Rocky Votolato - 6/27/07 - Boston
Hello Again, I’ve never sweated this much at a show in my entire life. Played Boston tonight during a heat wave and the AC went out at Harper’s Ferry where we were playing. Had a good time but nearly died of heat exhaustion. This is a picture of us right before we went on - you can already see the sweat dripping. We’ve got “The Owl” with us too, so the team is complete. Crashing at his place in Road Island tonight. Flying everyone out here to the east coast was kind of a pain in the ass, but after... read more
Man Man - Athens - 40 Watt - 6/29/07
Photos taken at the 40 Watt by David Marek Related links: WeAreManMan.com Man Man tours, talks with Paste Man Man on MySpace ... read more
Telluride Bluegrass Festival 2007 (Master Blaster)
As I said in an earlier post, Telluride Bluegrass Festival is the benchmark on how to throw a music party. Yes, it doesn’t hurt that the surroundings are majestic and the weather idyllic, but it’s still a feat to implant perma-grins on 11,000 faces year after year. I’ll admit I’m not a uber bluegrass aficionado, but that’s the beauty of TBF, it’s not only kid friendly it’s rookie friendly. To the point, if you want to take a break from the main grounds you can amble three blocks into town and sit in on various workshops and seminars at tiny,... read more
The Death of Local Radio
Switching it over to AM Searching for a truer sound Can’t recall the call letters Steel guitar and settle down Catching an all-night station somewhere in Louisiana It sounds like 1963, but for now it sounds like heaven -- Son Volt, “Windfall” It occurred to me a while back that I never listen to the radio. This is an odd thing for a music reviewer to admit, but there you go. I simply never turn it on in the car, or when I’m at home, although I’m listening to new music all the time. And it’s a bit of a... read more
All FIRE Songs, All the Time
Part of the office is on fire right now. I have been challenged by the interns to make a playlist before we’re allowed to go back in the office. I won! Nobody was hurt and the fire is small, Kate 1. Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy “You Will Miss Me When I Burn” 2. Alasdair Roberts “Firewater (Library Of Aethers)” 3. Ben Harper “Not Fire, Not Ice” 4. Mindy Smith “Down in Flames” 5. Modest Mouse “Fire it Up” 6. David Berkeley “Fire Sign” 7. Gram Parsons “Hearts on Fire” 8. Hem “Hotel Fire” 9. Patty Loveless “Out of Control Raging Fire”... read more
Sweet Talk’s Bonnaroo 2007 Part Four (Day of the W with Wolfmother, Wilco, and The White Stripes )
I know Bonnaroo was three weeks ago but believe me it still lingers like the bizarre and massive smoke rings wafting from the Art of Such and Such’s fire pit. Like an alien jellyfish preying on the sun burnt horde of unwashed, the smoke perfectly captured Sunday’s general vibe; either the apocalypse was near or someone was bogarting a really big blunt. Our day opened with the first of the three W’s, Wolfmother. While the Kings of Leon may challenge Tina Turner for best legs in rock, Wolfmother’s was not the first thing anyone should have to see after a... read more
Apostle of Hustle - New York, NY - Central Park SummerStage - 6/24/07
Photos taken at Central Park SummerStage by Stephen Lindley Related links: Apostle of Hustle at Arts & Crafts Apostle of Hustle on MySpace Apostle of Hustle on Wikipedia ... read more
Hoots & Hellmouth - Philadelphia - World Cafe Live - 5/25/07
Photos taken at World Cafe Live by Doug Seymour Related links: 4 to Watch: Hoots & Hellmouth HootsAndHellmouth.com Hoots & Hellmouth on Myspace ... read more
Hellsongs - Darkness Lite
Photo credit: Sophia Sånglöf Scandinavia has long been the bastion of both brooding death metal and blissful pop, with Sweden in particular proving itself a fertile breeding ground for this schizophrenic trend. Indeed, exactly how the musical culture of this relatively small country could spawn both Meshuggah and ABBA ranks among the deepest of Swedish national mysteries (right up there with the appeal of lutefisk and 95% of all Ikea assembly instructions). Not that we were asking for it, but three industrious Swedes have stepped forward to reconcile these two seemingly incompatible genres. Hellsongs first applied their decidedly pop stylings... read more
Feist - Atlanta - Variety Playhouse - 6/15/07
Photos by David Marek Related links: Leslie Feist Lets It Bleed The Hottest State to feature Emmylou, Norah, Willie Nelson, Cat Power, Bright Eyes, Feist, more Feist - Let it Die ... read more
Hallelujah the Hills, The Mendoza Line, The Safes, Richard and Linda Thompson
The albums that have hogged the CD player of late ... Hallelujah the Hills – Collective Psychosis Begone Post-modernists will love Boston’s Hallelujah the Hills. “Made inventions, broke conventions/Raised a glass to new pretensions/Meta-meta-meta-and the novel is dead” singer/songwriter Ryan Walsh shrieks, and hipster literature professors will rejoice worldwide. The good news is that rock ‘n roll fans will rejoice as well. HtH exhibit the kind of madcap free-for-all egalitarianism that characterizes bands like The Arcade Fire. The band mixes equal parts fuzzed-out guitars, cellos, trumpets and synths. They chant in unison. They write songs with Sufjan-like... read more
Wilco - New York, NY - Hammerstein Ballroom - 6/25/07
Photos by Stephen Lindley Related links: Wilco: In the Company of Ghosts (Issue 11 cover story) Wilco - Sky Blue Sky WilcoWorld.net ... read more
The Rosebuds and Land of Talk - Atlanta - The EARL - 6/23/07
Above: Land of Talk Photos taken at The EARL by Ashley Melzer Above: Land of Talk Above: The Rosebuds Above: The Rosebuds Above: The Rosebuds Above: The Rosebuds Related links: Band of the Week: The Rosebuds The Rosebuds - Night of the Furies Band of the Week: Land of Talk ... read more
Pop Go the Junkies
I’ve seen some really terrible opening bands. And I’ve even seen some good ones sabotaged by the soundman to make the headliner more impressive by comparison. But tonight at Boston’s Symphony Hall, before the Cowboy Junkies took the stage as part of the Boston Pops’ Edgefest series (ful disclosure: Paste is the media sponsor), the show opened with Keith Lockhart conducting the 60-person orchestra through selections of West Side Story and both world and regional premieres from two young composers. The first, 26-year-old Philip Glass protegé Nico Muhly, has collaborated with Björk and Antony. He said his work was inspired... read more
Rocky Votolato - 6/23/07 - Seattle 2.0
Hello again, So the week in Seattle was amazing. The CD release show at the Triple Door went as well as I could have hoped for and I’m really grateful to everyone who came out! We had a great time playing on 107.7 The End and at the Easy Street in-store on Friday as well. Definitely the best in-store experience I’ve ever had. I got up at 4:30 a.m. this morning to take the dudes to the airport. They are all flying out to our roadie’s house (Mark Gallant a.k.a “The Owl"), in Providence, RI today. If you see him... read more
Sweet Talk’s Bonnaroo 2007 Part Three (God Bless The Flaming Lips)
Sweet Talk’s Bonnaroo 2007 Part Three After waking up “early’, I dragged my aching soles to the Sonic Stage, my favorite venue on the farm, for the first live music of the day. It’s always refreshing when your musical expectations are surpassed and the Brooklyn Salt Mines super group, American Babies, did just that and then some. The Hamilton brothers (Brothers Past) and Joe Russo (Benevento Russo Duo) recently solidified their fledging band by adding guitar whiz Scott Metzger (Rana, Particle, Project Logic) which allows them to translate their soaring and exquisite Gram Parson’s steeped Americana blues to the stage. ... read more
Telluride Bluegrass Festival (Where have you been all my life?)
Yes, I know I am only on day two of my Bonnaroo posts but listen dear reader, I seem to live three full lives every year at that piece of fertile soil in the western Tennessee Valley and much like Jack’s famous whiskey distilled in the same county, you just can’t rush these things. There plenty more to come from the farm, but currently I am at 8000 some odd feet in what is arguably the most eye popping piece of Colorado, listening to some of the most ear popping bluegrass floating from the heavens. This is indeed the cradle... read more
Sweet Talk at Bonnaroo Part Two (When The Levee Breaks)
So where did we leave off. Oh yeah the Roots vieing for the title of hardest working band in show biz. To prove the point, as soon as ?uestlove left the stage he went back to the Holiday Inn to rehearse with Ben Harper and John Paul Jones (yes, that John Paul Jones as in Led Zep) for the annual Bonnaroo Superjam. Sometime after the witching hour the trio took the stage in the Other Tent to a thunderous reception. It was a hair on your arms standing up kind of ovation, even before the first chord was struck, but... read more
Great Lake Swimmers - Philadelphia - 6/8/07
Photos by Doug Seymour Related links: Great Lake Swimmers - Ongiara Great Lake Swimmers: Songs of Ambient Rural Isolation GreatLakeSwimmers.com ... read more
Rocky Votolato - 6/20/07 - Seattle
Howdy, I’ve never done this kind of thing before. Feels pretty strange, but here we go. So my record, The Brag & Cuss, came out yesterday, and I’ve been getting ready for this string of shows for a while. The boys flew in four days ago and we’ve been practicing our asses off since then. My entire band is from Denver. Dave Barker is playing drums for me now full time. He’s the one with the “Kentucky Waterfall,” or for those of you who don’t call it that, a badass mullet. Spacey Casey is playing pedal steel and B-Bender Tele... read more
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