This Friday, November 28 is Black Friday 2014, but more importantly is “Back to Black” Friday, or Black Friday Record Store Day. There are a few releases this time that I’m looking forward to, so I’m going to make the trek to Moondog Music in Dubuque– my regular RSD haunt.
One piece I think is particularly interesting is a Miles Davis Christmas 7″. In transparent blue vinyl, it includes two tracks recorded in August 1962 with the short-lived Miles Davis Sextet. This sextet lineup is Miles Davis (trumpet) Frank Rehak (trombone) Wayne Shorter (tenor saxophone) Paul Chambers (bass) Jimmy Cobb (drums) and Willie Bobo (percussion).
According to the Wikipedia article on Bob Dorough, Columbia asked Davis to contribute a track to their upcoming Jingle Bell Jazz compliation and he called on Bob Dorough to collaborate since Davis was a fan of Dorough’s 1956 album Devil May Care. The resulting sessions yielded the dark and antithematic holiday track in “Blue Xmas (To Whom It May Concern).” During those same 2-day sessions, Dorough also tracked “Nothing Like You” which would eventually end up on Davis’s 1967 album Nefertiti. Davis wrapped those sessions up with a version of “Devil May Care.” This single for RSD is “Blue Xmas” on the A side and Davis’s version of “Devil May Care” on the flip.
The two tracks were previously also included in the 1970 import collection Facets Vol. 1.
Here is “Blue Xmas”
Here is “Devil May Care”
So, a release with a really interesting pedegree and one that is pretty essential for Miles Davis fans.
In addition to those two tracks, the EP will include the Lateness of Dancers outtake “He Wrote The Book” which dedicated HGM fans might recall was a solo acoustic Bad Debt outtake that was collected on the 2012 album Lord I Love The Rain. I’m assuming since this was intended for Lateness, that it is a full-band recording.
In addition to this, a full-band HGM stormed the Ed Sullivan Theater (home of The Late Show with David Letterman) last night and performed “Southern Grammar.”
Here are the tracks from the EP you can check out:
A video for the World Cafe performance of “Southern Grammar”
“Brother, Do You Know the Road?”
The version of “He Wrote the Book” that was on Lord I Love the Rain
It was a scorchingly hot– but not atypically so– early August evening at Codfish Hollow Barn in 2010 when I was turned on to Gold Motel.
The barn has a tendency of stockpiling the day’s heat and the best thing you can do is get outside occasionally and look for shade or maybe a breeze. Fronted by the blond siren Greta Morgan, Gold Motel was the perfect execution of retro 60’s girl-band-meets-Debbie Harry jangly pop and by the time they hit the stage any plans I had to get outside for a respite were quickly dashed. I was quickly minted as a fan and within a few months their debut album Summer House came out on vinyl. In 2012, they followed up with their equally-wonderful self-titled album and then that was it from the band and Morgan.
Starting in 2013 Morgan started releasing songs and videos under the cryptic solo moniker Springtime Carnivore. The songs still have the beautiful soaring melodies that we came to expect from her, but the sonics are more wall-of-sound– big roomy reverb washes over everything and the spit-and-polish from Gold Motel has been replaced with the fuzziness and compression of what sounds like tape distortion. The sunny melodies songs seem to also belie a subtle darkness. Maybe that is what a Springtime Carnivore is– something that dares rip its canines into flesh during a time of seasonal renewal and birth.
This new spin on her sound seems to have been influenced by working with producer Richard Swift (also of The Shins, and currently touring bass player for The Black Keys).
Cover Art for Springtime Carnivore
Springtime Carnivore was picked up by Autumn Tone— the label run by the folks at Aquarium Drunkard and will be releasing the debut LP on November 4th. The first single is “Name on a Matchbook” and along with “Sun Went Black” you have a good sampling o the sound.
“Sun Went Black” reminds me of The Cure (like “Close to Me”).
The leadoff track on the album “Collectors” (if you don’t include the opening short instrumental “Western Pink”) was a 7″ single last year with “Two Scars” on the flipside.
Also included on the album are “Creature Feature” and “Two Scars” which where previously released as videos. They are both directed by Eddie O’Keefe whose soundtrack to his 2011 film “The Ghosts” had a song from Greta Morgan on it.
Springtime Carnivore will be kicking off a North American tour in support of Fr. John Misty and Jenny Lewis Here are the dates:
SPRINGTIME CARNIVORE TOUR DATES:
May 30 Do Division Street Fest Chicago, IL
May 31 Pabst Theater w. FATHER JOHN MISTY, Milwaukee, WI
Jun 01 Rozz Tox, Rock Island, IL
Aug 01 Town Ballroom w/ FATHER JOHN MISTY, Buffalo, NY
Aug 14 Wild Buffalo w/ JENNY LEWIS, Bellingham, WA
Aug 16 Crystal Ballroom w/ JENNY LEWIS, Portland, OR
Aug 19 Club Red w/ JENNY LEWIS, Bend, OR
Aug 20 Belly Up w/ JENNY LEWIS, Aspen, CO
Aug 21 Fox Theatre w/ JENNY LEWIS, Boulder, CO
You can order the CD or vinyl version through Amazon:
Amidst all of the activity surrounding the release of Ryan Adams’s latest self-titled album (big full-band tour, high-profile TV and radio appearances, many interviews) the latest news about a legendary (at least amongst the Adams faithful) unreleased album titled Blackhole has started to resurface, prompted by Ryan talking about it as well as performing a couple of songs from it.
To understand the Blackhole story, one needs to start in the middle of it. In 2010, Adams released the first of his post-Lost Highway Records releases.
A quick synopsis of his career at that point is that he was famously at odds with his label who had a different idea about what the very prolific Adams should be releasing than he did. A feud was waged in public resulting in compromises on both sides of the relationship– quick cash-ins from the label who put out a compilation record of unreleased material squashing the promise of probably three full albums of songs, Adams spitefully releasing Rock N Roll which he regards as “jokey” as a result of Lost Highway not wanting to put out Love Is Hell as one release. He was let out of his contract following 2008’s Cardinology and granted ownership of all of the unreleased recordings he had created during that time.
But, in 2007 there were plans afoot to put out a box set of the unreleased songs while he was still on Lost Highway. Although I can’t find a direct source for the article, everyone quotes a September 2007 article for Q Magazine where he talks about 20:20which among other rare albums he would include Blackhole, saying, “It’s like a real serious effort to make a rock record, really epic and big. None of those absurdist jokey lyrics like on Rock N Roll. You listen to it and think, ‘My God, this guy is gonna die.’ That was the last record I made in the last days of the drugs.”
In 2010 he spun up a full version of his Pax Americana/PaxAm imprint– one that he had used to release a few tour-only 7″es with the intention of releasing some of his vast archives of recordings as well as new. The hardcore fans knew about a lot of the unreleased archives due to rampant bootlegging of sessions (likely a result of the mismanagement by Lost Highway– a few of these made it out the door as promotional CD’s). In Spring of 2010, Adams put out a vinyl/digital release of a “metal concept album” called Orion. Recorded in 2006 during the recordings of Easy Tiger the punky metal album would likely never have seen the light of day under the curation of Lost Highway.
Riding a wave of unexpected productivity, Adams announced shortly after the delivery of the orders of Orion what he had planned next. A 2 LP compilation of Cardinals-backed leftovers songs from the Easy Tiger sessions, titled III/IV (meaning the 3rd and 4th LP’s following Cold Roses which was labeled “I” and “II”) which eventually came out in December of 2010 after Adams inked a distribution deal with Orchard for the album (likely surrendering to the pains of independent distribution and mailing releases) and Blackhole— an album he started working on in 2005 and revisited in 2010 with some additional overdubs, mixing and mastering with Jamie Candiloro (who was part of Orion as well).
Thanks to the fans over at the Ryan Adams Boards of tobeyoung.org (who are carrying the sole flag of RA Fandom since the demise of the ryanadamsarchives boards) we have some concise bits of the history through Ryan’s own posts to social media. Poster mustbeburt provided most of the 2010 posts about Blackhole as well as a picture of the test pressing, which I augmented with other sources from the boards:
03.2010 “Congrats Jamie C… After 4 years of production work we finished the infmous never-ending BLACKHOLE Record tonight! What a trip! Big love to the Candyman… WOOP WOOP ( or woot wut or something one of those kind of football noises here!!!”
03.15.2010 From a post to Facebook: “Why Does This Come Out LeftHanded? Gtr Stuffz at BananaChicken… So FUN!!!”
06.11.10
“oh yeah, p.s. the “Blackhole” LP ( recorded over Christmas in 2005 ) is also back from the mastering plant. I f’n love this thing. It took 4 years to make it and to me it is basically Love is Hell Part 3… lots of shimmery guitar love on this. Exciting times!!!
06.19.10 No. You never heard BLACKHOLE. only two songs ( the demo versions or rough versions of DiscoQueen and Tomorrowland ) were every out there.
09.04.10 total bullshit. Blackhole will go to preorder after III/IV. don’t listen to these sites with this shit or the one’s that have “tour dates” or made up guarantees- they are full of shit. The people I work with don’t have websites they have telephones and they do business the old fashioned way, over lunch and in great detail. hang in there, all 6 of you, who are still excited.
Also, that video from 3/15/2010 shows Ryan adding guitars to what is very likely “S.O.S.” which he released as a song on the “fake” Sad Dracula album Fasterpiece as part of the avalanche of music (24 albums) he released to his website in 2006/2007.
Ultimately, we never saw the preorder for Blackhole, and it seemed that the issues surrounding getting III/IV out the door for the pre-orders took a toll on the future of the PaxAm releases. Ryan announced on the ryanadamsarchives boards that he was through trying to release albums on his own. I have the full quote in this article. He did release a few amazing Record Store Day 7″es and also the massive Live After Deaf compendium box set of his 2011 solo acoustic tour independently. Ashes & Fire was a PaxAm release jointly with Capitol which established his free agent method of releases– similar to how Prince is handling his catalog. Adams’s new self-titled album is PaxAm jointly with Blue Note Records.
The recording and releases of Ashes & Fire in 2011, touring, an aborted followup to Ashes & Fire and his new album would continue to hold up the release Blackhole. Ryan isn’t really much for dwelling on the past. He records so much new material he would likely never need to go back and revisit old material, unless he needed some closure.
But nobody forgot about Blackhole. During interviews about Ashes & Fire, he was asked about Blackhole.
From Record Collector magazine (and clipped by alt.country.org):
RC: “And what about those people who’ve been waiting for Blackhole?”
RA: “It’s all done. It’s all mastered,” Adams says. It’s also been five years in the making, with Ryan going in to the studio at the end of 2010 to finish it. “When I started demoing for the new record, my intention was to go finish Blackhole — which I did.” he says. “There were guitars missing and a few vocals that were just too fucked up at the time to put out.” Adams and his drummer even found sound effects and song fragments that they’d entirely forgotten about. Eventually, several extra songs were added to the mix, and the album was finished with the help of old notes and photographs taken when the project began. “All of a sudden, we knew that that was the real record. Like that was exactly what we had intended,” he enthuses, adding, “It’s historical how it was put together.” As “easy and as beautiful and as natural” as recording Ashes & Fire was, Adams notes: “Rescuing Blackhole was like rescuing my past. It’s like Love is Hell’s sister. In every way. In the most profound way. My most beautiful electric guitar: Johnny Marr-inspired guitar. It’s just all in there.”
Here is what he said to Onion’s AVClub around the same time about it:
AVC: Speaking of putting out more records, you’ve talked about finally completing Blackhole, which dates back to the mid-’00s. What’s its status?
RA: The art is done. The album is mastered. It’s so ready to go. But the thing is, I just did this Ashes & Fire record, and there’s also a live box-set thing. It sounds so brutal and old-school and great. People were good enough to not bootleg the shows. We asked them not to. I’ve always let my fans tape all the shows. I was like, “Just let me do it right.” So we did this really cool set list, and did that, so that’s sort of waiting. And Blackhole is badass, man. I fucking love it. It’s like Love Is Hell, but more up. It has that same feeling and texture, the way Love Is Hell sounds. It’s definitely [Love Is Hell producer] John Porter 101, although the record was not recorded with John Porter, it was tracked with [producer] Tom Schick, and then finished with [producer and Cardinals member] Jamie Candiloro, and also this guy that works with The Strokes sometimes, Gus [Oberg]. It’s sort of like everybody that I’ve ever worked with has a little bit of engineering on it.
We mixed it for four months just to get it exactly right, like adding guitars, subtracting guitars. I even went to New York with [bandmate] Johnny T, who I originally recorded it with, and we opened up all the sessions. We put all the reels back on; we found pieces of songs that were only kind of done that were so good, we were fucking finishing things, but really respectfully. By the time it was done, we got it down to 11 songs, leaving a bunch of shit off. But I was like, “I want it to be exactly what it should be.” A few of my friends have it, and it reduced a few of them to tears. It is so much of [that] time. And it’s cool, too, ’cause it’s sort of like the last party. [Laughs.] So it has beauty, but it has a darkness. But what’s really cool about it is, it has the darkness and it has the wisdom, but to me, it has the feeling of the one fucking thing all of my records were missing, the one part of the story, which is a record that’s sort of just reveling in youth, and reveling in life, as it is. It’s not a “Go to the beach” record, but it’s like, “Let’s go out at night and let’s fuckin’ be werewolves of chaos in New York.” It had that fuckin’ reckless-abandon feeling, and I love it for that.
I love that there’s this great picture of that time. It feels really good, and it’s super, super-connected to all the post-punk records I loved growing up. It’s probably the best electric guitar-playing I’ve ever done, the best bass-playing I’ve ever done, and the most consistently psychedelic rock record that it could be. But it’s not hippie stuff at all. It’s a record that you could listen to if you were listening to The Lemonheads or listening to My Bloody Valentine, or Hüsker Dü. It really is an alternative record.
Another quote from Paste Magazine
“…the long-gestating, finally completed Blackhole, on which he played all the instruments other than drums, just like 2003’s Rock N Roll, although he describes it as Love Is Hell’s “rock sibling.” Adams started and recorded most of it in 2006—“It was the last sessions I did before I knocked all that crap out—drinkin’, partyin’ and all that stuff. So it was the tail end of that crazy winter, so it has that energy, which is really beautiful. I haven’t decided when or how I’m gonna put it out, but there are songs on that people in my life really love—my wife digs it, my best friend thinks it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done—and my other best friend is the only other person on the record: Johnny T played drums on it. Whatever it was that wasn’t done, we just finished it off, and it’s one of the coolest things ever, man.”
And, with those interviews in 2011, that was the last we heard about Blackhole until the recent interviews in support of Ryan Adams.
Adams had been performing a new song titled “Catherine” which was not on the tracklisting for the new album. The first time we got to hear it was for the Newport Folk Festival appearance in July. While the song seemed to fit with the rest of the songs on the new album, its appearance with no initial explanation sparked some debate on the boards about what it was. One leading theory was that it was possibly a song that would be included in the recently announced PaxAm 7-inch Singles series, or possibly it was a bonus track for an import version of the album.
Then Adams spilled the beans on “Catharine” on last weeks’ World Cafe performance— it is a track from Blackhole, and then performed another song “The Door” from it! Here is the exerpt of the interview with David Dye:
DD: “Is there anything that hasn’t seen the light of day that you want to get out?”
RA: “Yeah, I think I’m finally ready, maybe, to release the Blackhole record that’s been on the shelf for a long time. It’s been hiding, and there’s been actually two versions of it which is pretty interesting. But it’s actually gotten to the point where I think I’ve gotta let it out there. I’ve got to let it out in its weird context. I’m going to try to do it in a way where the finished thing of what I’ve always dreamed it was is released and maybe I’ll make some kind of pocket of the really raw and crazy from before because it was the last record I made when I was on drugs and I say that in like a sweet way. I took drugs to stay in the studio longer and to play music I didn’t take drugs to wander down the street or sit at a bar or whatever. I always just wanted to play and there was something about that you know? And that record particularly– it’s the finale of that time that met with tracks that happened just after. So, there is a real tempest there.
When you put together your setlist– do ever do any of that stuff live?
OK, this is cool because people don’t know this yet, but they keep asking about this song. This song “Catherine” that we have been playing live is from Blackhole.
Is there one you can do for us?
Yeah, we’re gonna do one that’s never played live before called “The Door.”
In Summary:
Blackhole is mastered, has cover art and will be 11 tracks. Of the 11 tracks, we have five songs confirmed: “Tomorrowland,” “Disco Queen,” “S.O.S.,” “Catherine” and “The Door.”
As far as the liklihood that Blackhole will come out soon, it’s anybody’s guess and as we see with all of the quotes I’ve included here, he’s been talking about the album for many years. At least the basic work has been done to prepare the album for release so it is ready to go to manufacturing. In an interview with Bob Mehr for Buzzfeed.com, Adams says that he might consider releasing it for the next Record Store Day (probably the April 2015 one and not the Black Friday one considering he’d still be touring through the end of November for the new album). In an upcoming interview with Chris Familton of fasterlouder.com, he says, ““I think I might release that, though I haven’t completely decided. It’s my own label, my own studio and my own rules so yeah, I’m open to releasing stuff that hasn’t come out but right now it’s about stuff I’ve been making in the last few years because there’s so much of it.”
Even though Kelly Pardekooper resides in Indianapolis these days, Eastern Iowa still claims him as its own. The bulk of his six albums to date were written and recorded while he resided here and his sound is one that draws heavy inspiration from the Folk Country sound that originated from local artists like Bo Ramsey, Greg Brown, Dave Zollo and their circle of friends.
Kelly has enjoyed some exposure recently not on the radio, but as incidental music on quite a few big TV shows including HBO’s True Blood, CBS’s Cold Case, FX’s Sons of Anarchy. This burst of popularity among the Music Supervisors for shows has given him the freedom to go back to the studio and record a seventh record and release something on vinyl! In an exchange of emails with Kelly, he admits that he’s “an odd fit for a record label at this point” in his career, and that this surge of publishing popularity has afforded him the ability to self-release the new album.
The new album, titled Milk in Sunshine will be released on October 14th on vinyl, CD and digital download. The CD has the eight new tracks of Milk in Sunshine plus what Kelly is calling “TV Gold” – a 16 track “Greatest Hits” of his career in chronological order by album (not including his debut release 30 Weight). The CD is also included with the very limited vinyl release of 100 which will be signed and numbered. It will also be pressed in orange and will include two vinyl-only bonus tracks! “Shit Out of Luck” by Greg Brown and “I Never Said” by Bo Ramsey!
If you pre-order you get a download of the new song “So Lovely.”
You can see the track listings of the vinyl and the CD below. I included links to the audio where I could find it– Kelly had a few mp3’s on his website (indicated with “full mp3”) and links to his CDBaby CD’s.
Certainly as the record industry machine is having to re-invent itself, it’s avenues like publishing that are helping many artists to continue pursuing this career, even if it is part-time. As a long-time fan of Kelly Pardekooper, I’m really excited for the prospects of a new record and the promise of a few more live shows.
Album Release show at The Mill in Iowa City on 11/29!
Vinyl Side A
1. So Lovely 2. She Moves
3. Milk in Sunshine
4. Release Me
5. Shit out of Luck (Greg Brown)
Vinyl Side B
6. Authentic
7. I Still Cry
8. Elliot
9. That Girl
10. I Never Said (Bo Ramsey)
CD
1. She Moves (Milk in Sunshine)
2. I Still Cry (Milk in Sunshine)
3. Milk in Sunshine (Milk in Sunshine)
4. Release Me (Milk in Sunshine)
5. So Lovely (Milk in Sunshine)
6. Elliot (Milk in Sunshine)
7. Authentic (Milk in Sunshine)
8. That Girl (Milk in Sunshine)
9. Compromise (Johnson County Snow) full mp3
10. Fly on the Wall (Johnson County Snow)
11. Drown in Alcohol (House of Mud) full mp3
12. Hayseed Girl (House of Mud)
13. Can’t Go There (House of Mud)
14. Not in Iowa (Haymaker Heart) full mp3
15. Wild Love (Haymaker Heart)
16. I Adore (Haymaker Heart)
17. Tell Me (You’re the One) (Haymaker Heart)
18. Brand New Bag (Brand New Bag) full mp3
19. Mehaffey Bridge (Brand New Bag)
20. Crazy Girl (Brand New Bag)
21. Yonder (Yonder)
22. Forgotten (Yonder) full mp3
23. Where’s the Love (Yonder)
24. Where I Come From (Yonder)
The reunion of The Black Keys with Dangermouse Turn Blue came out in May. The Auerbach-produced sophomore Lana Del Rey album Ultraviolence came out this month.
In less high-profile work, Auerbach produced the new album from Nashville native Nikki Lane who fancies herself a “modern era Wanda Jackson” (what her website says). (Note: the actual Wanda Jackson is on Jack White’s Third Man Records!) Aside from that hype, Lane’s album is really good and benefited from Auerbach’s production and participation.
L.A. retro rock band The Black Tibetans packed up their dusty motorcycle leathers and flew to Nashville to work with Auerbach on their new 2-track single aptly-titled The Nashville Session.
Auerbach’s lo-fi leanings are a perfect fit for The Black Tibetans and the gear-jamming amphetamine fueled punk of “You’re Cold” lays this in spades. Check out the video for “You’re Cold” which serves as a document of the trip. The band is shown in the studio with Auerbach (who puts a signature guitar riff on the song) and checking out the local vintage shops in Nashville.
Prior to that we got the ultra-rare 15-LP Live After Deaf box set compiling most of the 2011 solo tour in 2012.
The 7″ which is available right now, has new songs “Gimme Something Good” on the A side and “Aching For More” on the flip. We have no other details about the songs or who else may be participating in the songs. We also don’t know what style or genre the typically-chameleon Adams may have used for these songs. I’ll update this article as more details emerge.
The ordering site says the records will ship to arrive for July 1st and cost $5 with $7.50 priority shipping.
The A Side “Gimme Something Good” comes from the upcoming Ryan Adams album confirmed to be on Blue Note Records and has Adams on Electric Guitar and Vocals, Jeremy Stacey on drums, Benmont Tench from Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers on Organ, Tal Wilkenfield on Bass and Mike Viola on 12-string and vocals. Viola also co-produced the A and B side.
The B Side “Aching For More” has Adams on Electric Guitar and Vocals, Johnny Depp (!!) on Electric Guitar and Solo, Gus Seyffert on Bass, Jeremy Stacey on Drums and Percussion, and Mike Viola on Acoustic Guitar, 12-string and vocals.
You can pre-order the new album from Amazon. It is apparently self-titled and should release on September 9th:
In July of 2010, my wife and I along with our friend Brendan from Chicago band The Right Now made a marathon trip to Memphis and Nashville to get their first album mastered to vinyl. It was a crazy whirlwind of a trip, but filled with great times– most of them in Nashville. We had an over-the-top great time dancing at The 5 Spot on a Monday night, ate at a really great Latin restaurant (whose name escapes me), stopped in at Third Man Records, got to tour United Record Pressing. We had such a great time that my wife and I often talk about going back.
When ABC premiered the show Nashville with the first season’s music director as none other than T-Bone Burnett, I knew it would be a show to watch. Admittedly, it’s a prime time soap opera with its attendent drama, but the cast is really good and the music selection– primarily drawn from Nashville songwriters (a VERY nice touch) is top-notch. Burnett’s assistant Buddy Miller has taken over for the busy Burnett but the song selection doesn’t appear to have suffered from it.
About this same time, I had the honor of interviewing former Nashvillian Iris DeMent for Little Village Magazine. Currently living in Iowa with her husband Greg Brown, she still shared some of the early days of her career in Nashville when she was discovered at the legendary Blue Bird Cafe by John Prine.
So, all of this has reenforced an interest in Nashville– past and future. I’ve been keeping an eye on what seems to be a kind of music renaissance going on with lots of new artists and frankly very interesting spins on old country music, folk, blues and rock. Nashville producer and sessionman Scott Williams told me that it is kind of a musical melting pot these days. One recent discovery is Allie Summers.
Nashville transplant Allie Summers has been growing her musical roots with a weekly gig at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, but has decided it’s time to take the first step of her budding recording career. A very firm-footed first step. Her debut EP titled When We Were Young, recorded in Music City at Blackbird Studio with some recording session heavy-hitters, is a tasty platter of new-generation bluegrass and folk fusion drawing easy comparisons to Nickle Creek and The Civil Wars.
The album’s lead single “Wysteria Lane” is popping chicken-pickin’ tribute to lost love and hopes for return. The choice of this song as the lead single is a smart one as it sounds to me like it stands up against some of the songs dropped by recent country chanteusses. I really like the bridge with a drum machine break.
The choice of a fairly straight rendition of the Gram Parsons Grievous Angel track “Ooh Las Vegas” was a nice surprise and shows some appreciated knowledge of the classics (well, classics to me anyway).
My favorite two tracks on the album sit next to each other — the title track and “Drive.” Both songs carry a bit of the country melancholy I’m a sucker for. “When We Were Young” carries a nice Celtic march time punctured by acoustic guitar and violin, but the build to the chorus reminds me of 70’s Linda Ronstadt.
“Drive” is a warm memory of cruising the countryside with the windows rolled down. I really like the acoustic guitars, mandolins and violins on this one, particularly the violin solo that makes a key change in the middle. Good stuff.
Before you think that Ms. Summers has completely abandoned her bluegrass roots, the final track “Red Haired Boy” is a live take of the traditional Irish reel with some of her very talented family.
When We Were Young is both an invitation and a calling card for Allie Summers. You’re invited to sit and listen and come back for more.
The EP is released on CD and digital outlets on Tuesday June 3rd on MuzMedia Recordings.
Click Here to visit Allie Summers Facebook Fanpage
Click Here to visit Allie Summers Official Website
Off the heels of a recent announcement that Hiss Golden Messenger have been signed to the very copacetic North Carolina label Merge (home to William Tyler, who lends a helping hand frequently) with a new album slated for September, and on the cusp of a run of live dates in Europe we are treated to a new Hiss Golden Messenger song, “Brother, Do You Know the Road?” Available this week on iTunes.
Recorded in one take— the song encapsulates what is so enchanting about the HGM sound– seemingly autobiographical, vaguely spiritual, undertones of lost hope, revelatory appearances of joy, all wrapped in stunning musical performances which draw influence from early 70’s folk rock. At $0.99 for over six-minutes of music it is a heck of a deal, and belongs on everyone’s digital player.
This Saturday night’s show at CSPS promises to be a rockin’ one! Headlining the show is Brook Hoover’s Surf Zombies who are having a CD Release show for their latest album It’s a… THING!. I reviewed It’s a… THING! for Little Village Magazine last month saying, “another solid slab of sinewy guitars evoking images of busting surfboards, wipeouts and pipelines on a distant glistening beach.” It’s my favorite Surf Zombies record yet!
I’m pretty excited about the lineup for Saturday night at CSPS– both bands put on great live shows, and we’re lucky to get them here in Cedar Rapids. Oh, and Twins will be bringing vinyl! In between sets DJ Tone Zone will be spinning records.
Sounds like a great night, doesn’t it? See you there!
The Surf Zombies with TWINS and DJ Tone Zone will start at 8PM on Saturday, April 26th. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 at the door.
This Friday, November 28 is Black Friday 2014, but more importantly is “Back to Black” Friday, or Black Friday Record Store Day. There are a few releases this time that I’m looking forward to, so I’m going to make the trek to Moondog Music in Dubuque– my regular RSD haunt.
