New Music 2015 - Part 26 - back across the ocean

I was always intending the theme of new, or new to me, music from North America to be the theme of a few upcoming posts. I have been listening to plenty of it, across various genres, recently.

It is with much happiness that I heard the condition of Joni Mitchell is improving. It is with sadness that I heard that, on Friday evening, Robert Lewis Jones Sr. and the original drummer with Southern Rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd,was killed in a car accident. He had already left the band before three of its then members were killed in a plane crash in 1977.

I have a 12" single of 'Freebird', it was on the band's 1973 début album, and I'm giving it a spin right now:

If I leave here tomorrow, would you still remember me?

For I must be travelin' on now, for there's too many places left to see.

Southern Rock hasn't been such a big deal, certainly viewed from a UK perspective, in recent times but maybe that isn't the way things will remain. This next band was going to figure here regardless of the foregoing. It is not the same, I don't suppose they ever intended that, but it is worthy of a listen I think.

I guess that, as regards to this band, I'm a bit slow to the nose-bag with this release.

Staying down South, but changing genre, this news is to me as good as it gets.

Amy LaVere and Will Sexton's 'Hallelujah I'm a Dreamer' is released today, 7 April,  in the US as a download by Archer Records. It is said the CD follows on 19 May. As for UK/Europe release I just don't know - yet. I'm on the case not least because it is a live album by one of the artists that I would most like to see live but thus far never have.

This is the track-list:

• Cricket (At Night I Can Fly)
• Dreamer
• Day Like Any
• Cupid's Arrow
• It's the Thing to Do
• Last Rock 'n' Roll Boy to Dance
• Overcome
• Red Banks
• Tonight Will Be Fine
• Lesson
• Tennessee Valentine

It would be remiss of me to leave music from Canada out of this post. This looks intriguing too and Annabelle Chovstek is coming to the UK soon and not least to Marnhull Acoustic Sessions on 10 May. She brings a new LP 'Be The Media' into the equation too.

I don't know a whole lot about it yet but it is said to see her largely play electric guitar (of 1957 vintage) and that it includes a cover of fellow Canadian Neil Young's 'Like A Hurricane'. It was notably covered by Jason Isbell and The 400 Unit on the 2013 live LP 'Live From Alabama'. On that subject Jason Isbell has just about finished work on his latest studio LP that is the follow-up to 'Southeastern'.

That said, this is the track-list I believe:

1. Be The Media
2. Jerusalem
3. Black Hole
4. This Night
5. Carnal Delights
6. You Can Come Now
7. Like A Hurricane
8. Inside The Scream/Screen

Here is the title track from it:

Runaway's Diary - revisited!

To revisit an album on its day of release might seem a rather strange thing to do. Here is why I am doing it. I mentioned Runaway's Diary only a couple of months back. It was released only this week but Amazon has been bombarding me with the suggestion that I should buy it...
This was more correct than Amazon could know. I have had it for much of the last week, it cost slightly less but probably more of that went to the artist. Here it is (the digipack CD version).

It is signed too, but musically it is everything hoped for and that matters much more.

LaVere has over the course of her four solo LPs not been the most prolific of songwriters but when she does it tends to work well. Cupid's Arrow from the 2007 LP 'Anchors and Anvils' is a good case in point, but so is the title track. Rarely are they cheerful songs but that is of little consequence.
There are five on this disc and two co-writes with Tim Regan and they don't suffer by comparison with the four covers, one of which is Townes Van Zant's 'Where I Lead Me'. This also makes a point that I wish to raise, which is that like several other Americans of her generation, she is a fine interpreter of the songs of others. My first impression is that I like 'Runaway's Diary' more than the LP 'Stranger Me' (2011) that was released between these. I think however that I must now revisit that.
I never did get to the end of the lyric of the song Anchors and Anvils although I promised to. That's not a problem with Runaway's Diary as the CD comes with a lyric booklet.
Finally, you need to read a review written by somebody far more knowledgeable. The one that I proffer is this.

New Music 2014 - Part 10 - Roots and Americana

I have been listening to all kinds of music lately and as you might have guessed that has included much that goes under the heading Roots and Americana. I'll start with three forthcoming albums that have come to my attention but perhaps I should add that I already have all the previous albums by these artists; to some extent I am therefore a convert already.

Jessica Lea Mayfield - 'Make My Head Sing', released on 2 June 2014 in the UK.

   

This is the third album by the Ohio native who first came to my attention at End Of The Road Festival 2010, playing the Tipi stage and previously quite unknown to me. Her albums thus far are 'With Blasphemy, So Heartfelt' (2008) and 'Tell Me' (2011), both released by Nonesuch Records, and were produced by Dan Auerbach. I'm not sure about the details of this one yet, as I have only recently found about it, except to say that it is released by ATO Records. This label is snapping up many artists in this broad music space including Caitlin Rose and Hurray For The Riff Raff who have peppered this blog over the last few years.
It is certainly a dramatic and very deliberate departure from the aforementioned albums. An interview in which she explains how it came about, and the history behind it, is here:
http://noisey.vice.com/blog/jessica-lea-mayfield-i-want-to-love-you-video-premiere

The appearance here is true of this next artist Amy LaVere too, but she is the only one of the three that I have never seen play live.

'Runaway's Dream' is released by Archer Records on 26 May 2014 in the UK.

    

It is a concept album but, before you click elsewhere in fear and loathing, be aware that this has been done before to some acclaim: In my book Anaïs Mitchell's 'Hadestown' (2010) is a case in point.
This one is however loosely based on the story of Seasick Steve, with whom she toured extensively as support, and also her own few days as a teenage runaway. To that list I shall add another bridge - Alynda Lee Segarra of Hurray For The Riff Raff and in particular the song Ramblin' Gal from the album 'Watch Out Mama' (2012). Their new LP 'Small Town Heroes' was released in the UK, again on ATO Records, on 31 March 2014. It isn't one of the three included in this post because I have mentioned it already.
    
The last of the three is this and the only one by non-American artists but like its predecessor, The Lion's Roar (2012), it was made with Mike Mogis at his studio in Omaha, NE. It is all a far cry from the time I first saw First Aid Kit live in the old-style Tipi stage at End Of The Road Festival. That is no bad thing because the potential was clear for all to hear.
   

'Stay Gold' is released by Columbia on 9 June in the UK.

It remains to be seen if First Aid Kit can sustain the momentum that was generated by 'The Lion's Roar'. One thing that I can say with certainty, having seen them play again on the Garden Stage at EOTR 2012, is that First Aid Kit certainly does not disappoint live.
Maybe I need to buy a ticket to Green Man Festival in August - I've never been before, so that would tick another box.

2013 isn't over yet...

If you think that my last post, and the ensuing hiatus, signalled the end of my blogging in 2013 then think again:

The casual chemistry between Amy LaVere and John Paul Keith makes it seem like this happens all the time - boy meets girl, boy plays girl some songs, boy and girl form band.

“It’s not that we really decided to have a band” as Keith tells it.  

“It’s just that by the time we got done having coffee she’d decided we were a band and was already booking shows for us. By the time I got home, we were exchanging ideas for band names.”
   

If you want a cover version then try this. Eddie Berman, from southern California, and Laura Marling take a shot at Springsteen's 'Dancing in the Dark'.

   

To be fair that is only just a part of it, even as regards cover versions, but this is one I love.

I'm particularly interested to hear about your own favourite covered-songs this year, be they recorded, live or whatever. You are welcome to comment here or via Twitter @thoughtsonmusic.

2011 in Music - Albums - Part 1

No real change in presentation here from last year; two lists of albums strictly in order alphabetical by artist. The difference is that this year I'm going to publish the lists first and, only when you have had a week to consider (and comment - see below), shall I add the links and my thoughts on why they are included and, perhaps, others are not.
In no way is this intended to be a balanced list, far from it in fact: It is quite utterly biased to what has caught my attention in a lasting way in 2011.

• Adele - 21
• Amy LaVere - Stranger Me
• Austra - Feel It Break
• Bella Hardy - Songs Lost and Stolen
• Emily Barker - Almanac
• Esben and The Witch - Violet Cries
• Jessica Lea Mayfield - Tell Me
• Lanterns On The Lake - Gracious Tide, Take Me Home
• Seapony - Go With Me
• Thea Gilmore - John Wesley Harding
• Widowspeak - Widowspeak
• Yuck - Yuck

Please feel free to add comments, queries, suggestions or questions. It is what this is all about, whether negative, positive or simply mystified!  All comments are moderated (by me alone, so you know that I read them) and while I prefer it that you can put your real identity to your piece, because you should believe in what you are saying and be prepared to stand up and be counted, I will sometimes sanction the publishing of "anonymous" comments. Comments that are defamatory, offensive or simply irrelevant in content or context will not be published regardless of source.
I'll attempt to answer valid questions and comments either in comments of my own in reply or in a more general 'round-up' post.

New Music 2011 goes Americana again.

This is something that is too good not to mention straight away. 
  

July 19 is the US release date for Stranger Me, the third studio album from Memphis, TN based singer songwriter Amy LaVere. It is, as were the preceeding ones, released by independent label Archer Records.

I have, quite literally, only just found out about it and currently know nothing more. I shall be equally surprised and disappointed if it has not been worth the wait since Anchors and Anvils (2008) and the amazing Died Of Love EP (2009).  I'll add more, and relevant links, asap but for now I just wanted to share the excitement!
It will be available, at least in the US, on vinyl too. Count me as being on-board. UK CD & d/l date is slated as July 4 and the track listing is as follows: 

• You Can't Keep Me
• Red Banks
• A Great Divide
• Often Happens
• Lucky Boy
• Tricky Heart
• Stranger Me
• Candle Mambo
• Cry My Eyes Out
• Let Yourself Go (Come on)

The album is produced by Craig Silvey whose recent production credits include 'The Suburbs' - Arcade Fire (2010) and 'Suck It And See' - Arctic Monkeys (2011).

Pointless Drinking - Amy LaVere - lyric

This is the other song about drinking to which I alluded in my post yesterday.  It seems quite simple just listening to it, as do many of the songs on the album 'Anchors and Anvils', until that is you decide to try and dissect them.
  
Pointless Drinking
Pointless drinking. Where does it end? Where to begin?
Who are your friends? Who are your foes?
You'll never know, long as you go.
  
Pointless drinking: 'Til it seems they're all speaking poorly in Spanish
Who do you wish would totally vanish?
It's only you and all you can do.
  
I'm not an actor but I act like I am
I'm really awful but act like I'm not
Pretending my days hold the value of gold
They only hold one thing and it's all that I've got.
  
Pointless drinking. Keeping my healthy dose of resentment
Keeping me waking with an empty repentment
Keeping me broke, broke as a joke.
  
Pointless drinking took all the days that I should have felt young
Took all the joy from the songs that I have sung
Took me a while, took me a while.
Oh I'm not a hater; I love you all so
But I look at myself and I don't really know.
Can I dig myself out of the wreck of my past?
Will I ever unharden and stop showing my ass?
Will those eternal bartenders ever stop filling this half-empty glass?
  
Pointless drinking. Hate the effect, even more hate the cause.
Hate to admit that I'm tragically flawed
I would just keep going but that's past recall.
  
Pointless drinking. Why do you do it? You always go through it.
Drink to forget all the times that you blew it
Think everyone knows, think everyone cares.
  
Pointless drinking. Keeping you drunk on your dreams of great heights
From the bottom to the top and back down overnight
You know it's not right. You know it's not right.
  
Pointless drinking. It's just the one thing your overachieving
Feels like you never will stop believing
That you'll never win, you'll never win.
  
Maybe one day you might.


This song is credited to Paul Taylor in the album notes but the whole album is quite an underrated gem. Anchors and Anvils (2008) is one hell of an album and so is the Died Of Love EP (2009). I've struggled with the lyric to at least one other track, 'Overcome' from it already and, but for the fear of attempting it, I'd try others too - especially the incredible and bipolar 'Cupid's Arrow'.
  
I gather that she and her band are just about to tour again (in the US to start with) and hope that this means a new album is imminent...
Amy LaVere is another artist that I would dearly like to see live.
I feel like I deserve a drink now...
  
A drink to make me brave?  I'm going to attempt 'Cupid's Arrow' - but not until tomorrow! I think I know the basics and also most of the tune already, both of which should make it easier than 'Pointless Drinking' and if I just have to listen to that slide guitar part a hundred times for my sins then I'm clearly not concentrating on the lyric!

I'm On My Own Side Now

The title is taken from one of the best songs on one of my favourite albums of last year by one of the most impressive new live artists I saw.  This version of the lyric is a close as I can get to that which she performed at EOTR 2010 (twice, on different days and on different stages). It is almost identical to the version on the album 'Own Side Now' though the live instrumentation was somewhat different.


Own Side
I'm goin' out on the town
Said I'm tired of chasin' you down
And it's not my right
To always push you around
I'm on my own side now


Who's gonna take me home?
Cause I don't wanna go it alone
Who's gonna want me when I'm just somewhere you've been
Who's gonna want me now?
And who's gonna take me home?


I'm gonna find me true love
Said I'm through asking you if you knew, love
How much it meant to me?
How it was meant to be?
And how it all feels empty?


Who's gonna take me home?
Cause I don't wanna go it alone
Who's gonna want me when I'm just somewhere you've been?
Who's gonna want me now?
And who's gonna take me home?


Who? [repeat x4]
And who's gonna take me home?
Cause I don't wanna go it alone
Who's gonna want me when I'm just somewhere you've been?
Who's gonna want me now?


Who's gonna take me home?
Cause I don't wanna go it alone
Who's gonna want me when I'm just somewhere you've been?
Who's gonna want me now?
And who's gonna take me home?


I'm goin' out on the  town
Said I'm tired of chasin' you down
And it's not my right
To always push you around
I'm on my own side now.


Own side now.


What I particularly like about it, and many of her other songs too, is its ambidextrous balance of emotion - it is outwardly-assertive indignation and gnawing self-doubt rolled together.  It is far from the only example in her song-writing canon - Learning To Ride, the first song on this, her début album proper, is another.  But then, listening back to the 10" vinyl mini album 'Dead Flowers' that is similar, for all its cover versions also themed likewise, and includes the splendid self-penned - and her live audience-sing-a-long anthem of the summer gone - Answer In One Of These Bottles.  I'll add the lyric for both as soon as I can.
This latter song also has an interesting parallel in a track by another of my favourite artists out of Nashville - Amy LaVere.  I believe that she has been busy writing and recording new material with her band for a forthcoming third LP...  The song to which I am referring, however, is from her 2007 (2008 in the UK in effect) album 'Anchors and Anvils' and is the track Pointless Drinking, credited to Paul Taylor.  That is verging in to New Music 2011 territory, but why not?


As a sting in the tail, I'm now well and truly cross with myself to have not managed to see 'She Keeps Bees' at EOTR 2009. I have read so many good things about the Brooklyn duo lately...  and they are readying their new album too.
  

Note added March 8, 2011:

Caitlin Rose is now confirmed to appear at EOTR 2011.

Note added February 3, 2011:
[If you are currently at The Scala, 275 Pentonville Road, London, where 'She Keeps Bees' is supporting Smoke Fairies this evening then you can buy it pre-release.


More Caitlin Rose posts:
Docket - Caitlin Rose - lyric
Live at End of The Road 2010
Answer In One Of These Bottles - Caitlin Rose - lyric
Shotgun Wedding - Caitlin Rose - lyric


  
Pointless Drinking - Amy LaVere - lyric

Vinyl, for those who have asked...

It pains me to say that, while I'm delighted to discover that so many are still so interested in vinyl, I am often not able to provide the answers requested.

If I could find 'I Speak Because I Can' - Laura Marling (2010) on vinyl then I would have let you know. This is one of the ones that I am asked about most often. I hope that Virgin/EMI will take the hint...
Amy LaVere vinyl is something I can't find either - but recently discovered that is sought-for too and if you know something about any of this please copy it to me too!

Vinyl is not dead but it needs nurturing; independent labels and the likes of us are the future and we have to keep the faith, continue to fight for it and while is not going to be something for just for the short term, that only makes it more worthwhile. It is true that, while not twenty years ago they were commonplace in charity shops and similar, they now deserve a good home.

Demand can make a difference, something that is becoming increasingly apparent, but there are rarities from times long gone that await discovery in dusty attics and the like. If it is offered to you then just accept it gracefully; you can decide what is junk at your leisure and you might just get a surprise.

If you merely wish to listen to 'The Book Of Taliesyn', and I expect that quite reasonably that will be the limit of your ambition, then it is available to download, or on CD should that take your fancy, for a very modest price.

This may appear to be little different from that quite common, but it is up to us to save them from landfill. Yes it is vinyl (T-107) but not all that it seems. In the early days (1967) Deep Purple signed to the small US label Tetragrammaton because the band could not land a deal in the UK. Tetragrammaton went bust just months after this, Deep Purple's second album release, in 1968. Major-label history followed but that was not without its quirks either...

The World Is Not My Home, but the good get better...

Another day, another EP but this time it is one quite genuinely from across the Atlantic and it was released on CD in the US - on April 1, 2009 - again on Archer Records. The title track is a cover of the traditional 'Railroad Boy (Died of Love)', 'Lazarus' is a take on a traditional lament and 'Green Grass' is a cover of the Tom Waits song and that is just half of it.

Added: Thursday, 14 May:

I'm sorry that this post sort of ended prematurely. I was tired and I published it rather than saving it. Thanks to whoever added a comment to this asking for 'links' today and I assume that it was to this post you were referring. If not please let me know and I'll try to fix that.

If you want to buy or legally download 'Died Of Love' here are some links:

US & UK CD (cdbaby.com)
US Download (amazon.com)
UK Download (amazon.co.uk)

I do not know of any UK distributors of the CD version but independent music distributor cdbaby do shipping to the UK very well and at competitive prices. They publish reviews, both their own and those written by customers, too.
For more press reviews of Amy LaVere, see here.

Dog days, please smile down upon us...

This follows from a post I added last year, Soothing Music for Days That Bode Ill, which apparently still has resonance with others judging from the number of times that post has been visited in the last couple of weeks. It is no secret that I often still feel the same way too and, while I can recommend those albums no less a year later, the world has not stayed the same.
Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan have since released Sunday at Devil Dirt and the remainder of the lyrics are here. As one of 'The Gutter Twins' Mark Lanegan has also released an album with Greg Dulli, which is another that I would like to hear but either the music, or merely my appreciation of it, has expanded again.

Empty dish is still sitting where I'm gonna leave it.
This lamp hasn't been lit in quite a long while,
The wick doesn't reach what's left of the oil.
And the rain is coming and I'm overcome.

These bad newspapers they pile up unread
Dogs gaze out the windows, I know how they feel.
Adventure! adventure! Or sit by the door?
Open, open sesame! I'm overcome.

Figurines, dripping faucets, laundry and dust,
I hate to leave this a mess but I must....

Keepsakes can be anchors and anvils and such.
Like pianos and pets and the people we love.
I can't change the world from this place on MySpace
Spiders tag walls with their names in this place.

Figurines, dripping faucets, laundry and dust,
I hate to leave this a mess but I must...

Oh its never a clean break when you're trying to leave
But song birds need homes in live oak trees.

Maybe I've just not got the right idea about what I think they might be but I can't yet figure out the lyrics for the two lines that follow:
I hate to leave this a mess but I must...

Can anyone help? The song remains however, despite the time I've spent trying to figure those lyrics, one of my favourite album tracks of 2008 and it is 'Overcome' from the album Anchors and Anvils by Amy LaVere.

Leaving that topic aside for a moment, here is another album that rather appealed when I read about it. Some might say that it is slightly twee folksy Americana and had I simply invented that which follows, just to amuse myself this evening, I know that you would not have believed me.

The thing is that I didn't tell fibs - indie label Static Caravan released it - and it is VAN161.

It is of the most improbable heritage. The two acts that combined to produce this met on MySpace. Neither of them come from America and, at least at the time of its release, never the twain had met!
One of them, Phelan Sheppard, is a Londoner signed to Leeds-based The Leaf Label best known in this blog as the home of Parisienne Colleen (Cécile Schott) and her beguiling ambient/electronica, while the other half of the equation is moomLooo in Tokyo.

Latitude and the US influence...

"Is Latitude a typically British Festival?" was another topic that we ended up talking about while there, not that we ever came to a definite conclusion about this, and in so-doing I think we probably got it just about right!

In some ways it is, particularly in the non-music arenas, but although the music programme is certainly predominantly given to UK artists it is not overly so and to prove it this was a truly wonderful choice.

Did it matter that she actually forgot the lyrics to one of her songs? Not at all! In fact she seemed more embarrassed about the genuine applause that greeted her admission of fallibility than that for her earlier confession concerning her nervousness of playing completely solo, and at a festival too, for the first time in over a year.
Latitude was a perfect venue and in the middle of the set she took to the grand piano to showcase a new song, which became three new songs and the second of them was particularly good I think, but what really struck me was that the way she plays the piano made it sound rather harp-like. I wonder if she writes songs on piano, at least primarily, and then transposes and elaborates them on the harp? Whatever the truth about that she was awesome and without-doubt one of the top-three acts I saw at Latitude 2008, which leaves you to guess the other two.

We like to complain that the US market does not, generally speaking, readily take to UK artists. That is true but I think we have a little soul-searching to do here because we are guilty of this too and almost certainly for the same reasons. This is taken from a message I sent to my niece earlier this afternoon:

That said the current wave of US talent doesn't stop there. One of my favourite albums of the moment is not yet on general release in the UK but was released by Archer Records (ARR 3319272-2), a US independent label, in late 2007. Anchors and Anvils is the second album by Amy LaVere who writes, sings and also plays a rather unusual instrument, upright bass, which is like a double bass but even larger!
The album is a seamless mixture of new tracks and a few covers (including Bob Dylan's 'I'll Remember You') and is, on the face of it, a fusion of delta blues and Americana but for the use of Wurlizer, gypsy violin (that lends an eastern European folk influence) and various unusual guitars, plus of course upright bass, which makes it near indefinable. While I dislike none of them I find these two tracks particularly impressive:

• Tennessee Valentine
• Pointless Drinking
  

Now I also want her first album - This World Is Not My Home - too!

It is supposed to be summer... Virtual Festival 3

This has to do with festivals both real and imaginary. On the real side, the latest Latitude 2008 update shows that a "special guest" will play on the Obelisk arena at midday Sunday. I can think of several that would be fit for purpose. There is however one, amongst them, that I would have deemed the most improbable...

...and that is Joanna Newsom.

She is often pigeon-holed as freak folk, which may or may not be a good call, but one thing is certainly true --- there are few artists, in this or any other genre, for whom the instrument of choice is a double-stringed acoustic harp.

One thing that I totally failed to predict for 2008 is just what an influence American music would have on me. Some of it I have mentioned already but, if more examples were needed, here are another couple of albums on my 'Want To Listen To' list.

She sings while also playing upright bass at the same time.

This is yet another, from New York, that has come to my notice in the last couple of days.

Perhaps the most wonderful thing about it is that these three albums have all been released on North American independent record labels. Three different ones as it happens and artists and labels such as these deserve our support.