New Music 2015 - Part 45 - Andrew Combs - All These Dreams

I had intended to mention in my post on Monday that I was planning a week away from posting but I forgot to do so. Maybe that was as well.
This LP has been on my mind for a while now but finally I have given it a really good listen. It is fairly low-key and possibly not the easiest, most accessible to like from the get-go. It may take some time and I guess the album artwork even suggests that.

It is however well worth the effort, at least in my opinion. I was planning to wait until next week to post about it.

Then I discovered this collaboration today whereupon any other option was simply a non-starter. Andrew Combs plays End Of The Road Festival 2015.

New Music - 2015 - Part 3 - Caitlin Rose - Been Thinkin' 'Bout You All The Time

This is quite possibly the least new, new music of 2015. It however satisfies the criterion and then some. To be honest she can do no wrong as far as I'm concerned.

It is, so we are lead to believe, just another demo. 
Written with Willie Breeding of 'The Breedings' some time ago.

New Music 2014 - Part 39 - Caitlin Rose - Cold Answer

There are a few for whom one always needs to keep an eye open and a ready ear. This is one of them.

Cold Answer was co-written with Matthew Perryman Jones in 2013 and recorded in early 2014.

New Music 2014 - Part 33 - Caitlin Rose - Gemini Moon

I certainly wasn't planning on writing a post this evening. Then again you never know what might happen. Some things, many things indeed, I could happily have just left to my current mañana instinct. This simply isn't one of them. It is exactly what I needed to hear.

If I haven't worked out the lyric before I go to bed then I shall be somewhat disappointed with myself.

This is supposedly just a demo recording. If that is true, or even if not quite so given the premise of the song and the tease that she is, then the third album should be quite something.
It is now revealed that this song was written with Justin Hayward-Young of The Vaccines. On reflection that makes a lot of sense.

EOTR 2013 - acts to see live again.

For all that I say that festivals are largely about seeing acts that I haven't seen live before there is always the pleasure of seeing one's favourites for a second, third or.... *whistles* ...time.

One of those was The Staves, three sisters from Watford who specialize in close harmony vocals, that I first saw at Deer Shed Festival in North Yorkshire in July 2012. In the meantime they have recorded an album 'Dead & Born & Grown', released by Universal - so at least the major labels are finally sensing the way the wind is blowing. Here are Camilla, Emily and Jessica on the Garden Stage at EOTR on Sunday afternoon.

This next I had only seen as recently as Truck Festival 2013 but I was happy to see their quite esoterically British show all over again. As a matter of fact, as often such things are, it was better the second time around because I noticed so many things that had passed me by on the first listen. I was right at the back of the Big Top stage and so I couldn't take pictures, which allowed me to give my full attention to the performance. This picture is therefore one taken at Truck Festival 2013 and then I found it difficult to capture what makes Public Service Broadcasting worthwhile watching (and listening too; I had the EP before seeing them live).

Public Service Broadcasting, Market stage, Truck Festival 2013.

    

I am interested to see in what direction J. Willgoose Esq. and Wrigglesworth go next but I am quite sure that, given their awareness of history and its context, they have long ago considered this issue. The Yorkshire Post wondered, somewhat less charitably, about this too following a gig at Leeds' Brudenell Social Club.

  

I have to admit that the first time I saw The Leisure Society play live I was slightly underwhelmed but, perhaps sensing this was odd, I bought their first album anyhow. I saw them again last year and, as timings worked out that way, for a third time at EOTR 2013. At last I get it!
To be honest 17:15 - 18:15 on the main stage Saturday is not prime time; well in one way it is... after 36 hours many people are suffering from mid-festival lassitude, thinking more of food than music.  The food, and the choice thereof, at EOTR is pretty good too.

The Leisure Society - Woods Stage - End of The Road Festival 2013.

  

 [post in progress - to be continued soon but I am getting hungry]
  

There will be now be an intermission. There is nothing wrong with your TV set.

Please do not adjust your eyes or ears.

That was only supposed to be temporary but the

 cauliflower cheese was good, even if I say so myself. 

I shall finish with the artist who, as far as I am aware, I have seen more times playing live than any other. For readers of this blog she probably needs no further introduction. She played twice at EOTR 2013 and I saw all of both sets. The first was on the Woods Stage as part of her on-going UK tour. That is admirably summed up, though her apparent ennui is likely affected rather than genuine, by this review from the London Guardian of her subsequent show at Shepherds Bush Empire. It is no secret that she is not a fan of large venues and early stage times (17:45 start on the Woods Stage). Similarly you can have all the recorded music she has made, and I pretty much do, but it just isn't the same.

She reappeared about 1:15am Monday morning at an unannounced (at least in the printed programme) set on the small, tented Tipi Stage...

... and this truly was Caitlin Rose live: The real deal.

    

If I still had the slightest doubt that I would buy a ticket for End Of The Road Festival 2014, without any knowledge of the line up, it had well and truly vanished by this point. I have one and 'early-bird' tickets had all sold out less than 48 hours after their release on the Tuesday. It is fair to say that that is a public vote of confidence on quite some scale. See you at EOTR 2014?

New Music 2013 - Part 5 - The Stand-In (again)

I have mentioned this album once already. This is the second track to be released from it:


'I Was Cruel', with its mandolin and pedal-steel, would be worth it for that alone. It is actually a whole lot better than that might imply. It is the second track on 'The Stand-In', for which a vignette of what I believe to be the LP cover is in the side-bar and the track-listing as follows:

• No One to Call
• I Was Cruel
• Waiting
• Only A Clown
• Dallas
• Pink Champagne
• Golden Boy
• Silver Sings
• Everywhere I Go
• When I'm Gone
• Menagerie
• Old Numbers

Will it be available on vinyl? Well, it would be cruel not to... and I shall be on the case.

New Music 2013 - Part 2 - The Stand-In

February 25, 2013 (UK and Europe, Names Records) and March 5, 2013 (US & Canada, ATO Records) sees the release of the second LP from Caitlin Rose, 'The Stand-In', and the follow up to the 2009/2010 début 'Own Side Now'. I shall be disappointed to a huge extent if this new album does not feature on the lists that I will be writing this time next year... that is a measure of the weight of expectation I attach to the twelve tracks on this release.  Is that unreasonable? In the circumstances I believe not.
More to follow soon - in the meantime here is a picture of the artist in question that I took on the smallest stage at End of The Road Festival 2010.

  Caitlin Rose, The Local stage, End of The Road Festival 2010.

  

The lead song is 'No One To Call'.  Here, if I've got the code embedded correctly, is a link to a stream of it:

Here is a thought: she is playing Bristol 'Fleece' on February 26.

New Music 2012 - Part 21 - Record Store Day 2012

One blog that I always follow is Too Much Music (is a good thing). 
Here's an item, a Record Store Day 2012 limited edition 7", that we came to discuss only very recently: It is, basically, Alex Turner's lyrical sensibilities filtered through Caitlin Rose's astonishing avidity for making cover versions her own.

Round 2: over to you Alex.

Shotgun Wedding - Caitlin Rose - lyric

I should have gone to bed by now but, when somebody asked if I could add any more lyrics of songs by Caitlin Rose, this was irresistible.  I've been meaning to do so for ages and it is another of the self-written tracks from the 2009 'Dead Flowers' EP and, typically so, it pulls no punches.
  
Shotgun Wedding
Meet, conceive and marry
True love's a shotgun wedding
There's no time to fool around
Cause you have no choices now.
  
Flowers in the backyard
With the family gathered round
True love's a shotgun wedding
And you can't plan it out.
   
Perhaps if it was passion
And not just circumstances
That you'd put a little of love
Into that question you are asking.
  
She lays a kiss upon your cheek
Her lips so full and round
True love's a shotgun wedding
Momma said don't fool around.
  
I know it seems awkward
But that ain't gonna stop her
This down-payment is a promise
That your love is gonna prosper.
  
The world just won't end
When you roll into town
True love's a shotgun wedding
With the layman writing down.
  
It's the right thing boy
Put that ring around her finger
And don't you stop to worry
That the feeling won't linger.
  
Light yourself a cigarette
While writing invitations
She knows its matrimony
What with child expectations.
  
You lay a hand upon her belly
That's so full and round
True love's a shotgun wedding
Momma said don't you fool around.
  
True love's a shotgun wedding
And you can't plan it out.
  
At her somewhat impromptu, and utterly triumphant, second performance at EOTR 2010 (headlining the 'Big Top' in place of the indisposed Steve Mason) she performed this solo on acoustic as the first of two 'encore' tracks...
It was not part of her set on the smaller 'Local Stage', which had already attracted much attention.  To mark that here is another photo, previously unseen, from the first set.

  

Portland, OR is never a place that takes music for granted and it shows in this review:

http://www.portlandmercury.com/portland/belle-of-the-bar/Content?oid=3720522

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

I'm On My Own Side Now

Learning To Ride - Caitlin Rose - Lyric

To whosoever asked about this lyric about fifteen minutes ago, here it is. Another lyric from an artist who, as of this evening, is now confirmed for Latitude 2011 as well as, about a week ago, End Of The Road 2011.  This is the first track on the 2010 album 'Own Side Now'.
   
Learning To Ride
Learning to ride, oh, learning to ride
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride
A few broken bones for a place to hide
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride.
  
When I was young used to ride the wild ones
They were lots of fun but they almost took my life
Now all I need is a simple steed
To take me where I need without putting up a fight.
  
Learning to ride, oh, learning to ride
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride
A few broken bones for a place to hide
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride.
  
Tennessee Stud took me for a blooming bud
He chewed me up, spit me out just the same, oh
He took my words, spilled my beans in to the herd
Now they all look at me with courage and disdain.
  

Learning to ride, oh, learning to ride
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride
A few broken bones for a place to hide
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride.
  

Little-boy Lost, he's a real coin toss
And could I pay the cost of even heading for a fall?
Born in June, he could learn to run too soon
He's a real summer's child, with two heads about it all.
  
Learning to ride, oh, learning to ride
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride
A few broken bones for a place to hide
I get knocked down, oh
I get knocked down, oh
I get knocked down when I'm learning to ride.
  

Other posts about Caitlin Rose:
Caitlin Rose - Own Side Now - lyric
Caitlin Rose - Docket - lyric
Caitlin Rose - live at EOTR 2010

Caitlin Rose - Answer In One Of These Bottles - lyric 

Answer In One Of These Bottles - Caitlin Rose - lyric

I've been meaning to post the lyric to this for ages and Friday night seems a good time to do it.
This is one of the self-written songs from the 2009 10" EP 'Dead Flowers' by Caitlin Rose. It was also her audience sing-along song when playing live in 2010:

Answer In One Of These Bottles
One night at the bar didn't get me very far
I didn't find the answer I was looking for
Drink-a one, drink-a two, I'm-a drinking just for you
The only answer I have found is to drink more.

There's an answer in one of these bottles.
There must be something they forgot to mention.
There's an answer in one of these bottles I know
So I'm gonna drink until I forget the question.
  
Passed out on the floor. What do I do it for?
When I walk in they say 'Honey don't you even start.'
Drink-a one, drink-a two, I'm-a drinking just for you.
To find out what it is that happened to my heart.
  
There's an answer in one of these bottles.
There must be something they forgot to mention.
There's an answer in one of these bottles I know
So I'm gonna drink until I forget the question.
  
I'm drunk, long gone, wondering just what I done wrong
Singing along 'Baby don't you want me no more.'
Drink-a one, drink-a two, I'm-a drinking just for you
To find out what it is that I've been drinking for.
  
There's an answer in one of these bottles
There must be something they forgot to mention.
There's an answer in one of these bottles I know
So I'm gonna drink until I forget the question.

There is a second song about drinking, by a different artist and the lyric to which I also intended to post this evening, but it is more complicated and while I have worked most of it out the details and post will have to wait until tomorrow.
  
Other posts about Caitlin Rose:
Caitlin Rose - Own Side Now - lyric
Caitlin Rose - Docket - lyric
Caitlin Rose - live at EOTR 2010
  

Note added March 8, 2011:

Caitlin Rose is now confirmed to appear at EOTR 2011
  
Note added March 14, 2011:
Caitlin Rose is now confirmed to appear at Latitude Festival 2011

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

2010 in Music - EPs & mini-albums

Last year I started with this category, deeming it the easiest to solve.  This year, as will be noticeable, the inter-relation between items in all these lists and artists that I have seen live at one time or another has become much more apparent.  I find that an interesting paradigm but it does make keeping the lists distinct, let alone self-contained, much more difficult.  An extension of this, that I mentioned in my previous post, is that it is also interwoven with my thoughts on new music in 2011.
  
Ask Simon Cowell and Nick Clegg about why your votes don't always count like you thought they should have, if you will. This is not a list, nor is it a manifesto commitment; it is an exposition and therefore the rules governing lists and voting do not apply to it.
It is in reverse-date order and thus starts with the band with which I finished yesterday's post.

It is a bit of a triple-whammy, for it relates to three CD EPs by the same act:

• Lungs Quicken (not in the image above)
• The Starlight EP
• Misfortunes and Minor Victories EP

These three EPs comprise eleven tracks in total and amount to about forty minutes of music and  Lanterns On The Lake is to be filed under New Music 2011 even before the release of their first album...

...and just before the power failure during the opening chords of 'I Love You, Sleepyhead'.

The next, Esben and The Witch, has featured here before and is now also included in the fifteen-strong long-list of acts nominated for BBC 'Sound of 2011'.

This is the the 12" vinyl EP 'Marching Song'. The album is 'Violet Cries' (January 2011).

The next one is no great surprise I suppose, given my lists of  2010 albums already posted, but perhaps the most controversial.
 

She is not really enamoured with this, her first release, and when you listen to 'Own Side Now' it is perhaps possible to understand why.  I still rate it highly, which is why it is here, and I believe that I will eventually be forgiven. 

Nine hours and gone...

This is what happened when EOTR 2011 'early bird' tickets went on sale this morning. There are some more, at 2010 prices, on offer now but limited again, but does this tell you something about how good EOTR 2010 actually was.  I have a 2011 ticket but I'm still just coming to terms with EOTR 2010 and the acts that I saw. This is just one little piece of the jigsaw.

Saturday: Caitlin Rose live on the Local stage @ EOTR 2010.

On Sunday, co-opted to the Big Top to replace the unavailable Steve Mason, she finished with two songs accompanied only by herself.  The first was her own song 'Shotgun Wedding', from the Dead Flowers EP, and the second was a headlong cover of 'Tomorrow is a Long Time'.  I've mentioned the dangers of cover versions before; played and heard live this Dylan song was a quite remarkable example of how it can be done.


Note added March 8, 2011 (and later):
Caitlin Rose is now confirmed to appear at EOTR 2011, Truck Festival 2011 and Latitude 2011. 

Docket - Caitlin Rose - lyric

Thank you for asking about this just a few hours ago. This evening I was wondering just what should be the subject of something I thought that I would never do: this is my 500th published post on this blog.


Lyrics have, and this surprised me when I first posted some, become an integral and very satisfying part of the whole and I'll try and reply when I can. The proviso is that there will likely be a few mistakes especially when, as is the case with this one, I have done them 'by ear' and in this case from the 10" vinyl version of 'Dead Flowers'.  On the other hand I relish the challenge and I think that I have got better, and certainly faster, at doing it with practice.
This, therefore, is what I think they are and while, not to excuse myself of inaccuracies, here is an observation. Artists do actually vary their lyrics: this can be deliberately such as to customize live performances but it also concerns the lyrics in a CD sleeve and those that are actually to be heard on the CD therein. Cover versions, are, of course, even more prone to such variation...


Docket
I got a discount; I got a coupon
It cost ten dollars to get your groove on
I've got a docket in my pocket
It says all I'll ever want is to be free.

I've got a sweet bike, it gets me real far

It doesn't break down, like a sweet car

I've got a docket in my pocket

And speeding down the hill is where I want to be.

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says all I've ever wanted is to be free.

I got a big house, I bought a hi-rise

Women in my block act like Stepford Wives

Well they got pre-nups, acid reflux, Botox

Friday and a headache built for three.

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says all I've ever wanted is to be free.

I got a fresh pack, I got a red BIC

The Surgeon General can suck on my d**k

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says cancer's never catching up to me.

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says all I've ever wanted is to be free.

I got a nice guy and he's got no class

l like his blue eyes, call him trailer trash

But he's got a docket in his pocket

It says all he really wants is to be free.

We've got dockets in our pockets

That say all we've ever wanted is to be free.

I got a discount got a coupon
I'm not paying anyone to get my groove on.

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says no-one controls my destiny.

I've got a docket in my pocket

It says all I'll ever wanted is to be free.

I think that if indulging in karaoke you would get away with this version of the lyric, not that you are going to catch me putting this theory to the test myself!
The 'Dead Flowers' EP, also available on d/l and CD, is well worth having and so is the recent album 'Own Side Now', which is less obviously country than the former. I'd be happy to attempt lyrics for any track from either of them.


As a complete aside:
To whosoever asked for the lyric to 'River Clyde', from the album 'Folie à Deux' by '6 Day Riot' rest assured that I haven't forgotten you. I intend to add that track and indeed the lyrics to all the other songs in the next few days.

New Music 2010 - Part 16 - Across America in music.

This is perhaps going to be a hybrid of acts I heard at Latitude 2010, those that I am looking forward to at EOTR 2010 and others that have impinged on my consciousness for one reason or other.
If I can keep it focussed then it might work out OK.  If not it will become more than one post, maybe one of them devoted to Latitude artists or to US-based artists and acts.
At the start of the year I mentioned that I thought that diversity might be one of the beneficiaries of 2010 and, while I may not have specifically made that point, I'm starting to think that was a valid one nevertheless.  That which is certain is that, as regards the things I am listening to and those I now want to listen to, it most certainly is!


The US is springing surprises on an almost weekly basis and I have already mentioned some of them and 'Dead Flowers' - Caitlin Rose is on some kind of rotation as far as my personal play list is concerned. That the title track is a cover of a Jagger/Richards song only serves to make the self-written songs all the more apposite.

It is therefore not surprising that I now have the album 'Own Side Now' of which more later. What pleases me is that the US albums that I want are scattered across genres -  I have already mentioned Avi Buffalo's eponymous début album, which gets better with every listen I think. 

What is in it for...

Also on my list (and I'm hardly the first to mention this one) and if we get some late summer warmth then it is hard to imagine a BBQ that is not California-themed and sound-tracked, at least in part, by this...

...Best Coast's 'Crazy for You'.

They both have critics, of course. Some say that the lyrics of Avi Buffalo are too contorted (to be West Coast?)  while others that those of Bethany Cosentino's creations for Best Coast are too simplistic; just lyrics by numbers.   Well, and this is my point I suppose, you can take your choice: For me it is "yes, please" and "both, thank-you".

* If you are reading this, and it seems strange, you are quite normal*

In retrospect I should have gone all analogue instead and spent the time on those lyrics that simply require listening to on vinyl and putting a pencil to paper!  That of course puts me in mind of  New York, which metaphorically this trip is as yet nowhere near, and Caroline Polachek's line about 'the most evident utensil'.

While entirely imaginary this is proving suspiciously like the real thing.  Transport malfunction and unexpected detours amongst them. It was a very bad idea to start on Wednesday night, however...

The road trip can wait 'till tomorrow except that what was once tomorrow  is now today; and it has been so for a while now. I am, however, still west of the Mississippi and thus some way short of my next musical destination. The rest of today has been spent in Farmville, IA.  If  Facebook notifications are anything to go by then my sister farms a large part of it now.  She is always the industrious one.

Strange day today (August, 19) but not as bad as I thought it might be and

with it came some thoughts on music that had never really occurred to me before.

Travelling east, we will reach the home of another artist that I have mentioned. What is new is that this is now readily available in the UK.  It appeared in the US before her 2010 début album 'Catching A Tiger' and she is from Rock Island, IL. It is one of the Quad Cities that border the river that is the Iowa - Illinois boundary.

A mini-album, it is too long really to be an EP even in the broadest sense, and also totally worth a listen in its own right is Why You Runnin', by Lissie.
Tomorrow is another day so, once it is done, do I then cross the river and head east or do I take a right turn and follow the river south?


You are my guides for I do not have sat-nav for this virtual journey.
I'm heading south by popular request.
Here, therefore, is a thought for the next year and this applies to UK music even though that might seem surprising.

Pedal steel is not exactly that well known over here but it is a very worthwhile complement to slide guitar, which I have long liked.  I think we might be hearing a great deal more of both instruments in the next year or so.


As for the road trip and quite where the journey will end is anyone's guess now.  I like the idea of Seattle, or possibly even Portland, via Canada and I have my reasons why.  That said I'm not paying for the fuel and, that being so, I know exactly the vehicle I would be driving - one that I once owned.
It was nothing remotely flashy... no air con, even heating/cooling was a pretty much hit & miss affair but, at least soon after I bought it it had a CD auto-changer that had more wires than the rest of it but was one of the things that never failed.  That alone was worth all the other problems. It is a journey in progress.


I've got a docket in my pocket
It says all I've ever wanted is to be free.