In an online interview last month, "Eastbound & Down" creators Danny McBride and Jody Hill gave a nice shoutout to the Triangle music scene. Asked their favorite bands, they listed Black Keys, Avett Brothers, Jesus and Mary Chain, Bob Seger, MC5 -- plus Dynamite Brothers and Lonnie Walker,  two groups that  call the Triangle home.

McBride and Hill come by their Tarheelia honestly, since they studied film at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. So it's no surprise that Sunday's episode of the HBO series will include a Lonnie Walker song, "Heartbreakin' Ball," which you can hear playing over the concluding synopsis and end credits. Tune in at 10 p.m. Sunday.

Dynamite Brothers have had songs on the show, too, and drummer Scott Nurkin even appeared in an episode this season, playing in an onscreen band.

HBO's "Eastbound & Down," a comedy following the career of washed up baseball player Kenny Powers, returns tonight for its third and final season.

In the new season, Powers, played by Danny McBride, is a daddy (yikes!) and finds himself in Myrtle Beach working as a closer for the minor league team there -- the Myrtle Beach Mermen. And of course, partying up a storm. 

The eight-episode season was actually filmed in Wilmington and Carolina Beach.

Season 1 of "Eastbound & Down" was also shot in Wilmington, but the second season moved to Puerto Rico.

Jason Sudeikis from "Saturday Night Live" also stars this season as one of Kenny's teammates. Matthew McConaughey will return in as a guest star to play the openly gay Texas baseball scout Roy McDaniel, and Will Ferrell will also return in the role of BMW salesman Ashley Schaeffer.

"Eastbound & Down" airs on Sunday nights at 10 p.m. on HBO.

The show that gave us former WRAL traffic guy Mark Robert's comedy series debut, and was created and populated by the NC School of the Arts mafia is getting a second season from HBO, it was announced today.

The new episodes will begin filming later this year and debut in 2010.

That's not only good news for the actors involved, but for North Carolina's film and TV industry. The show is filmed in Wilmington.

It's not that I can't see why some people would find HBO's "Eastbound & Down" hilarious. I totally can.

But...

There are a lot of North Carolina School of the Arts ties here: the
star/writer Danny McBride, executive producers/writers Jody Hill and Ben Best and first episode director David Gordon Green. The group has worked together before, in various combinations, on films "All the Real Girls," "The Foot Fish Way," and "Pineapple Express."

Comic star Will Ferrell is also an executive producer.

McBride plays Kenny Powers, a big-league baseball pitcher with a Jheri curl mullet who was once so popular, even little kids repeated his profane catchphrase. But his pitching slows, and his John Rocker-like remarks, plus his drug use -- steroid and recreational -- send him down the ranks, until finally he ends up home in North Carolina working as a substitute gym teacher.