Doug Sahm’s 1972 album Doug Sahm and Band remains one of the clearest snapshots of Texas music as a meeting place rather than a strict genre. Country, blues,…
Stories
Austin’s honky-tonk scene was built around shared air, crowded dance floors and musicians reading a room in real time. When the coronavirus pandemic reached…
The 1960s are often remembered as the decade when country music became polished, chart-friendly and increasingly visible on television. Yet behind the string…
Honky-tonk has always sounded like music made close to the ground. Its stories unfold in working towns, roadside bars, dance halls and parked cars, where a…
Honky-tonk feels like a place before it feels like a musical category: a timber-floored bar, a battered upright piano, a hard-working crowd and a song built…
Texas honky-tonk is often presented as the musical child of the American South, born from the dust of Oklahoma and the honky-tonk bars of Nashville. That story…
When listeners talk about the sound that pulled country music back to its honky-tonk roots in the 1980s, the conversation eventually turns to the collaboration…
Honky-tonk music depends on movement. The shuffle, two-step and hard-driving barroom groove need to feel physical before a listener has time to analyse them.…
Fort Worth rewards travellers who look beyond the headline attractions. The Stockyards may be the city’s country-music calling card, yet its best nights often…
Honky-tonk songwriting begins with a strong emotional situation, a memorable chorus and a rhythm that feels at home in a crowded pub. The best songs in the…