In 1990, Michael Martin Murphey took a trip down a musical back road with the release of Cowboy Songs , an album that paid homage to the music of the Old West. At the time, Murphey was riding high on the country singles chart with songs like "From The Word Go" and "Never Givin' Up On Love." Though it was different from what the singer had previously recorded, it helped usher in another successful phase of his career. In the 70s, the singer was a mainstay on the Pop charts with songs like [...]
Frightened Rabbit From: Selkirk, Scotland, United Kingdom Frightened Rabbit precede their 3rd full length studio album, 'The Winter Of Mixed Drinks' with a brand new single 'Nothing Like You' on February 22nd, backed with another new song, 'Learned Your Name' . Furiously upbeat, 'Nothing Like You' s acoustic bustle is reminiscent of The Cure 's classic, 'Inbetween Days' and mines the most uptempo [...]
It's Tuesday again, which for the next four months or so will be known as "LOSTday" to a community of television nerds to which I belong. Rather than make some bold predictions about what is going to happen on tonight's episode, or write a recap of last week's stellar season premiere, I'm going to write briefly about two conversations I had with friends this week. Each one led to a crazy revelation which - and I don't want to build us up to be geniuses or anything - I have never once read about on any LOST related-website. [...]
Here's the song that caused Tipper Gore to have a Victorian-era style hemorrhage and start slapping Parental Advisory stickers on anything resembling a four letter word, Darling Nikki by Prince . Fun part was that no marketing team in the world could have dreamt up better publicity than those little stickers did. BTW Is the PMRC still around? Leading the purple proselytizers today is my pick, Love Is All , with their Yeah Yeah Yeahs/Cristina influenced screecher. Kudos to Xlover [...]
Tonight, Garrett Pierce returns to San Francisco to perform at the Hemlock Tavern with Mountain Man (Vermont), and Mira Cook (9pm, $6). As he might explain at the show, Pierce has been plotting the upcoming recording of his third full length, following the release of All Masks last spring, with Jen Grady (cello) and producer Eric Ruud (of Sholi , Islay Banks ) both expected to [...]
The great thing about running a blog is the constant flow of new music that comes my way. Some of its good, some of its bad, but that comes with the game. Sometimes though you get a a little taste of an artist and must know what else they have cooking up their sleeve. This was the case with Brooklyn based producer Alan Wilkis . I have really been digging the remixes he has put out lately including Yaesayer, Temper Trap, Chester French to name a few. They have the right amount of pop, with the right [...]
Photography by Elle Well... The weather outside is frightful, but the fire's soooo delightful. I wish there was no place to go today, but alas & alas, here we are and here we must be, no snuggling in a bed all day for us today. As the French say, "kest le vye, kest le vye", that's life man. One thing about the snow, it's keeping me indoors on the various stationary bikes. Not cool. BUT, made the most of it and did my first product review [...]
Oh hello. My name is Nate. You may know me from my rock and pop spectacle The Future Everybody , electrifying greater Boston since way back in 2009. No? Then perhaps it was my tour of duty co-fronting the synchronized-jumping, natty-suit-wearing, beloved former popsters Scamper . Really? Hmmm. Did you see me in my stint as whipping boy in the Brendan Boogie Band (pre- Best Intentions)? Was it the tender years I wasted on the Noise Board under the name diggity (among a dozen other personae, including — big [...]
Skybox are a local Chicago indie pop outfit comprised of Tim Ellis and Christian Fields, Mike Holtz and Dan Ingenthron. They've made a name for themselves with outlandish live shows and toured in support of artists like Ben Folds, Tilly and The Wall, Tally Hall and The Figurines. Most of our sessions (and content) are admittedly skewed to folk, America and alt-country, but I've spent two weeks visiting and revisiting Skybox's recent release, Morning After Cuts . Unlike our discussion about Midlake yesterday , Skybox keeps you on your toes and varies their sound from one [...]
It's not surprising that Matthew Barber's upcoming release - True Believer - is flying under the radar of most of the sites I read and most of the music loving public in general. Barber is easy to classify - essentially he's a rock solid song writer that could charm you with just an acoustic or a piano - but the surprising range he presents when he writes songs makes it almost to lock into a sound or style. His understated arrangements consistently display his talent, but really don't translate into press quotes and hyperbole. He can't be put [...]
Hello everybody!!! It is good to be back!! Sorry about the mass hiatus but I was in South America for a couple of months and it has taken me a month to get my head back. Many thanks must go to Adso for the great work at keeping the blog pumping with all your music needs. Now in the same vein as my Top 15 albums of 2007 , my Top 25 of 2008 and Adso's Favourite 15 albums of 2009 I bring my Top 30 Albums of 2009. Now this list has [...]
INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE KALI YUGA The Kali Yuga still has 200,000 or so years to play…good news for advocates & avatars of CHAOS, bad news for Brahmins, Yahwists, bureaucratic-gods & their runningdogs. I knew Darjeeling hid something for me soon as I heard the name-- dorje ling-- Thunderbolt City. In 1969 I arrived just before the monsoons. Old British hill station, summer hdqrs for Govt. of Bengal—streets in the form of winding wood staircases, the Mall with a View of Sikkim & Mt. Katchenhunga—Tibetan temples & refugees—beautiful yellow-porcelain [...]
Minimal Mondays More minimal for this Monday eve with a driving house number from Kevin Griffiths working with Amsterdam's Julian Chaptal . Released on Tsuba records alongside other VR favorites like Zoo Brazil, Danton Eeprom and Motorcitysoul its no surprise that we get down to this. DL : Kevin Griffiths - Oh Yeah (Julien Chaptal mix) Next up is a little Move D to get things going a bit faster and funkier. His work here with DJ Late is perfect [...]
Drake inadvertently disses 2010 Grammy winners Phoenix in this post-awards show smackdown edition of "The Take". Drake's Take: New Releases 02.02.10 New release post-Grammys week is always a crapshoot. Most labels avoid it like the plague, as it's the week award winners see sales bumps, but there are enough music fans out there (namely, me) who don't give a rat's ass about who won a Grammy. For those of us, there are some scraps like the new release from (the band formerly known as The Muslims) [...]
Wow. It was one year ago today that I squeezed out my first post as The Burning Ear and 411 posts later and here we are. It's amazing how fast time flies and how much great music can come out in a year. Birthday's are a time for celebration and gift giving so I've wrangled together a little something for all of you to celebrate with. Over the past 12 months a number of great tracks have found a happy home in my stereo but for whatever reason or another I never covered them on the site. As a 1st [...]
I'm about to start Saturday's lineup by blowing right through a cool half dozen uncool bands. I know it may make me look like I don't, you know, like anything ever... but I look at it this way (and I'm pretty sure I repeat this mantra every year)... would I pay US American dollars to see any of these bands perform on their own? Not in this recession, bitches! Saturday begins with Frank Turner and the always reliable Irish Music/Punk Rock blend... which is fine when you're drinking Guinness at Molly Malone's... [...]
Bonjour mon amis! C'est HazMat d'ici, et j'ai parlez en Francais parce que nous avon un tres bien tune pour vous! OK - enough of the French. What I'm trying to say is that we've been sent a rather fat little tune, that needs to be shared avec vous. It arrived in the form of a rather mysterious email which landed in our inbox a few days ago. The sender(s?) wrote nothing in the main body of the message, merely attaching a picture (above) and the tune (below). The sender goes by the name of 'Au Contraire' (which means 'on the contrary'), [...]
The JD Rock Awards 2010 ceremony was held at the Hard Rock Cafe, Mumbai on Friday, February 5. We were there. So what was the most shocking moment of this year's JD Rock Awards ? If you've only heard about the gig and didn't attend it, you'll probably say it was Anushka Manchanda's taking her shirt off and proceeding to sing the last song of Shkabang 's set in her bright blue bikini top. It was a bold move, but there were plenty of other WTF moments during [...]
The Whispertown 2000 - Restless Creaky huh? Like an old door frame. The Whispertown 2000 - apart from having a ridiculous band name also come from LA and sing a little jangly folk. If you're a fan of anything I post, you'll like this one. That's what I'm basing this on. Yeah. Download here . "Tug at my sleeve, I got a heart that leaves just like the winter do to trees"
In the previous instalments of Curious Germany we noted the tendency in the 1960s of artists re-recording their hits in European languages, particularly in German to cater for the mainland continent's biggest market. Here are a few more German re-recordings, plus a Motown-goes-Schlager track, a most unexpected cover, pre-Schlager stardom Krautrock, a slightly strange Beatles cover, and another singing footballer. * * * The Beatles – Komm, gib' mir Deine Hand.mp3 The Beatles – [...]
This Week's Other Releases
Cover That Don't Suck
Reuse Recycle Remix - February 8
