Thacker Mountain Radio welcomes Texas legend Kinky Friedman and Oxford’s newest novelist, Julie Cantrell, to Off Square Books Thursday, Feb. 23 at 6 PM. Musical guests will be bluesmen L.C. Ulmer and Jimmy “Duck” Holmes and New Orleans hillbilly band, Michael Hurtt and the Haunted Hearts.

Join us this Thursday at Off Square Books. Admission is free and the show can be heard on Rebel Radio, 92.1 FM.

Kinky Friedman- Kinky Friedman is a singer/songwriter known for his bawdy lyrics and biting social commentary (“They Ain’t Making Jews Like Jesus Anymore.”) He is the author of 30 books, including a successful series of mystery novels and was a candidate for Texas governor in 2006. His most recent book is Heroes of a Texas Childhood with essays on Sam Houston, Davy Crockett, Willie Nelson and Barbara Jordan, among others. He is also the author of Kinky Friedman’s Guide to Texas Etiquette: Or How to Get to Heaven or Hell Without Going Through Dallas-Fort Worth. A former Peace Corps worker in Borneo in the mid-1960s, Friedman lives in the Texas Hill Country, outside Kerrville, where he operates the Utopia Animal Rescue Ranch, in its 15th year as a haven for unwanted dogs and cats. Following his Thacker appearance, Kinky will perform at Proud Larry’s at 9 PM with songwriter, Kacey Jones.

Julie Cantrell- Julie Cantrell is the author of the just released novel, Into the Free (David C. Cook) a Depression-era tale of hardship, faith and redemption. Cantrell has been a freelance writer and children’s author for ten years. She was a contributing editor at MOMsense magazine and the Southern Literary Review. Oxford’s Neil White, author of In the Sanctuary of Outcasts, said, “Julie Cantrell’s Into the Free is a searing tale of heartache, faith, forgiveness, and doubt set amidst gypsies, angels, addicts, asylums, roughnecks and rodeo hands.” Julie and her family live outside Oxford where they operate the Valley House Farm.

Michael Hurtt and the Haunted Hearts- Michael Hurtt and the Haunted Hearts passionately resurrect New Orleans’ once rich, now nearly invisible, hillbilly music heritage. The band blends its original tunes with covers of lost gems by the likes of Jay Chevalier, Red LeBlanc and the original “Mardi Gras Mambo” man, Jody Leavins. The Hearts’ rock-a-bayou hillbilly style is a Southern Gothic collision of the rural and the urban; an electrified string sound with a Cajun back beat. The band’s latest release is the single, Hamtramck Baby.

Jimmy “Duck” Holmes- Jimmy “Duck” Holmes is the proprietor of one of the oldest juke joints in Mississippi, the Blue Front in Bentonia. In the mid-2000s he began performing more actively as a practitioner of the “Bentonia Blues,” a distinctive style of open tuning pioneered by Skip James. His CDs include Gonna Get Old Someday (Fat Possum), Back to Bentonia and Done Got Tired of Tryin’ (both Broke & Hungry) In August of 2007, a Mississippi Blues Trail historic marker was dedicated in Holmes’ honor in front of the Blue Front Café.

L.C. Ulmer- L.C. Ulmer was raised near Stringer, Miss. and left there at age 14. He drove a truck 40 years in and out of Chicago, playing his eccentric blues on the side. Ulmer moved back to his home state of Mississippi in 2004 and, with the help of bassist Justin Showah and Hill Country Records, began recording and touring. His CD, Long Way From Home: Live at Rootsway Festival, Parma, Italy, was released in 2007. In 2009, L.C. Ulmer was named the Blues Artist of the Year by the Mississippi Delta Blues Society of Indianola. 

Join host Jim Dees and our house band, the Yalobushwhackers, this Thursday, Feb. 23 at 6 PM at Off Square Books. You can hear the show locally Thursday on Rebel Radio (92.1 FM). Tune in to Mississippi Public Broadcasting every Saturday night at 7 PM for Thacker Mountain Radio immediately following A Prairie Home Companion, or listen Saturday online: (http://www.etv.state.ms.us/radio/index.html).  

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