Photo by Jason Wolter

Dayton performing as Friedman at the Mucky Duck last year.

​Over the weekend we learned of at least one high profile 2012 recording project that involves Houston at least peripherally: local arts patron and charity fundraiser Carolyn Farb will be the executive producer of a Jesse Dayton album of Kinky Friedman covers tentatively titled Sold American.

Farb was part of a group who staged last year's theatrical event, Becoming Kinky: The World According To Kinky Friedman, which premiered at McGonigel's Mucky Duck. Dayton was one of a group of four actors on the stage, playing the part of Friedman in his singer-songwriter heyday. Accompanied by longtime Friedman sideman/sidekick Little Jewford on keyboards, Dayton handled most of the musical part of the production.

Dayton explains that while working on the play, he was forced to revisit Friedman's catalog and it came to him what a great songwriter Friedman was during the height of his career as a traveling troubadour beginning in the early Seventies.

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Rocks Off is neck-deep in organizing Austin City Limits Festival coverage, both for the Press - you know, that paper product we insist on putting out every week - and right here online, but we're going to put that off until tomorrow so we can remind you that former U.S. House Speaker and Sugar Land's very own Tom "The Hammer" DeLay makes his debut on ABC's Dancing With the Stars in about an hour at 7 p.m. on Channel 13. Gamblers take note: out of the show's record 16-contestant field, the bookmakers at Sportsbook.com have the Hammer bringing up the rear, which means if you lay down one George Washington on the former pest-control specialist, you win a cool $3,000 should the Hammer wind up nailing competitors such as Mya (the favorite), Aaron Carter, Donny Osmond, Macy Gray and Michael Irvin.

One guy we're pretty sure won't be betting on DeLay - or at least won't be telling anyone if he does - is Air America talk jock Mike Papantonio, who in the above clip notes DeLay has "left a trail of ugly in almost everything he's touched as a politician." Rocks Off is no fan of the Hammer, but we feel like we should point out that this is a televised dancing competition, for God's sakes, and Papantonio may be taking it - to say nothing of himself - a tiny bit too seriously. Say what you will about DeLay, but in this pre-Dancing clip he at least appears to have a sense of humor about the whole thing. (The rest of us are waiting to laugh until we see the outfit he's supposedly going to wear.)

Will DeLay leave a trail of ugly on the dance floor? Find out soon enough, and check back on Rocks Off Tuesday morning for a step-by-step recap from our brand-new TV blogger Daniel Carlson. And, yes, some actual ACL previews.

By now, the news about former Sugar Land Congressman Tom DeLay's impending appearance on ABC's Dancing with the Stars has had time to sink in, and the long-term ramifications of this colossal melding of two of our greatest loves (reality television and the suffering of others) are starting to become clearer. To say mankind is doomed would be putting it mildly.

But there'll be plenty of time to mourn the collapse of civilization later. Now is the time to concern ourselves with serious issues; specifically, what songs will DeLay actually dance to?

M.C. Hammer, "Here Comes the Hammer" An obvious choice, perhaps, but DeLay and the former Stanley Burrell could swap a few stories about the fleeting nature of success as well as the importance of sound financial and legal advice. Still, it's hard to imagine anything more horrifyingly awesome that DeLay making his entrance on the show to this song, while wearing his own pair of 'Hammer pants.' Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh indeed.

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