ALBUMS OF THE MONTH: One Last Century, by The Damnwells “Somewhere between nothing and something is everything,” sings Alex Dezen about halfway through the band’s latest release. It seems an apt, if cryptic, explanation for his decision to make the album freely available on the internet. Freed from music industry obligations but still possessed by […]
Heartless Bastards – “The Mountain”
When I first heard the Heartless Bastards a few years back, I thought, “there’s someone who listened to a *lot* of Zeppelin when they were young.” That’s not a unique thought, by any means. It will get further reinforcement on their latest release, The Mountain. In addition to the guitar-fueled wall of sound, the lyrics […]
The Weight – Are Men
Grab a bowl. Place a few New Yorkers in the bowl. Give one of them an almost Dwight Yoakam-like vocal. Mix in a little jingle, a dash of jangle. Throw in a few nods to the glory of 70’s Southern-Rock while folding in some serious Country sensibility that retains a sense of humor and you […]
Appleseed Cast – Sagarmatha
“Post-Rock” is a term often used to describe a heavily or completely instrumental Rock sonic that may or may not employ effects and instruments not typically associated with Rock & Roll. Of course, as with any other label given to a sound, whether general or quite specific, that term has met with various forms of […]
The Whipsaws- 60 Watt Avenue
The Whipsaws are a bar band…. a glorious, alt. country ass kicking bar band. Just listen to the tossed off rock and roll of their sophomore effort, 60 Watt Avenue. Though Neil Young is the easiest influence to infer as the band moves from Crazy Horse style rockers to Harvest-era ballads with ease, the Whipsaws […]
Lisa Hannigan – Sea Sew
Angelic voices and classical music are like two peas in a pod. Rock, pop, and country, on the other hand, seem a bit more interested in the broken and damaged. Rock voices usually lack the purity of the biblical cherubs. There’s something about a perfect vocal that’s just the antithesis of rock. Now I didn’t […]
Darn the Damnwells
I’d just about given up on getting anything new from these guys. Yet here they are releasing a new album and darn, its good. They’ve mellowed a bit with age — would have loved a few more brawny rock anthems — but singer/songwriter Alex Dezen knows his way around a melody. His voice has just […]
Celebrating Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens & the Big Bopper
The rumors were fast and furious. Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Eric Clapton and the Rolling Stones were mentioned. I even heard Ozzy Osbourne, although that may have been a town local toying with me. The occasion? 50 Winters Later, a special concert honoring the legacy of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper. The […]
The Day the Music Died
Fifty years ago tonight, the music world lost some shining lights. Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper died when their plane crashed into a field on February 2nd, 1959. We’ll never fully know what they would have accomplished had they lived. Yet there is little doubt of the impact that they’ve had on […]
Mayer’s Playlist for January ’09, a Video Companion
What’s a playlist without a video companion? We kick things off with Otis Gibbs and Miranda Lee Richards, our featured artists this month. From there we’ve got live clips from the Gourds, Gary Louris & Mark Olson, Joe Ely and A.C. Newman, plus videos from Frank Turner and Bruce Springsteen. We close out this month […]