Howdy Amanda, some input from a guy who'd already played onstage at Union Grove a couple years before you were the proverbial gleam in yore daddy's eye.

Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs were HUGE heroes and influences in the South long before the late 1970s. Lester gave Marty Stuart his first shot onstage at the Grand Ol' Opry when Marty was knee-high to a milking stool. Poor Marty had to stand on tippytoe and hold his mando up over his head to reach the microphone.

As to the Gram Parsons deal, I think some copyrights might have fallen through the cracks, because usually if someone in this business thinks they can make a dime churning old releases onto CD, they'll do it. My bet is that there is currently an argument going on somewhere about how to divvy up the returns, and when that gets settled the CD will come out.

But Jim, wouldn't that equally apply to the copyrights/revenues of the DVD? I would think they would be one and the same.

Not necessarily, the two would be licensed, marketed and distributed differently. The DVD might be testing the waters for a CD release.

Thanks Jim! Because Scruggs is such a legend and hero, it seems to me the Revue contribution is underrated. Or not? Just beccause I've read quite a bit about the whole 60s/70s country rock thing and never really come across them.

Is there footage of Marty at the Opry? I have a vague memory ... but I might be getting confused with Ricky Skaggs playing with Bill Monroe as a nipper.

Not aware of footage of Marty then, he would have been 12 or 13 - never seen any, anyhow. You might contact the Marty Stuart Fan Club and ask.

Scruggs had the more modern orientation (us Carolina boys tend to think more about appealing to flatlanders) and his work with the Revue was a lot more like early country rock than what Flatt's Nashville Grass was putting out.

Both of them became part of modern American culture through stuff like the theme song for "The Beverly Hillbillies" and the music for "Bonnie and Clyde". Who knows how many young minds were corrupted by just those two things, much less the regular radio and TV spots they were putting out?

Plus, both of them started at the source, playing with Bill Monroe. Before Bill, it was just jug band music.

OK, so we have Jim's guess about the Gram Parsons tribute. Can't anyone do better then that? Is this blog called hickorywind.org for nothing, or what? No question, the bill at the gig alone will fund more than production and distribution of a CD. This is no light matter, he says, starting to warm up, I mean here we have Keith Richards covering "Hickory Wind" for the first time with James Burton and Al Perkins and more behind him, and I have to listen to it on my crappy TV set! In musical terms, getting this thing onto a decent stereo set is close to an international emergency.

Just sayin ...

According to some usenet posts I found the DVD itself was "poorly distributed" and only turned up in selected big chains, and the official website is a bit of a mess. Maybe its just that Polly Parsons ain't Donald Trump material. Less southern gothic rock opera, Polly. More Marketing 101.

Anyway, in the absence of a better explanation, I choose to blame Wilco, who are Evil and Must Die!!

;-) sorry Larry, Jay Farrar partisan here ...

Sounds like Polly has no investors. Not surprising in this genre, with everyone spending five bucks to make three.

Interesting Amanda. I went to the giant Virgin store in town first, and they didn't have it (and then had trouble finding it on their computer: 'who else is in the movie besides Cliff Richard?'). So I headed to Red Eye, as you do, and they didn't have it on display, but pulled it from under the counter.

And I hate to be cruel, especially given it was in many ways her night, and she was so happy and all, and she is descended from rock & roll royalty and so on, but the first thing that should have been cut from the DVD was every bit that had Polly in it.