Sometimes a duo, sometimes a trio or a quartet, almost always featuring St. Louis music veterans Gary Hunt and Dade Farrar, Colonel Ford keeps pre-outlaw, traditional honky-tonk alive with Hunt's original compositions and a slew of classic covers heavy on the Buck Owens. "We play pop music," Farrar explained when the duo opened for his brother Jay in June. "Music your pop probably liked." And they do it well, with Hunt's steadfast guitar and Farrar's swinging — literally — upright bass, often joined by other local music luminaries/Farrar family members, fleshing out their sound with pedal steel, more guitar and a morphing style that maintains their country roots without stagnating.