New Releases on
RARadio:
"Darkness" by
Leonard Cohen; "Sweetbread"
by Simian
Mobile Disco and "Keep You"
from Actress
off the Chronicle movie
soundtrack;"Goodbye to Love" from
October Dawn; Trouble in Mind 2011
label sampler;
Black Box Revelation Live on
Minnesota Public Radio;
Apteka "Striking Violet";
Mikal Cronin's "Apathy" and "Get
Along"; Dana deChaby's
progressive rock
MUSIC REVIEW:
Review of an "Edited Trio" House Concert: the sum of the parts…
The Edited Trio, from
left, is Brett Perkins, Mark Davis and David Zink. ► Performing
"Don't Know How to Get Through"
By my reckoning Songwriters (capital S)
are a mysterious bunch!
The process of receiving the offerings
they make is equally mysterious!
I have listened to a bunch of songwriters over the years & some grab me
& some don’t!
I grew up in a “golden age” of pop radio:
late ‘50’s, up to MTV!
I heard classic FM radio “abornin” & have
spent time “studying” the work of many of the best songwriters in
detail.
I had money when the first spate of CD
reissues came around & then found YouTube.
I know Artists that I count as friends
who are excellent songwriters & will us them as the benchmark with which
I make other critical judgments. The bar is high!
Three of these writers simply “stopped
the bus” when I put their discs on & in these cases I left them in my
“morning” disc player for 30+ days! I didn’t take them out until I
wanted to hear some Dylan.
The edited Trio (www.editedtrio.com)
is/was such a revelation!
Comprised of three strong solo songwriters:
David Zink (whose disc Popzinkle I reviewed here)
Brett Perkins & Mark Davis.
Brett & Mark were unknown to me when I
accepted the invite to a House Concert. They both have serious bonafides
& the requisite websites…check them out.
Each of the artists first did 3 songs
solo w/Brett going first.
Right out of the box he stunned me:
clear, strong voice, compelling lyrics. For You is v melodic & set the
bar for the 2 songs that followed. I will miss hanging out w/you (?) is
a great song & I couldn’t find it referenced on his site(?) He said he
had been referred to as “the pop guy” of the group. I bought his 2002
disc Danish Weather & couldn’t be happier w/the choice: the songs
are melodic & adult & have good, sometimes great arrangements, hooks &
his influences are “on his sleeve” throughout the proceedings…good
stuff!!
David Zink followed. I had heard David
perform in this very room & his album PopZinkle was one of the
discs I played for 30+ days. (read my review @ RARWRITER.com). My wife &
I have enjoyed it on a number of road trips. David did not disappoint.
Drawing from 4 discs he played a v strong harmonica prelude to a bluesy,
rockin’ tune, followed w/song from Popzinkle (Wings of Love) &
closed w/a song about stalking a woman…just kidding….David uses dynamics
extensively & is v animated & has a sly humor that is hard to ignore….a
great singer & player topped only by his thoughtful, highly melodic
writing…he’s the bluesy rocker of the group but much more indeed!
Mark Davis then came on: the brooding
rocker indeed!! Strong, sweet voice (he’s John Lennon on a good day)
w/much soul in his delivery & lyrics. He opened w/ Everybody’s Born
Believing & I was a believer a few bars in!! How can someone make a song
with a title like Black Cloud into a song you want to hear again? 2 of
his solo numbers are on disc ‘because there’s nothing outside’ & I
purchased ‘immaculate’ also & there is much to recommend on any/all of
his discs….his 3rd solo number ‘me & my old man’ is on immaculate & like
any really good song it “works” w/out the great arrangement on the
disc…he uses string sections to incredible effect and a bunch of
acoustic piano & makes the songs sound there is no other way they should
be performed. This is a song/studio tour de force at once likeable but
bearing up well under repeated listening.
The Trio came on after a short break &
made magic as soon as they opened their mouths…using vocal unison &
shifting lead voice, shifting harmony combinations they sang melodic
music w/2 guitars & Brett playing percussion (Cajon) to good effect.
They capoed the guitars (ala Peter, Paul & Mary) to produce specific
sonic effects for strong songs. All this material is the result of a
group process & indeed has another identity from music on the individual
discs. We listened to the 5 song edited Trio disc on the way home &
found the few studio additions (string section, bass) to be welcome
adornments to well crafted songs w/interesting melodies, well arranged
vocals & lyrics that speak to grownup concerns & the spiritual quest
inherent in our lives. We have been thrilled by groups of men singing
together over the years & these guys join the ranks w/a strong freshman
effort!
You can help these guys produce the next disc by going to
www.editedtrio.com & checking out the options for support.
Pax, Doug
Douglas Strobel
is a life-long musician and music educator and a regular
contributor to RARWRITER.com.
_________◊_________
Mohammed
Fairouz
Straddling Eastern and Western
idioms, Mohammed Fairouz, one of the most frequently
performed composers of his generation, has emerged as a
force on the musical scene. Praised by the New York Times as
"warmly sympathetic", his music has been received at venues
such as Carnegie Hall, Boston’s
Symphony
Hall, Kennedy Center and internationally throughout the
U.S., Europe, the Middle East and Australia. He has received
commissions from Musicians for Harmony,
Northeastern University, Imani Winds, Cygnus Ensemble,
Counter) induction, Alea III (Boston University), Alwan for
the Arts, the Second Instrumental Unit, among others. The
composer will have six world premieres in 2011-12, including
his Piano Sonata No. 2 “The Last resistance”, his first wind
quintet, a clarinet quintet, a multi-movement choral work
called "Anything Can Happen", an extended art song, and his
third symphony. An album of Fairouz’s chamber music,
entitled Critical Models, is slated for release on
the Sono Luminus label on November 15. - Stuart
Wolferman.
Vintage Blue is a 5-piece alt-rock
unit out of Chicago, who recently released their debut LP, Strike the
mics.
Vintage Blue has talent, but this debut
effort lacks focus, as if it is a compilation from tracks recorded by
several different bands that may previously have been fronted by singer/songwriters
Ben
Bassett and Ryan Tibbs. One of them writes a little more pop,
while the other veers toward coffee house acoustic. One sings like a guy
who could one day have a hit, the other not so much.
Vintage Blue is the subject of the debut
of "A&R with RAR", an audio-visual
presentation in which yours truly comments while listening to the CD
tracks. This is a unique opportunity to form your own reactions to
Vintage Blue while reading review comments.
Check it out.
The Edited
Trio:
Brett Perkins, Mark Davis &
David Zink. Live at Blågårds
Apotek, Copenhagen, Denmark
in February 2011.
__________________
Jinx
Jones Has A New CD that Finds Rockabilly to Be Alive and Kicking
He (Jones) is spectacular, not only
in his considerable pyrotechnical flash, but in the soul and depth of
his musical choices. He is a studied composer, a player who truly owns
his instrument. He is also a clever lyricist and an accomplished singer.
There he is a role player, performing the lyrics almost in character,
and this is a character we all recognize as Mr. America, our Everyman.
He works with his hands and strength of his back, and he leads with his
heart...
Steven L Smith seems to get that
sometimes guys go into those bars where mostly
naked women swing around on poles and, after a
few drinks, they fall in love with them. This
seems counter to the instincts that draw men to
these clubs in the first place, but then men are
weak and drink is strong, and the instinct to
care for vulnerable souls is even stronger,
one’s own and those of others. “I fell in love
with a woman on a pole,” sings Smith in the
opening track of Outside of Tupelo, his
2010 release on his Vinyl Record Company label.
It is the kickoff to an album’s worth of
top-flight country with white whiskers and a
sure step.
Sam Broussard Reviews Steve Conn's New CD Beautiful Dream.
Sam Broussard -
Musician/Writer.
There’s a lot of good music
out there these days. Powerful sounds burnished by sonic landscapers,
singers who can emote at the heights of passion all day, musicians who
can play anything and do, and amateur musicians who create mood
cathedrals on laptops that sound just tossed off, pulled out of a pocket
and dropped into your inner spaces, mixing in with the howling winds of
your very own and very unique void.
Diana
Olson on Heinali and Matt Finney's Internet Collaboration
Ukrainian composer Heinali and American poet
Matt Finney have never met each other in person. Their internet
collaboration has produced two acclaimed eps and now they are working on
their third album.
APEYGA, the three-piece heavy-jazzadelic
unit out of Culver City, Southern
California, who recently released Ring,
their third LP, is an indie film producer’s
mother lode of disturbing, disorienting,
sonic assault; just the kind needed for that
FEAR.NET gore fest my wife keeps on all
night long, so that now I can’t sleep unless
I hear women screaming in the background.
“San Francisco was our first stop
along the way, where Dad started up a blueprint company. They sent him
to Los Angeles to do it all over again and that’s where my musical
odessey (sic) begins.” So reads the liner notes on A Postcard from California, Al Jardine’s
sentimental labor of love chronicling his boyhood journey to California
and his serendipitous meeting, at El Camino College, with a kid named
Brian Wilson.
Whatever it is about guns, and songs
about guns, that has always resonated in the soul of man – it was a
staple on AM radio in songs from Johnny Horton, Marty Robbins, and
others when I was growing up in Middle America – it has clearly put its
stamp on Australian singer-songwriter Steve Lee.
When Mia Michaels
says that - "You're Stupid" - on the hit TV show "So You Think You Can Dance" it is
a supreme compliment. Unfortunately, when I get told that same
thing it is invariably because of something I have done. I am
not astonishing in any way, just "stupid" in the traditional
sense.
This edition I have
posted a review of country showboat Michael ONeill's new
CD (click here to read the review),
and "stupid" is what he thought I was when I commented on the
strength of the players on the recording, prompting this instant
message from his iPhone:
"Holy shit the players on this
record are the best of the best,
Dony Wynn drums / Robert Palmer - Brooks and dunn
Will sexton bass. Charlie sextons brother
Lloyd mains Dixie chicks
Carl bromel -my morning jacket
Goggle these folks
Randy korhs"
So chastened, I did
some "Goggling" and learned about some great talent in the
process.
Dony Wynn, who plays drums on
Ain't Leavin' Your Love, is most closely associated with
the late Robert Palmer, with whom he played for years, but he
got his first big-time tour experience as a teenager playing
with Dr. John. Other of his associations have been with Brooks
and Dunn, Steve Winwood, Patti LaBelle, and Wang Chung. He has
one of the coolest Websites around at
http://www.donywynn.com/
, which is packed with clever design, intelligent writing and
memorable lines, like this: My good friends, Jim Keltner and
Jeff Porcaro, supreme drummers each, both subscribed to the fact
that beatmasters are old souls who were drummers in past
lives..."
That
introduction of Will Sexton as "Charlie Sexton's brother"
is understandable as a context setter - Charlie Sexton came to
prominence as guitarist with Bob Dylan through Dylan's
resurgence in the late 1990s and into the new millennium.
Charlie has gone on to produce Lucinda Williams, tour with Eric
Clapton, and launch his own band, Arc Angels, with Tommy Shannon
and Chris "Whipper" Layton of "Double Trouble" (Stevie Ray
Vaughn's rhythm section). For all these reasons, Charlie
Sexton's name has resonance, but he and his brother Will
(pictured left in a photo by Todd Wolfson) share a provenance in
Austin, Texas, where Will performs constantly, and both were
taught guitar by Austin legend W.C. Clark, the "Godfather of the
Austin Blues". Will and Charlie were in the same band, "Will and
the Kill", which in 1988 released an album on MCA that was
produced by Joe Ely and featured Jimmy Vaughn on some tracks.
Will went on to collaborations with Waylon Jennings, Roky
Erickson (psychedelic), and punker Johnny Thunders. He was in
the "New Folk Underground" and he co-produced Ruby James with
his brother Charlie.
Lloyd Maines is the
multi-instrumentalist producer of the Dixie Chicks, and
father of Dixie Chick Natalie Maines. He was a member of the Joe
Ely Band and played with Guy Clark, Butch Hancock, Terry Allen,
Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Golden Bear, and other Texas musicians. He
was a member of The Maines Brothers Band in the late 1970s and
early 1980s and has contributed to alt-country releases,
including Uncle Tupelo's Anodyne and Wilco's debut, A.M..
The Grammy Award winner has produced and recorded Butch Hancock,
Rita Hosking, Jerry Jeff Walker, Charlie Robison, the Lost Gonzo
Band, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Wayne Hancock, Owen Temple, Robert Earl
Keen, Terri Hendrix, Pat Green, Roger Creager, Two Tons of
Steel, and The Waybacks.
Carl Broemel
is an American rock musician. He currently plays the guitar,
pedal steel guitar, saxophone and sings back-up vocals for the
Louisville, Kentucky band My Morning Jacket. Broemel was listed
among Rolling Stone's "20 New Guitar Gods" along with My Morning
Jacket front man Jim James under the title of "Skynard-Art
Theorists." He released a solo album titled "Lose What's Left".
(from Wikipedia)
Randy
Korhs came to prominence playing with Hank Williams III and
Tom T. Hall, and later the Canadian band Continental Divide.
Other associations have been with Holly Dunn, John Cowan
and Dolly Parton. In 2001, he released his debut solo album, A
Crack In My Armour, on Junction Records. In 2004, Parton
recorded a duet with him, “It Looked Good On Paper,” for his
third album, I’m Torn, on Lonesome Day Records. It spent
eight months on the bluegrass charts, rising into the Top 5. To
date, Kohrs has played on more than 500 albums, ranging from
those by such legends as Hank Thompson and Jerry Reed to current
and recent chart-toppers Trick Pony, Dierks Bentley and The
Wreckers. In the bluegrass domain, he has recorded projects for
Larry Sparks, Rhonda Vincent, Mark Newton, Bradley Walker, Lou
Reid, and 3 Fox Drive, among others. (Largely from his
MySpace site.)
Slide master Roy Rogers
has a new CD, Split Decision,
now available at www.roy-rogers.com in the Music Store and no
doubt soon available more widely. This new release features new
Americana, blues/rock and jazz influenced tracks. Regarding the
new release Roy says "Split Decision is more about the
songwriting and, in addition, I aimed to create a much more edgy
sound and cross-genre style. I really wanted to craft strong
stories and mix it up a bit with a lot of very different guitar
tones and textures - and still have those solid roots-oriented
grooves. My influences are from all over the map. I love
combining different elements on a recording, but ultimately it
is about 'the feel' of the total record. I hope that shines
through in a positive way for people."
Roy played a much talked about show
at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival that received a
glowing review in USA Today. That no doubt contributed to a
strong debut at #13 on the Billboard Blues chart.
Mohammed
Fairouz
Symphony
Hall, Kennedy Center and internationally throughout the
U.S., Europe, the Middle East and Australia. He has received
commissions from Musicians for Harmony,
Northeastern University, Imani Winds, Cygnus Ensemble,
Counter) induction, Alea III (Boston University), Alwan for
the Arts, the Second Instrumental Unit, among others. The
composer will have six world premieres in 2011-12, including
his Piano Sonata No. 2 “The Last resistance”, his first wind
quintet, a clarinet quintet, a multi-movement choral work
called "Anything Can Happen", an extended art song, and his
third symphony. An album of Fairouz’s chamber music,
entitled Critical Models, is slated for release on
the Sono Luminus label on November 15. - Stuart
Wolferman.
REVIEW:
Jinx
Jones Has A New CD that Finds Rockabilly to Be Alive and Kicking
Steven
L Smith rocks Memphis-country with Outside of Tupelo
Diana
Olson on Heinali and Matt Finney's Internet Collaboration
APEYGA
Takes Jazz Fusion to a Deep, Disorienting Pleasure
Douglas
Strobel Reviews PopZinkle, the Latest from Pop-Folky David Zink 
Al
Jardine takes a nice ride back to the pretension-free era of '60s rock
Aussie
Steve Lee offers a paean to the equalizer with I Like Guns
That
introduction of Will Sexton as "Charlie Sexton's brother"
is understandable as a context setter - Charlie Sexton came to
prominence as guitarist with Bob Dylan through Dylan's
resurgence in the late 1990s and into the new millennium.
Charlie has gone on to produce Lucinda Williams, tour with Eric
Clapton, and launch his own band, Arc Angels, with Tommy Shannon
and Chris "Whipper" Layton of "Double Trouble" (Stevie Ray
Vaughn's rhythm section). For all these reasons, Charlie
Sexton's name has resonance, but he and his brother Will
(pictured left in a photo by Todd Wolfson) share a provenance in
Austin, Texas, where Will performs constantly, and both were
taught guitar by Austin legend W.C. Clark, the "Godfather of the
Austin Blues". Will and Charlie were in the same band, "Will and
the Kill", which in 1988 released an album on MCA that was
produced by Joe Ely and featured Jimmy Vaughn on some tracks.
Will went on to collaborations with Waylon Jennings, Roky
Erickson (psychedelic), and punker Johnny Thunders. He was in
the "New Folk Underground" and he co-produced Ruby James with
his brother Charlie.
Randy
Korhs came to prominence playing with Hank Williams III and
Tom T. Hall, and later the Canadian band Continental Divide.
Other associations have been with Holly Dunn, John Cowan
and Dolly Parton. In 2001, he released his debut solo album, A
Crack In My Armour, on Junction Records. In 2004, Parton
recorded a duet with him, “It Looked Good On Paper,” for his
third album, I’m Torn, on Lonesome Day Records. It spent
eight months on the bluegrass charts, rising into the Top 5. To
date, Kohrs has played on more than 500 albums, ranging from
those by such legends as Hank Thompson and Jerry Reed to current
and recent chart-toppers Trick Pony, Dierks Bentley and The
Wreckers. In the bluegrass domain, he has recorded projects for
Larry Sparks, Rhonda Vincent, Mark Newton, Bradley Walker, Lou
Reid, and 3 Fox Drive, among others. (Largely from his
