The results are in, and the finalists have been chosen for the 1996 Grammy Showcase, a series of free nationwide concerts designed to create visibility and recognition for unsigned rock and alternative bands. Five local bands will slug it out Thursday night at the Exit/In for a shot at Grammy tickets, a demo deal with Atlantic Records, and a performance at the National Showcase to be held at the Palace in L.A.

The bands in question are the sultry folk-rock outfit The Evinrudes; art-pop favorites Joe, Marc’s Brother; classically trained vocalist Laurie Webb’s alternative folk-pop group Psyche; the blues-influenced groove unit Stir; and funk-metal devotees Stone Deep. The winning band will be selected by a panel of judges.

The show is free and open to the public, and Thunder 94 will be giving away VIP passes over the radio. For more information, contact 321-4400 or 327-0408.

Impromptu jam sessions. Unexpected guests. Steve Winwood racing through a crowded convention in search of one of his musical heroes, musician Sandy Bull. If you’ve ever tuned in to “City of Song,” the weekly Sunday-night interview program on WRLT-FM, you’ve heard all this and more. And throughout it all, one man has remained at the center of the whirlwind: FM 100 deejay Peter Rodman.

This Sunday night at 7 p.m., Rodman hosts a special two-hour retrospective of his favorite moments from the past year’s shows, which feature lengthy interviews and live performances by visiting musicians. The guest list reads like a Who’s Who of adventurous Triple-A radio: Winwood, John Hiatt, John Prine, Sting, Roger McGuinn, Michael Nesmith, Delbert McClinton, Chick Corea, Michael McDonald, ad infinitum. In addition, the show has spotlighted in-studio performances by local artists such as Tracy Nelson, the Delevantes, Kami Lyle and Gretchen Peters—often with the host chiming in on background harmonies.

Rodman’s touchy-feely interviewing style is a matter of taste. But he’s definitely carved out a niche for broadcast music interviews, and the performers sound unusually relaxed in the show’s convivial environs. “It’s a goofy show,” says Rodman, who has been conducting radio interviews since 1974, “but it’s as though it’s the one time people are talking to their peers.”

Rodman ran a similar show on the Boulder, Colo., station KBCO-FM for a decade, and he fine-tuned an interviewing style he describes as “bringing the couch out to the artist.” “City of Song” listeners have thus heard shows broadcast from the studio, from the street, and even from a subject’s living room. The results even surprise the host sometimes, as when songwriter Joe South casually strolled into Rodman’s interview booth with Justin Heyward of the Moody Blues. “It was terrific to hear ‘Nights in White Satin’ juxtaposed with ‘Games People Play,’ ” Rodman says.

“City of Song” runs Sunday nights from 7 to 9 p.m. on WRLT-FM.

In the 1950s and ’60s, honky-tonk heroes would barnstorm the dance halls and granges of backwoods America, playing package tours that might offer three or four worthwhile artists for a couple of bucks. The phenomenon had all but disappeared for children of the ’90s—until now.

HighTone Records, an independent California label with a sterling roster of country, rock and blues artists, is reviving the practice with the Roadhouse Revival Tour, a slam-bang package containing not three, not four, but five of the label’s hottest acts. Among these are a couple of Nashvillians: Buddy Miller, whose album Your Love and Other Lies is as good as modern honky-tonk music gets, and piano-pounding ex-pro wrestling manager The Rev. Billy C. Wirtz, whose new LP, Songs of Faith and Inflammation, is due from HighTone in March.

Rounding out the bill are former Blasters guitarist/songwriter Dave Alvin, who has written such gems as “Long Black Cadillac” (a hit for Dwight Yoakam) and “Dark Night” (which opens the Robert Rodriguez-Quentin Tarantino vampire thriller From Dusk Till Dawn); Dale Watson, who released a fine HighTone album last year entitled Cheatin’ Heart Attack; and the California swing outfit Big Sandy and His Fly-Rite Boys, who recently played a packed room at the Sutler.

The tour swings through Nashville Feb. 20 at the Ace of Clubs. We suggest you set up a pup tent if you want a seat. Watch the calendar for more information.

How’s this for a career pinnacle: Your band sends in a tape to the Dr. Demento radio show. Not only does the good Doctor play your tape on his nationwide broadcast, he then segues your song into a Spike Jones classic.

The above scenario might not set off any bells on Music Row, but for the footloose rock ’n’ roll quartet Supe & the Sandwiches, it was a distinction of epic proportions. Indeed, the song that won Dr. Demento’s heart, a ditty called “1-800-WHEN-I’M-GONE,” will be featured Friday night when the group brings its “Fan Appreciation Tour ’96” to the Boardwalk Cafe at 10 p.m.

Bandleader Supe, otherwise known as Michael Granda, formed the group a few years ago after moving to Nashville. The group has appeared infrequently at local clubs ever since, due to the busy schedules of its personnel. Granda himself is a 25-year member of the Ozark Mountain Daredevils (of “Jim Dandy” and “Jackie Blue” fame), and drummer Ron Gremp’s credentials range from the Ozarks to Eric Ambel’s Roscoe’s Gang and the wonderful Springfield, Mo., band the Morells. Add fellow Sandwiches David Rhodes-Brown on guitar and piano player Rick “Pickle” Gerken, and you have a veritable rock ’n’ roll delicatessen.

“We play lots of goofy rock ’n’ roll songs,” says Granda, who reels off titles such as “Pastaman” and “I Don’t Do Lunch.” In fact, the band has recorded an entire album of ’em, many of which you’ll probably hear Friday night. Granda says there won’t be an opening act “because we’ll play for hours and hours.” Admission to the Boardwalk Cafe show is free and open to the public.

The soundtrack for the new Tim Robbins drama Dead Man Walking contains superb new songs by Bruce Springsteen, Tom Waits, Patti Smith and Lyle Lovett, but the best reasons to buy the record belong to two Nashvillians. On “In Your Mind,” a ratchety Pentecostal shuffle with a switchblade Ry Cooder slide solo, Johnny Cash testifies like a street-corner pastor spouting harsh and desolate and grimly funny prophecies; he doesn’t raise his voice, ’cause when you’re Johnny Cash, you don’t have to. It helps that Cash is backed by Steve Earle, Memphis boogie shaman Jim Dickinson on piano, Roy Husky on bass, Roland White on mandolin, Joachim Cooder on drums, and the entire Nashville Bluegrass Band on rumbling backup vocals worthy of the Jordanaires.

The record’s other highlight is “Ellis Unit One,” sung by Steve Earle in a voice as flat and affectless as the last rush of breath. Another songwriter might be inspired to write a song about capital punishment from the executioner’s point of view, but only Earle could depict the man with such wounding empathy, with such dignity and directness. If this is the caliber of songwriting and insight we can expect from Earle’s long-awaited rock album in March, glory hallelujah. Dead Man Walking is available from Columbia Records at Compact Discovery and other local record stores.

Nashville has always been home to independent labels—little fly-by-night businesses that operated in the shadow of the major companies on Music Row. In the last few years, however, there’s been a flowering of small labels dedicated to releasing quality music. The latest kid on this well-tended block is Vertical Records (not to be confused with the Washington, D.C., label that released 45s by Sebadoh and Royal Trux a few years back). Brownlee Ferguson, the man behind Bluewater Music, launched the label expressly to give Canadian singer-songwriter Fred Eaglesmith wider exposure in the States. On Jan. 30, Vertical releases its inaugural effort, Eaglesmith’s Drive-In Movie. The CD, which features such candid country-rock originals as “I Like Trains” and “White Rose,” has already received a rave review from Tower Pulse!

As BR-549 journeys farther and farther from its Lower Broadway home, the group will find that it has already earned a national reputation. No less than The New Yorker magazine, in recommending BR-549’s Manhattan debut at The Mercury Lounge, described the band as “a high-power hepcat quintet from Nashville which mixes frenetic covers of rockabilly and country-and-Western classics with its own time-warping originals.” The Village Voice also chimed in with an endorsement.

Apparently, Nashville’s favorite hillbilly outfit is just as highly touted on the West Coast. In San Francisco, where a rockabilly and hillbilly swing revival is running rampant through underground rock clubs, BR-549 was featured as the cover story in a Xeroxed fanzine that was otherwise devoted to rockabilly legend Ronnie Dawson, L.A.’s Big Sandy & the Fly Rite Boys, and a few Bay Area upstarts. In addition, Nashville promoter Karen Leipziger reports overhearing the band’s name being bandied about by strangers in a barroom conversation in Detroit. Meanwhile, the band’s “Little Ramona” is featured on the Nashville Entertainment Association’s Spin Cycle compilation, which is being released in conjunction with the upcoming Extravaganza event. The song gives a taste of how BR-549 will translate its verve and humor onto record.

Elliptical dispatches: Singer/songwriter Terese Tiverra kicks off the release of Matters of the Heart, her debut CD on Nashville’s new Eagle’s Gold Music label, with a listening party Thursday night at the BMI office complex at 10 Music Square East. Tiverra, a Pennsylvania native who has lived here since 1992, plays Latin-flavored R&B and rock, and she wrote or cowrote six of the nine songs on her CD. Show time is 5:30 p.m....

Bluegrass and folk fans should mark their calendars now for two terrific upcoming shows at the Station Inn by Rounder recording artists. Claire Lynch, whose Moonlighter received a number of year-end best-of mentions, plays Jan. 31, and The Del McCoury Band swings through on Groundhog Day, Feb. 2. Both shows are definitely worth leaving your hole for....

Attention, all you local musicians who paint or sculpt on the side: The NEA Extravaganza ’96 Music and Visual Arts Committee is planning an event to benefit the Visual Arts and Music Education Foundation; it’s looking for artwork from local musicians who fall within the Extravaganza’s guidelines. For more information, contact Lisa Wells at 320-5153....

Kristi Rose, the hillbilly hellcat on a hot-steel rampage, has taken up residency at Wolfy’s every Saturday night, bringing a touch of torch and twang to Lower Broad. Drop in and say hi to Bob Wolf....

Not satisfied just playing the NEA Extravaganza? Didn’t get a gig in town that weekend? Well, go west, young band—to Memphis, where Crossroads ’96 will showcase unsigned acts Apr. 25-27. Crossroads organizers are looking for area bands to submit in the following categories: alternative, blues, country, contemporary Christian, gospel, metal/hard rock, pop/rock, singer/songwriter, urban/R&B, and—for those who fall between the cracks—“other.” For a band application and more information, call (901) 526-4280. The deadline is Feb. 14....