American Rambler With Colin Woodward

In part two of Colin's interview with Steve Bassett, the two talk about Steve's career after the success of "Sweet Virginia Breeze." In the late 70s, Steve began writing jingles and working with session musicians across the country. He talks about meeting and touring with Delbert McClinton, opening for Steve Ray Vaughan and B. B. King, touring with Willie Nelson, and recording for Columbia Records in Muscle Shoals with Jerry Wexler and the Muscle Shoals band the Swampers (featuring Dave Hood, bass player and father of Drive-By Truckers's Patterson Hood). Also, Steve and Colin talk about Johnny Cash, getting old in the music industry, and how things tend to come "full circle." It's another hour of music talk!  In the intro, Colin talks about his visit to Oakwood Cemetery, home of 17,000 Confederate graves.

Musician Stave Bassett has a new, funky album out called Tres Leches, named after a dessert at Richmond's Kuba Kuba restaurant. Steve's from Richmond, but his long career has taken him from the River City to Nashville, Muscle Shoals, New York City, and Chicago. Steve is perhaps best known for his song "Sweet Virginia Breeze," which he co-wrote with Robbin Thompson in 1978. A few years ago, it became the official popular song of Virginia. Steve talks with Colin about how he started as a drummer before moving on to keyboards, his early career in North Carolina, and how "Sweet Virginia Breeze" happened. It's part one of two hour talk about the music life.       

Adam Bulger is a Jersey guy who's always had a humorous take on American lit, music, and politics. Colin and Adam survived (more or less) Trinity College, where they wrote for the alternative campus paper The Other Voice. Now they're catching up after 20 years of school, work, kids, and travel. They pretty much pick up where they left off, discussing politics, music, and what's it's like to dedicate a life to writing. Adam, who works for the website BTRtoday in New York City, talks about the story behind Freddy Kruger, noir fiction, and what it was like to interview Hunter S. Thompson and David Cross. Hopefully, their next talk won't take 20 years!

Colin reads from his recent paper, published in the Arkansas Times of Little Rock, about Tom Murton and the Arkansas prison scandal of 1968. Murton was a prison reformer from California, who dug up three skeletons on the grounds of Cummins farm fifty years ago. The scandal rocked Arkansas, embarrassed Governor Winthrop Rockefeller, and made news around the world. Murton's story, which became the basis for the film Brubaker, involved everyone from Dick Cavett to Johnny Cash. The article begins at around the 6 minute mark. Enjoy!

Given his schedule lately, which has taken him from Virginia to Louisiana to California, you might think there's more than one Ed Ayers running around. As president of the Organization of American Historians, president emeritus at the University of Richmond (where he is also Tucker-Boatwright Professor of the Humanities), and author of a recent prize winning book on the Civil War, Dr. Ayers stays busy. Ed talks with Colin about growing up in Tennessee, his graduate studies at Yale, and a life spent studying the South--from its prison system to the Civil War and beyond. His latest book, The Thin Light of Freedom: The Civil War and Emancipation in the Heart of America won the Lincoln Prize for 2018. It's Ed Ayers's second appearance on the podcast, and this time it's for a full hour.    

Liz Covart is the host of the popular history podcast Ben Franklin's World. As someone with a Ph.D., she has worked hard to find success as a scholar in the world outside of academia. She talks with Colin about growing up in the Boston area, moving to California to study early American history with Alan Taylor, and the work involved in podcasting and staying relevant on social media. Her efforts have paid off, and last year she won Best History Podcast from the Academy of Podcasters. Interested in good history or even starting your own podcast? Liz is here to help. 

Colin Bailey is best known for his work with the Vince Guaraldi trio, whose inspired music helped make the Charlie Brown television shows famous. Colin, though, has played drums with many of the best musicians in the business, from Victor Feldman, Miles Davis, Stan Getz, and Frank Sinatra, to Joe Pass, Mel Torme, and Joao Gilberto. Colin tells Colin about growing up in wartime England, his long career in jazz, his thoughts on the Beatles and Ginger Baker, his work on The Tonight Show, and why Astrud Gilberto owes him fifty dollars. In the intro, Colin talks about Lucky, the last movie starring the great Harry Dean Stanton. To conclude the podcast, Colin offers some wisdom from Charles Bukowski about getting your work done. Intro music: "Samba de Orfeu" from Jazz Impressions of Black Orpheus and "Charlie Brown Theme" from A Boy Named Charlie Brown.    

Jarret Ruminski lives in Canada now, but he is an Ohio native who has long studied the American South. In the fall of 2017, he published his book The Limits of Loyalty: Ordinary People in Civil War Mississippi. Colin and Jarret talk about the Civil War, but also the perils of the history field and what it's like to be a "recovering academic." Also, what would a talk among historians-who-love-music be without a discussion of Drive-By Truckers? It's a conversation about history, surviving the Trump era, and life after grad school. Aspiring Ph.Ds, you have been warned!  

Jon Bachman stops by again to talk music and history. As always, the conversation begins with a discussion of modal jazz, then makes twisted turns into Virginia folklorist A. K. Davis, southern mystic Edgar Cayce, and, of course, Johnny Cash. Also, Jon talks about the upcoming albums by his son, guitar wizard Daniel Bachman. In the intro, Colin rambles about the recent blustery weather, the start of baseball season, and why you should never casually google Klaus Kinski.   

Greg Hansard just finished his first book, German Sailors in Hampton Roads: A World War I Story at the Norfolk Navy Yard, and he talks with Colin about teaching full time after many years of adjunct work and having a 9-5 gig. He also discusses his grandfather's experiences in France in World War II, playing baseball in Germany, and the joys of craft beer. You know, the usual stuff you hear at an Applebee's. In the intro, Colin talks about getting over yet another cold, his unabashed love for his old Zune, and the uncertainties of owning a Mickey Mouse record player.   

Historian and confirmed Anglophile Graham Dozier returns to the podcast to talk about his recent visit to London, where Colin lived for a semester back in 1996. Listen as two Civil War guys manage to get through a whole conversation without discussing Richmond monuments! Instead, Colin and Graham discuss why Cromwell died three times, the Mouse Trap's pretty good run, and the pointless mudbath that was World War I. It all begins and ends with the Beatles, of course. So, hold on tight to your bumper shoot, have a bite of spotted dick, and try not to spill your cuppa Earl Grey. It's the most English episode yet (Patrick Carr excepted)!

It's part two of Colin's talk with Gettysburg College professor and author Pete Carmichael. Hear more about Pete's work, the Civil War, and today's politics of commemoration. In the intro, Colin talks about seeing a bunny movie and how it didn't quite make as much of an impact as seeing Nazis melted when he was five.

Pete Carmichael is one of the busiest Civil War historians working today. He talks with Colin about growing up in Indiana, living in Richmond, and landing in Pennsylvania. He's now a professor of history and the Civil War at Gettysburg College. He has a book coming out in the fall on the "common" soldier of the Civil War. He discusses his latest work, but Colin and Pete cover everything from sports to the Confederate monuments debate. It's a two-part American Rambler extravaganza! In the intro, Colin talks about the Super Bowl, the late comedian Bill Hicks, and the odd similarity between one Confederate soldier and Dustin Hoffman.   

Michael Streissguth is a music writer, teacher, and filmmaker. His latest project is the documentary film he directed, The Nighthawks on the Blue Highway. He and Colin talk about how he got interested in music as a kid growing up in D.C., his books on Johnny Cash, and his collaboration with the Nighthawks. He also discusses his earlier work on Jim Reeves and Eddy Arnold. Lot of music talk here! 

It's Southern, the debut demo album from Country Kitchen, the house band at American Rambler. Country Kitchen draws on everything from the Who and the Beatles to Black Sabbath and the Drive-By Truckers to write songs about drinking, family, and a demonic hound haunting the Delta. The usual stuff. Is the album good? Does it suck? Take a listen and find out! In the meantime, Country Kitchen is available for weddings, children's parties, and bar and bat mitzvahs. Tracks 1. Traveling 2. Daddy Didn't Fish Cuz He Couldn't Sit Still 3. Up is Down 4. Devil Dog 5. It's a Fine Line Between Living and Dying 6. Sydney 7. Ella 8. Just Got Paid 9. I Love Drinking Too Much to Ever Drink Too Much 10. 100 Degrees in Little Rock 11. Blind Willie McGhee 12. Southern 13. Gonna Go Far Away  

Jack Lauterback got his start as a writer, blogging about his adventures in the Richmond bar scene. His funny and honest articles about bartending, drinking, and relationships led to a column in Style Weekly, where he stayed for years. Now, you can find him on the Richmond morning radio program he co-hosts with Melissa Chase at 103.7 FM. Colin and Jack talk about the Richmond bar scene, the writing life, and some jobs that aren't worth doing. It's happy hour at American Rambler!  

WS "Fluke" Holland is Johnny Cash's one and only drummer. After playing drums several years with Carl Perkins, Fluke joined Cash's band, which he never left until Cash stopped touring in the late 1990s. As one of the original members of the Tennessee Three, Fluke talks with Colin about the early days at Sun, discovering Bob Wootton, and what he's going to do on his 100th birthday. Music credits: "Drum Time," "The Legend," and "Ring of Fire" courtesy of the album Johnny Cash's Legendary Tennessee Three: The Sound Must Go On. Live, 1968 versions of "Matchbox" and "Big River" courtesy of the Winthrop Rockefeller Collection, UALR Center for Arkansas History and Culture, Little Rock.  

Jeffrey Abugel is a native of New York who now calls Petersburg home. He talks with Colin about growing up in NYC, living in California and writing about surf music, and suffering long winters in Iowa before landing in Virginia. He is an authority on depersonalization disorder, a prevalent but not well-known affliction that has historical roots in existentialist philosophy but has only recently entered the lexicon of mental health. Plus, Jeff discusses his work on Edgar Allan Poe, a new novel, and playing cards with Al Pacino. 

Erin Devlin is a professor of History and American Studies at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg. She has written a book Remember Little Rock (University of Massachusetts Press, 2017), about racial integration in Arkansas's capital from the 1950s onward. As she discusses with Colin, the story of Little Rock integration was one of progress and setbacks, and it's a story that resonates not just throughout the South, but in the North as well. It is also a story important to today's politics and battles over public education.

In their first episode in Richmond, Bun and Hawk take on the usual topics: film, politics, sexual deviancy (with focus on Louis CK), Mother Teresa, and Harriet Tubman. Why can't Bun keep the Jewish Community Center and the Byrd Theatre straight? Why does Hawk think that "no one is clean?" It's another R-rated foray into the world of pop culture and current events.