At a 19-May Black Eyed Snakes gig in Minneapolis, Snakes’ frontman Alan Sparhawk announced the availability of their new CD, “Seven Horses”.  A bootleg of the show where the announcement was made will soon be available here.  The album was available for sale at the gig but no further info about ordering or availability is known to the blog author at this time.

In other words, a perfect summer afternoon. Especially when you add in the blues.

The Square Lake Film & Music Festival is a small, independent festival organized by husband-wife team Paul Creager and Angela Knudson. It takes place on private property a mile from the clear waters of Square Lake. Last year was the 15th annual festival.

In a brief interview, Alan says the festival is one of the band’s favorites. Low and related projects have performed in previous years.

The Snakes wasted no time melting faces; the set list is below. The video was edited by Todd Mavis.

Songs:

1. Wicked Ways – 00:00:00:00
2. Get Right Church – 00:06:06:02
3. Water – 00:09:56:11
4. Hillside Blues – 00:16:27:29
5. Bo Diddley – 00:22:31:10
6. Interview – Part 2 – 00:25:36:01
7. Seven Horses – 00:26:14:14
8. Body Guard – 00:32:44:28
9. Don’t Kick Me Out – 00:36:17:01
10. Pony – 00:40:42:16
11. Interview – Part 1 – 00:45:23:14

Personnel:

Alan Sparhawk – Vocals & Guitar, Bob Olson – Guitar, Brad Nelson, Bryan “Lefty” Johnson

Video credits:

Video and audio editing – Todd Mavis, Cameras and audio recording: Darren Keil and Todd Mavis, Live sound – Tom Burt and Matt Johnson

Former Duluthian and blogger, Laurie attended a “Secret Show” with The Black Eyed Snakes on a return visit to Duluth she took with her family. Current Duluthian and amateur scene-documenter Ryan Dahlberg was also there taking photos. Ryan e-mailed me to point out the link to Laurie’s blog and his photos from the show. Since I wasn’t there I won’t even bother paraphrasing so check out the links and get in the moment.

• Black Eyed Snakes – Flickr photo set
• I <3 Dirty Rocker Boys – This is Babble On blog post

I recorded the fifty-three minute, twenty-four second set and have shared the audio on archive.org. To listen, use the embedded streaming functionality below, or download the set in it’s entirety from the archive.org set page.

Set page at archive.org:
Retribution Gospel Choir Live at Kilby Court on 2010-04-16

Photos from Flickr:
Retribution Gospel Choir Live at Kilby Court with last.fm event tag

Setlist:
01 Breaker (2:21)
02 Workin’ Hard (4:15)
03 White Wolf (4:42)
04 Poor Man’s Daughter (7:25)
05 They Knew You Well (2:55)
06 Take Your Time (3:56)
07 banter (2:16)
08 Hide It Away (3:07)
09 Your Bird (3:13)
10 Something’s Going to Break (2:49)
11 Electric Guitar (9:27)
12 banter (1:33)
13 Then She Turned Into (2:23)
14 ’68 Comeback (3:10)

Streaming Audio (53:56):

From the Onion’s A/V Club. If you’re feeling up for hating on or defending this video, hit up the comments page over there as well. Pretty “vigorous” discussion already underway.

Low is physically exhausting in it’s own way, but with Retribution it can be life-threatening…

…songwriting is humiliating, making records is confusing, and the industry is a joke…

…For sure the long cold season indoors has bearing, but then I think the underdog factor is also a big part of the artistic attitude in Duluth (or any other smaller town that’s sort of isolated.) Also, I think the lake is a strange factor – it disappears on the horizon, but it also freezes…

Read the whole thing »

Alan Sparhawk, Retribution Gospel Choir (photo by Jon Behm)

In the City Pages, Erik Thompson provides an appropriately concise but complete review of Retribution Gospel Choir’s recent show in Minneapolis.

The three-piece were locked in all evening long, hardly giving themselves (or the crowd) time to catch their breath before it was on to the next song, which only served to add to the intensity and frenzy of the songs themselves. The spotlight was clearly on Sparhawk’s guitar work during the entire set, tearing it up on “Your Bird” and an extended, fierce version of — appropriately enough — “Electric Guitar.” Sparhawk joked recently about how he’s done things in reverse and gotten louder as he’s grown older, and this was by far the loudest show I’ve ever seen him play.

Retribution Gospel Choir get intense at the Triple Rock

To kick off the show, Alan Sparhawk stood on the stage and yelled, “We bring you greetings from Lake Superior.” Somewhere in the middle of one of the greatest jams in rock and roll history on “Poor Man’s Daughter,” I almost had a euphoric coronary.

Meanwhile, over at the website Reviler, photographer Jon Behm has posted several images from the concert that pretty well captured the energy.

The house in the video is the same one RGC gave a recent private show, a report of which can be read at: Retribution Gospel Choir – Private East Hillside Performance.