So, let’s just put it this way: I’m tickled pink that someone is finally giving Whitey Morgan and the 78s a pat on the back. I have been awkwardly talking about a country band, from Flint and Detroit nonetheless, that plays about the most authentic contemporary outlaw music you can stumble upon, for quite some time now. You might remember mentions of them—- oh, here, here, here, here or here for starters.

Well, fear not, Travis Wright, in his “Best of” music for the year, has placed Whitey and the boys (and girl) in the top 10 albums. Finally. Some validation that I am not a complete lunatic recommending you listen to a (really excellent) country band that sounds absolutely nothing like the stuff you hear on the airwaves these days.

Happy New Year. Celebrate enthusiastically. And you betcha there’s some cool DL! stuff coming in 2011– more on that next week.

9:32am: Get off the phone with a customer service rep who tells me that the wrong ink cartridge was shipped to me and I am going to need to return the new ones. Not a fun way to start the day. Whatever. Little things. Shrug it off.

10:23am: Gather DL! web orders from the night before and morning, package them up, write the notes, get the address label, seal the package and set aside to take to take to the Post Office in a bit. First, I head to the kitchen to make some coffee. The coffee beans are gone. Whatever. Little things. Shrug it off.

11:15am: Leave to get coffee beans at Honeybee Market, errr, to go to the Post Office as planned. Holy crap, it’s really sunny out. Holy crap, it’s a beautiful day. I probably should just stand here and stare up at the blue sky.

11:17am (still staring up at the sky): The mail lady has come about five hours earlier than usual and my mailbox is uncharacteristically full with packages and such. Fairly large ones. No matter what, when this happens, I get excited. Even if it is those carefully masked larger looking packages that the credit card companies now send. What could it be? What could it be?

11:19am (still struggling to open package one amidst the metric ton of packing tape used): It’s a package from Bloodshot Records in Chicago. Holy mother. I had totally forgotten that Detroit’s own outlaw country band Whitey Morgan and the 78s released their new album on Tuesday (album release party is tomorrow, btw). I had pre-ordered it some time ago and it just slipped my mind. I am breathing heavily as I attempt to open the packaging on those impossible shrink-wrapped jewel cases. I am sort of feeling 12 years old again when there was a really electric feeling associated with opening a new compact disc and popping it in the CD tray.

11:21am: Sitting in the car, shoving the CD in the player, excited like a schoolboy to hear that opening track. “Bad News” assaults the speakers. I pull my truck away headed for the Post Office. I pass one, two, three, four and five people walking. The sun is shining, windows are down, music playing loudly. Fall, baby!

11:26am: Rose greets me at the Post Office with a smile. I see her practically every day at this time. She has a new hairstyle that I comment on, she tells me it was a lazy attempt at trying to re-invent her head of hair for the day. We talk about how today’s packages are going as far as Philadelphia. “Not too bad,” she says. I tell her I got a new CD in the mail today, from a local outlaw country band nonetheless, to which she laughs. I tell her to thank the postal lady for getting the mail over to me early. She turns back, knowing where my house is and knowing who the postal worker is covering that area, and jots a note down. It’ll get to her.

11:42am: Pull in to Honeybee Market and race in for some Great Lakes Coffee Beans and a couple gobs of that irresistibly good guacamole that greets me every time I walk in to the market. I get to the checkout and casually converse with the cashier over something I spotted in the soda isle (Inca Kola, this delicious pop that I nearly rotted my teeth with while spending some time a couple years back in Peru). I grabbed a 2-liter of it, overjoyed really. Nostalgia.

11:49am: I get back in the car. Whitey Morgan and the 78s are still in my CD player, blaring loudly. I pull on to Bagley, headed home, windows down, music blaring, sunshine just barreling in. As I wait to turn on to Trumbull, I sit at a red light probably looking especially idiotic singing along with the dashboard. A man is standing on the sidewalk that I can barely see in my periphery. I continue waiting for the light. Before I hit the accelerator, I look left to see the man doing a little dance on the sidewalk apparently enjoying a little outlaw country music himself, smiling a big grin. I pull away, he flashes the thumbs up and I give him one right back. Whooo! I could moonwalk home right now.

I love this little town. For the music, for the trips to Honeybee Market, for Rose at the Post Office and for all those random suprises in Detroit that jump out of nowhere and give you a charge.

DETROIT LIVES!

Err’body’s always talking about Detroit’s music scene. Here a few tracks from bands that are just getting started in Detroit, currently recording in Detroit, repping Detroit on the west coast and making believers out of the fact that Detroit isn’t just about electronic music and garage rock. Have a listen.

The latest Detroit sensation touring the west coast and getting airtime on KCRW, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr:

Brand-spanking newly signed Madis One to Blank Artists in Detroit with a little samplage of Bjork:

Bjork sample, madis music by MADIS ONE

The Auctioneers, a band not from Detroit (NYC), but currently recording an album here and playing shows around town:

And finally, the most astonishing addition to the lineup, Detroit’s best old-time country western band. These guys do nothing nothing like the new stuff coming out of Nashville; think more like Waylon Jennings, and these guys just kill it. Here’s a Johnny Cash cover they do particularly well, thats also rumored to be the opening track on their new album released October 12 on Bloodshot Records:

Detroit: city of surprises. Yesterday, Metro Times’ annual “best of” issue hit the newsstands yesterday giving you at least 100 reasons to appreciate the city. It hits on every possible angle you could imagine with categories all over the place; kind of like, get this, best indie lingerie. “Indie” has been ferociously used to categorize craft fairs around here, and more times than not music that is playing at the Magic Stick– and now apparently lingerie, too. Anyway, of particular importance with this years “best of” is the increasing reality that Detroit is embracing the uprising of honky tonk from its core. Sure, the grit and gore of the tool and dye beating heart of Detroit doesnt often get associated with good old country music, but by God, there couldn’t be a better match. Whitey Morgan and the 78s, a country band ala Waylon Jennings, got a “best of” award for being the best country artist this town has to offer. Now, for all of you that are thinking about Toby Keith, I present to you Whitey Morgan, frontman for one of Detroit’s best surprises and quite possibly one of the scariest males I have ever seen:

With a neckbeard hovering around 4 inches in length and the stare of a famished, angry water buffalo, Whitey Morgan is not on stage to play you some twangy parlor music that the folks in Nashville might pick up and put on the big stage. Oh no. This is country music– themes hover exclusively around cheating and drinking. Whitey Morgan and the 78s play music like Waylon Jennings if he gigged exclusively at biker bars. So, all that said, Whitey and his boys are organizing quite possibly one of the better live music spectactles of the Spring, aptly titled The Honky Tonk Throwdown. Whitey headlines night one, the Deadstring Brothers on night two and Wayne “THE TRAIN” Hancock– the Viper of Melody– on night three. Whoo! Tickets are $10 a day or $25 for the whole weekend. All shows are played at PJs Lager House. Do yourself a favor and be there.

Oh yeah, and come out and see the new goods on show tonight at Bureau of Urban Living. 5pm-8pm. 416 West Canfield. Got all kinds of new stuff– shirts, zip pouches, throw pillows, towels, art prints. Whoo!

Berry Gordy Jr. and the boys brought Motown to the masses, The Gories helped with the whole Garage scene, Carl Craig was pretty instrumental with electronic– and now, well, now we have Honky Tonk. That’s right. Bands like John Holk and the Sequins, Whitey Morgan and the 78’s, Doop and the Inside Outlaws and Deadstring Brothers (among others, all local) mix rock and roll standards with the likes of Hank Williams, with Waylon Jennings, with Bob Dylan with… with… awesome. Every week is Honky Tonk week at Club Bart in Ferndale where many of these bands come together and play each and every Tuesday night starting at about 9pm. No question it’s one of the more redeeming musical subcultures around town these days.