On June 9th, 2023, longtime Austin rock ‘n’ roll band, The Big Gun Show, finally released their brand new concept album Honky Rock.

The project features a collection of songs weaved together in a harmonious blend of album rock, Americana, country and blues, nostalgic of “old Austin,” with the project having been delivered in dedication to the group’s treasured late drummer, Yates Hagen, whose final work is shared on the album.

Steeped in Keith Richards stew, the inspiration of the album springs from the band’s 10-year “First Friday” residency at Ginny’s Little Longhorn Saloon, one of “old Austin’s” last surviving honky tonk venues.

Pressed on gold vinyl, Honky Rock features side H of tear-in-your-beer honky tonk anthems and side R offers up a plate of gut-punching, guitar driven Americana rock ‘n’ roll.

1. Bad Temper and a Blue Tattoo
2. Where Trouble Wants to Go
3. Chicago
4. Two Pack Habit
5. All I Ever Wanted
6. Devil in Hell
7. Aftermath and Gas
8. Liver and the Heart
9. Best left Unsaid
10. Too Close to Nowhere
11. Take the L Out of Lover
12. Screwed Again

This, at times bruisingly soulful, at others blues rock driven, at others Americana-country imbibed new album opens on the rambunctious Bad Temper and a Blue Tattoo and the rocking hipsway of the Alice Cooper vocalized-esque Where Trouble Wants to Go, and they are then followed by the low slung, mid-tempo balladry within both Chicago and the Hammond-bled Two Pack Habit, and then we get the dutiful Americana hipsway found within All I Ever Wanted and the blues rock of Devil in Hell.

Along next is the magnificently cultured, folk rock-hued Aftermath and Gas, which is in turned backed by the honky tonk ebb and flow of Liver and the Heart, the quietly free wheeling, ’80s country balladry of Best left Unsaid, and then we get the accordion-driven Too Close to Nowhere, the album rounding out on the pithy storytelling of both Take the L Out of Lover and the sing-along Screwed Again.

Since Honky Rock’s inception in 2019, the project’s journey and purpose found a drastic shift in 2020 after the unexpected and tragic death of founding member and drummer, Yates Hagan in 2020. A vibrant beam of light to all who crossed his path, Yates was the ultimate lover of live music, all things Austin, and all things fun.

Creating an impossibly irreplaceable and heartbreaking hole in the band, the group took two years to find the right way to steer the ship again. Now, with his final work featured, they release Honky Rock in his honor.

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