NashvilleGab - Nashville news and country music gossip

Jamey Johnson has a new song and a new app

Jamey Johnson has finally gave us a release date for his next musical offering, a 2-CD set called 'The Guitar Song' which will be released September 14th. 

Jamey's doing things a little differently than the rest of Nashville - while everyone else is going the six-pack route, Jamey's releasing a set of 25 songs with two hours' worth the music. 

The man is a rebel.  Now if they'd just offer his 25-pack for the same price as a six-pack, all would be right with the world.  

To get things started, Jamey's got a new song called Macon that you can download on www.JameyJohnson.com.  Jamey will debut the song on tomorrow's CMT Music Awards with the help of a few of his friends. 

And while we're talking about Jamey, he may be a rebel in most respects, but when it comes to technology Jamey's keeping up with the rest of today's artists.  He's released a new free iPhone and Android app that will let you stream music, watch videos, get news and tour info, and lots more.  Get your free app here.

   

I've got some Single White Female running through my head

I really liked Chely Wright's songs Single White Female and Jezebel so it's exciting to report that she's got a brand new label and CD on the horizon.

Country Standard Timeis reporting that Chely has signed with Vanguard Records and will release her new CD, "Lifted Off The Ground," on May 4.

On top of the label and CD news, Chely is also releasing her first book called "Like Me" which is also due May 4.  Chely's publicist describes the book as a "candid account of her life, her career and her extraordinary journey. Like Me is a book of revelation: honest, inspiring and true."

 

Two out of three aint bad

Yay! The Dixie Chicks are coming back for another round. Or two of the Chicks are anyway.

Back in November of 2008 I had told you that fiddle Chick, Martie Maguire, was working on an album of bluegrass music all her own.  Now comes word from CMT that the Dixie Chicks, minus Natalie Maines, will have new music out this year.  Of course since it's not the full trio I don't suppose the music will be released under the name The Dixie Chicks and will probably lack that Dixie Chicks coolness, but I'll take what I can get. 

Anyway, according to Natalie Maines' pop, Lloyd, (via CMT.com) Martie Maguire and Emily Robison are "cutting some demos" and that Natalie had recorded "a little something with them ... about a year ago. I know that Martie's doing a fiddle record on her own and that Emily has been demoing some of her [own] songs. I played on some of those." 

Although the word is out about the two-thirds of the Dixie Chicks recording an album, there's no word on when we can expect the new music.  And what about the full trio and new music? 

Natalie's dad says, "They were all here at my house for Christmas.  Everybody seemed happy and healthy. And they were back here on New Year's Eve with their families. Everybody had a great time, but, I tell you, during holidays, I don't ask any business questions, and they didn't offer any insight. ... But they're definitely still an entity. ...

"I know that the girls seem really happy being out of the public eye. They hit it so hard for so many years. The dynamics have changed so much now because they've all got kids that are in school. The happy-go-lucky, just-take-off-and-go situation has definitely changed."

So, in 2008 I had music news from one member of the group.  Now in 2010 I now have music news for two of the members.  With the law of averages working in our favor that means that sometime in 2012 we should have new Dixie Chicks music.  But that's just a theory.

Phil Vassar's gender bending music video

You gotta check this video out.  

A couple of days ago I had the funny behind-the-scenes peek at Phil Vassar's Bobbi with an I and thankfully the finished product is just as fun.

Toby pulls out of latest movie

I had told you a while back that Toby was going to be playing in a movie called Provinces of Night which would also star Hilary Duff.  Unknown to me, it was also supposed to star Kris Kristofferson I guess.  Well Toby reveals to Robin Leach this weekend that he and Kristofferson will not be in the movie and may be replaced by Dwight Yoakam and Val Kilmer. 

From VegasDeluxe.com...

*Toby Keith, who first played Las Vegas pre-stardom at Arizona Charlie’s for Elvis Presley’s road manager Joe Esposito, revealed that plans for him to make a follow-up to Beer for My Horses have now gone south! Provinces of Night was delayed going into production, and Toby kept his promise to the USO to play for our troops in Afghanistan. I asked him about the tour through one of the world’s toughest trouble spots: “I don’t know where in Afghanistan. They keep that from us until the last minute. I do three shows a day. The band is going to support me on six of the 14 days I’m there. The night shows are at the biggest bases, and they’ve never let us do that before. I go out on the front lines and then come in at night and play with the band.”

I asked Toby, in light of his “The Taliban Song,” if he will take anything special with him for protection: “The irony of the Taliban song that I wrote is we played in Camp Phoenix right outside Kabul, and they let the locals come on base and work. They scanned their eyes, and they checked them for everything. They had a translator there, and we sold out of my CD because I wrote the Taliban song, and all the locals lined up to buy it.” Toby thinks Val Kilmer and Dwight Yoakam will replace Kris Kristofferson and him, but Hilary Duff remains with the film.

You're the boss

Hey, had a great day hanging out with the hubby.  I even got him to go to the mall.  Trust me, that's a big deal and an unusual occurrence.  We shopped, had lunch at the Olive Garden, and then came home and just hung out.  It was great. The best part was probably laying down on the couch and taking a nap. 

Yep, it was a nice day.  I had to work tonight, but it still didn't ruin the nice day it was. 

Anyhoo, my buddy Broadway over on B93 is having a great chance for you to help pick Kenny Chesney and Pat Green's new singles.  Head over to Broadway's website to take a listen to two of Kenny's songs and three of Pat Green's and vote on your favorites. 

Rascal Flatts has taken my advice

Could it be somebody was listening to me when I bitched about sucky CD covers?  One of my suggestions was to let fans design the covers, that or college students.  Well Rascal Flatts has - knowingly or unknowingly - taken my advice and is letting you be the designer.  Hooray for ingenuity. 

Rascal Flatts have decided to name their new CD Unstoppable and if you visit here you can get all the details about how you can design their new CD cover.  You have until January 22nd to show your creative side so you better get crackin'. 

Thanks to Country Music Tattle Tale for finding this. 

Sheesh, what a busy day

Well so much for things being back to normal today.  It snowed like crazy yesterday and today so hubby was out at 3 am.  I got up with him, made his coffee and lunch and then went back to bed.  Got up with the kids and got them on their way to school after waiting for a bus that was 15 minutes late.  Then I had to clean my disaster area of a house after nearly three weeks of kids and husband home almost all day every day.  Then I had to brave the blowing, drifting snow to make my way to the grocery store and to the post office.  Went to turn into the Walmart parking lot and my car didn't turn, it just slid sorta kitty corner and I ended up on the little cement island that separates the ingoing and outgoing lanes.  Good gawd!  I had to sit there and laugh for a minute before I stepped on the gas to try and get off the island.  I was afraid I was high centered, but luckily I wasn't.  Then I made it home just in time to log in to work my regular day job, didn't even get the chance to do any posting.  

I logged out of work when hubby got home and got one whole post done before the kids got home.  Decided we'd head over and find them some new winter boots.  I should have done it a while ago but I procrastinated - again - per usual.  We went to Payless first, then Walmart, then D&B, then Bimart.  Nothing.  There was absolutely nothing warm or that would pass as winter shoe-wear.  There were lots and lots of sandals and boots with big tall heels, but nothing remotely kiddish unless they were toddlers and wanted pink Tinker Bell boots with light up flowers.  I tried but my son was having none of it.  Shishkabob.  So we killed nearly two hours searching for something that obviously didn't exist near us.  I live in a pretty small area.  I could drive to Boise but it's about 45 miles away and no way in hell I was driving there at 6:00 at night on the crappy snowy roads.  So dejected we headed home. Then I had the bright idea to swing by K-Mart. 

Holy moly, it was like all the kids boots in the area went there for vacation.  AND AND AND they were having 10-50% off everything.  It was cheap-mom heaven.  Got the kids both new boots plus two pairs of gloves each for $26 total.  I was expecting to pay that and then some for just one pair of boots.  It's wonderful when things like that happen.  If only I had tried K-marshay first.  So warm feet and hands tomorrow.  Yay. 

To start out tonight, Carrie Underwood has announced that her new single will be I Told You So.

And Lady A have announced that I Run To You will be their next single which they will be performing on Late Night With Conan O'Brien on Thursday night.

There, I feel tons better now that I got myself two whole posts done today.  Yay for me!

But what would become of Kenny and Taylor?

There's been a lot of talk lately about somebody trying to raise the royalty rates online radio and download places pay to artists.  Okay, it's something like that, honestly I haven't been paying any attention other than reading the headlines in passing.  It's sort of like watching the Charlie Brown cartoons when the kids are talking to an adult, all they hear is "Charlie Brown...wah wah wah..... not going to....wah wah wah..."  Well that's how all this royalty-raising talk has sounded to me.

Well that is until today.  MTV had the headline "Apple may shut down iTunes to protest proposed royalty hike."  Whoa, wait a minute, what?!?  I'm a big iPod user and I buy music from them all the time, what the hell are they doing messing with my music listening pleasure?  Then it hit me, what about all these stars who are staggering their music releases via iTunes.  What would happen to them?  Would they start doing it through Amazon or their own websites? 

Ho hum.  I'll just add this to my growing list of economic worries.  Foreclosure and iTunes closure.  It's all so dang depressing.  Apple hasn't officially said what they're going to do or even if it would be a permanent decision, but I'm sure we'll be hearing more about this in the very near future and I'll definitely be paying attention from now on.  Myself, I'd be willing to pay the extra few cents per song that I buy from them.  Seems like an easy fix to just raise the price of a song a little bit, I mean the price of everything else is going up, why not our tunage too?  But no one bothered to ask me...fools. 

You can read MTV's whole article here.

George Strait is almost the king of the top 10s

King George is almost the new king of top 10 hits and has finally passed George Jones in top hits.

As Troubadour moves up the charts, it has been determined by those who keep track of these things that George has now had 79 (yes that's a 7 AND a 9) top 10 hits in his many, many years singing, Jones is stuck at 78.  A few more albums and Strait may just surpass the actual top 10 leader, Eddy Arnold, who has a whopping 92. 

You can watch the video for Strait's newest hit, Troubadour, here.

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