Vic Chesnutt

Rest In Peace Vic Chesnutt (1964-2009)

The Felice Brothers Yonder Is The Clock

Wow, these guys were tied with The Hold Steady's Stay Positive for Tim Van Huss's Album of the year 2008 with their superb eponymously-titled album (see my July 2009 post on 2008 albums) . Their formula did not change on Yonder Is The Clock. This fourth full length album is another great slice of Americana, with its melancholic Old West nostalgia. Again, they interpret that sound so rooted in the upstate New York Hudson River Valley/Catskill Mountain school of roots folk made popular by Dylan, The Band, and Levon Helm. They have everything from the decedents of Eastern European folk music to dust bowl fiddle music and often in the same song. Most attractively though with so much of what I like about great folk music is that ability to transform you to a dusty old path (while riding on an 'ole paint') on the plains or an old saloon in California or something that you would not normally experience except in maybe movies. And maybe some early 20th Century dime store novels. Let's call it sepia-tone rock.

I think it also speaks to how literate a group like The Felice Brothers are. I am reading back my opening part of the review and thinking it sounds like I am talking more about a great book I just read rather, than an record. So for the singer/songwriter types out there this just really does it for me. I had the album very early in the 2009 year and just now getting around to reviewing it.
It's hard to find words for great literate groups like this who encompass their sound around fiddles, accordions, acoustic guitars, tubas, wash boards and the like (Dylan and The Band's Basement Tapes for example). I pick my favorite song that was really kind of a single, if a band like The Felice Brothers actually record with singles in mind, called Run Chicken Run as the song that represents the feel of this excellent roots folk rock album.

If it's from Austin...Ryan Bingham & The Dead Horses

You go to Nashville to write songs, but you go to Austin to play'em. -Tim Van Huss

At the beginning of 2009 on Austin City Limits I got my first taste of Ryan Bingham. I liked him immediately for one of the tunes he played called Hard Times from his debut album mescalito, released in 2008 . He plays a combination of country-influenced blues, roots rock, folk rock, country & western and all the various manifestations of the Great Americana Movement so dominant in Texas and especially Austin. A former professional rodeo "star" he abandoned it to pursue a career in music. In his late 20's when mescalito was released he sounded like he had been at this craft for 50 years. With a voice like sand paper filtered through whiskey and hand-rolled cigarettes, this up-and-comer can phrase as well as Bob Dylan or Willie Nelson. The debut album stayed pretty much in that Texas roadhouse Americana Vein.

Enter 2009 with a band and a new album on Lost Highway records. Ryan Bingham & The Dead Horses' Roadhouse Sun bursts on the scene this year with a rock & roll album, very similar to how label mate Lucinda Williams did it with her masterpiece Car Wheels On A Gravel Road. Both had been knocking around with blues, country and western, and folk for their early careers and both turn out to take the best of what always makes rock and roll great, by blurring the lines of all and just plain rawking out, with a fine, fine gumbo. There's even a nice paean to The Byrds and The Beatles on the track called Dylan's Hard Rain. He writes the beautiful heartbreak ballad Snake Eyes and follows it with a nice fuzzy guitar feedback tune called Endless Ways that could easily fit on Uncle Tupelo's Still Feel Gone or Neil Young's Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere.

The album is nicely produced, the tracks are all strong and although not yet at the masterpiece level, I will expect that due to his young age, he has plenty of time to write an album of those I am comparing him to. With this crack band that already sounds like its hitting its stride we should see some great things for Texas and the rest of us in the years to come.

Dinosaur jr. Farm

Dinosuar jr. is primarily the realm of J Mascis. As a hard rock guitar band with plenty of popular hooks to grant accessibility, Dinosuar jr. remains in indie rock land. That's okay by me. The 2009 release of Farm marks the new traditionalist sound that defines their music, yet manages to stay fresh every album (almost every album; there are a couple of in-betweens after the brilliant Where You Been such as Without A Sound that put horribleness on a new level).

Scronk and Roll is alive and well on Farm. J follows U2's formula. Although production value increases throughout the years, they continue to make great albums without changing the angle too much. When Where You Been first came out, CD's and the digital production markets were starting to go big time. Bands like Dinosaur jr. recorded these in a way that begged that you play it loud because it didn't sound good at lower volume. After the years have gone by, you can record an album like Farm and it sounds loud and good at a low volume. Farm pretty much continues where the excellent Beyond left off. Both albums are a lot less about fuzzy guitars and more about hard lead guitars, epic drum beatings, and crunch. I like J as a singer but he's put away his longing angst for more adult singing. The band is truly on the foreground here. Maybe for the first time Dinosaur jr. sounds like a band and not a J Mascis side project. No where is this more evident than the fact that Lou Barlow contributes two great tunes. There's also bonus disc featuring a cover of The Zombies' Whenever You're Ready.

Took me a while to getting around to reviewing this album. Have had it almost all year and listened to it many times, but subsequent listens keep this album on my barometer of good tuneage for 2009.

John Fogerty The Blue Ridge Rangers Rides Again

Unlike the James Gang album by the same title, John Fogerty, who really is The Blue Ridge Rangers, released its sophmore effort 36 years after its debut. However, nice job. This prog country effort starts with two bluegrass rave-ups. An album of covers of classic country soul Paradise and Never Ending Song of Love start this terrific album out with a fun bluegrass bang. We next hit the stride with traditional country with just beautiful fiddle and steel guitar on Buck Ownens's I Don't Care.

You can't not love the great cover of Ray Price's classic I'll Be There done with such fun reverence, again with a bluegrass style and beat. The album is primarily acoustic (some steel and electric guitar) is superior in every way to the debut. I suspect because of superior recording these days.

What is most striking, I have determined, is the absolute conclusion of why Creedence Clearwater Revival is so much of a country and country rock band. Pure Americana, as no more evidenced by the great Moody River. It could have easily fit in on any one of the seven CCR albums.

We even have a great interpretation of the sappy, The Judd's Heaven Is Just A Sin Away. Fogerty's expression of country music as filtered through one of the cooler left wing musicians who has been making statements about anti-establishment country music for 40 years. And this is way before the present crop of alt-country, rural, urban hipsters, ever understood the great songwriting contained in country & western and Americana style music of the Modern Era.

The singing guests of singer/songwriter fame include the likes of Don Henley on Garden Party and Bruce Springsteen dueting on the great Everly Brothers tune When Will I be Loved. Plus the review would be incomplete without mentioning the guitar slinging of Americana Artist of the Year Buddy Miles.

This is a superb country rock album. Buy it.

Built To Spill There Is No Enemy

As with every BTS album I have ever bought, upon first listen, I say "meh, it's not that great" and then about 5 listens later I am obsessed with the album and can't quit playing it. Such as the case with There Is No Enemy. I have not given the full five listens yet, but I am already just loving the new album from this indie prog rock band from Boise, ID. Oddly enough, this album has turned out to be one of the most accessible if not the MOST accessible BTS album I've bought. The songs are shorter on this album. I think all are 6 minutes or less. And I will admit there is a little pop lilt going on here to. There's also a real live melancholy here that kind of 'ghosts' around on the other albums. BTS can sometimes be maudlin in an oddly sarcastic way. I think that is front man Doug Martsch's M.O. anyway. It feels quite a bit like You In Reverse.

There Is No Enemy feels like it could easily be at home with adult alternative or indie record listeners. On the song Life's A Dream it sounds like maybe they've been listening to Pet Sounds Beach Boys before breaking into a sort of protracted Pink Floyd guitar riff. The opening song Aisle 13 is classic BTS opening song. Always a nice ambient rocker to get your attention without rattling your teeth.

I always am amazed at how literate Doug Martsch is anyway. And not just literate for writing sake, but the music is literate too. I guess I always go back to saying this is modern prog rock. Something I have always liked probably for that reason. As always the guitar playing is muscular and wiry. Whether it's the poetry of the words or the complex musicianship BTS is such a fine sounding band that never sounds old. They keep getting better.

Levon Helm Electric Dirt

As per usual, Levon Helm, has once again made a fine, fine American roots rock album with his 2009 release Electric Dirt. His voice on this album has returned to its best form in many years as he recovered from throat cancer. I ended up liking this album a little better than the stark Dirt Farmer. It sounds like a Band album with Levon Helm at the helm. There is a lot of electricity and horns on this album. The cover is even electric and colorful. I so enjoy Levon Helm's voice. He was my favorite singer in The Band as well.

I started to take notice of Levon Helm as he is a favorite of Don Imus. I listen to Don quite a bit and several years ago now he started featuring Levon and promoting Levon's Midnight Rambles which were intimate shows in which Levon headlined at his farm in New York and to raise funds to help pay his medical bills mounting from his bout with throat cancer. I was thrilled when Dirt Farmer came out and now this electrified album is out I am really pleased. The mostly covers range from the Dead's Tennessee Jed to Randy Newman's Kingfish. Levon makes them all his own too and there is not a weak cut here.

Drive-By Truckers the fine print

The Drive-By Truckers are undoubtedly my favorite rock & roll band of the 21st century. Not only are they the most important Southern Rock band playing and touring today, they just may be the most important live Rock & Roll band touring today (along with The Hold Steady). These keepers of the faith of rock & roll and all things Americana and all things Southern have been my Rosetta Stone and my musical Faulkner of being able to explain not just the moral ambiguity of the South, but bring Southern folklore into the mainstream and make it feasible and cool to like at the same time. And they do it without once waving a Confederate flag (although you know it is on the landscape somewhere, just not THEIR landscape).

Not since Uncle Tupelo has a band done so well at interpreting and sounding the cry of working class and rural ennui. They use punk and country & western styles to easily establish the DIY ethics of both genres. Poignant songwriting covering spoken word about the history of George Wallace to a song about Bush-league car racing; they sing their brand of Americana with humor and personal experience without being apologists over the not-so-polite aspects of Southern culture. On two separate occasions they have been enlisted as the backing band for R & B/Blues legends Booker T. on his 2009 release Potato Hole and Bettye LaVette on her brilliant Scene of The Crime.

At the same time the Drive-By Truckers never forget to rock with the 3-lead guitar assault of hard Southern Rock just like their older siblings Lynyrd Skynrd, the Allman Brothers Band, and Little Feat.

Now that I have been so gushy I wanted to praise their latest effort the final print (a collection of oddities and rarities) 2003-2008. Back when I was in college starting with R. E. M. Dead Letter Office it became vogue for indie rock bands to make a collection of outtakes, rarities and b-sides. This is exactly what this album is. It does not have a concept or appeal of a standard issue album, but it sure is nice to get a taste for some recordings that you might hear at their concert but didn't make it on a proper album. This is not their best work because it doesn't have to be. Their outtake and b-side work is better than what passes for most indie rock or rock bands' standard album issues! This is an album for Drive-By Trucker fans...an intimate portrait of a Southern rock band on tour in America.

The album's standouts for me is the covers they do. One of my favorite songs is Tom T. Hall's Mama Bake a Pie (Daddy Kill a Chicken) off the long out of print 100 Children album. It's the rumination of a Vietnam veteran returning home after being crippled from the war, losing his legs. Google the lyrics because it's so heart-wrenching and funny at the same time. They do a ham-fisted big-ass sound version of Tom Petty's Rebels and it is very good indeed. DBT had been on a Bob Dylan tribute album and got stuck with what Patterson Hood begged 'please not let it be the song they would have to do' which turned out to be Like A Rolling Stone. But they pull it off very well by simply making the song their own. It's from their Jason Isbell period and all the singers including bassist Shonna Tucker, Jason's Wife, take a turn singing a verse. It's a wonderful cover...overblown in a "we are having a goddamn good time doing this" sort of way. And who can be upset at anyone covering the great and legendary Warren Zevon. They do a great, if heavy (if you can make it heavier) Play It All Night Long. You know the one that "starts grampa pissed his pants again..."

This is not the best DBT album but I sure like it and say to any fan you need to own this for the cover versions if nothing else.

Columbia, MO Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ Festival

RBBBQ Festival Friday September ,25 & Saturday, September 26:

Although the lineup was terrific, due to some family problems, I was not able to attend all the stuff I wanted to. I did get to go both days though before leaving Columbia, MO for Toledo, OH. First of all, let me say, I think this venue in Columbia known as the Roots 'n Blues 'n BBQ is one of the best festivals in the country. Okay, it's not Kerrville or The Merle Fest or Newport Folk Festival...but...it is a fine, fine festival where you can see a great deal of the cross-section of music that I mine so much of in my musical pursuits. At the right of the blog are links to various things and the RBBBQ link is there too so you can see the lineup of this year's acts and the past two.

First of all they charged this year, which was fine. I had the mon(ey) so I had some fun. Friday night I caught one of my favorite live acts ever, Southern Culture On The Skids. May penis was laying on the ground because it got rocked off. This southern mixture of blues, funk, country, R&B, surfabilly/rockabilly and whatever else they throw in that gumbo actually overshadows their white trash shtick, which is entertaining in and of itself. I haven't seen them in 11 years. But this is probably the 6th or 7th time I have seen them. They did in fact throw out the chicken and from an 'eight piece box' and they also did The Great Santo Mexican Wrestler gag. It never gets old for me.

I also saw the great old-timey band out of Kansas City, The Wilders. This is hoe-down tuneage at its best. Makes you want to drink and dance. They range from Ozark style fiddle tunes to Southeast Appalachian folk stuff. The Wilders are very comparable to the Avett Brothers, Old Crow Medicine Show, The Freight Hoppers, The Stanley Brothers and the Carter Family. They can also do a gospel song like no body's business. Pick up their gospel album and you will be justified in the blood of the lamb. The fiddle player Betse Ellis also has a new solo album featuring her awesome fiddling. She is very adept at that Ozark fiddle playing in the vein of Bob Holt. If you ever pick up their albums they print extensive song by song liner notes on the style of the early Americana they perform. It's as good as anything that Smithsonian Folkways Records or Rounder's Deep River series puts in as annotated bibliographies. Oh yeah, and they are great live. That's all I got to hear and see on Friday.

Saturday had great acts too. I see the great Country & Western Modern Traditionalist James "Slim" Hand every year. It's so hard to find and see real live country and western. He puts on a great show always. This year it rained, but Mr. Hand stopped the show not because of the rain, but to come down in the crowd, shake hands and hug all the concert goers that braved the rain for his show. He is an outstanding showman and he did all his great material. On the other stage was C & W/Jazz/Rockabilly legend Junior Brown playing his guit-steel. A guitar and steel guitar on one instrument. He can maneuver from playing a hard pipe-hitting country truck-driving tune to Dick Dale-style surfabilly. He is one hell of a guitar and steel player and a crowd pleaser to say the least.

I am not a pure Reggae fan, but I got to hear the cool stylings of the traditional reggae band The Itals. Standard stuff, but great to see legends playing in the style of reggae I prefer mixed with lots of R & B. And on the other stage was legendary acoustic blues performer Rory Block. Now I love blues music, but I am burned out on the electric stuff. So I was happy to see this acoustic Delta Blues preservationist. Phenomenal! She stayed completely in the folk and country blues standard of Robert Johnson, early acoustic John Lee Hooker, and host of other Delta Blues styles. Her guitar playing is just absolutely haunting in how pure it is to the tradition...plus she's cute as hell.

I was disappointed to miss the likes of The Steeldrivers (bluegrass), Booker T. (blues and R & B), Backyard Tire Fire (indie rock and alt-country), The Blind Boys of Alabama (gospel, blues, R & B), The Perfect Age of Rock & Roll Blues Band (self-explanatory but featured Pinetop Perkins and Hubert Sumlin), The Carlolina Choclate Drops (saw them last year though, they are a black string band...banjo fiddle etc.) and Dan Tyminski cancelled. Well can't wait until next year!

John Doe And The Sadies

I am a huge X fan and I have had The Knitters brilliant eponymous album (X playing Country & Western) for many years. John Doe, Xene Cervenka, and Dave Alvin, whom are alumni of X and the Knitters, went on with solo careers that ended up heading for country, americana, folk, or singer/songwriter styles betraying their hard punk roots (that's not a bad thing at all).

John Doe with the Canadian surfabilly outfit, The Sadies, have made a very nice paean to Bakersfield Country & Western in this 2009 release called Country Club. John Doe's voice is sooo built for this stuff. It is very polished for a Bakersfield type sound. Let's say it is Bakersfield meets Billy Sherrill's Nashville via Studio B. On Yep Roc records, this wonderful album includes 15 tracks of Country & Western standards. John Doe and The Sadies do a wonderful job of making these classics their own. John Doe sings in a soft style with consummate musicians doing such classic titles as Ray Price's Night Life (written by Willie Nelson), Bobby Bare's Detroit City, and classic country fair such as Stop The World And Let Me Off and Help Me Make It Through The Night. Wonderful stuff and a very strong album. Good for the old punk or any country fan's album collection...go ahead and pick it up.

Melancholy Fall Albums cont'd.

Totally forgot Big Star #1 Record and Big Star Radio City. Tremendously great pop albums that just make me really melancholy.

Friday Vintage Vinyl Excursion

My job let's me travel to St. Louis frequently. I lived there for over 17 years. Anyway the big nice independent record store there is Vintage Vinyl. Great place. Plenty of surly music snob record store employees too. Anyway, still one of my favorite places in the world. I picked up a used copy of The Band's Jericho. It is a post-Robbie Robertson album. It puts Levon Helm back in the driver's seat of band leader...a role that he originally had back in the day. I listen to Don Imus via RFD TV. Imus, who adores Levon Helm, often uses as his bumper music the cover of Bruce Springsteen's Atlantic City which is from this album. It is stunning. Besides drums, Levon's instrument is the mandolin, which is the lead instrument on this tune's version.

I grabbed up Drive-By Trucker's new album which is an outtake album (in the vein of Dead Letter Office). I will review it once I have listened to it.

I also got local St. Louis musician Bob Reuter's album Thee Dirty South. I really like this guy. Nuff said for now, I'll review it eventually too. Good finds at Vintage Vinyl today. I am satisfied.

More Autumn and a question

More albums for the Fall
1) Tom Petty-Damn The Torpedoes
2) Let's Active-Cypress/Afoot (both albums in other words)
3) R. E. M. -Fables Of The Reconstruction


Here's the question: What is the difference really between the Monkees "I'm Not Your Stepping Stone" and Let's Active "Every Word Means No?"

Favorite Autumn Albums

In the Fall I get really melancholy and listen to a lot of mid-eighties stuff. Not all of it is mid-eighties but several are. Here is a list of my favorite albums that I really like a lot and still break out every Autumn.

1). R. E. M.-Life's Rich Pageant
2) R. E. M.-Reckoning
3) XTC-Lemons & Oranges
4) The Velvet Underground-Loaded
5) The Talking Heads-Speaking In Tongues
6) The Pretenders-Learning To Crawl
7) Guadalcanal Diary-Jamboree
8) The Smiths-The Queen Is Dead
9) British Sea Power-The Decline of British Sea Power
10) Dire Straits-Brothers In Arms
11) Yes-Close To The Edge
12) The Wrens-The Meadowlands
13) Midlake-The Trials Of Van Ocupanther
14) The Thrills-So Much For The City
15) Uncle Tupelo-Still Feel Gone
16) Built To Spill-Keep It Like A Secret
17) The Replacements-Let It Be
18) Luna-Lunapark
19) Yo La Tengo-Painful
20) Neil Young-American Stars 'n' Bars
21) O Positive-Only Breathing/Cloud Factory
22) The Beatles-Revolver
23) King Crimson-Discipline
24) The New Pornographers-Mass Romantic
25) Richard Shindell-Courier

New Prog Rock for Old Dogs

One of the cool albums I got for my birthday was Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion. For old timers like me who, when young, ate up Prog Rock like nobody's business. For the last few years I have been able to find updated sounds of Prog Rock through the likes of Built To Spill, The Halo Benders, The Decembrists, and others. Imagine again my happiness to add to the list, the tight, yet dreamy, dope-smokin' sounds of Animal Collective. This is a great song cycle of actually fairly short songs (maybe 6 minutes on average). It reminds me a lot of Yes via their Fragile period. Animal Collective is not real heavy on guitar, but the bass is pretty up-front in that Chris Squire Rickenbacker style jazz playing. It has that nice ringy low tone. There are plenty of polyrythms here too. The other thing that's pretty cool about any of the new Prog Rock sounds of the aforementioned bands including Animal Collective is the indie feel to it. The production standards have the classic indie/punk feel of the DIY attitude. For instance, Animal Collective has that great fuzzy guitar sound I've come to adore in indie rock over the last 20+ years. Lastly, it is imperative to have great album art inner/outer cover and everywhere else (they do). Grab it up, smoke it up, play it up and enjoy yourself.

The Great Booker T.

Booker T. this year has done what Bettye LaVette did a couple of years ago. He hired the best Southern rock band around known as the Drive-By Truckers, added Neil Young and cut a hard driving rock & roll, R & B album called Potato Hole. Best part is of course the signature Southern rock sound of three lead guitars. I first read about this album earlier in the year when Playboy profiled Booker T. and this new album. It is great stuff. The album is on ANTI records which is home to Bettye LaVette and Neko Case. Good company there.

A potato hole refers to a hole in the earthen floor of a cabin where food was kept when Booker T was growing up. The album has the new sounds of today's Southern rock but also that ancient feel, a deep and unyielding beat that must go back thousands of years. Primal but tempered. Modern yet it interprets the past. There is plenty of Hammond B-3, but don't expect any Green Onion organ fills here. Booker T. and his assembled group do a couple of cool covers. One is Outkast's Hey Ya. The second is a nice instrumental (the whole album is of course instrumental) version of Drive-By Trucker's Space City. Cool stuff, good modern R & B. Strongly recommend this to anyone dabbling in blues and R & B in general.

Chuck Berry

I live in Columbia, MO home of the University of Missouri. A downtown club here called The Blue Note hosts a set of (mostly) free concerts. Well, August 26, promised Chuck Berry. Of course it is always great to see a living legend. Especially since I am in the habit of blowing these guys off and then they die! Well, Chuck was very much alive, his voice was great but man his guitar playing was a lot like the Cheech and Chong sketch that features Blind Melon Chitlin'. It was like he was up there playing air guitar and then someone foists a guitar in his hands. It was so out of tune that if you walked in to an alley where the sound was distorted it would put the guitar back in tune. I thought surely this guy can hire a guitar tech. Seeing that beautiful Gibson hollow-body being violated like a couple of alley cats hard at it damn near ruined the experience for me. I did get to see him walk through The Blue Note and say hello to him. His handlers whisked him away pretty quickly. As far as I could tell, no one was peed on.

New stuff that's not new.

A few real neat things I picked up. Mary Lee's Corvette-Blood On The Tracks spectacular reworking of Dylan's album; Kinky Friedman-Last of the Texas Jewboys, the Frank Zappa of Austin, TX country music; Marty Robbins-Gunfighter Ballads & Trail Songs, the 1959 cowboy classic; Asylum Street Spankers-My Favorite Album, Scroat Belly meets Squirrel Nut Zippers.

More about Son Volt

I am listening to Son Volt's new album American Central Dust. The more I listen, the more I am struck how good of a songwriter that Jay Farrar has become. I think he has always used powerful metaphors, way back with Uncle Tupelo even. But these gentle and tender tunes on American Central Dust are just soooo good. The opening track of Dynamite has this great chorus lyric of our love is like celebrating Fourth of July with Dynamite. I really like that a lot. Cocaine and Ashes is his reflecting on a story he heard about Keith Richards smoking the ashes of his cremated father and mixing them with cocaine. I could go on-and-on about this record's great songs...and I might. The album closes with my favorite tune with its cool guitar fills called Jukebox of Steel.



I would not want him to, but Jay Farrar is good enough now to head to Nashville. He could write a commercial tune. And I am certain his tunes would be better than the drek that is passing for songs on country radio now. Hell, maybe he could just pen some Laurel Canyon stuff. He's that good. If Jeff Tweedy has heard this album, his heart is pierced with searing jealousy.

Son Volt American Central Dust

Wow! Son Volt, on the venerable Rounder Records record label. I am impressed. I am also impressed with this album. Jay Farrar has been churning out great records under the moniker of Son Volt for over 15 years. Okehmah and the Melody of Riot and the Search were excellent albums. But I really think Jay Farrar is now demonstrating what a great songwriter he has become. Very mature. He's going to be recognized this year.

American Central Dust is a roots rock album heavily steeped in piano, steel guitar, and fiddle sound that worked for generations of greats going back to the likes of Doug Sahm and the Sir Douglas Quintet. I think the reason Jay Farrar is doing so well at song-writing now is because he has the ability to arrange. He's utilizing his musicians to help him interpret his arrangements. Like Dylan and Neil Young before him he's picked a group of musicians that are a Rosetta Stone of Americana music. I'm not going to name standout songs on this record, just grab it up, listen up and straight through and you find an artist as venerable as his record label.

2008 music review

This is last year's music reviews that I wanted to blog about. It so happens that the domain name was taken. I had to change it for this particular blog. Anyway here it is as the original...

Volume 4
December 31, 2008

everybody knows this is nowhere…
A music newsletter and blog.

Golly, what a horrible year for new music. Music was as hard to pick out and collect as 2008 was difficult in general. Of course, there were many gems as you will see, but it was a tough year. Let’s get started, shall we?

Best and worst industry news this year was the news that The Feelies - Crazy Rhythms was being reissued. It turned out to be a hoax. I so wanted to be able to buy this classic indie pop album for less than the $25+ import price that is so often wanted. Good luck finding it in your favorite independent record store bins because I haven’t yet. Dang!

Onward….

It was a big year for reissues and one of the several that I will review is Willie Nelson -One Hell of a Ride. I had a lot of Willie Nelson already. The 100+ song 4-disc box-set covers everything you could possibly want by Willie. Columbia Legacy did a great annotated bibliography of not just a great country and western icon, but also a country and western iconoclast. It does a great job of compiling the outlaw country movement albums of Shotgun Willie, Redheaded Stranger, and Phases and Stages. The impressive part is annotating his later career, which was marked by inconsistent albums in the late 70’s, 80’s and 90’s, but consisted of great top forty stuff. His 21st -century work includes such great covers as Paul Simon’s Graceland, and is included here: a real treat! This box is top drawer! If you have passing interest in Willie Nelson and want to experience his catalog on a budget, get this box and you won’t have to buy anything else.

I guess this was a big year for Danger Mouse because three of the albums I am going to review this year have him as either the producer or collaborator. Let’s start with Gnarls Barkley’s sophomore effort, The Odd Couple. Danger Mouse is one-half of this duo and the other is the Goody Mob’s C-Lo. I really like this album. Critics panned it because it sounds exactly like their debut St. Elsewhere. It’s a great pop hip hop album with this one earmark…it is a lot darker than St. Elsewhere, which was dark, too (remember Crazy … not a happy tune). Lots of hummable stuff here, I think. Don’t be hatin’ just because it sounds a lot like St. Elsewhere. Be glad the blueprint works twice. C-Lo is a great soulful singer dashed into that nervous frenetic angst. Find someone who can do that in hip hop, pop, rap or anything else besides punk. The track called Blind Mary was as easily as catchy as Crazy. Check it out.

The next album that Danger Mouse produced is Beck’s Modern Guilt, easily the best Beck album since Sea Change. Again, this album is really nervous, even by Beck standards. It needs to be listened to all the way through. It has a nice flow from the first to last track. It’s like one long song. It still has a nice pop sound to it. If Odelay had been stripped down to beats and rap, it would sound like Modern Guilt. It has a lot of staccato drum riffs brought right out front. Beck continues his genre bending mixology that, for me, never gets tired.

My last Danger Mouse production review is The Black Keys - Attack & Release. No nervousness here. The Black Keys (who hail from Akron, OH, stomping grounds of both Devo and The Pretenders), along with their Detroit compadres The White Stripes, The Soledad Brothers, and The Detroit Cobras, are all pioneers of stinky, nasty blues filtered through The Stooges guitar crunch in a genre I like to call punk blues. I think I may have coined this phrase since no one else uses it. A quick history lesson: about 12 or so years ago, a friend of mine (we’ll call him Greg Duenow) turned me onto The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. A great punk band that could do grungy blues music tagged back then as scuzz blues. At the time, I was listening also to R. L. Burnside, a real live blues guy that was experimenting with hip hop and punk with his music. Lo and behold, The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion land a gig backing R. L. on his classic album A [sic] Ass Pocket of Whiskey. It made sense because they were label mates on Matador Records. In the history of popular music, this album is where punk blues was born, in my humble opinion. Anyway, shortly thereafter, I got all up in the White Stripes and kind of that whole Detroit Sound of the early part of the 21st century. Jack White of the White Stripes had mentioned The Black Keys and the Soledad Brothers in an interview I read. All these bands in Detroit are real minimalists, two or three members typically. In the case of the Black Keys, like the White Stripes, just two members banging out a lot of blues noise rock. Like the MC5 with only two musicians. Cool. Fast forward to today’s Black Keys and what the Danger Mouse production led to: this album is not my favorite of theirs, but it is far superior to what normally passes as good indie rock. They also fleshed out the album with a full band and switched over to more of rhythm & blues and soul of the late 60’s. Lots of moog-sounding organs, R&B guitar and that nice growl the lead singer sings in anyway. This Danger Mouse production is not nervous at all. It sounds almost like they could have been down on the Gulf around NOLA with Allen Toussaint producing and The Meters handling the rhythm section. All it needed was some horns. Not as good as Rubber Factory or last year’s Magic Potion. But it is worth picking up because subsequent listens really fill out this thick-ass album.

The really beautiful mellow southwestern stylings of Calexico’s Carried to Dust is just full of lilting pop with mariachi underpinnings and all that Mexican-cough-syrup-sound that so permeates bands from the Southwest (the Meat Puppets and Giant Sand come to mind). What I really enjoyed about this album is initially I had not cared for Calexico. I didn’t understand what the big fuss was. A number of years ago, I acquired their album Hot Rail, one of their weaker albums, and didn’t like it. They appeared as one of the two backing bands on my album of the year in 2006, Neko Case’s Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, a pure alt-country pop crooning classic (the other backing band being the Canadian surfabilly outfit The Sadies). So anyway, loving Neko’s album the way I did influenced me to pick up Carried to Dust. And I am sooooo glad I did! The great marker of any good album for me is sequencing and that all the tracks flow together like an album should. There are no weak tracks. Help yourself to your favorite codeine-laced cough syrup, roll up a number of Missouri ditchweed, turn on the black light and get ready for a sub-Mexican psychedelic pop fest that will stroke yer ears and brain in a very laid-back way. Their minimalist album art is way cool, too.

Okay, I waited until the last minute to pick up Bob Dylan - Bootleg Volume 8. Let me tell ya, it is worth the double CD edition. They also have a limited edition version which is a mini-box set with a third CD of material, a 7” vinyl, and other knick-knacks that drive the price from $20 for the basic edition to $150 for the special collector’s edition. Essentially, you are shelling out an extra $100+ dollars for a third CD. You’ll be okay with the “budget” one, I think. Great standout tunes covering the late 80’s, 90’s, and the new century. The focus of this volume is outtakes and re-workings of songs from Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft, and Modern Times, those three brilliant classic albums of his latter career. There are plenty of other interesting tidbits, too. A standout for me is a bluegrass number with Ralph Stanley deep on the second CD called The Lonesome River. Dylan just harmonizes with Stanley’s lonesome lead voice. This is a solid set of late period stuff, probably better for completists than for the casual fan. But I don’t think a casual fan would dislike this. There are lots of blues, folk, country and rock seamlessly combined; if that’s your music preference, then you will love this album.

You cain’t nev-uh lose wif da Drive-By Truckers. The spring release of Brighter Than Creation’s Dark kept this one at regular play intervals in my deck. Their already great songwriting just keeps getting better and better. On this album, you get southern-style blues, R&B, country, and most importantly, a regular and heady dose of Southern Rock (without the Rebel flag). The Drive-By Truckers paid homage to their heroes Lynyrd Skynyrd way-back-when with the double album Southern Rock Opera. They have not stopped working that formula which makes them two things: 1) one of the most important rock & roll bands touring today, and 2) the most important southern rock band touring today. When they started out as an alt country act, I don’t think anyone knew they would start that 3-lead-guitar assault marked by the greats such as Little Feat, The Allman Brothers Band or Lynyrd Skynyrd. This new album returns a lot to the alternative country realm that they started out playing. Sweet, dripping steel guitar and Bakersfield-Telecaster-Country type guitar riffs that The Beatles so favored. Oh yeah, did I mention that it is a double album? And there are no weak songs. They also let their bass player, Shonna Tucker, sing a couple of tunes and she has a voice built for playing behind the chicken wire and letting you know how broke you made her heart. Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley are both in fine songwriting form and the addition of one of the architects of the Muscle Shoals sound, Spooner Oldham, on keys throughout the album lends great credibility to an historic rock and roll band.

You may have thought things were juicy and I hope you are still reading because buried here, after several reviews, are the first of the two albums that tied as album of the year for me. I am talking about The Felice Brothers (eponymously titled). Man, I was at my local Streetside Records here in Columbia, MO. I think it was a Tuesday in late spring and I ask my pal, Steve the manager, what’s new and cool. He recommended The Felice Brothers new album. Fuck, what a great album! First of all, let me make a comparison. This stuff is really Dylanesque down to even where they are from, which is the Hudson River Valley of New York state. Anyone that knows me knows that I am a huge Dylan fan. I probably have 30 albums or more. One of Dylan’s classically rated albums is Bob Dylan and The Band - The Basement Tapes. I hate The Basement Tapes. The sound is mediocre, the songs are what they are…throwaway. Yes, there are gems on it. But I render this blaspheme: another throw away album is Bob Dylan’s Self Portrait and it is a better album (Rolling Stone only gives it two stars!). Okay, I said it. Now, back to The Felice Brothers…they made The Basement Tapes the way I actually imagined it should have been. It is sort of a Basement Tapes project that was produced and recorded well, with great songwriting. There is such melancholy and loss that romanticizes the Old West, cowboys, the South and a simpler time, in general, without mocking it or overdoing it. You hear European instruments like the squeeze box and violin strained through three-four waltz songs (just like The Band with the ghosts of Richard Manuel and Rick Danko hovering over Garth Hudson playing the Wurlitzer). The album is brilliantly new-sounding in all this nostalgic ancientness. You get that certain taste of how old popular music was when it carried over to the rough taverns of the American West. What I thought was the coolest is my pal, Lowell Handler, who also lives in the Hudson River Valley, was visiting my wife and me this past summer and he mentioned them and then we both exuberantly coincidentally burst into the chorus of the best song on the album, Frankie’s Gun. (“Bang, bang, bang she shot me down with Frankie’s Gun.”). Good times!

The Hold Steady’s Stay Positive, probably the best rock ‘n’ roll album since The Replacements’ Let It Be. This was my favorite rock ‘n’ roll album of the year. Great songwriting and containing something sorely missing from top 40 rock ‘n’ roll radio…that would be the rock ‘n’ roll. I can’t believe these guys aren’t schlogging around the arena and amphitheatre circuit, but then again, there is much injustice in the world. Their sound is really interesting. The first time and first song I heard by them was called Stevie Nix off their Separation Sunday album. I was immediately struck by how much they had this weird Bruce Springsteen thing going on. They have that Clarence Clemons horn and Roy Bittan piano thing and the singer sounds like a higher- pitched off-kilter Springsteen-with-a-cold voice. You immediately recognize it, but can’t figure out why. Many of their songs are anthemic like Springsteen. I was also struck by how much punk seeps in but goes unnoticed. Like the Replacements (who were essentially doing “cock rock” songs in the vein of The Rolling Stones), they just have the rock ‘n’ roll mastered and inherently understand the punk, the punk is somehow minimized, yet you recognize how much it influences the D.I.Y. work ethic. The best rock single I have heard in years is their song Sequestered in Memphis (the chorus lyric goes “subpoenaed in Texas, sequestered in Memphis” - a brilliant roots rock rave-up). It went completely unnoticed. Too bad. One review I read defined their sound through contrast; I paraphrase: The Hold Steady sound like Guided By Voices obsessed with Bruce Spingsteen instead of The Who. Their entire catalog is great with nary a weak song anywhere, but this new one should have garnered as much pop press as critical press.

My next big shout out about brilliant rock ‘n’ roll is the reissues of Mission of Burma’s entire catalog. The great late 70’s political atonal punk of this seminal band is fantastic. If you are fans of their contemporaries from across the pond, Gang of Four and The Mekons, you will see why America trumps those limey bastards every time (just kidding, I love Gang Of Four and The Mekons). Check out the three core albums of 1) Signals, Calls and Marches, 2) VS and 3) The Horrible Truth about Burma. All the reissues contain extra material, plus a DVD of concert appearances.

I have all The Replacements’ albums on CD already and, of course, vinyl. I miss listening to Tim and Let It Be on vinyl (I no longer have a turntable). I did get the one 2008 reissue of Let It Be, and it is beautiful, mastered like the vinyl and all the albums have extra tunes. Again, I will mention the core albums of the reissued catalog 1) Let It Be 2) Tim and 3) Pleased to Meet Me. The Replacements are one of the most important left-of-the-dial, proto-punk and college radio acts from the 80’s, and in my opinion, are a transcendent rock ‘n’ roll band. Four-man-rock-and-roll-band at its sloppy best, I would be sure new fans would find the investment gives quite the return. Turn it up to 11 if you have a decent stereo and think your speakers can handle it.

The runner-up to The Hold Steady-Stay Positive and probably as good is from Rock & Roll Hall of Famers The Pretenders. The new album that came out in the fall is called Break Up the Concrete. The last melodic roots rock rockabilly punk album they made was Pretenders I. Key phrase is roots rock. I’ve known Chrissie Hynde has loved American music, including country music, for a long time. But this album covers the great American canon of rock ‘n’ roll styles ranging from blues to country to roots rock to punk and all points in between in a seamless album of those distilled styles. It is also reminiscent of their Learning to Crawl album. The tunes can be quick, raw, and stylish at the same time. It is said that they returned to Ohio in order to record the album (Chrissie long ago moved to the UK). Grab this gritty masterpiece. This album defines why they are in the RRHOF. It RAWKS!

Joan Wasserman, releasing albums under the name Joan as Police Woman, makes achingly beautiful, jazz-inflected, blue-eyed soul, righteous pop songs. She did exactly this with her album Joan as Police Woman - To Survive, the follow-up to 2007’s Real Life. These songs are so tender and yet can be so bittersweet that you want to experience the joy of the music and cry out in grief at the same time. Joan Wasserman is also a multi-instrumentalist who not only sings, but plays guitar, piano, violin and miscellaneous percussion. Her arrangements are like the sweeter, romantic David Bowie albums such as Young Americans and even Hunky Dory. Her arrangements can be sparse with just her and a piano, or sweeping and majestic with a whole band. She has songs just made for the likes of Rufus Wainwright who duets with her on To America (touching without being whiny which is so often the case with Wainwright’s voice). Indie pop at its best. I regretted that I did not get Real Life until 2008, so I was unable to review it last year, but that also was, and is, a fantastic debut album.

For indie pop females, my next really big pop favorite of 2008 was She & Him-Volume One. This is a collaboration between actor/musician Zooey Deschanel and musician M. Ward. I wish I knew more about M. Ward, but I don’t. I know that he is associated with the alt country independent singer-songwriter movement. These are all original compositions by Zooey, except for a cover of Smokey Robinson’s You Really Got a Hold on Me and The Beatles I Should Have Known Better. I also thought it was interesting, too, if you recall your Beatles discography, that they covered You Really Got a Hold on Me on With The Beatles album. This album is seamless, and Zooey covers the sound of dripping early 70’s steel guitar-driven Billy Sherrill-produced top 40 country to her favorite posturing of late 60’s girl group (with her own backing harmonies) pop songs. There are some Phil Spector-like string arrangements that will make you weep for a simpler time in pop music. She also does some pretty good channeling of Billie Holiday style jazz/blues singing of that particular era. The country stuff though is amazing. I was surprised she could pull that style off without making fun of it. If you want to give her a chance without buying the album, you can always rent the movies she’s sung in like Elf or The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. I have to thank NPR’s Terry Gross, host of Fresh Air, who interviewed Zooey, not as an actor but, as a musician to promote this album. That’s how I got turned onto this brilliant indie pop album. I hope there will be a Volume Two.

It wasn’t one of my super favorite albums that came out this year, but The Raconteurs’ sophomore effort, Consolers of the Lonely, was a much better effort than their overhyped and disappointing debut Broken Boy Soldiers. It rawks better and the songwriting is more in the fashion that a supergroup of this caliber should be writing. The White Stripes’ Jack White guitar playing is more on display, and the passion that was lacking on the debut finally appears on this good rock and roll record.

I’m not sure if I like the soundtrack better or the movie better, but I like both a lot. Various Artists-I’m Not There (Movie Soundtrack) is the soundtrack to the fantasy biopic of Bob Dylan featuring various artists covering tunes from the film. Everyone does a great job. This is so much better than the tribute albums because they cover so much ground from Bob Dylan’s life. Plus the artists are big, and the ones who aren’t big are tremendously influential…Willie Nelson, Calexico, Stephen Malkmus, Jeff Tweedy, The Black Keys, The Hold Steady, Los Lobos, Eddie Vedder, John Doe, Sonic Youth, Cat Power, Yo La Tengo, Tom Verlaine and Richie Havens, to name a few, on this 34-song soundtrack. It is a must-own for any Bob Dylan, indie rock, or general music lover fan. I LOVE this album. And the film was great, too. Just having a who’s who of indie rockers performing so many of these classic tunes was just terrific. This album is as timeless as the artist. My favorite is the version of Goin’ to Acapulco performed by Jim James with Calexico. Cool!

Being a big fan of Imus in the Morning (Don Imus), I am obligated to give a very good review to Various Artists-The Imus Ranch Record. The main thing that needs to be mentioned is this is a project that Don Imus put together where 100% of the proceeds go to the Imus Ranch for Kids with Cancer charity that Don Imus and his wife, Deirdre, run. It is a real live working cattle ranch at Ribera, New Mexico. Although Don probably loves the classic rock that he was around for so much of his radio career, his primary interest now seems to be classic, progressive and new traditionalist country music. I am sure that’s why I like the record so much. Each of the artists cover a song on the album for a total of 13 tracks. Old regulars of his show are on it like Delbert McClinton (covering Lay Down Sally), Levon Helm (covering You Better Move On) and Dwight Yoakam (covering Doug Sahm’s classic Give Back The Keys to My Heart). Vince Gill gives a great performance of the classic A Satisfied Mind (popularized by Porter Wagoner) to round out the 13th track. The only glaring artist left out of this was Kinky Friedman, although I think he had a lot to do with pulling in the people who perform on the album. This album should please people on any side of the Country & Western canon. The album is on New West which is one of my favorite record labels and certainly the label of progressive country today. It seems it’s a given, from what Imus says on his show, that Volume II will be forthcoming.

Speaking of Imus, he introduced me to Hayes Carll and his 2008 release Trouble in Mind. He’s a Todd Snider-style folky funny man, but he is really a great Texas Troubadour singer/songwriter that moves easily from roots rock to hard country. He’s also got that wry sense of humor that James McMurtry has. The jokes often become a little too real to be laughed at. John Prine is another comparison I’d make. Don’t get me wrong, Hayes is not a copycat and he possesses his own unique style. Songs of drinking, longing, unrequited love, lost love, recovered love and more drinking. The opening song is called Drunken Poet’s Dream (“I think I’ll take me some mes-ca-leen”). He does another good one called Bad Liver and a Broken Heart, and ends the song cycle with She Left Me for Jesus (“when we were makin’ love she kept shoutin’ his name” and “if I ever find Jesus, I’m kickin’ his ass”). So yeah, he’s witty. If you have a passing interest in Austin music, you get a good 2008 survey with Hayes. I thank Imus for turning me on to him. I’ll say this was my favorite new roots rock and country album.

Similar to Dylan, Neil Young has been releasing buried live recordings/bootlegs from his personal vault for the last few years. The previous two releases of Live at The Filmore East, March 6 & 7, 1970, and Live at Massey Hall 1971, are beautiful historical documents. The new album Sugar Mountain Live at Canterbury House 1968 is no less historical. Essentially a solo outing for him to test material that would later become classics captures Neil Young between his stints with Buffalo Springfield and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. The really great part of this classic release is 5 or 6 tracks of him telling stories to the audience…very intimate and very rare. This is a crucial recording where you get to hear near first-time solo performances of Expecting to Fly, The Loner, Sugar Mountain, Broken Arrow and Mr. Soul, to name a few. This is a must-own.

In my interest of all things punk, I have a real penchant for those bands that mix their punk with traditional Irish songplaying and songwriting. This is certainly the case with Flogging Molly’s Float. They are not as brutal as the Dropkick Murphys and not quite as traditional as The Pogues, but they mix it just perfectly. The beats are fast and they mix the traditional instruments very well with the three chords of a fuzzy rhythm guitar. I think those of you who find the Irish style of whiny sentimentality soaked with whisky and warm Irish ale while having your genitals rocked off should very much like this album. Hey, March 17 is right around the corner, and these guys will probably leave a little tear in Shane McGowan’s bloodshot eye.

From Kansas City Mizz-ou-rah hails The Wilders. For several years, they have been doing traditional ol’ timey fiddle music, pre-WWII country & western, a little bluegrass and a mish-mash of folk rave-ups. Their live show is spectacular toe-tapping, booty- shaking good time. I say just try and not dance at one of their shows. Plus, before they send you home, they will send you to traditional country gospel church so that you make it home okay, guilt-free. This year, they updated their sound and modernized the songwriting on Someone’s Got to Pay, a brief song cycle based on main singer and songwriter Phil Wade’s experience of sitting jury duty at a murder trial. I quote from the liner notes he wrote: “I was un-nerved by a nagging familiarity in the story. It was an old time murder ballad come to life.” I love murder ballads, by the way. They are creepy and dark, and often morally bankrupt in the sense that often there is no reason for the murder except killing for the sake of killing. The Wilders do the Louvin Brothers proud with this album, while simultaneously updating their style for folk music in the 21st century. Good job. (I also like the name of their record label “Free Dirt”.)

For all you indie pop rockers, I submit my favorite indie pop album chance discovery MGMT - Oracular Spectacular. I heard this everywhere, including car commercials using the single Electric Feel. Hard to pigeon hole this duo, as they are kind of the anti-emo guys making fun of that whole scene, probably while being listened to by the same people they make fun of. They have a real TV on the Radio sound, or maybe even the Scissor Sisters. They sing in that high, almost electronic, falsetto voice. But Jesus, the tunes are super catchy. I got turned onto them watching their video for the single Time to Pretend. Lots of pop electronic keyboard repetition, but that’s okay, it works great. Hey, I like punk rock, for Pete’s sake. This was a nifty indie pop album that you’ll play over and over. Wash, rinse, repeat.

A lot of people really liked the new Randy Newman album called Harps and Angels. It’s impressive. I liked it, too. It is a lightweight, hopeful and positive version of his classic album Good Ol’ Boys. And if you are familiar with Sail Away and 12 Songs, then you know how he does folk, country, pop standards, Tin Pan Alley, blues, New Orleans, barrelhouse piano, and rock ‘n’ roll, not just on one album, but often in the same song. He’s one of the great humorists: a Mark Twain of sorts who is a great watcher of humanity without necessarily interfering with it. He can be biting and acidic, then witty and compassionate without calling attention to the irony and sarcasm that might be the main theme of any particular song. Randy is not breaking any new ground here, but singer/songwriters like this don’t need to because they are so far ahead of the rest that they sound groundbreaking in 1968 or 2008. Harps and Angels is a great rumination on the state of America today by one of its best and keenest observers.

Much of Van Morrison’s records of the last 20 years were re-issued in 2008. From 1990, Enlightenment really does it for me. I remember wanting this as a Christmas present way back then. I wanted it for the song In the Days Before Rock ‘n’ Roll, a paean to early 40 and 50’s radio that gave audience to pre-rock ‘n’ roll music naming famous and obscure international broadcasting hubs. Pretty neat I thought. The album also has a deep spiritual message to it (hence the title) that manifests itself in songs like Youth of 1,000 Summers and, of course, the title track. It’s not the best Van Morrison album, but a really great reissue that deserves subsequent listens.

Ladies and gentlemen, although you may not have been the huge glam rock fan that I am, besides the Willie Nelson box, the best compilation in 2008 had to be the Mott the Hoople/Ian Hunter Anthology-Old Records Never Die! I have always been a casual Mott fan, but this anthology combines the best with the best. The Ian Hunter tunes (someone my wife has always been into) were a real treat because I was not as familiar with him as a solo artist. But believe me, he is a great rock ‘n’ roll songwriter. You get the best of the Mott the Hoople years with Ian Hunter’s solo career. People always forget he penned and performed the classic tunes Once Bitten Twice Shy (an anthemic song made popular by hard rock band Great White) and the Drew Carey Show theme song, Cleveland Rocks. This album is on a new upstart reissue label called Shout Factory which is rivaling Rhino Records compilations and reissues. I won’t even go into all the cool artists that Shout Factory has reissued with the original artists handling the ownership (which they returned to many). But check ’em out. Anyway, back to Mott the Hoople and Ian Hunter…pick this 2-CD set up of 32 songs (16 per artist) and remember: 70’s FM radio used to be the coolest thing around! Oh yeah, all the Mott songs that you will want are here. This is not to discourage you from getting their production catalog, but you might start here.

My “redneck girlfriend”, as I like to call her, has come out with another winner. Lucinda Williams - Little Honey is a pretty great album, if for nothing else than her duet with Elvis Costello called Jailhouse Tears. Now I will not say that this is her best album, but it is pretty darn good. The more albums Cindy makes, the more hard rock she becomes. Remember when she was a folk and country singer/songwriter and penning tunes for the likes of Mary-Chapin Carpenter? The highlight for me, besides the Elvis Costello duet, has to be her cover of AC/DC’s It’s A Long Way To The Top (If You Want To Rock ‘n’ Roll). All the 13 tunes are pretty hard-edged and bluesy. Some of her country and folk sounds come through, but I am pretty much convinced that this is purely a rock ‘n’ roll album. I also got exposed to a new marketing ploy with this album. If you buy the album and put it in to your CD ROM drive, it takes you to an exclusive website where you can download another 30 minutes of songs free…which I did. If you are a fan, you will really enjoy this album. Try and catch her live if you can. Cindy, if you read this…call me. My wife (whom I love) will never have to know. Hell, she may even be interested herself, although she thinks you look a little stinky.

Guest review of Alejandro Escovedo’s Real Animal by Christine Zeigler (Tim’s wife):

Alejandro Escovedo’s Real Animal was one of the standout releases of 2008. I didn’t get much new music, but this was one that was well worth it. I have been a fan since his days with his brother, Javier Escovedo, fronting The True Believers. My husband says it is called roots rock, but some of these songs on Real Animal have a realistic hard driving edge that I love, reminiscent of the True Believers. Rather a punk sensibility, and that’s OK, too. A few of the songs are slower and more contemplative, such as Sensitive Boys and Swallows of San Juan. That is one of the things I love about Alejandro Escovedo’s songs: not only does he have a memorably plaintive heartfelt voice, but the words are so beautiful and meaningful, they could stand on their own as poetry, and I guess that’s the mark of a great songwriter. The first song Always a Friend is an infectious hard-driving song and gets into your head as it was meant to, because this is the song I first heard on the Adult Alternative radio station, KBXR 102.3 FM, I listen to from time to time. I thought, I love that song, what is it? Introspective, yet rockin’. Oh, it’s Alejandro Escovedo, after hearing the announcer say his name. Gotta have that. Enlarging upon the album’s name (I’m old and dated so I still say album), Real Animal, there’s a track called Real as an Animal, that my husband told me was written about AE’s living with Hepatitis C. I didn’t pick up on that: I just thought it was about the real animal that lives in all of us... and maybe that's his point. Even though the song is about Escovedo’s own personal experience, he's such a gifted songwriter that he makes it a universal song that speaks to everyone. Now the song called Golden Bear could easily be speaking to his Hep C with these lyrics: “There’s a creature in my body, there’s a creature in my blood, don’t know how long he’s been there, or why he’s after us, Golden Bear is burning down, Golden Bear is burning down, oh, why me?” Another tune that addresses mortality is People (We’re Only Gonna Live so Long) with the lines “We’re only gonna live so long, we still got time, but never quite as much as we need.” Wow, a shot of reality hitting you right between the eyes, but in a wonderful musical way. Also have to mention his paean or shout-out to old sloppy garage band music because he mentions “Louie Louie” in two songs: Nuns Song and Real as an Animal. Escovedo was in a band called The Nuns so maybe it has something to do with that. Both are great rocking raveups! Also have to give mention to Chuck Prophet being on this album, a great gifted singer/songwriter in his own right. Plus, I’m a sucker for stringed instruments in a rock ‘n’ roll band, and by stringed instruments, I don’t mean guitars: I mean the unconventional kind like violin and cello that are usually found in an orchestra, or a small stringed chamber ensemble. Including violin and cello in some of these songs gives them that rich multi-layered sound I love, where you go: “Oh, what’s that sound? It’s different. I love it!” Enough of my rambling about this great CD (there I said it): now go out and get it for yourself. You’ll be doing yourself a favor because Real Animal is a real treat for your ears and spirit.

So ends this addition of my year end record reviews, folks. This is a sample of what I am considering doing with having my own music blog where maybe next year I’ll just send you a link. If you like this as a blog, spread it around, give me feedback, and let me know if you think I should pursue this. If not, I won’t be insulted, I’ll just cram your e-mail at the end of next year with more crap about music that you may not care about.

Tim Van Huss

Together Through Life

Bob Dylan's Together Through Life has been a constant in my deck. In a lot of ways he seems to be channeling Howlin' Wolf. Sure there are several influences here. Not to mention Bob Dylan informing Bob Dylan. Although not as ground breaking as Love and Theft and especially Modern Times, Bob carries the blues idiom he has been working on so hard in to a real fruition here. I think when Dylan was a folk singer he was influenced heavily by blues music and channeled it where he could. I think it is a great boon to all of us when an artist like Dylan can come full circle and shed the expectations that old time fans have of the 'folk singer' or the 'protest singer' or the Christian Bob period, et al. It seems like Dylan can do what he wants because he really enjoys showing how a master is both influenced and pushes forward. I am not saying that he hasn't always done that...now it seems attitude-wise though he does it for the sheer sake of having fun.

All the songs are strong on this album. Dylan has never skimped on having crack musicians on tour or on his recordings and this is over half of what makes these songs and his late period stuff in general so good to me. The first track called Beyond Lies Nothing is a slow burn blues walk that gets you prepared for what's to come. Track three called My Wife's Hometown sounds like the channeling of Howlin' Wolf's Taildragger or even Smokestack Lightening. Track seven called This Dream of You has a nice Tex-Mex-y country sound to it that most would not find familiar in Bob's repertoire. But as with all Americana that he does he makes it his sound and it works great!

I picked up the deluxe version of this CD which includes an interview disc DVD which I have not viewed called Roy Silver - The Lost Interview. But the real extra-special coolness CD extra is a recording of Bob Dylan's satellite radio show called Bob Dylan's Theme Time Radio Hour (in this recording 'Friends & Neighbors'). Bob does the programming of Americana both familiar and obscure surveying items anywhere in time of the past 60 years. Best part, he talks and does great setup for the tunes.

Anyway I suggest picking the Deluxe Edition of Together Though Life.

Neko Case Middle Cyclone

I love Neko Case. I love Middle Cyclone. It was the first 2009 album I bought. There's nothing wrong with the fact that it sounds exactly like Fox Confessor Brings The Flood and has the same cast of characters (The Sadies, Calexico's front dudes, Garth Hudson from The Band, Kelly Hogan, Jon Rauhouse). The themes aren't dramatically different except for the fact that the themes have shifted from animals to weather. The important thing to remember is that She is beautiful, She has a siren's voice, She is a GREAT songwriter and She has red hair. The songs are just sweeping pop gems that will not have radio airplay. I particulary like the opening song This Tornado Loves You. Let's not forget the hidden track of approximately 30 minutes of crickets chirping and peepers burping. It helps you relax. It is real, real gone. And check out that cover: total feminine cool.

Blogging is hard

Well, this blogging isn't as easy as some would have you believe. I haven't even talked about music yet. I thought this would kind of write itself. I was wrong. Something I thought was funny that I heard Bill Maher talking about during the writer's strike a couple of years ago was a feature on his show called 'Bloggah Please!' He was essentially following some blogs for his show as filler since all the writers were on strike.

The first day

Originally I wanted to call this blog "everybody knows this is nowhere" after the Neil Young album and song. It was taken already, no big deal though. I decided to call it what it really is which is my personal obsession with music and other entertainment. Passive exsistance, true, but you have to have something to believe in and have fun with. Here's mine. Hope you like it. Tootle-loo.