'Rebel' Rod's - From Under The Basement

WITH HIS NEW RELEASE BILL KIRCHEN STANDS EVEN TALLER AS A FOUNDING FATHER OF AMERICANA

2013-04-17T22:16:00.000-07:00

Career-spanning studio album Seeds and Stems due out June 18 on Proper Records

AUSTIN, Texas — Bill Kirchen’s forthcoming album Seeds and Stems contains a truckload of songs that capture the singular sound and high-energy vibe of Kirchen’s live shows, the songs he started out with that are still perpetual crowd-pleasers. As Bill describes it, “We went to London and cut it pretty fast with the band that I tour with. We did it all at once. Something happens when you do that. I don’t understand the science behind it, but it’s undeniable.”

Kirchen offers a rare combination of guitar virtuosity, a mastery of roots rock ’n’ roll, and an almost magical connection with his audience. Finally with Seeds and Stems, due out on Proper Records on June 18, 2013, he has an album that captures all of this.

Perhaps the reason they were able to bottle lightning is that they recorded during a whirlwind two-week U.K. tour, catching studio time with producer Paul Riley in London whenever possible between shows. Kirchen says, “It was a busy time for the band [Jack O’Dell on drums and bassist Maurice Cridlin, plus singing and writing partner Austin de Lone on piano]. Some of the songs were reinvented for the tour, and we had the luxury of playing and recording the same material.”

One of those reinvented songs is a Kirchen classic “Womb to the Tomb.” Originally a fast-paced dieselbilly rocker, the new version is slower and bluesier with a gravelly, pounding beat well suited to tell the tale of a lonely trucker’s brush with the supernatural. Kirchen conceived the changes through an immersion in Louisiana culture that came about when he was teaching an Early Country Music class at Augusta Heritage Center that happened to coincide with their Cajun and Zydeco week. “It’s a ghost trucker song set on I-10, which runs right through the bayou. Because I’m an outsider I didn’t want to just shove an accordion on it, so I tried for the aura of Louisiana.” And he succeeds: in this new arrangement you can almost feel the steam rising up from the asphalt.

The opening track, a rocked-up “Too Much Fun,” is a Kirchen favorite from his early days as singer and lead guitarist for Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen. It was one of the very first songs he ever wrote, with fellow Airman Billy C. Farlow. “It was my first real success as a songwriter, and I called my own band that for years. It’s still a good song,” says Kirchen, a master of the understatement. Another track from the early Cody days is “Semi-Truck,” also written by Kirchen and Farlow. The complete title, “Here I Sit, All Alone With a Broken Heart, I Took Three Bennies and My Semi-Truck Won’t Start” is proof that, aside from pioneering new connections between the worlds of rock, folk, boogie-woogie, swing and country, the Cody band had another unique aspect for their time: a sense of humor. “We had a humorous component,” says Kirchen, “but it wasn’t too arch, it wasn’t smirky. We were playing the hard-core stuff, and we aware of its irony with a supreme affection for it. The people who wrote that stuff — they had perspective too. I’m not the first to notice that these cornball tear-jerking songs are not only cornball and tear-jerky, they are also fabulous.” The title cut, “Down to Seeds and Stems Again,” by Commander George Frayne and Farlow, is surely in the running for the saddest country song ever written. Kirchen’s delivery is up to the task at hand.

Kirchen’s Cody days began in 1967 when he co-founded Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen. They recorded seven albums for Paramount and Warner Brothers, one of which (Live From Deep in the Heart of Texas) rightfully made Rolling Stone’s list of the “100 Best Albums of All Time.” The original band established its place in the infancy of the Americana movement by being one of the first and only rock ’n’ roll bands to infuse their honky-tonk sound with pure, blood-and-guts country roots and Western swing. It’s Kirchen’s indelible guitar licks that define their top-ten charting hit, “Hot Rod Lincoln,” a song that eventually took on a post-Cody life of its own.

Today, Kirchen and his own band’s extended version of “Hot Rod Lincoln” is his universally loved signature masterpiece, a breathtaking, pumped up joyride through the last 60 years of guitar history. It starts with Johnny Cash and breezes by everyone from Howlin’ Wolf to the Merles (Travis and Haggard), the Ray Family (Link, Alvino, and Stevie) to the King Family (Freddy, BB, Albert, Ben E., Don, Carol, Billie Jean and The King), Carl Perkins to the Sex Pistols and then some. Rolling Stone called it “epic.” This cut is enhanced by the addition of Austin de Lone’s choice piano chronology, honoring such greats as Fats Domino, Professor Longhair and Count Basie. The concept started on stage as a joke, a way for Kirchen to amuse his band members, throwing them off by calling out a name and trying to play through it. “We tried to keep each other off-balance in the middle of a performance, when we first added Johnny Cash in between the car horns it cracked us up, so we did it again. At that point of the show the band would be up on two wheels bouncing off the guardrail but it was exciting. When we went to record it we tried to goof it up a little, just to keep it spontaneous.”

Before Bill Kirchen ever picked up a Telecaster he was a classical trombonist. That’s what he was studying as a teenager at Interlochen Center for the Arts in the early ’60s when he first fell for the guitar, in part due to the blossoming “folk scare” [his words] and in part thanks to his guitar-playing cabin counselor, Dave Siglin (founder of The Ark in Bill’s hometown Ann Arbor, Michigan). Just turned 16, Bill rescued his mom’s old banjo from the attic, got a copy of Pete Seeger’s How to Play the 5-String Banjo book and hitch-hiked to the 1964 Newport Folk Festival. Kirchen: “I witnessed stuff that knocked me out — Lightnin’ Hopkins, the Kweskin Jug Band, Son House, Johnny Cash, the Staples Singers, my original guitar hero Mississippi John Hurt. The top of my head flipped open and it’s never shut.” He’d head for New York when he could, hanging out in the Village and letting the whole scene wash over him. When he went back to Newport in ’65 and saw Dylan go electric, then on to New York City to see the Lovin’ Spoonful at the Night Owl, it “ruined me for normal work.” His strikingly powerful Dylan covers are staples of the live show to this day, and this CD includes “It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry,” perhaps the most moving and sublime of the bunch.

After the California-based Cody band split, Kirchen started his own band, The Moonlighters, and cut two more albums before relocating to DC in the mid-’80s. There he started his Too Much Fun trio, released ten more critically-acclaimed albums and began his robust touring schedule of 200-plus dates a year around the country and as far afield as Lapland, Israel and Palestine.

In 2001, Kirchen received a Grammy nomination for his instrumental “Poultry in Motion.” The following year he was inducted into the Washington Area Music Association Hall of Fame, neatly sandwiched between John Phillip Sousa and Dave Grohl. He has played and recorded with a long list of luminaries, including Nick Lowe, Doug Sahm, Elvis Costello, Link Wray, Emmylou Harris, Hoyt Axton and Gene Vincent. Bill is pretty sure that he is the only person to have, in a single year, stood on stage and played with both Ralph Stanley and Elvis Costello.

Now living in Austin, Kirchen maintains his rigorous and far-reaching tour schedule and also teaches at Augusta Heritage Center, Centrum Voiceworks and Jorma Kaukonen’s Fur Peace Ranch. Jorma was called in to fingerpick on the new release’s bonus track, the song that asks the musical question, “Are You Talkin’ About Love or Are You Talkin’ About Chicken?” It’s practically a true story written by Bill and Louise Kirchen and Sarah Brown, and inspired by their dog Rufus.

Bill Kirchen’s latest, Seeds and Stems, takes a fresh approach to many of the songs that were planted at the beginning of an incredibly full career, songs that grew into classics and branched out across the variegated styles of Americana and roots rock ’n’ roll.

Bill sums it up best: “I could have called this record Why I Love My Job. I got to write or co-write most of the songs, sing ’em, play a whole mess of guitar, and record with some of my favorite musicians on the planet. Thank you.”

# # #

BLUE CHEER “ROCKS EUROPE” CONCERT TO BE RELEASED ON CD, AVAILABLE ON MAY 28

2013-04-02T09:53:00.000-07:00

Final Blue Cheer concert

features legendary Dickie Peterson’s last performance;

CD includes two previously unreleased studio tracks

LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Blue Cheer muscled their way onto an unsuspecting late-’60s rock scene with an aggressively overdriven sonic assault that was as brutal as it was unprecedented. In the process, they helped to lay the groundwork for heavy metal, punk, grunge and innumerable variants of those genres.

Original members Dickie Peterson and Paul Whaley kept the band’s engine burning for much of the next four decades, maintaining the same pummeling intensity that had originally established Blue Cheer as one of their era's most subversive and influential musical forces.

Blue Cheer Rocks Europe, set for May 28, 2013 release on Rainman Records, represents the final chapter of the Blue Cheer story. The 12-song double-CD captures a compelling and powerful live set recorded for the legendary Rockpalast television show in Bonn, Germany on April 11, 2008 as well as two previously unreleased studio tracks. It finds the pioneering threesome in fierce form on what would be its final tour, prior to bassist/vocalist Dickie Peterson's death in October of the following year.

Embodying the raw, uncompromising attitude that first put the band on the map, the ten-song set is a potent testament to Blue Cheer’s enduring legacy, with Peterson and drummer Whaley joined by guitarist Andrew “Duck” MacDonald, who first became a member in the late ’80s. The double-disc bonus tracks are “Alligator Boots” and “She’s Something Else.”

Blue Cheer originally rose from the heady late-’60s San Francisco rock scene, although their blunt attitude and unapologetically unsophisticated psychedelic-blues approach made most of their Aquarian-age contemporaries sound positively polite by comparison. Their landmark 1968 debut album Vincebus Eruptum was edgy and rebellious even by late-’60s standards, yet somehow launched the band onto AM radio with their apocalyptic demolition of Eddie Cochran's “Summertime Blues,” which reached #14 on the U.S. singles chart.

Although Blue Cheer disbanded in 1972, Peterson revived the group a couple of years later, and it remained active for much of the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s and aughts, spending much of its last two decades based in Germany.

Blue Cheer’s undiluted passion is evident throughout the ten-song live set, which is a mix of old and new material, with four songs (“Parchman Farm,” “Out of Focus,” “Doctor Please” and “Summertime Blues”) from Vincebus Eruptum, three (“Babylon,” “Just a Little Bit” and “The Hunter”) from its follow-up Outsideinside, and three more (“Rollin’ Dem Bones,” “I’m Gonna Get to You” and “Maladjusted Child”) from 2007’s What Doesn't Kill You.

While the iconic classics confirm how far ahead of its time Blue Cheer was in the ’60s, the newer material demonstrates how staunchly the act maintained its original musical mission without succumbing to staleness. Rounding out the double-CD set are two previously unreleased studio tracks, “Alligator Boots” and “She’s Something Else” which confirms the band’s ongoing vitality and the sadness of Dickie Peterson’s loss.

Eulogizing Peterson in the pages of Rolling Stone, Rush’s Neil Peart did a good job of summing up Blue Cheer's appeal. “Dickie Peterson,” Peart wrote, “stood at the roaring heart of the creation, a primal scream through wild hair, bass hung low, in an aural apocalypse of defiant energy. His music left deafening echoes in a thousand other bands in the following decades, thrilling some, angering others, and disturbing everything — like art is supposed to do.”

http://www.rainmanrecords.com

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ELVIN BISHOP, JANIVA MAGNESS, SMOKIN’ JOE KUBEK PLUS GRAMMY WINNERS STEVE RILEY & THE MAMOU PLAYBOYS HEADLINE 24th ANNUAL SIMI VALLEY CAJUN & BLUES MUSIC FESTIVAL, SATURDAY-SUNDAY, MAY 25-26

2013-03-05T20:56:00.000-08:00

Los Angeles area’s largest Cajun and Blues festival, held over Memorial Day weekend, features two stages, a Mardi Gras parade, kids’ stages, crafts and dozens of food booths

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — The 24th annual Simi Valley Cajun & Blues Festival will rock over Memorial Day weekend, May 25-26, at Rancho Santa Susanna Community Park, 5005 Los Angeles Ave., in Simi Valley. The festival features two full stages for each of its musical genres. Music will proceed non-stop each day from 12 noon until 7:30 p.m. Tickets cost $20 (adults 13+) and $15 (children) and are available online at http://www.simicajun.org or at the gate. Parking is ample and free. Fast-moving California Hwy. 118 (Ronald Reagan Freeway) can be taken to the Stearns Street exit; the festival is four blocks south.

Co-headlining the blues stage this year, Alligator recording artist Janiva Magness and Elvin Bishop will lead a Tribute to Finis Tasby.

Janiva Magness received the coveted 2009 Blues Music Award for B.B. King Entertainer of the Year (she is the second woman to ever win this award; Koko Taylor was the first). She also won Contemporary Blues Female Artist of the Year for three years. She has received a total of 22 Blues Music Award nominations to date, including five nominations this year. Her album Stronger For It is her tenth.

Elvin Bishop, who will lead a tribute to ailing Texas bluesman Finis Tasby, a member of the Mannish Boys, with John Nemeth and Kid Anderson, began his career with the Butterfield Blues Band. He notched a #3 pop hit with the single “I Fooled Around and Fell in Love” in 1976. His latest recording (and 18th album) is the live Raisin’ Hell Revue on Delta Groove Records.

Meanwhile, on the Cajun stage, Rounder Records artists and two-time Grammy Award nominees and 2013 winner Steve Riley & the Mamou Playboys, will headline both Saturday and Sunday; Swampland star Teresa Russell, Southern California’s own Lisa Haley, Leroy Thomas & the Zydeco Roadrunners, David Sousa & the Zydeco Mudbugs, J Paul D. & the Zydeco Nubreeds and Andre Thierry & the Zydeco Magic will create a Louisiana-style fais-do-do. A sizeable dance floor will be built alongside the stage. The annual Mardi Gras Parade will take place both days at 4 p.m.

Meanwhile, back at the blues stage (and festival goers are encouraged to go back and forth), other performers include the Mannish Boys with guests Curtis Salgado, Kevin Selfe, Peter Dammann, Otis Grand and Audrey Turner; Smokin’ Joe Kubek & Bnois King with guests Bob Corritore, Rand Chortkoff and Big Pete; Sugar Ray & the Bluetones, Andy T/Nick Nixon Band with Anson Funderbaugh; James Herman’s Back Porch Revue; and the Delta Groove Harp Blast.

The blues stage also presents two young blues up-and-comers, redefining the genre for a new generation: Nathan James & His Rhythm Scratchers and Kara Grainger. Nathan James plays his self-invented washboard guitar, harmonica and kazoo. His 2012 What You Make of It album was called “one of the most original blues CDs (and bands) to come along in a long time.” Of Australian-born Kara Grainger — soon to release her Delta Groove Records debut album — Nashville’s Tennessean newspaper noted, "There's a whole lot of Bonnie Raitt in (her songs) . . . Grainger's alternately throaty and honeyed voice floats over a . . . bed of bluesy accompaniment."

The festival has received national press accolades: “Everywhere you turned, there was something exciting happening. Put this on your 2013 festival calendar,” wrote Blue Revue editor Art Tipaldi, who made the trek from New England. The Blues Blast writer enthused, “I attend many venues and festivals throughout the year but the ones that seem to impress me the most are the ones that serve the community in some way. I highly recommend you put this on your calendar for next Memorial Day weekend.” And the music industry trade journal Hits added, “As the last strains of (Candye) Kane’s set rang in our ears, we left the grounds fully sated by music, food, drink and, as the saying goes, bon temps.”

This family-friendly event boasts a huge kids’ area with bouncers, rock walls. specialty acts, crafts and talent shows.

The festival boasts dozens of food booths featuring a variety of fare: authentic Cajun creations and Southern BBQ as well as multi-cultural cuisine. More than 100 craft booths and retailers will be scattered throughout the festival grounds.

Tickets may be obtained online at http://wl.flavorus.com/rotaryclubofsimisunrise/cajunbluesfestival

Support of the not-for-profit Simi Valley Cajun & Blues Music Festival has benefited dozens of local community, national and international organizations a list of which may be found at http://www.simicajun.org/2013/whobenefits.html.

Simi Valley Cajun & Blues Festival web site:
http://www.simicajun.org/2013/index.html

POWER POP LEGENDS SHOES BEGIN THEIR SERIES OF 2013 SHOWS WITH THEIR SXSW DEBUT IN MARCH IN AUSTIN

2013-02-22T10:34:00.000-08:00

In celebration of their first new album in 18 years,

the acclaimed Ignition, the boys from Zion fire up for Austin

ZION, Ill. — Following the August 2012 release of Ignition, their first new album in 18 years, Shoes will appear at the South by Southwest (SXSW) Music Conference and Festival in Austin, Texas in March, their first time at the event.

The legendary power pop band, originally from Zion, Ill., will bring their memorable melodies and do-it-yourself ethic for a series of performances and a discussion panel at one of the most prestigious music gatherings in the United States.

Showcases for Shoes include a Wednesday, March 13, 1:35 p.m. show at Molotov for the SXSW Guitartown/Conqueroo/M Music & Musicians/AllMusic Block Party Kickoff; a Friday, March 15, 4 p.m. performance at the Ginger Man Pub for the Dog Fish Head/Blurt Magazine SXSW Party; and an Official SXSW Showcase concert presented by CD Baby at 11 p.m. at Maggie Mae’s. More appearances are planned though not yet scheduled.

Shoes member Jeff Murphy also will be participating on a Friday, March 15th, 11 a.m. panel discussion in Room 11 AB of the Austin Convention Center.

“We’re really excited about having the opportunity to participate in SXSW,” says Shoes singer/bass player John Murphy. “It’s a great event with a lot of people who love music. We’re looking forward to being a part of it.”

Shoes’ 2012 release, Ignition, received glowing reviews from publications around the country and further added to the band’s legacy.

Ignition is Shoes’ 11th studio album and their fourth self-released album of all-new music since parting ways with Elektra Records, which released Present Tense (1979), Tongue Twister (1981), and Boomerang (1982).

The 1984 Shoes offering Silhouette brought the band back to the same self-released D.I.Y. process it had used for the 1977 groundbreaking Black Vinyl Shoes album. Shoes followed up in 1990 with the critically acclaimed Stolen Wishes, which received a four-star review in Rolling Stone Magazine; and the 1994 follow-up, Propeller.

The ensuing 18 years’ output has included a live CD, reissues, rarities compilations, and a two-CD set of early demos (2007’s limited-edition Double Exposure) as well as film-soundtrack and tribute-album contributions.

Look for announcements of shows and festivals around the Midwest this summer.

# # #

MAGIC SLIM, BLUES ICON, DIES AT 75

2013-02-22T09:56:00.000-08:00

From Blind Pig Records - Thanks to Debra Regur - RIP Magic Slim

Magic Slim, a revered and towering figure in the field of traditional Chicago blues, died today in a Philadelphia hospital at the age of 75. Born Morris Holt in Torrance, Mississippi in 1937, the guitarist performer, bandleader, and recording artist went on to enjoy a career that launched him to national and international recognition and acclaim.

Slim was one of the foremost practitioners of the raw, gut-bucket, back alley blues associated with the postwar Chicago blues sound. He and his band, the Teardrops, were known as "the last real Chicago blues band" for their authentic, no-frills, straight-no-chaser performance of the music.

Slim's slash and burn guitar technique and booming vocals made for a commanding stage presence. His intense style was the blueprint that spawned much of the music played by modern blues artists and rockers. After catching one of Slim's electrifying live shows at a local nightclub Eddie Vetter invited Slim to open Pearl Jam's concert in Chicago. Magic Slim also had an encyclopedic repertoire of hundreds of blues songs in his head, giving his live shows a charming impromptu quality.

Growing up in Grenada, Mississippi, Slim took an early interest in music, singing in the church choir, and fashioning a guitar for himself with baling wire from a broom, which he nailed to the wall. "Mama whooped me for that," recalled Slim. His first love was the piano, but having lost the little finger on his right hand in a cotton gin accident, he found it difficult to play properly. Undaunted, he simply switched to guitar, working in the cotton fields during the week and playing the blues at house parties on weekends. In 2011 the state of Mississippi erected a Blues Trail Marker in Slim's honor in front of a building in Grenada where his mother operated a restaurant.

In 1955, like many musicians from the Deep South, Slim migrated to Chicago, where he was mentored by his friend Magic Sam, who gave the lanky Morris his lifelong stage moniker. Initially discouraged by the highly competitive local music scene, Slim went back to Mississippi and spent the next five years woodshedding and perfecting his craft. He confidently returned to Chicago and became a formidable player on the scene, eventually putting together the Teardrops, who would become one of the busiest and best-loved blues bands around, and one of the most sought-after headliners for festivals in Europe, Japan, and South America. Slim and his group won the coveted Blues Music Award in 2003 as "Blues Band of the Year," one of six times Slim won a BMA, considered the highest honor in the blues. Living Blues magazine called Slim and the Teardrops "a national treasure."

Slim's recording career began with a series of singles in 1966, and he recorded his first album for a French label in 1977. With the release of Gravel Road in 1990, he began a twenty-two year association with Blind Pig Records, who issued ten albums and a live DVD over that span. His last release, 2012's Bay Boy, proved that Slim could still deliver the goods. As No Depression said, "Magic Slim doesn't just play the blues, he body slams his audiences with a vicious guitar attack that pins them to the floor. His blues are the in-your-face variety." AllMusicGuide added, "Magic Slim turned 75 in 2012, but his growling vocals have the fire and brimstone of a Young Lion and his guitar playing is still as razor-sharp as it was when he turned pro in the '50s."

Blind Pig Records owner Jerry Del Giudice said, "Magic Slim embodied the heart and soul of this label. It was Magic Slim, and the guys like him, and their music, that inspired us to start the label in the first place."

Blues Revue once remarked, "Whoever the house band in blues heaven may be, even money says they're wearing out Magic Slim albums trying to get that Teardrops sound down cold." Now Slim can assume his rightful place as the leader of that band.

For a complete biography, please click HERE. For publicity photos, please click HERE. To see a video of Slim recording "Goin' To Mississippi" in the Blind Pig Chicago warehouse in April of 2002, please click HERE.

For more information visit www.blindpigrecords.com.

JIMBO MATHUS & THE TRI-STATE COALITION

2013-02-21T06:45:00.000-08:00

March US tour dates and SxSW appearances announced
Click here to view the new video for "White Buffalo"
(White Buffalo out now on Fat Possum Records)

February 20, 2013: Jimbo Mathus & the Tri-State Coalition have announced March US dates with Reverend Peyton's Big Band and SxSW appearances (scroll down for complete listing) in support of their new album, White Buffalo, out now on Fat Possum Records. To get a taste of Mathus' and the boys Mississippi Delta-flavored guitar rock, check out the video for the dirty blooz title track premiering at Relix Magazine here.

With White Buffalo, Mathus and the band deliver a high-octane collection of guitar-driven songs that draws on the musical styles of the American South. Over his 40-some years, he's played mandolin in his family band (starting at age 6), did the South Memphis early punk scene with Jack Oblivion, co-founded the Squirrel Nut Zippers, been nominated for two Grammys, including one for his guitar work on Buddy Guy's Sweet Tea album, worked as a river barge deckhand and wandered the US alone to get a feel for its music and its people. This album finds Mathus embracing his heritage - it's steeped in the mythology, culture and language of the Deep South, where his family goes back generations.

White Buffalo was recorded at Delta Recording Services Studio with producer Eric "Roscoe" Ambel (Steve Earle, Del Lords), who contributes guitar throughout. There are references to the early Allman Brothers' dual-lead guitar work, '70s-era Rolling Stones at their country bluesiest and a nod to the Memphis Stax/Volt sound. The performances are intuitive and effortless, from the Springsteen-esque, mandolin-driven biblical tale "In the Garden," to the Southern gospel flavor of "Poor Lost Souls," to the eerie electric blues of "Run Devil Run" (named for a Lucky Mojo "vigil candle"). He pays tribute to his mother with "Tennessee Walking Mare," who "never shied" when the family went through hard times, and loose-talking, no-count women on "Fake Hex."

The raw, heart-wrenching closing track, "Useless Heart," finds him wrestling with his demons and repeating the same mistakes in love. It's an honest, frills-free song, with Mathus putting himself out there on the line and sharing his pain and self-doubt. It's a quality his fans have come to expect from the man, both on his records and live performances. A true journeyman, Mathus just keeps getting better.

View the video for "In the Garden" HERE
Soundcloud link for "In the Garden" HERE

JIMBO MATHUS & THE TRI-STATE COALITION

# with REVEREND PEYTON'S BIG DAMN BAND

+ SXSW SHOWS

WE 3/06 COLUMBIA, MO - BLUE NOTE #

TH 3/07 ST. LOUIS, MO - OLD ROCK HOUSE #

FR 3 /08 KANSAS CITY, MO - KNUCKLEHEADS #

SA 3/09 LITTLE ROCK, AR - STICKY FINGERS #

WE 3/13 AUSTIN, TX - GUITARTOWN PARTY (details tba)

WE 3/13 AUSTIN, TX - FAT POSSUM SHOWCASE(details tba)

WE 3/20 NASHVILLE, TN - EXIT IN #

TH 3/21 COLUMBUS, OH - WOODLAND TAVERN #

FR 3 /22 FERNDALE, MI - MAGIC BAG THEATER #

SA 3/23 CLEVELAND, OH - BEACHLAND BALLROOM #

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Ron Asheton Tribute Concert with Iggy & the Stooges + Special Guests Coming to DVD on April 9

2013-02-19T17:07:00.000-08:00

Live concert tribute to brother Ron Asheton featuring

the Stooges, Henry Rollins and more!

Recorded live at the Michigan Theater, this heartfelt tribute/celebration of Stooge guitarist Ron Asheton's life and music featured Iggy and the Stooges, Henry Rollins, and guest guitarist Deniz Tek (Radio Birdman). Includes a string section on a few Stooges classics! All profits from the sale of the DVD go to the Ron Asheton Foundation which supports animal welfare and music.

Gary Graff of BILLBOARD writes:

"It was a typical night of Stooges-style brutality but in an even more passionate form, as the group and its guests took a wide swing through the repertoire, clearly moved by the sense of occasion and the cacophonous spirit of the 1,700 fans who snapped up tickets for the concert in less than an hour.

"Some of his (Asheton's) themes always reminded me a lot of...classical music in the 17th century," Pop told Billboard.com prior to the show -- emcee Henry Rollins fronted the band for "I Got a Right." Pop then came on to commence a full-on Stooges performance with co-founder and drummer Scott "Rock Action" Asheton, "Raw Power" guitarist James Williamson, longtime saxophonist Steve Mackay and Mike Watt, the group's bassist since 2003.

Shirtless and manic as always, even two days before his 64th birthday, it didn't take Pop long to turn the theater to bedlam. Following pulverizing renditions of "Raw Power," "Search and Destroy" and "Gimme Danger," Pop brought dozens of fans on stage for "Shake Appeal," clearly reveling in the ecstatic anarchy of the moment. The rest of the night maintained the energy through favorites such as "Beyond the Law," "1970" and "Fun House," the "ballad" "Open Up and Bleed" and a rendition of "I Wanna Be Your Dog" beefed up by an 11-piece orchestra.

The ensemble stayed on stage as Radio Birdman's Deniz Tek, a longtime Asheton friend, spelled Williamson for "T.V. Eye," "Loose," "Dirt" and "Real Good Time," while Williamson returned for a new acoustic composition called "Ron's Tune," in which Pop sang that "the music says you'll be my friend to the end" and "because you were my friend, I always think of you again." The night finished with everyone, including more audience members, onstage for "No Fun" -- whose title, of course, was the antithesis of the experience."

The complete story can be read HERE.

Preorder: http://www.seeofsound.com/p.php?s=MVD5711D

Cover Art: http://mvdb2b.com/i/300dpi/MVD5711D.jpg

Clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HoYsFD2wDw

Track Listing

I Got a Right

(with Henry Rollins)

Raw Power

Search and Destroy

Gimme Danger

Shake Appeal

1970

L.A. Blues

Night Theme

Beyond the Law

Fun House

Open Up And Bleed

Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell

I Wanna Be Your Dog

TV Eye

Loose

Dirt

Real Cool Time

Iggy's Speech

Ron's Tune

No Fun

# # #

WILLIE NILE’S AMERICAN RIDE MOVES INTO HIGH GEAR

2013-02-13T06:16:00.000-08:00

New fan-financed album by veteran rocker

and “songwriter’s songwriter”

coming on April 30 — with or without a label!

NEW YORK, N.Y. — When Willie Nile recently sought help in underwriting his new album American Ride — out on April 30, 2013 on his own River House Records — with a fundraising campaign on pledgemusic.com, his fans turned out in huge numbers, reaching his goal amount in a mere four days and ultimately exceeding it.

Anyone who’s familiar with the New York-bred singer-songwriter’s large and impressive body of work will have no trouble understanding why he commands such devotion and loyalty from his fan base. And anyone who’s paid attention to his recent output knows that Nile is currently in the midst of a creative renaissance that’s produced some of the most compelling music he’s ever made.

The timeless qualities of melodic craft, lyrical insight and emotional engagement that have endeared Nile to listeners around the world are prominent on American Ride, which ranks among the most powerful and personally charged work of his three-and-a-half-decade recording career.

“It’s pretty rockin’ overall, but there are some left turns and right turns along the way,” Nile says of the album. “There are songs about the rights of man, songs about freedom, songs about love and hate, songs about loss, songs about God and the absence of God, and songs about standing up for your fellow man. It’s upbeat and full of life. I’m thrilled with how it came out.”

American Ride offers a bracing set of 11 original compositions, and one well-chosen cover, that rank with the catchiest and most vivid music that Nile’s ever delivered. From the everyday wisdom of “Life on Bleecker Street” and “Sunrise in New York City” to the broader observations of “This Is Our Time” and “Holy War” to the rock ’n’ roll abandon of “Say Hey” and the road-tripping title track, the album consistently lives up to the artist’s reputation for writing songs that are as impassioned as they are infectious, and performing them with the fervor of a true believer. Several of American Ride’s recurring themes come into focus on the last two songs, “The Crossing” and “There’s No Place Like Home,” which end the album on a note of humanistic uplift. Another highlight is a fiery reading of Jim Carroll’s “People Who Died,” recorded as a tribute to both Carroll, who passed away in 2009, and to Nile’s late brother John.

American Ride features backup from Nile’s live band — guitarist Matt Hogan, bassist Johnny Pisano, drummer Alex Alexander, and Nile on guitar and piano — along with guest appearances by Eagles/Rosanne Cash guitarist Steuart Smith and New York singer-songwriters James Maddock and Leslie Mendelson. Nile also worked with some notable songwriting collaborators, including Eric Bazilian of The Hooters, who co-wrote “God Laughs”; The Alarm’s Mike Peters, who contributed to the title number; and Nile’s frequent writing partner Frankie Lee, who co-wrote four tracks. The release was produced by the team of Grammy-winner Stewart Lerman (who has worked with Nile since the ’90s), and Nile himself. Additional production by Pisano and Alexander.

Having launched his recording career at the height of the major-label era, and never comfortable with the baggage that comes along with being a major-label commodity, Nile has in recent years embraced the autonomy and freedom of his current indie status. To bring American Ride to fruition, he decided to take his case directly to the fans, financing the album’s recording, manufacturing and promotion via the aforementioned pledgemusic.com campaign.

“The record business is completely changed from what it was when I started,” he observes. “Artists can be independent now and make music on their own terms, and I love the freedom of that. I’ve been very fortunate in that fans and friends have been getting behind the work I’ve been doing, and it’s amazing and heartening to get that kind of support.”

Willie Nile’s fans include Bruce Springsteen, with whom he’s guested onstage on multiple occasions, and Pete Townshend, who personally requested him as the opening act on the Who’s 1982 U.S. tour. Other avowed Nile admirers include Bono, Lou Reed, Paul Simon, Ian Hunter, Graham Parker, Jim Jarmusch, Adam Duritz, Little Steven and Lucinda Williams, who once remarked, “Willie Nile is a great artist. If there was any justice in this world, I’d be opening up for him instead of him for me.”

Born into a large Irish Catholic family in Buffalo, N.Y., Willie began writing songs in his early teens. After graduating from the University at Buffalo with a B.A. in Philosophy, he moved to Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. During his first winter there, he was sidelined by pneumonia. While spending nearly a year recuperating, he concentrated on honing his songwriting skills. After his recovery, Nile became a popular fixture in the Village’s folk clubs, while drawing inspiration from the emerging downtown punk scene. His budding career received a major boost from a high-profile New York Times piece by legendary critic Robert Palmer, who called Nile “an exceptional talent” and “one of the most gifted singer-songwriters to emerge from the New York scene in years.”

The local buzz stoked by the Times story led to a deal with Arista Records, for which Nile recorded Willie Nile and Golden Down, released in 1980 and 1981, respectively. Those albums won a sizable audience and generated reams of press raves, with one critic likening Nile to a “one-man Clash,” and another calling his debut effort “one of the most thrilling post-Byrds folk-rock albums of all time.” But his progress ground to a halt after legal disputes with his label caused Nile to walk away from the music business, beginning a recording hiatus that lasted for nearly a decade.

Although he continued to write new material, Nile maintained a discreet distance from the spotlight until 1991, when he reemerged with a new deal with Columbia Records and a new album, Places I Have Never Been, which restored the artist to prominence with fans and critics. The following year, he went the independent route with the four-song EP Hard Times in America. Willie Nile — Archive Alive, a vintage document of a 1980 performance in New York’s Central Park, was released in 1997. In 1998, Nile lent his unmistakable voice to the all-star concept album Largo.

In 1999, Nile released Beautiful Wreck of the World, which marked the start of an exciting new chapter in his career, one in which he’s wholeheartedly embraced his new indie status to create and distribute his music free from corporate agendas. His new approach yielded substantial results, with Beautiful Wreck of the World chosen as one of the year’s Top Ten Albums by critics at Billboard, The Village Voice and Stereo Review. During this period, Nile substantially stepped up his touring activities in Europe, where he’s since built a large and enthusiastic following.

The well-received Streets of New York, from 2006, ushered in the most productive and prolific period of Nile’s musical life. The CD Live From the Turning Point and the DVD Live From the Streets of New York followed in 2007 and 2008, respectively, as did another widely celebrated new studio album, House of a Thousand Guitars, and 2011’s The Innocent Ones, which won some of the most enthusiastic notices Nile’s ever received.

The BBC called The Innocent Ones “stunning . . . THE rock ’n’ roll album of the year,” and Rolling Stone included it in its “Top Ten Best Under-the-Radar Albums of 2011.” USA Today named the album’s anthemic lead track “One Guitar” as the number-one song in the nation. It was also one of five songs chosen to be played on Occupy Wall Street’s 1000-guitar march, alongside Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land.”

“It’s been a great time,” Nile says of his recent activities. “I’ve been touring more in the last two years than in my entire career up until then. I’m in Europe four months a year and we’ve really built something solid over there. The fans are so great, so vocal, so supportive, and I’m deeply grateful to each and every one of them.”

With American Ride now a reality thanks to his — and his fans’ — efforts, Willie Nile is moving with the unmistakable momentum of a deeply accomplished artist who’s just hitting his stride.

“People who’ve heard this album say it’s as good a record as I’ve ever made, and I don’t disagree,” he states, adding, “I definitely think it’s as good a collection of songs as I’ve put together. I’m still learning as I go, and it gets easier every time in. I still love what I do and I’m probably feeling more inspired now than I ever have. I really do feel like I’m just getting started.”

# # #

HYMN FOR HER TURN UP THE HEAT WITH INCENDIARY BLEND OF WHITE LIGHTNIN’ COUNTRY BLUES AND PSYCHEDELIC-DOSED ROCK ’N’ ROLL ON NEW CD

2013-02-12T16:48:00.000-08:00

Hymn for Her Presents Lucy and Wayne’s Smokin Flames due out April 23

LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Lucy Tight and Wayne Waxing of Hymn for Her have been busy touring across the country and abroad over the past few years, injecting juiced-up backwoods country blues with a dose of desert rock psychedelia that has been described as “Hell’s Angeles meets the Amish.”

They recorded their last album, Hymn for Her Presents . . . Lucy and Wayne and the Amairican Stream, in their vintage 1961 Bambi Airstream trailer at locations stretching from Philadelphia to Malibu on a three-month tour.

For their new release, Hymn for Her Presents . . . Lucy and Wayne’s Smokin Flames, due out April 23rd, the twosome wanted to kick it into high gear. They traveled to Detroit to work with Jim Diamond, who mixed The Amairican Stream. In his Ghetto Recorders studio, the former White Stripes producer helped evolve their “stompgrass” sound to something even more heavy and rockin’.

Arriving at Diamond’s studio with road-tested tunes, Hymn for Her recorded live and mixed 12 original songs in just one week. “People wanted what they heard live at shows and we captured that moment and corked it,” explained Lucy.

The duo certainly covers a lot of musical territory in Smokin Flames. Their wild-eyed mash-up of country, blues and punk led U.K. music critic Steve Bennett to call H4H’s sound “a riotous, rocking roadkill stew,” while others have referenced such diverse bands as Captain Beefheart, Primus, X, R.L. Burnside, JS Blues Explosion and the Ramones.

Impressively, the two create their “ripsaw sounds” (Los Angeles Times’ Randy Lewis) with only a few instruments. Wayne (with the devilish voice), mainly playing the kick-drum, high-hat, acoustic guitar and harp, serves as the group’s rhythmic driving force. Lucy (of the fallen-angel voice) delivers a gritty squall on her “Lowebow” — a custom-made cigar-box guitar that she describes as “The Riff Monster.” In “Trash the Sun” Lucy launches a solo into the stratosphere, while she kicks up a sonic dust storm on “Mojave.”

“Mojave” stands among several Smokin Flames songs that were inspired by Lucy and Wayne’s desert night highway hallucinations. “Rosa Parks Blvd.,” a revved-up punk-abilly number, comes from their squatter days in Detroit. “Landescape,” an ode to nomads, suggests finding a place to cherish and hold in one’s heart during life’s hard travels.

After reading a plaque at Big Sur’s Pfeiffer Beach about a young girl, her mother and grandmother who all drowned together, Lucy was inspired to write the deeply felt “Ivy Pacheko.” She revealed that H4H weren’t planning on including this tune on Smokin Flames; however, just before the recording sessions began, she got an email reply from Ivy’s brother (nearly a year after emailing him). He thanked her for writing the song. Lucy saw this as a sign the song needed to be on the album.

“Ivy,” along with tracks like “For the Dead” and “Dark Deeds,” takes listeners down a rather macabre path. The demonic-sounding “Lucy Fur” continues down this blood-stained dirt road with its story about “the daughter of Lucifer,” but actually reveals the duo’s devilish sense of humor. The tune, according to Wayne, is about their beloved six-year-old spawn, “99% angel, 1% baby of Beelzebub”.

Although Hymn for Her hails from Philadelphia, Lucy characterizes H4H as “a band born on Route 66.” With their daughter Diver, Manny the nanny and Pokey, their spirit guardian dog, this little self-contained unit enjoys life’s unknown adventures on the highway. They recently had a successful U.K/European tour and plan to return soon.

Along with launching the new CD, Hymn for Her also have a hot sauce brewing under the same name as the album. They have been mixing, tasting and testing with their friends, Armando y Jorge’s Orlandonian Hot Sauce Company, to get the perfect flavors that will rock as hard as the record. It will feature bananas, jalapeños and smoked paprika. These spicy minstrels are running a Kickstarter campaign through the first week of April to fund the project. http://kck.st/Wm5p30

Always pondering new, space-age ideas for the future, the duo’s motto in life is “Inspire ’til you expire.” They’d love to transform their Airstream rocket into a mobile studio, a touring radio station, a mini-cinema and popcorn stand (with banana hot sauce) or even a botanical garden.

Music, however, remains their lifeblood, as the two burn up the highway and ignite your town this year to promote Hymn for Her Presents . . .Lucy & Wayne’s Smokin Flames.

Come out and taste the heat, y’all!

Hymn for Her

http://hymnforher.com/

https://www.youtube.com/user/h4h07

https://www.facebook.com/hymnforher

https://twitter.com/HymnForHer

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MEAT PUPPETS ICONIC DESERT PUNKS RETURN WITH "RAT FARM" THEIR 14TH STUDIO ALBUM

2013-02-06T16:52:00.000-08:00

SPRING US TOUR DATES ANNOUNCED

(April 16, 2013; Megaforce Records)

February 6, 2013; New York, NY: For 40 years, legendary desert punks the Meat Puppets have carved a unique niche for themselves with an unmistakable blend of cosmic country and punk rock filtered through countless acid trips, dog-eared comic books and their eclectic record collections. Along the way they've earned the admiration of a pantheon of critics and rock music peers. The certified classics reach back to Meat Puppets I, II, and Up On The Sun, and have been book-ended by recent releases Sewn Together and Lollipop. With brothers Curt and Cris Kirkwood reunited in 2009 and the 2012 release of the band's the band's graphic tell-all biography, Too High to Die, the Puppets' iconic status seems assured. But the drive to create goes on and fire still burns; the band's live shows and new material, including their 14th studio release, Rat Farm (April 16 release via Megaforce Records), are as colorful, vital and undiluted as ever.

After a visit to Russia to perform later this month, the Meat Puppets will be touring the States fromMarch 28 through April 11 (scroll down for complete dates). They'll also be making select appearances at SxSW and have confirmed for Primavera Festival in Barcelona in May. The touring band consists of the Kirkwood brothers, singer/guitarist Curt Kirkwood and bassist Cris Kirkwood with drummer Shandon Sahm and new addition on second guitar, Elmo Kirkwood (Curt's son).

Curt Kirkwood says that fans can expect to hear "real blown-up folk music," on Rat Farm. Songs like the title track feature the effortless laid-back harmonies, distinctive guitar work and psychedelic, cosmic country sound that they do better than anyone. The Meat Puppets might evolve but their sound is unique - you'll never mistake them for anyone else, nor anyone else for them, despite their influence. And they make what they do look easy considering that they're deceptively accomplished players.

"I tried to write stuff that would stand on its own -- just the chords and the melodies, and play it kind of straight," he says of the Rat Farm material. "I think that was the guiding boundary that I gave myself. It was one of those things where a lot of times, in the past especially, Cris would go, 'Well, that's all there is? Let's put a prog rock part in the middle.' But I tried to hold it off as much as I could."

It's those instincts - knowing when to be understated, the confidence that comes with decades of honing your craft -- that keep the Meat Puppets pure and relevant. Their sound will never go out of style because they invented their drug-fueled, sun-baked, country-tinged sound. Accept no substitutes.

RAT FARMTrack Listing:

1. Rat Farm

2. One More Drop

3. Down

4. Leave Your Head Alone

5. Again

6. You Don't Know

7. Waiting

8. Time and Money

9. Sometimes Blue

10. Original One

11. River Rose

12. Sweet

Meat Puppets 2013 Spring US Tour Dates:

TH 3/28 SHREVEPORT, LA - VOO DOO LOUNGE

FR 3/29 BIRMINGHAM, AL - BOTTLE TREE

SA 3/30 ATHENS, GA - 40 WATT

MO 4/01 LANCASTER, PA - THE CHAMELEON CLUB

TU 4/02 NEW HOPE, PA - JOHN AND PETER'S PLACE

WE 4/03 NEW YORK, NY - MERCURY LOUNGE

TH 4/04 NEW YORK, NY - MERCURY LOUNGE

FR 5/05 ITHACA, NY - THE HAUNT

SA 4/06 ROCHESTER, NY - THE CLUB AT WATER STREET

SU 4/07 COLUMBUS, OH - SKULLYS

TU 4/09 BLOOMINGTON, IN - THE BISHOP

WE 4/10 LEXINGTON, KY - COSMIC CHARLIES

TH 4/11 NASHVILLE, TN - HIGH WATT

FR 4/12 CHATTANOOGA, TN - JJ'S BOHEMIA SA

SA 4/13 JACKSON, MS - MARTIN'S

*SxSW and European dates to be announced soon

MEAT PUPPETS on the web:

themeatpuppets.com

http://derrickbostrom.com

Meat Puppets on YouTube

Twitter

Facebook

STEVE FORBERT’S ACCLAIMED BREAKOUT ALBUMS, ALIVE ON ARRIVAL AND JACKRABBIT SLIM, REPACKAGED WITH BONUS TRACKS AS 2-CD SET BY BLUE CORN MUSIC ON MARCH 26

2013-02-05T19:13:00.000-08:00

The late ’70s New York years of this Mississippi-bred singer/songwriter
offer glimpse into the soul of renegade artist.
Reissue package contains liner notes by David Wild.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Among the Ramones’ blitzkrieg boppin’, the Talking Heads’ art-school New Wave and Blondie’s thrift-store garage pop at the now-legendary CBGB’s in the late ’70s, Steve Forbert stood tall as the lone troubadour. But it didn’t matter to him. “I never thought about it being strange to play there,” he recently confided from Nashville, his current home base. “I just figured they had live entertainment. I had done other auditions I didn’t get hired for, so what I did have to lose?”

Forbert left Meridian, Mississippi — down state from Elvis Presley’s Tupelo homeland — for New York City in June of 1976 to play music. “A lot was happening in New York at the time,” he recalls. “Even in Mississippi, we were able to acquire Patti Smith’s Horses and the Ramones were out — that was all very exciting.” He busked in the subway and Grand Central Station. “I was going anywhere there was a rumor of an open mic,” with Folk City’s hoot nights being the open mic crown jewel. “It was like being a kid in a candy store,” he remembers. “I made a lot of friends. I could learn a lot from people who were good, and I could learn a lot from people who were bad.”

He certainly learned how to craft a good song, as his career-launching first two albums — the aptly titled debut Alive on Arrival and its follow-up Jackrabbit Slim — well demonstrate. On March 26, Blue Corn Music is releasing those albums as a two-disc set (complete with a dozen rare bonus tracks), providing a fresh opportunity to appreciate the Southern grace and youthful energy, the honeysuckle innocence and gravel-road grit that Forbert effortlessly imbued into songs like “Goin” Down to Laurel,” “What Kinda Guy,” “Say Goodbye to Little Jo,” “Complications” and his breakthrough hit “Romeo’s Tune.”

Rolling Stone contributing editor David Wild, in his liner notes, figures that Forbert made “one of music’s greatest entrances ever, arriving fully formed as an extraordinary singer-songwriter — a subtle troubadour for his times, and for all time too. Now or then, you would be hard-pressed to find a debut effort that was simultaneously as fresh and accomplished as Alive on Arrival . . . it was like a great first novel by a young author who somehow managed to split the difference between Mark Twain and J.D. Salinger.”

Critics were heaping praise on an unsigned Forbert when he was playing clubs like CBGB’s and Kenny’s Castaways. In 1977, the New York Times’ John Rockwell created a buzz when he wrote, “What makes him remarkable is that he’s good already, when he’s still growing. And at his frequent best, he’s already a star.”

As many labels quickly became interested, Forbert worried about being manipulated into someone that he wasn’t — turned into to a Johnny Cougar, in his words. He wound up signing with Nemperor Records because he trusted its founder, Nat Weiss. “I just felt if Nat said something it would be true and he would let me pick my producer.” Forbert remains friends with Weiss to this day.

Forbert selected studio veteran Steve Burgh to produce after being impressed by an album Burgh handed him one night in a club. Not wanting to sound overproduced, the artist refused to have overdubs or reverb on Alive. However, after Bonnie Raitt said that she liked the album but it needed some reverb, the admittedly stubborn Forbert acquiesced. “I owe some thanks to Bonnie Raitt,” he confessed. “Bonnie set me straight on that.”

He owes Barbra Streisand a debt of thanks too. He had chosen Joe Wissert to produce his second album but Wissert got hired to work on a Streisand album just before Forbert’s Nashville sessions were to begin. Fortunately, late-minute replacement John Simon (The Band, Simon & Garfunkel) proved to be “fantastic,” according to Forbert. He credits Simon pushing for a third recording session in order to get “Romeo’s Tune” right. While the song stands as his greatest hit and best known number (Keith Urban covered it a few years back), Jackrabbit Slim offers more than just “Romeo’s Tune.” In his liner notes, Wild notes that the album, with its many memorable tunes, beat “the sophomore jinx and then some,” showing “great artistic growth” and featuring “songs that are among Forbert’s most enduring.”

Since the double-barrel blast of Alive on Arrival and Jackrabbit Slim, Forbert has continued creating more albums “full of focused, intelligent and sharp songs” (as critic Steve Pick recently wrote in Blurt), including his Grammy-nominated Jimmie Rodgers tribute Any Old Time. Last year’s Over With You accumulated more accolades, with All Music Guide’s Steve Leggett calling Forbert “a wonderful songwriter with a clear and sharply observed vision,” and American Songwriter’s Hal Horowitz describing the CD as “all lovely, melancholy, lyrically moving and beautifully performed.”

The songs on Alive on Arrival and Jackrabbit Slim, with their special blend of folk, rock and soul, form the foundation of Forbert’s music and remain a vital part of his live performances. “I do still enjoy playing these songs,” he says. “There’s nothing wrong with starting out a show with “Thinkin” and nothing weird about singing ‘Everybody here seems to like to laugh’ [the opening lines of “Going Down To Laurel”].” He finds it gratifying that these songs have stood the test of time and have touched so many people. “A lot of people who discovered Alive on Arrival took it real personally and that has really been a great thing.” Among those Alive acolytes is David Wild, who states in the liner notes that “one of the many things that make this life so much more beautiful than strange is truly great music and that is assuredly what Steve Forbert has given us right from his arrival until today.”

The artist sums up his first two albums this way: “I try to make music that has lasting power all the time but those two were the right people at the right time and right place . . . Had it been two years later it might not have happened (or) two years earlier, it might have been different. Those two records — I am proud of them.”

# # #

NAKIA READIES DROWN IN THE CRIMSON TIDE EP FOR MARCH 5 RELEASE ON SOMETHING-MUSIC

2013-02-01T04:18:00.001-08:00

Soul/R&B singer collaborates with Bleu, Johnny Lee Schell,

Barry Goldberg, Chris Seefried

AUSTIN, Texas — Austin-based, Alabama-raised singer/songwriter Nakia has a heart that beats to the rhythms of Muscle Shoals soul, pumping blood infused with Stax funk to cells lined with Chicago blues grooves. His vocal talent is the kind that instantly turns listeners into fans — among them CeeLo Green, who invited Nakia to sing on his Muppets Christmas special.

On his new EP, Drown in the Crimson Tide, releasing March 5 on the Something-Music label, Nakia unleashes that voice on six songs he wrote in collaboration with top-tier artists including Barry Goldberg, Bleu, Chris Seefried and Brian West. Three were co-produced by legendary keyboardist Goldberg, whose vast resume includes playing Dylan’s ’65 Newport gig and producing Percy Sledge; and guitarist Johnny Lee Schell, who’s worked with Bonnie Raitt, John Fogerty and Eric Burdon.

It’s the latest chapter in a musical journey that started in earnest when Nakia moved from Chicago to Austin in 2002. After a brief stint in the Small Stars, a tongue-in-cheek lounge act fronted by Fastball’s Miles Zuniga, he formed Nakia & His Southern Cousins, got booked to perform at the 2008 Austin City Limits Festival, and wound up singing with Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings. Alejandro Escovedo heard him at a Rolling Stones tribute, which led to him singing backup on Escovedo’s Street Songs of Love album, and to a second recommendation — this time by producer Tony Visconti — for Nakia to front his own Blues band. So he formed the Blues Grifters. A YouTube video of the band led to The Voice producer Mark Burnett recruiting him for the pilot, which resulted in his relationship with CeeLo.

And those are just some of the musical aspects of his career.

Among Nakia’s non-musical undertakings, he worked at an Apple store, modeled, and was a cavern guide, a show rider (yes, horseback), a record label promo guy (pushing John Mayer for Aware Records) and an actual missionary in Africa.

Along the way, he managed to overcome drug and alcohol addiction and growing up as a declared gay kid in the South. He gets to the core of his experiences, and how he moved beyond them and into a positive place on “Dream Big,” a bluesy mid-tempo ballad co-written with his friend Bleu. The EP’s title, Drown in the Crimson Tide, comes from a line in the song — it’s not just a reference to a certain Alabama football team.

“When you grow up in that area of the world, it is really easy to get drawn into your surroundings and your environment,” Nakia explains. “If you’re not careful, you’ll get sucked into that tide and you’ll drown. My aunt told me if I ever got a chance to leave, I should. She also said that one of the hardest things in life to do is to change your lot.”

Nakia has worked to do just that. In fact, as CeeLo listened to Tide, he told Nakia, “I am consistently impressed by the amount you've been able to accomplish on your own by just rubbing two pennies together.”

Networking hard in L.A., Nakia made connections that resulted in several fruitful collaborations. He co-wrote the funky “Pieces and Castles” and the EP’s big soul-stirrer, the ode to his life partner, “When I Found You,” with Goldberg. “Make Up With a Gun,” a getaway tale that might be at home in a Sergio Leone or Robert Rodriguez flick, was written with Disney hitmaker Archontis. Seefried (Fitz & the Tantrums) collaborated on the groove-filled “Tight.” Juno Award winner Brian West (Nelly Furtado, K’Naan and Bono) had a hand in the closer, the party-hard R&B-funk rave-up “Walking on a Slant.”

“It was really important for me to have this Otis Redding/Fabulous Thunderbirds/Doug Sahm vibe to this song,” Nakia says. “Then we added the horns, and it took it to this whole other level.”

Joe Sublett and Darrell Leonard, a.k.a. the Grammy-winning Texicali Horns, are heard in various spots on the EP, half of which was recorded at Schell’s home studio.

Nakia continues to work with A-list writers, including legendary Motown hit man Lamont Dozier. Turns out Nakia’s earned himself a few famous fans along the way, including Dozier and Stevie Nicks, who floored him with a red-carpet rave before he could utter his own words of devotion.

Hero encounters aside, Nakia is generally regarded as a super cool, affable guy, one who makes friends as easily as he earns fans.

Nakia

nakia.net

http://instagram.com/nakia

JONNY FRITZ Dad Country (April 16, 2013; ATO Records)

2013-01-31T06:10:00.000-08:00

Listen/download a new song, "Ain't It Your Birthday" at Paste Magazine
Co-produced by Taylor Goldsmith (Dawes)

January 30, 2013: Nashville songwriter Jonny Fritz's work ethic and boldness have paid off in spades. It's been a big year for Jonny with opening stints for Alabama Shakes, Deer Tick, Dawes, Shooter Jennings and kudos from CMT and Rolling Stone, among many others. He's signed a deal with indie label ATO Records (he actually signed the deal with gravy at Nashville landmark Arnold's Country Kitchen), and his third full-length album, Dad Country, is set for release on April 16, 2013. Dad Country is also his first release under his real name Fritz with Jonny ditching the "Corndawg" moniker he'd carried since his early teens. Fans will recognize these songs from Fritz's live shows; they've been road-tested and fine-tuned. He's released the first single from the album, "Ain't It Your Birthday" today at Paste Magazine; it's available for download here. (scroll down for embed code).

Like his songwriting heroes Tom T. Hall, Michael Hurley, Roger Miller and Clint Black, Jonny can turn phrases 'til you're dizzy, all while plucking your heartstrings or capturing a sharp, lonesome vulnerability that never seems lost or brooding. Produced by Jonny and Dawes' Taylor Goldsmith, recorded at Jackson Browne's Los Angeles studio and finished up in Music City, USA; this breakthrough album balances Jonny's trademark earthy humor and unfiltered worldview with some of his darkest material to date. Co-producer Goldsmith says, "Funny as they can be at moments, his songs access realities and experiences that we're all familiar with but sometimes fail to consider the depths of." Dad Country has a Nashville sound kept aloft on a sure Southern Californian wind, no doubt from the influence of his backing band: Taylor and Griffin Goldsmith, Tay Strathairn and Wylie Gelber of Dawes, Jackson Browne, and his Nashville band: Spencer Cullum Jr, Joshua Hedley, Taylor Zachry and Jerry Pentecost.

After nearly a decade spent on the road (since his late teens), it was well-earned luck that brought Jonny together with dream team that would bring Dad Country to life. Originally scheduled to record at another Los Angeles studio, Jonny and Goldsmith were left scrambling for a backup plan when their original producer flaked. As it happened, they were playing a show in Hollywood that week and Browne was in attendance. After the show, Browne approached Jonny and, learning of their troubles, generously offered up his studio. Just three weeks later, they were all holed up at Browne's recording the new songs.

"It was really spontaneous," says Jonny. "We just pulled it out of our proverbial asses as we went along." In just four days, they pounded out 14 tracks in one long, inspired rush and this excitement pervades the results. Jonny later decided to re-record two of the songs that had evolved significantly on the road -- the Red Simpson-esque "Fever Dreams" and down-home lament "Ain't It Your Birthday" -- using his own band back in Nashville. With these, the record was ready and dead-on with Jonny's vision of "Dad Country."

Born in Montana and raised in Virginia, Jonny grew up in the middle of mountains and weirdos of every allegiance, developing a blind man's ear for the slightest turn in a tale or human voice. He dropped out of school and left home early, totally undaunted, and toured the country on his motorcycle, selling just enough music to keep his freedom and stay ahead of bitterness. "If I could sell three CDs a night, I would have enough for gas and to make it to the next town."

Cramming six lifetimes into six years and collecting triumphs and heartaches every corner of the globe, he eventually wound his way toward Tennessee. "Not because I wanted to break in over on Music Row and 'make it,' because I knew I didn't really belong there," he says. "I wanted to learn the ways of country music ... to get my education in this cool old world that exists only in Nashville."

While immersing himself in the music world, Jonny began running marathons from Philadelphia to Barcelona and pounding out his signature leather works -- the dog collars and guitar straps -- seen all over Nashville and half the musical universe. He found himself in NYC for year trying to save a relationship, and its slow, painful unraveling (and demise) inspired Dad Country's bleakest, heartrending tracks, including "All We Do Is Complain" and "Have You Ever Wanted to Die."

These days, life has never been better for Jonny Fritz. He's back in Nashville again and putting down roots- and has even gone and bought himself a house. "It just keeps getting better. Now, the band is getting paid, I'm getting paid, everybody's happy, and we're packing 'em in when we play."

"This is the dream life. I couldn't really ask for anything else."

Track Listing

Goodbye Summer

All We Do Is Complain

Holy Water

Social Climbers

Ain't It Your Birthday

Shut Up

Wrong Crowd

Have You Ever Wanted to Die

Fever Dreams

Trash Day

Suck In Your Gut

Instrumental

Praise for Jonny Fritz:

"Clever songs like "Chevy Beretta," "Shaved (Like a Razor)" and "Undercover Dad" made last year's Down on the Bikini Line an underground hit, but it had more to do with the surprising authentic quality of his music than it did with his quirky style." - CMT.com

"... filthy, funny, vagrant and harmonious." - Paste Magazine

"His love of classic country--in all its heartbreaking, plainspoken, at times ridiculous glory--burns hotter than a backyard tire fire."- M: Music and Musicians

"... a preternatural grasp of honky-tonk, bluegrass, traditional, and outlaw country music."

- Consequence of Sound

"When he zeroes in on the sort of absurd detail that nobody else would think to write about, he's unbeatable." - Relix Magazine

"Corndawg reels you in with some good shtick-the blatant country signposts ... but you'll stick around for the genuine craftsmanship." - Popmatters (review of Down on the Bikini Line)

JONNY FRITZ LINKS:

Jonny Fritz

Facebook

Instagram

Twitter

Bandcamp

Daytrotter Session

Jonny's leatherwork (guitar straps, belts, dog collars ...)

REVEREND PEYTON'S BIG DAMN BAND ROARS ACROSS THE COUNTRY THIS SPRING

2013-01-30T05:23:00.000-08:00

Big Damn Blues Revolution Tour Kicks Off March 6th With Special Guests:

Jimbo Mathus & Grammy Winner Alvin Youngblood Hart

Los Angeles, CA (January 30, 2013) - Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band is happy to announce the Big Damn Blues Revolution Tour, which will take the band throughout the U.S. this spring with special guests Jimbo Mathus and Alvin Youngblood Hart.

With a reputation for their incendiary live shows, it seemed only natural for The Big Damn Band to hit the road again in support of Between the Ditches, their latest album. But this time, The Rev, Breezy & Cuz will unleash their ferocious blues explosion to the masses alongside some of their favorite artists for what is sure an unforgettably raucous affair.

Conceptualized by none other than the Reverend Peyton himself, The Big Damn Blues Revolution Tour is a musical event that will showcase today’s top blues artists in a whole new light. Coming along for the ride are Jimbo Mathus, best known for his work with the swing revival band Squirrel Nut Zippers and blues legend Buddy Guy as well as Grammy Award-winning guitarist Alvin Youngblood Hart. The tour kicks off in March then the Rev will make several appearances at the world-renowned music festival South By Southwest in Austin, TX before continuing the tour throughout the summer.

Between the Ditches has been received with enthusiasm since its debut at #1 on the iTunes Blues chart week of release. They’ve received critical raves in the US and internationally, video play from CMT and MTVu, charting at both college and Americana radio and inclusion in the hit Showtime series “Shameless” starring William H. Macy.

Roaring out of the southern Indiana foothills, Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band, plays a brand of Americana and Blues that stands alone - Delta blues and hillbilly fervor combine with musical acuity sharp as razor wire. Their new album Between The Ditches is a chronicle of this lifestyle. Since it arrived in August, excellent reviews have appeared in publications like Vintage Guitar, Classic Rock Magazine, Alternative Press and Living Blues. Their fifth album celebrates the growl of a good truck engine, the fiercest passion for their country home and the importance of family.

Big Damn Blues Revolution dates:

Wed Mar 6 Columbia, MO Blue Note

Thu Mar 7 St. Louis, MO Old Rock House

Fri Mar 8 Kansas City, MO Knuckleheads

Sat Mar 9 Little Rock, AR Sticky Fingers

Tue Mar 12 Austin, TX The Blackheart SXSW

Wed Mar 13 Austin, TX Club Deville SXSW

Thu Mar 14 Ft. Worth, TX Live Oak Music Hall

Fri Mar 15 Austin, TX Continental Club SXSW

Sat Mar 16 San Antonio, TX Spurs Performance

Sun Mar 17 San Antonio, TX Sam's Burger Joint

Wed Mar 20 Nashville, TN Exit In

Thu Mar 21 Columbus, OH Woodland Tavern

Fri Mar 22 Ferndale, MI Magic Bag Theater

Sat Mar 23 Cleveland, OH Beachland Ballroom

More dates to be announced soon.

Stay connected for the latest:http://www.bigdamnband.com
http://www.facebook.com/bigdamnband
http://www.twitter.com/bigdamnband

Here's a track from Jack Cade and the Everyday Sinners upcoming album "Lord of the Empty Manor" - Dig it baby!

2013-01-29T19:47:00.001-08:00

2011 saw the release of Jack Cade and the Everyday Sinners debut Collision Music album ‘This
Fiery Road’ which introduced the band to an audience far and wide from their native Reading home, picking up new fans from across Europe and the US in the process.

If you haven’t heard the album these words from Rebel' Rod Ames at ‘From Under The Basement’ just about sum it up:

"Take about two cups of Johnny Cash, add a dash or two of Tom Waits, and a smidgen of the psychobilly or punk roots that began molding him years ago, and you have Jack Cade."

Having spent 2012 writing new material, shooting videos and playing a whole bunch of gigs Jack Cade and the Everyday Sinners are ready to embark on their follow up album. The band has been trimmed down from the large mix of musicians who appeared on the debut, and are now based around a core 4 piece band with occasional appearances from guest musicians. The current line-‐up is Jack Cade (vocals & guitar) Mike Muggeridge (bass) Helen Togher (vocal) and Adam Perry (drums). In keeping with this stripped down format the new material is a lot more raw, whilst still weaving its way through an Americana, Country and Folk vibe. The 'Lord of the empty Manor' album will introduce 12 new songs with themes ranging from passion and despair to the ills of the modern life, there are even some Zombies thrown in along the way. However, there is a change to this Collision release, in that the tracks will be released individually each month through the year, with a limited edition vinyl copy available December 2013. First up will be the relentlessly thumping 'Dead Weight Walkin' an allegory for our times, railing against the greed of the few riding on the backs of the many, a theme truly in keeping with the historical links of the name Jack Cade. It’s told through the story of five brothers and their lopsided, turbulent relationship, delivered in a deep angry growl and backed by some searing vocals from Helen and all underpinned by a rolling tribal beat and rhythmic bass line. At the helm for the recording of this album is producer Bobby Bloomfield of Does it offend you, yeah? who has also collaborated with Vienna Ditto, The Adelines, SixNationState, Kamikaze Test Pilots as well as working on numerous other remixes.

Please check out Dead Weight Walkin' which was released on 21 January 2013.

Please, by all means check "Dead Weight Walkin'" a great new tune by Jack Cade and The Everyday Sinners. You will not be sorry.

Dig it!

HENRY WAGONS RELEASES EXPECTING COMPANY? MINI-ALBUM FEATURING DUETS WITH ALISON MOSSHART AND OTHER FRIENDS; HEADS TO NORTH AMERICA FOR SHORT, SWEET TOUR

2013-01-29T05:40:00.000-08:00

Australian roots rocker also to

shadow SXSW proceedings in Austin in March

MELBOURNE, Australia — Henry Wagons last week released his first between-band-albums solo recording, Expecting Company?, on Thirty Tigers in the U.S. and Six Shooter in Canada. The release follows the artist’s critically acclaimed U.S. debut effort, Rumble Shake & Tumble, with his band, Wagons.

With favorable reviews starting to gather, Henry will head to the U.S. for a short tour in February and March including several appearances during SXSW week.

Six of the seven tracks are duets featuring six stellar guests: Alison Mosshart (The Kills, The Dead Weather), Sophia Brous, Canada’s Jenn Grant, Robert Forster (The Go-Betweens), Patience Hodgson (The Grates) and Australia’s Gossling.
“Most of these songs were written in a slightly altered state,” Henry reveals. Finally home after a long stint on the road, he found himself sick and injured — “delirious with a bad fever and maimed due to a light bulb exploding in my hand.” Resisting the urge to recover in bed, Henry harnessed “the twisted voices” in his head and wrote some songs instead. “They came from a different place, so they required some different voices,” he explains.
“Having multiple voices in a song holds a certain power. They can represent a unique synergy and oneness, or have a certain schizophrenia or oppositional battle.”

The U.S. press is impressed: American Songwriter called Wagons “a cool, downbeat and shadowy version of the duskier side of Americana,” while the Country Fried Rock Internet radio program waxed descriptive: “Henry Wagons must have watched a few too many Las Vegas television specials growing up. How else would the Australian songwriter have developed a fascination with the showmanship of Tom Jones and Elvis? Add to the mix (literally) Wagons’ obsession with vintage reverb sounds like the songs of Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra, and you end up with a record full of noir duets that is both retro and ethereal — without becoming too trippy.”

“There must be something about the Land Down Under that breeds a dark delivery,” opined Blurt. “Look at Nick Cave or Midnight Oil’s Peter Garrett as ideal examples. Arched and “intimidating, they possess foreboding tenors well suited to that ominous stance. Now add Henry Wagons to this list.”

“Expecting Company is a triumph of teamwork and music making (it) of one of the most exciting and elegant albums of the year,” wrote country ‘zine Roughstock in its five-star review.

“I'm very proud of this duets record and can't wait to some smash some hefty American floorboards stomping these tunes out,” says Henry Wagons. “We have some very grand, fun, and mildly twisted plans for the show which I'm sure people won't want to miss.”

THE NORTH AMERICAN TOUR:

Wed., Feb. 20 NASHVILLE, TN Music City Roots

Thurs., Feb. 21 KNOXVILLE, TN Square Room

Fri., Feb. 22 KNOXVILLE, TN WDVX Blue Plate Special

Mon., Feb. 25 CHICAGO, IL Empty Bottle

Thurs., Feb. 28 TORONTO, ON The Dakota Tavern

Fri., March 1 HARTFORD, CT Black Eyed Susan’s

Sat., March 2 NEW YORK, NY Joe’s Pub

Thurs., March 7 NASHVILLE, TN The High Watt

Fri., March 8 ATLANTA, GA The Masquerade

Sat., March 9 SAVANNAH, GA Savannah Stopover

Sun, March 10 JACKSONVILLE, FL Natural Life Music Festival

Wed., March 13 AUSTIN, TX Guitartown/Conqueroo Kickoff at the Dogwood (3:30 p.m.)

Thurs., March 14 AUSTIN, TX Lucy’s South by South Austin Fried Chicken Revival (1 p.m.)

Thurs., March 14 AUSTIN, TX Thirty Tigers party at St. David's Episcopal Church

March 13-15 TBA – AUSTIN, TX Blurt Magazine party (TBS)

# # #

Jimbo Mathus & The Tri-State Coalition's "White Buffalo" (Fat Possum Records) is brilliant! Available now

2013-01-27T14:48:00.000-08:00

By ' Rebel' Rod Ames

If there was ever a more under rated artist in this vast musical universe, I do not know who it would be other than Mississippi’s own Jimbo Mathus. I suppose, after reading what I just wrote there are certainly many other extremely underrated musicians out there, but this article is about Jimbo Mathus. More specifically, this article is a review of Jimbo Mathus & The Tri-State Coalition’s “White Buffalo”.

I was turned on to Jimbo via the Squirrel Nut Zippers but I had absolutely no idea that Jimbo Mathus was such an enormous part of what made that band. The revelation came to me while I was doing my radio show on KOOK 93.5 FM/KERV 1230 AM in beautiful Junction/Kerrville, Texas.

At times I review music on an internet outfit called Reviewshine.com. A very talented gentlemen who goes by the somewhat satirical name of Reverend Robert Earl Reed, submitted an amazin album called “Carlene”. It was a brilliant record cut from the same fabric as the darkest music Johnny Cash ever released. After playing cuts from this record on my show, I got to know the good Reverend. He raised the curtain for me to some extent on this extremely versatile Jimbo Mathus.

As I said earlier, I had heard The Squirrel Nut Zippers, and I dug their interesting take on ragtime music, but they had not captured my undivided attention. Mr. Reed began sending me YouTube videos, and before long I felt like an ever loving imbecilic music idiot.

Then I started listening to Mr. Mathus’ other albums. Wonderful records like “The Confederate Buddha” and “Jimmy the Kid”. I have been a Jimbo Mathus junkie ever since. However, It’s the good kind of junk, the kind that soothes the soul and you can’t die from it!

“White Buffalo” is an unbelievably good album! The songs are all catchy as hell. It is absolutely Southern Rock ‘N Roll at its very best. At times he takes the listener from soothing southern rock ballads such as “Tennessee Walker Mare”, to hard driving, guitar driven, purist rock ‘n roll like the title track “White Buffalo”. Right after that he knocks it down a notch or two with a beautifully written and performed traditional country tune, “Hatchie Bottom”.

Everything melds perfectly into an album where the whole enchilada works. Every tune, the playing, the lyrics – every single song on the album is a homerun. Every single song! That is something that rarely happens anymore, but Jimbo Mathus and The Tri-State Coalition make it seem easy. It’s obvious the band had an enormously good time making this record.

Within Mr. Mathus’ bio, there is a quote from the late Memphis producer Jim Dickenson. It states - “If you don’t like this, there is seriously something wrong with you”.

If there is seriously something wrong with you, then Jimbo Mathus and The Tri-State Coalition’s “White Buffalo” is certainly the cure.

Yes, it’s very early in 2013, but so far, this is the best of 2013.

SKYDOG: THE DUANE ALLMAN RETROSPECTIVE CHRONICLES GROUNDBREAKING GUITARIST’S CAREER, FROM GARAGE BANDS AND R&B SESSION WORK TO THE ALLMAN BROTHERS AND DEREK & THE DOMINOS

2013-01-25T21:00:00.000-08:00

Seven CD set, due out March 5 on Rounder Records,
includes rare recordings by Allman’s early bands:
the Escorts, Allman Joys, the 31st of February, and the Bleus.
Extensive liner notes are accompanied by a tribute from Allman’s daughter.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Even if he’d never formed the Allman Brothers Band, Duane Allman would be a major figure in American popular music. Long before his name became known to mainstream audiences, he had already established his credentials as a once-in-a-lifetime guitar visionary, leaving his unmistakable stamp on a broad array of recordings. On March 5, 2013, Rounder Records, a division of Concord Music Group, will release the most ambitious retrospective of Allman’s short but influential career titled Skydog: The Duane Allman Retrospective.

The deluxe seven-disc collection, carrying a list price of $139.98, contains the guitarist’s best-known and most commercially successful recordings with the Allman Brothers Band and Derek & the Dominos, as well as session work with Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Boz Scaggs, Clarence Carter, King Curtis, Delaney & Bonnie & Friends, Ronnie Hawkins, Otis Rush, Laura Nyro, Lulu, the Sweet Inspirations, Laura Lee, Spencer Wiggins, Arthur Conley, Willie Walker, the Lovelles, the Soul Survivors, Johnny Jenkins, John Hammond, Doris Duke, Eric Quincy Tate, Herbie Mann and more.

The set was produced by Galadrielle Allman (Duane’s daughter) and two-time Grammy® winning producer Bill Levenson. Rounder Records’ Scott Billington served as executive producer. Scott Schinder contributed comprehensive historical liner notes, complemented by additional notes by Galadrielle Allman.

In her recollection of her father, who died when she was a young child, Galadrielle writes, “I am very lucky that my father is Duane Allman, an artist who left behind a wealth of incredible music . . . Working on this retrospective, I have gotten closer than I ever have been to understanding my father’s development as a musician and a man.”

Duane Allman, known to his bandmates as Skydog, was born in Nashville in 1946. With Gregg, his only sibling, Duane had his first moment of musical revelation upon witnessing a late ’50s R&B bill that featured B.B. King and Jackie Wilson. By 1960, both Duane and Gregg owned guitars and played in a series of neighborhood garage bands in Tennessee and Florida. Continuing their interest in blues and R&B in the shadow of blues radio station WLAC-AM’s continent-spanning signal, as well as absorbing the influence of the British Invasion, the brothers launched the Escorts in 1965 and the Allman Joys, who recorded a handful of sides in Bradley’s Barn in Nashville in 1966. By 1967, Duane and Gregg signed to Liberty as the Hour Glass and recorded two albums in Nashville and Los Angeles. When the band sought to defy the label and spread its musical wings, they were dropped. The brothers returned to Florida, hooked up with drummer Butch Trucks, and recorded two sides as the 31st of February, and later at Ardent Studio in Memphis as the Bleus.

By this time Duane had developed a reputation as a leading session guitarist. He was on Fame Studio’s A list, his guitar licks coloring hits by Wilson Pickett. Atlantic Records producer and executive Jerry Wexler took note and hired him to perform on Atlantic sessions by King Curtis, Otis Rush, Arthur Conley, the Soul Survivors and Sweet Inspirations. Wexler signed him to a solo Atlantic deal, resulting in a session that contained the raucous original “Happily Married Man” and more. The session, contained on the Skydog set, was abandoned mid-stream. But by then Capricorn Records’ Phil Walden had noticed the rumblings from Muscle Shoals. Duane gathered up brother Gregg, Dickey Betts, Berry Oakley, Butch Trucks, Jai Johanny Johanson and others and the Allman Brothers Band was born.

According to reissue annotator Schinder, “The [Allman Brothers Band’s] music was complex and adventurous, yet unfailingly accessible. The subtle and harmonic interplay between Duane and Dickey’s dual lead guitars was matched by the three-man rhythm section’s surging, swinging cross-rhythms, with Gregg’s massively expressive singing and organ playing keeping the music firmly grounded in human emotion.” The band’s profile grew with each release — the self-titled debut, Idlewild South and eventually the band’s breakthrough, At Fillmore East.

Testament to his energy and ambition, Duane still found time for side projects. When bandmates would hole up at home after tours, Duane joined fellow world-class guitarist Eric Clapton on Derek & the Dominos’ Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs. While not an official member, he quickly emerged as a major contributor to the classic album, his twin guitar interplay with Clapton shaping the hits “Layla” and “Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad.” He also worked with Delaney & Bonnie & Friends and Laura Nyro between Allman Brothers Band projects.

By then acknowledged as one of rock’s premier guitarists, Duane and the Allman Brothers Band began recording their follow-up to At Fillmore East — Eat a Peach. Tom Dowd, another legendary Atlantic house producer, oversaw sessions at Criteria Studios. Then on October 29, 1971, four days after Fillmore had been certified gold, Duane was riding his motorcycle and swerved to avoid hitting a truck. He crashed and died of internal injuries. He was 24 years old.
The band forged ahead as a quintet on Eat a Peach, which became one of their best selling albums. The Allman Brothers, led by Gregg Allman and Butch Trucks, continue to perform to this day.

Schinder notes, “More than four decades after his death, Duane Allman remains a towering figure whose stature has only increased in his absence. His influence lives on, not only in the multiple generations of guitarists who have been motivated by his input, but also in the legions of listeners who have continued to find inspiration in his vibrant vision of American music, which remains as fresh and truthful today as when it was created.”

“When a musician of my father’s caliber dies, every note he ever recorded becomes even more precious,” writes Galadrielle. “Each song is pressed into the service of telling his story. The longer Duane is gone, the clearer it becomes that there will never be another like him.”

Over seven discs, Skydog tells the Duane Allman story with rare and never-before-heard gems alongside smash hits.

“I hope the celebration of Duane’s life inspires you to live fearlessly and enjoy life,” Galadrielle concludes. “I know that would have made him proud.”

Disc One
1            THE ESCORTS Turn On Your Love Light 2:33
  2            THE ESCORTS No Name Instrumental 3:13
  3            THE ESCORTS What’d I Say 4:04
  4            THE ALLMAN JOYS Spoonful 2:27
  5            THE ALLMAN JOYS Gotta Get Away 2:38
  6            THE ALLMAN JOYS Shapes Of Things 2:47
  7            THE ALLMAN JOYS Crossroads 3:32
  8            THE ALLMAN JOYS Mister, You’re A Better Man Than I 4:45
  9            THE ALLMAN JOYS Lost Woman 5:23
10            HOUR GLASS Cast Off All My Fears 3:31
11            HOUR GLASS I’ve Been Trying 2:39
12            HOUR GLASS Nothing But Tears 2:29
13            HOUR GLASS Power Of Love 2:51
14            HOUR GLASS Down In Texas 3:08
15            HOUR GLASS Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) 3:01
16    HOUR GLASS B.B. King Medley 7:07
17            HOUR GLASS Been Gone Too Long 3:03
18            HOUR GLASS Ain’t No Good To Cry 3:08
19            31ST OF FEBRUARY Morning Dew 3:46
20            31ST OF FEBRUARY Melissa 3:12
21            THE BLEUS Milk And Honey 2:34
22            THE BLEUS Leavin’ Lisa 2:43
23            THE BLEUS Julianna’s Gone 2:59

Disc Two
1            CLARENCE CARTER The Road Of Love 2:54
  2            CLARENCE CARTER Light My Fire 2:49
  3            WILSON PICKETT Hey Jude 4:06
  4            WILSON PICKETT Toe Hold 2:49
  5            WILSON PICKETT My Own Style Of Loving 2:41
  6            WILSON PICKETT Born to Be Wild 2:45
  7            LAURA LEE It’s How You Make It Good 2:32
  8            LAURA LEE It Ain’t What You Do (But How You Do It) 2:05
  9            SPENCER WIGGINS I Never Loved A Woman (The Way I Love You) 3:01
10            ARTHUR CONLEY Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da 3:00
11            ARTHUR CONLEY Stuff You Gotta Watch 2:15
12            ARTHUR CONLEY Speak Her Name 2:39
13            ARTHUR CONLEY That Can't Be My Baby 2:22
14            WILLIE WALKER A Lucky Loser 2:20
15            THE LOVELLES I'm Coming Today 2:59
16            THE LOVELLES Pretending Dear 2:38
17            ARETHA FRANKLIN The Weight 2:53
18            ARETHA FRANKLIN It Ain't Fair 3:22
19            SOUL SURVIVORS Darkness 2:56
20            SOUL SURVIVORS Tell Daddy 2:30
21            SOUL SURVIVORS Got Down On Saturday 3:10
22            KING CURTIS Hey Joe 2:56
23            KING CURTIS Foot Pattin' 4:49
24            KING CURTIS Games People Play 2:46
25            KING CURTIS The Weight 2:47
26            THE SWEET INSPIRATIONS Get A Little Order 2:06

Disc Three
1            THE BARRY GOLDBERG BLUES BAND Twice A Man 4:26
  2            DUANE ALLMAN Goin' Down Slow 8:44
  3            DUANE ALLMAN No Money Down 3:25
  4            DUANE ALLMAN Happily Married Man 2:40
  5            OTIS RUSH Me 2:55
  6            OTIS RUSH Reap What You Sow 4:53
  7            OTIS RUSH It Takes Time 3:25
  8            THE DUCK & THE BEAR Going Up The Country 2:34
  9            THE DUCK & THE BEAR Hand Jive 2:41
10            BOZ SCAGGS Finding Her 4:10
11            BOZ SCAGGS Look What I Got 4:13
12            BOZ SCAGGS Waiting For A Train 2:41
13            BOZ SCAGGS Loan Me A Dime 13:01
14            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Don't Want You No More 2:26
15            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND It's Not My Cross To Bear 5:01
16            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Black Hearted Woman 5:07
17            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Trouble No More 3:45

Disc Four
1            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Every Hungry Woman 4:13
  2            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Dreams 7:16
  3            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Whipping Post 5:16
  4            RONNIE HAWKINS One More Night 2:22
  5            RONNIE HAWKINS Will The Circle Be Unbroken 2:50
  6            RONNIE HAWKINS Matchbox 3:05
  7            RONNIE HAWKINS Down In The Alley 5:08
  8            RONNIE HAWKINS Who Do You Love 2:13
  9            LULU Marley Purt Drive 3:21
10            LULU Dirty Old Man 2:20
11            LULU Mr. Bojangles 3:08
12            LULU Sweep Around Your Own Back Door 2:40
13            JOHNNY JENKINS I Walk On Gilded Splinters 5:16
14            JOHNNY JENKINS Rollin’ Stone 4:56
15            JOHNNY JENKINS Down Along The Cove 3:02
16            JOHNNY JENKINS Voodoo In You 4:50
17            JOHN HAMMOND Shake For Me 2:42
18            JOHN HAMMOND Cryin’ For My Baby 2:39
19            JOHN HAMMOND I’m Leavin’ You 3:20
20            JOHN HAMMOND You’ll Be Mine 2:42
21            DORIS DUKE Ghost Of Myself 3:06

Disc Five
1    ERIC QUINCY TATE Comin’ Down (demo version) 2:52
  2            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Hoochie Coochie Man (live) 5:00
  3            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Midnight Rider 2:58
  4            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Dimples (live) 4:59
  5            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND I'm Gonna Move To The Outskirts Of Town (live) 9:21
  6            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Soul Shake 3:06
  7            LAURA NYRO Beads Of Sweat 4:47
  8            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Don’t Keep Me Wonderin’ 3:28
  9            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Living On The Open Road 3:03

10            ELLA BROWN A Woman Left Lonely 3:23
11            ELLA BROWN Touch Me 2:59
12            BOBBY LANCE More Than Enough Rain 5:51
13            DEREK & THE DOMINOS I Am Yours 3:34
14            DEREK & THE DOMINOS Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad? 4:41
15            DEREK & THE DOMINOS Have You Ever Loved A Woman 6:52
16            DEREK & THE DOMINOS Layla 7:03
17            ERIC CLAPTON & DUANE ALLMAN Mean Old World 3:48

Disc Six
1            SAM SAMUDIO Me And Bobby McGee 3:31
  2            SAM SAMUDIO Relativity 3:14
  3            SAM SAMUDIO Goin' Upstairs 5:06
  4            RONNIE HAWKINS Don't Tell Me Your Troubles 2:13
  5            RONNIE HAWKINS Sick And Tired 2:45
  6            RONNIE HAWKINS Odessa 3:19
  7            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Gift Of Love 2:09
  8            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Sing My Way Home 4:02
  9            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Statesboro Blues (live) 4:17
10            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed (live) 13:04
11            GRATEFUL DEAD Sugar Magnolia (live) 7:20
12            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND One Way Out (live) 4:57
13            HERBIE MANN Push Push 10:03
14            HERBIE MANN Spirit In The Dark 7:59
15            HERBIE MANN What’d I Say 4:57

Disc Seven
1            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Come On In My Kitchen (live) 3:42
  2            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Going Down The Road Feeling Bad (live) 4:03
  3            DELANEY & BONNIE & FRIENDS Poor Elijah / Tribute To Johnson (Medley) (live) 4:54
  4            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND You Don't Love Me / Soul Serenade (live) 19:25
  5            COWBOY Please Be With Me 3:41
  6            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Stand Back 3:24
  7            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Blue Sky 5:09
  8            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Blue Sky (live) 11:24
  9            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Dreams (live) 17:56
10            THE ALLMAN BROTHERS BAND Little Martha 2:07

# # #

Kris Brownlee "Sincerely Yours" to be released on CD and Digital Formats on February 19

2013-01-25T04:35:00.000-08:00

Saxophonist Kris Brownlee collaborates with legendary guitarist Freddie Fox and Grammy Award-winning producer Michael Broening on Brownlee's third album, entitled Sincerely Yours, via MEGAWAVE. He often plays multiple instruments on each album track, and the accent-filled groove "Halo" has already gotten early radio airplay.

With a degree in music performance and psychology from Manchester College in North Manchester, Indiana, Brownlee has played with the likes of blues artist Willie Kent, former Duke Ellington saxophonist Stephen Foster, and internationally known trombonist Jiggs Whigham. "Over the past 25 years of playing, I've been influenced by many, but none more than by saxophonist Boney James," Brownlee said.

Website:
www.krisbrownlee.com

Facebook:
www.facebook.com/KrisBrownleeSax

YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/user/KrisBrownleeSax

Pre-Order Link:
http://www.seeofsound.com/p.php?s=MEGW0412

Cover Art:
http://mvdb2b.com/i/300dpi/MEGW0412.jpg

Lansing, Michigan-based MEGAWAVE ("small label-big sound"), celebrating its 40th year, specializes in jazz, world, reggae, gospel, and piano blues music. It is distributed in North America by MVD Entertainment Group, in Europe by Membran Media GmbH, in Japan by BounDEE, and digitally worldwide by Independent Online Distribution Alliance (IODA).

Website: www.MEGAWAVEmusic.com

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GENE CLARK’S HERE TONIGHT: THE WHITE LIGHT DEMOS COMING FROM OMNIVORE RECORDINGS ON MARCH 26

2013-01-22T16:12:00.000-08:00

In 1970 former Byrds singer and songwriter moved to Northern California to escape Los Angeles. There he found inspiration for the songs that became his first solo album of the ’70s, White Light.

LOS ANGELES, Calif. — By 1970, weary and wary of the fame game in Los Angeles with the trappings of “the star-maker machinery” surrounding him at every turn, ex-Byrds songwriter and singer Gene Clark was looking for a refuge. On March 26, 2013, Omnivore Recordings will release Clark’s Here Tonight: The White Light Demos, a glimpse into the songwriting craft of Clark at the inception of the compositions that would become his first ’70s solo album, White Light, for A&M Records, released in August of 1971.

Of the tracks on this 12-song album, six (“White Light,” “For a Spanish Guitar,” “Where My Love Lies Asleep,” “The Virgin” “Because of You” and “With Tomorrow”) appeared in final form on White Light. Two (“Opening Day” and “Winter”) appeared in final form as bonus tracks on the 2002 A&M/Universal reissue of the album. One track (”Here Tonight”) is an alternate version of a song that appeared on the Flying Burrito Brothers compilation Honky Tonk Heroes.[J1] <#_msocom_1> And three songs (“For No One,” “Please Mr. Freud” and “Jimmy Christ”) have never been issued previously in any form. Liner notes are by John Einarson, author of Mr. Tambourine Man: The Life and Legacy of Gene Clark (Backbeat Books, 2005). The collection is being reissued with the full cooperation of the estate of Gene Clark.

Precipitating Clark’s move to a secluded life in Northern California, events of the prior four years had elevated the reclusive Kansas-raised boy to the top of the rock ’n’ roll pantheon. The Byrds had topped the charts with their 1965 debut single, “Mr. Tambourine Man” and followed it with a string of folk- and country-influenced songs, many of them from Clark’s own pen. With a little help from Bob Dylan, the Byrds gave rock a literary sensibility. In his own songwriting, Clark had come to embrace the Dylan style of oblique lyric poetry and accrued considerable attention for his songs, to the chagrin of his band mates. Fissures in the band hierarchy ensued.

With his sudden departure from the Byrds in 1966, Clark withdrew from the public eye. His attempt at a solo career later that year was hampered by a reluctance to tour or fly (earning him the title of “the Byrd who wouldn’t fly”). Teaming up with banjo demon Doug Dillard in 1968, the Fantastic Expedition of Dillard & Clark recorded two trail-blazing country-rock bluegrass band [J2] <#_msocom_2> around Gene’s well-crafted songs. By early 1970, he left the band, left L.A. for the open spaces of Little River, Calif., near Mendocino, accompanied by his girlfriend Carlie McCummings. The two were equally captivated by the tiny seaside community and were married in June of that year.

Away from the pressure of the music business and inspired by the pastoral beauty of the area, Clark began to write songs that took on a reflective, introspective direction. His songs became more folky and stripped down as Clark swore he’d never again play electric guitar. “There was no deadline,” says McCumming. “He wasn’t under any pressure. And as a result, the songs just flowed out of him. The lyrics were so pure. They don’t come out of any manufactured experience.” Clark also began exploring the nature of spirituality and the human condition in his lyrics, inspired by friend Philip O’Leno. At the end of the Dillard & Clark partnership, Gene owed A&M Records two additional albums. Company co-founder Jerry Moss himself paid Gene a visit in Little River and managed to entice him and Carlie back to L.A. to record. Jesse Ed Davis, with whom Gene had struck up a friendship during the Dillard & Clark sessions, was enlisted to produce.

Clark first recorded the songs meant for the White Light album in demo form on acoustic guitar. It’s these demos, lost for decades and recently discovered, that comprise Here Tonight: The White Light Demos with the songs presented as Clark had originally conceived them in his Mendocino Coast cabin. “His voice was absolutely perfect at that point,” notes Carlie. Included are songs that would later appear on the A&M debut, as well as several that failed to make the cut. Jesse Ed Davis maintained much of the simplicity and honesty of the demos in producing the finished album. Rolling Stone drew comparisons to Clark’s mentor Bob Dylan. It was voted “album of the year” in the Netherlands, whereupon Clark boarded a rare airplane to tour internationally.

Sadly sales were slim. Clark returned to Northern California to write the next album at his own pace. Eventually he returned to L.A. to sustain his career. The rigors of the road eventually tore his marriage apart, leading to a tailspin of alcohol, drugs and death in 1991. He was 46.

As biographer and reissue annotator John Einarson writes, “In the intervening decades, the songs Gene Clark wrote and demoed for White Light, offered here, stand as a deeply personal statement to an enduring talent at peace with himself, his surroundings and his life choices.”

About Omnivore Recordings:
Founded in 2010 by longtime, highly respected industry veterans Cheryl Pawelski, Greg Allen, Dutch Cramblitt, and Brad Rosenberger, Omnivore Recordings preserves the legacies and music created by historical, heritage, and catalog artists while also releasing previously unissued, newly found “lost” recordings and making them available for music-loving audiences to discover. Omnivore Recordings is distributed by EMI.

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JIMBO MATHUS & THE TRI-STATE COALITION

2013-01-22T12:16:00.000-08:00

"White Buffalo" out today on Fat Possum Records
Stream the album in its entirely HERE

January 22, 2012: Jimbo Mathus & the Tri-State Coalition release White Buffalo today on

Fat Possum Records. The twice Grammy-nominated musician and guitarist, co-founder of the South Memphis String Band and defunct dancehall outfit Squirrel Nut Zippers, delivers a high-octane collection of guitar-driven songs that draws on the musical styles of the American South. Mathus' autobiographical writing is peopled with characters from his life; his narratives are steeped in the lore and mythology of his native Mississippi and filtered through generations of American musical styles he has known, played and loved since joining in on family band sessions at the age of six. Recently signed to High Road Touring, Mathus kicks off 2013 with southern dates with Lucero (scroll down for complete dates). Complete US tour dates to be announced soon.

White Buffalo can be streamed in its entirety at AOL Spinner HERE.

White Buffalo was recorded at Delta Recording Services Studio with producer Eric "Roscoe" Ambel (Steve Earle, Del Lords), who also contributes guitar. There are references to the early Allman Brothers' dual-lead guitar work, '70s Rolling Stones at their country bluesiest and a nod to the Memphis Stax/Volt sound. These sessions capture the the sound of lifetime musicians hitting a groove and getting it down on tape; the performances are intuitive and effortless and you can feel the chemistry.

Mathus and his band conjure some serious musical mojo on White Buffalo, from the Springsteen-esque, mandolin-driven biblical tale "In the Garden," to the Southern gospel flavor of "Poor Lost Souls," to the eerie electric blues of "Run Devil Run" (named for a Lucky Mojo "vigil candle"). He pays tribute to his mother with "Tennessee Walking Mare," who "never shied" when the family went through hard times, and loose-talking, no-count women on "Fake Hex." His soulful, lived-in voice is rough but expressive, inspired by his own family skeletons and misadventures as well as those of the "marginal" folks he'd meet on his early jobs, which included stints as a river barge deckhand and Waffle House fry cook.

The raw, heart-wrenching closing track, "Useless Heart," finds him wrestling with his demons and repeating the same mistakes in love. It's an honest, frills-free song, with Mathus putting himself out there on the line and sharing his pain and self-doubt. It's a quality Mathus' fans have come to expect from the man, both on his records and live performances. A true journeyman, Mathus just keeps getting better.

View the video for "In the Garden" HERE
Soundcloud link for "In the Garden HERE"

JIMBO MATHUS & THE TRI-STATE COALITION

* dates with Lucero

FR 1/25 MEMPHIS, TN - BRASS DOOR

SA 1/26 OXFORD MS, PROUD LARRY'S

FR 2/01 BIRMINGHAM AL - WORKPLAY THEATER +

TH 2/07 SPRINGFIELD MO - OUTLAND BALLROOM +

FR 2/08 FAYETTEVILLE AR - GEORGE'S MAJESTIC LOUNGE +

SA 2/09 LITTLE ROCK AR - WHITEWATER TAVERN

FR 2/15 JACKSON MS - 119 UNDERGROUND

SA 2/16 JONESBORO AR - SKINNY J'S

* Additional US tour dates to be announced soon

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LONELY & BLUE: THE DEEPEST SOUL OF OTIS REDDING, DUE OUT MARCH 5 ON STAX RECORDS, COLLECTS SOUL LEGEND’S POIGNANT BALLADS

2013-01-16T16:26:00.000-08:00

Available on CD and blue vinyl, packaging evokes the look and feel
of a late ’60s Stax/Volt album
that Redding might have released at the height of his career

LOS ANGELES, Calif. — Otis Redding’s Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul of Otis Redding could pass for a title Stax/Volt might have released in the late ’60s. The look of the album reflects Stax’s design themes of the era. But in fact it’s a collection that never existed, until now, that homes in on one mood and one theme —heartbreaking, yearning ballads — of which Redding had many. The album will be released as a CD and blue vinyl LP on March 5, 2013 on Stax Records through Concord Music Group.

Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul of Otis Redding contains the hits (“I’ve Been Loving You Too Long,” “These Arms of Mine,” “My Lover’s Prayer,” “Free Me”) alongside many lesser-known songs (“Gone Again,” “Open the Door,” “Waste of Time,” “Everybody Makes a Mistake,” to name a few). They’re all included in this compilation because they share the tangled theme of sorrow.

According to compilation producer David Gorman, “Given how nobody delivered a gut-wrenching sad song like Otis, I always felt he should have made an album you could put on late at night and settle into with a glass of something strong. The mood and the subject of every song is the same — Otis, heartbroken, and begging for love. I tried to find the saddest most potently heartbreaking songs he ever sang, with no regard for chart position or notoriety. There are a few hits on the album, but they’re there because they fit the mood, not because we wanted to include the hits.”

For instance, an alternate version of “I’ve Got Dreams To Remember” features lyrics that are darker and tell a more personal story than the better-known hit version. Little-known tracks like “Gone Again” and “A Waste of Time” are given the same weight as “I’ve Been Loving You too Long.” The motif of love is even subtly addressed in the sequencing, the album closing with “Send Me Some Lovin’” and “My Lover’s Prayer.”

The concept of Lonely & Blue: The Deepest Soul of Otis Redding plays out in the packaging as well, which was intentionally designed by Gorman to look as if Redding actually did put this album out at the height of his career. The typography, color palette, and layout are all meant to adhere to the Stax/Volt LP designs of the time. This extends to the liner notes, which are written in the present tense and credited to a fictitious DJ so that they read as if they were written while Redding was alive at his peak.

“The goal,” explains Gorman, “was to create the best album Otis never made and ‘reissue’ it in 2013 rather than do another hits compilation. We hope this album will reframe him as something more than an oldies radio staple and become his Night Beat (a classic 1963 Sam Cooke LP) — the album that exists as a starting point for people wondering why so many consider Otis Redding the greatest soul singer of all time.”

Track Listing:

1. I Love You More Than Words Can Say
2. Gone Again
3. Free Me
4. Open the Door [Skeleton Key Version]
5. A Waste of Time
6. These Arms of Mine
7. I’ve Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now)
8. Everybody Makes a Mistake
9. Little Ol’ Me
10. I’ve Got Dreams to Remember [Rougher Dreams]
11. Send Me Some Lovin’
12. My Lover’s Prayer

http://www.otisredding.com

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The Riverbreaks To Celebrate Release Wildfire w/ Performance at the Kennedy Center, DC’s Black Cat, NYC’s The Living Room, Chapel Hill’s Local 506

2013-01-16T06:03:00.000-08:00

From Central America to the American South, The Riverbreaks of Washington, DC is an Americana band in more ways than one. The band’s singer Ryan Bailey was raised in Nashville and came of musical age in Chapel Hill, NC, but wrote much of Wildfire in the Costa Rican jungle. He emerged with the songs for Wildfire, an album that sonically combines the best of Americana and indie rock with folk and country influences, but lyrically covers a lot of ground, from celebrating the beauty of nature to heartbreak to deploring the poor treatment of indigenous groups and the drug wars. The Riverbreaks will release Wildfire on February 1, 2013 and celebrate it with a performance that evening at the renowned Kennedy Center in their home base of Washington, DC. They’ll also rock the Living Room in New York on January 2nd, Black Cat in DC on February 16th and Local 506 in Chapel Hill February 17th. The album is already getting action at college radio stations in Philadephia and Chicago as well as spins on AAA powerhouses like KVMR.

Listen to songs from Wildfire: http://theriverbreaks.bandcamp.com/album/wildfire-preview-full-length-release-fall-2012

Informal video for “American Sun” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQX2TtnSabo

The album was produced by Chris Stamey, who is a critically acclaimed member of the dB’s and producer of bands including Whiskeytown, Lost in the Trees, Megafaun, The Rosebuds, Le Tigre, and Alejandro Escovedo. Working with Stamey seemed natural to The Riverbreaks, as members Ryan, Jesse, Neela, and Andrew attended UNC Chapel Hill, where Stamey’s studio is located. As they delved into the music scene there, all roads led back to Chris as a musician, songwriter and producer. Special guests on the album include Caitlin Cary (Whiskeytown, Tres Chicas), Mitch Easter (Lets Active, REM producer) and Logan Matheny (Roman Candle – a major influence on The Riverbreaks) among others.

Wildfire is the second album for The Riverbreaks. The band released its debut album Get You Right in spring 2011, and shortly thereafter began working on Wildfire, which it recorded in the spring and summer of 2012. It is a rich album, full of songs with a strong narrative. “Some of the lyrics took shape when I started thinking about the parallels in the southern US and South America – in both places indigenous groups have been marginalized and there are similar agricultural, natural and spiritual elements,” Ryan commented. “For example, one night after going to a ‘Corn Festival’ in Costa Rica, where they make beautiful dresses using mosaics of multi-colored corn, I dreamed the melody to ‘Corn Blue Night,’ and immediately knew the song took place in Appalachia.”

“Wild Fruit” (the subject of their upcoming video)—is a violin-driven song referencing the Ayoreo people and the destruction of their land. There are also songs with roots deep in the American south. “American Sun” is a highlight: a rollicking organ riff dances through this tune about youth, love and loss featuring a soaring Caitlin Cary harmony. “Paper Moon,” a late addition, was recorded in one take; it combines a crooning vocal and haunting reverb-drenched guitar. “Tell the Girls” is a straight up dance number, building from solo acoustic guitar to a stomping chorus with an indelible hook.

The Riverbreaks prove that while there is no place like home, sometimes an exotic locale lends depth and dimension to songs with deeply personal references. Their combination of gorgeous Americana and indie rock makes Wildfire unforgettable.

The Riverbreaks Live:

Kennedy Center

Friday, February 1st

6 PM, Free

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts

Millennium Stage

2700 F Street, NW Washington, DC 20566

Information: 800/444-1324

The Living Room

Saturday, February 2nd

7PM, Suggested Donation

154 Ludlow Street – 212/533-7237

www.livingroomnyc.com

The Black Cat

Saturday, February 16th w/ the North Country

9pm Tickets TBA

1811 14th Street NW – 202/667-4490

www.blackcatdc.com

Local 506

Sunday, February 17th

Showtime TBA Tickets TBA

506 West Franklin – 919/942-5506

www.local506.com

La Tuna's in San Antonio presented the very talented Austin singer/songwriter Eric Hisaw for a special solo acoustic show this past Saturday Evening

2013-01-15T06:12:00.000-08:00

By ‘Rebel’ Rod Ames

Last Saturday afternoon I was sitting in my small cabin up on the hill contemplating my plans for the evening.

In reality, what that involves is which movie I am going to watch and what is for dinner – go out or eat in.

That is where I heard the notification from my computer, signifying someone had messaged me. I walked over to the computer to see that Austin singer/songwriter Eric Hisaw had FB messaged me, letting me know he was doing a solo acoustic gig at La Tuna’s Ice House on Probandt Street in San Antonio, and was urging me to come on out and see the show.

The first time I had ever seen Eric was at the old Java Pump on Waters Street in Kerrville. I have since seen and/or heard him with a band. In fact, Eric is a very sought after guitarist who plays with or has played with many accomplished artists in and around the Austin/San Antonio area.

It didn’t take me long to decide I was not going to be watching a movie and that I wasn’t that hungry anyway. La Tuna’s Ice House here I come!

I arrived at about 7:25 PM, about five minutes before show time. However, The Denver Broncos and the Baltimore Ravens were still playing their marathon of a football game. Therefore, to avoid a riot, Eric agreed to start his show after the game was. Things finally got under way at around 8 ‘o clock.

Eric had brought a cache of new tunes he had put together, each sung and played wonderfully, his soulful voice resonating throughout the dimly lit intimate setting. In the beginning there were only three of us in the room, with a few outside on the deck (it was right before a cold front blew into San Antonio). At about three or four songs deep into his show, the flood gates opened, and what seemed like a flash, the venue was full of adoring fans, many of which were shouting out requests! I somehow knew it would be like that.

Eric loves to play his originals and played several from a couple of my favorite albums of his, “Ghost Stories” and “Nature of the Blues”, but he also loves to play songs from the great songwriters, like Dallas Frazier (Elvira), Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman (Little Sister). and Doug Sahm (Texas Me).

Now this says a lot about Eric’s style of songwriting; I would put his songs right up there with the fore mentioned cats any day of the week.

So here is my recommendation to any aficionado of music. When you hear that Eric Hisaw is playing somewhere, stop what you’re doing, put down those DVD’s, cancel your dinner plans and go see this wonderful singer/songwriter perform his guts out!

Dig it!

Enjoy a mostly acoustic jam from Plowboy and their tune "Deathbed"

2013-01-14T06:37:00.002-08:00

Shot by Tony Gallucci, Max Watson and Draven Moore, a Milk River Film

Hope you all enjoy this fine Monday morning video.

Peace....RR