Chicago -
By Don Jacobson
Dean Schlabowske’s new, Web-only, free-download album Deano Waco Meats the Purveyors is a pure example of artsy electric bluegrass and strangely disturbing gospel hollers. It also reminds us what the world is missing now that Austin’s The Meat Purveyors have all but closed up the butcher shop.
Posted on June 10, 2009
By Don Jacobson
1. From the Department of Couldn’t Agree More.
Former Oasis guitarist Paul “Bonehead” Arthurs says the group should have broken up years ago, at its height in 1996.
According to music writer Rick Sky of the British entertainment news website Bangshowbiz, Bonehead, who co-founded Oasis with The Fabulous Gallagher Boys, says the group’s legendary shows at Knebworth in 1996 – which the BBC calls the crowning moment of Britpop – should have been the moment to go out on top.
Posted on June 8, 2009
By Matt Harness
In case you don’t already know, Justin Townes Earle is the 27-year-old son of Steve Earle, the notable country musician/political activist who coincidentally recently released an album of Townes Van Zandt covers. Steve honored his friend and mentor by bestowing Townes’ name to Justin.
I caught up with Justin by phone as he was relaxing in a hotel room preparing for a show in Kent, Ohio. We chatted about his bad-boy days as a teenager in Rogers Park and what he would put on his jukebox, if he had one.
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Beachwood Music: Read where you moved from Nashville to Brooklyn not too long ago. Seems worlds apart. How is NYC treating you?
Justin Townes Earle: I live in Manhattan now. Alphabet City. Being an imagery-based and situational songwriter, you can only go so far in one place. Nashville ran its course, and I moved to New York. The possibilities are endless here. Nothing ever calms down, and nothing gets old. All Southern songwriters should live in New York.
And I happened to get a good deal on an apartment on the Lower East Side, which otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to afford. I’m still young, but I don’t go out to bars. When I was in Brooklyn, I never went to Willamsburg. Here, there’s no yee-haw at 2 a.m. in the hallways and no yee-haw at 2 a.m. outside. Everybody here’s been through that.
Beachwood Music: You lived in Chicago years ago. Where did you live, and what are your memories?
Posted on June 5, 2009
By Steve Rhodes
The first time I saw Koko Taylor – indeed the first time I heard her – wasn’t here in Chicago but at a show in Tampa in the summer of 1990. I was working at a newspaper in nearby Lakeland at the time. My editor, in his inimitable minimal style, asked me one day: “Blues show. Tampa. Wannago?”
I did, and I was mesmerized. Koko and her band easily fell into that deep soul blues groove that can be so moving. Her rich and deeplly layered voice was one for the ages. That throaty growl! Like she had to clear her throat – but no, please don’t! She always had a crack band with her, and her passion never wavered.
Koko Taylor is gone. She left us with many gifts.
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1. My personal favorite: “I’d Rather Go Blind.”*
Posted on June 4, 2009
By The Beachwood Critics Affairs Desk
Wilco’s new album, Wilco (The Album), is scheduled for a June 30 release but the reviews are already coming in. (You can hear the streams for yourself.)
Let’s take a look.
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Critic: Greg Kot, Tribune
Review: “Wilco Presents Nuanced Snapshots on Self-Titled Release.”
Verdict: “[A] mostly modest collection of sturdy songs.”
Song Descriptions:
– “”Deeper Down”: “[S]wathed in a lovely, chamber-pop arrangement augmented by harpsichord and sighing lap-steel guitar.”
– “You and I”: “[E]xplores a fragile bond, as voiced by Tweedy and guest vocalist Feist . . . sparse simplicity.”
– “Everlasting”: “[O]rchestral flourishes . . . surges with quiet conviction and finishes with a bird-song guitar solo that echoes the Duane Allman-led coda of Derek and the Dominoes’ “Layla.”
Posted on June 2, 2009
By Matt Harness
A sampling of Bloodshot bands performing in Chicago in June.
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Artist: Scotland Yard Gospel Choir
Date: June 5
Venue: Double Door
Sample:
Posted on May 29, 2009
“His collaboration with Tweedy, the band’s primary songwriter and singer, reached its apex on the 1999 Summerteeth album, and one of its densely orchestrated songs, “Pieholden Suite,” later became the name of Bennett’s recording studio.”
– Greg Kot, “Jay Bennett Dies At Age 45: Ex-Wilco Member And Musician Extraordinaire
Pieholden Suite
Posted on May 26, 2009
By Matt Harness
As far as I know, Bloodshot Records’ current stable houses two musicians whose fathers also beat the main streets playing tunes. Justin Townes Earle is the son of folk-country hippie Steve Earle, and Bobby Bare Jr. is the offspring of Bobby Bare, a man who ran in circles with Waylon Jennings and lived on the same block in Nashville as Tammy Wynette and George Jones.
I tracked down Bobby Bare Jr. – who was nominated for a Grammy Award at the age of six for a song he sang with his father – this week and we covered everything from Kenny Chesney to Shel Silverstein.
Posted on May 22, 2009
By Steve Rhodes
Band: Pipe Dream
Song: I Touch Myself
YouTube Added Date: May 17, 2009
Shooter: pipedreamband
Locale: Chicago City Limits, Schaumburg
Video Quality: Generally strong, with slight focus problems offset by nicely capture color contrasts.
Sound Quality: Barely adequate, with muddy vocals and tinny guitars not doing the band any favors.
Overall Beachwood Shaky-Cam Rating: 8.5 (out of 10)
Comments: The video is stronger than the band’s performance, keeping lead singer Fantasy front and center with occasional smart cuts to other band members in a way that doesn’t distract from the main focus, which, in a song like this, is inevitably the performance of Fantasy.
Posted on May 20, 2009
By Matt Harness
Now that we’ve sucked you in on a weekly basis with one-of-a-kind features on the musicians, let’s step back from the bands and get inside a corner in the mind of Bloodshot Records co-founder Rob Miller, a man responsible for so many of the sweet sounds we enjoy so much.
Today’s topic: Jukeboxes
The Satellite Lounge in New Orleans hosts his favorite bar jukebox, but Miller is a rare audiophile who owns his own record spinner.
We wanted to know what was on it.
Posted on May 15, 2009
