Austin, Texas-based Heather Rae and the Moonshine Boys play music for purists and partiers, punks and potheads.  They sound like a juke-joint combo in a haze from days gone by, loaded with corn liquor and high on country, bluegrass and blues.  See them live, and you’ll hear them channeling straight-ahead rockabilly by Patsy and Johnny.  Then out come their originals, from their debut album “Just a Shot o’ Shine” (Truxton Records, 2005).  Some songs seem warmly familiar, and you think you’ve heard them before, until you remember they were written by a couple of old punks in the twenty-double-oughts.   (Check out “Born to Raise Hell” and “Death Valley”.)  Citing influences that range from the Carter Family to X, Heather Rae and the Moonshine Boys delve deep into the roots of American music.  Deftly changing styles from the scorching bluegrass of The Stanley Brothers to the two-step shuffle of Loretta Lynn to the ‘30’s swing of Trixie Smith, their sets of mostly original music sweep the listener away to anywhere the music sends them. 

It all started one drunken night in ’98 at the Tropicana Motel in Yuma, Arizona. Heather Rae Johnson, Shannon Marino and original guitarist Tom Sanderson(Long Gone Trio) were all three members of Tempe, Arizona rockabilly outfit Exit 56.   Nobody got lucky that night, except for teaching Heather Rae a few guitar chords to “Blue Moon of Kentucky”.  Thus begat the Moonshine Boys.  Along with Heather Rae’s  heartbroke vocals, searing fiddle and solid acoustic guitar, and Shannon Marino’s slappin’ upright bass and hollerin’ songs, the likes of Mario Moreno (Forbidden Pigs, Varmits, Ramblers) and Kevin Daly (Trophy Husbands, Grave Danger) have been heard laying down tasty jazz licks and finger-lickin’ pickin’ on lead guitar.  Mr. Daly is also the lead guitar on “Just a Shot o’ Shine”.
Their current Moonshine Boys lineup features rotating appearances by Michael Molnar, Tom Umberger, or Jeremy Wade on the lead picking.  Or sometimes two out of the three, with Wade wailing on lap steel.   The non-use of drums adds to the raw hillbilly rootsiness of their sound. 

Heather Rae and the Moonshine Boys crept up on the unsuspecting Arizona scene to be nominated as one of the best Roots/Americana bands in the Phoenix New Times Music Showcase in 2001, 2002 and 2005.  They have since relocated to Austin, TX, in August 2005, and like the trees and water, but not so much the lack of Sonoran Mexican food.

They have opened for many respected acts, including:

Wayne Hancock 

Big Sandy and his Fly-Rite Boys

Original Sinners (Exene Cervenka)

Josie Kreuzer

Nathan Hamilton

Jesse Dayton

The Sadies

The Ex-Husbands
 

CD's are available from the MERCHANDISE page on this website, or at Antone's Records, Austin TX; cheapo discs, Austin TX; Eastside Records, Tempe AZ; Yucca Tap Room, Tempe AZ;and Zia Record Exchanges region-wide in Arizona and Nevada.