Jackson C. Frank said it best…
[ download ] Halloween Is Black As Night
=tyler=
Happy Halloween
Happy Halloween from Naturalismo! If you feel like getting contemporary for a moment head over to Gorilla Vs Bear for a great compilation he’s compiled for this all hallows eve.
This is how we’re gonna roll though:
Skeleton Dance from 1929
Spinal Cord Xylophone
The Skygreen Leopards, California's Family Band
The Skygreen Leopards is a collaboration between Donovan Quinn and Glenn Donaldson. They have released six albums and an EP since their formation in 2001, and each successive album has witnessed a transformation of composition. A river is never the same on two consecutive days, and Disciples Of California, the newest Leopards album, is arguably their “biggest riverboat yet”.
Disciples Of California is the first record to include The Skyband; Wymond Miles on pedal steel, Jasmyn Wong on drums, and Shayde Sartin on bass. The basic tracks were recorded live in the studio, which gave the rhythm of the songs more space to breathe than on previous recordings. The result is a jingle-jangling, gentle sway that lies somewhere between pop and folk. Donovan Quinn and Glenn Donaldon’s highly expressive voices blossom through colored washes of pedal steel as electric twelve-string riffs rotate and slide by overhead. Acoustic strumming, warm and persistent, hold it all together even when the songs threaten to stumble and fade.
Lovers and friends take the listener down the back roads of memory, through the sun-drenched fields and quiet evenings of the past. Like dreams, the songs present scenes that may seem new and strange, and yet somehow entirely primal; derivative of past experiences. Under closer examination archetypes emerge, which may lead one to ponder the existence of a universal unconscious. The idea that, at a certain level, we are all manifestations of a deeper archetype, a pattern of being that speaks through all of us. As Glenn Donaldson said in an interview, ”each song is a remembrance of a song not yet written.”
[download] Disciples Of California
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[download] Places West Of Shawnapee
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[download] Tents Along The Water (from Life And Love In Sparrow’s Meadow)
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[download] Minotaur (Burn A Candle For Love) (from Life And Love In Sparrow’s Meadow)
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-kevin-
Wavves
I’m a total sucker for fuzzed out loud doo-wop/60′s pop drenched madness and Wavves new album delivers in full. Based out of San Diego, Nathan Williams-who goes by the name Wavves-exemplifies every pastiche of where I feel anyone in their mid 20′s has been through musically. Whether it be hearing your dad play that early Beach Boys tape one too many times on the way to the beach or wearing out your older brothers copy of Nevermind in 5th grade before discovering the Pixies, Wavves isn’t afraid to shy away from throwing it all into his distorted blender of sound. The more I listen to it the more it’s been growing on me…maybe it’s my San Diego childhood upbringing coming out.
Tape is out now on Woodsist/Fuck It Tapes with LP to follow next year on De Stijl, I’m sure he’ll blow up sometime around then…
Wavves – Wavves (fixed link)
Lula Côrtes e Zé Ramalho – Paêbirú
Paêbirú is an obscure Brazilian psych concept album about the four elements (earth, air, fire, water) that was lost to time in a warehouse fire in 1974, causing it to become a massively sought-after lost classic, fetching up to $1500 for vinyl copies.
This recording of the collaboration between Brazilian artists Lula Côrtes and Zé Ramalho is a wonderfully off-kilter record, full of fantastic hooky and strange tunes that range all over the place, from full-on freakouts to quiet pastoral. The entire range of 1970s hippie Brazilian musician culture is displayed in this record. It’s experimental, but it’s relentlessly driven towards fun. If you like good music, you will like this legendary album untouched by time.
[ download ] Harpos dos Ares
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=tyler= via jonesthought
Viking Moses: Additional US Dates
Photo: Daniel Arnold
Additional tour dates have been posted on Viking Moses’ page. See if your town has beens added to the list. ”More dates coming soon. Dates are filling fast. If you want a Viking Moses concert where you live please write soon. See you in the pit!”
Dates below the jump!
Vashti Bunyan in Tonite Let's All Make Love in London
Peter Whitehead’s 1967 film, Tonite Let’s All Make Love in London, features a small clip of Vashti Bunyan singing Winter Is Blue in the studio in 1966. Sorry about the subtitles.
-kevin-
Woods – Family Creeps
Time-Lag Records, with the help of WOODSIST, is doing a second pressing of Woods’ Family Creeps LP. An intact copy of the thing is a nine-course meal of broken-down, drone-and-moan music, echoes squeezed and flung through wobbly space and electric tunes of mournful, whaful fun.
[download] Twisted Tongue from Family Creeps
Also, Tour.
-Josh
Nimrod Workman: I Want To Go Where Things Are Beautiful
“It’s amazing that Nimrod learned and retained these songs, that he can compose on the spot, that he survived 40 years of mining life and many more years than that of tobacco and alcohol use, and that he remains at the age of 92 vital and able to talk and sing with strong conviction. He is a treasure.” – Mike Seeger, 1987
The voice is the vehicle through which all singer-songwriters separate themselves from the rest. Through its pitch and its timbre, through its imperfections and its quaver, the voice builds a bridge between the singer and his listener. It’s the human element that any folk fan craves, because the folk fan craves narrative (both in the lyrics and in the musician himself). Many talented musicians have mastered their instrument only to collapse, to recede in the undertow of their own fluency. Because we’ve all heard virtuoso musicians, and gawked, and let our lips turn upright and exalt the wonder of it all. They’re great. A virtuoso plays their instrument with unparalleled mastery, the fruits of weeks spent locked in a bedroom. We watch with a passing fascination: awed, yes, but apt to amble.
From a strictly auditory standpoint, Nimrod Workman’s voice is difficult to listen to. There’s no sugar coating that fact. It’s imperfection personified, but that’s the point. By listening to it, you’re not going to be transported anywhere but directly into the grizzled, pain-stricken life of the man singing. Comprised of strictly acapella folk ballads and some ramshackle originals, I Want to Go Where Things Are Beautiful is part musical odyssey and part history lesson. It is, to my ears, an album of vicarious pain or, more accurately, its ability to give me some. But I crave that connection, however unsettling. In a disconnected paint-by-data world I long for the ability to understand someone else’s reality. I want to go where things are beautiful too.
The record, being released November 18, is Drag City’s first release in conjunction with Twos & Fews and was recorded by Mike Seeger in 1987. Nimrod died at the age of 99 in 1994.
[ download ] Rock the Cradle Alone
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=tyler=
Animal Collective's Merriweather listening party in NYC
Just got final word about the time and place you can check out the new Animal Collective album, Merriweather Post Pavilion, in its full in a little under a week from now.
Here’s the details, make sure to RSVP today/soon if you’re in NYC and plan on making it out:
Edvard
Davy Graham
Allow me to alienate myself for a moment here and say that while I love Davy Graham’s first album, The Guitar Player, I always thought that the sound was slightly overproduced in comparison to his first three cuts on his first EP 3/4 AD and a rare BBC outtake where you get to see him in his more raw and natural element. Sometimes I think the only proper way to hear him in album form is on “After Hours,” a performance recorded after a gig at the University of Hull in 1967, with a hand-held mic in a student bedroom at 1am with a bunch of drunk students in the background. If this is your first experience with Graham’s music I think this is the perfect place to start. I’ll try and get some of the After Hours songs up soon but for now you can hear the newly remastered version streaming for free on his website.
I think the difference between the E.P.’s earlier sound and his first album is well evidenced by his two versions of Anji-his most famous song- that was somewhat popularized by Bert Jansch and more so by Jimmy Page obsessing over it. Regardless the first take of it to me sounds more full and the 2nd sounds a bit hollow to my ears. Both are fantastic though…
Davy Graham -- Angi (From 3/4 AD)
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Davy Graham -- Anji (From The Guitar Player)
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Stunning live video of Davy Graham in 1959 appearing on a BBC special about the rise of Folk guitar in Britain playing “Cry me a river”
Edvard