Originally posted, with slight modifications, in August 2009. Because it's one of my favorite sets...and because bloggers need vacations, too. We're in Truro for a short weekend, just like in 2009, in the same rented beachhouse high on the dunes above the Cape Cod sound. Wakeless trawlers and shore fishermen, beach wanderers and bathers are few and far between, mere specks on an otherwise natural landscape that fills the sense with color: green grasses, faded yellow sand, the variable [...]
One of the biggest challenges of coming of age in the late eighties is that some of the best pop performers of the post-punk/new wave era were already past their musical prime when I discovered them, invariably through radio hits that echoed their earlier work while somehow managing to sound derivative and old-school amidst the rising tide of majestic yet ultimately ephemeral heartland rock, bouncy pop, early grunge and smooth R&B which characterized the era. Case in point: I went through a brief Elvis Costello phase when I was in high school, [...]
Peter Mulvey : Abilene (The Eisenhower Waltz) [ purchase ] Abilene (The Eisenhower Waltz) doesn't sound like a political song. It was recorded in 2005, when the Iraq war was much more in the news and the public's awareness than it is now. Peter Mulvey evokes a period 50 years prior to that, even taking the phrase "Iron cross" from an Eisenhower speech in 1953. He presents Eisenhower as a man who had gotten the country into a tight spot, and took responsibility for it. Mulvey says not a word about [...]
I was one of those arty middle-class music-and-theater kids - you know, the ones who spend their free periods in the band room, stay after school to paint sets, seem utterly disconnected from the mass media-driven marks of popular consumer culture, and demonstrate a complete and utter lack of coordinated ability in running shorts. But it wasn't just desire or common interest that kept me there. Natural talent, a strong ear, and an ADHD sufferer's tendency to misplace my instrument had led to formal voice lessons and private choruses as a child (lose [...]
As I was searching my collection for the songs I would post this week, a strange thing happened: I came across two songs, released sixteen years apart, with oddly similar titles. The only other thing they have in common is that I really like them. So I couldn't resist posting them together. Indigo Girls : You and Me of the 10,000 Wars [ purchase ] First, 1990 saw the release of the Indigo Girls album Nomads Indians Saints. My first selection is not one of [...]
I don't know as much about Townes Van Zandt as I'd like to. Despite the great similarities in sound and sensibility between his work and that of Guthrie, Dylan, and other core members of the folkworld, somehow he never cropped up in a childhood balanced between a mother's love of the Seeger classics and a father's fandom for the singer-songwriters of his own generation. Of course, some of that is due to Van Zandt's relative obscurity during the bulk of his life - as my father notes, until his resurgence in [...]
Here's another song from the excellent new Peter Mulvey record on Signature Sounds. If you'd like an invite to the Oct. 11 Chicago area house concert email me at cbonnell@gmail.com. Buy Letters From A flying Machine here or here . Kids In The Square
This is from The Trouble With Poets released in 2000. MP3 File yousendit
We're in Truro for a short week, in a rented beachhouse high on the dunes above the Cape Cod sound. Wakeless trawlers and shore fishermen, beach wanderers and bathers are few and far between, mere specks on an otherwise natural landscape that fills the sense with color: green grasses, faded yellow sand, the variable blues of sky and water. At night the lights of Provincetown shine brightly just on the edge of the vista, a line of stars marking the difference between pitch-black sea and an invisible sky. Last [...]
As always, I'm offline at our annual Falcon Ridge Folk Festival pilgrimage for the last weeks of July; feel free to stop by the Teen Crew tent some morning and say hi if you're at the fest. But arriving early to help set up the festival site means making hard choices, and there's none harder than missing this year's Green River Festival , which featured an incredible Friday night line-up of fifteen Signature Sounds artists in honor of the label's fifteenth anniversary year. Signature Sounds is at the top [...]
"Through the songs and stories of this album, I'm trying to figure out what actually lasts a long time," explains New England singer/songwriter Peter Mulvey . On his wry and spry new album Letters From A Flying Machine, due August 11, Mulvey takes the listener on a "voyage" of music and spoken word "essays" meant, he says, to be listened to from start to finish: "I want the listener to hear the end of the album differently that they heard the beginning." Nimble and jazzy at times (particularly on the delightfully verbose "Some People"), wistful and observational [...]
As I sit here listening to Allen Toussaint's excellent new record The Bright Mississippi I realize I've selected the only jazzy song from the new Peter Mulvey record to share with you. Perhaps I was influenced by the New Orleans vibe of Toussaint. Or perhaps I needed a pick me up. Either way "some People" has got a jauntiness that sets it apart from the other fine (yet typical singer-songwriter fare) found on his new record Letters From A Flying Machine . Peter is another of the amazing artists being represented in the [...]
Peter Mulvey : The Fly [ purchase ] Kris Delmhorst : Galuppi Baldessare [ purchase ] Eilen Jewell : Heartache Boulevard [ purchase ] Signature Sounds has only been around since 1995. But in fourteen years, they have managed to corner the market on the New England acoustic music scene. A Signature Sounds artist or band usually features literate lyrics and interesting instrumental arrangements. The [...]
In introducing last year's surprisingly popular St. Patrick's Day entry on the folkier side of Sinead O'Connor , I noted that I had almost exhausted my collection of U2 covers. Since then, however, discovery and a surprisingly rapid pace of coverage have widened the playing field of potential, making for a lovely set. So raise a glass, and let's begin. It's St. Pat's, and the folk is flowing. I came to U2 too late to be [...]
I had high hopes of being alone in my father's house tonight, mining memory and time, writing a poignant entry amidst the same record collection which first sparked my interest in music as something more than just background noise or singalong. I've even got a few handwritten notes at the bottom of my pocket, written this morning while I waited for my father to come ever-so-slowly down the stairs, now ready as fodder for when the moment is ripe. But the routine spinal fusion which has brought me into Boston started much [...]
Dar Williams: The Ocean [ purchase ] Peter Mulvey: The Ocean [ purchase ] Dar Williams: The Ocean (w/intro, live at the Kate Wolf Festival, June 14, 1997) Living here in South Florida for soon-to-be 17 years, the ocean is obviously near and dear to my heart... and, although it is only a 25-minute drive from my suburban home to the shores of Hollywood [...]
Peter Mulvey is yet another acoustic singer song writer who hasn't quite made it to the top but has all the talent and professionalism needed. He's been around long enough and his self produced debut album "Brother Rabbit Speaks" was created in 1992 which showed the self motivated and self produced quality that Peter has in his pocket. To get an idea of his sound, think Newton Faulkner but a bit less rhythmic and more melodic approach while his singing voice is more mature and consistently boasts top notch lyrics. Peter has a showman feel [...]
I haven't purchased much new Christmas music this year, but I have been pleasantly surprised by what I did! Visit the blog to hear some great music! First, on a whim induced perhaps by an impending infusion of caffeine, I bought this year's holiday collection from Starbucks, Winter Wonderland . These collections are often hit or miss, but more often both, with some good tracks interspersed among bad ones. Not so for this collection. Pink [...]
Today you get eight versions of painter-turned-music-legend Joni Mitchell's ( fansite wiki AMG ) 1971 " River ." She first started singing by belting out Christmas carols in a children's hospital. By 1971 she was in California, missing the winters of Canada and writing a "selfish and sad" paean to the end of a relationship. I don't have a lot to say about this song, except that I had planned at one point to include every single one of these versions on this year's compilation, Have Yourself A Depressing Little Christmas. (Watch this [...]
The honest, richly-spun folk sounds of Gregory Alan Isakov captivated a packed house in Denver last week as he opened for the Calexico show . I've written about the marvelous skiffle of Isakov's " The Salt and The Sea " tune before, and have been appreciated the bright talent of this local artist in several venues across Colorado this year. I love to hear Gregory sing; his voice is really something special in the singer-songwriter pantheon, with hints of sly knowing, balanced with a warm and soaring verve. "Gonna write one [...]
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