Monthly Archives: January 2023

VIA PRESS RELEASE | When singer Eva Cassidy wandered into producer Chris Biondo’s studio in Glenn Dale, Maryland to make extra money by singing on a band’s demo, she began an unprecedented journey that would lead to more than 12 million albums sold worldwide, largely posthumously. When she passed away in 1996 from melanoma at the age of 33, she left behind a small catalogue of recorded material that has been painstakingly curated into more than a dozen individual collections that showcase her extraordinarily versatile voice and her wide-ranging, but unerringly tasteful, sense of material.

To celebrate what would have been her 60th birthday (on February 2), Blix Street Records will release a landmark new album, which pairs Cassidy’s impeccable voice with the backing of the legendary London Symphony Orchestra. I Can Only Be, the album’s title track, is a radical reworking of a little-known song by Eva Cassidy’s musical hero, Stevie Wonder, while the album’s eight other tracks receive their own special reimagining. The album arrives on March 3, 2023.

I Can Only Be by Eva Cassidy with the London Symphony Orchestra is a new work that employs the groundbreaking machine learning audio restoration technology developed by filmmaker Peter Jackson for his 2021 The Beatles: Get Back film and used more recently for the re-issue of The Beatles classic album, Revolver. The process allows for splitting mono tracks into their separate vocal and instrumental parts. Hence, Cassidy’s vocal parts were painstakingly separated, restored and enhanced to reveal previously unheard levels of clarity and depth, resulting in an emotive, atmospheric album with lush arrangements created by award-winning composer/arranger Christopher Willis (Schmigadoon!, Veep, Death of Stalin, The Personal History of David Copperfield) accompanying now pristine vocals.

“Songbird,” the first track on the new album, was released by Blix Street Records as a digital single in November, followed last week by Buffy Sainte-Marie’s emotive tale of love and loss, “Tall Trees in Georgia.” Both are now available from iTunes, Spotify and other digital outlets.

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Celebrating Neil Diamond on his 82nd birthday. —Ed.

So my physicist buddy Stoner Doug finally managed to construct an actual time machine and was like, “Where should we go?” And we looked at each other and without even having to think about it shouted in perfect sync, “Hot August Night!” Because who wouldn’t have wanted to be at The Greek Theater on that historic August night in 1972 when Neil “Beautiful Noise” Diamond put it all out there in an orgiastic celebration of cosmic shlock?

Forget Elvis! Forget Chuck Berry! Forget Jesus Christ! This was NEIL at his Forever in Blue Jeans best, giving it his all! The Greatest Concert Ever! You don’t hear about it much because the story got suppressed by Neil’s record label, but 15 people died on that sultry August night! Steamed to death by sheer joy!

And Doug and I wanted to be two of them. So we climbed into his primitive time capsule made out of aluminum siding and flattened Dr. Pepper cans with a big sign on a stick reading “We LOVE you Neil!” And following a dramatic WHOOSH and the shriek of the time machine’s 350 Small Block Chevy engine there we were, sitting in Row Three beside a 50-year-old woman from Reno who told us she owned 13 cats all of whom were named Neil (if male) or Diamond (if female).

And there he was! Neil in the flesh! Just like on the cover of Hot August Night on which he appears to be jerking himself off! And why not? If anybody has the right to stroke his shtupper in front of an audience of thousands it’s Neil, who is THE songwriter of our time! The Brill Building savant who came up with such master strokes of pop brilliance as “Cherry, Cherry,” “Sweet Caroline,” and “Song Sung Blue”! To say nothing of the deep philosophical meditation that is “I Am, I Said,” in which an existentially alone Neil complains that nobody will listen to him, not even his chair!

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Over a decade after releasing a self-titled debut, Heavy Blanket has returned with Moon Is, out on vinyl, compact disc, and digital January 27 through Outer Battery Records. Featuring J Mascis on guitar, the bass and drums are respectively credited to (the suspiciously fictive duo of) Johnny Pancake and Pete Cougar. Sans vocals, the nature of Heavy Blanket’s sound is reflected in the moniker. Folks who enthusiastically soak up the “classic” hard rock elements in Dinosaur Jr.’s kitbag should step up without hesitation.

I won’t categorically deny that Johnny Pancake and Pete Cougar exist, but the colorfully humorous backstory attached to Heavy Blanket’s debut, where these bandmates are introduced as a couple of Mascis’ high school chums and playing partners in a youthful side band circa the winddown of the now-legendary early ’80s Massachusetts hardcore band Deep Wound (which featured Mascis on drums and Lou Barlow on guitar, don’tcha know), is almost certainly a tall tale. A head injury, a prison stay, and Pearl Jam also figure into the narrative.

Sporting a cover drawing by Tim Lehi of four dudes and a groundhog hanging out in the woods, with the whole bunch leisurely lounging while seemingly cooking yet another dude in a sizable pot over a bonfire (as the rodent is fully invested in the proceedings), Moon Is retains the backstory’s sense of humor as the album offers six tracks, three per side, with the opener on each stretching out a bit. “Danny” on the first side lasts nearly seven minutes and “String Along” on the flip reaches eight.

“Danny” is the catchier of the two, though both are essentially vessels of expansive soloing and Mascis’ immediately recognizable tone. And that’s a fitting description of Heavy Blanket’s raison d’etre, in fact, or to put it another way, Mascis is leaning into the “stoner rock” side of his musical personality, all while resisting self-indulgence or inspiring boredom through the exaltation of tired-ass, frequently blues-rocking clichés.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | San Francisco, CA | The Haight Street Art Center is pleased to announce the opening of their new exhibition, “The Haight-Ashbury Experience and the Pursuit of Happiness: The Photography of Herb Greene,” a groundbreaking exhibition that will present the first career-long retrospective of San Francisco’s pioneering rock photographer.

The exhibition opens with a ticketed reception on February 23rd from 5pm-9pm with food, beverages, and music. Tickets are $20 for Haight Street Art Center members and $40 for non-members. Free admission begins on February 24th and the exhibition will remain open until May 28th. A custom exhibition poster by artist Stanley Mouse will be available for purchase.

A founding member of the Haight-Ashbury art community who went on to become an internationally acclaimed photographer, Herb Greene’s work embodied the spirit of the Haight-Ashbury before it was catapulted into media prominence.

As a friend and contemporary of his subjects, Greene captured the elusive heart and soul of the musicians, artists, and fellow travelers who would play major roles in the nation’s counterculture of the 1960s. As they matured and earned greater fame, so did Greene, who became a leading rock portraitist, photographing Led Zeppelin, the Pointer Sisters, and many more. Greene was also the Grateful Dead’s favorite photographer, capturing the band over their three decades and beyond.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Alongside brand new cover art, all configurations of this deluxe reissue feature the hits “Gasoline,” “Fine Again,” and “Driven Under,” plus a previously unreleased live show, captured in its entirety at New Hampshire’s Hampton Beach Casino in 2003. Rounding out the bonus content is a rare 2002 live acoustic cover of Nirvana’s “Something in the Way,” issued first as a B-side.

“It’s difficult to believe that 20 years have passed by in what feels like the blink of an eye,” the band exclaims. “This album was our first US release under the band name ‘Seether’ and it holds a very special place in our hearts. This is where our career really began and it’s a great pleasure to present this updated version of Disclaimer that we hope fans, both seasoned and new, will love as much as we have enjoyed this incredible journey over the past two decades. As always—play it loud!”

The 3-LP set is housed in a deluxe triple gatefold jacket, while both physical formats also include new liner notes from Katherine Turman, an acclaimed music journalist, producer and co-author of Louder Than Hell: The Definitive Oral History of Metal (HarperCollins).

Formed in Pretoria, South Africa, in 1999, Seether (originally named “Saron Gas”) instantly hooked fans at home with their blend of alt-metal, grunge, and heart-on-sleeve lyricism. At the turn of the millennium, not long after releasing the South Africa-only Fragile, the band (originally consisting of vocalist and guitarist Shaun Morgan, bassist Dale Stewart, and drummer Dave Cohoe) caught the ears of Wind-up Records, who brought the trio to the US to record their international debut.

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I can think of a lot of great reasons to love Lightning Bolt. For starters, the Providence, Rhode Island duo play noise rock, which everyone, with the exception of just about everybody, loves. Further, they play it at the velocity of a high-dosage DMT trip. What’s more, singer guy and drummer Brian Chippendale’s vocals are almost as unintelligible as Curt Kirkwood’s on 1982’s Meat Puppets, which scientists have concluded is a physical impossibility. Finally, Lightning Bolt have a great sense of humor as they prove on 2019’s Sonic Citadel, which features song titles along the lines of “Van Halen 2049,” “Don Henley in the Park,” and the simply unbeatable “Hüsker Dön’t.”

Instrumentally, Lightning Bolt are hardly your average distortion-happy power duo. They eschew the guitar, for example—Brian Gibson prefers a bass tuned to standard cello tuning, and as of late he’s been using a five-string job with two banjo strings. As for Chippendale, he prefers to sing with the microphone from a household telephone receiver in his mouth, if only because it simplifies calling his grandmother. Needless to say, Lightning Bolt sound like no one else, and they don’t behave like anyone else either. If you’re looking for a band to play at your house or in your local strip mall parking lot, they’re your guys.

Gibson has been quoted as saying “I hate, hate, hate the category ‘noise-punk’” and he doesn’t want Lightning Bolt to be labeled as such. So let’s just call them a country rock band, which could be why they’re hanging out with Don Henley in the park in the first place. Speaking of which, “Don Henley in the Park” differs from most of its companions on the album insofar as it doesn’t proceed at hyperspeed, although its dissonance quotient increases as it goes along. And it’s one of the rare songs where you can make out at least some of what Chippendale is singing, although things get sketchy after the opening lines, “Don Henley in the park/The Muppets see it’s dark.”

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Remembering Esquivel!, born on this date in 1918. —Ed.

It’s not often that a compilation of thirty-year old music is almost as representative of the time of its issue as it is of the artist that originally made it, but that’s the case with Space-Age Bachelor Pad Music from the always suave and ever distinctive musician known to many as simply Esquivel. If the ‘90s fad for lounge and exotica sounds is often perceived as an unfortunate occurrence, it did hold a few pleasant twists and turns. This is one of them.

When Space-Age Bachelor Pad Music, a quite unexpected compilation of material by one-of-a-kind Mexican band leader/composer Juan García Esquivel first hit the racks back in 1994 via Bar/None Records, it was a welcome curveball of smooth lounge/exotica strangeness and a dish unspoiled by the potential taint of contemporary approximation.

For outside of Combustible Edison I consider the ‘90s retro-lounge field to be a rather dismal bunch of pikers, and while I do enjoy them in doses I’m not even all that bonkers over Edison (though I am rather taken with Edison members Michael Cudahy and Elizabeth Cox’s non-retro inclined previous group Christmas). For the record I consider the excellent Chicago band Coctails to fall outside the genre.

The only sticky thing about Esquivel’s unlikely rise from obscurity was pondering if people were sincerely digging him (or fellow exotica specialists Martin Denny or Les Baxter); it was always possible they were just being infuriatingly ironic. This situation was sorta similar to the ebbing and flowing penchant of folks attaching themselves to Z-grade movies, but different in that nobody would actually fess up to believing it was “so bad its good.” However, spending too much time wondering about the ultimately innocuous motives of others is a surefire way to end up in a straightjacket. And whenever I would listen to Esquivel’s stuff my concern just evaporated anyway, for it’s a truly inspired and loony trip.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Today, Trojan Records release The Skatalites’ and The Maytals’ The Essential Artist Collection albums—the first two installments from a brand new series of artist-focused compilation albums showcasing some of the very best talent from the label’s esteemed roster. Championing their stellar catalogues, the series highlights the most important ska and reggae tracks from the most influential artists and vocal/instrumental groups with each title available in double colour vinyl, double CD, and digital formats.

As the sound of ska exploded upon Jamaica’s musical landscape in the early ’60s, the driving dynamic sound was championed by a group frequently credited as the originators of ska and the greatest ensemble of musicians ever to have performed and recorded on the island—The Skatalites. Formed in 1964, the group comprised of legendary saxophonist Tommy McCook, trombonist Don Drummond, tenor saxman Roland Alphonso, drumming supremo Lloyd Knibb, and keyboard prodigy Jackie Mittoo. The powerhouse instrumental combo dominated the island’s music industry for 18 glorious months, and this new collection includes the very best of their work including ska anthems such as “One Eyed Giant,” “Alley Cat,” and “Music Is My Occupation”—produced by famed Treasure Isle Records boss, Arthur “Duke” Reid.

Led by the dynamic Frederick ‘Toots’ Hibbert, The Maytals are highly regarded as one of the greatest singing trios in the history of Jamaican music, scoring hit after hit on the island’s charts during an incredible career spanning six decades. This new collection brings together the very best of their work, including their rock steady and early recordings for Leslie Kong’s revered Beverley’s Records during the late sixties and early seventies; a period that spawned ground-breaking work such as “54 46 Was My Number,” “Monkey Man,” and “Do the Reggay,” to name but a few. It also includes numerous classics such as “Sweet And Dandy,” “Pressure Drop,” and “Night And Day,” demonstrating just why the unforgettable music of The Maytals will continue to be loved for many years to come.

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Remembering David Crosby. —Ed.

Few bands have produced such blissful music, or music that so well fit the spirit of its time as The Byrds. Theirs was a bright and shining sound, filled with shimmering optimism and jingle-jangle hope, and they made the transition to the psychedelic age as well as anybody. Indeed, their 1966 LP Fifth Dimension is an acid rock landmark, and I listen to it whenever I want to pretend I’m tripping.

Speaking of pretending, let’s play a game of make believe, shall we? The year is 1966, and we’re just removing the plastic shrink-wrap from a virgin copy of Fifth Dimension. Let’s say we’re at my pad. It’s not bad so far as hippie crash pads go. Please don’t touch the lava lamp. I just bought the album, you brought the pot, and that redolent example of fetid man reek over there in the filthy poncho and crud-encrusted beard is the hippie who brought the acid, which is the only reason we invited him to our little listening party in the first place.

Really, no one wants him around. Not with his long staring silences, sudden bouts of insane cackling provoked by nothing going on around him, and rather scary habit of carrying a long and wicked-looking blade in a buckskin sheath. He uses it to kill squirrels, which along with the acorns he stole from the squirrels and purloined packets of McDonald’s ketchup constitute his entire diet. Do you have any idea how quick you have to be to seize and slit the throat of your typically twitchy squirrel? It’s too horrifying to contemplate. He reaches into his pocket and says, “Anybody want some delicious squirrel jerky?”

You and I both shudder and politely refuse, and then we put the LP on. The opening track “FD (Fifth Dimension)” instantly transports us to a higher astral plane where giant birds of phantasmagorical plumage perform dizzying acrobatics above the pulsating crystal abodes of the perfect ones. Or something like that.

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Myths are funny things, especially in the 21st century where we find ourselves constantly reevaluating standards that were accepted as gospel only a few years ago. And who knows? It’s feasible to posit that society’s reevaluations will be reevaluated somewhere else down the long road of time. Telling the story of early rock and roll is an interesting exercise at this point in history as many of the music makers are still with us. It’s so important to get the story right so that future generations can grapple with both the facts and the myths.

David Leaf is a Peabody and Writers Guild of America West award-winning writer, director, and producer and has long been regarded as a scholar of rock and pop music, specifically of The Beach Boys and Brian Wilson. He’s spent his career sorting through rumors and myths and facts and—of course, music—and he’s written a book about The Beach Boys history that most rock and rock academics regard as the pinnacle, God Only Knows: The Story of Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys & the California Myth.

Originally published in 1978, Leaf hasn’t altered the text of the original manuscript, but, rather, has added additional segments and information to create a body of work that will stand the test of time. Leaf joins me on this episode to discuss his updated book, sort through some records with me, and also to provide us all with learned theories about what was singularly unique and enduring about the music created by Brian Wilson and The Beach Boys.

Evan Toth is a songwriter, professional musician, educator, radio host, avid record collector, and hi-fi aficionado. Toth hosts and produces The Evan Toth Show and TVD Radar on WFDU, 89.1 FM. Follow him at the usual social media places and visit his website.

Vinyl? Australia’s Wolfmother should have released 2021’s Rock Out on 8-track, that’s how groovy seventies it is. This baby should be blaring from a 1979 Pontiac Trans Am (bitchin’ hood scoop, dude!) cruising Main Street U.S.A., not from your turntable. Not that it doesn’t sound great on your turntable. But your living room isn’t a 1979 Pontiac Trans Am, now is it?

Its ten tracks make one thing clear; frontman and guitar god Andrew Stockdale is a huge fan of seventies’ populist hard rock. You know, the stuff beloved by kids who’d never heard of the Velvet Underground and would have hated them if they had. It’s like Stockdale disappeared in a thick pall of pot smoke at the end of the seventies only to reemerge coughing midway through the first decade of the 21st Century, unaware that Ted Nugent’s loincloth no longer ruled the world.

No, he was one of those kids who worshiped the likes of Kiss, Black Sabbath, Boston, and Led Zeppelin. Redd Kross turned that period of music history into high, Linda Blair-riffing camp. Stockdale avoids the cheesy pop signifiers and gives you the sound, and if you love that sound Rock Out is a no-lose proposition. Is the music on Rock Out derivative? A bit, but certainly not in the way that of shameless Zep clones Greta Van Fleet is. I prefer the phrase “inspired by,” insofar as Wolfmother captures the spirit of the times, rather than—at least in most cases—apes its artists. That pall of pot smoke may have been a means of time travel, but Rock Out is no time capsule.

Opener “Feelin Love” is Black Sabbath gone upbeat pop—Wolfmother lowers the band’s legendary doom and gloom level, but Stockdale injects lots of Ozzy into the vocals. “Rock Out” is the clincher, what with its Kiss feel and flashy guitars, while “Upload” is less streamlined Boston with lots of echo on Stockdale’s vocals and a riff straight from the spaceship guitar on the cover of Boston’s debut, although the concept of uploading would have been unknown to the zonked out kid in the Uriah Heep t-shirt sitting next to you at the Black Oak Arkansas concert in 1977. “Humble” is a House of the Holy fusion of Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin at their dinosaur crush best, while “Only Way” opens with a guitar turning baroque Catherine Wheels over a rumbling bass and features a truly badass riff. And the guitar solo is killer.

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