Man of many talents
Folk, country mainstay in Kalispell for one intimate show
The Montana Radio Cafe Music Series presents folk and country star Tom Russell in a return engagement at the KM Theatre in downtown Kalispell on July 7 at 7:30 p.m.
In March 2006 Hightone Records released Russell's acclaimed "Love and Fear," featuring 11 new original songs which explore the raw truth about love. International publications, from the New Yorker to the Village Voice have hailed it as Russell's strongest work in a career that has seen two dozen recordings which have ranged from folk, cowboy, roots and rock.
"Love and Fear" was the number-one-played Folk Radio Record, and the number one report record in March 2006.
Russell was featured on "The Late Show with David Letterman" in April. It was his third appearance on the program.
Russell has recorded one DVD and 20 albums of original material. His songs have been recorded by Johnny Cash, Nanci Griffith, Doug Sahm, Dave Alvin, Joe Ely, Ian Tyson, and others. He is credited, along with Dave Alvin, with establishing the Americana radio format with their co-produced tribute to Merle Haggard, "Tulare Dust," released Hightone in 1994.
Russell was born in Los Angels in 1950 and now makes his home on the border of El Paso-Juarez. He graduated from the University of California with a master's degree in criminology, taught school in Nigeria during the Biafran War, and then relocated to Vancouver, Canada.
He began his music career in the bars of Vancouver's skid row. He has since lived in Austin, San Francisco, New York and, finally, on a farm in the desert of West Texas.
Russell has also published three books: a detective novel, a songwriting compendium of quotes with Sylvia Tyson, "And then I Wrote: The Songwriter Speaks," and a book of letters with Charles Bukowski, "Tough Company."
His paintings were recently featured in Paste Magazine and a major exhibition of his artwork took place at Yard Dog Folk Art Gallery, Austin, Texas from February to April 2006.
Russell's record "Hotwalker," released in 2005, is the second stage of a three-part American Trilogy which will conclude with a film and CD on the American West though the eyes of a California woman, Claudia Russell.
Russell also co-produces concert trains across Canada and Mexico. Past and current performers include Nanci Griffith, Eliza Gilkyson, Mary Gauthier, Ramblin' Jack Eliott and Peter Rowan.
Tickets are $18; only 96 will be sold. They are on sale at Red's Wines & Blues and Montana Coffee Traders in Kalispell and at the Montana Coffee Traders in downtown Whitefish.