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Tom Russell

Growing up in 1940s Los Angeles, Tom Russell saw blues heroes Lightnin' Hopkins and Mance Lipscomb at small clubs, heard Buck Owens and Johnny Cash on country radio, discovered the beat poets and was inspired by the great songwriters like Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen. His generation of friends were partly defined by those who dropped out and went to the Woodstock Festival and those who were sent to the Vietnam War; but Russell instead found himself in war-torn Nigeria teaching criminology, reading Graham Greene novels and hanging out playing guitar with King Sunny Ade. He lived in...