Rita Ballou joins Radio Texas, LIVE! each week to keep us up to date on all the 'Dirt' in the Texas and Red Dirt Music scene. Here's what she brought us this week.
A few months back a photo of Texas A&M football great (and Heisman winner) Johnny Manziel sporting a 'We Bleed Maroon' bracelet was captured and Granger Smith's promotional team was super excited. 'We Bleed Maroon' is a song Granger wrote about A&M and is now played at every home game. Now, here we are a few months later and Granger has chosen Johnny and Ryan Swope (another Aggie alum) to appear in his video for his latest release 'Silverado Bench Seat'.
On Friday Granger Smith released yet another video into the world. Smith who is also known as Earl Dibbles Jr., tapped Texas A&M football standouts Johnny Manziel and Ryan Swope for their acting debuts in "Silverado Bench Seat." And this video made it's world debut Friday (6/7), before a national audience on ESPN's College Football Live.
This week for your RTX Sunday Video we've got "Oh Tonight." Released in 2011 off Josh Abbott Band's hugely popular album "She's Like Texas," the song features the then future ACM Female Vocalist of the Year nominee, Kacey Musgraves.
Honda of Abilene presents the KEAN 105 Free Summer Concert Series, featuring the best live music around, all summer long. The best part is, you can get into these shows for free! Along with special guest Matt Kimbrow, KEAN 105 welcomes Granger Smith featuring Earl Dibbles, Jr. to the Lucky Mule Saloon on Friday, August 2nd.
If you look back over Granger Smith's early album covers, you'll find that he presented himself as a hat act. Sonically he's come a long way since those efforts, with his latest album 'Dirt Road Driveway' falling squarely in the singer-songwriter sub-genre of country music. It's an album that would sound best at a coffee house, not a honky tonk.
Granger Smith releases his ninth studio album next week (April 16) -- one he calls his most ambitious project to date. 'Dirt Road Driveway' features singles 'We Do It in a Field' and 'The Country Boy Song' in addition to 10 other tracks from the pen of the the Red Dirt singer-songwriter. Listen to the entire album early via this exclusive stream on Taste of Country.
I don't think anyone will be surprised to hear me say that Earl Dibbles, Jr. is the alter-ego of Granger Smith. The Texas Country singer/songwriter with a whole lot of talent, an impressive collection of Top 5 singles and has very unique ways of entertaining his fans. Smith as Dibbles, Jr. can easily be described as an extreme country boy who regularly speaks his opinion with a simplistic approach to life, love, political views and beer drinking (a.k.a. 'crackin' a cold one'). And he posts his opinion regularly on social network sites like Instagram, Twitter, and my personal source for Earl Dibbles Jr.-isms, Facebook.
Granger Smith is going to pull out of the 'Dirt Road Driveway' on April 16. The singer will release his new album, which is his ninth, on that day.
They say you can't really understand a person until you've walked a mile in their shoes. Well you best not try to understand Granger Smith because he's doing a lot of walking. Granger Smith has walked 200 miles in his 'boots' and will add another 100 miles to those boots this coming April with the 3rd annual Boot Walk.
Granger Smith is one of the most interesting personalities in music today. He's among the most appreciated singer/songwriters around, is an unapologetic Texas Aggie, endless supporter of the U.S. military, and master of the YouTube video. And now, Smith has developed an alter-ego, Earl Dibbles, Jr. to add another dimension of entertainment to his live shows.
Granger Smith is more than just an accomplished singer/songwriter. He's more than a great live performer. Smith is an all-around entertainer. Smith has gone so far as to create an alter-ego -- and overal
