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Grant Alden

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Small But Mighty Music

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Small But Mighty Music

Shop small, they say, backed by a brief national marketing campaign, signage, slogans, all the rest. Yes, please. Please support small business, what's left of it, for I am a serial entrepreneur, married into a bookstore/coffeeshop located in a small town in the Appalachian foothills. Voting matters,

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Re-Release of Tony Joe White’s ‘The Real Thang’ Certainly Is

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Re-Release of Tony Joe White’s ‘The Real Thang’ Certainly Is

It is possible, with very little effort, to stream live video of Elvis Presley singing “Polk Salad Annie,” back during his final credibility scare, and then of the songwriter, Tony Joe White, singing it on network T.V. with the host of “The Johnny Cash Show” (oh yeah, that'

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Sing it Like You Mean It. Love, Woody Guthrie

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Sing it Like You Mean It. Love, Woody Guthrie

We learned by heart most of the words to “This Land Is Your Land” in second grade, the year the duck and cover drills ended and I was fitted for black-rimmed glasses. Most of the words, that is, because we were second graders and, really, it was all about pounding

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Sticking to the Music of James McMurtry and Mark Rubin

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Sticking to the Music of James McMurtry and Mark Rubin

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: The Bottle Rockets and The Legacy of Misfits Piecing Together a Living

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: The Bottle Rockets and The Legacy of Misfits Piecing Together a Living

This is going to be about The Bottle Rockets, the other alt-country band from St. Louis, that graced the cover of the original magazine twice (even though the second time we all knew the futility of the gesture). But it's going to take a while to get there.

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: After the Fire is Gone; The Last Sessions of Bluesman Elmore James

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: After the Fire is Gone; The Last Sessions of Bluesman Elmore James

It began here, in the safety of the suburbs, black vinyl spinning in someone's back room, George Harrison bragging on John Lennon during the bridge in the Beatles' “For You Blue,” a minor track from 1970's Let It Be“: “Elmore James got nothin' on

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Can't Steal My Fire: The Songs of David Olney

FOUNDERS KEEPERS: Can't Steal My Fire: The Songs of David Olney

Near the bottom of my stack of indifferently folded black t-shirts rests a relic from 2003, a wry marker from the career of the late Nashville singer-songwriter David Olney. “David Olney's World Tour of Nashville,” the back reads, listing six performances over six days. Those Music City shows,