Music In

Reader polling has revealed that the favorite feature of this blog is the Music In topic. Acquisitions have down lately. Everything is rated back to the start of June, so 2 months worth. Also some exciting Music Out News.

• "Closing Time", by Tom Waits (1973). So Amazon says, Tom Waits, 2005, I think, I don't have that. Download, start listening. First song, "Ol' 55", I'm like, wait a minute, I know that song, it's an Eagles song?!?!? Why would Tom Waits cover that? So do some research, this is Tom Waits' first album, from 1973. The Eagles covered Tom Waits. If you do not have this album, I would highly recommend you get it. It's one of those fabulous 1st albums by a singer-songwriter who went on to a 40 year (and counting) career. His voice wasn't so gruff then. 4 stars.

  I was going to work up the 2nd song, "I Hope That I Don't Fall In Love With You", really nice guitar riff. I download the lyrics, 5 verses of 7 lines each -- lots of songs only have 2 verses. So I'll be doing this one from the book only, doubt I'll memorize all 5 verses. Altho, I have remembered all 5 verses of "Up On Cripple Creek" the last couple of times I did it (around the time of Levon Helm's death).

  Tom Waits just released this really ... nasty, creepy, dark ??? but compelling video. I've watched it several times.
  

• "The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than The Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do", Fiona Apple. Ms. Apple puts so much angst into her music, you cannot help but admire it. No standout catchy tunes tho. 3 stars.
  
• Walk The Moon, "Walk the Moon". A Cincinnati band. We all know what a sucker for pop I am, this somehow crosses the line from pop to commercial. Still, the tunes are not bad. 3 stars.
  
• "The Flaming Lips and Heady Fwends", Flaming Lips. These guys continue to pad their resume as the masters of odd orchestration / sounds / noises. Some of these collaborations really work, I particularly liked the ones with Nick Cave, and with Yoko Ono and the Plastic Ono Band. 3 stars.
  
• "New Beard City", New Beard. Hot damn, another great Brooklyn band! The 1st track opens with peppy pop, strings and hand-clapping orchestration, male and female vocals, then an 80s guitar harmony interlude, then a shredding solo, while the strings continue to build. 13 consistently good tracks. 4 stars.
  
• "Carry Me Back", Old Crow Medicine Show. Power folk / bluegrass, similar to their prior album, somehow it doesn't work as well for me. 3 stars.
  
• "Shrines", Purity Ring. A Montreal band, electronica/dance. Good female lead singer, nice grooves. 3 stars.
  
• "The Soul Sessions, Vol. 2", Joss Stone. Has Ms. Stone got this sh#t down or what? Interesting to see the covers she decided to do -- wait a minute, I thought only a few of these were covers, looks like they all are. I only recognized a few. Ms. Stone must be a real aficionado -- duh. 3 stars.
  

The Joss Stone has been here for ~10 days, nothing new since then, so, I am all caught up! All music rated and reviewed!

Re Music Out, after years without one, I've recently played 3 paying gigs with the Here For Party Band: the weekends before and after the 4th of July, and last weekend. A block party (cancelled due to a blown transformer in the heat wave, but, we still got paid, so it counts) and 2 private parties. I think that 4th of July is the time of biggest demand for musicians, even more so than New Year's.

The most recent gig was the most fun, lots of dancers for the last 1-1/2 hours. And the last hour, I was the only guitarist (the most excellent Lindsay Olive had to leave for another gig), and I played some feedback on "Wang Dang Doodle" that seemed to really work. A compressor, 2 fuzz tones and a wah-wah, you can definitely get some serious feedback, but totally under the control of the wah-wah and the whammy bar.