Shovels and Rope's 'Busted Jukebox Vol 2' and it is great. Like Shovels and Rope-scale great. Which is really great. Really really great.

Shovels and Rope are husband-and-wife duo Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent, based in Charleston, South Carolina, and they deliver dirty, sweaty, and insanely beautiful, in turn or all at once, country/folk/bluesy rock with more than a dash of punk attitude.

The magic of Shovels and Rope is their raw energy, combined with often soaring harmonies and wrapped in sheer joy and love for what they do. They sound like Angels from Heaven, but one's who've just escaped Hell. They're beautiful, but singed.

Playing just guitar and drums, and occasionally keyboards, swapping between the instruments mid-show, they are really a band to see live to get their full value -- their records are great, but it's hard  for a recording to fully capture the live dynamism.

That is not to say a new Shovels and Rope record is not a cause for wild celebrations coz it definitely is. There should be street parties. Public holidays should be declared. They won't be, because we are all governed by pricks, but they should be.

So what could be better than a new Shovels and Rope album? Well, it seems the second volume of their covers project, whereby they collaborate a different artist on each track., as with Busted Jukebox Volume 2, which was released on Thursday and which you can and indeed should purchase here.

In all honesty, I didn't full expect that. It follows on from Busted Jukebox Volume 1, where they also recorded a series of covers with other artists.

And that was good. I mean I doubt Shovels and Rope could do bad if they told them their lives and the lives of all their loved ones depended on it. Among other highlights, their version of "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understand?" is transcendental. But it never grabbed me as hard as their original music

I'm not sure exactly why I feel Busted Jukebox 2 is different, but it is. It is not just a pretty good record done well and interestingly: every track sounds like a revelation. They take well known songs and turn them inside out, or just add fresh layers and new elements that create a different, but often profound impact.

This is a record features everything that is great about Shovels and Rope... then adds to with a different awesome singer/performer added to each song. They manage to give each track a unique feel with different singers brought it, yet their sparkling performances always makes it sound like Shovels and Rope. It sounds fresh, evocative and full of wonder.

Here, you can also listen to each track with interesting notes specifically written by Shovels and Rope at.

It is hard to know which tracks to highlight as I really like them all. Their version of Faith No More's "Epic" is one of the more interesting. Featuring Lera Lynn (possibly the only good thing about season 2 of True Detective), it is a significant re-interpretation of the song.

However, I've chosen to highlight three other tracks that give a good feel for the vibe -- including,  naturally, their glorious version of the Clash's "Death of Glory" featuring none other than Hayes Carll (who I may have mentioned on this blog once or twice). I post them below, following a playlist of each track on the album.

With a new Shovels and Rope album,t he only thing that will make this week better is if, tonight, the Western Sydney Wanderers do the unlikely and beat Sydney FC in the derby.




A cover of a song by post-rock art-rock band from Iceland, Sigur Ros, Shovels and Rope noted: “A lot of people might not know the original version of this song but it is a beautiful, floating, anthemic soundscape by Sigur Rós."




As brilliant a songwriter as Leonard Cohen was, he often lived up to his reputation as "depressing". This song, which vacillates between declarations of being determined to prove love and admission of failure, comes with more colour and life here than the beautiful but typically more downbeat original.




In their notes, Shovels ad Rope had these lovely words to say: “Hayes Carll was the first guy to take us out on the road when we had absolutely nothing going on. He taught us a lot about what’s important and what’s not in this business and on the road. He’s one of our favorite songwriters and human beings and we owe so much of what we’ve been able to build over these last six years or so to his kindness and generosity.

“We wanted to do a slinky, swung version of this song where we traded off verses and just had some fun with it; loose and raucous. It still sounds like punk rock, but with cowboy boots.”

The full playlist:

'This world's been shaved by a drunken barber's hand' -- a playlist for my stand up show 'Inspired?'

Slaid Cleaves.

Now, I've been pretty quiet about it, I know, but I actually do have a solo stand up show at the Sydney Fringe Comedy festival next week, in fact on Wednesday and Friday at 7pm and Sunday at 6pm. Just in case if you are interested at all.

I don't care. I don't care if you attend any of the shows at are at the Container room at The Factory theatre, to which you can book tickets here for the cheap, affordable price of $15/$10, which frankly is a fucking bargin. 

It is also a fundraiser for Green Left Weekly, so I guess it depends, like, if you want the planet to survive or not. I mean I'm not saying it literally hinges on this show, I'm just saying you'd have to be some sort of Donald Trump-loving prick to consciously not come. That's all. The choice is yours. Fascism or humanity. Choose wisely. I mean, I don't care myself...

The point is, faced with a show next week, some performers might try to focus on last minute building, or even working on refining the material by going to various comedy rooms to test things or just agonising in front of their laptop over exact wording, pacing and structure.

That is because they are hacks. The key question is to spend your time developing a musical playlist to accompany the show.

And by "accompany", I don't mean literally. I don't mean the songs have any role in the show. Don't worry, you can turn up to the show without country music ruining your night. Or the Hobart-originated Nation Blue screaming about corporate destruction of a small town in rural Australia with lines like "THESE STREETS ARE SCREAMING HELP ME!!!"

They are just songs that I like and happen to relate loosely to the theme. The type of songs I think about when I think about the shit I talk about in my show.

They describe the sort of topics that get discussed, but as is self-evident, they don't as a rule contain jokes and let me tell you... that's one thing my show has! Jokes! Oh yeah! It is sort of the point!

(Of course, the Hayes Carll and John Prine tracks have a couple of witty lines, as they are witty chaps, but still not the same as trying to come up with a 50-minute stand-up show.)

So, my show is called "Inspired?" and it is about the hilarious topic, which is the fact it is fucking hard to be inspired about the world and the prospects for positive change when everything is SO FUCKING SHIT and seemingly getting worse.

This is dealt with by these songs in various ways. It runs through the shit we deal with, the fact life is hard, the fact our politicians are pricks, the fact climate change is terrifying, the fact this is hard to deal with, and then runs through to the crucial question of hope in the face of darkness.

To be honest, with that in mind, the two key songs are the first, Texas folk/country/Americana singer songwriter Slaid Cleaves' "Drunken Barber's Hand", and the last, South Carolina folk/country/Americana husband-and-wife duo Shovels and Rope's glorious rendition of Nick Lowe's "What's So Funny About Peace Love and Understanding".

I feel those two tracks form a great start and end point, and the rest fills the gaps, from Celtic punk band Flogging Molly's self-explanatory "The Worst Day Since Yesterday" to Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit's "Hope The High Road" about combatting despair with hope.

The list includes incredible acts like Tom Waits, Lucinda Williams, John Prine, Jason Isbell ... and more! Some aren't even country/folk/Americana!

Well you can hear it below and my show will be like this, only with jokes. So like if you like these songs... come along! And if you hate them... then fear not, they play no role in my show at all, and forget this post ever existed!

Just... come along if you are in Sydney. You will not regret it. Here's the fucking playlist:





Yar:




I don't need to read the papers
Or the tea leaves to understand
This world's been shaved
By a drunken barber's hand




Well, I know, I miss more than hit
With a face that was launched to sink
And I seldom feel, the bright relief
It's been the worst day since yesterday

Everybody knows it's a hard time
Livin' on the minimum wage
Ah, some people just gonna sneak on through
Others gotta rattle that cage
One of these days, I'm gonna find my way
Or else just disappear
I'm out here in the filth and squalor
And all I wanna do is stomp and holler

Well over the sea, and far away,
Our kids die in deserts, they been sent that way...

Well Hell doesn't want you
And Heaven is full...

Some humans ain't human
Though they walk like we do
They live and they breathe
Just to turn the old screw
They screw you when you're sleeping
They try to screw you blind
Some humans ain't human
Some people ain't kind

From the cradle to the grave
You will always be a slave
To the quiet darkness of your memories
And that's the truth, my friend
The ugly truth, my friend
I've got proof, my friend
And that's the truth

These streets are screaming help me
Burn the town down
Burn the fucking thing down!!!

There can't be more of them than us
There can't be more

I know you're tired
And you ain't sleeping well
Uninspired
And likely mad as hell
But wherever you are
I hope the high road leads you home again
To a world you want to live in

As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.
I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?
And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I want to know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

'There is hope where you can't see it, there is a light after the storm...' Corbyn, neoliberalism and Shovels & Rope

The British elections certainly didn't go according to plan.

A humiliated Theresa May looks to form a decidedly unstable government via some agreement with a bunch of fanatical Presbyterians from Ireland who are convinced they are British, despite all available evidence suggesting they are actually definitely from Ireland, and whose social views have not advanced since 1690, and whose agreement to prop up the Tories is based on reinstating government programs of Catholic burning or something.

But a bigger story is the scale of the successful campaign by Jeremy Corbyn, his team and left activists around a popular Manifesto that breaks with austerity and neoliberalism. This campaign's success defied predictions of almost all pundits and polls.

Is this important? I'd say that depends how bothered you are by the horrific catastrophe of the Grenfell Tower inferno in London, where repeat warnings by residents were ignored by the cost cutting privatised company running council housing in dangerous conditions that are repeated in tower blocks the poor live in across the country.

BBC reporter trying her utmost to stop lady telling the truth; trying to put spin on it. Bravo, lady. #GrenfellTowerpic.twitter.com/snYSCY82G7

— Z4M1R (@Z4M1R7) June 15, 2017

If you think a further kicking of the poor to worsen such conditions is neither here nor there, then maybe the success of Corbyn's campaign can be viewed on grounds of "well that was surprising, that is interesting isn't it, an election manifesto about NOT kicking the shit out of ordinary people prove quite popular with ordinary people? I guess this crazy ol' world will never fail to surprise us, eh?"

But for those strongly opposed to a society that sacrifices the majority to ever worsening conditions amid growing inequality, while the poorest and weakest are sacrificed, literally, in bonfires... the fact that Corbyn was so successful, and consolidated the hold of "Corbynism" on Labour's leadership, and has helped energise a mass movement, led by youth who were inspired to turn out in huge numbers to vote for an alternative FOR FUCKING ONCE... well it means something more.

I mean, everyone told young people Corbyn was a no-hoper, at best a decent bloke with nice ideas but who'll never get anywhere. But it didn't work, they turned out in the largest numbers for years because the people telling them this have done nothing but spit in their faces. Meanwhile, the Manifesto Corbyn has touting actually promised them something when no one had ever offered them anything before. Not really.

And their response?



Within Labour, which is now the largest left-of-centre party across Europe with as many as 800,000 members, the Great Neoliberal Orthodoxy has been overturned. There is the growth of a mass, youthful movement around the politics of solidarity and hope.

The fact that, while Corbyn has failed to form a government this time, he is very well positioned to do so sooner rather than later around a Manifesto that says "For the Many, Not The Few" on its cover and actually fucking means it ... is not just stunning, it is heartrendingly, beautifully hopeful.

Derek Wall, an ecosocialist and activist involved in Green politics since 1979, which is a fucking long time ago, and who is the joint international coordinator for the Green Party of England and Wales, put it simply an article on Green Left Weekly:

For the first time in my lifetime, the left in Britain are making dramatic gains.

We have lived through, and are still living through, a dark neoliberal nightmare where people and planet are sacrificed.

The rise of Corbyn (and similar left political breakthrough in other countries) is not The End of it, not by a long way. Hell, here in Australia, we haven't gotten close to even looking like seeing this type of political breakthrough.

That is without even getting to the challenged a Corbyn-led government would face if it won government from powerful entrenched interests, notwithstanding his platform actually being little more than reasonable. For a taste, you could just look the intense financial blackmail applied to Greece when they elected Syriza on a perfectly reasonable platform of not letting Greece be strangled to death. Syriza finally capitulated and abandoned its democratic mandate with the banks threatened with total collapse -- all done to send a strong message to ordinary people across Europe that they should STOP asking for FUCKING REASONABLE THINGS if they know what's good for them.

And that is not even discussing the fact a Corbyn government would formally head an imperial state whose actual democratic content is not quite as strong as it claims on the label, and would need to be countered by strong mobilisations from below.

But the Corbyn movement is a serious challenge to all this that brings hope of a struggle that may end the neoliberal nightmare, for the sake of the many and fuck the few.

It is hard to know how to fully put this into words, so I will do what I love to do, which is a) use a song and b) make that song by the glorious country folk husband-and-wife duo from South Carolina, Shovels and Rope, from their 2014 album Swimming Time.

Said I thought it would be colder
You put your head upon my shoulder
Ain’t it funny
How time just seems to run
What the hell have you been doin'
Not too sure, guess mostly movin'
I’ve been spinnin' for so long
Now I guess I’m spun 

Like the widest river
Like the brightest morn
There is hope where you can’t see it
There is a light after the storm
But won’t you help me to get through it
I’ve been flailing like a child
My mistakes, they are so many
For my lovin heart is wild 

Not quite old
But far from young
Body bold
With a youthful tongue
Like a kiss held out of context
I can’t separate my mind
We can set this boat on fire
We can leave it all behind 

Like the widest river
Like the brightest morn
There is hope just up ahead
There is a shelter safe and warm

 I am NOT crying! Fuck you. You don't deserve another Shovels and Rope song, but I'll give you one any way.

...I’m going down a long road, maybe it's the wrong road
But either way I gotta find my way back home again
It's too late to turn back now, gotta get the lead on out
Gotta find some way to make it right on

And nobody knows it like you do babe, nobody knows it like you do
Nobody knows it like you do babe, the lengths we will go to

There must be some other way, I just don't know
Gotta get myself back up on that high road 

But nobody knows that like you do...

What is that??? MORE??? Fucking Jesus, OK in the spirit of sharing I offer this... Shovels and Rope covering Nick Lowe's classic "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace Love and Understanding

As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.
I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?
And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I want to know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

...And as I walked on
Through troubled times
My spirit gets so downhearted sometimes
So where are the strong
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.
'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me want to cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

Alright now fuck off.

'My tongue's a match and my veins are full of gasoline...' This might actually be how you do it

How does one "do" "it"? How does one produce scintillating, dirty, sweaty, fury-driven rock'n'roll to give a massive fuck off to every hypocrite and prick there is, while insisting you will throw any hit "right back", but, like, with only two people on the stage armed with a guitar and drum set?

Well, Shovels and Rope, Charleston, South Carolina's finest product, can probably provide some clues. The married due produce country infused with punk rock energy and a style carved out of endless shows on the road.

So, you better back up
I'll show you bad luck
Ooh you got me shakin in my boots like I was seventeen
My tongue's a match and all my veins are full of gasoline
I come upon ya like a hit of methamphetamine
Eyes roll back in your head
Well I tell you right now, you better watch your back
You can talk dirty til your tongue turns black
But if you're throwin into me I'm gonna throw it right back at you...

They got lucky with one?

We always back the underdog because he's the only one we trust
And if that ones for the winner, this one must be for us...

And they don't do a bad cover.

As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.
I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?
And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I want to know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

Five covers of Tom Waits you need in your life right now! It will blow your mind in the most amazing way possible!!!

Number four actually gave me chills!!!

Yes that is click bait. I mean, yeah, listening number four on this list gives me fucking chills. Listening to a Tom Waits song always give me chills.

But if just one person is conned into listening to a single Waits song, then the end most certainly justifies even the most irritating means.

And we do need more of the sheer glory that is Tom Waits in our lives. For fuck's sake, Donald Trump is running rampant, the latest climate science is terrifying and the Western Sydney Wanderers are struggling to hold on sixth in the fucking A-League (and don't even mention what allegedly passes for the Wanderers' Asian Champions League campaign).

These, of course, are not simply "Tom Waits songs". They are five great covers I stumbled across while trawling YouTube.

It seems to me that ii is a basic, self-evident truth that Tom Waits is an incredible songwriter. I mean some things are just a fucking given, even in this strange age of alternative facts.

However, I am forced to accept, though I do not pretend to understand, that Tom Waits famed ultra-gravelly voice is something of an "acquired taste" and the voice can put-off for some from enjoying the remarkable storytelling and song-writing craftsmanship of which Waits is one of the greatest practitioners.

Waits voice is actually a tool to express emotion and serve the story telling. There is a sense that Waits just sounds like a Cookie Monster impersonator (or vice versa) , and, yeah, he sometimes does. But his voice is actually quite versatile and used in range of ways, including a sort of falsetto.

A recent New York Times article described Waits' voice, in a somewhat breathlessly OTT way, as:

An instrument of subtle melodic grace and brutal rhythmic power, his voice breeds metaphors as much as it delivers unmistakable sounds. It’s a worn leather bag, a broken chair, a lost dog that has just found his owner, a day without rain, a children’s choir with strep throat and the purest producer of deep feeling I’ve encountered. The last one isn’t a metaphor, I realize. 

More prosaically, Waits has a falsetto and a basso, a holler and a croon. It’s a voice that can take in the full breadth of human experience, on songs like “A Little Rain” or “Last Leaf,” managing, in its gentleness, to find new ways, through story and through image, to put the listener elsewhere, to put them deep inside a song.

Personally, I think as good an example as any as to the value of Waits' voice is his beautifully sweet song to the love of his life, who he was soon married -- 1980's "Jersey Girl". It is a song whose sweetness threatens to  overpower but for the way Waits' voice grounds it, brings the soaring sentiment of love down to Earth.

The beauty of its sentiment is contrasted with the harshness his voice, making it even more moving -- a man whose voice suggests suffering losing himself in the joy of finding true love, itself a love grounded in the very real urban landscape of New Jersey.

(Bruce Springsteen famously made the song a concert standard, and he also knows how to deliver a song like this with just enough dirt to carry it. An example of what happens when you fail to moderate its sweet core is Bon Jovi's horrific cover, which you can check out for purposes of scientific research.)

But... regardless... there are plenty of ways to skin a tale of a broken heart, and these covers all present Waits songs with vocals that serve the stories without grating any poor sensitive eardrums.

On his 2007 Orphans triple album of previously unrecorded tracks, Tom Waits divided his music into the broad categories of "brawlers", "bawlers" and "bastards". Three of these five tracks fall clearly into the "bawlers" category ("Alice", "Hold On" and "New Year's Eve"), which is probably the one on which Waits has most built his songwriting reputation. These are tales of heartache as people ground down by society struggle to find a way to keep on going.

One of the tracks fits pretty clearly into the "brawlers" basket -- "Bad As Me", a raucous tale of joyful sinners from his 2011 album of the same name.

And the other doesn't really fit exactly into these categories. "Clap Hands" is from Waits classic 1985 album Rain Dogs, his album inspired by living in New York, in which he presents the city's streets are overflowing with drunks and weirdos in a surreal dream-scape. The song, and the rendition below (second on the list), captures that pretty well.

Full playlist




Alice


'And so a secret kiss brings madness with the bliss...' 

That line has always struck me. This is beautiful rendition of a song filled with a bittersweet melancholy.

At the start, Evan Ivey, who I know nothing else about, says the song "saved my life". I don't know what prompted her claim, but she is not alone. You can read a moving account by blogger William Henry Prince in which he explains in detail how a Tom Waits song did, in fact, save his life.

There is also a Reddit discussion of people discussing how listening to Waits saved their lives, and I can believe it. Waits certainly makes me want to save this world from the rapidly developing eco-holocaust coz what is the point of achieving something as glorious as Tom Waits' output only for it to be destroyed along with the rest of human civilisation? You can hear Waits' equally spine-tingling original.


Clap Hands


'Said steam, steam, a hundred bad dreams, going up to Harlem with a pistol in his jeans...'

The Dirty Diary's YouTube account has some similarly great versions of other Tom Waits songs, as well as some other impressive dirty blues all recorded in his home. This is not a million miles from the original, but still a stunning effort and, like all five tracks, probably more immediately accessible to someone not already a Waits fan. Hear the original.


Hold On

Down by the Riverside motel
It's ten below and falling
By a ninety-nine cent store
She closed her eyes and started swaying
But it's so hard to dance that way
When it's cold and there's no music...

I have to admit, I did not expect to like to like this as much as I do. The three acts combining for the cover -- Burroughs,  Hi Ho Silver and The Native Siblings -- all seem the kinda middle-class indie kid music that brings out a savage allergic reaction in me that often comes close to requiring hospitalisation.

But... and I don't know anything else about these acts... this is an affecting take on one of Waits' best  heart-wrenching "story" songs. Hear Waits' original.


New Year's Eve

'The stars looked like diamonds, then came the sirens. And everyone started to cuss...'

I had never heard of Madison Ward and the Mama Bear -- a son-and-mother folk duo -- before this very solid cover of a track from Tom Waits 2011 Bad as Me album. It is a story song in a similar vein to  "Hold On" and, in a just world, would be to New Year's Eve what The Pogue's "Fairy Tale of New York" is to Christmas.

It is great cover by an act that, listening to some more from them, definitely seem worth following. And, as I said at the start, their cover gives me chills. Hear the original.


Bad As Me

I'm the one with the gun
Most likely to run
I'm the car in the weeds
If you cut me I'll bleed
You're the same kind of bad as me

FUCK I LOVE SHOVELS AND ROPE! My love of Shovels and Rope rivals my love of Tom Waits, and if you've made it this far into this post you'll grasp how big that praise is for me. I could rant a lot about Shovels and Rope, but that is a topic for another blog post (like this one).

I'll just note their combination of deeply affecting harmonies with the dirt and sweat of rock'n'roll, served up as a raw, dirt stained duo is second to none, performance wise. And here... they dedicate themselves to Tom Waits and produce an energetic, electric cover worthy of The Great Man himself. You can hear the original here.

Shovels & Rope Saturday: 'We always back the underdog, coz he's the only one we trust...'

 '... and if that one's for the winner, then this one must be for me'

My SIXTH STRAIGHT DAY of alliteratively derived musically themed blog posts was always going to be "Shovels and Rope Saturday" because my love of the glorious rock'n'roll-country-folk husband-and-wife duo of Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent is so intense it is almost unnatural.

The Charleston, South Carolina-based duo are just SO GODDAMN GLORIOUS. From the first time I accidently stumbled across them on YouTube (playing The Thread in a big empty warehouse) my heart was lost.

I have never heard them be anything short of breathtakingly awesome, raw, sweaty and beautiful in equal measures. The dynamics that makes them work so well is the combination of wonderful harmonies wedded to the dirty grit and high energy of rock'n'roll, with more than a dash of punk.

With just two of them on a stage — alternating between playing beaten-down looking guitars and drums, with harmonica and keyboards sometimes thrown in — these dynamics can be seen in songs and between songs.

It can even sometimes be seen between Hearst and Trent themselves — with Hearst the brassy Southern belle with the "howdee-do-dee" accent and Trent the dishevelled rock'n'roller with a three-day growth. Though, like their frequent switching between drums and guitar, they don't stay in those rolls, with Hearst looking often as down-and-dirty as anyone and Trent proving (as in the Americana Music Festival clip below shows) capable of carrying off a stylish suit as well as anyone.

It is a near perfect mix of sugar-and-spice, sweet-and-sour, Heaven-and-Hell (with the emphasis on Heaven). They are everything I ever wanted and their performances make me feel like crying with joy.

I saw them live in Sydney in March last year...  and they were as perfect as I'd expected. The night before, at a typically over-policed Western Sydney Wanderers game, I'd managed to get arrested for "assaulting police" (an insane charge — CCTV footage showed the cop assaulted me — that was later thrown out of court).

I turned up to the Factory in Marrickville barely 24 hours later, charge sheet still in my back pocket, and it was a case of "from the ridiculous to the sublime". If there is anything closer to Heaven than standing just metres from Shovels and Rope playing live, I'd be keen to know about it.

(Being with the Red and Black Bloc as the Wanderers play at Wanderland does give S&R a run for their money... and the one year ban from the Wanderers' stadium that came with the police charge is very very close to running out...)

As my mouth-foaming praise suggests, I'd find it near impossible to pick any Shovels and Rope song as "the best", but I chose "The Winner" coz it particularly speaks to me. It was originally released on a Michael Trent solo album (2010's The Winner).

But, with Trent and Hearst appearing on each others solo albums by that stage, that is a technicality and it is one of a host of songs from their solo albums played live as Shovels and Rope so often extent they as much part of the S&R repertoire as any other song.

The words of this ode to the underdog, the "battler" as I guess you'd say in Australia, are below. Then I chuck in one more clip — a live performance of "Birmingham", because the song is an autobiographical account of how Shovels and Rope came about.

The Winner 

Well I'm going through the motions
Seems it happens every night of every week
Well it's an ever running cycle
And the chance of breakin out of it seems weak
Well my mind becomes a freight train
And it never lets me get no decent sleep
Oh
Well my head starts a worrying about all the little things I cannot change
And my heart it starts a pounding
Messing up the way the blood goes through my veins
Oh
I never dream of nothin pleasant
I'm always lost or gettin booed off of the stage
Well the west coast was a desert
And New York City black
So I spent some time in Caroline
To make my money back
There's a trail of blood that trickles down from Denver to the sea
And if that ones for the winner, this one must be for me
Oh
Well there's this busy little corner
Half a mile down the road from where I live
Where all these beautiful women
Work the sidewalk with a little take and give
Oh it's like an escalator walkway
I just mind my own biz and make sure my money's hid
Well I got this friend, he takes his money down there every day when he gets done from work
He asks for Georgia cuz she's special,
She reminds him he's a man and he has worth
Oh but I don't judge him cuz he's honest
Which is more'n I can say I've been since birth
Oh
Well the west coast was a desert
And New York City black
So I spent some time in Caroline
To make my money back
There's a trail of blood that trickles down from Denver to the sea
And if that ones for the winner, this one must be for me
So if you're led into a wasteland or made to stumble through the dark
You leave a cartoon-colored legacy or a common watermark
We always back the underdog because he's the only one we trust
And if that ones for the winner, this one must be for us

Making something out of nothing with a scratcher and our hope
With two old guitars like a shovel and a rope

The Daily Carlo: Well Jesus fuck, the week this country has had... let's just have a *nice song*

Christ almighty. I mean... christ. This fucking country. This fucking week. 

On top of everything else like the torturing of children in jails and like children in jails is horrific enough, especially when you consider how unspeakable the jails are, and the ongoing genocide against Aboriginal people with huge incarceration rates and the fucking fact that you can fucking kill workers, in the 21st century, you can be responsible for the death of building workers on your site and when the workers protest your fucking responsibility, when they say for god's sake let's improve safety.... the trade union involved gets fined $3.5 million... and the employer? NOTHING! NOT A FUCKING THING THEY CAN JUST KILL WORKERS WITH FUCKING IMPUNITY!!!

And that is just the FUCKING START!!! THE VERY FUCKING START!!!

Because THIS WEEK  a man found not guilty of terrorism dared asked a fucking elected politician a question of some fucking TV show apparently set up for that very purpose of having members of the public ask questions... and THE FUCKING GOVERNMENT USED IT AS AN EXCUSE TO SEEK TO SMASH THE ABC, WHICH IS SO COWARDLY IT GOT ON ITS KNEES TO BEG FOR MERCY ONLY THERE WAS NO MERCY COZ ABBOTT SMELLED BLOOD SO HE CALLED A PRESS CONFERENCE WITH *TEN* FLAGS!!! YES TEN!!! A RECORD!!! AND HE SAYS "HEADS WILL ROLL!!!"

Because, as our prime minster asked the supposedly independent national broadcaster... "Which side are you on?"

And why? Because of a perfectly obvious point that severe attacks on the Muslim community, including the destruction of the rule of law, would likely lead to more radicalisation among young Muslims.

And the man who was asked the question was Liberal MP Steve Ciobo -- a member of the government, you know those in power. And he said, on national TV that he would be happy to see the questioner deported! Like thrown from the country!

Why was this such a fucking scandal? Because he was once accused and then acquitted of terrorism-related charges and dared ask him a question he didn't like! And the scandal for the government and the Murdoch press is the bloke got to ASK A QUESTION!!! And this man, this elected MP, is on record as saying the previous prime minster should have had her throat cut!!!

The Murdoch press, arguably, went a bit nuts with this "scandal".

But unlike some they were willing to ask the hard questions:

AAARGHH JESUS FUCK! Now an inquiry in the ABC to smash them up a bit further. On top of the most insane laws stripped people of the most basic democratic rights.  And this is barely scratching the surface really. This is just all I can think of in a stream of consciousness rant fuelled by cheap cider.

So I think we need this song. We specifically need glorious country folk husband-and-wife duo Shovels and Rope singing it. We need their glorious version of Nick Lowe's classic song. So play it. For christ's sake play it. PLAY IT!




'As I walk through this wicked world... searching for light in the darkest of insanity...' And no. I don't care if you think I am a fucking bleeding heart hippy. FUCK YOU.

(What's So Funny About) Peace Love And Understanding

As I walk through
This wicked world
Searchin' for light in the darkness of insanity.
I ask myself
Is all hope lost?
Is there only pain and hatred, and misery?
And each time I feel like this inside,
There's one thing I wanna know:
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?
And as I walked on
Through troubled times
My spirit gets so downhearted sometimes
So where are the strong
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.
'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?
So where are the strong?
And who are the trusted?
And where is the harmony?
Sweet harmony.
'Cause each time I feel it slippin' away, just makes me wanna cry.
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding? Ohhhh
What's so funny 'bout peace love & understanding?

Yeah. So FUCK YOU. I hate you all. Just listen to the song. Why can't you all be more like Shovels and Rope's Cary-Ann Heart and  Michael Trent, you goddamn arseholes?

The Daily Carlo: If you throw a hit at me I'm gonna throw it right back...

As regular readers will know, for a couple of weeks now I've been doing my "Daily Carlo" posts whereby I post on this blog every single day to ensure the Internet gets its *daily* dose of Carlo Sands!!!

It is without question a very important cause and one I remain *so* committed to I have posted *every single day* except for all the days between the last time I posted on February 28! Aside from those days, which have included every single day in the month of March except for today, March 17, I have been posting daily without fail. It is, indeed, an impressive record.

And today, well, really, I don't know that I have anything to say asides from: I FUCKING HATE PEOPLE.

I mean, I try not to let it show, as anyone who has ever had any engagement with me will attest. A more sociable and "skilled at social interaction with other humans" person you will not find on this or any other planet in the Known Universe. FACT.

But... sometimes... sometimes people are just, like, you know, really, really "people-like" and I just want to kill them and then the voices in my head start getting louder and louder till I can't even hear myself SCREAM and then A RED MIST DESCENDS AND EVERY GOES BLANK AND WHEN I COME TO THERE IS BLOOD AND BODY PARTS EVERYWHERE AND POLICE SIRENS ARE WAILING AND I NEED TO GO INTO HIDING ONCE MORE!!!

I fucking hate that.

On days like that, all you can do, should you want my advice (and why else would you be reading this blog?) is listen to God's Gift To Humanity: Shovels and Rope.

I got to see the husband-and-wife folk country rock'n'roll duo from South Carolina just two weeks ago and they were AWESOME. They were BEYOND AWESOME. They were the MOST AWESOME THING EVER SINCE THE LAST TIME I SAID SOMETHING WAS THE MOST AWESOME THING EVER EXCEPT THIS TIME I REALLY MEAN IT!!!!

Yes, when I say I hate people, I mean people WHO ARE NOT MICHAEL TRENT AND CARY ANN HEART FROM SHOVELS AND ROPE!!! COZ I LOVE THEM!!!

I love them in a maybe slightly creepily obsessive fashion that includes finding their address online then looking at images of their Johns Island, Charleston house on Google Maps ... but I am not going to post the image or link to such things here because that would be wrong and creepy and THEY ARE MINE!!! SHOVELS AND ROPE AND ME HAVE SOMETHING SPECIAL AND YOU JUST STAY AWAY!!!

The best bit about seeing them was when we were like right up the front and they were like just metres away. Like five metres away. I was so close to them I could see the veins bulging on Michael's neck (I call him "Michael" because I have stood five metres from him for like an hour-and-a-half watching his veins bulge and also looked at images of his street on the Internet, so we are pretty close really.)

Actually, the best way to comprehend how I feel about them is to post their song "Tickin' Bomb", which, by the way, they played when I saw them and it was AWESOME!!!

I don’t know you, but I know of you
And from what I know I think I love you
oh oh ooh Oh!
You make me feel like I’m sitting right beside you
If we ever met it’s just no telling
What I might do
Oh oh ooh oh!

Anyway, the point I was trying to make before I got distracted by how awesome Shovels and Rope are was... that this awesome Shovels and Rope song sums up my attitude to the rest of humanity today. QUITE FUCKING WELL.

My tongue's a match and all my veins are full of gasoline
I come upon ya like a hit of methamphetamine
Eyes roll back in your head
Well I tell you right now, you better watch your back
You can talk dirty til your tongue turns black
But if you're throwin into me I'm gonna throw it right back at you

In other news, today is St Patrick's Day, the Official International Day For Pretending To Be Irish And Using That Nation's Problem With Alcohol As An Excuse To Get Really Drunk -- or as Tony Abbott likes to think of it, "a great excuse to offend an entirely new group of people".

So, to honour the day, loyal readers, here is everything I have ever posted on this Godforsaken blog that has included the tag Ireland.

And here is a great song by The Pogues about a mythical Irish hero and getting really drunk.

There's devils on each side of you
with bottles in their hands
You need one more drop of poison
and you'll dream of foreign lands

The Weekly Carlo: This Human Rights Commission pro-human rights bias is truly incredible

Hello loyal readers! This is day five since I began my Brave and Inspirational Internet Commitment to blog every day!

Now, rather than waste your time with a *whole new* blog post filled with *all new rambling thoughts and rants* and *attempts at jokes* and all those things you have come to hate whenever you click of one of my posts in the vain hope maybe *this* time it will actually be enjoyable, entertaining and informative, I have decided to share with you all my latest weekly "Carlo's Corner" column that I write for Green Left Weekly!!! WOOHOO!!!

And I can this weekend post The Weekly Carlo because I like to talk about myself in the third person in blog post titles as if I am important! Anyway, enough about me, here's something by me!!!

Carlo's Corner: Human Rights Commission's bias towards human rights is just unbelievable

It seems there is no end to the incredible bias facing the poor, beleaguered Tony Abbott government. 

If it isn't an ABC journalist daring to ask a government minister a question they don't like, it's the Human Rights Commission releasing a report on the plight of children in immigration detention centres that even the most impartial observer would have to admit shows a distinct and unmistakable bias in favour of respecting human rights. 

Full article 

Yeah, I am pretty generous, I know, sharing that with you, like, for free! You can even read this other ting I wrote at the news satire site The (un)Australian yesterday called Teenager Right To Shout 'I Wish I'd Never Been Born', Climate Scientists Say. Wow! Don't thank me, just buy me a beer some time, via the Pay Pal button on the right hand side of the blog!



'When the Devil is all around, got you crawling on the ground...' Here is a BONUS random clip by South Carolina's awesome country folk duo Shovels and Rope at the Grand Ol' Opre! I AM SEEING THEM NEXT THURSDAY IN SYDNEY!!! 

The Daily Carlo: 'Aint it nice to be fighting on the winning side?' Syriza, Rojava, the Wanderers and SHOVELS & ROPE NEXT THURSDAY!!!

Well, holy fuck, this is Day 3 of my new Internet-Carlo Sands related initiative, the widely lauded Daily Carlo in which I pledge to blog EVERY MOTHERFUCKING DAY, and I have somehow I have made it three days out of three!

A truly remarkable milestone, and to celebrate, I thought I'd try something different. I thought I'd point out a few good things happening in the godforsaken world for a change!

Amid our seemingly inexorable descent into barbarism -- with terrifying climate news, our own fucking government torturing innocent children then seeking to destroy the woman who dare report the facts, and the fucking Smurf pricks at East Sydney Bling FC sitting a full five spots above the Western Sydney Wanderers on the A League table -- it seems humanity could sure use some cheering up.

Well, just call me Mr Cheery, coz this year has already involved some pretty impressive wins that push in the opposite direction.

Let's just start with the stunning victory of the left-wing party Syriza in Greece's January 25 elections, the first election of a radical left government in Europe since the 1930s and a decisive kick back against the austerity polices causing extreme humanitarian crisis.

Now I know what you're thinking: what the FUCK is the radical left doing wining anything?

The far left should, by rights, be on inner-city street corners with stalls people avoid or in inner-city pubs complaining about all those other leftists on the other stalls. I mean that's the left, yeah?

SO WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON???

'Holy fuck! The left WON something!' Syriza supporters celebrate.

And yes, I know the Latin Americans have been doing this kinda thing, electing radical left governments and defeating elite attacks for, like, years already, but for fuck's sake, that's them! I mean, if all followed the ways of the Latinos, we'd suffer collective liver failure in a week.

But then, as if like one victory for the global left was not enough, the next fucking day the revolutionary Kurdish-led liberation forces finally decisively repelled the ISIS siege on the town of Kobane in Rojava, where a profound experiment in genuine, direct democracy has been underway!

And then, and this is without a doubt the most glorious win of all, Western Sydney Wanderers put aside their dismal A-League season to start their Asian Champions League title defence with a stunning 3-1 victory over J-League heavyweights Kashima in Japan!!!

Despite being forced to wear especially shit ugly away jerseys, the Wanderers won 3-1!!! Goal scorers Mark Bridge and Yojiro Takahagi celebrate a glorious win for all humanity!

And then, as if that isn't enough sheer glory to celebrate... brilliant country folk act from South Carolina, Shovels and Rope, are playing in Sydney NEXT FUCKING WEEK!!! ARRGGHHHHH!!!

'Four big wheels, American steel. Pouring gasoline on the killing fields' Shovels & Rope are coming!!!

'Though we've never met you've captured my heart. I love you like gunpowder loves a good spark...'


Now, yes, sure. I can already hear all the nay-sayers. Yes, I know the limts of each and every one of these victories.

Yes, the new Syriza government has already been blackmailed into accepting some serious compromises that block key chunks of its program in the short term -- though how much is debated.

And yes, despite heroically beating the fascists of ISIS, there are legitimate questions as to how long the relatively isolated revolutionary cantons of Rojava can hold out against competing pressures of the Assad dictatorship, ISIS terrorists and Western imperialists.

Plus, despite our glorious win in Japan last night, the Wanderers don't just sit last in the A-League with just eight points from 16 matches, we face the crucial derby The Enemy Of All Humanity that is Sydney FC on Saturday missing Spiranovic and Poljak due to suspnsion and Santalab and Cole due to injury, which a somewhat unnerving prospect to say the least.

Worse of all, I have it on good authority that, having played their Australian gigs, Shovels and Rope plan to leave the fucking country, rather than stay here, permantly, in my basement, playing constant gigs.

But Jesus... sometimes... well sometimes... well... to quote the classics, by which I mean to quote Shovels and Rope... aint it nice to be fighting on the winning side?




'Aint it nice to fighting on the wining side?'


It is, Shovels and Rope! It really is! And no need to thank me for bringing a bit of happiness into your otherwise pathetic and utterly depressing lives! You can just buy me a beer! Courtesy of the Pay Pal button on the right-hand of this blog! WOOHOO!!!

The 6 Things You Should Never Say To A Psycopath

As anyone who has been near the internet at all in the past couple of years knows, some people in this world are introverts and others are extroverts. And both groups have their own special needs that only other introverts/extroverts could possibly understand.

But what about psychopaths? It can seem like our special nature and needs are all too often ignored.

This is not surprising when you consider all the negative portrayals of psychopaths coming out of Hollywood. What, with films ranging from American Psycho to Texas Chainsaw Massacre to the seemingly endless versions of Snow White (seriously, couldn't Hollywood manage to have at least one of them try to depict things from the Evil Queen's perspective???) it is no wonder psychopaths are so misunderstood and even feared!

No doubt you have many preconceived, and possibly quite wrong, notions about psychopaths -- that we are all mass murderers, torturers or CEO of major banks! I mean, it just isn't true -- some of us also run large oil companies!

Well you need worry no more! I have compiled this list to help you better understand and relate to the psycopaths in your life, and also increase your chances of staying alive! Yes, here are "The 6 Things You Should Never Say To A Psycopath"! Don't thank me, just buy me a beer sometime! Seriously! Just do it! Don't make me hurt you!


* * *

1) "Why are you carrying that machete?"

Yes we know we are carrying a machete! And yes we know it is dripping in blood! This is because psychopaths find social interaction to be difficult and frustrating if we don't have some sort of deadly weapon at hand with which to brutally slaughter whoever we are talking to, should the need arise.

This is just one of the defence mechanisms we have to help us cope with the outside world. It doesn't make us lesser humans or mean we hate you. It just means we are constantly weighing up whether or not to slash your ugly face to pieces with our machete.

Healthy relationships are all about maintaining respect, so keep in mind that pointing to the deadly weapon in a psychopath's twitching hand is basically like asking a disabled person why they have a wheelchair or asking someone what their false leg is for. As well as rude, it will also likely shorten your life expectancy.


2) "Why do you kill people?"

Why do you ask stupid questions? Seriously, it might be well-intended, but asking this is almost guaranteed to offend/enrage a psychopath.

But basically, so you know, it is kinda how we recharge our batteries.

Imagine that every person has one cup of energy that can be emptied out and needs refilling. Generally, non-psychopaths find the act of brutally butchering another human being to be a draining activity, after which they will often need a decent rest or even a long holiday on an entirely different continent with a fake passport and new identity.

Psychopaths, on the other hand, find the act of slaughter to be an exhilarating and uplifting experience! It really gets the blood flowing (haha bad pun!)

Essentially, it gives us the energy we need to face another day on this truly godforsaken hellhole of a planet. Best to just get out of the way and leave us to it, if you know what is good for you.

3) "Where do you bury all the bodies?"

OK, now asking this is a pretty big "no-no". No psychopath will want to answer this one partly for some pretty obvious legal reasons and partly because each psychopath's burial ground is a deeply personal space. For many of us, the place we bury our victims is one of the few places we can ever really truly feel at peace.

Also, it can be hard to find a decent place to bury bodies and space is often at a premium. Asking this of a psychopath will just lead to us having one more dead body we have to find a place to hide and this will increase stress levels unnecessarily. So just be respectful and avoid this one. For your own sake.


4) "ARRRGGH!!! FUCK!!! YOU'RE SLASHING MY LIMBS! OH MY GOD THE PAIN!"

Yes, OK, we know. Sometimes we start hacking away at anyone in our general vicinity when we get anxious or upset. Often it happens if someone tries to ask us where bodies are buried. It is a spontaneous response and often we won't even realise we are doing it!

However, you highlighting the fact in a public situation is unlikely to help and will only raise levels of anxiety and/or murderous rage. The best procedure is to wait for a quiet moment to discreetly raise the matter with the psychopath in your life and explain, gently and very, very carefully, your negative feelings towards having your limbs hacked to pieces.

Assuming you are still alive, of course. Which is probably pretty unlikely, because if there is one thing you can say about us psychopaths, it is once we start hacking, we tend not to stop until your body is in small, easy-to-dispose-of pieces! Sorry, it's just how we are!

5) "You are under arrest."

This is definitely a very bad thing to say to any psychopath. It is about the most offensive thing you could say -- and yet amazingly, you'd be shocked at how many times I actually hear this said to me! Even in 2014, some people still seem to think this is acceptable!

And why does it always seems to be police officers?!? I don't know what it is, but I can tell you right now the police forces in this country are clearly long-overdue for some "psychopath sensitivity training". Honestly, you'd think some of them have never seen a blood-splattered psychopath standing over a dismembered corpse before!

This really is one sure way to guarantee more blood being spilled. If you say this one to a psychopath, don't expect to stay alive much longer. You've been warned!


6) "Hey, psycho!"

"Psychopath" is the proper name for people who suffer from the medical condition psychopathy, which is characterised by enduring antisocial behaviour, diminished empathy and remorse, and disinhibited or bold behavior. The term "psycho", however, is widely recognised by psychopaths as a negative slur.

Yes, a psychopath can, and sometimes will, call another psychopath a "psycho" -- often when engaged in a battle to the death over some prime corpse-burying territory. But for a non-psychopath to use the term is deeply offensive.

Other terms to avoid include "crazed killer", "deranged lunatic", "freak", "murderous fruitloop", "serial killer", "monster", "The Butcher", "blood-stained axe-wielding maniac", "The Spawn of Satan" or "The Very Personification of Pure Evil".

Also unacceptable are "the suspect", "the accused" or "the defendant" (see point five). 

Use of such terms is likely to lead to your brutal death and it is unlikely to be quick or painless. Of course, if you have a psychopath in your life, you will probably die a horrible death sooner or later anyway. But you can do your bit to ensure your last remaining time on Earth is as non-offensive to your almost-certain-to-be murderer as possible. We thank you in advance.

* * *

OK, I hope that was useful, but if you wish to know more, I recommend these tracks about psychopaths and our culture. It is important to highlight those parts of popular culture treating psychoths with respect, so no I am not putting up any versions of Leon Payne's "Psycho" -- not even the Beasts of Bourbon's version despite Tex Perkin's fine vocal performance -- on grounds it uses the unacceptable "P" word.

I hope you enjoy the below tracks, however, featuring, somewhat unsurprisingly for anyone who has read more than one post on this blog, Tom Waits, Shovels and Rope and Alberta's finest country singer Corb Lund. DO YOU HAVE YOUR OWN PSYCHOPATH SONG? Suggest it in the comments.



'Cause there's nothin' strange about an axe with bloodstains in the barn. There's always some killin' you got to do around the farm...' Damn straight Tom! You tell 'em.




'She saw a thin man and a shadow make their way across the lawn ... And it'll be a long time before the sun shines on Shank Hill street again...' The South Carolina husband-and-wife duo's sensitive song by about a psychopath's sometimes strained relationship with their surrounding community.




'I ain’t got time to savour ‘em, I gotta drink ‘em quick
I’ve conveyed my urgency, I hope
If they catch me it’s all over, I’ll be way on up the creek
And I’ll be swingin’ on the wrong end of a rope'

Such a sad song by Canadian country singer Corb Lund! All about a psychopath from the American Wild West on the run from the law (does persecution of my kind ever stop?) who stops for a badly needed drink, only to be cruelly gunned down by the bar tender when he turns his back! I mean really, if you can't even trust your own bar tender who can you trust? Sad, sad song.

All your questions answered PART 2!!! FEATURING SHOVELS AND ROPE!!!

Well fuck yeah people! I told you to tell me your fucking problems and then I answered your fucking problems! That's just how I roll! I fucking solve shit. I am a "solver".

More than that, I'm a fucking "doer". It took me less than four months to answer the last lot of "Agony Aunt/Ask Your Friendly Prophet" questions, and this time I was even quicker! Just a matter of weeks since you asked your questions!

This is what progress looks like. Goddamn governments claiming to take "the need for climate action" seriously might want to take notes here. Action should be as swift and decisive as a Carlo Sands blog post, you motherfuckers.

It did help that there were a just two questions. It helped even more that one came from a man whom dedicated readers of this blog will immediately recognise as the cad who beat me in a duel to the death -- yes, Leslie Fucking Richmond!!! Having basically killed me with the help of the Facebook quiz "when will you die?", the prick now has the sheer fucking gall to ask me a question!!!

But, personal feelings/murder notwithstanding, I made a solemn promise to my multitude of fans that I would answer their questions -- and that my answeers would come with a specially designated song by the glorious American country/folk husband-and-wife duo Shovels and Rope. 

I made a similar promise last time with Tom Waits and I fucking delivered... so you better believe I will come through with SHOVELS AND FUCKING ROPE!!!! Yeah? So here we go...

1) Alright let's start with the goddamn cad and get him out of the way -- literally, with any luck. "Leslie Richmond" (and I am confident that is his real name coz why would anyone impersonate such a prick?) has the unspeakable gall to ask:

Sorry, is this Room 101? I was told to report to Room 101. It looks ... scarier ... than I imagined it to be.

Well, don't you fucking even bother apologising to me, Richmond! Jesus fuck! But... to answer your question. No.

There you go. That is your answer, straight up. No, this is not "Room 101". It is not the fucking fictitious room George Orwell invented in his novel 1984, whereby people are tortured by their own worst nightmares.

Nor, for that matter, is it the British TV show of the same name in which comics and other celebrities nominate pet hates they would like condemned to an Orwell-inspired Room 101 -- which, and never let it be said this blog is not "up-to-date" with show bizz "goss", is going to be recreated for Australian TV with Paul McDermott as its host.

So I hope this answers your question. You get a Shovels and Rope song -- even if you don't fucking deserve one. It is, however, highly appropriate. It is like the song was written for you, you evil prick.

But every now and then I get evil
I’m ashamed in the shadow of the steeple
I’m a lunatic looking thru a keyhole

2) OK I was quite grateful to receive a second question... or so I thought, until I saw the questioner! It was one "Simon Ronald", who I am sure all dedicated readers of this blog immediately recognise as that fucking freak who in the last round of questions confessed to being a degenerate and compulsive TOUCHER OF HIS EYEBROWS!!! 

Now, I'll admit it takes some courage to come back after admitting something that and daring to pose a new question. So, purely out of respect for his sheer bravery, I'll report and seek to answer the degenerate's new question, which is: 

how often should one "treat oneself"?

Well, jesus christ, you try to give a fucker a break and he throws this at you! How often should you "treat yourself"??? Now, I don't presume to know exactly what you mean by "treat oneself", Simon Ronald, but I assume, to go by your past sinful admissions, what you mean is how often should you "treat yourself" by touching your eyebrows, you sick fuck!!!

To which I can only reply: that is NOT A TREAT, THAT IS A SIN!!! YOU ARE CLEARLY BEYOND HELP AND YOU DO NOT DESERVE TREATS!!! 

Nonetheless, I shall take mercy on you. Yes, despite your degeneracy I hereby assign you the following Shovels and Rope song "The Devil Is All Around". I think you will find it highly pertinent to your "eyebrown-touching" predicament. I pray you will listen and consider its message of possible salvation.

So I'm gonna be a good man, gonna do the best I can
Though I'm a shell of the man that I once was
And if I find forgiveness in the eyes of god
It will be hard won, I assure you

PRAY LISTEN TO SHOVELS AND ROPE, SIMON, AND DO THE BEST THAT YOU CAN!!!

Well, that is your questions answered once more. I really feel that deserves a beer, which you can purchase for me via the PayPal donations button on the righthand side of the blog. I PROMISE ALL MONIES DONATED WILL BE SPENT ON BEER!!! THAT IS A CARLO SANDS GUARANTEE!!!

Do you have more questions for Carlo Sands? YEAH? YOU DO? Well ask me in the comments section under this post and I shall rush to answer them!!! I will even award you with your own personal song by Texas singer-songwriter Hayes Carll!!! GO ON!!! GIVE IT A GO!!!


BONUS TRACK

Yes, a bonus Shovels and Rope track! I have chosen "Boxcar" coz I think it speaks to the universal experience of being a couple of in-love desperados on the run from the law somewhere in Depression-era United States -- and "bleeding out in a boxcar, shot in the back". Christ, we've all been there.

Well ain't it just like you and me to go down like that?
Bleedin' out in a boxcar, shot in the back
We were all out of luck, all out of time
Law was waiting for us at the end of the line...

The Reason I Have Not Jumped From My Window Today #1 Featuring Shovels And Rope

I am thinking of starting a series along these lines. The world is dark, it is horrible, it is filled with bands like Mumford and Sons. Sometimes, it all seems too much. Why live in a world where shit like that passes for "civilisation"???

Because there exists acts like Shovels and Rope and listening to this clip below, one of a number of YouTube clips showing full performances of the GLORIOUS country/folk/roots/Americana duo and not even the best, just the one I have listened to today, well... that is why I haven't jumped. Because there is good in the world. And it is really fucking good.




YARRRRRRRRRR


Bonus track




We're hangin here within an inch of our lives
from the day we're born until the day we die
don't it make you want to take your time
are you gonna let it pass you by

Made every way cut you like a knife
any moment in time could change your life
will you be ready with the time you got
maker is ready if your ready or not

Hangin on by a fragile thread
livin your life like your already dead
will you be happy with the time you gave
these words will be your final days...

Wish i could look death in the face
transcend both time and space
and reclaim those bygone days
that i was such a fool to waste...

When it comes my day when it comes my time
I hope to hear y'all moaning in the second life
Just throw my ashes on some hollow ground
and sing me on my way with a joyful sound
you can sing me on my way with a joyful sound
you can sing me on my way

I'm so sorry for what I did. Here, have some Shovels and Rope and Hayes Carll to make up for it

You know, it's hard to admit when you are wrong. Luckily for me, then, that I wasn't.

However, it is true that my last post was about that strange and disturbing "celebrity" called (for what I am sure is some horrific reason) "Redfoo" and I did fail to provide a "trigger warning".

Now, as part of my research for that post, I subjected myself to some of the clips for Redfoo's "songs" and, believing pain shared is pained doubled, felt it was only fair readers also had the chance to have their faith in the future of humanity decimanted by posting the clips as part of the post.

It had to be done. I am sorry, but it did. THE WORLD HAD TO KNOW! But I am truly sorry for any suffering my actions caused.

To make it up to my huge number of readers, fans and fanatical followers, I hearby provide some brain-cleansing music from two of the greatest acts on God's Own Earth -- Shovels and Rope and Hayes Carll.

I have ranted on the glories of both on this blog at some point. Hayes Carll is the brilliant country singer-songwriter from Houston, Texas who has never written a bad song. He is your classic drunken and slightly dishevelled troubadour, staggering from gig to gig with various degrees of facial hair, singing songs alternately witty and heartbreakingly beautiful.

Hayes has increasingly made a name for himself in the US with the sheer quality of his songwriting and performances, but he is not well-enough known in this country by any measure. I saw him in Sydney a couple of years ago with maybe 100 others, max, and he was stunningly brilliant.

Also, this beer can from the US reads 'To Carlo, love Hayes' and was sent to me by DonnaCat, my friend/only person I know from Arizona, who got him to sign it after a gig. It may be the most valuable thing I own.

Shovels and Rope... well... they are another act getting increasing well-deserved attention and critical acclaim. They are the truly glorious husband-and-wife duo of Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent, both established performers before joining forces -- Hearst a country singer, Trent heading a rock'n'roll band. Together... they are something else.

With the pair alternating between guitar and drums, their music is ragged, rowdy, rough-edged and earthy. It is filled with raw energy and features absolutely beautiful harmonies. That combination -- of the raw earthiness of their frill-free recordings (their breakthrough album O' Be Joyful was recorded in the back of their van while they travelled around gigging endlessly), with the beauty of their harmonies raises their tales of low-life desperados, murderers and battlers to a whole other level.

Listening to Shovels and Rope is one of those all-too-rare experiences in this godforsaken world -- it actually makes me feel happy. They are so good, I feel like crying when I hear them.

There are, of course, countless labels thrown on their music -- from "Americana" to a wide range of subgenres ending in "-folk" or "-country". It is the kinda thing they take up in a good-natured way in their song Cavalier.

But all that really matters is Shovels and Rope are how music should sound, a reminder that late monopoly capitalism has not, despite its best efforts, snuffed out all talent or enthusiastic energy out of popular music.

They have also just released a great new album called "Swimmin' Time" and there is a documentary I am desperate to see about them called "The Ballad of Shovels and Rope". Tragically, I also have no beer can signed by either half of Shovels and Rope.

So here are the clips. One Shovels and Rope song as a taste, then a clip of an extended live performance, then the formula is repeated for Hayes Carll.

AND THEN THERE IS A *TOM WAITS* BONUS!!! I KINOW RIGHT??? A TOM WAITS BONUS!!! Yes, clips of Shovels and Rope and Hayes Carll each covering a Tom Waits song live!


***

Shovels and Rope!!!

'We're hanging here within an inch of our lives, from the day we're born till the day we die...'

'I love you like gunpowder loves a good spark...' Just one of the great lines...

***

Hayes Carll!!!

'Ah, some people just gunna sneak on through, others gotta rattle that cage...'




"I'm gunna leave these blues behind, for some other fool to find...' HA! As if Hayes! As if.



TOM WAITS BONUS!!!




'You're the letter from Jesus on the bathroom wall, you're Mother Superior in only a bra...' Shovels and Rope cover the title track from Tom Waits' most recent album.




'When I see the five o'clock news, I don't wanna grow up...' Hayes' covers Tom's classic from his 1992 album Bone Machine.


EXTRA EXTRA BONUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah I know what you are thinking! The Tom Waits Bonus is just AWESOME surely there is NOTHING ELSE AWESOME to give us???

Well... indeed there is an extra bonus after the first extra bonus! And that is... a "duet" between Hayes Carll and Shovel and Rope's Cary Ann Hearst!!! I KNOW RIGHT??? HOW MINDBLOWING AWESOME IS THAT??????????




'You were falling like the Alamo, talking fast and drinking slow...' This duet was featured on Hayes Carll's 2011 album KMAG YOYO.

No need to thank me for all this, world. Just buy me a beer some time. No, seriously, BUY ME A BEER I AM REALLY FUCKING THIRSTY!