El Paso. The lovely ballad of love and murder on the Mexican border won the very first Grammy for Country & Western for Marty Robbins in 1960. But for some it will never feel complete without Steve Martin's video, in which he recreates the lyrics with some non-union actors. [more inside]
posted by Bookhouse on Jan 19, 2008 - 28 comments

The Maestro FZ-1 Fuzztone was one of the first stomp boxes a guitar player could use. Released in 1962 by Gibson, sales didn't take off until a British band used it in the introduction to one of their songs in 1965. But if it weren't for a Marty Robbins song and engineer Glen Snoddy, the pedal might have never been invented and country music wouldn't have been the same. [more inside]
posted by sleepy pete on Dec 4, 2007 - 29 comments