Sooooo...Music has been problematic for me of late.  I am no longer buying music but just renting it and this continues a long occurring trend of “disassociation” from information about the music.  It is a long way from the liner notes I grew up with when I could often find everything I wanted to know about the album.  Who played on all the tracks, where they were recorded, who produced, who wrote.  The lyrics often we all there as well as a “feel” that you were really understanding what the artist was presenting.  You were delving deeper.  It often provided factoids to pretentiously throw at your ever diminishing group of friends who tired of such “card tricks” but still.  I miss them.  CD’s provided the same information but in tiny impersonal print and when I started buying from iTunes the separation continued knowing less and less other than artist name and track name...finally arriving at streaming music where other people (or algorithms) curate play lists tailored specifically for the hundreds of thousands of similarly pretentious pieces of shit like myself who still like to listen to new music.

My brain had tired of the game, reading reviews etc… in order to go deeper.  I was becoming a grazer.  A little of this, a little of that…”oh that is pleasant”.  Awful.  But it happens.  It is just a lot of work to keep up and with digital ALL the music in the world other than Prince and Bob Seger is at your fingertips.  But no filter.  No trusted sources other than NPR, No Depression and Lefsetz and that ain't much.  Rolling Stone long ago became irrelevant.  If it was not a major label release Jann Wenner wasn't having his folks review.  But last year with Courtney Barnett and Wakahatchie I started to try and list again and as always when you listen, there is a LOT of good music out there and there is even some great music.  Although I have my own peculiar tastes I will posit the Band Car Seat Headrest and their latest “Teens of Denial” is great.

The Pitchfork review is worth a read but to give you an idea of the grandeur of the songwriting and the angst:

“Teens of Denial is guitar-driven music filled with book smart lyrics concerned largely with depression, which naturally means that Toledo has been championed in some circles as an “indie rock savior,” whatever that means.”

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/21673-teens-of-denial/

I mean Pitchfork is too pretentious 90% of the time to gush.  How uncool is that?  But they nail this one.  Will Toledo is the driving force behind it and in this heroin age he writes of denial, dysfunction and a personal dystopia that the sick and the lame (me) need as we thrash around with out brilliant, depressing, mundane, fabulous, perfect, disastrous and disappointing days.

I don’t have the strength

(I don’t have the time)

I poured myself a drink

(I told myself a lie)

You know I’ve worried

(You know I’ve tried)

Don’t you know I’m not strong?

(Don’t you know I’m not kind?)

Someone’s getting lucky

(Someone’s calling the cops)

Someone take me away

(Someone make it all stop)

I had a bright tomorrow

(I spent it all today)

Now I am silent at last

Now I have nothing to say

If I’m being honest with myself

I haven’t been honest with myself

-Vincent

Now I have to be honest.  I love songwriters who reference Van Gogh.  I love clever word play and if you don't listen to lyrics than you cannot appreciate how brilliant this guy is.  I always figure when I hear something like this that I am catching a guy who is peaking and it is a brilliant feeling.  Most of them never become greats who crank out brilliant music for years.  Their personal psychosis and their talent allow them to deliver a shooting star and then they thrash around but god help me I love the rush of feeding on his brilliance.  

Every song has trite, clever chestnuts.  I remember reading someone talking about alcoholics anonymous and saying the hardest thing is to give yourself up to the cliches like “one day at a time” but equally hard was realizing that those cliches tend to encompass huge and Biblical truths. In his upbeat song “Fill In The Blank” Toledo explains….

I’m so sick of (fill in the blank)

Accomplish more, accomplish nothing

If I were split in two I would just take my fists

So I could beat up the rest of me

You have no right to be depressed

You haven’t tried hard enough to like it

Haven’t seen enough of this world yet

But it hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts

Well stop your whining, try again

No one wants to cause you pain

They’re just trying to let some air in

But you hold your breath you hold your breath you hold it

Hold my breath I hold my breath I hold it

I could go on reading and quoting his lyrics all day but the bottom line is this a great lyricist who with his band sounds like the great Ray Davies of the Kinks.  That is a distinctive voice and I don't think I have ever heard anyone and thought…”Ray Davies”.  How cool is that.  The atonal thrash that I love so much is Meat Puppets, Dinosaur Junior cacophony of brilliance and sometimes veers to the brilliance of my fave Built to Spill.

Buy this.  Rent this. Stream this.  Dream this.  You need music and you need to be distracted and you need to be reminded that your pain is not suffered alone and that maybe your pain isn't pain at all.  Thank you will Toledo.  You can bleed for me anytime.

Decluttering Diary Volume I: Beginning To Sell My Children

Soooo…. I am old.  Recently my wife and I have come to the conclusion that we have too much stuff.  Looking around our home and in our basement it is hard to deny.  As discussed over the last several years I like music.  I listen to a lot of music.  I like to go to shows and historically I have liked to “buy” and “own” music.  I have come to realization that this is dark ages stuff.  Streaming has won and my 1500 (or so) CD’s will one day be of all the value of 1500 8-Tracks and it is going to happen sooner rather than later.  My albums… they are different at least for now. They have art and liner notes my 53 year old eyes can read.  But CD’s?  They never had any magic.  They were beautiful and functional but… they seemed like a logical place for me to start the decluttering process.

I have over the years ripped many of these onto various computer hard drives and subsequently lost some of the libraries when i got new computers.  iTunes solved that storage dilemma but only up to 25,000 songs so there was a picking and choosing process while also adding new audio files and downloads instead of actually buying new CD’s.  When I decided that this would be first test of my resolve I asked my son for my birthday to put together ripping machine and hard drive to rip all CD’s to hard drive and up into the cloud.  He built me a pretty little two disk drive Hacintosh and wrote out detailed instructions for how to rip and I have now started the process in earnest.

I type this after ripping (with Jon giving me a head start of doing 50 or so about 100 CD’s.  It is interesting and it is painful.  Interesting to see how many jewel boxes had concert tickets stuffed into them, a quaint habit I picked up somewhere along the line.  Interesting because he also hooked me up with something called “Delicious Library” which allows me to scan the barcodes of the ripped CD’s and it creates visual library of art together with information on the Cd as well as current value of CD on Amazon.  This “value” proposition remains to be tested.  But it was interesting too to see how the market has “valued” my collection (more on that later).  Painful is just because I love the music and I am a hoarder.  Seeing that I have 11 Yo La Tengo CDs is a thing of awe and beauty to me and the fact that 80% of you reading this have no idea who Yo La Tengo is magnifies my sense of the “importance” of my “collection”.

So I sit in front of my machine I load, I open as audio file in something called XLD, I get the track names downloaded and then I rip something called a FLAC file which my son tells me can then convert into an MP3 file.Each one takes about 10 minutes and I can do 2 at a time. I tried to find a high school kid to do this but couldn't and now realize that it would take all the profit out of it.  I have opened up an EBay account and I think I need to open Amazon account as well to sell.  

I took 96 CD’s to Euclid records and they were very professional with me.  I advised that I was coming in to sell my children.  The young lady did not seem sympathetic or interested but she was polite.  I left them my name and number and about ½ hour later she told me they wanted 26 of them and would pay me 72 dollars.  I had priced them Amazon as being worth about 300 total.but was looking at this first batch as an experiment.  She explained  that the ones I saw as “valuable were worth 5 bucks to them, the rest were either two dollars or one dollar,  That just happened.  I feel somewhat violated but I think when you sell your children you feel that way.  There is a site called Decluttr which will pay me .40 each for them and handle shipping but I think I try my hand at Amazon and/or Ebay and maybe make a trip to Vintage Vinyl.  I will report.  The process should take me well into the Spring and as of this point for CD’s that probably cost me 1000 bucks I am 72 dollars to the good but I still have 70 of them to get rid of. I have opened a special account for the liquidation of my “treasures” starting with the CD’s, followed by the books I am embarrassed of (Dick Francis, John Grisham and what not) and then...the comic books...scrap metal...who knows.  This might be an interesting obsession…. maybe a sad little book…”The Baby Boomers Guide To Selling Your Children, (Decluttering)”.  What could go wrong?

Diner Review : Best of 2014

Soooo… 2014 is over and it is time for the much anticipated “best of” for music.  OK, so maybe no one anticipates it.  I don’t blame them.  My tastes are well known and fairly limited but… consistent.  There has been a ton of good music in 2014.  That is the problem. There is literally good music everywhere.  It has never been easier for a talented artist to put music out where everyone has access to it.  It should be awesome but instead it has produced a numbing glut of music because there is no “talent filter”.  Everyone can make music and put it on iTunes or Spottify or anywhere else.  Everyone has a “voice” or a “vision” and they just want you to listen to their “album”... 12-14 songs that they want you to sit through and “get it”.  Anyone can buy “Pro Tools” and share their “vision”.  But the world has passed them by.  I don't just mean my generation.  Most of my heroes are still insisting on cranking out albums (CD’s whatever) and our children for the most part are stuck in that mode.  Everyone is crying about how the Internet ruined music with no appreciation of the fact that they would not have “made it” under the old model either.  With so much music out there, no one has time or interest in anything but the brilliant.  You can access the great instantaneously.  No one has time to wade through your vision or listen over and over again to understand your muse.  

So we have two problems:

1. Two much music; and

2. Too many artists stuck in the old (moldy) model of making “albums”.

This year, I was going to  not list any CD’s or Albums of the year but instead just name a few with several great tracks and other than that I just wanted to give you a play list, give you some tunes, but… when i got into what I listened to this year I real;ized… I too am still stuck in the old model.

One more observation before we start though.  Streaming has won.  In five years they will not have a CD player in the car anymore.  It will go the way of the 8-Track and then the Cassette.  Additionally, iTunes is in the midst of dramatic decline.  My generation of Bushies (The Ownership Society) is on the way out.  The kids are not going to buy music for their hard drives or to burn into CD’s.  That is like… soooooo 2009.  Still, God Blessed us with a lot of good music this year and music...music makes life better and in 2015, you can get a few smiles by enjoying some of the greats of 2014.

Toward the end of the year, Lost on the River, an amalgamation of some of my favorite artists putting lyrics to and music to Bob Dylan.  Evidently when ensconced at “The Big Pink” with The Band he wrote and then performed a brilliant Album know as the basement tapes.  Also during those months and years in northern New York he wrote another 100 or so other songs, lyrics, snippets and these were given to a collection of musicians under the guidance of genius, muse, manager, parent, T-Bone Burnett.  The musicians:

Elvis Costello

Jim James

Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes

Marcus Mumford and

Rhiannon Giddens.

I was not familiar with Giddens.  Giddens was violinist, singer in The Carolina Chocolate Drops.  Anyway, if you get a chance watch the Showtime Special “The Lost Songs”.  It is awesome and will really give you some insight into the brilliance of what they did.  If you don't get a chance to watch that, do download or stream the following songs:

“Married To My Hack”

“Kansas City”

“Spanish Mary”

“Liberty Street”

They all are to nuanced to describe.  Just do it.  Seriously.  The whole CD is worth a listen.

***

In my normal pedigree, the Felice Brothers new CD “Favorite Waitress” is another winner.  Quality all the way through with the right quality of lightness and darkness and the always perfect time and heart ache and beauty that their lyrics and their years of playing together bring.  Recorded with the Omaha Genius Mike Mogis as producer it is a dance hall, and a party and carries on their brilliant discography.  Download or stream:

“Bird on a Broken Wing:

“Cherry Licorice”

***

Rosanne Cash surprised and delighted this year.  She has always had the pedigree with spots of brilliance always promising more but she never has put out anything even close to this years “River and a Thread”. If you like female singers and songwriters this is a great album and if you just like great music this is...a GREAT album.  The whole thing is good but download or stream:

“A Feathers Not  A Bird”

“Modern Blue”
"Will you still be there when I round the curve?
Will you hold my hand when I lose my nerve?
I went to Barcelona and my mind got changed
So I'm heading back to Memphis on the midnight train

I keep my head down, I keep my eyes on you
It's a big wide world"

***

My old Heroes The Old 97’s got together for another sing along.  The Band has always been a Rhett Miller vehicle but there is something special about the way the boys sing together.  20 years gone from Dallas they know their game and still seem to enjoy it.  I would argue that this is the best pure Old 97’s CD since “Too Far To Care”.  The Cd is is called “Most Messed Up” and the theme, politely is summed up by the song “Let’s Get Drunk and Get It On”.  It is a really good Old 97’s Cd and if you love them, you will really love this return to form.  The themes are somewhat distanced from Christian rock though i would still hold that it is, good for the soul.  Download or stream:

“Longer Than You’ve Been Alive”

“Let’s Get Drunk and Get It On”

“Wasted”

“This is the Ballad”

"I’m not crazy about songs that get self-referential

and most of this stuff should be kept confidential

but who even gives half a fuck anymore

well you should know the truth it’s both a blast and a bore

rock stars were once such mythical creatures

up there with presidents playmates and preachers"

***

Local and personal favorite Sleepy Kitty killed it with their sophomore release.  The band from Cherokee street runs a art printing shop that puts out some great stuff and the two of them,  Evan Sult and Paige Brubeck moved to the Lou from Chicago 4 or so years ago and are a brilliant example of a national artist who decided that we have a lot live ability and “scene” here and they are helping to make it so.  Evan Sult was formerly with indie rock demigods Harvey Danger who had a nice hit when radio was still something called “Flagpole Sitta”.  Anyway, their debut CD was awesome, this is more of the same.

“Dont You Start”

Hold Yr. Ground”

“Batman The Ride”

This is loud music for my taste which makes it even better.  Her voice aches and his drumming…”spot on”.

“To whoever stole the Dodge Caravan,

In December 2010

I hope you graduated High School

And your not doing 12th grade again.

What do you do

when your born in 63118?

Where do you run to,

when you get out of the starting gate?”

Ultimate questions memorializing one of what has become the epidemic of touring band van thefts in out beautiful little city.

***

OK, the Last CD is probably not going to be for most of you but… Su Kil Moon (Mark Kozelek) is likely an acquired taste for moth but if you love atonal, brilliant (heart wrenching) songs about life and...life, the CD “Benji” cannot be beat.  He played for years to critical acclaim with The Red House Painters but his solo stuff with Sun Kil Moon is just stripped down and painful.  The songs are like Springsteen Nebraska without… Springsteen.  Download or stream:

“Richard Ramierez Died Today”

“Pray For Newtown”

“Carissa”

“Richard Ramirez died today of natural causes

These things mark time and they cause pause

Think about we were kids scared of taps on the window

What’s under the bed and what’s under the pillow

And the jim jones massacre got in our heads

And the TV headlines elvis presley's dead

And the ayatollah who too many? committed(?) hostages

and ronald regan died of ---”

As Omar from “The Wire” would say…”Indeed.”

***

Laundry List of other artists and songs who did great stuff in 2014:

1. Kurt Vile:  He just rocks and rocks hard in a Lou Reed patois that I love.  His CD KV Crimes is good all the way through but download or stream “Walkin On A Pretty Daze”.

2. Lydia Loveless:  Sweet heart wrenching, rocking country.  Tanya Tucker on steroids and not over produced.  Download or stream “Hurt So Bad”.

3. Curtis mc Murtry:  Son of the brilliant and (by me) lionized James Mc Murtry debuted with a really solid freshman effort that continues to prove that good genes count for a lot.  the kid is a thoroughbred songwriter.  Dowload or stream “Ghost In My Bed”.

4. My fave Mike Doughty (Soul Coughing) came out with “Live at Kens House”.  Download or stream “St. Louise is Listening.”

5. Yusuf Islam (Cat Stevens) came out with a great CD showing he is still cat fucking Stevens.  Download or stream “You Are My Sunshine”.

There is more but folks… you gotta put in the work.  Let’s see what 2015 brings but follow my advice and buy the upgraded Spotify and cur commercials out of your life and stream whatever you want, whenever you want.  I will be posting a best of 2014 play list for streaming to all comers.  

Lucero/The Ready Room

Lucero and Murder by Death

The Ready Room/St. Louis Missouri

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Murder by Death and Lucero the other night.

They were playing “The Ready Room” which I had not attended a show at prior to this performance.  They have been hosting more and more quality acts lately including my fav’s The Old 97’s.  I had never seen Murder by Death before and they cut right into it with twangy, mounrful Flannery O’Connor soundtrack music about alcoholism, death and of course murder.They are not Chatty Cathies but their lead singer, keyboardist, and guitarist Adam Turla told the crowd.”

According to “Andreina Byrne and KC’s “The Pitch”, “Murder By Death has been riding the wave of dark western for years. Their sound is a haunting one - moreChildren of the Corn than back-porch Americana, but still graceful and wistful at the same time. Cellist Sarah Balliet’s orchestral elements brought some sentimentality to songs that might otherwise drop heavily as morbid tunes. Keyboardist Scott Brackett would often switch things up for a mandolin or trumpet riff, driving tracks “The Curse of Elkhart” to thrilling - and slightly creepy - heights. Turla’s voice was so eerie and enchanting, you either fell in love with him or avoided his eyes for fear of him casting a curse.”  

I quote her because i thought she was brilliant, right on and said it better than I could.  This is a band worth seeing.  They will make a living but never kill it but music is better for bands like this making great music because… it is all they can do.  Their show in St. Louis was just too loud.  The mournful jello was not mournful and the volume was deafening.  The room was packed and the cinder blocks and warehouse roof made me have to move around to find a place with listenable sound.  It was a good opener and the crowd clearly loved them but this is a band I would recommend listening to their music at home rather then take the time and cash to go to their show.

I have seen Memphis-based Lucero at least 7 times.  The first was in the long gone and not much lamented “Fred’s Music Lounge” that was on Chippewa across from Paul's bait and Tackle.  In between I have seen them at the pageant, the Duck Room, Lou Fest and Austin City Limits.  Lead singer and guitarist Ben Nichols drinks too much and he seems to do it...every night.  That boy is placing quite a bit of his pain in the bottle but what does not go there moves with his pen and his guitar to bleed out everywhere for the rest of us and it is…. beautiful and sad and… beautiful again but…

Nichols is a bad and sad drunk and he often puts on shitty and unprofessional shows and frankly, this was one of them.  The volume was toned down from the opener and I waded up front and I got the great high that I always get when I am five feet from the stage and able to catch all the nuance, or lack of nuance that is exhibited.  I have to admit that I was a little shamed by the audience up front.  Everyone knew all of the words to every song.  It was inspiring and made me remember when I was that kind of crazy fan for every band I went to see.  Humbling (again God… with the humbling.  Really?) Nichols was hung over which he announced upon arrival (which made sense based on the review from the night before in KC) and then proceeded to drink whatever was brought to him.  He was slightly critical of the rumple mint.  Now I do not mean to ne one to criticize because I drink too much but this guy… who I love… put on a really bad show.  He was not always in time and worst of all, he kept forgetting and fucking up the verses of songs.  Last time when I saw him at Lou Fest he claimed the flu, came out and tried to sing and puked… but this was just kind of sad and stupid.  I was still happy to be there.  I still got the high that I get form thrumming live music and beautiful lyrics.  I was

The band consisted of Jim Spake on sax, Rick Steff on keyboard and accordion and Scott Thompson on trumpet.  Being an asshole I do not like their more recent stuff as much.  It is great music and his lyrics resonate but it reminds me of Texas Swing or Delbert Mc Clinton (and I say that with respect not disdain) and I am just more of a fan of gritty, jangly, twangy darkness that Nichols does better than anyone else.  That boy… he has a lot of ink.  Songs like “Sweet Little Thing.” Songs like “Raising Hell” become group sings that feel more like going to a dying but grace filled church more than anything else.  A church with a great deal of booze.  My kind of church, were I asked to build one.

Nichols was engaging and he has clearly been around the block since their brilliant debut back in the early 90s.  There are some bands that it is a pleasure to watch age but, I am not sure off this in regard to Lucero.  Nichols drinks so much on stage it is hard to imagine him still being alive but despite the bad show, I am powerfully pleased that he is.

Soooooo…. it would appear that I have been absent for some period of time.  I have many apologies… travel...work… what not.  They are lame but indeed, that is what we have come to expect from these halting pages.  But I have not been idle.  Half way through, despite all the issues and some mist steps it has been… quite year.  

I have seen a lot of music this year.  Much of it has been at Off Broadway and I am happy to report again, and again that this is becoming a treasured venue in town.  I have lived through the venue being the worst and stupidest of shit holes.  Back in the day… when i was a pup it competed rather unsuccessfully with Mississippi Nights and the old Cicero's.  But these venues eventually went on to not become a Jacques Cousteau museum or to become a lame incarnation of itself up the street from it’s former location.  But Off Broadway ambled on… trudged on...slowly… awkwardly and sometimes horribly.  Great bands but a really stupid room.  You would arrive at the front door and come in behind the stage into a “lobby”.  Then walk around and there was a cool long bar that extended down the side.  A “stage” was there, poorly lit.  The “room” had a beautiful wagon wheel chandelier which didn’t belong.  There was an upstairs which could have been funky but was instead awkward and vision was blocked by the over hang as well as… the chandelier.  Doors were at 8.  Bands started to play at 9 ish and there were often 3 of them.  On a school night you were always out till 1.  Too late for people with jobs and too random an experience for a “grown up”

But a few years ago new owners came on the scene.  Things started to happen.  Good things.  Happy things.  They started to experiment with:

Earlier shows

Afternoon shows

Shows that started on time

Tall boy beers

Professional employees

Redecorating

Losing the iconic chandelier

Peeling years of...shit of the walls

Painting

Shortening the bar

Bringing in seats for old people shows or partial old people shows.  What I am saying is that if you ever have an inclination to see some live music.  Hit their website and go out.  They bring in some of the most talented acts that are both breaking and established and when local bands play there it is because they are awesome.  Their website is:

http://www.offbroadwaystl.com/calendar/

So some of the shows I have seen recently.

Rhett Miller.  Rhett is lead singer and other than one song per album by their bassist sole lyricist for The Old 97s.  Rhett is… well… their is really no one else like Rhett.  I would assume he is about 40 (I am too bored to WIKI him).  He went to Sarah Lawrence (girls school) on a poetry scholarship.  Now remember he is from Texas.  He dropped out and moved back and started a band and they have turned out 8-10 CD’s and he has dated and married super models and he has long hair and my best friend’s wife loves to go to shows just to see him whip his hair.  And he does.  But when he comes to town for a show he normally just shows up with a guitar.  I think he has 5 solo albums out and he writes great songs.  He writes lines like:

“I was going through a hell of a time

When suddenly you showed up

You gave me hope but I lost mine

But hope is not enough

I loved you so hard

It broke my heart

And you weren’t like the rest

Until you left”

Seriously… that is “Dylanesque” which is the nicest thing I can say about a songwriter.

Frankly this show was the most fun.  Buy his newest album and buy the new Old 97’s album as well.  It is not poetry but is an album full of songs about getting drunk on bourbon and having sex.  What could possibly go wrong.

Steve Earle hit the Pageant and reminded us all what a grumpy, great, tuneful, deep, flawed, wonderful nightmare that he is.  He had a pretty set with a tight band featuring the husband and wife team “The Mastersons” who opened up the show with a tight swinging sound.  She has a sweet voice and he has good chops.  Together they ably backed Earle.  Steve Earle has had a checkered personal life but has always been a brilliant artist.  Sidelined by heroin and drugs it appeared he had straightened himself out after several marriages and had settled with the talented Allison Moorer in NYC.  This tour seemed to be about him working through that latest break up.  The bottom line with Steve Earle is that he is likely the most soul filled white man out there.  He bleeds through his songs and is constantly working out his thoughts in his songs whether it is personally or politically and… you should go see him.  The Pageant is not intimate enough for what he was doing on this tour but still… as I said...get off your dead ass and go see a show.

Twang Fest 38 returned this year with it’s normal panoply of touring and local acts.  I was only able to hit two nights of the four nights but each one was filled with great music.  KDHX does such a great job for my kind of tunes and the Fest gets better and more professional each year and the partnership with Off Broadway seems here to stay which… is good.

More  recently I hit Off Broadway to see the late great Robbie Fulks (not yet deceased).  Fulks, from Georgia via 20 years or so in Chicago does not come to town enough.  he was playing an early show opening for Chatham County Line who is the latest “thing” in Americana/Alt Country...whatever you want to call it.  But Fulks… I have seen 4-5 times.  I was able to reminisce with him briefly about his first show in the St. Louis at the old High Point...100 or so years ago.

Fulks has been keeping himself in Chicago at the Old Town Folk School up there and has helped them create a beautiful community that teaches a lot of people and promotes even more.  Fulks is a gem and no one knows about him who does not pay attention to great music.  He has a truly unique voice and I don't mean “unique” like Dylan or Niel Young.  I mean unique like...fucking beautiful.  There is something in the way he resonates that literally can make me tear up and there is both a joy and a mournfulness that he conjures which becomes stunning in a small venue like Off Broadway.

The voice coupled with 30 years of songwriting proved too much for the normal 45 minute opener and he played for over an hour and left everyone wanting for more.

Georgia Hard

She said she was leaving

So I went to follow

Blind love and I-55 got me here

Dirty old salt truck

in the smog before me

And dear old Dixie, back in the rearview mirror

Got a third-story walk-up

With a view of the alley

A mailroom job that isn't all glamour and fun

The woman I came for

Is gone to another

Now my feet are just too planted to run

Chorus:

But there's no Carolina Moon over Chicago

No bluegrass growin' out in my backyard

No fields of sugarcane, no soft Virginia rain

But damn, if this livin' ain't Georgia Hard

Down on Halsted

The women walk by me

Like they can tell

I haven't got a dollar to spare

So it's into a side street

For a beer and a sad song

I guess some things

Are the same most everywhere

So please, Mr. Conwell

Could you except the charges?

When I told you "A cold day in Maacon", I lied

And if your pecan trees still need a-shakin'

I'll be back a-beggin' fast as the grey dog flies”

Chatham County seemed like they were going to be awesome after some awful sound problems.  They do 4 musicians, no drummer, and one microphone.  It is almost too cute but these guys are clearly killing it and a braver man would have stayed for more but… I am old.

Robbie Fulks/Chatham County Line

Most recently I went to Off Broadway to see the Felice Brothers.  The Felice Brothers became like gods to me with the release of their eponymous CD from 2008.  Songs like “Whiskey In My Whiskey”, “Scarecrow” and more made a CD that was so solid song to song, so lyrical and so filled with sad energy that it was far and away my best CD released that year.  But so what?  They came to town to the Firebird once since then and I missed them (out of town) which was clearly my bad but mistakes get made.  But I did not miss them this time and they were everything I had hoped and more.  They were brilliant.  Sad.  Emotional.  Funny.  Talented and… shit… they were beautiful.   Ian and James Felice even without their brother Simone play the kind of music that can only be played from playing together for life and loving and hating each other as only brothers can do.  The concert ambled, rambled, soared and swooped.  It was meticulous and it was a train wreck and it was everything rock and roll is supposed to be.  It is clearly for me the best show of 2014!                    

Songs of addiction and madness that when you read the lyrics they just make you ache… and cringe.

Scarecrow

Would you love me

If I told you I was born upstream

If I told you I come from money

White money

Would you love me

Would you love me

Well, I was born down

By a bad little river in a poor town

Where an indian-giver put a board out

It said "Boarding House"

Call him Scarecrow

He kept whores around

And I'd go there

I'd wait my turn on the broke stairs

And get me the girl with the gold hair

Aw yeah, leave your clothes there

On the folding chair

In that cold room

Your breath would twist just like ghosts do

You said, "Call me Dorothy in red shoes"

And the bed moved

The bed moved

The bed moved

Tracy, don't you wake that scarecrow tonight

Well, the man would come in

It's hard living right giving head when

The sad days of winter have set in

And the medicine for an addict is heroin

I'd find you there in the bath

We'd cook up your shit in a tin can

And you started calling me Tin Man

And we started making plans to begin again

Begin again

You saved a C note

Told me you felt like a seagull

Told me to meet at the depot

With the needle, then maybe we'd go

To Reno

Where you'd be my desert dove

And we'd find a way to make better love

Said, "Baby, that's how the West was won"

And the blood-red sun

Yeah, the blood-red sun

And the blood-red sun

Tracy, don't you wake that scarecrow tonight

Well, the man cries,

"Who gives a damn when a tramp dies?"

But I loved you there in the lamp light

With your bare thighs

And the halo of your hair alive

And all my lifelong

I'll never shake off your siren song

And all of your talk about dying young

With an iron lung and that crazy way

Would you love me

If I told you I was born upstream

If I told you I come from money

White money

Would you love me

Would you love me

And all my lifelong

I'll never shake off your siren song

And all of your talk about dying young

With an iron lung and that crazy way

You said, "Simon,

I think I might stay here with Scarecrow tonight

Simon, I think I'm gonna stay here with Scarecrow tonight."

                                  s

“I put some whiskey into my whiskey

I put some heartbreak into my heart

I put my boots on that ole dance floor

I put three rounds Lord, in my 44”

The Felice Brothers.

Quite a year indeed.

Go see some music.

Save your soul.