the frig blig

One thing leads to another — I went to hear Red Jacket Mine at their CD release gig at the Tractor last Thursday and discovered another great local band who played warmup: Downpilot who incidentally were also plugging their new CD They Kind of Shine and apparently will spend the next month gigging in Germany. A talented four-piece (including pedal steel) with great songwriting, Downpilot sounds a little REM-ish but more country and less hypnotic. Makes me suspect there’s this vibrant music community all around me of which I only see tiny bits and pieces.

I did purchase Red Jacket Mine’s new CD Lovers Lookout too but haven’t had a chance to listen yet — I’ll post a report soon on my impressions and maybe a comment or two on what I saw and heard at last weekend’s Hardly Strictly bluegrass fest as well.

Red Jacket Mine is playing at the Tractor Tavern tomorrow night to celebrate the release of their new CD Lovers Lookout. I’m hoping there will be physical copies of the disc available, with all of the non-green implications that has. I just discovered this band a few months ago and am looking forward to finding musical growth on their second CD (I’m hoping it’s harder edged than their first).

RJM shares the bill with fellow Seattle bands downpilot and Sweet Secrets. I’m looking forward to a great show — see you there!

S, D & I saw two good local bands at the Tractor last night. Red Jacket Mine (above) was the warmup act, and they were every bit as talented (with a darker sound) as the headliners The Minus 5 (below) who were playing a “new CD release” gig for recording ‘Killingsworth’ published by Yep Roc Records.

Some interesting music has come my way lately.

Iran’s CD Dissolver is great — I can’t get enough of it. I hadn’t heard of this NY-based band until they were booked at a recent KEXP concert.

Speaking of NY bands, I first ran into Gogol Bordello while visiting a friend in Tallahassee last December but didn’t get around to listening to his tunes until now. Very funny, lively and a little crazy!

And for something completely different — 70’s Texas tunesmith Townes Van Zandt died in 1997 but not before writing lots of classic songs made famous by other bands’s covers (e.g. ‘If I Needed You’, ‘Pancho and Lefty’, and ‘Who Do You Love’). Country musician Steve Earle recently released an album of Van Zandt covers, which prompted me to listen to the original again in the form of the double CD Live at the Old Quarter, Houston, Texas recorded in 1973 but not released until 1977. Some mighty fine songs, yup.

Was present at the most excellent performance of Sunship at Res Audio. One of the cooler moments of my year to date.

Cozy in the metro 16 on my way to work this morn I gave a first listen to Dark Night of the Soul. Was tickled to hear a guy singing ‘Sucking on my angel’s heart,’ only to realize several choruses later he was really saying ‘plucking on my angel’s harp’.

Darn. If Frank had spent a little more time on that tune maybe he could have reached ’sucking on my angel’s heart’, obviously superior.

Which segs into all the creative lyric twistings we’ve known over the years. A couple I recall off the top of my head:

‘Every time she goes away, she takes a piece of meat with her.’

‘Got a Black Magic Marker’

Submit your favs please?

Thanks to the NY Times sunday magazine column The Medium by Virginia Heffernan for writing about thru-you.com, a mashup of YouTube videos by amateur musicians which is rather amazing. They were all made independently and Kutiman did a heck of a job mixing them together. Check it out.

Biologists reported to their amazement that birds can dance, according to Rebecca Morelle in BBC news today. (I will suppress the easy jokes about musical taste here.)

Several years ago I was a member of a band called Minnow. We had weekly practice sessions at the piano players house. The piano player had an African grey parrot named Picard. When we musicians would arrive, the bird was very excited to see us. When we started playing Picard would join in (although he didn’t know the tunes). It appeared to me that band practice was one of the high points of Picard’s week.

So I’m guessing that other bird owners may have had similar experiences, and would not be super shocked at reading this research paper.

Regardless, wider human acknowledgement of birds’ appreciation of music cannot be a bad thing.

S and I caught 20 Riverside at Tost in Fremont last night. So danceable! This young Everett band rocked the house so hard I felt sorry for the next band. Catch ‘em if you can.

For those wondering how my guitar playing is going after six months of lessons. Clearly there’s plenty of room for improvement. I’m still learning pieces in the key of C and (relative) a but getting much pleasure from it.