K's Choice - A Sound That Only You Can Hear

As both a solo artist and the front woman for K’s Choice, Belgian rocker Sarah Bettens has long been a staple in the LGBTQ music community, even before she officially came out more than a dozen years ago. Around that same time, Bettens put K’s Choice on hold and settled into a domestic life with her now-wife and two step-children. The couple has since adopted two more kids and Bettens has regrouped with K’s Choice, most recently for The Phantom Cowboy. But something else happened a few years back: After earning her U.S. citizenship, Bettens became a firefighter.

So… the obvious question would be, why a firefighter?

[Laughs] That is not what I thought you were going to ask. I thought it would be about the album.

Oh, I’ll get to that. But first things first. Firefighter. Go.

I had a high need of doing something that had nothing to do with music and was very different in nature. There are a couple of things I felt… you could probably call it a mid-life crisis… things I never really got to do. I never got to go to college and have that experience. Everything got very serious very quickly with the band, so I always had a little bit of a feeling that I missed out on something. It’s hard to do hobbies with music and get into any kind of routine of playing soccer on Sundays, stuff like that, because I was gone a lot of the Sundays. There are just all these things that sound very small — and they are, in a way. But, put together, I felt like there was something I still had to do that I couldn’t find in my music career.
I don’t know how I first came up with it, but it sounded exactly like what I wanted to do. The part I really like about my band is that I hang out with a bunch of guys and that comes easily for me. And being part of something bigger than yourself — I liked the public service aspect of it, I liked the physical aspect of it. And what I really liked about it was that it was outlined, as in 24-hour shifts and when it’s done, it’s done. My life has been a long series of self-starter events and I was craving something that was more defined. I have to show up, do a good job, and then it’s over. I applied after becoming a citizen. I got an interview and was hired. I remember calling my now-wife and saying, “Shit! I got hired.” [Laughs] It was so incredibly exciting. I went to rookie school with a bunch of 25-year-old guys learning new things, and things that didn’t come naturally for me. It was challenging. It still is. I completely fell head-over-heels in love with it.

Okay, so there are some parallels between that and music, but do you have to switch gears — mentally or otherwise — going between firefighter and musician?

Yeah. I’ve been so used to that. That comes naturally to me, too. Coming on and off tour, there’s no bigger gear switch than that. We have four kids so, when I go on tour, it’s about as big a shift as there is, especially coming off tour. You’ve been hanging out with a bunch of guys and your family’s been moving on without you. That’s been a real art in itself — coming in and going out and realizing that they’re doing just fine without you in the two weeks that you’re gone. So, my life’s been that, a constant packing and unpacking of bags and adjusting. People will say, “Oh, but it’s such a long flight to Belgium.” And I’ll say, “Yes. But I’m alone in peace.” I don’t mind those nine hours at all.

You have this super-domestic life with your wife and kids and day job. Which really is as rock and roll as it gets, right?

[Laughs] I would agree with that. Yes. Absolutely. That’s my brother’s song and I loved it so much when I heard it. I thought it was so fun to write a song with that kind of music and really still be talking about your kids. And it’s true: It takes a lot of strength to be a parent. It takes a lot of coolness. You’re just not the most important thing anymore. You’re just trying to keep everything afloat. And that’s about as big a challenge as anything that I’ve ever done. When you try to do it well and feel like it’s working, that’s about as cool as it gets, to me.

I talked to Brandi Carlile about this a few months back… I lot of female artists I love got soft after parenthood. Not her. And not you. This new record is one of your most rocking.

Kind of the opposite with this one. Getting into your everyday routine of being a mom and how incredibly unglamorous that is outside of your Facebook pictures. Then you want to feel like, “I’m not just that. I’m a little bit more than that. I have some things left to do.”

Yeah yeah. You get to remind yourself of that other side of you.

You have to feed it. It’s important to be a great parent. But, in order to be a great parent, you have to feel great in your own self. It can’t be all about making sure the kids are happy every second of every day. You have to be a fulfilled person yourself. That’s what your kids see and that’s who they look at. I don’t believe you can be a great parent if you’re miserable. It’s a balancing and it keeps life interesting.
Those are things I still want and need in my life. Even though it takes me away from my kids sometimes, luckily they have two moms. So, there’s another one and they’re very happy and very safe, even when I’m gone. Then I come home and I feel fulfilled in my life. I’ve done things that I enjoy doing and I want them to see that, as well.

It seems like, if you’re getting what you need away from them, then you can really be present when you are with them.

I can relax hard, sit down and have a beer. But I can only do that because I work very hard the rest of the time.

Talk to me about the overarching themes on this record. Because the family stuff is there, but you’re stepping outside of yourself on some things.

It’s the first time my brother and I have written together. We sat in the same room and it made for, musically, a very different record. And I think the music very much inspired the direction we ended up going with the lyrics. We had no preconceived notions of what we wanted the record to be about. On the musical part, we knew what we wanted to do. Somehow, when I started writing lyrics, there was a little bit of assertiveness to it — more than in other records. Less poetic imagery, maybe, and more just straightforward “This is what I want to talk about.” The music demands that.

We’re of a certain age now when there’s no time for BS.

[Laughs] Yes. I like that you said “of a certain age.” Yeah, you take yourself a little less seriously. I don’t take my career less seriously. But not every word in every song has to be the deepest truth ever written anymore. I want to write a fun record. I want everyone to jump up and down when they hear it. That’s the kind of music I want to make. I still want to talk about meaningful things, but it doesn’t all have to be about me, anymore. It can float a little more. At some point, you really learn to cut through a lot of bullshit. “This is the art. This is what I want to talk about. And there it is.”
I used to think the stars had to be aligned in a certain way and the light has to come through my window at a certain angle, and I have to have at least five hours ahead of me of nothing, and be in just the right space for, “Okay, I think I might be able to write a song today.” This time, it was like, “Well, you’re here. We gotta write. It’s 9 o’clock. Let’s go.” That was super-freeing, too. Why did I take my own songs so seriously? It’s still just a flipping song, at the end of the day. I appreciate that people appreciate it and I’m very grateful for the connection, that there’s an understanding of what I’m trying to say. That’s a special feeling and I understand that. Still, it’s just a flipping song. It’s not a novel. It’s not a life-and-death situation. None of us are trying to fit into boxes anymore. “Let’s see what the trend is.” If I really cared about trends, I’d get some major cosmetic surgery and a boob job and turn straight again, and probably sell a lot more records. Obviously, none of those things are an option, so…

From: https://www.kellymccartney.com/2015/10/16/suffer-no-fools-an-interview-with-sarah-bettens/

The Dear Hunter - City Escape

The Dear Hunter started out as a solo project of songwriter-multi-instrumentalist-vocalist Casey Crescenzo, releasing their first album, Act 1: The Lake South, River North, in 2006, which then grew into a full progressive rock band in subsequent albums, chronicling a continuing story in the Act Series of albums (so far, 5 albums over a ten year period). There have also been other musical projects and EPs in between those albums. Their latest album, Antimai, is separate from those previous works, and I was pleasantly surprised at how fun this new album is. It is predominantly lively, upbeat, and quite accessible. They incorporate much soul, R&B, latin, pop, jazz, and rock into the mix, with liberal use of funky horns and tuned percussion, yet the result is still undeniably prog rock. This is a concept album that chronicles a world where society is set-up in concentric rings, with the outer rings occupied by the poor and industrial sectors moving inward to the more luxurious and powerful inner rings. The album consists of 8 tracks, each corresponding to one of the rings and highlighting features of that sector. But you don't need to know or care about the concept or story to enjoy the album, as it is quite wonderful from start to finish. One of the best and longer tracks, Ring 5 - Middle Class, features multiple sections, starting with a catchy pop opening, a slower middle section, then a jazz-funk Steely Dan-esque closing section. Ring 4 - Patrol, is somewhat reminiscent of the Alan Parsons Project with its a funky beat and cool pop style. Ring 3 - Luxury starts off with some clever Hamilton-style rap vocals before leading into subsequent sections. Casey Crescenzo's vocals are very enjoyable, and quite versatile, working well in a variety of styles and moods. The album flows well and all the tracks are very well done, featuring a variety of vibrant styles, dynamics, and instrumentation, in addition to very fine vocals. One minor complaint is that it ends a bit weakly, as I was expecting a buildup to a big finish, but the album ends rather meekly and abruptly, without any real conclusion. Overall, this is a wonderful, very enjoyable album, one of the best of 2022.  From: https://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=3330

Ebb - Dark Lady

The picture may look as if this is a standard looking release, but here the CD is at the rear of a 48-page full-colour A5 landscape glossy book which provides us with the lyrics, numerous photos, and an insight of what makes this art/prog/folk/rock collective really tick. What we have here is a continuation of the 'Krystal Svava' mythos they started in their EP 'Death & The Maiden'. It is somewhat based an old dying ex- army musician and his housekeeper cum part time sex worker they knew, mixed with that of a new friend, David, also an old soldier and ex-musician living in Scotland. The band are based around Erin Bennett (lead vocals, guitar, trumpet), and comprise Kitty Biscuits (backing vocals, percussion, spoken word poetry), Anna Fraser (drums, percussion), Bad Dog (bass), Susan Dasi (backing vocals, synths), and Nikki Francis (Hammond, piano, synths, saxophone, flute, clarinet). Yes, we have a band which are nearly all-female, which is unusual in any style of music but certainly rare within anything remotely thought of as prog where women are generally allowed to be lead singers but rarely anything else (yes, I am fully aware of bands like Eternal Wanderers, but there are very few like that).
The album commences with the sound of an orchestra warming up and getting ready for the performance and is quite unlike the rest of the material, but somehow it is also quite fitting in that it allows us to know that whatever comes next will be unexpected, and that is certainly the case throughout. It is a heavily layered and arranged album, and one never knows what to expect, and by concentrating on different musicians it is possible to clearly understand just how much impact each of the players is having on the rest of the band. Erin can really crunch when she wants to, sing sweetly or with real power, while behind her Anna is never content to sit within any particular pattern or style, moving all over the kit when the time is right, keeping it restrained at others. Bassist Bad Dog is in many ways the cornerstone as he can keep it simple or provide great complexity, moving right up the neck for counterpoint melodies, linking with both Anna and Erin which then allows the others to add their own layers. At times we have piano which is simply beautiful and delicate, at others swathes of keyboards and orchestration, while various woodwind and brass instruments come in when the time is right. There are times when they are quite Floydian, others more direct, and yet others where folk is an important aspect with a feeling that Mostly Autumn have also been an influence, yet it also feels somewhat deeper, stronger, with a real connection. This really is a wonderful release, and it is great that the physical version really does justice to the music contained within. Well worth discovering.  From: https://www.progarchives.com/artist.asp?id=12717  

Edwin Starr - Funky Music Sho Nuff Turns Me On

Edwin Starr made his name with War, the thumping chorus of which became the chant of protesters against America’s involvement in Vietnam. The success of the song eclipsed his other achievements, although his soul and disco anthems brought him modest success, especially in Britain, and kept him on a frantic touring schedule which may, in the end, have contributed to his death. Originally penned as a Temptations number for their LP Psychedelic Shack, Starr’s lyrics for War were intended as a plea to end the inter-gang rivalries that sparked the Chicago and Los Angeles Riots of 1968. But when campus demonstrators adopted the song and demanded it be re-released as a single, Motown baulked at the idea: opposing the Truman Doctrine was not part of the Temptations’ easygoing image. So Starr performed War by himself.
Born Charles Hatcher in Nashville in 1942, Starr moved with his family to Cleveland, Ohio, early in life, and there, as a teenager, he led his band, the Future Tones, to a record contract with a local label. They managed one single before Starr was drafted into the US Army, where he spent three years entertaining troops across Europe. On leaving the army he moved to Detroit and played with the Bill Doggett combo, taking his new name from his manager’s hackneyed prophesy: “Kid, one day you’re gonna be a star!”
He toured continuously for two years before releasing his first single with Detroit’s Ric-Tic Records, a low-budget Motown copycat. Agent Double-O-Soul achieved moderate success and struck a particular chord in England, where underground dance clubs picked it up. He followed up with Stop Her On Sight (SOS), and stayed on the books when Ric-Tic was swallowed by Motown. In 1969 he gave them the foot-stomping Top 10 hit 25 Miles, followed by I’m Still a Strugglin’ Man. In 1970 he reached his apogee, the simple but effective words of War carrying the song to number one in the US and keeping it in the charts for 13 weeks: “War has shattered many young men’s dreams / We’ve got no place for it today / They say we must fight to keep our freedom but Lord / There’s just got to be a better way.”
The single sold 3.5 million copies in the US by the end of the year, and has sold a further 1.5 million since. It was banned by the BBC during the 1991 Gulf War and by Clear Channel Communications, America’s largest radio network, in the wake of September 11, 2001. It was covered by Bruce Springsteen, who used it, in blatant opposition to the American attack on Iraq, to launch each concert on a recent tour of Australia. It is currently banned from American airwaves again. Starr’s attempt to capitalise with another anti-Vietnam song, Stop the War Now took him only to No 26 in the American charts. His last major soul single, in 1974, was Funky Music Sho’ Nuff Turns Me On.  From: https://www.thetimes.com/article/edwin-starr-r7zfrsz5lvm

Crooked Still - Sometimes in This Country

Neo-bluegrass group Crooked Still combines four musicians with distinguished backgrounds and connections. Singer Aoife O'Donovan, a graduate of the New England Conservatory, is also a member of the Wayfaring Strangers. Cellist Rushad Eggleston, the first string student admitted to the Berklee College of Music on a full scholarship, also performs with Fiddlers 4 and Darol Anger's American Fiddle Ensemble while also leading his own Wild Band of Snee. Banjo player Greg Liszt, a Ph.D. candidate in biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, also plays with the Wayfaring Strangers and the Jake Armerding Band. And double bassist Corey DiMario, also a member of the Lissa Schneckenburger Band, has played in prestigious venues around the U.S. with such notable performers as Liz Carroll and McCoy Tyner. The four came together as Crooked Still in September 2001 when O'Donovan was asked to assemble a group for an informal concert at the New England Conservatory. Over the next few years, they developed a following in New England before releasing their debut album, Hop High, in February 2005. Their second release, Shaken by a Low Sound, followed a year later.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/crooked-still-mn0000332973#biography

Bad Company - Simple Man

There’s a particular scene in the award-winning 2000 Cameron Crowe film, Almost Famous. In that playful scene, “band aid,” Estrella Starr (played by Bijou Phillips) peers out the window of a hotel room and announces (excitedly) to her frolicking female companions, “Simon Kirke from Bad Company is by the pool!” Not only did the band’s co-founding drummer get a nod with that memorable quote, but the film’s fictional group, Stillwater, also bared a strikingly close stylistic resemblance to Bad Company — and for good reason. Straight out the gate, Bad Company achieved global notoriety as a supergroup, comprised of Mott the Hoople, Free and King Crimson alumni. And at the time the motion picture’s storyline would have taken place, during the early to mid-‘70s, Bad Company was revving up as one of the biggest bands in the world. Birthing such FM staples as “Bad Company,” “Can’t Get Enough,” “Movin’ On,” “Good Lovin’ Gone Bad,” “Feel Like Makin’ Love” and “Shooting Star,” the first two Bad Company LPs, Bad Company (1974) and Straight Shooter (1975) were stylistic companion records, and both enjoyed Top Ten, multi-platinum success. But with album #3, Bad Company stepped a smidge outside the “zone.” Arriving in stores worldwide 45 years ago today (February 21, 1976), Run with the Pack also was a chart-busting million-seller.
As if wrapped by Reynolds, the shiny silver packaging was eye-catching — the front cover image of papa wolf watching on as mama wolf nurses her pups. The inner gatefold photo depicted the band members holed up in a tiny apartment, surrounded by booze bottles, with a Bugs Bunny cartoon playing on the TV. Musically, the self-produced ten-song set oozed the signature Bad Company mystique. Down and dirty, sweet and soulful, bluesy and beautiful, each track is a bullet point highlight.
The record kicks off in fine fashion with a pair of tunes penned by co-founding guitarist, Mick Ralphs — the gritty and chunky, “Live for the Music,” coupled with “Simple Man” — a powerful track that smacks of such previous B.C. classics as “Bad Company” and “Feel Like Making Love.” Owning the notable line, “Freedom is the only thing that means a damn to me,” the song is polished by a convincing performance from co-founding frontman, Paul Rodgers, and accented by Ralph’s seemingly Neil Young-inspired guitar work.
Bursting with bona fide cock-rock swagger, “Honey Child” is brought to life by the punchy, defibrillator-like basslines of the late Boz Burrell. This one, when placed next to Rodgers’ slow and sultry, gospel-tinged heartbreak ballad, “Somebody Love Me,” makes for another magical yin and yang scenario. Orchestrated magnificently, the piano-driven, riff-heavy title track was one of the record’s mightiest moments. But, it can be argued that the shiniest gemstone of this musical treasure trove is Rodgers’ masterpiece breakup ballad, “Silver, Blue and Gold.” The lyrics — engaging. The melody — enchanting. In fact, it could be said that if Run with the Pack housed only ONE single track, this should be the one.  From: https://v13.net/2021/02/bad-company-run-with-the-pack-retro-album-review/

Covers: Fanny - Special Care (Buffalo Springfield) / Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway - White Rabbit (Jefferson Airplane) / PigPen Theatre Co. - The Only Living Boy in New York (Simon & Garfunkel) / Stonefield - Whole Lotta Love (Led Zeppelin) / The Bangles - Open My Eyes (The Nazz) / The Flaming Lips feat. Miley Cyrus and Moby - Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (The Beatles) / Two Minutes To Late Night - Walking on Broken Glass (Annie Lennox)

 Fanny - Special Care

 

 Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway - White Rabbit

 

 PigPen Theatre Co. - The Only Living Boy in New York

 

 Stonefield - Whole Lotta Love

 

 The Bangles - Open My Eyes

 

 The Flaming Lips feat. Miley Cyrus and Moby - Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

 

 Two Minutes To Late Night - Walking on Broken Glass

 

Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway went all in on this cover of Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit” in this video they released last month.
“I have loved the story of Alice in Wonderland since I read the book as a kid and played the Queen of Hearts in my school play. I chose to cover ‘White Rabbit’ back in the fall of 2020 for a live stream of songs by San Francisco Bay Area artists. Grace Slick of Jefferson Airplane is from Palo Alto, CA, just like me, and this song gives me the nostalgic feeling of growing up, but recording it also pushed my band forward into new territory musically. This is the first song I have arranged, produced and recorded from the ground up with the band members that I’ve been on the road with all year. Golden Highway and I have formed a strong musical bond after playing almost 100 shows together this year. Each band member brought ideas to the table, making this a truly collaborative effort.”  From: https://www.notreble.com/buzz/2023/05/23/molly-tuttle-golden-highway-white-rabbit-live/

Back in March, the Flaming Lips and Miley Cyrus got together in the studio for a weed-fueled session that produced a cover of the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.” It’s part of a star-studded, full-album remake of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band by the Lips, and they previewed it last night at Cyrus’ gig at Manchester, England’s Phones4u Arena. According to Lips fan site the Future Heart, the performance of the song was filmed, possibly for the Billboard Music Awards, with Miley, Wayne Coyne, and Steven Drozd playing the cover three times in a row to make sure they got a good take. “You guys gotta pretend like you like it every single time, okay?” Cyrus tells the crowd before the first rendition. Overall, the cover is pretty faithful to the original, with some modern psychedelic effects added and other sections drawn out. It’s hard to tell for sure, because at one point Cyrus misses her cue, leading her to say, “We’re gonna do that again because I f—ked that shit up.”  From: https://www.spin.com/2014/05/flaming-lips-miley-cyrus-lucy-in-the-sky-with-diamonds/

No matter who you are or what your taste in music is, chances are you love at least one Led Zeppelin song, or you’ve got some sort of childhood memory attached to the band. We had a chat with Amy Findlay, drummer for Stonefield, who’s set to perform in the Led Zeppelin celebration show Whole Lotta Love.

So normally you’re playing drums and singing for Stonefield. How did you get on board for the Whole Lotta Love show?

A while ago I sang a couple of guest songs for Frank Zappa cover band Petulant Frenzy. One of the guys from that band is friends with the organiser of the Whole Lotta Love shows and put us in touch. It’s been a very different experience for me. I am so used to singing my own songs, so there is a lot of pressure when performing Led Zeppelin songs for hardcore fans! It’s also a lot of fun and an honour to sing some of my favourite songs.

And the rest of Stonefield weren’t interested in the part?

The way the show works is that they have a great band for the whole show and rotate guest vocalists. It makes for a really entertaining, exciting show. I guess being a vocalist opens me up for a lot more opportunities like this.

It must be pretty great knowing you’re a part of such a well-respected and long-running national show?

For sure, I feel totally honoured to have been asked in the first place. The musicians I get to sing with are pretty phenomenal!

Growing up, were you always a big fan of Led Zeppelin, and what is it you love about the band?

Always! Zeppelin make up majority of the soundtrack to my childhood. They are brilliant songs, an incredible band – both individually and it’s magic with them all together!

From: https://fortemag.com.au/whole-lotta-love/

 

 

Fanny

 

Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway

 

PigPen Theatre Co.

 

Stonefield

The Bangles

The Flaming Lips

Throwing Muses - Counting Backwards

Having been a Throwing Muses fan since I first saw them play with Pixies some 37 years ago at the Town and Country Club in Kentish Town, it was with some excitement that I received the news that the band would soon be releasing a new record, Moonlight Concessions, particularly as their extensive UK tour would also include a date in Hastings, my new home since February 2024. Employing a different sound palette to 2020’s noisier Sun Racket, Moonlight Concessions offers an evocative collection of vignettes from everyday life that impact in a similar way to the understated and deceptively simple prose of Raymond Carver. Cello, strings and overlaid acoustic guitars imbue the music with an atmospheric presence that matches the directness of the stark but empathic lyrics. Yet the consistently hardworking Hersh again manages to carve out a distinct sonic identity that marks the release apart from her other (also excellent) solo material and work with her noise rock trio 50 Foot Wave. Hersh has in the past said that during her earlier years as a musician, songs would seem to arrive fully formed as a consequence of a dissociative disorder. Since integrating both sides of her personality via successful EMDR therapy, Hersh stresses the importance of a creative process that transcends the ego, humorously adding: “This process that we all are as humans is hard to keep tabs on. When we try, we screw up. So, I’d rather just keep saying the good songs are not me, while the bad ones are definitely me.” Hersh says that the process this time “took about three years. Usually, it’s longer. I recorded 30 or 40 songs, which is not unusual. Then I pared them down to the most elemental form, to this paragraph that is a collection of songs. If it’s your blue period, then you just gotta keep painting in blue over and over again until it forms itself into something that you learn from.” She again stresses that the writing comes from somewhere bigger than just the mind, adding: “I would probably say the same thing about my children. I didn’t invent their fingernails or what they say.”

You mentioned colour. Do you still think in terms of colour when you write music?

Kristin Hersh: Absolutely. Everything is colour. People still have doubts about synaesthesia. There are a lot of musicians who also claim that there’s no such thing as inspiration. A lot of writers and painters too. They’re just jealous. They’re baffled that sometimes they suck and sometimes they’re OK. It can be really confusing, because in the music business suckage is success! This activity that we engage in, it necessarily has to keep your mind and your ego out of it, or you’re going to make a dead body. The people that say there’s no inspiration, they’re just working on craft – absolutely, hone your craft, love your instrument. Fall in love with it. Lose time, lose self. But what happens when you’re good? That’s inspiration. I don’t care what they say.

Did the mood of the album appear over time, or did you have something in mind when you began?

KH: I can learn as I go, but if I had a vibe in mind, it would fall apart. I record so many songs so that I can just stare at the speakers and let the musical moments hit me. This one was honed to only nine songs. We’ve done records of 30 songs because it was like, “this has to work this way”. This time, it wanted to be very clean and clear and percussive and simple. Not simplistic, but simple in a human way. If I started dancing around the studio, I knew that it was working. And if I stopped dancing and just squinted at the speakers, I knew it wasn’t working. Sometimes you have to kind of crucify yourself. If it sounds pretentious, then you have to take that bullet. And if it sounds really unpretentious, like this one, then you have to take that bullet! Gravity is a truism in music. You can’t apply it to yourself, you can’t think that you’re important. Yet your process must engage with that kind of gravity and that kind of depth, or you’re insulting your listener.

Does the album title, Moonlight Concessions, have any specific meaning, or do you want to keep it mysterious?

KH: At Moonlight Beach in Encinitas California, there’s a concession stand. It’s really beautiful. I wrote a lot of the songs there. The cover art is all at Moonlight Beach. It’s my son Bodhi’s dog on the cover. We were living in our truck at the time. We had to escape a stalker landlord and we didn’t have a lot of money and we had to lose almost all of our belongings. We had to live in our truck while we tried to find a place. We ended up living in the ‘Junky’ Days Inn, with a bunch of people who were never gonna leave, and the staff from Tijuana. It was a very moving time but we didn’t know that it was going to end, we just sort of hoped and it did. A quarter of the nation’s homeless are in California. When we moved out there, we were really struck by the homeless. We made friends with them. We visited them every day. Bo called them our ‘burrito brothers’ because one burrito could feed them all day. So, we’d bring burritos and we’d listen to their stories and we’d sit by the railroad tracks which are on the ocean there and bring them donuts and listen to more stories.

This informed the record, the stories and the sense of human connection?

KH: I learned from these people and their stories. They’d had the inspired moment, which was sometimes something horrifying, and they would bring it to this kind of entertainment. We’d be sitting in a circle, everybody eating donuts and they would entertain. This process, I’d liken it to the process of creating music, since most of these songs were written at that time on that beach, and I think this is why there’s something you want to dance to about them, which is not something someone’s ever said about Throwing Muses! There’s definitely a humanising function in places with poverty. New Orleans [where Hersh spends part of her time] runs on the concept of redemption through sin. So, everything is forgiven before you even begin. I live pretty clean and I’m pretty pure of heart but I can’t stomach the places where hypocrisy runs the show. I get real ill about that. And here in New Orleans, with all the degradation, and it’s the murder capital of the country, it’s tough and it’s rough and yet it’s so kind. It’s where I come for my familial information. This is family and they treat you like family. You can’t get away with anything and yet they don’t call you out on anything either, you’re already forgiven. 

From: https://thequietus.com/interviews/kristin-hersh-throwing-muses-moonlight-concessions-interview/

The Shins - The Rifle's Spiral

James Mercer talks Craig Howieson through the songs that showed him there are no limits in the quest to write the perfect pop song.

There are few songwriters with an ear for melody quite like James Mercer. But it is clear that in crafting some of the most memorable moments of his back catalogue, he was also paying homage to some of the very best who had come before. This month marks the twentieth anniversary of The Shins second record Chutes Too Narrow; an event that is being marked by the release of a remaster of the album and also coincides with the launch of Sub Pop’s first ever EU/UK online store, the Mega Mart 2. The significance of such anniversaries is not lost on Mercer, the driving force behind the band. “It's a strange thing, because it's revealing how long I've been doing this.” It also becomes apparent that the intervening years have provided some perspective on Chutes Too Narrow’s creation for the indie pop icon. “When I was doing the record, I felt like I was under a lot of pressure,” he says. “It was the first time I had worked on a project where felt like I hadn't been given the opportunity to get into every little detail and tweak it.” While the album may not hold the band's biggest hits - if streaming numbers are to be believed - it holds a special place in the hearts of fans, and seemingly amongst some of Mercer's inner circle. “It's funny,” he laughs. “So many of my friends and people that I respect are like, ‘That's your best record.’ I think it's probably because when I do go in there and get obsessive about things, I tend to actually make things worse…maybe? Who knows?” And while there may be a raw immediacy to Chutes Too Narrow, it still contains all the hallmarks of Mercer's uniquely pop inflected indie rock. The Shins are rightfully regarded as one of the finest indie bands of the past two decades, but they have also always been outliers, daring to embrace classic pop when their peers would scoff at the mere thought of it. It comes as no surprise then to find Mercer’s song choices are littered with some of the most exquisite pop moments from the past seventy years. “These are songs that definitely mean a lot to me,” he explains. “I guess they represent some sort of higher ideal of quality that you could aspire to.” One constant in his transient youth - a time spent following his dad, who was a munitions officer in the Air Force to bases in Germany, England and then back to the U.S - was the presence, and deeply held love of music. “One of the first songs I remember ingesting and really being moved by was “Top of The World,” he beams when talking of his formative experiences with music. “I'm talking about when I'm four or five and just being really transported.” It’s clear his almost studious approach of the masters has shaped the writer he is today. “I'm blatantly trying to do this type of material” he says when asked how much of an influence the acts on his list have been.  “I don't worry too much about trying to make a song sound avant-garde or anything. I'm just trying to get to the nuts and guts of what makes a song compelling. I follow these people as examples of how you could do it.”

“We've Only Just Begun” by The Carpenters
Who doesn't love that song? I remember as a high school student in the ‘80s when things were so much more cliquish, that you had to pick an identity and your music was going to be part of that, at least in the American high school culture.  I was in England during high school, but I was with a lot of American kids in an International School. And you just couldn't stray from what you knew. If you were a punker, then all you listened to was those few bands that were accepted as proper punk.  So the Carpenters were just something you would never claim to like at all. You had to hate them in fact, if you wanted to be cool. But in my 20s, I succumbed to the beauty of these songs; how wonderfully they're recorded and the charming nature of those two kids who made them.  It’s beautifully written and beautifully executed. I don't know much about it, but I know that they were fans of Burt Bacharach and they even worked with him a little bit. And you can tell they loved the Beatles, and they loved songwriting. They just were trying to be ninjas and they did it.

“Mama Tried” by Merle Haggard
I really learned this song because my dad would play it. We lived in Germany during my elementary school years, and he was a nightclub singer. He had an old Gibson J-50 - a big bodied acoustic guitar - and he would sing a lot of country songs. He grew up on a cattle ranch in Montana, so he was literally a fucking cowboy. He learned how to ride a horse before he was driving a car or riding a bike or anything. And so he was legit, and the Germans just loved it. And he was good at doing it. He was good at sitting with the guitar and being funny and entertaining in between songs. He'd walk around and ask for requests and stuff.  It's one of those cases where I knew my dad's version of the song and the way he delivered it. Then when I heard Merle Haggard's version later, I was a little bit disappointed. There was something about the way my dad did it. And there were many songs like that, where I'll hear them and I'll remember ‘Oh, my dad used to do that. He did it better.’ But I love Merle Haggard's version of it, it's terrific. It's just different I guess. So that's the story behind me being introduced to Merle Haggard. It was my dad covering those songs to earn supplemental income for the family in the late ‘70s through the ‘80s.

“Close To Me” by The Cure
My freshman year of high school was in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And there was a girl down the street who all the boys had crushes on. She had a checkerboard shaved into the side of her head and half of a mohawk and she was just super cute. And she was into The Cure. I didn't know much about them because back then I would have been 14, and I wouldn't have even known where to go. The records that I had bought up to that point were from department stores. It would be hits, so it wouldn't be anything as obscure as The Cure. So I knew I had vaguely heard her playing The Cure in her bedroom and I knew it was really cool, and that I could be cooler if I liked them. And so when I moved to the UK in 1986 The Cure were like a pop band, or at least they were in the charts. You didn't have to go to some weird fucking record store to find out what's going on with them.  I bought The Head on the Door and this song has always stood out to me because it is so interesting. It's such an inventive, strange way to produce a song. It has this old timey sort of jazzy flow to it, it’s kind of cinematic in that way.

“Seven Seas” by Echo & The Bunnymen
Ocean Rain by Echo & the Bunnymen would have been right around the same time. I really fell in love with that record. That was a record where I sat down and tried to learn songs like “The Killing Moon” and they were manageable. Really, really gorgeous stuff.  I found the 7” release of “Seven Seas” sometime in the late ‘90s and I gave it to a girl that I was trying to impress. I should never have done that. It was so cool. It was a fold out 7” thing with a little booklet, and now she's got it and she probably doesn't even care.

BEST FIT: Are they a band that you've continued to follow? Or are they more of a fixed moment in time for you?

I think they're more fixed in a moment in time. In the later ‘80s, they came out with some really great stuff like “Bring on the Dancing Horses” and “Lips Like Sugar” and it was bigger and maybe more pop sounding, but still really good.

“Do You Know the Way to San Jose” by Dionne Warwick
I love Dionne Warwick. I loved her when I was a kid in the ‘80s because she still had hits then too. And I thought she was so pretty, and she looked like a very kind person. So I kind of had a crush on her when I was like 13. I guess I must have heard this song on the radio but I'm not exactly sure as it probably came out in the mid-60s or something. But it would have been sometime in the 2000s that I heard it again, and I was struck by how interesting it is. The arrangements are so clever. You can hear the room and it's just that classic old world way of doing records. It seemed like Burt Bacharach would produce things in the same way that Frank Sinatra had been doing them in the ‘50s. It's a big room, you’ve got a really good band, you fucking get a terrific take, and maybe overdub the main vocal, and it's just nightmarishly good. She's so charming and there's so much charisma coming across from her voice, but the lyrics are so great too. It's such a moment in time. It's a sad story about this kid who goes off to L.A. from San Jose, hoping to have a career in the business and it just doesn't work out. And she's defeated, but also seems to say, ‘You know what? I'll be fine.’ It’s just a neat, complex and subtle song.

BEST FIT: I read somewhere that initially she wasn't a huge fan of the song. But when it did so well and she realised how much it resonated with people she made sure to always sing it in her sets. Is that something you can relate to? Are there songs that you've written that fall flat for you personally, but someone's latched on to it and you feel you can't deny them by not performing it?

I'm a very pragmatic person and when you're doing a show and people have travelled to get there, and paid good money to be there, I feel a responsibility to entertain them, and I intend to show them a good time. Some people may think that somehow that's being inauthentic, or you're not a proper artist if you try and please anyone. Or that you shouldn't ever try to please anyone but yourself, and you have to be completely selfish and all that. And maybe that's true when you're writing, as you don't want to be trying to sound like that Taylor Swift song because ‘Boy, that did well.’ But when we're out touring, and working people are showing up and paying money, we have to play “New Slang” you know? Because I know that's a huge reason why a lot of people are there. But there's certainly evenings where I'm not excited about doing it. And there's a number of songs that are like that, but I'll do what it takes to keep people happy and coming back. You can put yourself back in that moment, you can remember how it was when you were writing the song and why you wrote those lyrics. That's what we're doing when we're listening to Dionne Warwick sing the song. We're being transported by the song and the words.

From: https://www.thelineofbestfit.com/features/interviews/nine-songs-the-shins-james-mercer

Hatis Noit - Jomon

Hatis Noit is a Japanese vocal performer hailing from distant Shiretoko in Hokkaido who now resides in London. Her accomplished range is astonishingly self-taught, inspired by everything she could find from Gagaku — Japanese classical music — and operatic styles, Bulgarian and Gregorian chanting, to avant-garde and pop vocalists. It was at the age of 16, during a trek in Nepal to Buddha's birthplace, that she realised singing was her calling. While staying at a women’s temple in Lumbini, one morning on a walk Hatis Noit heard someone singing. On further investigation it was a female monk singing Buddhist chants, alone. The sound moved her so intensely she was instantly aware of the visceral power of the human voice; a primal and instinctive instrument that connects us to the very essence of humanity, nature and our universe.
The name Hatis Noit itself is taken from Japanese folklore, meaning the stem of the lotus flower. The lotus represents the living world, while it’s root represents the spirit world, therefore Hatis Noit is what connects the two. For Hatis Noit, music represents the same netherworld with its ability to move and transport us to the other side; the past, a memory, our subconscious. After participating in a memorial and appreciation ceremony tailored to the withdrawal of the evacuation area in Fukushima on 31 March 2017, Hatis Noit collaborated with renowned visual artist Nobumichi Asai on a project titled Inori (prayer) which they premiered live at Mutek Japan in Tokyo. March 23, 2018 marked the worldwide release of her first enigmatic EP Illogical Dance on Erased Tapes. The arresting 4-track record features Björk-collaborators Matmos and creates unique song-worlds with transcendent vocal interpretations that at once deconstruct and recombine Western Classical, Japanese folk and nature's own ambience atmosphere.
Having recently moved to London, she's performed solo shows and appeared at various festivals across Europe, including a special live performance at the Milan Fashion Week 2018. Hatis Noit has collaborated with Kevin Richard Martin aka The Bug, the NYX Electronic Drone Choir and appeared on recordings by fellow countryman Masayoshi Fujita as well as Ukrainian pianist and Continuous Music pioneer Lubomyr Melnyk. She's been invited by David Lynch to perform at his Manchester International Festival takeover in 2019, and appeared on US super-producer Rick Rubin's Showtime documentary series Shangri-la, followed by headline shows across Europe and beyond, culminating in a much applauded sold-out London show with the London Contemporary Orchestra at Southbank Centre.  From: https://www.erasedtapes.com/artist/hatis-noit   

Deep Purple - Into the Fire - Live 1971

Well, first you have a four octave vocal assault, given by no other than the legendary Ian Gillan, also known as Jesus Christ (Superstar, of course.) His amazing banshee wails have been known to Disturb the Priest, every now and then. I can't emphasize how great Ian Gillan is, you have to hear this album to truly understand. Combine Ian Gillan's mastery at hard rock vocals with Ritchie Blackmore, and you have a winning team. Ritchie Blackmore is a truly great guitar player. He gives us fantastic riff after riff, and his solos are even more amazing. He is deeply rooted in classical music, and it gives a fresh perspective compared to the blues style many bands played at the time (and hey, I love Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, but variety is good). Add Tony Iommi into the mix with these four greats, and you have my five favourite guitarists outside of prog. We cannot forget Jon Lord, the organ player. "Organ player!?" some might exclaim. But believe me, he is fantastic. He really knows what he is doing. Without him, Ritchie's guitar riffs wouldn't sound half the same. What a lot of people don't realize is that when Jon Lord is riffing with his Hammond Organ, it sounds similar to a guitar. This in turn creates a huge massive sound, which would become a trademark of the band (well, sometimes Jon played piano and stuff, but that wasn't particularly often). I could compare Jon Lord to some other organ players, maybe Keith Emerson or Rick Wakeman, but his style is far different from these geniuses. He himself is also one!
We cannot forget the rhythm section, however. They are very impressive themselves. The two of them are Ian Paice (drums) and Roger Glover (bass). I'll start with Little Ian first (Gillan was called Big Ian, and Paice wasn't really small or anything, but Gillan was pretty big). Ian Paice, in short, just has the groove. His drum beats are great. He can play speedy beats with ease, bashing his drum set, but at the same time keeping his "groove." He plays amazingly throughout the album, and is often underrated when people talk about drummers. Granted, I prefer John Bonham (Led Zeppelin) over him, but he beats out his other competitors at the time such as Bill Ward (Black Sabbath). Then again there is Keith Moon, who is fantastic, but I would still put Ian Paice on the same level as him. I just mentioned these drummers because they were all in Hard Rock bands that had overflowing influence on the genres of Hard Rock and Heavy Metal.
Now on to Roger Glover, who is very important in the history of Deep Purple, despite getting the job in Deep Purple by coming along with Ian Gillan when he was about to join Purple. Roger Glover is a great bassist, and was the co-writer of the lyrics along with Ian Gillan. You can hear his thundering bass amidst all the guitar and organ action from Ritchie and Jon. Admittedly, his bass was not as loud as Geezer Butler, but it is still loud and great. He works great alongside of Ian Paice, which is very important for the rhythm section. Someone has to keep the rhythm while Jon and Ritchie are trading off solos (which happens frequently)! We cannot forget the fact that he does the remixing and a lot of the work on the Anniversary Editions of the Mark II (which is this line-up) albums. Before I go on, I should also mention that I will be reviewing the 25th Anniversary Edition of "In Rock". The normal version is great too, but the extra songs you get are a superb addition, and the intro to Speed King isn't cut off. Plus, the 25th version is remastered, which is very noticeable. I have both versions, and the sound quality is vastly improved on the remastered version. "Into the Fire" is barely listenable on the non remastered version! The remastered version is an import though, but it is only about five dollars more if you order it. In Germany you can get it in any well-ordered cd shop for the price of around 8 dollars/euros.  From: https://www.progarchives.com/album.asp?id=9120

Rhiannon Giddens - Black Is the Color

The Believer: How did you develop such an interest in telling other people’s stories? That’s been a constant in your songwriting and now your opera as well.

Rhiannon Giddens: Well, it came from the very fact that we don’t know what we think we know, and what we’re being told is… they’re not even trying to hide the fact that it’s just lies. You kind of go, OK, this thing I was told my entire life, that the banjo was invented by white people in Appalachia — it’s not just a little bit wrong. It’s not like it was invented by white people in Arkansas or Maine, or by Irish people, which I’ve been told before. It was invented by enslaved Africans in the Caribbean! I mean, if that is so wrong, what else have I been told that is that wrong? It’s like, if that is so wrong, what else don’t I know? And then the corollary is always: In whose best interest is it that I don’t know these things? In whose best interest is it that these divisive narratives have become truth for people? Because it’s always in somebody’s best interest. Nobody makes this shit up just for the fun of it. It’s got to be working on lots of different levels. You’ve got to have a grand plan of white supremacy. And it’s not a conspiracy; it’s not like there’s some mastermind behind it. It’s just the way of American thought. England practiced genocide on Irish and Scottish people by saying that Gaels, who have one of the oldest literate languages in Europe, were savages. They wanted land, so they used this rhetoric of race. Then you have trans-Saharan Arabic slave traders talking about sub-Saharan Blacks being natural slaves. These racial attitudes that have already existed for a while come together in this unholy alliance during the economic explosion that happens around the slave trade. I mean, people are making money hand over fist. So it is in everybody’s best interest to reinforce this racial notion of a permanent underclass. When you’re looking at where white supremacy comes from, I mean, it’s just literally enforcement of the status quo to maintain the wealth of the many in the hands of the few. That’s it. And it’s an underclass of all colors, where everybody has one thing in common. They’re all poor. That’s why this narrative is so fucking important, because it strikes at the heart of anywhere those people come together. Poor white people, poor brown people, poor Black people, living together.

BLVR: What role does music play in all this? And how is your own music a response to it?

RG: We’re so often told, Well, you guys do this kind of music, and you guys do this kind of music, and you don’t really do each other’s music. But take the banjo, which used to be an instrument that everybody played. There were Black people playing banjos in the Caribbean as ceremonial instruments, as sort of spiritual instruments. It becomes a dance band instrument in North America. And by the 1820s and ’30s, it’s starting to transfer over to European American hands and people in rural areas. There were Black people in Appalachia; there were brown people in Appalachia. There was all this mixing going on constantly, continuously, everywhere. Thousands of interactions, millions of interactions. And so the banjo is starting to be played by everybody. The first recorded instance of banjo and fiddle being played together is by Black people playing them in Rhode Island in 1756. It’s a pan-American instrument. There are banjo orchestras. There’s a famous Black banjo player who’s a celebrity in Australia. But this all starts to change by the early twentieth century. Because you still have blackface minstrelsy, though it’s starting to go underground in the nineteen-teens. You have The Birth of a Nation and the rejuvenated Ku Klux Klan and this growing idea that there’s too many immigrants. You see the rhetoric happening, this obsession with mongrelization. Henry Ford is very vocal about the “jungle music” of the time, and he’s very anti-Semitic, so he sees an unholy coalition between Blacks and Jews. And that’s when you really start seeing this idea of the banjo and Appalachia being an ethnically pure receptacle for good old-fashioned Anglo culture.

BLVR: You live in Ireland, whose influence is foundational to US music and culture, especially in the Appalachian region you’re describing. What are you learning from it? Are you playing or learning more Irish music?

RG: Irish music is foundational and a major pillar of the creation of the unique American sound. I, however, think it’s more foundational in the Atlantic world, from the Caribbean up to the centers in New York, the waterways, Baltimore. That’s where Irish music, I think, really inserts itself. But I don’t think it’s more than German tunes or English tunes or Welsh tunes or Scottish tunes in Appalachia. The recording of Irish music in America during the 1920s is what revitalized the Irish traditional movement. Not a lot of people know that. But it was dying out in Ireland because the culture was being murdered by the English. A lot of that culture was tied to Gaelic speakers, and the aristocracy had fled hundreds of years before. So there was not any kind of reinvestment in the native Gaelic culture. It was being pushed out along with the people because of the famine. And then by the ’20s, Ireland was fighting for its independence, and impoverished. They didn’t really value that music in that culture. It was being kind of invaded by English culture. This is not answering your question, but that is what drives me; because that’s more interesting and it’s more true than these nationalistic narratives that were told.

From: https://www.thebeliever.net/an-interview-with-rhiannon-giddens/

Attrition - A Girl Called Harmony

Attrition, whose early work showed a similarity to other experimental and industrial artists of the time, were set slightly apart from their contemporaries by the combination of punk aesthetics and EBM-styled beats but also the inclusion of ethereal and classical touches that permeate nearly all of their repertoire. After initial releases which moved from eerily constructed ambience into standard dancefloor electro sounds, the band soon developed their distinctive texture, based on haunting synthesizer washes, strong beats, fretless bass backing, and Martin Bowes's deep growls contrasted with Julia Niblock's operatic soprano flourishes.
Attrition began after Martin Bowes issued, as part of a fanzine covering the Coventry music scene, a vinyl compilation and met Julia Niblock at a resulting music festival. After a handful of demos, fully-formed tracks by Attrition began to appear on several notable cassette compilations, such as the Rising From the Red Sand series from the fledging Third Mind label. In 1983 their vinyl breakthrough came with the inclusion of "Dreamsleep" on the influential The Elephant Table Album alongside notable experimental artists such as Nurse With Wound, Chris and Cosey and Portion Control. Coil even opened for them at their first London show, and they appearded side by side with The Legendary Pink Dots on a European tour in 1984, attracting brief notice by John Peel in 1985.
In 1984 the band moved to London, rooming and sharing a studio with The Legendary Pink Dots. After signing to Third Mind Records, they released their debut album The Attrition of Reason as well as The Voice Of God EP to moderate commercial success. At this point, Julia Niblock briefly left the band to collaborate with The Legendary Pink Dots on Asylum (where she is credited as "Poison Barbarella") but returned the following year to rejoin Attrition. In 1985, the seminal Smiling, At The Hypogonder Club was released to extremely positive reviews; the release was later picked up for American audiences by the Projekt label.  From: https://rateyourmusic.com/artist/attrition

Daisy House - Emma In The Morning

I had the great pleasure of reviewing Doug Hammond of Daisy House last year, and this time I am talking to his daughter Tatiana about her background and about the band’s beautiful new album, Beaus and Arrows. It’s a departure from their first album’s folk rock in that it introduces music hall stylings and pure pop that could have come straight from the 1960s. It is nice to see the band stretch their wings, and I wish them the best in achieving the recognition they so richly deserve.

What is your earliest musical memory? Do you have any vocal training? Because the clarity of your voice is simply superb.

First of all, thank you. It’s definitely improved on this second album. I’d never recorded anything before the first. I think the sound of my voice owes a lot to the ladies I’ve sung along with over the years, like Joni Mitchell, Sandy Denny, Chrissie Hynde, Mary Hopkin, Vashti, Feisty (Leslie Feist, ha), Mama Cass, and Marianne Faithfull. All of them are truly superb singers and my Dad’s given me tips like making sure to pronounce lyrics clearly, and breath control. My most important vocal training has come out of our relationship; it’s always been my Dad’s keen ear, his funny analogies, and our shared musical references that kept me going when it was hard for me in the beginning. When I get behind the mic, we basically start speaking in hilarious code to each other. Earliest memory? If you grow up with my Dad, music transcends memory. ;) He made a mix tape for nap time for me when I was little that had Sebadoh, Talk Talk, Nina Simone, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Clannad, and Joni Mitchell on it - all mellow stuff. So I suppose “New Grass” is my earliest memory, either that or “This Frog” by Kermit ;)

What has been your involvement in the creative process with respect to songwriting and instrumentation on this new record? I saw the video where it looks like you are playing guitar and piano.

My Dad and I have collaborated on lyrics for some of the newer songs. Lots of the songs from the second album were based on things I was experiencing at the time. He knew if he turned my anecdotes into songs, I could own them when I sang. We’ve got a new co-written song called “Battle Days” which is a sweet, “I’ll follow the sun”/Leonard Cohen/Beatles-y ballad, with half the lyrics in French, which I’ve studied for 7 years now. In the video for “Raise High The Roof Beam Carpenter,” I sat down at that piano and accidentally blonked out that chord while the camera was rolling so Dad threw it on the album track. He writes and plays almost everything you hear, like 90% of it, and I interpret what he writes. I intend to write a bit more of my own going forward, but he’s been doing this since he was 10. It might take me a little while to catch up to him.

Have you and your Dad played out live with Chris since the first album was released?

Chris Stiles was a high school friend of my Dad’s and they hooked up after decades, and jammed a bit for old time’s sake. Chris had those opening chords for “Ready To Go”, and Dad, who’d been kicking around the idea of a freak-folk song collection, went home and finished it off in a Fairport Convention style for me to sing, which I’d never done before at that point. Chris and Daddy worked like that for about half the 1st album; a few chords from Chris, Daddy finishing it off. Pretty soon we had a whole album, but Chris wasn’t able to commit much time to it from the very beginning; he’s had a full time job and family to deal with, and since music is just a hobby for him, he basically bowed out. Dad and I have done about 17 shows “unplugged” locally and been invited to do some pretty amazing shows in the UK; like a 500 year old Royal Observatory! But until I graduate in May, touring is problematic. Once I graduate, look out!

What are your favorite tracks on the new album? What was the hardest song to record?

I like them all, but I get visibly giddy when I listen to “Time to Make Up For;” the instruments are so playful. I love the majesty of “Beaus and Arrows,” and the string arrangement my Dad came up with for it is amazing. I also love the melody and lyrics to “Why do you Dive so Deep in Beauty.” My Dad sings that one, and when I hear it my soul smiles. Hardest to record? Probably “Woman From Walkern,” I have allergies and they always hit when I’m back home. “Woman” was sung through a handful of tissues! I also really, really like “Raise High The Roof Beam Carpenter”, which my Dad wrote when he was 21. He likes to say, “I had to wait 30 years for another 21 year old to sing it properly”. “In Between Girl” was written in about 15 minutes while we were recording my vocals on something else. We love Sixties pop music in general; that’s a favorite and Dad wrote “Time To Make Up For” about me and my boyfriend. A sweet song.

Do you only work on Daisy House when you’re home on school vacation, or do you have ideas you communicate with Doug as they come to mind?

No, we’re always swapping song ideas and Youtube videos. My musical education never ends, and I don’t think we’ve had more than three conversations in the last few years that didn’t at least touch on music. We talk all the time about it, even when I’ve been away overseas.

What has been your biggest influence musically and artistically?

The Sixties (and the folkies, also present in the Seventies). I love the sounds of the Sixties. I love the enthusiasm and the freedom they had to be playful and innovative that I hear in things like Sandy Denny and Joni Mitchell especially, but also in Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, The Merry Go Round, The Association, The Left Banke etc. I like the fact that experimentation was more ubiquitous in pop culture. Creativity and “weirdness” and “music for music sake” seemed to be more encouraged back then by record labels. I think that creativity is coming back today, though. I think there are a lot of people turning away from over-commodified music, and a renewed search for what feels more like “authentic art and expression.”

Do film and literature ever come into play as an influence? It appears so since your song “Raise High the Roof Beam Carpenter” is a J.D. Salinger title.

Definitely. “Raise High” is an old song of my Dad’s. It’s his nod to Dylan. We like to give our songs lots of richness, so if any art form inspires us, some of it’s mojo will go into our work. Folk tales are also a really good starting point for cool spooky things. So the Child Ballads and other old stories are inspiration for a lot of our folkier numbers (“Two Sisters,” “Why do you Dive”, “Emma”, “The Woman From Walkern”, “Beaus And Arrows”). Most of them have either a folk tale feel or were adapted. You may also notice we reference Cain and Abel in “Beaus and Arrows,” which is possibly one of my favorite songs on the album, and definitely our richest, in terms of its epic sound and story. The Bible, like folk tales, has big sin, big mystery, and big poetry in it. There’s nothing out of bounds for what we do.

Besides conquering the world, what would you like to see happen with Daisy House?

More radio. More press. More shows. More videos. When I think of Daisy House “conquering the world,” I think of our songs reaching across the world and I imagine people I’ve never met smiling the way I do when I hear these songs. I also think it would be nice to have the opportunity to inspire kids coming up, the way I’ve been inspired, to explore wit and creativity, rather than accepting conformity to a standard that tells girls they have to get breast implants and tattoos and be “transgressive” or something like that. I’d like our music to remind people that you don’t have to get things “perfect”, that the boundaries of life and self-expression are much wider than currently understood.

What can fans look forward to with upcoming musical works?

I think after the first album, we had come up with a solid folk-rock template, so we developed that theme a bit further on “Beaus And Arrows”. We had a lot of fun playing with hybrid folk/pop themes, so there’s “molten-folk” as my Dad calls it on “What’s Your Time Bought?”, 60’s folk go-go on “In Between Girl”, Baroque-folk… you get the idea. We really enjoyed making the pop stuff on B&A so I think we may be ready to drop our “El Camino”. I’d rather become the first “Daisy House”, instead of the next Mumford, and do for Folk-Rock/60’s Pop what the Black Keys did for blues-rock and the White Stripes did for mid-Sixties British invasion/Garage rock. We go to sources like they did, but it’s a slightly different vein of forgotten greatness that we mine that translates to modern kids as something fresh. Daisy House is generous music, and very old school at heart. Who knows? It might even be revolutionary.

From: http://active-listener.blogspot.com/2014/07/a-chat-with-in-between-girl-tatiana.html

Buckethead - Spokes for the Wheel of Torment

So Buckethead has someone send us some mp3’s of his new album without any comment or album art. We are struck by the “Spokes” track and instantly visualize animated Hieronymus Bosch in our heads. We scan a few of his paintings in and make a 15 second test animation. A week or so later we drive to Buckethead’s secret headquarters and play him the test. He freaks out and takes us into his recording area, right there on the wall is a huge Hieronymus Bosch poster. Buckethead had been imagining the painting coming to life when he wrote the song. This was one of the most effortless things we had ever done, it felt like it was meant to be. This video was created almost entirely from Hieronymus Bosch paintings with a few extra paintings from Frankensuess. Compare BH’s body to HB’s “Prodigal Son” painting to get an idea of how things worked.  From: https://mindbombfilms.com/projects/buckethead-spokes-wheel-torment/

Buckethead is one of the most bizarre and enigmatic figures in American underground and experimental music since Parliament-Funkadelic birthed their bevy of cosmic characters in the mid-'70s. An accomplished multi-instrumentalist best known for his virtuosic command of the electric guitar, Buckethead is one of the instrument's most recognizable contemporary innovators, his rapid-fire riffing, near-robotic fretwork, and idiosyncratic lead lines combining elements of Yngwie Malmsteen, Adrian Belew, Slayer's Kerry King, P-Funk's Eddie Hazel, and avant-improv artist John Zorn's Scud-attack sax abuse. His first group, the San Francisco-based metal-funk combine the Deli Creeps, were a regional success, but disbanded before they could release anything. Buckethead's solo career has been more productive, thanks mostly to the motivation of Zorn and Bill Laswell, the latter of whom Buckethead has also recorded and toured with in Praxis. Laswell has also produced a number of Buckethead's solo albums (including Dreamatorium and Day of the Robot) and included him on more than a dozen one-off recordings with the likes of Hakim Bey, Bootsy Collins, Anton Fier, Jonas Hellborg, and Bernie Worrell. In addition to releases including 1998's Colma, Buckethead has also contributed soundtrack material to such films as Last Action Hero and Street Fighter. Buckethead returned in 1999 with Monsters and Robots, after which he joined the short-lived re-formation of Guns N' Roses. A steady stream of releases followed into the 21st century ranging from the contemplative Electric Tears to a more electronica/rock hybrid, and collaborations with San Francisco's underground hip-hop scene. In the following decade, he averaged a few releases a year, teaming up with dozens of artists, including Les Claypool, Iggy Pop, and Mike Patton, and in 2008, he collaborated with actor/musician Viggo Mortensen for Pandemonium from American.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/buckethead-mn0000594765#biography

Spirit - Live French TV 1970

If I recall correctly, Spirit got the biggest label push of its career around the time of the band's second album, The Family That Plays Together. Fueled by the Top 30 success of the single, "I've Got A Line On You," the album was prominently featured on every album rack of nearly every store I frequented at the time (including old-line discount retailers like Grand-Way.) Unfortunately for Spirit, the roster at Columbia Records and its affiliate labels in 1968-69 was HUGE! With high-powered, high-profile acts like Simon & Garfunkel; Chicago; Blood, Sweat & Tears; Bob Dylan; etc, all demanding label attention, I think if you didn't have a hit single burning up the charts, you tended to fall off the CBS radar. As great and innovative as Spirit was musically, CBS never seemed to find a way to push them over the top to that mega-stardom-success level that other label acts achieved. To their credit, CBS did stick by the band and retained Spirit on the company's own Epic label through the "Feedback" album (after the original Ode distribution deal ended in late 1970.) Without question, Spirit is one of my favorite '60s bands and there is no denying they should have been more successful.

I think people who weren't around in the 60's and 70's have a hard time understanding how competitive and evolutionary pop music became, how music marketing was at that time. Throw in the dynamics of keeping a band together amidst a lack of money and you can see why the era unfolded as it did. These were the adolescent years of pop music - it was growing too fast to keep it’s attention focused on anything but a few key artists. There was a 'leading edge' of 'current' sound. Just one year could make a difference as to whether your sound was 'dated', whether you would get billed for a show, or recorded, or given airplay. There were only so many radio stations and so much time in a given month/year. Crowd this finite amount of time with the exponentially increasing sophistication of pop music, the numbers of artists and albums coming out, and its easy to see why a lot of great artists got shunted to the B and C tiers. It didn't necessarily have to do with talent.  If you decided to have a rockabilly revival band in 1969 you were a goner. There would be no one stepping up with money to market you or your sound. If you decided to do this within the last twenty years or so - you could make a solid paying career out of it. As for Spirit - I remember them getting decent radio airplay around the turn of the 70's. The song Mr. Skin off of Dr. Sardonicus was a 'top 40' type radio hit in 1972. So it’s not like they were unknown. They, like a lot of other great bands then, just didn't get the same exposure as the biggies.

From: https://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/why-wasnt-the-group-spirit-a-bigger-success.187989/