Regular Byron Bluesfest performer Bonnie Raitt look out three gongs at yesterday's GRAMMY awards, bringing her a total of 13 across the span of her career.

Kerrie Gray has recently received a Medal of the Order of Australia and is also Ballina Shire's newest Senior Citizen of the Year. She met The Echo in Alstonville to talk about the ongoing crises facing our region, and what everyone can do to help.

The Westpac Rescue Helicopter Service reports that at around 9.30 this morning, they were tasked by New South Wales Ambulance on a primary mission to a property at Tyalgum Creek, west of Murwillumbah.

Steve Earle is not a fluffball of peace, light and unicorns, though he wears his heart on his sleeve – and his jacket and his jeans. It can get messy. And at 68 his work isn’t getting any fluffier. Husband to six wives (one twice-married) and with three sons (his firstborn, Justin Towns Earle, died tragically in 2020), telling it like it is, both personally and professionally makes his work some of the most important in modern music history – Seven recently spoke to Steve at home in New York about life and his preparations for Bluesfest.

Psst: want to get Council staff to do something about the appalling state of roads in your neighbourhood?

A much-loved fig tree next to the Brunswick Heads boat harbour has been saved from destruction – for now – by the quick thinking of a local activist.