The Musical Box

chris knight performs thursday at cadillac ranch.

October 9 is almost here. One of my favorite days of the year. It’s the birthday of two personal heroes: John Lennon and my mother. So let the celebrations commence.

Thursday also brings Chris Knight back to town, which in itself might not seem like big news. After all, Knight has been a regular fixture of local concert venues since the heyday of Lynagh’s Music Club.

The crowds have always turned out for Knight. And they weren’t always the locals. Many braved the highways from Western Kentucky, where Knight lived, went to school and worked (as a mining inspector, no less). They kept turning out after Lynagh’s Music Club closed in 2002 and The Dame opened a year later. An especially memorable engagement came a few winters ago when Knight and Knoxville songwriter Scott Miller played the latter during one of the quietest weeks of the music nightclub year: those downshift days between Christmas and New Year’s.

Knight was back in the region as recently as two weeks ago for a Millville performance - the same weekend as the Christ the King Oktoberfest and the Terrapin Hill Harvest Festival. On Thursday, Knight heads to Cadillac Ranch, a venue that usually adheres to hard country music. An unfamiliar venue (at least to many of Knight’s fans) and a weeknight - two tests of the songwriter’s proven ability to draw a crowd.

But there is a plus. Knight has another fine album, Heart of Stone, to showcase that doesn’t veer far from the restless rural themes that have long dominated his music. In short, he still writes like (a young) Steve Earle and still sings like John Mellencamp.

A personal favorite on Heart of Stone: My Old Cars, a graveyard tour of dead Mustangs and GTOs with the gears stripped and grills caved in. Set to a swampy guitar rumble, the tune is lighter in temperament than many of the album’s more agitated acoustic moments (like the “good dreams gone cold” outlined in Crooked Road). But My Old Cars is still ghostly in a way that only a rugged, rural songsmith like Knight can convey.

So here’s to staying up late on the 10/9 and taking Knight’s old ghosts out for a spin.

Chris Knight performs at 10 p.m. October 9 at Cadillac Ranch, 2320 Palumbo Drive. Tickets are $15. (859) 335-8800.