Up on Cripple Creek

The Baptist Generals open for the Gourds March 6 at the Gypsy Tea Room.

Scene, heard
After releasing one of 1998's best locally produced discs, The Calways will be recording their next album for Pineapple Records, a tiny indie based out of Arlington. The label--which used to be Twin Buddha, till it was bought out (for what?)--owns its own studio in Arlington, and the band will go into the studio in May and begin recording a full-length album for a fall release. "I'm excited," says frontman Todd Deatherage--who is, in fact, far more giddy about his band's opening gig for Billy Ray Cyrus March 4 at the Bronco Bowl. The Calways and Brian Houser both landed a gig opening for the reformed mullet, which is so frightening a prospect we can't even think of a joke--how do you laugh in the face of such tragedy? "It's beautiful," Deatherage says with a straight face. "It's a great opportunity. We're gonna be in front of thousands of people. I just hope we didn't lose any artistic credibility for that." Seriously, dude...

It's the bill of the month--or a lifetime, if it lives up to its potential. On March 12, Bobby Blue Bland and Bobby Patterson--two men with the word legend somewhere on their driver's licenses--will share a stage at the is-it-still-open? Longhorn Ballroom. The show, titled "The Dirty Rat Blues Festival and Birthday Bash," is a birthday party of sorts for Bobby "T.C.B. or T.Y.A." Patterson, who's currently hosting a mile-a-minute radio show from 9 a.m. to noon weekdays on KKDA-AM (730). Quiet, do not disturb while he's making love to a microphone.

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