Cracker Barrel and Dailey & Vincent Honor Statler Brothers with Exclusive New Release

Jamie Dailey and Darrin Vincent, the reigning IBMA bluegrass Entertainers of the Year, will take another step in honoring the legendary Statler Brothers as they perform several Statler Brothers' songs during their 2010 tour. Many of these classic songs are featured on the duo's new release: Dailey and Vincent Sing The Statler Brothers. This twelve-song CD, now available exclusively at Cracker Barrel Old Country Store® and online at crackerbarrel.com, features new recordings of classic Statler Brothers' songs and showcases the incredible musical talents of Dailey & Vincent.

"Dailey & Vincent Sing The Statler Brothers features one of the country's top bluegrass acts performing music that is authentic and loved," says Cracker Barrel's Vice President of Marketing, Peter Keiser. "Jamie and Darrin have years of performing and recording experience, and they have earned a great deal of notice as well as a number of significant awards in the short time they have been recording together. This CD honors the Statlers, and gives us all a good idea of what's to come with Dailey & Vincent."

With more than 100 performances planned for 2010, Dailey & Vincent will add a special Statler Brothers segment to their concert song list. The songs featured on this exclusive CD are exciting and authentic bluegrass interpretations of 12 Statler Brothers' classics. The Statler Brothers, one of country music's most popular groups until they retired in 2002, are pleased that Dailey & Vincent are bringing new sounds to these beloved songs by recording and performing them with such care and dedication.

"Jamie and Darrin have used their magic touch to honor us and our music," says Statler Don Reid. "This CD is one great tribute from two great friends. Dailey and Vincent - they are what good music and friendship is about today." The Statler Brothers made an indelible contribution to the American music landscape, from the day they hit the road with Johnny Cash in 1964 until their retirement in 2002. They are one of only six acts to be inducted into both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Gospel Music Hall of Fame, writing and recording iconic songs about small-town life, love, faith, and days gone by.

The Cost of Wal-Mart

I have always been a Wal-mart supporter. Their low prices allow average people to streatch their dollar further than they could without Wally World’s aggressive cost lowering. That being said, I don’t shop there very often. In fact, I avoid it at all cost. I like saving money, but sometimes I need to save my sanity too. My problem you see is not with the store, but with the people who shop there. So I am asking all of you to do a few simple things to make it easier for me to shop at Wal-mart without taking the last of my Xanax:

Leave Already! You’ve got a spot close to the door, and you saw me pull up and turn my blinker on. Put your crap in the car and leave! Why must you check your hair, fiddle with the radio and update your Twitter status before backing out of the spot. I’m not trying to be impatient, but i can do my taxes faster than some of you can put the Hummer in gear!

Control your children! When did this become something I have to tell you? You’re staring at the hundred-calorie snack packs as if Howie Mandel just asked you to choose a briefcase; and your adorable offspring is reaching into my cart as he prefers my Pringles to your healthy choice. Meanwhile three other kids are screaming because their parents took them down the candy aisle and are now SHOCKED that they want something from said aisle. In the distance a glass bottle shatters and some random child’s name is yelled out, followed by no further words.

Move Along Please Twitter and Myspace are great social networks. Aisle seven is not! You and a friend pull up side-by-side, cart-to-cart like two police cars outside the Krispy Kreme completely blocking the aisle while you debate that potato salad Nancy brought to the put-luck that you are sure was store bought. People are backing up behind you like 280 at six o’clock, but you are oblivious to the world around you as you continue to insult your friends and neighbors, who are likely over in Aisle twelve doing the same to you. Single file ladies!

Can You Hear Me Now? Get off the damn phone. This applies almost everywhere, but never more so than when you are shouting into your Nokia because you only have one bar under this steel roof, so everyone in the housewares department can your conversation and can almost here the party on the other end of the line: Your husband who is in electronics!

Freezer Door Dominance There are a dozen flavors of Ben and Jerrys in front of you, and for each flavor there is a row of ten or more tubs. You can’t decide between Chubby Hubby or Cherry Garcia; so you stand there with the door open, blocking the section. I know what I want, Steven Colbert’s Americone Dream. I go to reach in beside you, and you not-so-subtly shift your body to block me. This is your case, and you aren’t done yet! There’s no shortage, plenty to go around, but no one will have ice cream until you do! I say, let me reach by – politely of course – not only would it be a kind gesture, but my selection may just give you a push in the right direction. Come on, it has chocolate-covered waffle cone pieces in it!

Fun With Money This is another one for the parents. Our educational system needs work, I agree, but the express checkout lane is not the place to teach money management. If you have five kids, just buy five pieces of candy. Don’t have each kid a dollar and tie up the lane for ten minutes while they each complete their own single-item transaction, including two returns as some of the children have now decided they want what Charlie got, not what they actually wanted. It’s cute at the dollar store, it’s fun at a toy store…. it;s infuriating at the Wal-Mart when I just want to pay for my stuff and get out!

Electronics Hell Okay, I lied. This one is directed at Wal-Mart. Must everything in the electronics department be locked behind bulletproof glass, secured by locks that can only be opened with one key which Wanda has – but she’s on break right now? I’m buying a DVD, not trying to steal the declaration of independence. And as if that wasn’t annoying enough, you have the nerve to get all pissy when I call you over to open a case so I can look at an item. “Do you want it or not?” It’s a laptop computer, not a vanilla ice cream cone, give me a second to look at the stats. After all, you did just get done telling me computers stats were “I have no idea.”

Eh, forget it. Do what you want, I’ll just go to Target. Sure the prices are higher, and you stand a better chance of finding a unicorn than someone to help you; but at least I can get out the door without some senile old lady scrutinizing my bags and papers like she works for the TSA.

MARLEY’S GHOST'S 9th ALBUM 'GHOST TOWN,' RECORDED IN NASHVILLE WITH COWBOY JACK CLEMENT

Acoustic quintet from Northern California and Pacific Northwest migrates to the (615) to record with legendary musician/producer, veteran of Jerry Lee Lewis, Patsy Cline and Johnny Cash.

Marley’s Ghost, cited by Paste magazine as “(having) earned cult-band status over 20 years of spirited musicianship, multi-part harmonies and irreverent humor,” will return from a three-year absence from recording with a new album, Ghost Town, due out February 23, 2010 on Sage Arts Records. The new album was produced by Cowboy Jack Clement, in whose Nashville home studio it was recorded. The cover was painted by acclaimed American watercolorist William Matthews.

The album follows Marley’s Ghost’s 2006 album Spooked, which was produced by Van Dyke Parks and featured a cover by R. Crumb. Of Spooked, No Depression remarked, “The band’s eighth full-length in 20 years glides with deadpan sincerity through sea chanteys, perverted mountain gospel, country-rock, vintage pre-WWII pop, Jazz Age vamps, Dylan, western campfire songs, and a rib-tickling salute to ‘the French Elvis,’ Johnny Hallyday. Brilliantly sung and played, Spooked is a heady, subversive treat.”

The latest development in the band’s recording career may prove to be the crucial link for Marley’s Ghost. Clement, the country music cornerstone whose career entwined with those of Jerry Lee Lewis, Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and so many others, is the beloved dean of Nashville producers, and the presence of Marley’s Ghost in his studio earned the band its first Music Row buzz.

“Working with Jack is standing in the front door looking out into the world with the whole house of rock ’n’ roll and country music behind you,” says Marley’s Ghost bassist and singer Dan Wheetman. “Jack is steeped in the Sun Records ideals of music. The technical side is important but takes a backseat to the ‘bang,’ the performance with heart and energy.”

“It’s easy to think of Jack as the guy who wrote hits for Cash at Sun Records and recorded Charley Pride in the ’70s, but you know, he has a platinum album with U2,” he adds, referring to a portion of Rattle and Hum that Clement oversaw.

“Marley’s Ghost is very experienced, versatile and best of all, open-minded, and a fun bunch of guys,” says Clement. “I prefer to play with a great band rather than a bunch of great session players. And they are a great band. They understand that we are all in the fun business and if we’re not having fun, we’re not doing our jobs. And they can play just about anything they want to. Even polkas. I ain’t got ’em to do one yet, but I will.”

After more than 20 years of making music together— recording nine albums and performing thousands of shows around the country — Marley’s Ghost remains one of the best-kept secrets in the music world, an untapped natural resource waiting to be discovered.

“Our criteria,” says the band’s guitarist, Mike Phelan, “has always been: bring it, let’s run it. It’s not about genre or style.” This is one band that knows all the songs from both The Harder They Come soundtrack and Ralph Stanley’s Cry From the Cross. Or as Paste puts it, "a decidedly unusual band, as capable of reanimating Appalachian folk songs as they are traditional Celtic fare, honky tonk and reggae.”

The most important ingredients in the Marley’s Ghost musical brew are the characters in the band. The five multi-instrumentalists boast distinctive musical personalities that couldn’t be less alike.

Dan Wheetman is a veteran of the ’60s Simi Valley, Calif. teen rock group the Humane Society, and, as a member of ’70s country-rockers Liberty, toured for years with John Denver and Steve Martin. Jon Wilcox, mandolinist and vocalist, used to trudge around the country as a solo artist. Mike Phelan, like Wheetman and Wilcox a prolific songwriter, can tear your heart out with a soul tune, put a romantic lilt into an Irish folk tune or blast molten lead guitar licks through the heart of a blues. Innovative pedal steel guitarist Ed Littlefield, Jr., spent years performing C&W in rugged roadhouses for loggers across the Pacific Northwest, and plays a fierce fiddle and bagpipes. And Jerry Fletcher, the band’s secret weapon and unofficial fifth Ghost, became “certified” in 2006, bringing his eclectic music skills (drums, keys, accordion and vocal arranging) to bear full-time.

Together they are a unique amalgam of their respective backgrounds, personal proclivities and musical abilities — a blend honed to a seamless collaboration over the many miles they have traveled together down the road.

“I call it ’bang,’” says Clement in summation. “It’s got bang. The band’s got some bang to it.”

PEOPLE.COM TO PREMIERE COMEDIC HOLIDAY VIDEO TIED TO GOLD AND GREEN



In the spirit of the upcoming holiday season and in promotion of their newly released Christmas record Gold And Green, Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush created a comedic holiday video dramatizing their favorite seasonal traditions. Visit http://www.people.com the morning of Wednesday, November 11 to view the exclusive premiere!

Several of Bill's music industry friends suprised him with a Birthday Brunch prior to the Tennessee Titans football game on November 1st.

The Titans suprised him by wishing him a Happy Birthday on the giant jumbotron at LP Field.

Guests included singer-songwriter, Jon Randall, his wife, Jessi Alexander, and their daughter, Shyla Rose...songwriter Brad Crisler who co-wrote a beautiful ballad called "Thanks To You" for Bill's forthcoming album...singer-songwriter Gary Nicholson with his wife, Barbara...Bill's daughter Terri Whitman and his manager, Lee Willard.

Bill's longtime friends, Billie and Buddy Cannon, were also present, but for some reason the cameraman didn't aim his lens in their direction. (http://www.billanderson.com/slideshows/#id=album-78&num=1)

The Titans provided the icing on Bill's birthday cake with a 30-13 win over Jacksonville.

Jimmy Wayne Returns With New Album SARA SMILE In Stores November 23rd

Country star Jimmy Wayne is back with his new album, SARA SMILE, which lands on stores shelves just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday on Monday, November 23rd.

Wayne's remake of the Daryl Hall & John Oates pop classic is the centerpiece of an album that showcases his depth and range as a vocalist and a songwriter. The single, which rose to #35 on the country charts this week, is the highest chart debut of Wayne's career - fitting for the song which Wayne has described as his "sword and shield" throughout his career.

"'Sara Smile' is a song I've been singing for 13 years," says Wayne. "I sang it on the prison yard when I worked at the prison. Even though I didn't write it, I sang it at writers' nights in Nashville. It is the song that taught me how to play the guitar. In 2002, I sang 'Sara Smile' for Scott Borchetta, and he gave me a record deal. This song has had a major impact on my life."

"I'm so happy I've finally had the opportunity to record it in a way that does the song proud," Wayne continues. "Dann Huff was able to capture the feel of the live show and having Daryl Hall and John Oates come into the studio to sing background vocals on the new track was icing on the cake."

Kenny Rogers on CBS Hit Show.. HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER

Music legend Kenny Rogers, who is well known to small and big screen audiences as The Gambler, returns to television Monday, October 19th for a special guest appearance on the CBS hit show, HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER.

In the episode titled, DUAL CITIZENSHIP Kenny will lend his “voice” to "GOODBYE SPARKY," a tribute to his beloved dog, while the characters Ted, Marshall and Lily (portrayed by actors Josh Radnor, Jason Segel and Alyson Hannigan) are on a road trip to Chicago.

Don't miss this special episode!

Garth Brooks Comes Out of Retirement

LAS VEGAS, Oct. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Steve Wynn celebrates a relationship with Garth Brooks to present a series of special engagements at the Encore Theater at Wynn Las Vegas. Concerts begin December 11, 2009.

The Chairman of the Board and CEO of Wynn Resorts describes the first time he saw Brooks perform for friends: "Everything about Garth's performances--his artistry, the range of his voice and connection with his audience--is something that I haven't seen since the Rat Pack. In show business, for a single performer to lift an entire audience emotionally to the point where they pray it doesn't end, is an extraordinary and unique thing that only a few gifted people can do. But that is what I experienced when I saw Garth on stage, alone with his guitar, doing a history of his personal journey in music. I watched a man create instant love in real time, right before my eyes. Now we have the privilege at Wynn and Encore in Las Vegas to share this extraordinary, intimate experience with everyone," says Wynn.

"Steve Wynn has done what I thought was impossible. He has given me a chance to sing again for the people, while at the same time never missing a day with my children," says Brooks. "I am naturally nervous, but it feels good to be out from under the low ceiling of 'retirement' I put on myself."

Craig Morgan & Chris Young Announced for Latest Stars for Stripes Tour Overseas

Craig Morgan, Chris Young, and GAC host Nan Kelley are joining forces with Stars for Stripes (SFS), Great American Country (GAC) and Armed Forces Entertainment (AFE) to bring hard-working service members overseas a much-needed taste of home.

The Stars for Stripes tour will visit military bases and hospitals in Iraq and Germany this month for a series of acoustic concerts, courtesy of RCA recording artist Chris Young and BNA recording artist Craig Morgan. Young is currently celebrating his first No. 1 on the Billboard chart with "Gettin' You Home (The Black Dress Song)," while Morgan's "Bonfire" is close behind at No. 12. GAC host Nan Kelley will serve as guest emcee at each tour stop.

(Every light in the house is on, and set to shine all night...this one's for the girls and boys alike! What a D-light...) --Melissa Coker



SUNNYD PRESENTS THE SHINE ALL NIGHT TOUR STARRING MARTINA MCBRIDE AND TRACE ADKINS

Nashville, Tenn. (October 5, 2009) - She's one hot mama and he's a tall drink of water. His rich baritone voice can bring the house down while her soaring, unparalleled vocals lift the roof off. He's garnered legions of fans with his anthems that inspire and champion America's heroes and she's made a name worldwide as a premier female vocalist with hits that entertain, raise awareness and deliver hope.

Together, country music superstars Martina McBride and Trace Adkins have created an exceptional evening flavored with boisterous revelry, sexy romance and honest reflection.

The Shine All Night Tour, also sponsored in part by GAC, kicks off November 20th and covers 40 cities across the U.S. through the spring of 2010. Both McBride and Adkins will each perform full-length shows. In a few select cities, Blake Shelton and The Lost Trailers will be joining McBride ensuring that every night will be packed with great music and fun times -- both on stage and in the audience.

"I want fans to leave here knowing they got more than their money's worth," says Martina. "My goal is to have this on their list of memorable nights for years to come."

"I think this tour is going to give people a lot more bang for their buck," says Adkins. "And that's important --especially in today's economy."

SunnyD's ® sponsorship of Martina McBride's Shine All Night Tour represents SunnyD's first music partnership. The concert tour is a fun way to connect with SunnyD's consumers and Martina's fans who share an optimistic and youthful spirit. SunnyD's involvement includes sampling vans, Martina's appearance in SunnyD television advertising, and a contest in which the winner will be able to sing on stage with Martina.

Martina McBride and Trace Adkins are really going all out to promote this tour. Recently, the pair starred in a series of irreverent TV commercials which will be featured on GAC, local television and online. In the spots, the two go for the laughs at their own and each other's expense and demonstrate a chemistry that may surprise those who have never experienced their witty antics and off-handed senses of humor.

In addition to the surprising video clips and commercials, the tour will have a dominant online presence, allowing fans to get involved in the tour. Visit www.ShineAllNight.com for dates, ticket links, exclusive content, contests and to sign up for updates. For fans engrossed in the Twitter phenomenon, follow the official Twitter feed at ShineAllNight for the latest news, photos and contests.

To coincide with the tour announcement, Martina is launching a redesigned website (MartinaMcBride.com) that offers more interactivity and features content as well as ticket presales exclusively for fan club members. Eager fans can also access ticket presales and other offers through TraceAdkins.com, AmericanExpress.com and several other online outlets.

Click "read more" for tour dates.