Country Joe McDonald Remembers Woody Guthrie's100th Birthday in Sacramento, Saturday, January 7, 2012. Woody Guthrie was born in July of 1912.  My father was born in January of 1911.  My dad always reminded me of Woody Guthrie.  Both men were short, wiry and grew up poorer than Job's turkey.  My father didn't play the guitar or compose songs and sing them.  He worked in the oil fields of Oklahoma and Kansas, not far from where Woody did much of his growing up.  My dad kept his job all through the not-so-Great Depression.  Woody WAS the Depression.  He lived it.  And so, a man who died too soon in 1967 lives on through his astonishing legacy of gritty, honest songs for working people. W

Seven local musicians are getting together at Old Ironsides this Friday to not only pay tribute to music legend Sam Cooke but also help with the Haiti earthquake relief effort. "Havin' a Party: A Tribute to Sam Cooke" was originally going to be just a show about Sam Cooke until concert organizer Jerry Perry saw the destruction in Haiti from the Jan. 12 earthquake. Perry decided to put on a benefit show to help. "When things like this happen, we like to try to put together relief shows," said Perry, who also organized relief benefit concerts for Hurricane Katrina and Sept. 11. "Whatever money we can raise through the door, we're going to take and give it to the Red Cross," he said. The

Local Americana musicians Richard March and Tyler Ragle are not afraid to get political. Their new song "Gold Star Café" includes a café conversation about politics, praises for President Obama and criticism of the public for not being involved enough in politics. "Thank God this young man got the vote/But he alone won't save this boat/Gonna take 'all hands' to get her right/So we can sleep at night," March writes. Saturday at Javalounge, the local country-influenced folk duo will play a CD-release concert for their five-song EP Kings and Thieves, their first release as a duo. Davis-based singer-songwriter Nat Lefkoff will open the show. March lived in the Bay Area until age 30, when h

Unless you're a musician, or particularly observant, you don't notice The Sound Guy. But if he weren't there, you'd notice his absence. A good soundman balances the volume levels and adjusts the equalization (basically, treble and bass) of every instrument's amplification. He is also responsible for something you don't hear, but which makes a huge difference in the quality of a performance: He adjusts the same things on the monitor mix, or the sound that the musicians hear on stage. A band on stage without good monitors can't hear each other, can't even, often, hear themselves. Which means they can't tell how they're playing. And at that point, you don't want to hear it, either. A bad so