Southern Culture On The Skids Returns

Not that they ever actually went away... tour starts this week, new album drops next week.

By Fred Mills

Back at the Kudzu Ranch recording enclave, Tarheel twang merchants Southern Culture On the Skids recently put the finishing touches on their new album. It's titled, fittingly, The Kudzu Ranch, and it's issued on their own Kudzu label following a three-album run with the venerable Yep Roc which concluded with 2007's Countrypolitan Favorites.

"The Kudzu Ranch is collection of 10 originals and a couple covers," said guitarist Rick Miller recently, "songs about people, places and things - like good friends and crazy neighbors, dry dirt and pompadoured flirts, busy roads and horny toads - all of them motivatin', salivatin' and procreatin' to their own crazy beat!"

It arrives next week, Sept. 7, via their official website, www.scots.com, and will eventually be available at retail in early November. Folks who do pick it up directly from the band will also nab some fun digital freebies, so you have been advised. Meanwhile, the band heads out for a 3-week trek out west starting this week (the second leg of their tour will commence in mid October), so BLURT is sitting down with guitarist Rick Miller tomorrow afternoon for an in-depth yak about all things SCOTS - including details on their remastered reissue of their 1991 sophomore platter Too Much Pork For Just One Fork, which is also due very soon. Watch the BLURT site for the fruits of that conversation real soon.

Yours truly saw the band play about a month ago at the Bele Chere street festival in Asheville, NC, and I can safely advise that, in the parlance, "They still got it." I was almost hit in the forehead with a chicken wing in the process of formulating that assessment, in fact. So don't miss ‘em.

Tour Dates:

Fri 9/3/2010     Los Angeles, CA        The Echo

Sat 9/4/2010    Ventura, CA   Ventura Fairgrounds

Sun 9/5/2010   Lockwood, CA           Hungry Flats Diner

Tue 9/7/2010   San Jose, CA   The Blank Club

Wed 9/8/2010             Petaluma, CA McNears Mystic Theatre

Thu 9/9/2010   Santa Cruz, CA           Moe's Alley

Fri 9/10/2010   Crystal Bay, NV         Crystal Bay Club Crown Room

Sat 9/11/2010 San Francisco, CA      Great American Music Hall

Sun 9/12/2010             Bakersfield, CA          Fishlips

Wed 9/15/2010           Tucson, AZ     Plush

Thu 9/16/2010             Phoenix, AZ    Rhythm Room

Sat 9/18/2010 San Diego, CA            Casbah

Fri 10/8/2010   Richmond, Va             Plaza Duckpin Bowl

Sat 10/9/2010 Washington, DC         9:30 Club

Sun 10/10/2010           Harrisburg, PA            The Abbey Bar

Tue 10/12/2010           Marietta, OH   The Adelphia (at the Galley)

Wed 10/13/2010         Pittsburgh, PA            Diesel Club

Thu 10/14/2010           Philadelphia, PA         World Cafe Live

Fri 10/15/2010             Brooklyn, NY             The Bell House

Sat 10/16/2010            Hoboken, NJ   Maxwell's

Fri 10/29/2010             Johnson City, TN        Casbah

Sat 10/30/2010            Buford, GA    Hell On Wheels Beer Festival

Sun 10/31/2010           Birmingham, AL         Zydeco

Fri 11/26/2010             Kill Devil Hills, NC    Port O' Call

Sat 11/27/2010            Kill Devil Hills, NC    Port O' Call