For a half-century, Nashvillians have been entitled to walk tall through any of the great musical hubs of America, buoyed by one piece of inarguable knowledge: Our session musicians can whip your session musicians’ asses. Music City “A-Team” players are precision-trained within an inch of their lives to deliver perfection on the first take and get better from there. Guitarist Harold Bradley is peerless, even among this hallowed constituency, having contributed hot licks to records by everyone from Elvis Presley to Hank Williams to Buddy Holly and any country legend you can name (and, with brother Owen, established Music Row’s first studio). That’s him on Loretta Lynn’s “Coal Miner’s Daughter,” Roger Miller’s “King of the Road,” Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” and far too many other classics to even contemplate. This planned interview session and interactive program, hosted by Museum stringed-instrument curator Bill Lloyd, will attempt to encapsulate Bradley’s 60 years of fancy fretwork and tireless innovation. (halloffame.org) —CHRIS NEAL MUSIC THURSDAY, 17TH RONNIE BAKER BROOKS This second-generation bluesman titled his third album The Torch, after an original song about learning to entertain from sitting in with masters like his father, the eternal Lonnie Brooks, and similar heroes like Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters and Eddy “The Chief” Clearwater. Indeed, the younger Brooks carries on the high-voltage, in-your-face sound made famous by latter-day Chicago bluesmen, but he broadens beyond that strict style too. From sweet Memphis soul to Texas boogie to Minneapolis funk, integrating hip-hop into his grooves, Brooks breaks beyond old formulas to create an entertaining mash-up unified by his gritty voice and piercing guitar. This ain’t his father’s blues, and that’s how it should be. Bourbon Street Blues & Boogie Bar —MICHAEL MCCALL BRUCE ROBISON Texas singer-songwriter Bruce Robison is probably best known for penning hits for Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, the Dixie Chicks and George Strait. But his latest, Eleven Stories, surpasses even the best work of each of these artists. Imbued with Robison’s trademark blend of longing and wistfulness, the record’s a minimalist country-folk collection that includes some of the songwriter’s strongest songs to date. “Virginia” is a banjo-driven mosey about falling in love with a wayward girl, while Robison and co-writer Miles Zuniga tackle the story of a down-and-out drug addict in the tender “Days Go By.” The barroom pick-up ballad “Don’t Call It Love” recalls the countrypolitan sound of the ’70s and ’80s, and “Kitchen Blues” mixes folk-pop influences like James Taylor with the curveball country of Roger Miller. For those who enjoy subtlety, empathy and depth in their music, Robison’s a must-see. ( www.brucerobison.com ) 3rd & Lindsley —TRACY M. ROGERS SATURDAY, 19TH JON LANGFORD Keep an eye on this subversive bastard while he’s in town. The minute we drop our vigilance, that’s when Music Row goes up in flames, somebody lops the balls off Musica, and a wrecking-ball convoy takes out a Wal-Mart Supercenter in the dead of night. Sure, this founding father of British punk—with the death-defying Mekons, Class of ’77—claims to love all the stuff that put Nashville on the map, from long-forgotten hillbillies to Hank Williams himself. And yeah, he’s got a 180-proof country band called the Waco Brothers that can bellow “Wreck on the Highway” loud enough to summon Roy Acuff back from yonder. And OK, yes, as shown in a book called Nashville Radio (Verse Chorus, $29.95), he’s done some pretty fair artwork of Hank, Johnny Cash and others, even if they tend to come out looking like they missed a few meals. (Like the record industry isn’t a good provider!) But he shows a suspicious lack of respect for marketer-driven country and capitalism in general. And now word is he’s cut a record with a local boy, Paul Burch, a nice clean-cut young country fella. They’re even playing together on the same bill. Sounds like another one of his tricks. Hello, Homeland Security? ( www.jonlangford.de ) The Basement —JIM RIDLEY A DAY ON THE GREEN If you’ve spent any time at The End, you’ve no doubt noticed sound guy Brad Baker twiddling knobs in back. What you may not know is that Baker penned GN’R’s “Night Train,” and has many a rock ’n’ roll tale from his decades spent as a roadie (ask him about running sound at Neverland). He’s also an animal lover, and he’s hosting a benefit on his property this Saturday, culling a lineup straight off The End’s stage. Featuring a range of acts from hard rock (Shadows of Light, 100 Watt Opera) and Southern rock (Bang Bang Bang) to pop (How I Became the Bomb, The Comfies), the show is a microcosm of Nashville’s rock offerings. The all-ages show starts at noon, will have food and drink and aims to fund the Nashville Humane Association’s ROVERs, those humane shelters on wheels that offer pet spaying and neutering on the spot for those who can’t swing the usually hefty fees for the procedure. Consider this your chance to help the lovable pets as well as the creepy crawlies: headliners The Pink Spiders will play their first show back in town since Teenage Graffiti hit the shelves. ( www.katrockradio.com ) Katmandu Ranch, 2418 Pulley Road —TRACY MOORE BELA FLECK & THE FLECKTONES These stridently unclassifiable improvisers open their 11 millionth album (or whatever it is) with a fleet, irreverent take on a Bach fugue, then slide without a break into a dizzyingly playful vamp on a loping theme that could have been taken from Dave Brubeck. It’s the kind of wise-guy action that delights fans and confounds detractors, who wonder why these guys can’t focus on conveying a tune and finding a soulful core. But such criticism misses both the point and the fun of the Flecktones. These are master musicians who like jumping from limb to limb to see what shakes loose, and sometimes they just like to run through a maze with little concern for rhyme or reason. Fleck’s been bouncing his pioneering banjo progressions off the trampoline rhythm section of bassist Victor Wooten and drumitarist Roy “Futureman” Wooten for 16 years now, and reed player Jeff Coffin has been jumping along for eight of them. They haven’t yet run out of ideas—or ways to entertain themselves. Ryman Auditorium —MICHAEL MCCALL MARC BROUSSARD The son of Boogie Kings guitarist Ted Broussard, Louisiana native Marc Broussard was born into music. Nowhere is this more apparent than the opening track of his 2004 record Carencro. The aptly titled “Home” marries Motown with Delta blues and lyrical reminiscences about Broussard’s childhood: it’s the highlight of an album that mixes sounds ranging from old-school R&B to mainstream pop. “Rocksteady” is—not surprisingly—an R&B party anthem, while songs like “Save Me” and “Saturday” recall Brian McKnight’s late ’90s love songs. In late 2005, Broussard also released Bootleg to Benefit the Victims of Hurricane Katrina, which includes songs from Carencro as well as his acclaimed 2002 release Momentary Setback. ( www.marcbroussard.com ) Ryman Auditorium —TRACY M. ROGERS BONES The White Stripes and the Black Keys might be the most visible incarnations of the two-person band, grinding out sinewy, overdriven blues with minimal instrumentation, but Baton Rouge’s Bones is by far the dirtiest. Wringing a filthy rumble out of a Flying V outfitted with bass strings, Michael Miller half-sneers, half-sings about “sexploitation,” strip clubs and male arousal, while Scott Campbell thrashes out a hip-jarring cacophony on the drums. The two describe their sound as “a sex-induced heart attack,” one part sheer volume, one part pounding pulse and one part titillation. Bones have been slaving away in sweaty dive bars for the past four years: Miller and Campbell recently played their biggest gig yet for the swollen crowds at this year’s Bonnaroo, but now they’re back to plying their colorful, carnal trade in tiny, smoke-filled rooms. Their independent album, Disconnected, releases next month. The Blacklist Royals and the Lower Broads also play. Springwater —JEWLY HIGHT SHELLY FAIRCHILD Shelly Fairchild’s 2005 Ride was an idiosyncratic major-label debut, with ambivalent songs about the relationship between hometown pull and big-city attraction. It suited a Clinton, Miss., native whose big voice suggested a pop-country synthesis that was tough-minded and sexy. The title track stands as one of the classic motorcycle songs, while “Eight Crazy Hours (In the Story of Love)” is a beautifully rendered account of middle-class despair. Fairchild has since parted ways with her label, and is writing songs with her Ride collaborator Stephony Smith as well as with Aerosmith songwriter Richie Supa. She says her new songs mix country-pop and Mississippi funk, and she’s worked up a cover of a song by the venerable Southern funk band Mother’s Finest, which gives you an idea of her current direction. This show should afford a chance to see a talented performer in transition. ( www.myspace.com/shellyfairchild ) 3rd & Lindsley —EDD HURT MONDAY, 21ST CORNDAWG / THE EXTRAORDINAIRES I didn’t think the cover of Enter the Corndawg, with its karate-attack pose worthy of Rudy Ray Moore as The Human Tornado, could be topped—but here comes the South Philadelphia crunk-folk wonder with Always Remember, Never Forget and its awesome lenticular cover. Look at it one way, and there’s the ’Dawg in all his Morgan Spurlock-esque glory; tilt it, and voila!—he morphs into Osama bin Laden! The package, which also comes with a cut-and-fold replica of the Corndawg “tour bus,” might lead you to expect something along the lines of 21st-century Mojo Nixon. Instead, the album is full of surprises—a modern-day Alan Lomax field recording sampled from Corndawg’s travels in Cambodia, India and elsewhere abroad, with the singer’s own juiced-up hillbilly tunes sounding less like novelties than links in a worldwide tradition of happily tossed-off music. His Punk Rock Payroll labelmates The Extraordinaires, featuring Jay Purdy, Matt Gibson and Justin Wolf, careen from sweetly decelerated indie rock to woozy waltzes to stop-start jug-band shambles that sound like The Fugs for grade-schoolers; in a world not ruled by corporateers, the ingenious library-book artwork for their Short Stories CD, checkout card included, would swipe the Grammy for package design. With The Mattoid. ( www.punkrockpayroll.com ) Springwater; also Aug. 22 at Casa Burrito, Murfreesboro —JIM RIDLEY DALE HAWKINS A photo on Hawkins’ website shows him with an arm around John Fogerty, and it could be mistaken for a father-son snapshot. Indeed, the elder Louisiana rockabilly and blues-boogie pioneer taught a generation the power of an insistent guitar riff set against a cowbell and a swampy rhythm with his hit “Suzie Q” and other classics. The Rock ’n’ Roll Tornado’s classic late ’50s and early ’60s sides are revered for how Hawkins’ lustful drawl treated rock like a four-letter word, and for the guitar work of sidemen like James Burton, Fred Carter Jr. and Roy Buchanan. At 67, he mostly tours Europe, where they appreciate old rock wildmen. He hasn’t played Nashville in several decades, and reports from the road say he’s still tearing it with daredevil verve. 3rd & Lindsley —MICHAEL MCCALL COUNTING CROWS According to public opinion, Counting Crows were ’90s-specific, hit-friendly alt-rockers who, with their three-year creative peak between “Mr. Jones” and “A Long December,” single-handedly eased radio out of the grunge era. Since then? Nada, save that annoyingly peppy song from Shrek. True, in the 10 years since Recovering the Satellites, the Bay Area septet have released only two studio albums and a greatest hits collection, all while touring alongside Live, John Mayer and this summer’s humanoid jukeboxes, Goo Goo Dolls. Yet the Crows have increasingly (and deliberately) flown in the face of commercial appeal. In concert, Adam Duritz and company painstakingly rearrange old favorites and elongate lesser-knowns with stories, turned phrases and near-nervous breakdowns that come with each freshly raised memory. But above all, each set is wholly raw, emotional and on the fly, as evidenced by June’s New Amsterdam: Live at Heineken Music Hall. For most bands, their musical legacy resides in the sum total of their recorded albums. For Counting Crows, the recordings are merely where the legacy begins. ( www.countingcrows.com ) Starwood Amphitheatre —JULIE SEABAUGH WEDNESDAY, 23RD LAST TRAIN HOME It’s been three years since Last Train Home migrated south from D.C., where frontman Eric Brace used to cover the local music scene for the Washington Post. Nashville has been good to the loosely organized roots quartet, which features guitarist and vocalist Brace, bassist Jim Carson Gray, drummer Martin Lynds and guitarist Steve Wedemeyer as the four core members, with erstwhile Jayhawks keyboardist/Vanderbilt music prof Jen Gunderman and a host of other skilled players often swelling the ranks. Not good in the lucrative-record-deal sense, but good in the turning-out-increasingly-superb-albums sense. Sure, last year’s Bound Away, released on German imprint Blue Buffalo, featured yet another Johnny and June goodbye tune entitled “Hendersonville,” but the rolling, gospel-tinted ballad was so tender, therapeutic and thoroughly soulful as to momentarily wash away the memory of all the other similarly themed songs out there. A fifth full-length is reportedly in the works on Brace’s brand new Red Beet Records. Family Wash —JEWLY HIGHT THEATER FIDDLER ON THE ROOF What could be more apropos for the Gordon Jewish Community Center’s Shalom Theater than this undisputed classic? Dan McGeachy directs this community production and also takes on the role of Tevye, the Ukrainian milkman who leads his family through the challenges of poverty, prejudice and a changing world. Cathy Sanborn-Street provides the musical direction for the hit-laden Jerry Bock/Sheldon Harnick score (“Sunrise, Sunset,” “If I Were a Rich Man,” “Matchmaker”), and the cast includes talented locals such as Maggi Bowden, Daniel Vincent and Catherine Birdsong. Performances are Aug. 17, 19 and 20 in the Pargh Auditorium at the GJCC. Tickets are available online at www.nashvillejcc.org. For more information, phone 356-7170. —MARTIN BRADY ART WILL CLENDENING: RETROSPECTIVE/WATKINS COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN The Nashville art community got a shock earlier this summer when Will ClenDening died in a motorcycle accident. A young and talented artist, he graduated from Watkins in 2005, and as a tribute to their lost alumnus, the college is exhibiting some of his sculptures, videos, installations and paintings. In his years at Watkins and after, ClenDening produced work of remarkable intelligence and range, worth seeing independently of this exhibit’s status as a memorial. And the sad fact is that this may be the last time most Nashville viewers will see his work. At the opening reception, to be held 6 to 8 p.m. Friday, Aug. 18, Watkins will be accepting donations to its Will ClenDening Memorial Fund. —DAVID MADDOX MY SPACE @ THE PLOWHAUS Don’t worry: Rupert Murdoch hasn’t bought out the Plowhaus artists’ co-op, at least not yet. This show is the latest group exhibit by co-op members, with an emphasis on what they describe as more personal works. Participants in the ever-evolving group stay tuned into the cultural zeitgeist, and in this case the co-op uses the titular reference to online social networking systems to describe what Plowhaus has been doing all along. The show opens with a reception and music Saturday, Aug. 19, from 7 to 11 p.m. —DAVID MADDOX Billy O’Donnell and Bob Schatz Cityscapes of Nashville’s changing downtown skyline will be served up at this month’s installment of The Arts Company’s Salon Saturday. Nashville Urban Icons pairs local photographer Bob Schatz with Billy O’Donnell, a plein air painter from St. Louis. Subjects like the new Schermerhorn Symphony Center and the Gateway Bridge will be explored in a show that is as much about documenting our shared urban environment as it is about architecture and aesthetics. Schatz will also sign his new book Nashville Impressions at the reception, to be held Saturday, Aug. 19, from 2 to 6 p.m. —JOE NOLAN BOOKS CARL L. KELL Since fundamentalists gained control of the Southern Baptist Convention in 1979, the organization has been synonymous with the religious right and its conservative political agenda. But there was once a sizeable moderate element in the SBC that included influential women, progressive clergy and liberal academics—people who actually believed in things like gender equality and religious tolerance. The organization’s systematic purge of such voices is the subject of Carl Kell’s new book, Exiled: Voices of the Southern Baptist Convention Holy War. Kell, a communications professor at Western Kentucky University, analyzed the rise of the fundamentalists in his previous book, written with Raymond Camp, In the Name of the Father: The Rhetoric of the New Southern Baptist Convention. Exiled puts academic analysis aside, and allows the men and women cast out of the SBC to tell their own stories, which are rife with personal betrayal and ruthless political maneuvering. Many of the first-person narratives have a baldly emotional tone, and give a powerful sense of the human toll when faith and power collide. Carl Kell will discuss and sign Exiled at Davis-Kidd Booksellers on Aug. 22 at 6 p.m. –Maria Browning EVENTS Grand Slam! Nashville, Baseball and Sulphur Dell The youngest player ever to hit a home run in major league baseball lives in Brentwood: his name is Tommy “Buckshot” Brown, and he managed that trick in 1945, off the notorious spitballer Preacher Roe, at the tender age of 17. Brown, among others, is being honored this summer by the Metro Archives as part of its celebration of the history of Nashville baseball. On Saturday, Aug. 19, the Archive is hosting a reception for ballplayers from the Nashville Vols, the old Negro League and several historic semi-pro teams. Nashville’s leading baseball authority, 90-year-old Junie McBride, will also attend. And, of course, Buckshot should be there too. The reception is 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Metro Archives in the old Green Hills Library building, 3801 Green Hills Village Drive. —WAYNE CHRISTESON FILM WEEKEND CLASSIC MATINEE: ARMY OF SHADOWS The best movie currently in theaters is 37 years old, unreleased in America until now. Jean-Pierre Melville’s searing 1969 thriller plunges viewers into the terror and paranoia of Nazi-occupied France, as a French resistance leader (Lino Ventura) faces torture, double crosses and gut-wrenching decisions that sentence his own men to death. The Rialto Pictures reissue opens Friday for a week’s run at the Belcourt, but it’s also this week’s selection for the theater’s new classic matinee series, held 11:30 a.m. every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. For information about senior and student discounts, call 846-3150. —JIM RIDLEY SNAKES ON A PLANE By this point, the only way this glorified drive-in movie could possibly live up to its hype would be if topless chicks in snake-priestess get-ups ran up and down the aisles hurling live cobras into the audience. (Feel free to run with the idea, sans cobras.) But for sheer marketing ingenuity and cheeseball chutzpah, it’s the event movie of the summer, driven by an uprising of schlock-horror fans who actually got the film beefed up from PG-13 to a bloodier, bustier R. The movie slithers into theaters Friday, with a special 10 p.m. advance show Thursday. Keep your seat locked and in an upright position. —JIM RIDLEY