Drink Hole Saturday Night Concerts - Billy Joe Shaver "Unshaven"

Saturday Night at Ye Olde Drink Hole! Sit back, relax and dance...or at least have a beer and take a listen to one of the finest songwriters living today, Billy Joe Shaver!

This 1995 album comes from back when Billy Joe and his son Eddy were performing together as "Shaver" and the sound they put together was awesome! This is real Honky Tonk-beer drinkin' music!

Eddy left us not long after, a heroin OD takes away another guitar virtuoso, but during this period I actually got to see them live myself. We were only a small crowd that arrived for them here (Southern California is a cultural wasteland) but they played a show like there were 50,000 people in the house.

Then both Billy Joe and Eddy signed my guitar and Rev. Will's guitar.

And while the music is rockin' you away, the lyrics come through loud and clear. Billy Joe has been called "The most well-read guy who never read a book." His music is poetic in the plain language sense as possible. If you've at any time of your life been one of the simple an down-trodden masses, Billy Joe was down there in the dirt with you, and making it rhyme.

"The Hottest Thing in Town" - 'She was built for speed with all the tools you need to make a new fool every day'



"Good News Blues" - 'My woman left me, and I'm sure glad she did'



"Georgia On a Fast Train" - 'I got a good Christian raisin' and an 8th grade education, ain't no need in y'all a-treatin' me this way!'



"Honky Tonk Heroes" - 'There weren't no other, other way to be.'



"Honey Bee" - I'm not so sure if this is a great song, or more just an excuse (a really, really, really GOOD excuse) to whip out the Dobro...



"Ride Me Down Easy" - 'I'm easy come and easy go and easy to love when I stay.'



"Love You 'Til the Cows Come Home." - '...'til the cotton's all picked AND the hay is in the barn!'



"Live Forever" - you've seen Rev. Will and I do this one, right here in this blog...now hear Shaver do it!



"Black Rose" - 'The Devil made me do it the first time, the second time I done it on my own'



"I'm Just an Old Chunk of Coal" - 'but I'm gonna be a diamond some day.'



"Sweet Mama" - 'Pride ain't worth a U.S. dime, pride ain't worth this poor boys time!'



"You Asked Me To" - 'Just because...'



Ahhhhhhh, good stuff!

Once again I state, I don't offer these songs for download. Billy Joe Shaver is a working artist. Visit his website if you like what you hear here.

Talk to you later. I need another beer and I've got 14 other Billy Joe albums to listen too!