I´m currently reading To Live´s To Fly, John Kruth´s recent biography of Townes Van Zandt, the late great Texan singer/songwriter who gave this blog its name. A full review will appear here when I´ve finished the book, but I can tell you I´m not complaining thus far.
In the meantime I´m listening to a lot of Townes as a soundtrack while reading. And although Van Zandt´s got some excellent studio albums to his name, I find again and again that I like him best live, alone with his Gibson guitar. Sparse, naked, totally sad and enormously uplifting at the same time, telling corny jokes between songs every once in a while to lighten up the atmosphere a bit. How about this one: "What´s white and runs up your leg? Uncle Ben´s perverted rice."
Anyway, here are some classic Townes performances from an excellent soundboard recording which was made in the K4 Club in Ljubljana, Slovenia (of all places) on 24 November 1994, a few years before he died. "Days full of rain, sky´s comin' down again, I get so tired of the same old blues... same old song, baby it won't be long, ´till I be tyin' on my flyin' shoes..."
Townes Van Zandt - Two Girls (live ´94) MP3
Townes Van Zandt - Flyin´ Shoes (live ´94) MP3
Townes Van Zandt - A Song For You (live ´94) MP3
2 comments:
Great recordings. Some of Townes's live stuff misses pretty widely, but when he was on.... (Full disclosure: I think Live At The Old Quarter is the greatest live album ever cut.)
Curious to hear your final thoughts on the book. Love your blog too!
Man....Thank you for this great blog.. It is a daily stop.
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