Led Zeppelin - Live at the Royal Albert Hall 1970

 Led Zeppelin - Live at the Royal Albert Hall 1970 - Part 1

 

 Led Zeppelin - Live at the Royal Albert Hall 1970 - Part 2

 

Led Zeppelin - Live at the Royal Albert Hall 1970 - Part 3

 

It isn’t hard to understand the substantial appeal of Led Zeppelin. Their current two-hour plus act is a blitzkrieg of musically-perfected hard rock that combines heavy dramatics with lashings of sex into a formula that can’t fail to move the senses and limbs. At the pace they’ve been setting on their current seven-town British tour there are few groups who could live with them on stage. Friday night, the third stop of the tour brought them back to London’s Albert Hall for a two and a quarter hour solo marathon that completely destroyed the ever-weakening argument about British reserve. At the end of two 15-minute long encores, when the audience had been on its feet dancing, clapping and shouting for 35 minutes, they were still calling them back for more. It was electricity that had been building up throughout the evening. The Albert Hall suits the Zep’s style and they were in good form, working through a selection of their heavier numbers of which Dazed and Confused is still a tour de force.
The slight frame of Jimmy Page, clad like a Woolworth’s sales counter in Alf Garnett shirt and jeans, belies the fearsome aggression of his guitar, which the other side of his nature comes through on the intricate White Summer solo. Midway through the set John Paul Jones switched to Hammond organ for a segment of quieter Led Zeppelin not previously heard on stage, before John Bonham’s Moby Dick drum solo brought him a standing ovation. But the Zeppelin forte, the closing 20 or so minutes were still to come and when it did, such was the rapport that when on How Many More Times, Robert Plant sang I” want you all to put your hands together…” the audience en masse had done so before he’d finished the request.
Strutting about the stage with arrogance, Plant is a most accomplished performer, drawing from the finest blues/soul-shouter traditions with a confidence out of line with his inexperience previous to Led Zeppelin. His control is masterful; so much so that when he dragged out the lyric “I’ve got you in the s-s-s-sights of my gun,” hesitating dramatically over the “s,” the crowd was shouting back and filling in the missing word. I spoke to Jimmy Page after the show and he confessed that the whole band had suffered extreme nerves beforehand, mainly because people like John Lennon, Eric Clapton and Jeff Beck had requested tickets.
“But it was just like it was at the Albert Hall in the summer,” said Jimmy, “with everyone dancing around the stage. It was a great feeling. What could be better than having everyone clapping and shouting along? It’s indescribable; but it just makes you feel that everything is worthwhile.”
“We’d actually finished How Many More Times and were going into the Lemon Song, but the audience was still clapping so we just went into another riff and carried on for a further ten minutes.
The group’s intention in doing solo shows of such length, says Jimmy, is so that if the audience wants it, they can continue playing without having to worry about whether earlier support groups have overrun and how much time there is left. They’ve had hassles with hall management on this point in the past and Jimmy points out:
“Our sets have gone longer and longer anyway. They are now always at least two hours long – and that’s without any extra numbers for encores. I really believe in doing as much as it is physically possible to do… if the audience wants it.”  From: https://www.ledzeppelin.com/show/royal-albert-hall-january-9-1970

 

Portishead - Machine Gun

In 2002, rumours abounded that Portishead’s third record would be called Alien. They were wrong, but not without truth; much of Third sounds like the soundtrack to a genuinely chilling sci-fi horror film. It’s not an accident that the fascistic, ossified and mechanical rhythm of ‘Machine Gun’ finds itself transformed and consumed by crazed Terminator / Blade Runner / Vangelis synthesisers.
The sound throughout is muffled and dark, cinematic still, but differently. ‘The Rip’ swells electronically just over two minutes in and suddenly becomes magnificently repetitive. The oddly falling in-and-out of earshot shuffles that open ‘Plastic’ are perhaps the closest thing here to trip-hop, only the crackling, noir-ish strings one might expect of Portishead are replaced by shuddering, unsettling electronic echoes.
‘We Carry On’ is Third’s highlight, a monolith at its centre that is stomped into submission by a serial-killer drum pulse, and which climaxes in an intensifying storm of gothic guitars, before ‘Deep Water’ offers brief, disquieting acoustic relief. Every speck of dusty spittle on Beth Gibbons’ lips is apparent in ‘Small’, the opening minimal pain, the mid-section and finale run through with weird bass ululations, fucked-up cello, scraping guitar and dissident synth. Huge piano chords, tick-tocking cowbell percussion, and squalling, corrupted brass characterise ‘Magic Doors’ while the doom-laden drum rolls and cancerous, radioactive bleeding edges of ‘Threads’ close the album in a clamour of nuclear alarms.
Third is not a pleasant experience. Even Mezzanine and Maxinquaye, perhaps the only other two records to have come from Bristol’s stable that come close to this in terms of foreboding aura, seem like twinkly children’s albums by comparison. Both ancient and futuristic, a mildewed signal from a more advanced culture that failed to survive the ice age, Third doesn’t make you pay attention to its desolate contours, but rather stare out of the window, creeping panic causing your mind to dart in a million dark directions at once. This is not a nice record. It is music without a time, a place or a context. Inertia, solitude, suffocation.  From: https://drownedinsound.com/releases/13067/reviews/3158523-portishead-third 

Turn Me On Dead Man - Missing Time

Turn Me On Dead Man is a rock band from San Francisco that formed at the turn of this century but didn’t release their first album until they were five years old.  Since then they’ve released a few more and have now released their newest one titled, We Are The Star People which is their first for the Alternative Tentacles label.
The band is an interesting one as they sound as if they appeared here in a time machine that left in the 1970’s. Their sound is primarily psychedelic space rock with very loud, fuzzed-out guitars that are played at volume 11. The songs are mid-tempo and have a melodic edge to them despite the big wall of sound guitars that owe at least a nod to the shoegaze and stoner metal scenes. The vocals sound layered as well and are slightly buried in the mix right behind the guitars. They’ve got some good hooks too and wrote some really catchy and soothing songs. Notable standouts include, “Dreamchild” with its very thick fuzzed out guitar songs and slightly reverb vocals and strong leads, and “Missing Time” which starts out simple and slowly builds into a dense, psychedelic wall of sound only to come gently back down. The little dabs of things like grunge and shoegaze add depth to their excellent space rock sound and this is definitely a band that would be amazing to see live at top volume. This record is a shining example of mixing the heavy with the melodic without going too far in either direction and striking that perfect balance.
In keeping with their retro style sound the band recorded this album on analog tape and the only physical media it is available on is vinyl! This kind of rock record was designed to be analog and kudos to the band and label for sticking to that format. The record does come with a download code so you can take this on the go but ideally you should be playing this on a turntable at top volume with the lights  turned down. Being my first exposure to this band I was extremely impressed with this album and now aim to check out their back catalog to see what I’m missing.  From: https://punkvinyl.com/2013/12/03/turn-me-on-dead-man-we-are-the-star-people-lp/

Moon Honey - Betta Fish

Moon Honey is a band that’s difficult to describe on paper, and I think that’s the point. Their intense uniqueness forces the writer to a higher creative plane—the observer has grown from what is observed. Their music feels like the sonic third-way, blending elements of the familiar and the bizarre to create something truly new. Meanwhile, their shows are a symphony of artistic mediums that exceed your expectations by subverting them. Everything they do feels new. Originally from Louisiana, they recently moved to Los Angeles to double down on all of their creative endeavors. We sat down with front-woman Jess to chat about her endless inspirations and commitment to wearing the mask of authenticity.

First off, tell us a little about yourself and how you came to find music:

I love all art, whether it’s music, painting, photography, underwater basket weaving, etc. I’m naturally introverted, so I find it pretty amusing this is now my life. Years ago, I was hired by Andrew (given two bottles of wine) to paint his guitar cabinet and I found out he was looking for a singer for his band. I had zero performance or writing experience, but joining a rock band was not a life experience I was willing to pass up. 

What is your songwriting process like?

It’s all over the place, but for the most part, we both start in solitude: Andrew composes a piece, records a demo and sends it to me. I write lyrics and melody for the piece, sometimes fresh, sometimes drawing from my bank of poems I keep handy. We get together and light candles to practice performing it to work out kinks.
 
One of the things that first captured me about your sound is how truly unique it is. In a world of pre-packaged pop and rock, how do you fight the urge to be “accessible” and instead push for your own creative ideals? 

Hey thank you! Personally, I’m coming to the realization my urges are just naturally inaccessible! I have tried to write a pop song, and I failed miserably. It sounded icky to my heart to hear it back. There is certainly an art to attempting to identify what is mainstream and accomplishing that perfectly. Perhaps crafting a pop song is like making a Piet Mondrian piece. You look at it and think, “I can do that!” But…can you really? His lines are dangerously straight; his geometry is outstanding. Can you muster that 27th perfectly tuned vocal layer and write that painfully addictive hook, or will you find when you’re done that it isn’t actually your style? My style, I’m finding, is pretty crooked. But then again…what is mainstream anyways? At one point, Korn was accessible. When I feel sad that our music could never make it on radio, I remember Korn. I can’t live my life trying to be someone else, I can only hope that in my humanism I tap into universal human emotions which translate. Like that mainstream band Korn did.

Another stand-out element of Moon Honey is the visually rich world you create. Has this always been a part of your performances? What would you say is its primary purpose? 

This is pretty new! I have been working on artwork for every song of our upcoming album’s artwork package—some of these pieces are very large, and so I feel excited to bring them on stage with me. We’ve been working with great lighting artists too. The purpose is to create an atmosphere to further describe the landscape of the music—to bring people into the songs, into deeper expression. Once I tried putting lavender essential oil into a smoke machine at a show—it didn’t really work or smell, but you can see our dedication to using all senses in the name of atmosphere.

Tell us about the headdresses/costume pieces you create for your performances. Does the donning of them help you transform yourself into “someone else” i.e. David Bowie’s “The Thin White Duke” or “Ziggy Stardust”?

Yes! First I’ll say that my biggest influence is Corinne Loperfido. When we first moved to L.A. I met Corinne and loved her costumes—they really spoke to me, as they are inspired by the beautiful culture of New Orleans where she lived and near where I grew up in Louisiana. The pieces are so creative and vibrant. I felt transformed when I began wearing them for sure. I suffered so much from stage fright and mild body dysmorphia (again, why am I a front woman?). I hated the idea that people were looking at my body and my movements on stage—I was afraid that people could see straight through my art and were only focusing on my nervousness and flaws. I thought no one enjoyed my presence. I craved a transformation of confidence, and the costumes were a big step in me finding relief—exiting my humanism and entering into the world of theater and fantasy, where I could be whoever I wanted. A new role.
This past year I’ve been wearing costumes that I’ve painted and sewed myself, and I’m thinking more about integration with the upcoming album. A core theme is the monarch butterfly, a symbol of transformation that is very personally dear to me. Another is white satin gloves—another theme of delicate transformation, a sublimation of wrongs if you will. Of course, it’s not so much role playing anymore—it is me taking myself to the maximum. It’s my inner freak of the moment coming out to play.

From: https://blog.society6.com/pure-imagination-an-interview-with-la-musicians-moon-honey/ 

Ideal Free Distribution - William Buss

The Ideal Free Distribution (IFD) were an indie rock band formed in Benton, Kentucky in 1997 and based in both Benton and Lexington, Kentucky. Heavily influenced by 1960s pop music and promoted by Robert Schneider, the band is indirectly associated with Elephant 6 Recording Company groups such as The Minders, Neutral Milk Hotel, The Olivia Tremor Control, and The Apples in Stereo. 
Guitarist Craig Morris and bass player Eric Griffy were next-door neighbors growing up and lead singer Tony Miller lived about two miles away. Griffy played a few of his four-track recordings on the way to the store one day and Miller claimed that “it was the best music Craig and I had ever heard.” This led Miller and Morris to fully engross themselves in songwriting. Morris wrote “the most brilliant two pop songs ever,” according to Miller, which led to an unofficial competition between the three friends. 
The group began recording at Griffy's parents home in 1997 using a Marantz cassette four-track and a Shure SM-57. Initially they looked to the early Who and Stone Roses for inspiration and as time went on they began adding more “elaborate overdubs to add depth to sound”. Finding a permanent drummer proved to be a challenge for the band after going through six. This, along with the fact that some of the group members had moved and now lived four hours apart, made live performances difficult. They were few and far between, occurring only when the group had a track appearing on a Lexington compilation. IDF's self-titled debut album was released by Happy Happy Birthday To Me Records in 2007. It combines a “variety of psychedelia, folk, and 60s British pop” and draws inspiration from a myriad of groups including The Zombies, The Beatles, The Who, Love, and The Moody Blues.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideal_Free_Distribution

Jill Sobule - I Kissed a Girl

LGBTQ audiences who wanted visibility in pop culture had it tough for most of 1995, when Morrissey’s “Boy Racer” was about as explicit as things got (“He’s just too good-looking…”). Two years before Ellen DeGeneres came out to a network TV audience of millions, several fresh shoots appeared in an otherwise largely barren field. The political ABC sitcom Spin City boasted a gay Black character, the third- or fourth-funniest cast member. A closeted lesbian chief of staff kept an eye on the hospital in NBC’s megahit E.R. Maria Maggenti’s film The Incredibly True Adventure About Two Girls in Love, whose title’s ironic alarmism begged for novelty status, got a limited release. On Billboard’s Modern Rock chart, the band Garbage, months before their breakthrough “Stupid Girl,” went Top 20 with a slinky, coquettish number called “Queer” back when many gays and lesbians considered it a slur.
Then Jill Sobule showed up. The Denver singer-songwriter, who died in a house fire on May 1, had already demonstrated a facility in packaging sticky melodies in acoustic pop arrangements that a granny could love. 1990’s “Too Cool to Fall in Love” hit Number 17 on the adult contemporary charts, its lilt and Sobule’s grainy warble a terrific palate cleanser amid hits by Gloria Estefan, Michael Bolton, and Wilson Phillips. (In its video, Sobule even sported short Chynna Phillps bangs.)
The Todd Rundgren-produced Things Here Are Different proved a solid debut that year; by 1995, the openly bisexual Sobule had “I Kissed a Girl” ready to go. Co-written with frequent collaborator Robin Eaton, the song has a strummy, unthreatening lope, which — in the year before Bill Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act (reluctantly, he’d later insist) — came across as subversive, like normality can be in its small way. Making out with someone of the same sex was fine. It just happens. Sobule’s fictional scenario unfolds in a similarly matter-of-fact manner. Sympathetic to her neighbor, married to a “hairy behemoth” who’s as “dumb as a box of nails,” the narrator invites Jenny inside for a smoke and sympathy. When the inevitable happens, Sobule sings the title chorus with a winning subject-verb-object directness. Had Morrisey sung the line “He was just like kissing me,” we would mutter, “What a narcissist”; Sobule bodies it like she discovered radium. Yet the kiss is special, too, for being unexpected, as the song’s fierce guitar solo — a couple of reverb-drenched notes — suggests.  “And I may do it again,” she teases. She’s earned it.
The video might have helped push the song to its Number 67 Billboard Hot 100 peak and, alas, it also pushed towards dismissing Sobule as a gimmick. I mean, c’mon: Co-starring male model/romance novel cover boy/human cheesecake Fabio at his swole peak as Jenny’s dumb-ass husband, it looked like Pee-wee’s Playhouse Guide to Sapphism, with Sobule’s blonde hair styled in a combination of Princess Leia braids and a Mouseketeer cap.
Betraying little artistic anxiety, Sobule continued releasing music as if “I Kissed a Girl” didn’t exist, though, sadly, on the pop charts she might as well not have. Follow-up single “Supermodel” appeared on the Clueless soundtrack, and, thanks to co-writer David Baerwald of Sheryl Crow’s band, it has a welcome crunch, though Sobule had mixed feelings about the song for years. 2000’s Pink Pearl is her full-length triumph: a dozen well-observed and droll songs that helped her royalty statements as TV and film producers discovered how adroitly her material complemented their scenarios. “Rainy Day Parade,”  with a marimba line brightening the couplet “We’ll have a celebration/Getting back on my medication,” showed up in Ben Stiller’s woebegone superhero flick Mystery Men. She composed the music for the Nickelodeon teen sitcom Unfabulous, and, while I haven’t watched a single episode, I hope a girl did kiss a girl in one, for Sobule’s hit was meant for adolescents for whom a daydream is safer than the reality.
Had Spotify been around in 2007 and had fans of a new star hurriedly typed “I Kissed a Girl” in the search engine hoping to hear Katy Perry’s Number One smash, Sobule might have relished the streaming royalties; that platform didn’t exist yet, but YouTube did, and she wasn’t pleased.  “Fuck you, Katy Perry,” Sobule declared in a 2009 interview with The Rumpus. “You fucking stupid, maybe ‘not good for the gays,’ title thieving, haven’t heard much else, so not quite sure if you’re talented, fucking little slut.” Not long after the comments went live, Sobule backpedaled. She was kidding, she wrote in a Huffington Post column. She was, in the words of that cliché, taken out of context. 
Her rage makes sense, though. Sobule had written an unaffected, cheerful valentine when to be queer meant skulking in the shadows or presenting oneself as a leering curiosity — I don’t know which is worse. As subtle as a car alarm, Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” comes across as a declaration by a teen who tongued a friend on a dare and as a public penance can’t stop screaming in strangers’ ears about it. This “I Kissed a Girl” made its singer one of the next decade’s biggest acts, with a whole playlist of songs whose Spotify streams top one billion. Meanwhile, Sobule’s has just about 1.3 million as of this afternoon (“Supermodel,” at least, has more than 7 million).
“I used to have stars in my pocket/Now I just watch them on TV,” Sobule sang on “Rainy Day Parade.” The trick is, she doesn’t sound aggrieved. Before her death, she released several more albums, crowdfunded in part no doubt by the untold number of women who heard in “I Kissed a Girl” years ago a way to think about their desires with wit and frankness in a pop context. Her 2022 Off-Broadway musical F–k 7th Grade, about a queer middle schooler, earned good reviews. All of them mentioned “I Kissed a Girl.” Touchstones hang around—manifestos live forever.  From: https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/jill-sobule-i-kissed-a-girl-queer-representation-1235330509/

Himmellegeme - Natteravn

Himmellegeme have a unique name and a captivating sound. Though the band is from Bergen, Norway, they actually remind me of a mix of two Icelandic bands: Sólstafir and Sigur Rós. I am a massive fan of those bands so Himmellegeme really fits my taste perfectly. On their debut album “Myth of Earth,” they balance the power and angst of Sólstafir with the ethereal beauty of Sigur Rós. “Myth of Earth” is one of those albums that sounds like it cannot POSSIBLY be a band’s first album. The production is stellar, the musicianship is immaculate and the band’s sound is fully realized. It’s quite staggering really. The lyrics are split between being sung in English on tracks like “Breathe in the Air Like Fire” and the title track and in Norwegian on the rest. And once again it works! Right off, the band showcase their two main strengths. “Natteravn” features their bombastic side (along the lines of Sólstafir) and then “Hjertedød” is more atmospheric but does have plenty of power. The title track dials things in a bit more so that 3 songs in, you have a great indication of just how great Himmellegeme are and how awesome “Myth of Earth” is. Plus no matter the language of the lyrics, you can feel what’s being sung. That’s a testament to vocalist Aleksander Vormestrand to be sure.  From: https://progressivemusicplanet.wordpress.com/2017/09/28/himmellegeme-myth-of-earth/

Daisy House - Open Your Eyes

A week ago, I didn’t know Daisy House existed. Then my friend Jim saw them mentioned on Mary Lou Lord’s Facebook page and told me they’d be right up my alley. Boy, was he ever right. This wonderful Long Beach folk rock band formed in December 2011, and consists of multi-instrumentalist/vocalist Doug Hammond, his daughter Tatiana (Angel) Hammond on vocals, and his long time friend Christ Stiles on cittern (an ancient, lute-like instrument). From the first listen, I was riveted by their deep grounding in British folk, most especially the late 60’s variety done so well by Fairport Convention. That is only a starting point, for it’s clear Daisy House have ingested a whole host of influences ranging from The Byrds to Donovan. I contacted Doug about an interview and he readily agreed to entertain my queries. 

I have been a fan of Sandy Denny and Fairport Convention for over 30 years. When I first heard your work the other day, I was astonished. Many have tried and failed to capture the excitement of that long ago era, and yet the three of you have nailed it. How did you accomplish this?

DH: Fairport….Chris and I hooked up again, Christmas 2011, after a 30 year pause. We’d bonded originally over New Wave stuff and he played bass in our 1st originals “band” when we were Tatiana’s age. Shortly after that, he went into a self-described “English Folk Frenzy”, buying up everything he could find while I was digging into The Smiths, The Cocteau Twins, and REM. I did a couple shows with Chris’s folk band though that were very, uh, “Holy”. It left an impression on me, the intimacy and purity of it. When we reconnected, Chris’ electric cittern had literally rusted in its case, though the brass fittings had corroded like some sunken treasure. We jammed a bit with his acoustic cittern, and I suggested we do some folky songs with Angel and I singing; .Donovan and Fairport in the back of my mind. As it progressed, I started seeing the possibilities more and more and the strange central hook of this singing blonde folk girl, flanked by these two elder dudes. Beauty and the Beasts, lol. Everybody loves her, little girls, college girls (except the mean ones). and their moms, who are reminded of their younger selves when they see her. 
So Chris had known about Fairport Convention back in the day, but I’d only known about Sandy through “Battle Of Evermore” like everybody else, and I didn’t didn’t realize she had this amazing body of work apart from that until around 2001. I heard “Blackwaterside” on KCRW (public radio), and after that just fell heart first into them. Fairport incorporated the depth of time into their music. The English writer Colin Wilson used to refer to the expansive psychological power and allure that “other places, other times” have on people’s imaginations. Fairport hit me like that, they just had it all, they were large, they were intimate, they were psychedelic, and they were grounded. They were “human-scaled”, in performance and improvisation, yet otherworldly in their themes. Sandy’s expressive voice and Richard’s playing, they were new to me, like a box of gold. The only thing that’s hit me as hard that way is discovering Elliott Smith.
I don’t know of anyone else who’s attempted that Fairport dynamic except the folks in the original UK folk-rock music scene like Steeleye Span and Pentangle. That was part of the appeal of using Fairport as a template; it felt fertile and abandoned by the world, at the same time, and it seemed to fit the global economic moment. Handmade music for a world that may or may not find itself using hand tools again ;) So, I guess Tatiana’s “Sandy”. I’m Richard Thompson, and Chris is the guy with the citterns. They are a big part of the “sound” of us. That, “what is that thing?” thing. Another thing that helps us get closer to the expansiveness and intimacy of Fairport I believe, is the dynamic of a 50-year-old’s thoughts being channelled by a 20-year-old girl. It makes for an interesting frisson; experience and innocence in one pretty package, “skater boy” it’s not.

What artists have influenced you the most? And why is it that so much of today’s modern music is missing that critical element that makes it stand out?

DH: Most influential artists? Beatles. Beatles and the Beatles. 60’s pop music in general. The untouchably best decade for pop/rock/soul music that will ever be. Fairport, The Byrds, Beach Boys, Velvet Underground, Nick Drake, Cat Stevens, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Donovan, Dylan, Zeppelin, Left Banke, Emitt Rhodes, Traffic, the Who, garage rock, The Kinks, The Association, Jefferson Airplane, Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, Animals, Mamas and Papas, Doors, The Monkees, Small Faces, Zombies, Simon & Garfunkel, Walker Brothers, Nilsson, Jimmy Webb, Fleetwood Mac (both iterations). So much foment in such a tight time span.
Like that song “Deep Blue” by Arcade Fire, my first memories of life are the songs of the 60’s coming out of car speakers when my older teenage half-brother had to babysit. He liked to go cruising in the suburbs with me in the back seat;) I love Elliott Smith,The Smiths, REM, My Bloody Valentine. I just started digging into Richard Thompson; I love his lyrics, voice and guitar work. People kept saying, “You sound a bit like The National“, now I like The National. There’s The Black Keys, White Stripes, Radiohead, and Sharon Van Etten.
Chrissy likes Gregorian chants, lute music, Bert Jansch, Martin Carthy, deep catalog UK folk artists, madrigals, and rounds. A lot of the “ancient” things I throw into Daisy House are a nod to Chrissy’s taste. Tatiana (I call her “Angel”) likes what I like. She never had a chance, poor kid. Hip hop is mocked in our house, singalongs are mandatory. She grew up with aphorisms like, “if singing is the most generous thing the human voice can do, what is rapping?” There’s really good stuff out there today in indie land, but there’s also a “dark side” to the “underground”. It can be lyrically obtuse, spiritually empty, and abstracted to death. Folk music hits more directly, usually with a bitchin’ story attached, if it’s done right.
The mainstream as far as I can see (I don’t pay much attention) is still being culturally CHOKED to death by what remains of the corporate music infrastructure. In rap, it’s been an endless parade of scowling clowns traipsing up to the mic over the last twenty years to rhyme “Bitch” with “Rich”, “Nigga” with “Trigga”. That’s corporatism at work, that “guaranteed revenue stream”. For pop music, the “career path” of any pop diva in America today seems to be innocent Disney chanteuse to pole dancing, cooch flashing “vixen”, that’s corporatism as well. Country? Pixel perfect approximations of the legacy of guys like George Jones and Johnny Cash, who used to sing about death among other non-pop subjects (end “old man rant”).
A lot of modern American cultural offerings leave one cold I believe because they are NOT human scaled anymore. They’ve been engorged and “perfected” and offered up to a species that will never be perfected. There’s your disconnect right there, it’s the fllaws that make a song adoptable and human in my opinion. I’m encouraged though, by the success of Adele (she’s got soul), The Black Keys (they’ve got funk on ‘em), Mumford and Sons (we have better songs though), and Arcade Fire. Makes me think that people may adopt us as well.

From: https://bigtakeover.com/interviews/an-interview-with-doug-hammond-of-daisy-house

Dinowalrus - Falling to the Periphery

An album created by a band with a, simply put, different name like Dinowalrus, is sure to hold something different musically. Their soon to be released album, Fairweather, set to drop September 23rd 2016, is definitely one of a kind. The band congregates loads of influences into one, light and airy yet powerful tone that skillfully uses contradicting sounds to create a psychedelic, electronic rock, punk dance voice. It pulls from a mouthful of influences and the album shows it, but it’s not distractingly busy in terms of instrumentals. One might even call it easy listening. Others will call it party music. And the fact that it’s not easily defined makes the album pretty special.
The group of eclectic musicians from Brooklyn started to dabble with their sound in 2008, releasing several albums and touring with a number of groups including Real Estate, Screaming Females and A Place to Bury Strangers. When asked what inspires their song writing process, they said, “Songs always start with a beat and bass line that moves us in a new and different way than anything we’ve done before, then layers of synths and guitars expand intuitively on top of that, finally vocal hooks and lyrics drop into our heads when we least expect it, usually while lulled into a trance by riding the subway around our hometown of NYC.”
A big part of their tone is the contradicting  instruments. Their drums and bass lines are driving and pushing through measures non-stop. They’re tight, driving and consistent while almost all other aspects of their tracks are at first, unexpected. The synthesizers are legato; long and flowing. Same goes for their vocals. Visually, this album is a gargantuan wall of bass and beats with wisps of melodies and harmonies seeping through the cracks.  From: https://nysmusic.com/2016/09/15/hearing-aide-dinowalrus-fairweather/

Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway - Alice in the Bluegrass

You come from a musical family with your father Jack being a bluegrass multi-instrumentalist and instructor and your siblings Sullivan and Michael being musicians themselves by playing the guitar and mandolin respectively. How would you describe this unique upbringing while being immersed in music from the day you were born?

I grew up hearing music around the house all the time and my dad had all these guitars lying around on the couches and on the walls. He would sit down and play me songs whenever I wanted to hear some of my favorites, which were usually these bluegrass songs my dad would sing. When I was really little, around the ages of three or four, I wanted to play the fiddle, and I thought I was going to stick with that. When I was eight, I asked my parents for a guitar because I was interested in trying it out. I played piano, but it didn’t really stick with me.
I’m the oldest out of my siblings, so I was the first out of us to start playing music and it became a fun way of bonding with my dad. Then my brothers wanted to get in on it too, so they started playing music, and when I was probably 12 or so, we started playing little gigs around town. These were at pizza shops, places where we’d open for bluegrass bands coming through the area and stuff like that.

You just mentioned that you’ve been playing guitar since the age of eight and you’re also the first woman to win the International Bluegrass Music Association’s Guitar Player of the Year Award, so how did this come about and what was your reaction to winning when it happened?

It was kind of a surprise and I actually remember where I was when I found out I was nominated. I was back home in California, and it was 2017 or 2018, so I must have been in my early 20s. I was just kind of scrolling through stuff on my phone and I think people were texting me saying “Congratulations!” while I was trying to figure out what happened. I saw that I had been nominated and I was a bit shocked. I had moved to Nashville in 2015, so it was a year or two after that.
I saw someone saying that I was the first woman achieve the nomination, which was really cool as well. I remember thinking how crazy it was that it’s taken this long for a woman to be recognized on the guitar at the Bluegrass Music Awards. Then after that, I was wondering what was actually going to happen at the ceremony and I ended up winning, which was another big surprise. There were a whole lot of questions about being the first woman to win, but I think for me it was just an honor to be up there at all. I grew up going to those award shows and it felt like the biggest thing in the world to me. I got to see my heroes like Tony Rice and Bryan Sutton win the award, so it was really cool to see my name up there with people I really admired and looked up to.

It must have been a great feeling. Over the past few years, you’ve been performing with your own backing band Golden Highway, so how did this come together and what makes this band stand out for you versus other projects you’ve been involved in?

It really started to come together during the pandemic. I wanted to switch things up, go back to my roots and make a bluegrass record. In the bluegrass world, you’ll often see the name of the artist and then their band name, so I thought that it would be fun to differentiate the record from what I’ve done in the past. From there, I put the band together and we’ve been touring ever since. It’s been really fun to step away from the total solo artist thing and really put a spotlight on these amazing musicians that I’ve been performing with on the road.

From: https://medium.com/culture-beat/interview-molly-tuttle-prepares-to-make-her-return-to-freshgrass-with-golden-highway-cba8b962cc7a

Elton John - Live A&R Recording Studios, NYC 11-17-70 Complete

01 I Need You to Turn To
02 Your Song
03 Country Comfort
04 Border Song
05 Indian Sunset
06 Amoreena
07 Bad Side of the Moon
08 Take Me to the Pilot
09 Sixty Years On
10 Honky Tonk Women
11 Can I Put You On
12 Burn Down the Mission / My Baby Left Me / Get Back
13 My Father's Gun

The Juliana Hatfield Three - Supermodel

Vinyl makes you sit down and listen. It's way too much trouble to get up to count grooves to find specific songs. So I put the record on the turntable and for all intents and purposes heard Become What You Are for the first time. I realized that all those years ago I had been selling this masterful collection short. Hatfield's girlish voice has an unexpected edge, cutting in the way paper can slice through skin. But her voice is the counterpoint to her true instrument: Hatfield is an adept and impressive guitarist. How did I not notice this? Driven by guitar riffs that veer away from expected patterns, producer Scott Litt keeps the elements balanced but doesn't polish off the rough sonic surfaces, taking a cue from trios like The Police, Nirvana, and Dinosaur Jr. whose sound is more than the sum of its parts, far bigger than guitar + drum + bass should be. These songs, which I was so quick to dismiss in my youth, are deeper and more complex than I originally gave them credit for. They document a time when Gen X-ers were old enough to make their own decisions, but young enough to not regret their mistakes. 
The Nineties were the golden age of the "Supermodel", also the title of the moody, drawling opening track, which exposes the veneer of perfection as a superficial – even degrading – illusion. "The highest paid piece of ass/You know it's not gonna last/Those magazines end up in the trash." It foreshadows the creepiness of reality television and social media influencers: "She's a living doll/and she's famous for nothing at all/She's living life like a dream/With a false sense of self-esteem." Then the ringer: "I wish she'd trade places with me."  From: http://www.apessimistisneverdisappointed.com/2023/01/this-is-sound-brief-review-of-reissue.html 

Steeleye Span - Blackleg Miner

The Blackleg Miner is printed in A.L. Lloyd’s book Come All Ye Bold Miners: Ballads & Songs of the Coalfields (1952). Lloyd commented in the revised 1978 version:
As sung by W. Sampey, of Bishop Auckland, Co. Durham,18 November 1949. George Korson, in Coal Dust on the Fiddle (Philadelphia, 1943) prints what looks like a parody of this song, The Yahie Miners. Korson’s version comes from Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, a well-known changing-post for British and American miners’ songs. The Durham song has become quite widespread since its appearance in the first edition of the present work, and the tune in particular has taken on variant shapes.

Louis Killen sang Blackleg Miners in 1961 oh his and Isla Cameron’s Prestige International album The Waters of Tyne: Northumbrian Songs and Ballads. He also sang The Blackleg Miners a year later on A.L. Lloyd’s project album, The Iron Muse. The Iron Muse sleeve notes commented:
At the height of the miners’ union struggles of the 1880’s and ’90’s, labourers were brought in from other areas to act as strikebreakers. Ballads of the time describe how the colliers hunted the strikebreakers “like hares upon the moor.” When caught, the blacklegs might be stripped and the clothes and tools thrown down the pit shaft. In the dark, a rope might be stretched across the way to catch the non-union man by the throat and fling him down.

Ray and Archie Fisher sang Blackleg Miner in a concert in Edinburgh that was published in 1964 on the album The Hoot’nanny Show Vol. 2. The album’s sleeve notes commented:
Industrial strife in the bitter bad old days of the mines provoked this Northumbrian ballad. Few songs are so completely unyielding in their attitude. The blackleg or the scab—the worker who defies the strike call of his mates—is still regarded as something that belongs under a stone. It is not a pretty song. Indeed, in these more tolerant times, it is a provocative, ugly song. But it expresses in most eloquent terms the genuine emotions of people at bay.

The Ian Campbell Folk Group recorded The Blackleg Miner for their 1965 album Coal Dust Ballads. The sleeve notes gave their source as W. Sampey as above, and continue:
No collection of miners’ songs would be complete without this song, which was so typical of the militant miners’ attitude to the non-union man.

Steeleye Span recorded The Blackleg Miner in 1970 for their first album, Hark! The Village Wait, with Tim Hart singing lead vocals. The album’s sleeve notes comment:
It is strange that a song as powerful and as singable as this should be so rare, yet it has only once been collected, from a man in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, in 1949. Seghill and Seaton Delaval (presumably the Delaval mentioned in the song) are adjacent mining villages about six miles north of Newcastle upon Tyne, but it is difficult to date the song due to the innumerable mining strikes which have occurred. It is, however, interesting as much as it illustrates the violent hatred felt by the “union” men towards the blacklegs. Ashley Hutchings: “This is the most modern traditional song on the album, possibly dating from the early part of the 20th Century, and is sometimes sung by singers from Northumberland. I believe it was suggested by Tim.”

From: https://mainlynorfolk.info/louis.killen/songs/blacklegminers.html 

Sally Rogers & Claudia Schmidt - Mama, I Miss You Tonight

Old friends Sally Rogers and Claudia Schmidt, each with productive and storied solo careers, relish joining forces to make glorious music. Between them, they have over 30 fine recordings, but only three as a duo, most recently Evidence of Happiness in 2012. Radio stations across the country voted their 1987 collaboration, Closing the Distance, in the top 10 most popular albums of the year. Their separate home bases (Rogers in Connecticut, Schmidt in Minnesota) and full teaching, composing, and touring schedules make it challenging to converge. This Ithaca concert is a rare chance to hear them create magic together, with the synergy that comes from shared musicality and a gift for lyrics, instinctive harmonies, passion for social justice, education, and the environment, and radiant joy in the “Tree of Life.” These are energetic, powerful women who revitalize their audiences with a mix of humor, poignancy, and fire. Both drew attention decades back as regulars on A Prairie Home Companion, and have traveled far and wide since then.
Free-ranging and unclassifiable, Claudia Schmidt is fluent in folk, jazz, blues, and world music styles, a prolific composer and great wordsmith, and a soulful player of 12-string guitar and mountain dulcimer. In addition to taking the stage at festivals, big arenas, and house concerts across North America and Europe, she writes and performs in film, television, and theater. She’s an inimitable force. “When Claudia sings a song, it stays sung,” declares Garrison Keillor. A reviewer in the San Francisco Bay Guardian wrote, “Schmidt’s shows are a lot like falling in love. You never know what’s going to happen next, chances are it’s going to be wonderful, every moment is burned into your memory, and you know you’ll never be the same again.”
Sally Rogers is firmly grounded in traditional folk, old-timey, and children’s music, graced with a pure voice and accomplished playing of guitar, banjo, and dulcimer. In her hands, songs, whether original, contemporary, or hundreds of years old, have a timeless quality. Once heard, audiences remember them and take them home to sing in the kitchen, car, or at gatherings. As a born, and now professional, teacher, Sally Rogers’ successful mission is to set the world singing. When she’s not in a schoolroom, she’s likely to be touring across the States, Europe, or China, recording, creating books and videos for children, composing songs for Unitarian and Quaker hymnals, and quilting.  From: https://canaaninstitute.org/mikesmusicblog/sally-rogers-and-claudia-schmidt-in-concert/