The Back Lounge Bundle: Any 2 or 3 Books

This is your chance to get all of Josh Crutchmer's books about independent music at one special price.

Get all three — Red Dirt Unplugged (2024), The Motel Cowboy Show (2023), or Red Dirt (2020) — or pick any two. Either way represents a discount off of the retail prices! Bundle all three for $60 or bundle any two for $40.

Here are the books you can get:

Red Dirt Unplugged is the view from the wings as the Red Dirt music scene reaches heights never-before thought possible. At the crossroads of country, roots rock, and Americana, artists in the scene are enjoying sustained worldwide attention at a large scale for the first time in history. Wyatt Flores, Kaitlin Butts, Southall, Josh Meloy and more are walking through the doors opened by The Turnpike Troubadours and all the artists before them who first put the cracks in those same doors. As Red Dirt became less of an Oklahoma-centric scene and more of a catchall term for original, from-the-heart songwriting, harmonies and melodies, artists like Dylan Gossett, Vincent Neil Emerson, Courtney Patton, Bri Bagwell, Them Dirty Roses, and Vandoliers have been made welcome into the same fold, and find themselves thriving. Meanwhile, Red Dirt’s oldest guard — The Great Divide — is in the midst of the finest moment of its three-decade career. Over time, John Moreland and John Calvin Abney only found a stronger grip on heartstrings. Even Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers, themselves torchbearers for Arizona’s roots rock scene, have made themselves inseparable from the musicians who claim Red Dirt. Venues like Tulsa’s Mercury Lounge and Cain’s Ballroom have combined history and swagger to become must-visit showrooms for artists and fans alike.

Red Dirt Unplugged gets into all of this. Structured around The Great Divide’s 2023 homecoming concert at the Tumbleweed Dancehall in Stillwater, Oklahoma, it seamlessly connects the young artists in the midst of “blowups” like never before to the tradition, history, and confident arrogance that built Red Dirt. Author and journalist Josh Crutchmer had a front row seat to it all, and shares his perspective through an endless stream of artist interviews, side-stage musings, and thoughtful, old-fashioned concert reviews.

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The Motel Cowboy Show is not a book — it’s a journey. From the Sawtooth Mountains of central Idaho, where phone service does not always reach, to the bustle of Austin, centerpiece of the Texas Music Scene, the influence of mountain roots music is real, lasting, and chronicled by Josh Crutchmer. This highly-anticipated sequel to Red Dirt: Roots Music, Born in Oklahoma, Raised in Texas, At Home Anywhere follows the threads from mountain originals like Pinto Bennett to cowboy poets like Baxter Black and Chris LeDoux, and traces their trail down every highway and back road they chose. The rise, heyday and pending touring retirement of Reckless Kelly is covered extensively, bouyed by the humor and introspection of Willy and Cody Braun, their musical upbringing and the larger-than-life influence they forged wherever they made music. The book also puts you in the seats at the venerable Red Rocks Amphitheater for the 2022 comeback concerts by the Turnpike Troubadours, supported by Reckless Kelly and Shovels & Rope. You’ll also get the complete story of the Braun Brothers Reunion and its lasting impact on the community of Challis. The wry humor of Micky and Gary Braun shows up when they share the way Micky & The Motorcars forged their own legacy, boosted by Texas icons like Cross Canadian Ragweed. Throw in one-of-a-kind insight from Shane Smith and Wade Bowen, who contributed the intro and final word, and The Motel Cowboy Show will inform as much as it entertains. And it will leave readers casting eyes toward the stages and studios of the American West.

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Red Dirt tells the story of a roots music scene that grabbed a foothold in Stillwater, Oklahoma, and spread across the country. The scene took roots in the late 1970s as an outlet for college-town hippies. The scene gave rise to Garth Brooks, who credits it with helping his early rise to prominence. Later, The Great Divide, Cross Canadian Ragweed, Jason Boland and the Stragglers and Stoney LaRue rose from the scene to become regional stars, including a major record deal for The Divide and Ragweed. They were followed by the Turnpike Troubadours, who carried the scene to its highest heights in the late 2010s. Using exclusive interviews and unprecedented access to the artists themselves, Red Dirt tells their story. The book also explains how key relationships with non-Red Dirt artists like Reckless Kelly, Randy Rogers and Wade Bowen helped Red Dirt gain acceptance and immense popularity across Texas, which claims a burgeoning original-music scene of its own.

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Note: Orders that include Red Dirt Unplugged will be held until the December 2024 release. If your order includes this book, and you would like the other books to ship immediately, please let us know in the notes when you place your order.

All orders will ship via UPS Ground or USPS Priority Mail, or better.