The middle of the country might be frozen solid all the way over to the Gulf of Mexico, but here in the Great Mojave Wilderness the weather is fine, the skies are blue, and the first hints of so many little green something-or-others are now apparent on the desert sands.
You ever drive the “Loneliest Road In America”? That’s what they call U.S. 50, across the Great Basin Desert through the middle of Nevada. Not many people out there, not a lot going on. Just as we like it. The mystery visitors like it, too. They like the quiet. They need the wild mountains and desert valleys of the Basin and Range. We hope em like this: Episode #119: “Alien Corpses of the Great Basin,” with all-new spacey soundscapes by our own RedBlueBlackSilver. (And we’re on Spotify, too.)
And way back in 1952, so the story goes, 16 little alien friends were found dead in the wreckage of a glowing oval craft that smashed into the side of a copper mine near Ely, Nevada. Find out more, if you dare, tonight at 10 p.m. on Joshua Tree’s own Z107.7 FM, or streaming from Z1077FM.com or Tune In.
There’s a leak in the studio roof and the only way we know is because an atmospheric river is bearing down upon the American Southwest. So get a bucket or a cereal bowl or something and we’ll all paddle to Hell together . . . . with new soundscapes by RedBlueBlackSilver to keep us company.
Do you know about the mysterious Dragoon Mountains of Cochise County? Well get in the truck, we’re taking a night drive to Arizona. Now is the time for Episode #117, so get ready for the weird times. New soundscapes by RedBlueBlackSilver as we cover some difficult terrain with the Apache leader Cochise, the strange granite of his stronghold, and the mystery craft seen on many nights around these mysterious 78-million-year-old mountain spires to this day.
Might be a nutty new year on the national news, but here in the desert we are just trying to get along and not got crushed. What happened at the Yucca Valley protest on Friday? Well good luck getting the straight story on that. With guest Brendan Maze and new sounds by RedBlueBlackSilver.
San Francisco was so cheap in the 1990s that people would move there when they ran out of money. You could get around on a $35 monthly MUNI pass, cable cars included, and there was always a rundown Victorian in need of another roommate. There were plenty of bar jobs, temp jobs, restaurant jobs, part-time work that afforded the luxury of doing the important stuff: boozy nights, bookstore afternoons, art and music.
I washed up there in late 1992, having bummed around Eastern Europe for a while. Because I’d spent a memorable night carousing with Giant Sand in Prague, when I saw they were playing San Francisco’s Bottom of the Hill, I took the bus down to Potrero. The opening band started up just as I got my first beer, and within half a song I had relocated to the edge of the low stage.
The music they played stuck right in my soul and has been there ever since—one of those rare moments when you walk into a bar and everything feels like a movie. And you’re in it, along with all these beautiful people: punks and bums and booze-bags, spirits high despite the usual load of troubles on everybody’s back.
The group was called the Buckets. What you’ve got here is a platter of demo/single songs they put out themselves, or on minuscule 45 labels, in the era of grunge and alternative. “Postmarked Virginia” and “I Wrote This Song”—both performed that long-ago night at the bottom of Potrero Hill—are perfect country compositions, better than anything of the Nashville or Alt-Country of the time. The rockers had a bit of grunge, and all their music has soul and sincerity far beyond the jokey truck-driver premise of the band; none of them drove big rigs, as far as I know.
Earl Butter and Wanderlean Taters were the heart of the Buckets, loaning themselves from the oddball folk group Ed’s Redeeming Qualities, but each lineup I saw in those years was terrific. I brought everybody I knew to see the Buckets, and nobody ever regretted it.
Speaking of, we are also joined by Patrick Donnelly, Nevada state director of the Center for Biological Diversity, which along with Nevada native tribes and desert lovers everywhere is celebrating a victory. Ever been to the Desert National Wildlife Refuge? Well whether you ever set foot there or not, it’s safe again, for the desert bighorn and desert tortoise and a true wonderland of rare wild lands. For now. Let’s keep it that way.
A new show for Friday night, yes! And on SUNDAY, 12/6/2020, join Ken Layne and Anna Merlan for a Skylight Books virtual event, where we’ll be telling ghost stories and reading something weird from the new book and talking with you, if you choose to talk to us. Virtually, sadly. No whiskey & kissin’. Maybe next time. And we don’t know who “Lockdown Willie” is, either. It just sounded good.
@KenLayne, author of "Desert Oracle," will join us for #AltaAsksLive next Wednesday at 12:30pm PT to take us on a digital journey through the massive, magical Mojave. Register here for this free event:https://t.co/TisLJdsPMv
Listen to tonight’s show, Episode #112, on the FM radio, from Amboy to Zzyzx (Fridays at 10 p.m. on Z 107.7 FM), or streaming from Z1077FM.com or streaming via Tune In or get the free podcast. Hey and if you listen on the radio, there’s a bonus episode after that. A repeat, yes, but it’s nice to hear a couple of shows together on the radio. New soundscapes from RedBlueBlackSilver, and don’t forget to check out his new album, Five Flora.
