Pokey LaFarge & The South City Three

I have played some songs recently by Pokey LaFarge and the South City Free from their great new album called "Middle Of Everywhere". LaFarge is keeping the traditions of REAL American music alive. He combines country, blues, swing and old time jazz into a heady mix of "old-time" Americana.

Check out the clip for the tune "So Long Honey Bee"

So Long Honeybee, Goodbye - Pokey LaFarge & the South City Three (Official Music Video) from bill streeter on Vimeo.

Hope Sandoval and the Warm Inventions - Through the Devil Softly

Eight years since her last album (Bavarian Fruit Bread) and thirteen years since Mazzy Star's last album (Among My Swan), Hope Sandoval return with a new album - Through the Devil Softly.

The album was recorded with members of the Dublin band Dirt Blue Gene and will also back Sandoval on tour. Her main partner in the Warm Inventions, however, is drummer Colm Ó CíosÓig, better known as a member with My Bloody Valentine. He was also involved in the previous album.

If you are a fan of the previous work of Sandoval then you will enjoy this new album as it sort of continues on from where she left off. The familiar sultry vocals are back. And if you thought you'd never hear from Mazzy Star again, you will be surprised to hear that Sandoval has been working on material with Mazzy Star guitarist David Roback and new material could emerge some time in 2010.

Black Crowes - Before the Frost ... Until The Freeze

Before the Frost....features 11 new Black Crowes' studio songs. A second album, titled ...Until The Freeze, will be given away for free exclusively through a unique download code included in Before The Frost... CD as a thank you to their fans for two decades of support. The free album ...Until The Freeze has eight new original Black Crowes' studio songs plus a cover version of the Stephen Stills classic "So Many Times." Before the Frost...Until The Freeze, were recorded over a series of five nights at Levon Helm Studios. Although both are studio albums, all the new material was performed and recorded in front of an intimate audience of the band's fans.

Track Listing as follows

Before The Frost… (CD Track Listing)
Good Morning Captain
Been A Long Time (Waiting On Love)
Appaloosa
A Train Still Makes A Lonely Sound
I Ain’t Hiding
Kept My Soul
What Is Home
Houston Don’t Dream About Me
Make Glad
And The Band Played On
Last Place That Love Lives

…Until The Freeze (Free Download Album Track Listing)
Aimless Peacock
Shady Grove
Garden Gate
Greenhorn
Shine Along
Roll Old Jeremiah
Lady Of Avenue A
So Many Times
Fork In The River

Son Volt - American Central Dust

The new album is out now in the States. I got my copy this week and you can expect to hear about three tracks on the show this Monday.

After reforming the band with a new line up about four years ago, Jay Farrar returns with the third album for Son Volt 2.0. He also returns to what he does best, the new album has echoes of his finest work on albums like Trace.As with the last two albums the line up is Dave Bryson on drums; Andrew Duplantis on bass and backing vocals; Chris Masterson on lead guitar; and Mark Spencer on keyboards and steel guitar.

The first two albums for Son Volt 2.0 (Okemah and the Melody of Riot and The Search) were both well received by critics and loyal fans but they failed to connect with a larger audience. As a result the band left Sony/Legacy and this new album is released by Rounder - a label well known for its country based releases. About Rounder Farrar has been quoted as saying "Rounder has shown a long term commitment to music forms, like folk and blues, that I have a lot of respect for," said Farrar. "Going with Rounder has been a kind of a full circle continuum -- the first Rounder person I met with was instrumental in booking Uncle Tupelo gigs years ago."

I'll be playing three tracks from the album, "Down to the Wire, "Roll on" and "Dust of Daylight". I've got to say that I was impressed on first listen and it has grown on me since. I love the return to the more simpler sounds (gone as the weird sounds of Farrar's solo albums) and a more alt-country sound as well which of course appeals enormously. I'd love to hear what you think.

No release date here in Australia that I know of but it should be in your favourite Indie Record Store or buy it from Amazon.

TODD SNIDER - THE EXCITMENT PLAN

Regular listeners to the show would know that Todd Snider is one of my particular favourites. He has made a habit of releasing albums on a regular basis and his latest "The Excitement Plan" is out now on Yep Roc. Once again it a beauty! Made with the help of legendary producer Don Was it's a more personal album than last years "Peace Queer". Snider's greatest gift is his talent for words and once again each song has you listening intently for words of wisdom. For me, Snider has the ability to articulate the way I feel and think about things better than I ever could and I think that's why I love his work so much. The album also contains a duet "Don't Tempt me" with Loretta Lynn.

As always it best to leave it up to Snider himself to tell us what it's all about;
"Initially The Excitement Plan (June 9th on Yep Roc Records) wasn't supposed to be about anything. I was just trying to come up with the best... most open hearted ... well-thought-out lyrics I could come up with. I wanted every song to be sad and funny at the same time, vulnerable and entertaining at the same time, personal and universal at the same time. I wanted every song to be as uniquely written as possible and then I wanted to perform them in a studio loose and rugged and hopefully as uniquely as I could. My hope is to be hard to describe and/or new…I'm not saying I am. I'm just saying that's the hope."

It's available from YepRoc and eMusic or in all good record stores.



Website
Myspace

FROG HOLLER - BELIEVE IT OR NOT

"Believe it or not" is the sixth full length album by the Berks County, Pennsylvania based band. Still fiercely independent, the band put the album out on ZoBird Records earlier this year. Originally a bluegrass outfit they have evolved over the years but still maintain that original element in their music.

The band convenes every Tuesday night at the house of one of the band members to play music and share a meal. They have a rehearsal space and a recording studio at the house and the album was put together in these comfortable surrounds. Frog Holler sings songs about hope for the future in uncertain times and that the lessons learnt from the past will be remembered.The album is available from eMusic or CdBaby



Band Website
MySpace

LEO RONDEAU - DOWN AT THE END OF THE BAR

Originally from North Dakota, Leo Rondeau’s now lives Austin, Texas. His 2007 debut, "Bangs, Bullets and the Turtle Mountains", mixes traditional country and bluegrass and is mostly about stories of his younger days in ND. His latest album is called "Down at the End of the Bar" and it continues on from where his debut left off. And as with the first CD, it is self-released via cdbaby or iTunes.

Rondeau possess that classic gravel-based country voice that sounds as old as time itself and much like other new kids on the block, Ryan Bingham and Hayes Caryl, he is sure to keep gaining new fans.

myspace

John Doe and The Sadies - Country Club

John Doe and the Sadies have delivered a great album with "Country Club". The result of a drunken promise made a while back when The Sadies were playing with Doe's band The Knitters. It really is a corker.

They pay homage to their country music heroes by covering songs by Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings and late-night ballads by Tammy Wynette and Roger Miller. They also provide four originals, three of them by The Sadies (two are instrumentals) and one by Doe with his long time musical partner (X and The Knitters) Exene Cervenka.

John Doe has made the country album he has always threatened to make and it's a fine tribute to the Bakersfield and Countrypolitain Nashville sounds of days gone by.

More at Yep Roc

Felice Brothers - Tonight At The Arizona

Released in June this year by the UK based label Loose The Felice Brothers hail from the Hudson Valley in the USA (upstate New York), the same part of the world that Bob Dylan & The Band sometimes called home & recorded. Fair enough to say that the Felice Brothers owe a debt to these great artists, which is fine as they do not try to hide the obvious influences.

The Felice Brothers actually contain some brothers plus some drifters who have latched on them. The band are, Simone, Ian and James Felice, a runaway dice-thrower called Christmas, The Searcher and Farley. They call themselves unschooled illegal street/subway musicians & from the start, their distinct brand of songwriting and the lawless sound they've forged has earned them comparisons to Woodie Guthrie, Neil Young, Walt Whitman & the aforementioned Bob Dylan.

Probably the best on-line review comes from Drowned in Sound.

Fresh of face but haggard of voice, The Felice Brothers have weathered a few storms, quite literally. Composed by the (unschooled) eldest three boys from a carpenter’s family seven children strong, along with their runaway friend called Christmas, Tonight At The Arizona documents the reality of happy endings not being one of life’s guarantees. From teenage pregnancies and the study of your firearm as you contemplate suicide, to being arrested for the drugs you were dealing to pay for your mother’s medical bills, the gritty contents are delivered with a wavery-voiced nod to all-time greats Dylan and Guthrie, backed by wailed group choruses liberated from hick bars and films set in the Deep South.

Links:
myspace.com/thefelicebrothers
www.loosemusic.com/thefelicebrothers
www.thefelicebrothers.com

Frank Smith - Heavy Handed Peace & Love

My New Favourite Band - Frank Smith


I've recently fluked upon this band by accident while browsing around here & there on the net. Didn't know much about them except that they are now signed to Juliana Hatfield's label Ye Olde Records & have a new CD called Heavy Handed Peace & Love. They are also her backing band on the latest from Juliana called Sittin in a tree. For a reference think Drive By Truckers, Uncle Tupelo or early My Morning Jacket.

The Ye Olde Records website has the following about the band.

Frank Smith is a band, not a man. Formed in Boston and recently relocated to frontman Aaron Sinclair’s home state of Texas, the band has a sound as vast as America. Like the country they come from, Frank Smith reconcile countless would-be opposites, as songs from the back porch are driven straight into the noise of the city, simple folk tunes are given the most intricately complex arrangements, and the freedom of the music is constantly pulled back by the authority of the beat. “Heavy Handed Peace And Love” is the band’s first release since moving from Boston to Austin, and their first release on Ye Olde Records.

Links:
www.yeolderecords.com
www.franksmithmusic.com
www.myspace.com/franksmith