Gem Music Video of the Week # 4: A Touch of Americana
Song: Our Town by Iris Dement
(Songwriter: Iris Dement)
January 31, 2008
Here's a touch of Americana
Dement. She's a staple on the folk circuit. I am sure Jeff Strause (cc'd here) has seen her on a number of occasions. It's a great song about a town which has (in the singers eyes) changed beyond recognition.
One of the few weekly series TV shows I have ever enjoyed was Northern Exposure. The best part of the show was the last five minutes, which always did a nice job of capturing that night’s show in a nut shell. The show lost a bit of its edge in the last 2 years of its run, but the very last show closed with this song.
The first link is a live performance on Austin City Limits by Iris Dement. The second is the closing moments of the final episode of Northern Exposure (with the studio version playing in the back ground).
"Over there is where I bought my first car, it turned over once and then it never went far"
Gem Music Video: Our Town
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRlaZ5zBDjA
- Pete
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About the video: Iris Dement at Austin City Limits some time in the late 90’s
Best Feedback: Jeff Strause
Hey there Pete, Iris is playing the Iron Horse on 3/6, I may get up to it depending where I'm at by then with stuff at home. Although by the time I decide, it may be sold out. Sarah Lee Guthrie & Johnny Irion are opening too, which makes it quite a bill.
I never got to mention back to you about the Richard Thompson links a few back. I suppose I am about the same place with him now as I was back in the early 90s. Seen too much, burned out for now. I have seen about 10 times in the last 15 yrs, but past up several others. He is always a very consistent performer but unlike some people (Iris included) who I could happily go see every week, I feel differently about him and I am not sure why. I even enjoy a lot hearing most covers of his songs. Del McCoury doing 52 Vincent is phenomenal. If you haven't heard it I will get you one of his live shows. What you may not have been aware as far as my experience with RT, I listened pretty heavily for a few short years in college and afterwards to the early Fairport albums, especially Full House and Liege and Leaf to a lesser extent, and then didn't listen a lot until moving to MA, and then listened a lot to the solo stuff for a few years. And in the past several years after collecting a good number of live shows, I listened quite a bit for a while again, but then kind of put him aside. Below is a list of the live shows I have, also a list of the Jonathan shows. Most of these have come with some kind of set list and venue info, one of these days I will pull them all together into one data CD you can have for reference, along with the Rick D stuff. I have most of the shows that I traded or downloaded compiled as compressed files (FLACs or SHNs, which is the way they come) onto data DVDs, so it is a little easier to find and get at things, but there are over 1000 of them now, each with about 6 to 8 shows, and then several thousand earlier ones of just audio disks. Oh well, it keeps me with something to do ( as if I needed ...).
