Today, modern roots-rock band Rose’s Pawn Shop releases their long-awaited new album, Punch-Drunk Life (KZZ Music). Recorded at Electro Sound Recordings in Los Angeles, the album features 12 songs packed with an Americana punch, telling stories of hard-fought battles and redemption. A music video for the kick-off song on Punch-Drunk Life, “Old Time Pugilist,” is also available today.

People are rejoicing here on Mulberry Mountain this year. After 3 years of poor weather during Harvest Music Festival, it's finally a perfect weekend. Sunny, cool and breezy...I guess climate change is working in our favor right now. Folks are rolling in and setting up camp, but the crowd seems smaller this year, but it's only the second day - and a Friday, to boot.

Lock up your daughters and hide your sisters, the five-piece Americana outfit Rose’s Pawn Shop is hitting the road this fall on a fourteen-day west coast tour that will take the band along the pacific coast and through the mountain west  including stops in Oregon, California, Washington, Montana, Utah and Colorado.Known for watertight musicianship and soaring harmonies, the LA based string band has been blowing the roof off of basement dives and packed theaters since the release of their 2010 album, Dancing on the Gallows.

Saturday at Wakarusa started late due to an overnight near-monsoon (there were actual tornado warnings for the area). But after the rain stopped, the sun came out and my friends and I cooked a delicious breakfast of eggs, beans, chicken sausage, fresh veggies and salsa. It was amazing, and the first real meal I’d eaten yet. It’s so difficult to eat real food out there, especially considering all the energy being burned from walking everywhere.

With an arsenal of banjos, guitars, mandolin, fiddle, pedal steel, upright bass, and thundering drums, Rose’s Pawn Shop will kick off 2013 with two key performances in the Mountain West including Salt Lake City on January 12^th and Bosie on January 13^th. Hot to trot on the Americana circuit, Rose’s Pawn Shop is clearly a band to watch in 2013 with a number of festival and theater performances already slated for the coming year.