Laura Love - I Am Wondering

 #Laura Love #folk #Afro-Celtic #Americana #Afro-Carribean #folk pop #funk #R&B #world music #singer-songwriter

Laura Love's restless, musically adventurous spirit has carried her in a remarkable array of directions. A bass player with a unique vocal style, Love has performed everything from grunge to jazz to bluegrass. She has covered songs as diverse as Hank Williams' I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry, Jackie DeShannon's Put a Little Love in Your Heart, and Kurt Cobain's Come As You Are. Most remarkably, she has melded her own funky, folky genre from African and Caribbean rhythms, Irish melodies, and R&B. She calls it Afro/Celtic. "Love has a powerful raspy voice not unlike Toni Childs, and she uses it to full advantage — howling , crooning, and even yodeling," Lahri Bond wrote in Dirty Linen magazine. "These tunes usually have spiritual underpinnings that give Love's lyrics a simplicity with a lot of depth. Love often strings together 'nonsense' words that serve as rhythmic connecting devices similar to scatting or African chant."
With self-deprecating wit, the singer described her sound to Billboard as "more like confusion than fusion. I don't really devour a lot of music, but I hear snippets here and there at festivals without meaning to. Some of it just sinks in — the really emotionally grabbing stuff — and sticks with me. But I've always loved Appalachian — the high lonesome, bluegrassy, mournful, minor-key white soul music — and I love black soul music. Time magazine music critic Christopher Farley has described Love as more traditionally folky than musically exotic, believing that Love could be a descendent of Joni Mitchell, and her songs address typical coffeehouse subject matter. "Love has a voice rich with dark shadings and rural twang," Farley wrote. "She calls her music Afro/Celtic, but it's mostly front-porch folk with a few twists."
Love made her jazz-singing debut for a "captive audience" at a penitentiary in her home state of Nebraska in the early 1980s. She was 16 years old. Later, she developed a following in the Seattle music scene, where she played grunge rock in the early years of her career. Eventually, Love found — or, more accurately, created — her own niche. "The Afro-Celtic label doesn't communicate the full flavor of Love's songs," Nelson George wrote in Playboy. "Her songs have bright, lilting melodies that contrast nicely with lyrics that focus on poverty and pain. But Love isn't as heavy-voiced or didactic as Tracy Chapman. Her vocals are lighter, higher-pitched, and less guarded than those of her fellow pop-folkie. As pained and bitter as the songs are, Love suggests there's room for optimism."  From:https://musicianguide.com/biographies/1608000914/Laura-Love.html

 

First Aid Kit - War Pigs

 #First Aid Kit #indie folk #Americana #country folk #folk rock #folk pop #singer-songwriter #Swedish #Black Sabbath cover #music video

You wouldn’t imagine that the mellow folky tones of First Aid Kit would pair well with the frenzied howling maelstrom of Black Sabbath. Sometimes defying convention is a thrill and music proves that time and time again. In fact, defying convention is something that First Aid Kit have had to do in their own usual field anyway. "We had a lot to prove, especially being in a genre that’s dominated by a certain type of man – you know, nerdy, bearded men listening to folk,” Klara Söderberg told The Telegraph. “We felt we had to prove we were serious about music and we weren’t just doing this because we thought it was trendy.” Her sister Johanna adds: “I felt there was a lot of sexism in that as well.” Thankfully, they persevered and have been offering up blissful music ever since, not least last year’s cracking album Palomino. Throughout their musical journey so far, they have remained defiant enough to venture into a range of genres and let their individualism and undoubted talent shine through.
That’s just as well when it comes to covering Black Sabbath because very few songs have the raw, mystic power that the anti-war juggernaut of ‘War Pigs’ contains. It is, in essence, an outcry. “Britain was on the verge of being brought into the Vietnam War,” Geezer Butler recalls, “there was protests in the street, all kinds of anti-Vietnam things going on. War is the real Satanism. Politicians are the real Satanists. That’s what I was trying to say.” The anthem remains one of the great opening tracks, blasting Paranoid off like the gunshot at the start of a race. Everything about the band was rough, tumble, and raw. Even their debut album was pieced together in a day, as Tony Iommi recalls, “We thought we have two days to do it and one of the days is mixing. So we played live. Ozzy was singing at the same time, we just put him in a separate booth and off we went. We never had a second run of most of the stuff.” While Ozzy Osbourne’s thunderous screech is hard to match, the duo bring their own sense of power to it. As Alex Turner of the Arctic Monkeys once correctly identified, there is just something special about siblings harmonizing.  From: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/first-aid-kits-cover-black-sabbath-war-pigs/

Nickel Creek - When in Rome

 #Nickel Creek #bluegrass #folk #contemporary bluegrass #progressive acoustic #Americana

Today, the music community broadly known as Americana has too many stars, scenes and subcategories to count. Beloved artists like Jason Isbell and Kacey Musgraves, who in another era might have been all but ignored by country gatekeepers, have found a welcoming community and something in the neighborhood of household-name status. The Americana Music Festival, held annually in Nashville, grows larger each year. And in 2014, the Grammys gave the first awards in the newly created "American roots" categories, which encompass bluegrass, blues, folk, gospel and anything too left-of-center for the country mainstream. But the music under this umbrella wasn't always the stuff of major festivals and glitzy awards shows, or of such broad interest to the youth market whose tastes drive the industry. At the turn of the 21st century, progressive-minded artists in this world were likely to be scattered across granular labels like contemporary folk or the then-popular "alt-country," with smaller audiences and fewer entry points for a casual listener. As it still does today, country radio leaned heavily commercial (though it did, at least, play music by women back then): In 2000, the songs that dominated genre playlists before finding crossover success were pop smashes like Faith Hill's "Breathe" and Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You Dance." Traditionalists, meanwhile, carried on in the passionate but niche scenes they had occupied for years.
Then, 20 years ago this month, an album arrived that seemed to speak all these languages at once: unafraid to push the boundaries of its primary genre, and packing the musical chops to bring such an eclectic vision to life. Behind it were three musicians just barely old enough to vote. When Nickel Creek released its breakthrough album on March 21, 2000, the players comprising the California-born bluegrass trio were anything but newcomers: Chris Thile and siblings Sara Watkins and Sean Watkins had been playing together since 1989, when Thile and Sara were just 8 and Sean 12. The young talents had already released two studio albums as well as a handful of solo projects, and were regulars on the bluegrass festival circuit, a tenure that had refined their sound to a level typically reserved for older players with bigger discographies. Still, despite arriving with a pages-long resumé, Nickel Creek is still popularly thought of as the trio's debut — perhaps because, in retrospect, everything about it seems to signal a new beginning.
Both to mainstream ears and those steeped in string music, what Nickel Creek was doing sounded fresh. The three musicians, then aged 18 to 23, found creative and playful ways to infuse bluegrass music with ideas from jazz, classical, pop and rock. They put traditional songs next to original material about characters from The Lord of the Rings. Perhaps most impressively, they did so in a way that felt cohesive, as though the new approach they had forged for themselves had roots as deep as bluegrass itself. Working in a genre known to spark arguments over what counts as "authentic," the trio seemed far more concerned with realizing its own vision than hewing to hardline conventions — like sticking to a repertoire of mostly folk songs and standards, using common chord progressions or relegating the guitarist to the rhythm section. (And how fortunate that Nickel Creek didn't, as Sean Watkins' masterful guitar solos are always album highlights.)
There was some precedent for this kind of deviation, of course. Veteran genre agnostic Béla Fleck, who made his studio debut in 1979, had racked up accolades for his singular take on banjo playing, which often treads closer to jam and world music than to traditional American bluegrass. Alison Krauss, who would be integral in bringing Nickel Creek to a wider audience, toyed with pop and rock tropes alongside her band Union Station, and is often considered a primary influence on the "newgrass" movement. In 1998, Lucinda Williams released her landmark album Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, which won the Grammy for best contemporary folk album. The same year, Wilco released its first Mermaid Avenue team-up with Billy Bragg, which featured new songs built around previously unheard lyrics by Woody Guthrie. The album was a critical and commercial success. While nonconformists had found room in the conversation before, there was still something novel and uniquely compelling about the sight of three musicians, two in their teens and one in his early 20s, who revered Bach and Bill Monroe in equal measure. Krauss agreed, bringing the trio to Sugar Hill Records and producing Nickel Creek herself. Already a multi-Grammy winner upon meeting the group, Krauss had found great success both in bluegrass and adult contemporary, making her uniquely qualified to shepherd such an unconventional young act.
From: https://www.npr.org/2020/03/13/814739478/nickel-creek-self-titled-20-years-americana-roots-folk-country

Grant Lee Buffalo - Seconds

 #Grant Lee Buffalo #Grant Lee Phillips #alternative rock #folk rock #Americana #psychedelic folk rock #1990s

The first three Grant Lee Buffalo albums were insular affairs. Together, singer/guitarist Grant Lee Phillips, drummer/percussionist Joey Peters and bassist/keyboardist/producer Paul Kimble fashioned a self-sufficient musical workshop as impervious to pop fashion as a sharecropper is to the vicissitudes of life in the big city.
On Fuzzy (1993) and Mighty Joe Moon (1994), the trio rummaged through the antique art-junk of America’s attic, dressing up their garage-folk with vintage instruments and rediscovering the ancient wisdom of The Band, the Byrds, Big Star and R.E.M. along the way. It all worked to wondrous effect. But by Copperopolis (1996) — a gorgeous but unrelentingly somber song cycle — GLB sounded as if those attic walls, once valued for their windowless integrity, were beginning to close in on them. Kimble was dismissed from the band shortly thereafter.
On Jubilee, Phillips and Peters treat Kimble’s absence as a license to cut loose. The maelstrom of crunchy guitars and brisk tempos that comprise “APB”, “Change Your Tune” and “My, My, My” indicate a newfound will to rock out with raucous abandon. (Previously, rock was something GLB’s music implied more than manifested.) Even those tunes emitting the dusky pastoralism of early GLB — “SuperSloMotion”, “8 Mile Road”, “The Shallow End” — show a bit more tooth. Producer Paul Fox sometimes equates tooth with splashy, pumped-up choruses (“APB”, Truly, Truly”), and after three critically acclaimed but commercially ignored albums, the band seems bent on casting a wider net. But Fox deserves credit for bathing the band in prismatic light, thereby revealing a heretofore obscured aspect of the band. (Indeed, Fox’s production is luminous precisely where Kimble’s was tenebrous.) And, for their part, Grant Lee Buffalo never sound compromised, even when enlisting the services of such outside guests as Michael Stipe, Robyn Hitchcock and the Wallflowers’ Rami Jaffee. No, they just sound like they’re finally okay with windows — open windows — in their attic walls.  From: https://www.nodepression.com/album-reviews/grant-lee-buffalo-jubilee/

Lyle Lovett - Fiona

 #Lyle Lovett #Americana #roots music #country folk #C&W #Western swing #singer-songwriter 

I think it's safe to say that there are not too many people out there quite like Lyle Lovett. One of the most creative singer-songwriters on the scene, he's a Texan through and through, embracing country music, but is about as musically eclectic an artist as you will find. He's an engaging singer with a distinctive voice and a gifted lyricist, but he nevertheless writes some songs that can only be described as having downright weird words. After being a confirmed bachelor well into his 30s, Lovett suddenly married movie star Julia Roberts. After being pretty much the domain of Public Radio, he found himself plastered on the front pages of the supermarket tabloids and trash TV shows. Lovett also acted in a few films himself.
After creating a series of outstanding albums with an often jazzy group he called his Large Band, in October 1994, Lovett released I Love Everybody, a collection of older songs he had lying around since as long ago as the 1970s, performed with scaled back arrangements. They included a few pieces with some of the most eccentric lyrics of his career. That album was released during his happy marriage to Ms. Roberts, and many of Lovett's fans were wondering if there was anything autobiographical to be heard the record. But Lovett stressed that all the songs pre-dated his engagement and marriage.
Well, Lovett and Roberts have separated, and thus the tabloids have lost interest in the songwriter. Now he is out with a collection of new songs called The Road to Ensenada, which shows him up to his old tricks again, creating songs that make you wonder what goes through his mind if you take the time to listen carefully to the lyrics. Also, as usual, musically, the album is very tastefully done, running from twangy country to jazzy, with some introspective folkie-type songs in there as well.
Texas has a rich tradition of singer-songwriters, going back to people like Jerry Jeff Walker, Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clarke and scores of fine current-day artists. Lovett grew up on their music listening them in folk clubs in college as he studied journalism. He made an interesting admission in an interview a couple of years ago - that while he was familiar with many of Bob Dylan's songs, he had never actually listened to an entire Dylan album straight through. I think that serves to illuminate Lovett's penchant for creating his own world, paying little attention to styles and trends around him.
From: http://georgegraham.com/lovett.html 

Squirrel Nut Zippers - Animule Ball

 #Squirrel Nut Zippers #swing revival #retro-jazz #Americana #Harlem jazz #New Orleans jazz #jump blues #gypsy jazz #punk jazz #retro-1930s #retro-1940s #animated music video

The Squirrel Nut Zippers began their musical journey in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, in the mid 1990s, as a musician’s escape from the cookie cutter world of modern rock radio at the time. Jimbo Mathus along with wife Katherine Whalen and drummer Chris Phillips formed the band as a casual musical foray playing for friends and family around town. It wasn’t long before the band (which had grown in size) developed a reputation for pioneering a quirky mix of jazz chords, folk music, and punk rock leanings and attracted a national audience. Outside of the rollicking concerts which were rapidly growing in attendance, NPR was the first significant national media to take notice of the band followed by an appearance on Late Night With Conan O’Brien. With grunge and alternative rock in full swing back in 1995, the Squirrel Nut Zippers debut album ‘The Inevitable’ sounded like nothing happening musically at the time.  From: https://thevogue.com/events/squirrel-nut-zippers-november-8-2022/

Since 1995, the Squirrel Nut Zippers have sacked and plundered old, weird America then sailed off to further distant lands. They have used New Orleans as their hideout and base of operations. Jean-Lafitte-like, they hide on the lee side of Barrier Island, receiving goods and masking dark back channel deals, hiding in cellars or in plain view. On Sept. 25, fans will be able to gaze into the tea leaves that make up their brand new album, ‘Lost Songs of Doc Souchon’, to see if they can discern their own destiny. The first single from the album “Animule Ball” was originally recorded back in 1938 by Jelly Roll Morton.
“This new album was inspired by all of the mysterious characters from the history of New Orleans jazz music,” commented band leader Jimbo Mathus. “It speaks to the hidden roots of where our aesthetic, interests and philosophy comes from. It pulls on the hidden thread.” As mentioned above, the album’s first single is a cover that dates back to 1938. In keeping with that time period, the band turned to Fleischer Studios (home of Betty Boop) to use some of their historic animations for a brand new video for the track. “When I first started the Zippers, the Max and Dave Fleischer cartoons were a huge part of our inspiration. The look, the music, all of it,” Jimbo said. “So to have their blessing to use some of these characters and create something new with it is thrilling to me.”
“Fleischer Studios has a long history of bringing together the best in music and animation, so the opportunity to continue that great tradition with a band like the Squirrel Nut Zippers, nearly 100 years after debuting the first sound cartoon in 1926, is a wonderful honor, and one that would surely put a smile on Max Fleischer’s face,” commented playwright Jeni Mahoney, who serves on the Board of Directors for Fleischer Studios.
From: https://parklifedc.com/2020/08/10/song-of-the-day-animule-ball-by-squirrel-nut-zippers/ 

Emmylou Harris - Wayfaring Stranger

 #Emmylou Harris #folk #country #folk rock #country rock #Americana #progressive country #traditional #singer-songwriter #bluegrass

There have been many iconic pairings in country music and about half of them involve Emmylou Harris. Gram and Emmylou. Willie and Emmylou. Skaggs and Emmylou. Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou. The list could go on through a litany of country greats and each one would probably remember their collaboration with Harris as among the highlights of their career. One of the most powerful harmonizers in the genre, her delicate singing style had a thread of iron running through it, a strength that gave her mournful twang a heartrending power that made her contributions to ballads and breakup songs essential to the evolution of country as a whole. It’s a shame then, that her solo career should be, while overall consistent, somewhat of a letdown, with a string of minor classics early in her career followed by a slew of releases that never really lived up to everything she offered as a singer. There are, to my mind, two albums that fully live up to the enormous artistic talent Emmylou’s displayed over the years: the titanic comeback that was 1995’s Wrecking Ball, and Roses In the Snow, perhaps the most complete expression of Emmylou’s potential and the perfect closer for the early period of her career.
Roses In The Snow, for the most part, stays true to bluegrass convention, although the music occasionally tends toward gospel and her country roots, two styles which have always had significant overlap with bluegrass. Ranging from wellworn classics to new compositions, she effortlessly makes each piece her own, indelibly marking her takes on the old classics and claiming the new cuts as incontrovertibly her own. Her take on Wayfaring Stranger, one of the archetypal examples of traditional American song, instantly becomes the standard against which all other iterations of the song are measured, the doleful hymn to the hope of a better world beyond this one a clear highlight in Emmylou’s career. No less astonishing is her take on Simon and Garfunkel’s The Boxer, which, by staying largely faithful to the original within her bluegrass framework, she more than lives up to, although she can’t quite lay claim to the song like she can with Wayfaring Stranger.  From: https://www.sputnikmusic.com/review/78184/Emmylou-Harris-Roses-in-the-Snow/

Jenny Lewis & The Watson Twins - Rise Up (With Fists!)

 #Jenny Lewis #The Watson Twins #ex-Rilo Kiley #indie rock #alt-country #indie folk #singer-songwriter #Americana #music video

Very rarely do record company press releases bear repeating, but in the case of Jenny Lewis we thought there was cause for its inclusion. Describing her as "having hair the color of a Pacific sunset, a voice as sweet as an ice cream cone and a wit sharper than a razor blade", the folk over at Rough Trade have almost managed to articulate what makes 'Rabbit Fur Coats' so arresting. Bearing comparison with the likes of Diane Cluck, Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins (yup, they're bona fide twins) mine classic Americana for a sound which is as clear as cut-glass and emotionally primed to match, resulting in the friable heartache of songs like 'The Big Guns' and 'Born Secular'. Like the sirens from 'O Brother, Where Art Thou?', Jenny Lewis and the Watson Twins have voices that could floor you from 50 feet, bringing a pathos and profound beauty that seem entirely natural partners.  From: https://boomkat.com/products/rabbit-fur-coat-a918b5d7-5899-47fa-a236-8f0604d63ada

What are you changing?
Who do you think you're changing?
You can't change things, we're all stuck in our ways
It's like trying to clean the ocean
What, do you think you can drain it?
Well, it was poison and dry long before you came

But you can wake up younger under the knife
And you can wake up sounder if you get analyzed
And I better wake up
There but for the grace of God go I

It's hard to believe your prophets
When they're asking you to change things
But with their suspect lives, we look the other way
Are you really that pure, sir?
Thought I saw you in Vegas
It was not pretty, but she was (not your wife)

But she will wake up wealthy
And you will wake up forty-five
And she will wake up with baby
There but for the grace of God go I

What am I fighting for?
The cops are at my front door
I can't escape that way, the windows are in flames
And what's that on your ankle?
You say they're not coming for you
But house arrest is really just the same

Like when you wake up behind the bar
Trying to remember where you are
Having crushed all the pretty things
There but for the grace of God go I

But I still believe
And I will rise up with fists
And I will take what's mine (mine, mine)
There but for the grace of God go I

Crooked Still - Ain't No Grave

 #Crooked Still #bluegrass #neo-bluegrass #folk #folk rock #progressive bluegrass #country folk #Americana

For any fans of Blue Grass or Folk, Crooked Still are highly recommended. They are a self-styled alternative bluegrass band consisting of vocalist Aoife O’Donovan, cellist Tristan Clarridge, fiddler Brittany Haas, banjo player Dr. Gregory Liszt, and bassist Corey DiMario. Meeting at New England Conservatory of Music in Boston in 2001, the evidently talented musicians started to collaborate and play gigs together which were brilliantly received by crowds and they soon gained a cult reputation. Making waves on the US folk scene, the band now have four LPs and a much larger fan base to attend their shows. The energetic performance onstage is captivating as the multi-instrumentalists cross genres and sounds with quick succession as they rattle through a selection of songs from their career thus far. Their technical skill alone could engage a crowd, as it's enjoyable to watch five truly skilled musicians collaborating and making really interesting sounds onstage. Songs such as 'Ain't No Grave' are extended and re-imagined to make the live experience really exciting for an audience as it's not simply like listening to the album regurgitated onstage. A great live act who engage audiences with their talent for their instruments and enjoyable personality.  From: https://www.songkick.com/artists/12695-crooked-still

Sally Rogers & Claudia Schmidt - Some Fathers Have Gone To Glory

 #Sally Rogers #Claudia Schmidt #folk #traditional #Americana #singer-songwriter #contemporary folk #a capella

A version of this Appalachian spiritual,  titled "Some Mothers Have Gone to Glory," was sung by Jean Ritchie in 1951 and recorded by Alan Lomax.

Pioneering the use of stereo recording in the field, Alan Lomax made his “Southern Journey” in 1959–60, returning to the rural South (after 10 years abroad) and rediscovering its still-vital traditions. He traveled from the Appalachians to the Georgia Sea Islands, from the Ozarks to the Mississippi Delta, recording blues, ballads, breakdowns, hymns, shouts, chanteys, and work songs. When they were released by Atlantic Records (1960) and Prestige Records (1962), these recordings served as inspiration and guide to a new generation of musicians passionately interested in the heritage this music represents.  From: https://www.culturalequity.org/rounder-records/southern-journey

 Alan Lomax was an American ethnomusicologist, best known for his numerous field recordings of folk music of the 20th century. He was also a musician himself, as well as a folklorist, archivist, writer, scholar, political activist, oral historian, and film-maker. Lomax produced recordings, concerts, and radio shows in the US and in England, which played an important role in preserving folk music traditions in both countries, and helped start both the American and British folk revivals of the 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. He collected material first with his father, folklorist and collector John Lomax, and later alone and with others, Lomax recorded thousands of songs and interviews for the Archive of American Folk Song, of which he was the director, at the Library of Congress on aluminum and acetate discs.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Lomax

 

Jean Ritchie

Bad Keys of the Mountain - As It Is

 #Bad Keys of the Mountain #country rock #alt-country #Southern rock #blues rock #Americana #animated music video

The shuffling boogie and Southern-fried licks in the opening title track of “Together and Alone” are an indicator that there’s plenty of good old-fashioned American, down-home rock in the new album from Bad Keys of the Mountain. But it’s not long before it becomes apparent how deep the influences of this West Virginia trio get, as Beatlesque melodies wind their way into the song. “I am you, and you are me / All in all is all we’ll be forever,” vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter David McGuire sings. “Laughing as we pass the time / ‘til we can be together and alone.” True to the album’s title, Together and Alone was recorded in quarantine during the summer of 2020. The band, which also feature bassist Joey Lafferty and drummer Joey Reese, holed up in a studio in their hometown of Charleston, West Virginia. “As the Covid pandemic hit early in the year and brought all things music to a halt, we decided to put all of our creative energies into making a record that we feel is both timeless and of the times, and that both looks inward and outward,” says McGuire in the album’s press materials. “Capturing the sounds of rock ‘n’ roll ranging from the 1960s to the indie wave of the early 2000s, this record is the best example yet of who we are as a collection of musicians.”  From: https://www.popmatters.com/bad-keys-mountain-together-alone

First Aid Kit - It's a Shame

 #First Aid Kit #indie folk #Americana #country folk #folk rock #folk pop #singer-songwriter #Swedish

First Aid Kit is a Swedish folk duo consisting of the sisters Johanna and Klara Söderberg.  They are from Stockholm, Sweden but their music sounds like a slice of Americana: acoustic guitar, autoharp and lots of vocal harmony. First Aid Kit is known for sweet melodies paired with lyrics that are often dark.  https://www.firstaidkitband.com/

This song was written in the car going back to our rental house in LA after spending a beautiful day at El Matador beach. It’s a song about having to get used to being on your own after being with someone for a long time. How desperately lonely you can feel. How you wish you were stronger and how ashamed you can be of the fact that you’re not. When we traveled to LA we had lots of expectations of what the trip was going to be like. It didn’t really turn out the way we had planned. We were both very sad. “It’s a Shame” came out of the frustration and guilt we felt at the time. We were listening a lot to Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours when recording this song in the studio. There’s a bouncy quality to that record that we love. We wanted the song to feel alive and upbeat, in stark contrast to the lyrical content.  From: https://genius.com/First-aid-kit-its-a-shame-lyrics

The Jayhawks - Nothing Left To Borrow

#The Jayhawks #Gary Louris #Mark Olson #alternative rock #country rock #alt-country #folk rock #Americana #roots rock #1990s

Led by the gifted songwriting, impeccable playing, and honeyed harmonies of vocalists/guitarists Mark Olson and Gary Louris, the Jayhawks' shimmering blend of country, folk, and bar band rock made them one of the most widely acclaimed artists to emerge from the 1980s alternative country scene.  From: https://www.iheart.com/artist/the-jayhawks-56757/

Occasionally, just occasionally, an album lies dormant in my collection waiting to be rediscovered. More likely, as my albums increase to ever more unmanageable levels, I won't have the time to devote to each to really appreciate the depth of the music and quality of the songs involved. Even after replaying Tomorrow The Green Grass by The Jayhawks I still don't think I've fully grasped how good this really is. The problem is there's nothing too prominent. Instead there is a sparse but beautiful feel which, after giving the album a dozen listens, may fall into place but, life is proving so busy and there's so much I want to listen to, I might never realize what I have. Indeed one of the liner notes states "these songs aren't as simple as they might seem at first glance" and that is bang on the money. Tomorrow The Green Grass is one of those rare albums that proves equally rewarding as mere background music or as something to dive right into and explore its dark corners and insightful nooks and crannies.
Playing harmonic country rock which can be traced all the way back to The Byrds, The Jayhawks strength is their strong song-writing as opposed to the trendy posturing of the day. In effect, this is loud folk music that weaves a tapestry of heartache and whimsy, innocence and angst – it could never be accused of being groundbreaking but the band takes pleasure in taking something familiar and performing it really, really well. The vocal harmonies of Gary Louris and Mark Olsen, whose final album with the band this would be, are an absolute joy. There is something of The Everly Brothers in there but it's more of an amalgam of different vocal styles: The Byrds, The Eagles, Buffalo Springfield, there's even something of Tom Petty in the mix and "Bad Time" boasts Beatlelesque vocal harmonies which include a contribution from Sharleen Spiteri taking time out from her band Texas. The best tracks on Tomorrow The Green Grass are some of the best the whole of the alt country genre has to offer. "Blue", "Two Hearts", "Bad Time", "Over My Shoulder" and "Nothing Left To Borrow" are all lovely in their simplicity and breathtaking in their execution.  From: https://rateyourmusic.com/release/album/the-jayhawks/tomorrow-the-green-grass/

Sally Rogers & Claudia Schmidt - Ezekiel Saw The Wheel

 #Sally Rogers #Claudia Schmidt #folk #traditional #Americana #singer-songwriter #contemporary folk #Appalachian dulcimer

"Ezekiel Saw the Wheel" is an African American spiritual arranged by William L. Dawson. It has been recorded by such artists as Woody Guthrie, Paul Robeson, John Lee Hooker, the Dixie Hummingbirds, the Tillers, the Fisk Jubilee Singers, The Charioteers and Gold City. The song recounts the Old Testament prophet Ezekiel's divine vision, described at the start of the eponymous book.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezekiel_Saw_the_Wheel

 Merkabah mysticism (lit. Chariot mysticism) is a school of early Jewish mysticism, c. 100 BCE – 1000 CE, centered on visions such as those found in the Book of Ezekiel chapter 1, or in the hekhalot literature ("palaces" literature), concerning stories of ascents to the heavenly palaces and the Throne of God. The main corpus of the merkabah literature was composed in the period 200–700 CE, although later references to the Chariot tradition can also be found in the literature of the Chassidei Ashkenaz in the Middle Ages. A major text in this tradition is the Maaseh Merkabah ("Work of the Chariot")  In English the Hebrew term merkabah relates to the throne-chariot of God in prophetic visions. It is most closely associated with the vision in Ezekiel chapter 1 of the four-wheeled vehicle driven by four hayyot ("living creatures"), each of which has four wings and the four faces of a man, lion, ox, and eagle (or vulture).
According to the verses in Ezekiel and its attendant commentaries, his vision consists of a chariot made of many heavenly beings driven by the "Likeness of a Man". The base structure of the chariot is composed of four beings. These beings are called the "living creatures". The bodies of the creatures are "like that of a human being", but each of them has four faces, corresponding to the four directions the chariot can go (East, South, North and West). The faces are that of a man, a lion, an ox (later changed to a cherub in Ezekiel 10:14) and an eagle. Since there are four angels and each has four faces, there are a total of sixteen faces. Each of the hayyot angels also has four wings. Two of these wings spread across the length of the chariot and connect with the wings of the angel on the other side. This creates a sort of 'box' of wings that forms the perimeter of the chariot. With the remaining two wings, each angel covers its own body. Below, but not attached to, the feet of the hayyot angels are other angels that are shaped like wheels. These wheel angels, which are described as "a wheel inside of a wheel", are called "ophanim" (wheels, cycles or ways). These wheels are not directly under the chariot but are nearby and along its perimeter. The angel with the face of the man is always on the east side and looks up at the "Likeness of a Man" that drives the chariot. The "Likeness of a Man" sits on a throne made of sapphire.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merkabah_mysticism

Ian Matthews - Old Man at the Mill

 #Ian Matthews #country rock #folk rock #British folk rock #Americana #singer-songwriter #1970s

A vital figure in the history of British folk, Ian Matthews was a founding member of the pioneering U.K. folk-rock band Fairport Convention before he went on to found his own group, Matthews' Southern Comfort, and later moved on to a solo career. Matthews possesses a warm and expressive tenor voice and a talent for songwriting. While he drew from British folk traditions in his work, his greatest inspiration came from American country, folk, and roots music, and he blended their timeless themes with a hippie-fied pastoral feel that was warm and sweet or sorrowful, depending on the song. Though he would dabble in soft rock, power pop, and synth pop in the late '70s and early '80s, he always returned to the sun-dappled sound of the country-folk hybrid that was his trademark.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/ian-matthews-mn0000768231/biography

“Old Man At the Mill“ is a traditional folk tune with many variations and slightly different titles and you can search for its history on google. Some of them delve into all these meanings of the circle of life and death as the turning of the mill and it’s certainly a good discussion among folk scholars of the 1960s when this song seems to have been recorded the most. But I’m a clawhammer banjoist who has played and danced at many old time dances. When I learned the words last year so I could record it on my baritone banjo, it became apparent to me that many of the lyrics were old square dance calls.   “First to the left and then to the right”  “Ladies Step Forward and the gents fall back” Also I’m going to guess that “one hand in the hopper and the other in the sack” is some dance direction lost to the last century or longer.  Also “Mill turns around of its own free will“ sounds much like some sort of circling movement.  Although much of this tune seems to be dance calls embedded in an earlier folk song, the last verse seems the most curious to me and I guess it may have been added at a later date? “My old man’s from Kalamazoo” which is a Michigan city famous for making Gibson banjos. No wonder banjoists love to play and sing this tune. And I’m no exception — I looked inside my old Gibson RB250 mastertone and sure enough it says “made in Kalamazoo, MI”.  From: https://www.banjohangout.org/archive/351543

The Seldom Scene - California Earthquake

#The Seldom Scene #John Starling #Mike Auldridge #bluegrass #folk #progressive bluegrass #Americana #alt-country #contemporary bluegrass #1970s

The Seldom Scene was established in 1971 in a basement in Bethesda, Maryland. The original line-up, our Founding Scene Fathers, was John Starling on guitar, Mike Auldridge on Dobro, Ben Eldridge on banjo, Tom Gray on double bass, and John Duffey on mandolin. Charlie Waller, a member of the Country Gentlemen, can be credited for the band's name. Expressing his doubt that this new band could succeed, Waller reportedly asked Duffey, "What are you going to call yourselves, the seldom seen?" The band performed weekly at the Red Fox Inn before getting a residency at the Birchmere Music Hall in Alexandria, Virginia. The rest is history.
The progressive bluegrass style played by the Seldom Scene had become increasingly popular during the 1970s. Their weekly shows included bluegrass versions of country music, rock, and  pop. The band's popularity soon forced them to play more than once a week - but they continued to maintain their image as being seldom seen, and on several of their early album covers were photographed with the stage lights on only their feet, or with their backs to the camera. Though the Scene remained a non-touring band, they were prolific recorders, producing seven albums in their first five years of existence, including one live album (among the first live bluegrass albums).
Since forming, the band has gone through numerous lineup changes. The last big shakeup happened in 1995, when Duffey and Eldridge, the two remaining original members, recruited dobro player Fred Travers, bassist Ronnie Simpkins, and guitarist Dudley Connell to join the band. Mandolinist Lou Reid returned the following year and in 2017 Ron Stewart joined as the new banjo player. The current band has been together the longest in Seldom Scene history, and for good reason. With an inventive take on bluegrass, the Seldom Scene has displayed both their original material and their interpretations of songs from limitless genres.  From: https://www.seldomscene.com/band

The Nields - This Town is Wrong

 #The Nields #Katryna & Nerissa Nields #folk rock #contemporary folk #alternative rock #indie rock #Americana #1990s

The first incarnation of what would later become the Nields came together in 1987 in McLean, Virginia, when Nerissa Nields met David Jones, and started a band with Nerissa's sister Katryna. In 1991, Katryna had graduated from Trinity College in Connecticut, and Nerissa had graduated from Yale University. Nerissa married David, who was now known as David Nields, having taken her surname. By now, the threesome was performing together as the Nields, with Katryna as the lead singer, Nerissa playing rhythm guitar and singing harmony, and David Nields on lead guitar. In 1992, the three of them moved to Connecticut, where David had accepted a job at the Loomis Chaffee School, and the band recorded its first album, the self-released 66 Hoxsey Street, named for a house in Williamstown where they had lived. The band began to tour New England in earnest, earning a reputation in the regional folk music scene. In 1993, they released a live album titled Live at the Iron Horse Music Hall, recorded at the popular folk club in Northampton, Massachusetts.
In 1994 the band grew from a three-piece folk group to a five-piece rock band. The new members were Dave Chalfant (bass), whom Katryna had met in college, and Dave Hower (drums), a friend of Chalfant's. Chalfant also produced the band's album released that year, Bob on the Ceiling. This album featured a mix of the acoustic material that the Nields had previously specialized in and a more rock-oriented sound that would become their trademark. With their new sound, the Nields received critical acclaim, and quit their day jobs to become full-time musicians. Their 1995 EP Abigail, named for Katryna and Nerissa's sister, was self-released, followed by Gotta Get Over Greta in 1996 on the independent Razor & Tie record label. The album was re-released in 1997 with three bonus tracks on Guardian, a division of Elektra Records.
Unfortunately, the group suffered a number of setbacks the next year. Guardian folded, leaving them without a record label, and their tour van was growing increasingly unreliable. The band self-released an album called Mousse (the nickname for Dave Chalfant's sister Andromache) and held a special fundraising concert entitled "Jam for the Van." As a result, the Nields were able to purchase a new van, and were also able to secure a new label, Zoë, a division of Rounder Records. Over the next three years, the Nields released two more records (Play and If You Lived Here You'd Be Home Now), and in 1999 Katryna Nields and Dave Chalfant got married.
Although the band enjoyed a moderate degree of success, they ceased touring as a five-piece in 2001. Their final recording with David Nields was a two-disc album titled Live From Northampton. Like their 1993 album, it was recorded at the Iron Horse Music Hall, and was self-released by the band. In 2002, David and Nerissa Nields were divorced.
In 1998, Katryna and Nerissa were invited to play Lilith Fair as a duo. The performances were successful, and the two sisters performed several more shows together in areas where the full band had not previously been able to tour. By 2001, shows by the full band were increasingly rare, as Katryna and Nerissa toured mostly by themselves. In mid-2001, Katryna took some time off to have a baby, Amelia. Afterwards, she and Nerissa recorded their first album as a duo, titled Love and China, followed by an EP of children's songs, Songs for Amelia. In 2004, they released their second full album, This Town is Wrong. In 2005, Nerissa's young adult novel, Plastic Angel, was published by Scholastic Books. This Town Is Wrong was intended as a soundtrack to the novel, which came packaged with a CD containing the songs "This Town Is Wrong" and "Glow-In-The-Dark Plastic Angel" from the album.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nields

Chris Isaak - Wicked Game

 #Chris Isaak #rock & roll #rockabilly #Americana #roots rock #singer-songwriter #1980s #1990s

Chris Isaak fashioned himself as a throwback to the early days of rock & roll, devising a fusion between Elvis Presley's rockabilly croon and Roy Orbison's moody, melancholy balladeering. Unlike his roots rock peers of the 1980s, Isaak didn't care for the earthier elements of rock & roll. He offered a stylized, picturesque spin on the spare, echoey sound of pre-Beatles rock, creating an atmosphere that was equally sweet and sensuous. Certainly, "Wicked Game," the sultry single that became a career-defining hit in 1989, captured his seductive side, a trait that would re-surface on the subsequent "Baby Did a Bad, Bad Thing," a darkly lit rockabilly tune from 1995 that was later included in Stanley Kubrick's 1999 film Eyes Wide Shut. Those two songs crystallize the shadowy sexiness lurking within Isaak's music, but much of his body of work found him exploring the lighter side of the first wave of rock & roll with a knowing yet loving playfulness. This sense of understated showmanship helped Isaak ease into side careers as an actor and television host, plus it was central to the live shows that kept him on the road in between a steady stream of records.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/chris-isaak-mn0000775323/biography

Los Lobos - Reva's House

 #Los Lobos #chicano rock #roots rock #tex-mex #country rock #Americana #cowpunk #blues rock #folk rock #Mexican #1990s

Los Lobos has defined the East Los Angeles sonic landscape for nearly a half century. Following the musical trajectory of giants such as Ritchie Valens and Lalo Guerrero, who melded traditional Mexican music with other popular forms, Los Lobos has carried the torch of Chicano music into the present and has amassed a body of work that will be cherished, studied, and emulated for many years to come.
Formed in 1973 by guitarist/accordionist David Hidalgo and percussionist and lyricist Louie Perez, their joint eclectic musical interests led them to recruit two other students from Garfield High School in East Los Angeles. Guitarist Cesar Rosas and bassist Conrad Lozano joined and they decided to call themselves Los Lobos del Este. As young, music-loving Chicanos from the barrio, they were a product of their surroundings. African-American influences such as the blues, rock n roll, jazz, and doo–wop were a natural complement to the deep and soulful Mexican and Latin American sounds they had grown up with, such as the bolero, rancheras, music Norteña, son jarocho, son huasteco, and cumbias. Los Lobos utilized these multicultural influences to give birth to their unique sound. From back yard family parties, weddings, and Mexican restaurants, Los Lobos was quickly in demand amid the pre- and post- Chicano civil rights movement. In 1978, they recorded and released their first album Los Lobos del Este De Los Angeles (Just Another Band From East LA), which led them to more popularity and to connect them to the versatility and angst of the city’s punk rock music scene. Their association with the LA roots band, the Blasters, led to the addition of multi-instrumentalist Steve Berlin, who left the Blasters to join them, further expanding their sound.
The wildly successful soundtrack of La Bamba (1985) catapulted Los Lobos into international stardom, earning them industry recognition and a Grammy Award. Los Lobos responded to this success by releasing the traditionalist La Pistola y El Corazon (1988).  The band’s accomplishments do not overshadow their ongoing commitment to mentoring and elevating up-and-coming bands that have benefited from their trailblazing, such as Making Movies, Ozomatli, Chicano Batman, La Santa Cecilia, and Quetzal.
A “musician’s band,” Los Lobos’ lyricism and unique poetic prose, mostly manifested by lyricist Louie Perez, expresses the environment and consciousness of the barrio in relation to the world around it. Their delivery in English, Spanish, or Spanglish espouses the important ideas of humanity, pro-immigration, depression, love of self, community, and deep Mexican/Chicano culture and heritage. Each of their albums takes the sound of Chicano rock music into another stratosphere.  From: https://www.arts.gov/honors/heritage/los-lobos

Laura Love - Bad Feeling

 #Laura Love #folk #Afro-Celtic #Americana #Afro-Carribean #folk rock #funk #R&B #world music #singer-songwriter

Over the past several years, Laura Love has become quite acclaimed in the Northwest music scene as an unparalleled vocalist, bassist, and songwriter. Love's style is a synthesis of inner-city funk and folk-ish sensibility. One of the most difficult tasks for a musician is to find an apt label for her music; folk/funk, African/Appalachian, and House/Celtic have been bandied about for Laura Love. Whatever you choose to call it, Love's original music is at once fresh, def, and rooted in tradition. Although a popular headliner in her own right, she has opened for John Lee Hooker, Lyle Lovett, Bo Diddley, Karla Bonoff, and Elayne Boosler and been invited to perform at a number of folk and eclectic music festivals. Born in Lincoln, Nebraska, Laura Love began her career at the age of 16, singing jazz and pop standards at the Nebraska State Penitentiary. Since then, Love has played in a blues-grunge outfit, in a duo, trio, and in the funny feminist foursome, Venus Envy. Love has released three albums: Menstrual Hut (1989), Z Therapy (1990), and Pangaea (1993), all on her own label, Octoroon Biography. Shum Ticky followed in 1998 and Fourteen Days arrived in 2000 on Zoe Records.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/laura-love-mn0000116761/biography

Singer-songwriter Laura Love isn't yet a household name, but she's done pretty well for an African-American woman who grew up in abject poverty in Nebraska - a place where other black faces like hers were few and far between. She's got her own flavor of music she calls folk-funk, and has sold more than 200,000 records over the span of her short and very independent career. Her latest creative blast is a combination memoir and CD of songs inspired by the trials during her young life, You Ain't Got No Easter Clothes. Love's life story isn't an easy one, but her words and music convey a wry wit and deep sense of joy and humor. Almost all of the songs on the You Ain't Got No Easter Clothes CD were composed at the same time she wrote her memoir. The book reveals Love's often shocking struggle against adversity - her mother's mental illness, the family's deep poverty, her stays in foster homes and other setbacks. But instead of hitting back, Love's words and music recall the gratitude, joy and sense of humor that characterize her outlook on life.  From: https://www.npr.org/2004/08/26/3871856/laura-love-two-for-easter