It had to happen. For months I have been awaiting the inevitable crash of the old hard drive and kept telling myself to back the damn thing up, but do you think I could put one brain cell in front of another and then another and then another to accomplish said task? Hell, no. So I hit the bathroom on a gloomy afternoon and come back to a computer screen filled with error messages with lots of click/cancel icons and think, crap! Oh, I had another computer in the wings. It was the lost information I mourned. Lots of mp3s--- demo tracks sent to me by hopeful musicians, interview transcripts, albums downloaded at the behest of PR people and managers, notes for possible future columns--- all gone.
The worst loss, of course, was my recording program. I have (er, had) a program for recording over the phone which I used with regularity. I recorded interviews with people I had somehow tracked down and talked into a short talk, some new and intriguing and some older and historically important--- to myself, at least. I lost chats with
Wayne Berry,
Steve Young,
Wayne Proctor (
We The People),
Paul Curreri,
Devon Sproule and many more. Thing is, I did have backup on many of those. I had sent transcripts of interviews to most of them and the attachments were saved in my gmail account.
The music, though? Pretty much gone. Most I received through
yousendit and the window of opportunity had long since expired. Some I received directly from PR people or musicians and I suppose I could approach them again, but I won't. Sigh.
Yep, I'm pretty much starting from scratch. In a way, it is not a bad thing at all. I had buried myself in work and probably needed a new start. Every day I spent feeling guilty about the mountain of work I had to do and my inability to make a dent in it. Music sat stagnant in my files because I had no time to get to it. Reviews and articles started in a fit of energy lay untouched after hitting the brick wall. It is nice to put much of that behind me. It is like waking to a nice sunny day after a week long drunk. Sober, at last.
That sobriety has led me on a circuitous path that I am now enjoying. You see, much of that music was saved on my mp3 player, so I still have access. Not to all, but to some. That some I am now listening to and if I ever thought I had been writing out my ass, I should hear it. I am happy to report that all I hear is the outstanding music I had written about in glowing terms--- buried, perhaps, and unknown. But outstanding.
This is a discovery. My discovery. Not of the music I have found and loved, but the fact that it has stood a test of time--- not much time, but enough. This is the story of my mp3 files--- music downloaded for review--- most of which I had already reviewed. This is a look back to what music could be, if only we let it.
BRIGHT GIANT.....
I have probably written more about
Bright Giant than any artist or band outside of
Research Turtles and what the tracks on the old mp3 tell me is that that is warranted. The entire new album (
Kings & Queens of Air) is on the mp3, plus five rough tracks from those sessions, meaning basic tracks minus the final touches. There is a rough, guttural sound to the band--- distorted guitars, snarky feedback, primal drums--- which I find gripping. Des Moines. Who knew? The most intriguing factor in these recordings are the subtle differences between rough track and finished product. Listening to
You Saved Me before the vocal touches shows me how much a small change can make. It's raw but good in its earlier form, but after the background vocals (which are very much in the background) it becomes downright magnificent. When band member
Josh Davis sent me the rough tracks, explaining that they were unfinished, I asked him what more he could do. Little did I know.
Kings & Queens of Air, by the way, is one of the best albums recorded this year--- if you like primitive and raw. Worth it for the guitar and feedback alone.
JENNY GILLESPIE.....
Finding Jenny was a fluke. I had stacks of scraps of paper on my desk, each scrap a note from the past, and was forced to clean the desktop one day. I found a list of artist names on one and searched the web sites and there she was. At the time I'd scratched her name on that paper, she had had a new album released,
Kindred, and I had probably meant to send a request for a review copy. Somehow it slipped through the cracks and I was forced to listen in hindsight, if you will--- to an album a year old or more. With good music, I am always finding out, time is not of the essence and I slipped into the ooze of what others termed "shoegaze" and have since refused to leave the hot tub. Her voice is floating and ethereal on most tracks, the music smooth and relaxing. The Wurlitzer helps (for those who are unaware, the Wurlitzer piano is an instrument of incredible beauty when used properly) as does the production. Gillespie stays just far enough from formula to make the album listen worthy and close enough to make you feel at home. She recently went to New York to record a new album. I thought, anyway. I see that she has a new EP,
Belita,
available through her Facebook page. I have yet to hear it, but I will soon because, wonder of wonders, there is a link to a free download. Damn, but life is good! But wait! Lest we forget,
Kindred is still there for the taking. Just sayin'.
THE DEMENTIANS.....
When I stumbled on to these guys, I found myself in uncharted waters, and yet they weren't. For one thing, this is only one guy,
David Jacques. Suffering from the typical Canadian inferiority complex, I suppose, he decided to market himself as a full group, and it does sound like it. He lives north of rap and south of pop, a strange combination that he sometimes makes not only palatable but engaging. Imagine crunching guitar, intricate pounding rhythms and Beach Boys-smooth harmony vocals
with
Gruppo Sportivo-quality lyrics (GS were the kings of lyrical content in the seventies). Original and solid. From silky pop (
Dedicated To You) to crunching rock with touches of trip hop (
Pistol Pete) to a combination of the two (
Middle Class Revolution), this guy nails one after the other. He even tosses in an updated version of
Rock 'n Roll Hoochie Koo (and why not? Everyone else is doing it). Is this guy good? All I know is that every time I hear him, I'm impressed as hell. Check his music out on
his Facebook Page.
MORRISON & WEST.....
For those who have been looking for that modern old-timey sound,
Cahalen Morrison and
Eli West have something quite excellent. Think
O Brother, Where Art Thou and you're getting close. They combine
Stanley Brothers,
Louvin Brothers,
Blue Sky Boys and the modern side of
Tim O'Brien and
Chris Thile to make their own modern sounds from the past. Not long ago, they released
The Holy Coming of the Storm, a very impressive collection of what I assume are all original compositions. The sound is sparse--- mostly acoustic guitar, mandolin and banjo--- but sparse is partially what the sound was always about--- a direct unamplified channel to the eardrum. The vocals are spot on, the playing remarkable and the end result a coup, of sorts. To hear it, you would think it really was the holy coming, storm or no. A big, big thumbs up.
OLLABELLE.....
There aren't that many bands which I would drive miles for, but when
Ollabelle played the
Alladin Theater in Portland, Oregon this past summer, I was there with bells on. I had spent the previous couple of months diving into their new album
Neon Bluebird as well as solo projects by band members
Glenn Patscha (
Songs From the Jefferson Highway) and
Byron Isaacs (
Disappearing Man). The show was incredible (
read my take here) and I walked away (well, I
drove away, anyway) with a new respect for
Ollabelle and their depth of talent. While I am slowly backstepping through their catalogue, I return to
Neon Bluebird again and again. There is something about a band which can take traditional gospel, blues and even traditional pop music by a composer like Stephen Foster and make them all not only palatable but ear worthy. Their originals? Outstanding.
KEITH MORRIS & THE CROOKED NUMBERS.....
I'm glad I don't live in Charlottesville PA because I would go broke attending shows. Pound for pound, that city has more quality musicians than anywhere outside of New Orleans and Texas.
Keith Morris is but one example, but an example of note. He recently released a new album titled
Love Wounds & Mars and dragged me back to the early seventies without dating himself (but like he always tells me, somebody has to). He writes in a style which defies genre, which means that you pretty much have to label him rock if you want to get close. He put together an outstanding band and they handle the songs with deft hand. This is nothing like his first effort,
Songs from Candyapolis, which has much more of a dramatic flair. This is just straight on rock--- some harder, some softer--- which seeps into your skin after a number of listens. Worth it for the background vocals on
Bordertown alone. Right now, available from limited sources, but soon available worldwide.
Ask Keith.
ELEPHANTOM.....
I used to spend hours surfing through cdBaby in search of music, which is where I tracked these guys down. They had an album available for free download (
Swim Toward the Sun) and I bit. There is so much potential in this band, I hardly know where to start. Musician-wise they are solid, though they have a tendency to wander on
Swim. It is an adventurous and
worthy wander, though, and I have found myself sending emails occasionally to see what they have been up to. The good news is that they are close to completing a new project. If they continue in the direction set by
Swim, it will be most welcome to my ears. The music? At times, it has a classical edge mixed with jazz and at others they dally around the stage (meaning theater-oriented tunes). While they do not sound at all like
Babe Ruth, their approach does remind me of that band on their second release,
Amar Caballero, in that they are sometimes pushing envelopes to an extreme. Stay tuned. BTW, the link above is for their new website. It looks like they need to tweak a few things, but it is still worth visiting.
PAUL CURRERI.....
While this is not about Curreri's new and excellent album,
The Big Shitty, one of my top picks for this past year, it is about just how eclectic Curreri can be. A little over a year ago, Paul sent me mp3s for a project he had been working on titled
Greenhorns, V.1. No notes, no nothing. I listened and I enjoyed. It was a strange mixture of jazz, new age and roots music
which I found intriguing but confusing. Turns out that
Greenhorns is a group put together by artists (musicians, painters, filmographers, photographers, etc) to support young farmers. Maybe an attempt at taking the Green Movement up a notch? I checked out their website and know as much now as I did before. I don't have the time to delve into the real reasons behind the group, but the music I heard was evidently written for a film being produced by that group, more than likely to help support that group. It bugs me that I don't have time to research it (I am really behind on my music projects), but it seems noteworthy. I hope it is. Paul put in some major time and effort producing the music.
THE BIG MOTIF.....
I could have deleted
The Big Motif from my mp3 player long ago, but I didn't. I didn't because the two EPs they have released (
The Daily Motion and
Does It Weigh Heavy) are fantastic albums for what they do. On the first, what they do is trip around bar music, giving their songs a heavy and jazzy edge not unlike that of
Moby Grape about the time of
Live Grape. By the time they handed us
Does It Weigh Heavy, they had morphed into a heavier three man band, guitar upfront with pounding rhythm section. Not as heavy as Hendrix but as heavy as, say
Bugs Henderson during his days with
The Bugs Henderson Group. It is an onslaught without the massacre. I listen to these guys because I love the raw feel of the bars and of the better three man bands. I listen to these guys because they are
good. From Colorado. Must be the thin air.
The hardest part of being a writer and writing about something you really love is that you are allowed revisitations only occasionally. In a way, the computer crashing set me back but in others, it allowed me to enjoy music I listen to all too occasionally. These are but a few. May the gods keep your computer safe and running, but may you have the experience I have just enjoyed.
