Brewer & Shipley - Don't Want to Die in Georgia

 #Brewer & Shipley #folk #folk rock #country rock #singer-songwriter #1960s #1970s

Michael Brewer & Tom Shipley began their careers as solo folk artists on the coffee house circuit in the early 1960s. Both native mid-westerns (Oklahoman and Ohioan respective to their billing), they first met in 1964 at the Blind Owl coffee house in Kent, Ohio.  It would be three more years before they would team up, and during those three years the two crossed paths at clubs on the folk circuit, and each tried their hand in other musical collaborations that didn’t pan out.
In 1965 Michael Brewer migrated to Los Angeles following the emerging west coast music scene. His initial duo Mastin & Brewer signed a record deal with Columbia Records but the group imploded before finishing their record. Brewer eventually accepted a job as a staff songwriter at Good Sam Music, a publishing offshoot of the newly formed A&M Records. Around this time, Tom Shipley arrived in L.A. and looked up his acquaintance from the folk circuit. Tom rented a house around the corner from Michael’s house, and soon they began writing songs together.  When Shipley was subsequently hired as staff writer for A&M in 1967, their partnership began as a songwriting collaboration.
As staff songwriters, their early songs were recorded by The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, Glen Yarborough, H.P. Lovecraft, The Poor, Noel Harrison, and Bobby Rydell. A&M Records soon recognized that Michael & Tom’s demo recordings exhibited a unique sound and style of their own, so they green lighted them to record an album. A&M brought in the best musicians in L.A. to play on the album. But even with a soon to be released debut album and mutual friends who were starting to make it big in bands such as The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, and The Association, Michael and Tom so disliked their life in L.A. that they decided to move back to the Midwest as soon as the record was recorded.
In the last decade-plus, the duo has witnessed rejuvenated interest in their music, beginning with BMG's purchase of their Kama Sutra catalog and subsequent re-issue of the critically acclaimed Tarkio release in 1996. This was soon followed by the inclusion of "One Toke Over The Line" on the Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas motion picture soundtrack. A live record of classic performances from 1973, Archive Alive, was released in 1997, the same year they released an album of new material Heartland on their own One Toke Productions label.  From: http://www.brewerandshipley.com/bios&liners/bio_b&s.htm

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

Dope Lemon - Honey Bones

 #Dope Lemon #Angus Stone #psychedelic rock #neo-psychedelia #pop rock #psychedelic pop  #psychedelic folk #dream pop #singer-songwriter #Australian #music video

Dope Lemon is the latest musical project from Angus Stone. After he was already established internationally as one-half of the sibling indie pop duo Angus & Julia Stone, the Australian singer/songwriter switched gears with his work under the pseudonym Dope Lemon, embracing more of a woozy, electric, '90s slacker rock sound than his other projects. Slick guitar playing, summery grooves, and dreamy-eyed vocal performances decorate Stone's highly stylized songwriting. From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/dope-lemon-mn0003490717/biography

Angus Stone (sans sister Julia), and his good friends have dropped the debut album for their side project Dope Lemon, ‘Honey Bones’. Unlike what comes from when you and your friends get together to jam in a basement, ‘Honey Bones’ is a beautiful psychedelic-folk album that brings so many different ideas together seamlessly in one release. The album takes you on a psychedelic journey, working you through so many different effects and layers that at times it can be a struggle to be entirely sure what you’re hearing and how it was created. The album is best experienced with headphones on, as the mixing definitely plays with your perceptions as sounds move around your ears and you’re caught in the swirling maelstrom of effects.
Title track Honey Bones takes an exotic excursion, employing a tabla drum beat and constantly jangling sitar in the background to paint a meditative backdrop, which is only further layered by long, drawn out bass notes, and repeating guitar lines. Almost inaudible vocal harmonies add a psychedelic texture to this track in the chorus.
‘Honey Bones’ is at its best when it totally throws your expectations out of the door. Initially, you’re led to believe that it would be a throw back to one of the earlier Bob Dylan albums that first used electric guitar work. However, four songs in you’re taking a psychedelic journey thanks to unadulterated guitar effects and fun layering. At times it sounds like a young guitarist who has tried to apply every guitar effect in his arsenal, but with a beautiful polish and direction that comes with an experienced songwriter like Angus Stone.

From: https://aaabackstage.com/album-review-dope-lemons-debut-album-honey-bones/

Patty Griffin - Moses

 #Patty Griffin #contemporary folk #Americana #country folk #alt-country #alternative folk rock #singer-songwriter

Patty Griffin's major-label debut was actually recorded as a demo cassette. A&M executives were so impressed with this raw display of talent that they snatched up the tape and threw it, unaltered, into the marketplace. Griffin recorded her songs exactly as she performed them live, armed with only her acoustic guitar and a voice that can rattle fences. While dozens of folk artists have attempted to bend the ear of the major labels by coating their acoustics with radio-friendly keyboards and drums, Griffin took the gutsy "band? I don't need no stinking band" approach. It's primarily a testament to her voice that A&M was so taken with her minimalism; as a guitarist, Griffin isn't much more than an energetic strummer. Her songwriting is only occasionally exceptional -- her word choices are as minimal as her arrangements, and her melodies are engaging but conventional. But she is nonetheless a striking and intriguing storyteller, because her tales of chronically lonely people are told with such passion. Griffin's Nashville-tinged warble has tremendous emotional range, one minute cracking with brittle vulnerability, the next minute blasting with passionate intensity. Occasionally it seems Griffin's demo engineers were unequipped to handle her vibrant transitions, setting the microphone level for a whisper then cringing as the speakers bristle and the needles slam into the red. But this subtle idiosyncrasy only adds to the charm of the album, lending to the impression that no stereo is big enough to contain this voice.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/living-with-ghosts-mw0000183522

Jazmin Bean - Birthday Bitch

 #Jazmin Bean #Jasmine Adams #pop metal #trap metal #hyperpop #alt-pop #electropop #alternative metal #electro-industrial #singer-songwriter #Filipino #British #music video 

From musician, to makeup artist, to fashionista, Jazmin Bean does not fit into any one category. But who exactly is Bean anyway? Well, that particular question doesn’t have an answer with a neatly wrapped bow around it. Instead, the answer takes you on a roller coaster ride. From the streets of Harajuku, Japan, to the glorious and topsy-turvy world of Tim Burton, you’ll encounter Bean at the intersection of your worst nightmare and your favourite daydream - a “visual and musical collision of the darkest corners of our imagination,” as The Forty Five puts it. Bean is a hybrid of both the terrifying and the terrific. Creating a myriad of gruesome gore visuals and musical aesthetics, the artist firmly places themself in a lane of their own - and everyone should pay attention.
Jasmine Adams, professionally known as Jazmin Bean, is a British singer, songwriter, makeup artist, beauty brand owner, business entrepreneur, and of course, style icon - so, just about everything under the sun. The artist is non-binary, goes by the pronouns they/them, and toes the line between pop star and underground rebel on a daily basis. As a champion of multiple aesthetics, Bean has been credited for their fearless approach to blending various styles together, sonically and visually, in their music career. “I create music and film that pushes the boundaries of beauty and societal standards and throws itself into extremes,” they said in an interview with Dazed. There is a certain allure in the dark and lurid appeal of Bean, with their website currently featuring an image of them holding a giant blade. Frequently linked to other acts like Grimes, Rina Sawayama, Babymetal, Poppy and Melanie Martinez, the rising pop star has cemented their place in the alternative genre. Bean’s art seems to pull all ends of the spectrum, from nightmarish visuals to lullaby lyrics which both transform the way we enjoy and interact with music.  From: https://screenshot-media.com/culture/influencers/who-is-jazmin-bean/   

Buckingham Nicks - Don't Let Me Down Again

 #Buckingham Nicks #Lindsey Buckingham #Stevie Nicks  #blues rock #folk rock #melodic hard rock #pop rock #singer-songwriter #pre-Fleetwood Mac #1970s

There was a lot of competition in the singer-songwriter field in 1973, and Buckingham Nicks wasn’t the best of the lot, but it’s excellent, and it’s still puzzling how swiftly it vanished. It’s packed with top-flight session musicians—Waddy Wachtel on guitar, Jim Keltner on drums—and was recorded by Keith Olsen, a producer with dozens of gold and platinum records ahead of him, but it was a complete failure. Promotion was light, the few reviews were mostly bad, and Polydor dropped the duo a few months after the album came out. After a five-year build-up, the moment was over as quickly as it started. But Stevie and Lindsey were writing for their next album even before this one was finished. Lindsey had penned “Monday Morning,” and Nicks, inspired by a passage in a book about a Welsh witch, had a stunning new song called “Rhiannon.” There was another ballad called “Landslide.” They weren’t ready to give up on Buckingham Nicks, which made the next decision difficult. In December 1974, Mick Fleetwood of Fleetwood Mac received news that his guitarist, Bob Welch, was quitting the band. Line-up changes were nothing new - in their seven-year history, they’d already been through several - but Fleetwood’s band was due back in the studio soon. He’d heard Lindsey play once, and Keith Olsen, with whom he was friendly, mentioned his name. It didn’t take long before he offered Buckingham the job. Lindsey was reticent, afraid of giving up what he and Stevie had built together. He said that Nicks would have to be part of the deal. After having dinner with the members of Fleetwood Mac in January 1975, they both agreed to join.  From: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/buckingham-nicks-buckingham-nicks/

Orla Gartland - I Go Crazy

#Orla Gartland #indie folk #contemporary folk #folk pop #R&B #alternative rock #indie rock #singer-songwriter #music video 

Irish musician Orla Gartland combines singer/songwriter folk and elements of traditional Irish music with bedroom pop sensibilities. Hailing from Dublin, Gartland was taught to play violin, fiddle, and other traditional instruments at the age of 5, but she found her true calling when she picked up the guitar at 12. Within a year she was uploading cover songs online, eventually branching out and creating her own tracks. At 17, she had released her debut single, "Devil on My Shoulder," landing her support slots for Ryan O'Shaughnessy and Nina Nesbitt on their respective U.K. tours. Her debut EP, Roots, surfaced the following year, and she toured the U.K. with five headline shows. Later the same year, Gartland contributed the song "Cast Your Stone" to the Simple Things album in support of suicide prevention in Ireland. After the release of her second EP, 2015's Lonely People, Gartland relocated to London and stepped back from writing for a short period, returning in 2019 with a third EP, Why Am I Like This?. She joined Irish Women in Harmony in 2020, working with them to record a version of "Dreams" in support of Safe Ireland, a domestic abuse charity. Later the same year she released her fourth EP, Freckle Season, which she combined with her previous EP to create Why Is Freckle Season Like This. It led to placements on the BBC Three/Hulu series Normal People. Gartland's first proper album, Woman on the Internet, was recorded with help from producers including Tom Stafford and the Vaccines' Pete Robertson. It arrived on her label, New Friends, in August of 2021.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/orla-gartland-mn0003202129/biography

Cat Stevens - Angelsea

 #Cat Stevens #folk rock #pop rock #album rock #singer-songwriter #1970s

Catch Bull At Four is a masterpiece of artistic creativity that saw Cat Stevens at the peak of his powers taking his insightful and introspective songwriting into a bold new direction. He was beginning to lean into his love of R&B, Soul, and even musical theatre with stunning results. Sonically, the album is bigger than the previous three records, introducing a broader array of instrumentation, backing vocals, and lush, multi-layered arrangements. Cat’s trademark impassioned vocals and percussive guitar style is combined with the sound of a new fuller backing band featuring Gerry Conway on drums, Jean Roussel on keys, and Alan James on bass, alongside the ever present force of Alun Davies on guitar. This heavier musical ensemble allowed the artist to inject a new level of drama into his work as is displayed on songs such as ‘Can’t Keep It In’, ‘18th Avenue (Kansas City Nightmare)’ and ‘Freezing Steel’. Even tracks such as the much loved ‘Sitting’ and ‘Angelsea’, that bare the hallmarks of songs from the Tillerman and Teaser albums, have a previously unheard intensity that is deeply hypnotic and entirely compelling.
Although Catch Bull At Four represents a progression beyond the classic Cat Stevens acoustic sound, thematically it is unmistakably a continuation of his earlier work. ‘O Caritas’ and ‘Ruins’ are both rooted in the prescient environmental and societal concerns found throughout his previous albums stretching back into the late 1960s. Similarly, ‘Sweet Scarlet’ and ‘Silent Sunlight’ emanate from the same sensitivity that informed many of his most beloved songs and that had already garnered so much profound devotion from legions of fans worldwide. And yet it is ‘Boy With The Moon And Star On His Head’, arguably the album’s crown jewel, that at once seems the most familiar song while simultaneously breaking new ground in terms of timeless folk storytelling. The song’s mystical narrative of a man’s transgression on his wedding day that results in a blessed child that grows into a wise sage who is revered by people from far and wide, feels as though it belongs in a collection of the world’s greatest epic poems or among the sagas and legends of a time now lost to history. This song, perhaps above all others, is a testament to Cat Stevens’ deep and transcendent spiritual awareness.  From: https://catstevens.com/catch-bull-at-four-50th-anniversary-remaster/

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

Susanna Hoffs - Feel Like Makin' Love

 #Susanna Hoffs #ex-Bangles #singer-songwriter #alternative rock #folk rock #pop rock #jangle pop #power pop #paisley pop #Bad Company cover #live music video

The Bangles' Susanna Hoffs will release a covers album, ‘Bright Lights’, on November 12, 2021 via Baroque Folk Records. On it she covers songs by Nick Drake, Syd Barrett, The Velvet Underground, Chris Bell, Prince (who wrote The Bangles' hit "Manic Monday"), The Monkees, and more. “The artists on Bright Lights approached songwriting from a deeply emotional place and with a profound sensitivity to the world around them,” says Hoffs. “Sadly, many of them died too young. I didn’t actually see the big picture of that until I looked at the whole tracklist. It was subconscious. Yet I’ve always been drawn to songs that were intensely emotional.” The first single from the album is a cover of Badfinger's "Name of the Game," which is a duet with Aimee Mann. ‘Bright Lights’ recalls the 1984 covers album credited to Rainy Day that was led by the late David Roback (of Rain Parade, Opal, and later Mazzy Star), and featured members of L.A.'s "Paisley Underground" scene, including Hoffs and members of The Three O'Clock, The Dream Syndicate and more, with their versions of songs by The Velvet Underground, Bob Dylan, Big Star and more.  From: https://www.brooklynvegan.com/the-bangles-susanna-hoffs-preps-covers-lp-shares-badfinger-cover-ft-aimee-mann/

K.D. Lang - Pullin' Back the Reins

 K.D. Lang #alt-country #cowpunk #country rock #folk rock #country pop #alternative rock #singer-songwriter #Canadian #1980s #1990s

When K.D. Lang released her first major-label album in 1987, she caused considerable controversy within the traditional world of country music. With her vaguely campy approach, androgynous appearance, and edgy, rock-inflected music, very few observers knew what to make of her or her music, although no one questioned her considerable vocal talents. Her self-reliant stature has never wavered over the course of her career, even when she abandoned country music for torchy adult contemporary pop in 1992 with her fourth album, Ingénue, which featured her biggest hit, "Constant Craving."
Born in Alberta, Canada, Lang was first drawn to music while she was in college, when she became acquainted with Patsy Cline while preparing to star in a collegiate theatrical production based on the vocalist's life. Soon, Lang immersed herself in Cline's life and music and decided that she would pursue a career as a professional singer. With the help of guitarist/co-songwriter Ben Mink, she formed a band named the Reclines in tribute to Cline, in 1983. They recorded a debut single, "Friday Dance Promenade," which received some positive notices in the independent press. Their album A Truly Western Experience followed in 1984 and received even better reviews and national attention.
All of the Canadian attention led to the interest of a number of American record labels. Sire signed lang in early 1986, and she recorded her first record for the label later that year. The resulting Angel with a Lariat was produced by Dave Edmunds and appeared in July 1987. The mix of '50s-styled ballads, kitschy rockabilly, and honky tonk numbers on Angel with a Lariat had heavy support from college radio as well as cutting-edge country stations. Though it was a mainstream hit in Canada and an underground smash in the U.S., Nashville resisted Lang, especially because of her tongue-in-cheek concert appearances.
Shadowland, her second Sire album, made her debt to Patsy Cline explicit. Recorded with Cline's producer, Owen Bradley, the album lacked the campy humor of Angel with a Lariat, which helped it succeed in traditional country circles. Shadowland became a sizable word-of-mouth hit, both in modern country and alternative music circles. The following year, Lang released the harder-edged Absolute Torch and Twang, which increased her mainstream American country audience in addition to being a college radio and Canadian hit. The attention made lang a minor celebrity, which meant that when she launched a protest against meat eating in 1990, it became a media sensation.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/kd-lang-mn0000852997/biography

Needshes - One Day

 #Needshes #Otabek Salamov #alternative rock #indie rock #pop rock #soul #blues rock #funk #singer-songwriter #multi-instrumentalist #Uzbekistan #animated music video 

The Central Asian country of Uzbekistan is the homeland of Otabek Salamov (Bek), songwriter, composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer, and founder of the alternative rock/indie-pop band Needshes. Currently based in Moscow, the band – rounded out by Ivan Petukhov (guitar) and Alexey Manakhov (drums) – continues to expand their eclectic style rooted in David Bowie, Queen, and James Brown in 2020. Bek started his musical journey in early childhood. He attended the music academy in his hometown, Tashkent, where he was awarded the first national prize for his precision on clarinet at the age of 13. As a teen, his interests varied, and he was drawn to compose and perform metalcore in night clubs with cross paint on his face. At that time, Bek was working as an assistant audio engineer in local studios, so he quickly adapted to recording and producing his own music. One day he decided to dilute it with melodic undertones. In the process of creating this transition, he realized that the switch was something that gravitated to his liking. In 2013 he founded a melodic rock project, Needshes, and moved to Moscow. His biggest influences stemmed from The Killers, Jack White, James Brown, David Bowie, Queen, RHCP, U2, a-ha, Coldplay, and Nirvana. Otabek gathered a full traditional formation around his brainchild with the intent to create authentic rock music. In 2016 after several line-up changes, Ivan (guitar) and Alexey (drums) joined him and made it possible for the sound created in the studio to fully sound live.  From: http://syncsummit.com/needshes/

Sheryl Crow - Maybe Angels

 #Sheryl Crow #country rock #folk rock #blues rock #alternative rock #heartland rock #roots rock #singer-songwriter #1990s

Hiring noted roots experimentalists Tchad Blake and Mitchell Froom as engineer and consultant, respectively, Sheryl Crow took a cue from their Latin Playboys project for her second album - she kept her roots rock foundation and added all sorts of noises, weird instruments, percussion loops, and off-balance production to give the eponymous “Sheryl Crow” a distinctly modern flavor. And, even with the Stones-y grind of "Sweet Rosalyn" or hippie spirits of "Love Is a Good Thing," it is an album that couldn't have been made any other time than the 1990s. As strange as it may sound, “Sheryl Crow” is a postmodern masterpiece of sorts - albeit a mainstream, post-alternative, postmodern masterpiece. It may not be as hip or innovative as, say, the Beastie Boys' “Paul's Boutique,” but it is as self-referential, pop culture obsessed, and musically eclectic. Throughout the record, Crow spins out wild, nearly incomprehensible stream-of-consciousness lyrics, dropping celebrity names and products every chance she gets ("drinking Falstaff beer/Mercedes Ruehl and a rented Leer"). Often, these litanies don't necessarily add up to anything specific, but they're a perfect match for the mess of rock, blues, alt-rock, country, folk, and lite hip-hop loops that dominate the record. At her core, she remains a traditionalist - the songcraft behind the infectious "Change Would Do You Good," the bubbly "Everyday Is a Winding Road," and the weary "If It Makes You Happy" helped get the singles on the radio - but the production and lyrics are often at odds with those instincts, creating for a fascinating and compelling listen and one of the most individual albums of its era.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/sheryl-crow-mw0000075511

Donovan - Wear Your Love Like Heaven

 #Donovan #folk rock #psychedelic folk #psychedelic rock #acid folk #British psychedelia #singer-songwriter #1960s

Rock music's first two-LP box set, Donovan’s A Gift from a Flower to a Garden overcomes its original shortcomings and stands out as a prime artifact of the flower-power era that produced it. The music still seems a bit fey, and overall more spacy than the average Moody Blues album of this era, but the sheer range of subjects and influences make this a surprisingly rewarding work. Essentially two albums recorded simultaneously in the summer of 1967, the electric tracks include Jack Bruce among the session players. The acoustic tracks represent an attempt by Donovan to get back to his old sound and depart from the heavily electric singles ("Sunshine Superman," etc.) and albums he'd been doing - it is folkier and bluesier (in an English folk sense) than much of his recent work.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/a-gift-from-a-flower-to-a-garden-mw0000691015

This very psychedelic song is a nod to the divine, conjuring up images of nature's colors and invoking both God and Allah. Heavy stuff. In our interview with Donovan, we asked how he came up with the vibrant images that appear in the lyric. Lines like:

Color sky Havana lake
Color sky rose carmethene
Alizarian crimson

Donovan explained that like many great songwriters - Joni Mitchell, John Lennon, Bob Dylan among them - he dabbled in art and thought in terms of paintings. This song is an example of translating images on a canvas into words. "'Wear Your Love Like Heaven' was really a paint-ily song - watching a sunset go down," he said.

From: https://www.songfacts.com/facts/donovan/wear-your-love-like-heaven

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

Andy Shauf - The Magician

 #Andy Shauf #folk rock #baroque pop #indie rock #jazz rock #indie folk #chamber pop #singer-songwriter #Canadian #animated music video

Hailed as “a gifted storyteller” (NPR Music) for 2016’s 'The Party' and 2020’s 'The Neon Skyline', Andy Shauf writes albums that unfold like short fiction, full of colorful characters, fine details and a rich emotional depth. With 'Norm', however, Shauf has slyly deconstructed and reshaped the style for which he’s been celebrated, elevating his songwriting with intricate layers and perspectives, challenging himself to find a new direction. Under the guise of an intoxicating collection of jazz-inflected romantic ballads, his storytelling has become decidedly more oblique, hinting at ominous situations and dark motivations.
Shauf had planned to be touring around 'The Neon Skyline' but, like many of us in the early days of the pandemic, he spent a lot of time alone instead. He sequestered himself in his garage studio, self-producing and playing every instrument on 'Norm', a collection of more conventional songs written predominantly on guitar, piano and synths. The latter was essential to creating the more spacious and tactile sounds he sought. Shauf’s goals were uncomplicated: create something melody-driven rather than chord-driven, and make it modern. Shauf recruited Neal Pogue (Tyler, the Creator, Janelle Monae, Outkast), a prodigious shaper of genre-and-time-defying tracks, to mix the album, further building on the gently levitating, synth-laden atmospherics.
During this period, he was captivated by David Lynch’s ‘Mulholland Drive’, which seemed to validate Shauf’s instinct to mix perspectives and tinker with shadowy narratives. He even rewrote all of the album’s original lyrics, recreating the story, and enlisting Nicholas Olson as a story editor - it was only after writing the title track that Shauf decided to build a narrative around the character Norm. "The character of Norm is introduced in a really nice way," Shauf says of the pleasant songs that precede the album's centerpiece. "But the closer you pay attention to the record, the more you're going to realize that it's sinister."  From: https://www.anti.com/artists/andy-shauf/  

Patti Smith - Frederick

 #Patti Smith #art punk #proto-punk #art rock #hard rock #new wave #alternative rock #singer-songwriter #1970s

Punk rock's poet laureate Patti Smith ranks among the most ambitious, unconventional, and challenging rock & rollers of all time. When she emerged in the '70s, Smith's music was hailed as the most exciting fusion of rock and poetry since Bob Dylan's heyday. With her androgynous, visual presentation echoing her unabashedly intellectual and uncompromising songwriting, Smith followed her muse wherever it took her, from structured rock songs to free-form experimentalism. Her most avant-garde outings, such as 1975's Horses and the following year's Radio Ethiopia, borrowed improvisation and interplay from free jazz, but remained firmly rooted in primal three-chord rock & roll. A regular at CBGB's during New York punk's early days, the artiness and the raw musicianship of her work had a major impact on the movement among contemporaries and followers alike. As boundary-pushing as her music could be, Smith nevertheless scored a hit in the Bruce Springsteen collaboration "Because the Night" from 1978's Easter, which, like 1979's Wave, offered a slightly more polished version of her sound. When she returned to music following a lengthy hiatus and the death of her husband, Fred "Sonic" Smith, her work was sometimes subtler and more meditative, as on 1996's Gone Again, but rock was still a fiery, vital part of albums like 2000's Gung Ho and 2012's Banga.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/patti-smith-mn0000747445/biography

By 1979, Patti Smith was in a relationship with Fred “Sonic” Smith of Detroit garage rock legends The MC5, and “Frederick” is one of the most beautifully pure love songs of its era; a sense of euphoric joy leaping from the speakers set to a classic rock melody that clings to the memory magnetically. It’s so vivid, the fact that Smith turned her back on music for a decade afterwards, choosing blissful domesticity and motherhood over life on the road, should have come as no surprise.  From: https://www.loudersound.com/features/patti-smith-every-album-ranked-from-worst-to-best  

The Story - When Two and Two Are Five

#The Story #Jonatha Brooke #Jennifer Kimball #folk rock #alternative rock #indie rock #contemporary folk rock #singer-songwriter #1990s

Jonatha Brooke and Jennifer Kimball first met in 1981 while first-year students at Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts. Originally called simply "Jonatha and Jennifer", they performed regularly throughout the Boston area until graduation, at which time Brooke started working in a dance company and Kimball went to a publishing firm. In 1989 the duo recorded a demo, Over Oceans, and were quickly signed by Green Linnet Records. They changed their name to The Story, and their debut album Grace in Gravity was released in 1991. Elektra Records then signed the band, reissuing the album a year later. The Angel in the House followed in 1993, but a year later The Story dissolved. Known for their ethereal and dissonant vocal harmonies, both Brooke and Kimball have gone on to critically acclaimed solo careers. Although The Story's work has been highly regarded by critics and fans alike, both Brooke and Kimball have individually downplayed the band's work.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Story_(American_band)

Laura Nyro - Stoned Soul Picnic

#Laura Nyro #blue-eyed soul #R&B #piano rock #jazz rock #folk rock #alternative pop #singer-songwriter #1960s #1970s

Whatever role Laura Nyro chose to play - earth mother, soul sister, angel of the Bronx subways - she committed to it. With a soaring, open-hearted voice and ingeniously crafted compositions, Nyro transformed a range of influences into her own kind of art song. She made vertiginous shifts from hushed reveries to ecstatic gospel-driven shout-ups with an intensity and a courage that, as Elton John would point out, left its mark on many contemporaries who achieved greater commercial success. As the music of the 1960s reached a climax, no one else merged the new songwriting freedoms pioneered by Bob Dylan with the pop sensibility of the Brill Building tunesmiths to such intriguing effect. As a teenager, she wrote And When I Die and Stoney End, songs that became hits for other artists. Her own enigmatically titled albums - Eli and the Thirteenth Confession, New York Tendaberry, Christmas and the Beads of Sweat - showed a precociously sophisticated sensibility. Later, rejecting commercial pressures, she would help push the boundaries of popular music by writing songs celebrating motherhood, female sexuality and her menstrual cycle. In the hearts of admirers, she kindled a loyalty fierce enough to withstand the semi-obscurity into which she had fallen by the time of her death from ovarian cancer in 1997, at 49. The dimming of her fame had been gradual and, to an extent, self-actuated. If her early songs seemed to give listeners the thrill of overhearing her innermost thoughts, she lived her adult life edging towards the spotlight before withdrawing to cope with personal upheavals, then re-emerging years later with songs that confounded expectations by explicitly affirming new commitments to radical feminism, animal rights and environmental activism.  From: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/jul/27/laura-nyro-the-phenomenal-singers-singer-the-60s-overlooked

surrey on

go somewhere, travel (from the ancient song 'surrey down to the stoned soul picnic', written by laura nyro (R.I.P.) and performed by the insipid 5th dimension)

a surrey is a 4-wheeled 2-seated horse-drawn carriage

lets' surrey on down to the bluntsman's and procure some 'goodness'

i'm going to surrey on over to jane's for a 'taste'

From: https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=surrey%20on

Emiliana Torrini - White Rabbit

 #Emiliana Torrini #alternative rock #trip-hop #electronica #dream pop #singer-songwriter #Icelandic #Jefferson Airplane cover

An Icelandic singer/songwriter whose music embraces elements of folk, electronica, pop/rock, and trip-hop, Emilíana Torrini has earned favorable comparisons to such vocally gifted artists as Beth Hirsch, Kirsty Hawkshaw, and Bjork. Torrini was raised in Kópavogur, where she worked at her father's Italian restaurant and attended opera school as a teenager. After releasing three albums in her native Iceland (Spoon, Crouçie D'où Là, and Merman), she joined forces with Tears For Fears’ Roland Orzabal to produce her first widely released effort, 1999's Love in the Time of Science. The famed Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson heard her cool, otherworldly croon and approved Torrini to voice the finale music for 2002's The Two Towers, a job that Bjork had previously accepted before backing out due to pregnancy.  From: https://open.spotify.com/artist/08j69Ndyx1P7RLO3Janb5P