Lone Justice/Maria McKee

Excellent suggestions! I was caught me off guard by the different line-up on the Palomino and Western Tapes releases (which is pretty remarkable considering all three Omnivore releases were recorded in 1983). Different rhythm section on the Western Tapes, but by the time they play that Palomino show, Etzioni takes over on bass. Then the Vaught tapes ends the year with Heffington taking over on drums from Don Willens.

Had to do some digging to see what happened with Willens, especially given Etzioni and Hedgecock's very generous thanks in their liner notes for the Palomino CD. There's not much that's out there, but unfortunately what did turn up was incredibly sad - a book interview mentioning addiction problems and an obituary that suggests donations to the American Liver Foundation. (Willens was only 44 when he passed away.)

According to social media posts, Marvin Etzioni, Ryan Hedgecock and Maria McKee are working on a new Lone Justice album. Apparently Marvin showed Maria some old demos and they decided to contact Ryan about making some new recordings. As mentioned, drummers Don Willens and Don Heffington both passed away years ago, so this basically reunites the surviving core members.

Hello Lone Justice Heads!
In the studio with Ryan Hedgecock working on the forthcoming LJ album.
He's playing his 1982 Telecaster reissue. pic.twitter.com/PGFKTSeKcW

— marvin etzioni (@marvinetzioni) July 2, 2022

McKee also mentions working on the album in an earlier Instagram post.

oh wow

Honestly surprised she would be up for this, given how far afield she’s shifted

For those without Instagram, this is from Maria McKee's account, the text under a photo cropped from the cover of The Vaught Tapes 1983 from Omnivore Recordings:

(April 20) It's hard to believe it's been over a year since Don died. Marvin and I meet every few weeks at Factor's deli for latkes and do a stroll through the neighborhood, stop for rugelach and coffee. We talk about old times but not just old times. New life too. He recently spruced up some demos we made during the recording of Sin To Get Saved. "How do you want to release them, as MM? Or LJ?" "As LJ," I said. But we can't release it as LJ without Ryan. You will have to overdub some Ryan!" So that's what they are doing today.

And in the comments, there's a nice one from Benmont Tench saying he can't wait to hear these.

jesus what a voice

“If Love Is A Red Dress” just shook me to my core

yep