Mat Herron at LEO has a good article on Steve Ferguson and the MERF Presents Shakin’ and Bakin’ For Steve show at the Phoenix on Sunday.

The all-new LEO website, running on Joomla!, looks much better than the old one and is faster as well. This week, they have reviews of the new Lords CD, Fuck All Y’all Motherfuckers; My Darling Asleep’s eponymous release; Broadfield Marchers The Inevitable Continuing; OK Zombie Do The Zombie; the Villiebillies’s newest From the Belly of the Beast; The Muckrakers’ The Concorde Fallacy; Ben Purdom’s Meets the Morning and Scott Mertz and His Panel Of Experts‘ You Wish.

Your humble editor caught the Squeeze-bot/Java Men show last night at the Pour Haus and I was once again reminded that Louisville music fans are simply over-saturated with music. How else to explain a fairly small crowd for such a show, particularly with the original Java Men, Craig Wagner, Todd Hildreth and Ray Rizzo, on hand? Rizzo, who’s currently living and working in New York City, has adopted a distinctly Rasputin-esque appearance, thanks a black bead that falls a third of the way down his chest, but don’t let that fool you - he beats the skins with a passion and style that’s more Gene Krupa meets Animal from The Muppets - but tastefully and to the point, musically speaking. I’ll upload a bit of video later today.

So what’s with the ‘Vote for Squeeze-bot” title? The band is trying to win an online contest to play at the inaugural Chicago Bluegrass and Blues festival, which comes with a $500 check as well. To vote for the band once a day, vote here. I mean, what’s a Blues and Bluegrass festival without a band that features accordion, banjo, tuba and drums?

The October cover story for Louisville Music News is the Troubadours of Divine Bliss. Check that out, along with all the latest columns, performance and CD reviews in the print edition.

The deadtree copies will be on the street beginning today - later than usual, due to the problems caused by Hurricane Ike.

Blues guitarist Phil Guy, brother of Buddy Guy, died pf pancreatic cancer on August 20, 2008. The Chicago Tribune has the story.

With the Forecastle Fest underway on the Belvedere, there are plenty of stories about it. J. L. Puckett has his take in todya’s C-J

It’s dueling weekly pubs on music time - LEO’s Music issue is out and Velocity has a sampler for the cover. LEO gets the call, though, as they have a cover story on none other than Travis Meeks, a feature certain to cause some disturbances in the ether. Seems Meeks’ has Asperger’s Syndrome. It’s in-n-n-n-terresting reading.

There’s a lot more about music in the town - LEO devotes the whole issue to various aspects, so pick up a copy on read it at leoweekly.com

This weekend has so much music going on in the Louisville area that the C-J had to spread it around their staff, instead of just leaving it all to J. L. Puckett. In no particular order, there’s the Lebowski Fest, covered by Puckett plus, of course, LMN and 37 Flood, which has an interview with Will Russell. And more.

Next, there’s the Water Tower Blues and BBQ Festival, awarded the first choice in the C-J’s Hot List

Puckett touts Your Black Star, which was the LMN cover story back in May.

Finally, there’s the LMN list of music for Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Louisville guitarist and Leadbelly scholar Harry C. Lewman, 58, died on Tuesday, July 9. In addition to performing in the Louisville area for many years, he wrote and published Lead Belly, no stranger to the blues, a compendium of 31 of Leadbelly’s most famous songs, annotated and scored for guitar. The Courier-Journal has his obituary.

Asheville N.C. freelancer Jason Bugg touts the Blues-n-Barbecue Festival at the Water Tower and Mike Doughty and the Lebowski Fest.