some cave songs into the Waco-izer and this is what you get: a tragicomic Battle Cry of the Lonely Guy, who wants to know where love goes when it\u2019s gone, and at some point pokes his head out of the cave long enough to see that there\u2019s a path that leads into the morning light.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis turned out better than anybody expected it to,\u201d said engineer extraordinaire Ken Sluiter. Maybe that\u2019s because there were no expectations. But perhaps it was la Timms who put it best: \u201cWhat I like about your record is that it doesn\u2019t sound like anybody else,\u201d she told Dave. \u201cIt\u2019s singular. In twenty years somebody\u2019s going to find it and say, \u2018What the fuck was this guy on about?\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Unca Dave, New York, 2004<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tracklist: PoisonNo HeartIn The Honky Tonk ShadowsJohnson To JonesBlink Of An EyeNew MoonBetter EverydayJust No WayAfc SongNew Deal BluesI’m A GhostThe Lie Reviews: http:\/\/www.ink19.com\/issues\/october2002\/musicReviews\/musicW\/wacoBrothers.htm For nearly a decade the spirits of Johnny Cash and Hank Williams have been riding aboard the runaway Waco express. Resurrecting all that was good about classic country and recasting it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":100,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":484,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76\/revisions\/484"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wacobrothers.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}