ABOUT CROSS CANADIAN RAGWEED

Let’s get this straight right off the bat, though it should be obvious to any and all who have been listening over the last decade or so: Cross Canadian Ragweed are a rock’n’roll band. “They may be the last great Southern rock band still stomping the boards,” says All Music Guide, while USA Today proclaims that “this ferociously rocking band is one of the better-kept secrets around.” But not a secret for much longer, as their seventh studio album, Happiness and All The Other Things, amply proves.

And, yes, being from a small town in Oklahoma and two of them now residing in the Lone Star State (where they are kings of the thriving Red Dirt/Texas music scene), Cross Canadian Ragweed also qualify as country, and have even played The Grand Ole Opry. It’s only natural, part of the musical heritage that the members of the band grew up on.

ABOUT RECKLESS KELLY

These are very good times for Reckless Kelly. With the release of Bulletproof in 2008, the Austin-based roots-rockers known for the integrity of their musical approach, the hard-core energy of their live shows and the fierce loyalty of their fans, turned up the intensity on their career. The album quickly became their biggest seller, hitting the Billboard 200 and reaching the Top 25 of the magazine's Top Country Albums chart. It contained their first #1 on both the Texas and Americana charts, "Ragged as the Road," and earned them a nomination as Best Band or Duo at the 2009 Americana Music Awards, a show that put them on stage with the country's best at the Ryman Auditorium. It also contained "American Blood" and "God Forsaken Town," widely regarded songs that link them to a working-class tradition of socially conscious music that stretches from Woody Guthrie to Bruce Springsteen.

The fact that "God Forsaken Town" was written by Reckless Kelly singer/songwriter Willy Braun with Robert Earl Keen is symbolic of the fact that the band's standing among its peers has never been higher. The respect they've earned from everyone from Steve Earle to Kevin Welch can be summarized by Joe Ely, who called them "my kind of band: hell-raising, hard-playing, kick-ass songwriting, feet firmly in the present, but with an amazing knowledge of where it has all come from."