"Kelly Hogan is a national treasure"-- Andrew Bird
Kelly was born and raised in Atlanta where her dad is a policeman and her mom can make a pickle out of anything. She's been singing as long as she can remember. Her brother used to punch her in the arm for constantly harmonizing with the radio, yet she could not put a sock in it. Hogan began to hone her mellifluously spooky welter of torch songs and honky tonk anthems when she fronted the legendary peg-legged cabaret quartet, The Jody Grind, and then fanned the flames of her bummer-rock fixation while playing guitar for Orbisonic southern gothic punks, The Rock*A*Teens. Then she got ants in her pants and she moved north to Chicago in 1997 where she became Bloodshot's first paid employee ($500 a month!). After Bloodshot Rob saw her get up and sing with Dale Watson at Schubas, he promptly fired her and demanded she get back to singing.
Her stint in our busy little hive was marked by two solo albums, appearances on some clever and popular Bloodshot compilations, a split single with fellow dirtybird Neko Case, and appearances on albums by the Sadies, Nora O'Connor, the Pine Valley Cosmonauts, Wee Hairy Beasties, Rex Hobart & the Misery Boys, Robbie Fulks, Roger Knox, Jon Langford, Alejandro Escovedo and, are we missing somone? Probably. Everybody wants Kelly on their records.
To whit, the past few years has seen Kelly singing with fellow Georgians the Drive-By Truckers, the Decemberists, gospel legend Mavis Staples, Iron and Wine, Jakob Dylan, the hopped up jazz combo The Wooden Leg and recording and touring with Neko Case as her back up singer (a match made in heaven, let us tell you). There's prolly a lot more we're missing, but we can guarantee if Hogan is on it or with it, you're gonna love it.
- "Blue Snowfall" on Bloodshot's 13 Days of Xmas
- "Me, Myself and Wine" w/ Nora O'Connor on Bloodshot Six Pack to Go: Working Songs for the Drinking Class
- "Blue Gums Calling Me Back Home" on Roger Knox's Stranger In My Land
- "Chicken Road" on For a Decade of Sin: 11 Years of Bloodshot Records
- "I Want To Be A Cowboy's Sweetheart" and "Blues Stay Away From Me" on Pine Valley Cosmonauts' Barn Dance Favorites
- "Last Thing On My Mind" on The Old Town School of Folk Music Songbook, Volumes Two and Three
- "Ac-cent-tchu-ate The Positive" live video on the DVD Bloodied But Unbowed
- "Ac-cent-tchu-ate The Positive" live performance on the Bloodied But Unbowed: The Soundtrack
- "Right or Wrong" on Hard-Headed Woman: A Celebration of Wanda Jackson
- "Green, Green Grass of Home" on the Pine Valley Cosmonauts' The Executioner's Last Songs: Volumes 2&3
- "Drunkard's Blues" on the Pine Valley Cosmonauts' Salute the Majesty of Bob Wills
- "Someone Like You" w/ The Rock*A*Teens on Poor Little Knitter on the Road
- "13 Nights" on Down to the Promised Land: 5 Years of Bloodshot Records
- "Pale Blue Eyes" (Velvet Underground cover) duet w/ Alejandro Escovedo on Bourbonitis Blues
- "Senor Don Gato" and "Rubber Duckie" on The Bottle Let Me Down
- "1,000,001," "Hanky Panky Woman," and "It's Only Make Believe" (duet w/ John Wesley Harding) on Making Singles, Drinking Doubles