Hillbilly Highway – Hard touring Memphis act Lucero roll into town

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by Sheldon Birnie

One of the hardest working bands in rock n roll is hitting Winnipeg this week, and I for one could not be happier.

Lucero are a long-running, hard-touring band out of Memphis, Tennessee. Having been out on the road for well over a decade, playing up to or over 200 shows a year, the band are far from slowing down, even as they edge into their 40s. Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Hard touring Memphis act Lucero roll into town”

Hillbilly Highway – Lucero preview

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by Sheldon Birnie

I’ve been a big fan of Memphis, Tennessee’s Lucero for years now. So when it was announced late in 2012 that the band would be finally playing in Winnipeg, I nearly lost it. I immediately contacted their management to arrange for an interview. After some back and forth in January, I finally completed a nice little chat with Lucero guitarist Brian Venable last week. Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Lucero preview”

Hillbilly Highway – Top 5 tunes about truckstop waitresses, topless turnpike dancers, and backroads beauties

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by Sheldon Birnie

Last week here on the Hillbilly Highway, we spoke with Dustin Bentall leading up to his performance at the Park Theatre on Valentine’s Day.

Now that a few days have passed, I’m still stuck with his unbelievable tune “Emmylou” playing repeat on the jukebox in my brain. I can’t shut it off. I wake up in the morning, it’s there. I’m walking the streets of Winnipeg, it’s keeping me company. I try to drown it out by hitting the Windsor or the Times, but when I deke outside for some air, it’s right there. Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Top 5 tunes about truckstop waitresses, topless turnpike dancers, and backroads beauties”

Vancouver’s Cityreal keeping a close to ear to the pavement

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by Harrison Samphir
When Stylus asked Remi Huot, otherwise known as Cityreal, how he began making hip hop music in his early twenties, the answer was not unusual.“I fell into it accidentally,” he recalls, speaking with Stylus on the phone from Vancouver BC. “I had some knowledge of music from playing in high school bands, and later on started messing around with beats. I just stuck with it as a hobby.”Now 26 years old, Huot is among Canada’s most prolific rising emcees, boasting two records, three Western Canadian Music Award nominations, and a substantive list of associated acts including Swollen Members, Sweatshop Union, D-Sisive and even Leslie Feist. Continue reading “Vancouver’s Cityreal keeping a close to ear to the pavement”

Hillbilly Highway – Dustin Bentall & The Smokes to light up the Park

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by Sheldon Birnie

Dustin Bentall is an award winning songwriter off of the West Coast of British Columbia. Since the early Oughts, he’s been travelling hard across the Hillbilly Highway, churning out a couple albums worth of solid storytelling songs about drifters, gunfighters, and guitar slingers. On his recent EP, Orion, Bentall has finally locked down a solid band at his back. With the Smokes in tow, Bentall, son of Canadian folk-rock hero Barney Bentall, is rolling into town with Lindi Ortega to take the Park Theatre by storm.  Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Dustin Bentall & The Smokes to light up the Park”

Hillbilly Highway – Crazy what a bunch of Paper Nickels can do…

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by Sheldon Birnie

It is truly amazing how far a crazy idea can go if you really give it all you got. Case in point is Corin Raymond’s latest album, Paper Nickels. Funded entirely by what Corin calls “The Great Canadian Tire Money Caper of 2012,” the album is possibly the craziest crowd sourcing experiment the world has seen yet, and certainly the most Canadian.  Continue reading “Hillbilly Highway – Crazy what a bunch of Paper Nickels can do…”