A West Texas Christmas for Guys Like Me

Pancho’s Picks — Holiday Edition (for the rest of us)

I wasn’t even in the damn holiday spirit this year. Hard to feel jolly when it’s 70 degrees in West Texas, the sun’s cookin’ your neck like it’s early October, and the only thing “frosty” is the beer you crack open after work.

But the wife gave me that look, so I crawled up into the attic, fought off the dust bunnies and regret, and dragged down every plastic tub labeled “Christmas Shit—DO NOT THROW AWAY.”

Tangled lights, glitter-covered angels, a Santa whose beard looks like it’s been dipped in mesquite ash.

You know — the usual.

But I figured if I’m gonna be knee-deep in fake snow and real attitude, I might as well throw on the only Christmas carols that guys like me actually listen to.

So I hit play.

1. “Merry Christmas from the Family” — Robert Earl Keen

This one’s scripture. The gospel of dysfunctional holiday gatherings.

Truth is, Robert Earl Keen wrote the soundtrack to every lopsided Christmas I’ve ever survived — cheap beer in the cooler, mismatched spouses, someone’s weird in-law stirring Bloody Marys like they’re casting a spell.

It’s home.

Chaotic, loud, a little embarrassing… but still home.

2. “Christmas in Prison” — John Prine

Leave it to Prine to make a love song out of cold steel and bad decisions.

And yeah… this one hits a little close.

I’ve spent a holiday or two behind bars, eating mystery meat while pretending it’s ham and trying not to think about the people waiting on the outside.

This song reminds me how damn grateful I am not to be there anymore — how lucky I am to be here dragging Christmas boxes for the woman who kept me alive long enough to figure life out.

3. “Santa Got Busted by the Border Patrol” — Kevin Fowler

I swear to God this is a true story.

Feels like something that’d happen on 285 after a night in Pecos — Santa, red suit wrinkled, sleigh running hot, trying to explain himself to a Border Patrol agent who’s had a long week. Hell, Fowler barely exaggerates it.

If they tried to bust Willie a time or three, they sure as hell aren’t giving Santa a pass.

This one’s pure Texas ridiculousness, and that’s why it belongs on my list.

4. “Grateful for Christmas” — Hayes Carll

Hayes always sneaks the truth in through the side door.

This one reminds me of home — not the picture-perfect Hallmark bullshit, but real home:

the family that’s getting older, the kids getting busy, the traditions shifting, the things you try to hold onto even as they slide through your fingers.

They say that if you’ve been married more than once you can say “several.” I have been married “several” times.

It’s funny and sad and honest… kind of like every damn December.

And somewhere between the lights, the boxes, and the songs… I caught myself feeling something I didn’t expect:

a little bit of Christmas spirit creeping in, dusty boots and all. Maybe it was the music.

Maybe it was the wife smiling because I did the thing I didn’t want to do.

Maybe it was gratitude — the kind that shows up whether you invited it or not.

Either way…

I reckon Christmas found me again this year.

— Pancho’s PicksRiding for the real ones, dodging the rhinestone pretenders

My Favorite Music of 2025

Pancho’s Picks: My Favorite Music of 2025

Looking back on the records, the roads, and the nights that stayed with me.

2025 was one hell of a year for music — the kind that doesn’t just play through your speakers, but moves into your bloodstream and starts living there. And when I look back, a few records rise above the rest like campfires burning bright on a long West Texas night.

Albums that will live in the canon.

Matt Moran’s The Ba’ar led the charge for me. A record rough as cedar bark and tender in the right places, the kind that feels like a man telling you the truth he didn’t want to say out loud.

Then came Colter Wall’s 1800 Miles — all dust, distance, and heartbreak stitched together with that ancient-sounding voice he carries around like an heirloom.

And Turnpike’s The Price of Admission may be their most lived-in record yet… full of scars, wisdom, and the kind of writing you only earn the hard way.

Vandoliers Life behind bars Took me back into the sunlight knowing damn well not everybody’s rooting for ’us But here’s the trick: We quit living for other people. Every song carries a tone of we survived you, and we’re still here.

Jason Isbell’s Foxes in the Snow capped off the list — quiet, cold, honest, and heavy in the way only Isbell can pull off. A winter album that finds the warm places in a man’s heart and sits there awhile.

Singles That Stopped Me in My Tracks

This year had its share of one-off punches too:

Gedda’s “Thick as Thieves” — a song so sharp it practically demanded an album around it, which he delivered with South of Mars.

Turnpike’s cover of Todd Snider’s “Just Like Old Times” — the kind of cover that wakes up every demon you thought you’d already sent packin’.

James McMurtry’s “South Texas Lawman”— dry as mesquite smoke and smart as a whip.

Best Concerts of the Year

I caught some unforgettable shows this year:

Ryan Bingham, burning hot as ever, Robert Earl Keen, returning like a long-lost uncle who still knows how to hold a crowd in his hands, Red Shahan, wild-eyed and wonderful.

But the night that will stay with me long after 2025 is gone was standing beside my wife and two of our grandkids, listening to Ray Wylie Hubbard howl, joke, stomp, and testify like only he can.

That wasn’t just a concert — it was a memory carved in oak.

If the music we love says anything about the year we lived, then 2025 was full of grit, grace, and damn good stories.

Here’s to more of all three in the new one.

— Pancho’s Picks

Ridin’ for the real ones, year after year.

Everything’s gonna be alright, guy. – A Texan’s Tribute to Todd Snider.

Scoot your chair in close, friend. Fire’s burnin’ steady, wind’s laid down, and the stars are listening.

We lost another highway poet this week. But I swear… if you take any Texas road at midnight, windows cracked, radio low, and Todd Snider comes drifting through the speakers, you’ll hear him lean in like an old friend and whisper:

“Everything’s gonna be alright, guy.”

And maybe — just maybe — it will. See, Todd wasn’t a Texas boy by birth, but this state carved itself into him all the same. Back before he was Todd Snider — the legend, the mischief-maker, the troubadour — he was just another kid trying to figure out his place in the world.

Then he wandered into San Marcos one night, caught Jerry Jeff Walker grinning through a song, and it hit him like a barstool to the soul. That Hill Country sound… that Cheatham Street magic…that mix of humor, heartbreak, and “hell, let’s play another one”… That’s where Todd found his direction.

Didn’t take long before he started giving back more than he took.

🔥 “Beer Run” — The Gospel According to Bad Decisions

Now let me tell you something —“ Beer Run” ain’t just a song. It’s a memory we all share, whether it happened in Lubbock, San Marcos, Amarillo, or some dusty county road between Pecos and nowhere.

It’s that feeling of being sunburned, river-wet, broke as hell, and somehow still convinced that one more beer run might just fix everything wrong with the world.

Todd bottled that moment. He turned it into a hymn. A Texas prayer said in four words and a grin:

B double-E double-R U-N.

That’s friendship, Texas-style. That’s Todd Snider magic.

🔥 And then there’s “Barbie Doll.”

Brother… that one’s carved into the floorboards of every honky-tonk from Luckenbach to Lubbock. Charlie Robison had the swagger. Todd had the sideways humor. Put ’em together and you get a song that feels like a Friday night

— boots stompin’, heads turnin’, hearts breakin’, and a fight that might start, but probably won’t, because everybody’s too busy singing along. That tune is a Texas treasure.

And Todd was right there, grinning while the ink dried.

Todd didn’t shout his influence. He whispered it.

And the right ears heard:

Jack Ingram

Picked up that loose-shouldered truth-telling Todd carried like a second guitar.

Robert Earl Keen

Found a brother who knew how to hide wisdom inside a joke.

Charlie Robison

Well… you heard what those two could cook up together.

These weren’t just peers. They were brothers of the road. And Todd sharpened their edges the way only a true songwriter can.

So here we sit tonight — watching the flames twist and spark, thinking about a man who made us laugh at our own bruises and believe our own brokenness was worth singing about.

Todd Snider may have left the stage, but he didn’t leave the room.

Not in Texas.

Not in the Hill Country haunts that raised him.

Not in the midnight highways he made feel less lonely.

Not in the songs — “Beer Run,” “Barbie Doll,” and a hundred others —that still walk around like old friends.

And if you’re real quiet for a second… just listen to that wind slip between the mesquite.

You’ll hear it:

“Everything’s gonna be alright, guy.”

And maybe — just maybe — it will.

Wife Thinks Ray Wylie Hubbard & Robert Earl Keen Are the Same Dude (And I’m Losing the Argument Badly)

Somewhere between the checkout line and the queso aisle, my wife decided — boldly, confidently, and without a lick of hesitation — that Ray Wylie Hubbard and Robert Earl Keen are the exact same man.

Same beard.

Same hat.

Same vibe.

“Same energy,” as she calls it.

I tried to gently correct her, like a husband who knows this road leads straight into a domestic buzzsaw.

“Baby… Ray Wylie wrote ‘Snake Farm.’ Robert Earl Keen wrote ‘Feeling Good Again.’ One leans into blues and mystic grit. The other leans into bluegrass and front-porch storytelling. Whole different universe.”

She didn’t even flinch.

Not a twitch.

Instead she hit me with this masterpiece:

“Pancho… they’re the same guy. You just like arguing.”

I almost dropped the salsa jar.

Meanwhile, tonight I’m spinning one of Ray Wylie’s finest albums — the one with the big title and the bigger attitude:

A: Enlightenment B: Endarkenment (Hint: There Is No C).

A record so Ray Wylie it feels like a campfire sermon preached by a coyote in a denim jacket.

It’s tight.

It’s gritty.

It’s blues with a philosopher’s smirk.

Ain’t nothing “loose” about it.

And Robert Earl Keen?

That man is bluegrass charm and beer-sipping back-porch brilliance.

Completely different lane.

But try explaining genres to a woman who has already decided the trial is over and the jury has gone home.

She just shrugs and says,

“Well, I like ’em both — so what’s the problem?”

Lord.

Take the wheel.

Still, I love her.

Every stubborn, wonderful, hard-headed bit of her.

And tomorrow she’ll still argue that Ray Wylie and REK share the same “aura,” whatever that means.

So once again, for posterity and for my peace:

No matter how many times I try to ’splain it to her… Blues is NOT Bluegrass.

Have a breakfast taco and jam some Texas Country- Rich O’Toole

Pancho

Life Gets Lifey

Life Gets Lifey is what I always like to say, what I really mean, is that things happen beyond my control. It’s how I react to them is what really matters, I mean like this blog , call it writers block, laziness, or something else. I also really don’t care what anyone thinks of me. That is what makes me, well me.

For the most part, my life rocks . I mean just last weekend I found myself on the Baylor campus in Waco Texas for something that was better than I could have ever imagined. The wife got me tickets to The Boys from Oklahoma, featuring Cross Canadian Ragweed, Turnpike Troubadours, Shane Smith and the Saints , and American Aquarium.. next thing i know there’s Wade Bowen on the bill.. then a series of other amazing performances by several of all my all time favorites throughout the night , including Pat Green and Robert Earl Keen.

Add in the final song of the night , Django Walker, son of the world famous late Jerry Jeff. Django sang a song that his daddy made famous which in my opinion helped to put songwriter Guy Clark on the map.

LA Freeway.

The whole concert had this kinda energy.. it was really something to see in person.

When the Turnpike Troubadours got back together a year or so ago, I recall, tweeting.. “all we need now is for Ragweed to come back”

Well.. now they have and I got to see them live in person after a 16 plus year’s hiatus..

And Gawddamn I am happy!

Pancho.

Ghost

I was up this morning before the West Texas sun rose into the eastern sky, before it dried out the dew and wilted the cactus flowers. The spirit of the day was to catch a Ghost.

Ghost is a compilation of Love and heartbreak, pain and glory.

Ghost – Rich O’Tooles 8th studio album. Some say it might be his best work yet. The album features previously released singles , Love on a Sunday, Texas is My Home , and Wildflower Lane.

Rich who credits Texas Greats like Robert Earl Keen and George Strait as his primary influences in the Texas Music Scene, posted on social media that his favorite take away from the album was his rendition of the Charlie Robison penned, John O’Reilly.

As of Midnight 6/21 O’Tooles new music is streaming every where. The album is also available on vinyl but is in limited supply so grab one while you still have time.

Pancho.

Floore’s up in Smoke

I left the oil patch of western Texas today for a much needed getaway, and an opportunity to finally see a band live that I had heard so much hoopla about.

Blackberry Smoke out on one hell of a rock show in Helotes today. Currently they are into the first half of their Be Right Here tour.

Blackberry Smoke John T Floores Helotes Texas 4/26/24

Today was also the first time for me to venture to John T Floore’s a venue I’ve had on my bucket list ever since Robert Earl Keen recorded Live Dinner #2 there.

The opener was Austin based musician Jeff Crosby. His country and rock licks were paired with a borrowed fiddle player from the OG Texas Country group Reckless Kelly.

Crosby played several original songs that he’d written and closed up the set with a perfect rendition of the Guy Clark penned, Anyhow I Love You.

Charlie Starr and his band BlackBerry smoke took the stage and the rock show began. This multi- talented group of musicians really gave the audience a show to remember.

The band recently lost their long time drummer, Brit Turner, but they didn’t miss a beat. Starr told the audience, “he’s still right here with us. Every night, and we are playing rock in roll for him now.”

Charlie Starr is one of the greatest guitarists I’ve personally seen play live . He must have changed his instrument at least a dozen times . Each guitar meant another amazing song and another story.

The weather was perfect for the outdoor event . The crowd was friendly and fun and the band played to the audience quite well.

The new album Be Right Here is out and available everywhere. Grab a copy you can hold onto. The Floore’s audience heard much of the new album as well as many old favorites. The fan loyalty to this group is impressive.

Blackberry Smoke fans from all over the world flocked into that little country store. We arrived as strangers and left as friends.

Thanks for sharing the music

Pancho.

Blue Light

The blue light is a wierd little place but it’s our place we like it
Blaze Butler

“The BlueLight is a weird little place but it’s our place we like it, “ Blaze Butler, bass player for Lubbock’s own Mason and the Gin Line, once told me. He was describing the iconic and historic venue nestled in Lubbock’s depot district. The BlueLight gave many a singer songwriter their first chance to play the songs that they had scribed on paper and picked over so many times a place to bounce off of fans and other musicians alike. Many success stories began in that little place. In the Texas country scene many names that we all know and love have performed on that little stage and keep that flame shining bright on Buddy Holly avenue.

Jason Boland started there. Cleto Cordero took his little band from Midland and grew it into the brand now known as Flatland Cavalry in that weird little place. William Clark Green, John Baumann, Josh Abbott have all been there. There were plenty others. Brandon Adams calls the place home so does Charlie Stout.

If you happen to be near Lubbock, Texas on any night of the week and you want something to do, the BlueLight is the place.

Bill Whitbeck, Robert Earl Keen’s longtime bass player, recently wrote a song named for this Texas Icon. The lyrics tell a story about one musician getting her start under that flame. Blue Light is a new single performed by Whitbeck and the Singer/Songwriter Robert Earl Keen.

https://open.spotify.com/track/7Ju9orKb5uBRHc2rV3vvO0?si=p7_Ur8K2RMuMiC6BGavwbw

Stream the song now on Spotify.

Pancho.

I’m Comin’ Home

I always love to go but there sure is something special about coming home.

Last night I made the 100 mile Trek to the city of Lubbock, Texas to see who has been one of my very favorite musicians for the last three decades.

I have witnessed Robert Earl Keen perform his breed of Texas Country and Blue Grass more times in person than I have any other artist. Last night was bittersweet special. For 41 years Robert Earl has been out on the road and recently he announced that he is hanging up his hat. Robert Earl Keen is in a sense, “Coming Home.” Last night may be the very last time I will see him live. On a positive note, the imprint of his music will be with me for the remainder of my life.

My love of REK began after my brother shared with me the live #2 album. I have been hooked every since. At the Helen DeVitt Jones theater last night in Lubbock I am quite sure Keen performed every song from this coveted album. I felt like he played pretty much his entire catalog, he even included an encore after the main show was complete where he provided us his fans with 6 more of his perfectly written songs.

Robert Earl Keen and the Robert Earl Keen band are constantly working on new projects. Often they co-write with other songwriters. REK loves to promote new talent and especially his own band members. During the show last night Keen’s long time friend and band member, Bill Whitbeck played some of his own tunes, including a song he’s recently written about the historic Bluelight. Fitting since the show was in Lubbock, Tx.

Bill Whitbeck has played with the Robert Earl Keen band for 27 years

Besides his own timeless classics, Keen also played cover songs by Terry Allen, Steve Earl and his friend who he claims is always grouchy, James McMurtry.

I thoroughly enjoyed every note. There is something about a Robert Keen song. It is physically impossible to have a bad day when listening to Robert Earl Keen.

Packed my suitcase and I racked my brain
Bought a ticket on a late night train
Took a taxi through the pourin’ rain
I’m comin’ home to you

Thanks for the miles Mr. Keen you will be missed by music lovers every where.

Pancho.

Pants is Overrated

A combination of elements of Blues, Gospel, Folk, and Country is Lyle Lovett’s latest release, “Pants is Overrated.” It’s been over ten years since Lovett released his last album. This single is the first release from a new Lovett album to be released this May. “12th if June” drops May 13 and is available for pre sale now.

I began listening to Lyle Lovett many years ago after another of my favorites in the Texas Country Genre, Robert Earle Keen made much reference to his fellow Aggie. The two have co written songs together dating back from their days at Texas A&M University. I was able to catch an acoustic show that blew me away several years ago where Keen and Lovett swapped songs, each artist performing the others creation.

Release Me is my all time favorite Lyle Lovett album. My favorite performance by Lyle is of him covering the Guy Clark penned- “Step Inside This House”

Looking forward to this greats, new album and his future in the music industry.

Pancho.