Roger Miller, Noam Chomsky, Hillman and Parsons, Brantley Kearns, Mike Stinson, Tony Gilkyson, anonymous, Hildegarde Von Bingen, Bill Monroe, James Burton, Kenny Buttrey, Latin Mass, Old Californio.
We're from Southern California, Minnesota, and North Carolina, and we play what used to be called country music but is now known as alt country or folk music.
Our lead singer might be an anarchist, but he won't say. Our bassist is a libertarian. Our guitarist believes that totalitarianism may be an inevitable consequence of population density. Our drummer bought a new preamp for his studio. Our fiddler knows 7,000 songs and doesn't leave his house except to go outside.
We sing of whales, hawks, distilled spirits, secondary highways, Klansman/Senators, gunnery ranges, weary love, preachers and housewives, herbs and herb growers, ferns and fern allies, Jackpot, Texarkanada, Caleximexico, Mexicalexico, Provo, and Vermont.
We encourage home gardening, the coming generation of thin solar panels, and an escape route. We've released four CDs of which we are proud and will release a 5th in January 2010 on American Beat Records.
We thrive in the margins and tour the secondary routes and blue highways: Chattanooga, Winters, Mariposa, Sebastopol, Johnson City, Knoxville, Eugene, Montpelier, Lafayette.
Here's what Jonny Whiteside of the L.A. Weekly says about us:
"These freewheeling lords of California psych country approach their music almost as if it were a portal, an unseen threshold that, once crossed, promises a wholly unpredictable experience. The Hawks singular style always operates on an epic scale, exploring weird panoramas of hallucinatory metaphor with a sound as much traditional hillbilly as it is accelerated lysergic-rock spontaneity. Up, up and away."
I really enjoyed your Wonder Vally set. Hadn't heard "The Mystery of Life" live before. It's always been one of my favorites. Did you really play "The Beautiful Narcotic Place I Reside"? I was spacing out in my lawn chair right about then and I was hearing it! Another rare live performance if it was. It was great kicking up some desert dust during the "Fight Song"! Thanks! and how about them Sibley's!?! Wow! Hope you had as much fun as I did!
Howdy! Long time no see ......I have been back and forth to the tree.........Dennis stilll has not made it out there...if ya'll have a rope we can drag him out there :).........I think a blast of Cosmic America would do him just fine!
Just droppin' on by to say how much we've been enjoying listening to your CDs on the road to play our shows out in the fjordlands and frozen wilds of Norway!
Hopefully you'll get back up our way someday soon.
It'd be great fun to have a 3 band bill with you and the Long Ryders!
Thanks for this. I would really appreciate you guys telling Peter we wuz good. Will send some tracks to you of our new Coal Porters album, entitled Durango, in September. I am off to my native Kentucky first and when I get that family chore outta the way I will focus on zee new rekkid. I would LOVE to have the Coal Porters play some shows with you guys anyplace...certainly Scandinavia seems the most logical place to start. You bet. Tell Art Fein I said hello and hope to see you dudes very soon. best from wet London where there are no forest fires as we ain't got a forest and it rains anyway, Sid G. Coal Porters World HQ
Good call on Naomi Klein, I got Allen Ginsberg on MySpace Sid Griffin. Hey the Coal Porters are speaking to Peter Holmsted about booking us for Scandinavia so if you guys remember Down On The Farm in Norway summer 2008 can you please, please, please put in a good word for us? Hope so. New Coal Porters CD out January 2010 with guests Tim O'Brien and Peter Rowan. I am right proud of it. All the best to you and say hi to Dodger Stadium for me, Sid Griffin Coal Porters World HQ London, England
I had such a great time last night! I can't believe that was my first time to Cinema Bar! Wow....what a great honky tonk...and so cool I saw yall there first! I really felt like I was in Texas. See yall on the 19th...that's gonna be a great night of music!
...listening to you from my switzerland livingroom. (which sounds like a palindrome, but clearly it isn't.) it's darn good to hear you today. peace ~ beth
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