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¡TERLINGUA BLOG!

  • ¡Viva Terlingua! (Start Here)
  • Jerry Jeff Walker
  • The Lost Gonzo Band
  • Hondo Crouch
  • Luckenbach
  • Album Credits
  • E Is For Extras

Latest

  • “I didn’t know anything about country music.” An interview with Sweet Mary Hattersley, May 2026.
    People, Personnel, Recording

    “I didn’t know anything about country music.” An interview with Sweet Mary Hattersley, May 2026.

    Featured image of Sweet Mary playing with Willie Nelson at the George McGovern rally in Austin’s Zilker Park, 1972. Photo by Bellmer Wright. Mary Egan was just passing through.  She and her husband Robert (known to everyone – including Mary – as “Egan”) had no plans to stay in Austin – why would they? It…

    Jamieson Clem
  • “Everybody knew everybody.” An interview with Mickey Raphael, April 2026.
    Concert, People, Personnel, Recording

    “Everybody knew everybody.” An interview with Mickey Raphael, April 2026.

    Jamieson Clem
  • “This was really a moment, you know?” An interview with Dr. James Allison, Jerry Jeff Walker fan and Director of the James P. Allison Institute at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas
    Concert, People

    “This was really a moment, you know?” An interview with Dr. James Allison, Jerry Jeff Walker fan and Director of the James P. Allison Institute at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas

    Jamieson Clem
  • Cowboyreggalypso: An interview with Michael McGeary via text, email, and phone; 2025
    Personnel, Recording, Songs

    Cowboyreggalypso: An interview with Michael McGeary via text, email, and phone; 2025

    Jamieson Clem
  • We Was Friends, Me and This Old Man: On Jerry Jeff, Hondo, and Guy Clark’s “Desperados Waiting for a Train”
    Personnel, Recording, Songs

    We Was Friends, Me and This Old Man: On Jerry Jeff, Hondo, and Guy Clark’s “Desperados Waiting for a Train”

    Jamieson Clem

Archives

  • June 18, 2026

    “I didn’t know anything about country music.” An interview with Sweet Mary Hattersley, May 2026.

  • May 2, 2026

    “Everybody knew everybody.” An interview with Mickey Raphael, April 2026.

  • April 16, 2026

    “This was really a moment, you know?” An interview with Dr. James Allison, Jerry Jeff Walker fan and Director of the James P. Allison Institute at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas

  • October 5, 2025

    Cowboyreggalypso: An interview with Michael McGeary via text, email, and phone; 2025

  • April 25, 2025

    We Was Friends, Me and This Old Man: On Jerry Jeff, Hondo, and Guy Clark’s “Desperados Waiting for a Train”

  • February 5, 2025

    “He Was Born in Oklahoma”: An interview with Gary P. Nunn over lunch on the 50th anniversary of the ¡Viva Terlingua! concert, 8/18/2023

  • December 26, 2024

    Catching the Smoke: An interview with Dale Ashby and Len Ognibene of Dale Ashby and Father, Location Recording, in May 2023 via Zoom

Jerry Jeff Walker’s classic album ¡Viva Terlingua! was recorded live with a remote truck in the tiny hamlet of Luckenbach, Texas (population 3), over the course of a week in August 1973. Like a giant washtub of Jerry Jeff’s famous sangria wine, the album mixes in every ingredient he and The Lost Gonzo Band could get their hands on: bouncy golden-age country, moody ballads, honky-tonk, rock and roll, a pinch of soul and psychedelia, and even a ragged, decidedly non-Texan (or maybe completely Texan, for that matter) attempt at reggae. It’s been called “The Big Bang of Texas Music” for its influence on all that came after it.

“Other albums had been important to the scene – my record Cosmic Cowboy Souvenir was the first to directly address what was happening in Austin. But ¡Viva Terlingua! wiped out everything else.” – Michael Martin Murphey

“The definitive progressive country album.” – Ray Wylie Hubbard

“They … sat down and made the best record that anybody in Texas will ever make.”  – Joe Gracey (program director at legendary Austin, Texas, radio station KOKE-FM) 

“Among the most legendary of ‘live’ singer/songwriter albums ever released. It’s the Live at the Fillmore East of redneck Texas folk-rock.” – Thom Jurek, AllMusic 

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