Cosmic Cowboy (cocktail and song)

“Cosmic Cowboy” is the name of a song by then Austin-based musician Michael (Martin) Murphey in 1973; the song was recorded in 1974 by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. In 2007, the “Cosmic Cowboy” became the name of a cocktail by an Austin-based distillery.
 
Austin’s Armadillo World Headquarters (1970-1980) was the home to many of the “cosmic cowboys.”
   
   
Wikipedia: Michael Martin Murphey
Michael Martin Murphey (born 14 March 1945 in Dallas, Texas) is a successful American country singer-songwriter whose biggest hit was “Wildfire” in 1975, produced by Bob Johnston. He was associated with the outlaw country movement. Murphey currently lives in Westby, Wisconsin, with interests in New Mexico and Texas.
Career
Having been influenced by gospel music at an early age, Murphey aspired to become a Baptist minister. Murphey grew up in Dallas and attended North Texas State University, now known as the University of North Texas. From 1965-70, as a staff songwriter for Screen Gems, Murphey was writing theme tunes and soundtrack material for television. He grew disillusioned with the poor financial rewards, and left. For a short time he was a member of the Lewis And Clarke Expedition, which he formed with Owen Castleman, before going solo. “Geronimo’s Cadillac” was produced in Nashville, Tennessee by Bob Johnston, who was responsible for Murphey’s signing with A&M Records. The title track was released as a single, and achieved a Top 40 place in the U.S. pop charts.
 
As well as folk, country and blues, Murphey’s early gospel leanings are evident in the overall sound of the album. He signed to Epic Records in 1973 after releasing Cosmic Cowboy Souvenir, which continued the urban cowboy theme of his earlier work.
 
During this period of association with the outlaw country music movement that began in Austin, Texas in the 1970s, Murphey performed a number of times at the Armadillo World Headquarters. Murphey’s photo also appeared as the original cover of Jan Reid’s book, The Improbable Rise of Redneck Rock. News reports of the time, suggested that Murphey was upset by the use of his image on the book’s cover, and his photo was removed in subsequent editions.
 
In 1975 he released his seminal album, Blue Sky, Night Thunder, which contained the hit “Carolina in the Pines”, and what is perhaps his masterpiece, “Wildfire”, which to this day is the song Murphey is most associated with even though he has had many other hits.
 
Handbook of Texas Online
ARMADILLO WORLD HEADQUARTERS. During the 1970s the Armadillo World Headquarters, a concert hall in Austin, became the focus of a musical renaissance that made the city a nationally recognized music capital.
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The Armadillo’s eclectic concert calendar brought together different, sometimes disparate, sectors of the community. The most dramatic fusion mixed traditional country-music culture with that of urban blues and rock to produce a Texas hybrid character known as the “cosmic cowboy” and a hybrid music called “progressive country” (sometimes referred to as “redneck rock”).   
 
(OCLC library record)
Title: Sunset painter
Author(s): Blessing, Lynn.  (Performer - prf)
Publication: New York :; Epic,
Year: 1969
Description: 1 sound disc (35 min.) :; analog, 33 1/3 rpm, stereo. ;; 12 in.
Language: No Linguistic Content
Music Type: Rock music
Standard No: Publisher: BN 26488; Epic
Contents: Cosmic cowboy—Sunset painter—Mother Naturess son—Anacalypsis—From deep within for Lynn—An awakening—Country pie—Pinball wizard—Emerald River—Child of the universe—“Monk 136”—Where there is grass.
   
(OCLC library record)
Title: Cosmic cowboy souvenir
Author(s): Murphey, Michael, 1945- 
Publication: Beverly Hills, Ca. :; A & M Records,
Year: 1973
Description: 1 sound disc :; analog, 33 1/3 rpm, stereo. ;; 12 in.
Language: English
Music Type: Country music; Multiple forms; Popular music
Standard No: Publisher: SP-4388; A & M Records; LCCN: 91-755958
Contents: Cosmic cowboy (part 1)—Alleys of Austin—South Canadian River song—Blessing in disguise—Temperature train—Drunken lady of the morning—Prometheus busted—Honolulu—Rolling hills.
       
(OCLC library record)
Title: Stars and stripes forever
Corp Author(s): Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.  (Performer - prf)
Publication: Los Angeles, Calif. :; United Artists Records,
Year: 1974
Description: 2 sound discs (113 min.) :; analog, 33 1/3 rpm, stereo. ;; 12 in.
Language: English
Music Type: Songs
Standard No: Publisher: UA-LA184-J2; United Artists Records; LCCN: 96-751314
Contents: Jambalaya (On the bayou)—Dirt Band interview—Cosmic cowboy (part 1)—Aluminum record award—Fish song—Mr. Bojangles—Vassar Clements interview—Listen to the mockingbird—The sheik of Araby—Resign yourself to me—Dixie hoedown—Cripple Creek—The mountain whipperwill (or, how Hillbilly Joe won the great fiddler’s prize)—Honky tonkin’—House at Pooh Corner—Buy for me the rain—Oh boy—Teardrops in my eyes—Glucoat blues—Stars and stripes forever—Battle of New Orleans—It came form the 50’s (blast from the past)—My true story—Diggy liggy lo.
   
(OCLC library record)
Title: Cosmic cowboy
Author(s): McGuire, Barry. 
Publication: Canoga Park, Calif. :; Sparrow,
Year: 1978
Description: 1 sound disc (38 min.) :; analog, 33 1/3 rpm ;; 12 in.
Language: English
Music Type: Gospel music
Standard No: Publisher: SPR-1023; Sparrow; LCCN: 95-784747
Contents: Cosmic cowboy—What good would it do—The presence—Walkin’—Flying merry-go-round—Mystery of life—Good news shoes—My king—You an’ me—White swan—Face to face.
 
PBS - Austin City Limits
1981
Michael Murphey followed by Ed Bruce
 
The original “Cosmic Cowboy” Michael Murphey (now known as Michael Martin Murphey) and the Great American Honky-Tonk Band stir up a cyclone in their “Cowboy Cadillac” with a “Hard Partyin’ Country Darlin’” and some “Hard Country” music on Austin City Limits. In the calm after the storm, songwriter Ed Bruce entertains with some of his most popular hits including “Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys.”
 
Yarn spinner/songwriter Murphey returns to Austin City Limits once again with the most full-blown country sound he’s ever produced. A forerunner in the “progressive blend of country and rock ‘n’ roll, Murphey’s current direction brings him back to his West Texas honky-tonk roots.
 
A Texas native, he spent many summers working on ranches while growing up. His West Texas experiences spawned a growing fascination with the people and lifestyle of the area that he sought to incorporate in an artistic endeavor. After several years in the works, Murphey now unveils the movie Hard Country which he co-wrote and produced the soundtrack. The story is aptly set in a honky-tonk wherein the music is an integral part of the tale of a traditional cowboy content to continue in West Texas and his unconventional girlfriend eager to explore her possibilities and the rest of the world. 
 
Lyrics Freak
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band › Cosmic Cowboy
 
Merry-go-rounds and burial grounds
Are all the same to me.
Horses on post and kids and ghosts
Are spirits that we ought to set free.
Then city slicker pickers got a lot of
Slicker licks than me.
But ridin the range and acting strange
Is where I want to be.
 
And I just wanna be a cosmic cowboy
I just wanna ride and rope and hoot (hoot!)
Well I just wanna be a cosmic cowboy
Talkin bout a supernatural country rockin galoot
     
(OCLC library record)
Title: Stevie Ray Vaughan :
caught in the crossfire /
Author(s): Patoski, Joe Nick, 1951-
Crawford, Bill,; 1955- 
Publication: Boston : Little, Brown,
Edition: 1st ed.
Year: 1993
Description: vi, 313 p. : ill. ; 25 cm.
Language: English
Contents: Don’t touch my guitar—Fuckhead—Lost in Austin—Crawlin’ to LA—Land of the cosmic cowboys—Home of the blues—Hurricane takes the wheel—Mean as howlin’ wolf—Stevie Ray—The legend of Ziggy Stardust and theTexas kid—Better than T-Bone—Carnegie Hall—Serious trouble—Seven grains a day—Voodoo chile—Stevie V.—Redemption—In step—Hillbillies from outer space—The Otis express—Slight return.
   
Astrobiology Magazine (August 5, 2004)
Cosmic Cowboy
New planets and signs of life in space
by Kay Randall, Univ. Texas
   
Blame it on the TV show “The Jetsons” or maybe it was the movie “Bladerunner,” but somehow a few of us got the notion, way back in the ‘70s and ‘80s, that the future would end up being more “futuristic.” Well into the 21st century we’re asking, “Where are the flying cars and the hourly shuttles from Earth to the moon, the Burger Kings, penthouses and strip malls on Mars?”
 
It’s like we were let down by the sexy side of science. Or maybe it just seems that way.
 
If you corner an astronomer like Dr. Bill Cochran and talk to him for an hour or two, suddenly life in outer space, for example, doesn’t seem nearly so improbable. Cochran, who is a senior research scientist in the College of Natural Sciences’ Department of Astronomy at The University of Texas at Austin, believes it’s an exciting time to be studying the sky and stars and that the future is much, much closer than most of us think.
 
“Earth is a planet around what is a very common, boring star the Sun,” says Cochran. “And there are literally millions of other stars like our Sun nearby, as well as out in the galaxy. There’s really no reason to believe that there is not an Earth-like planet with life on it around at least one of those millions of other stars. Discovering new planets is the first step in finding life in outer space I don’t know that the average person realizes just how likely it is that life did or does exist on other planets out there.”
 
Granted, the phrase “cosmic cowboy” has a corny ring, but there definitely is a rogue aura of romance and a renegade quality to someone like Cochran, who is a modern-day explorer of infinitude.
 
Austin American-Statesman
New Austin rum joins vodkas
Texas molasses fuels Treaty Oak Platinum Rum
By Ed Crowell
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Daniel Barnes believes in drinking locally. He’s made his own beer for years, so why not try distilling liquor? It’s getting to be an Austin thing, after all, with three vodkas and, now, Barnes’ Treaty Oak Platinum Rum.

Arriving on store shelves this week, the rum sparkles in a squat, clear bottle with a black etching of Austin’s most famous tree shining through. The 80-proof liquor is as smooth as a fine vodka. It comes with neither the cloying
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COSMIC COWBOY
1 oz. Treaty Oak Platinum Rum
1 oz. Cointreau
11/2 oz. cranberry juice
1/2 oz. fresh lime juice
Shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a chilled glass.
— Graham Barnes Distilling