Old Fellas New Music Episode 40

Episode 40 right here

Julian Taylor – Opening the Sky

Ty Segall – Saturday Pt. 2

Adam Baldwin – Causeway Road 

The Bros Landreth – Stay

SG Goodman – All My Love is Coming Back to Me

Laura Veirs – Eucalyptus

Days Of Lavender – People Who Care

Robyn Hitchcock – The Man Who Loves The Rain

The Dead South – People Are Strange

Bob’s notes

Ty Segall – Saturday Pt. 2 

Ty Segall is an American musician and producer. He is extremely prolific as exemplified by the sheer amount of his album, ep and single releases.  Check out his Discogs entry.  https://www.discogs.com/artist/1265284-Ty-Segall?limit=250&type=Releases&subtype=Albums&filter_anv=0&page=1  . I suppose he could be pigeonholed into the “garage-rock” genre but his latest lp, “Hello Hi” is anything but that.   Pitchfork Magazine explains: https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/ty-segall-hello-hi/

Here he is performing Saturday Pt. 2 live  

The Bros Landreth – Stay  – from 2022 lp Come Morning

The Bros. Landreth is a group from Winnipeg Manitoba.   Their debut album “Let It Lie” won the Juno Award for Roots & Traditional Album of the Year at the Juno Awards in 2015 so they have been around for a while.   In 2022, Bonnie Raitt released a cover of “Made Up Mind”, which appears on her album “Just Like That” Her recording of the song won a Grammy Award for Best Americana Performance at the 65th Annual Grammy Awards in 2022

Bonnie Raitt gave the guys a shoutout at the Grammys.  Stay is a soulful number with a nice kooky video.   

The whole album is solid. https://atthebarrier.com/2022/05/24/the-bros-landreth-come-morning-album-review/

Laura Veirs – Eucalyptus from the lp “Found Light”

Laura Veirs is an American singer-songwriter based out of Portland, Oregon.  She is known for her folk/alternative country records and live performances as well as her collaboration with Neko Case and k.d. lang on the case/lang/veirs project. Check this album out.  It’s a treasure.  https://www.allmusic.com/album/case-lang-veirs-mw0002925163

Veirs has been releasing music since 1999.  Her producer was usually her husband Tucker Martine.  However, in 2019, Martine and Veirs separated.  Found Light is considered by some as an album still dealing with the ending of that relationship.

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/jul/08/laura-veirs-found-light-review.  The featured track Eucalyptas seems to reflect this 

Robyn Hitchcock – The Man Who Loves The Rain from “Shufflemania”

Cult figure Robyn Hitchcock has been making music since the late 1970’s  first with The Soft Boys, then The Egyptians and for many many years as a solo artist.  He has released close to 30 solo albums.  Hitchcock’s  lyrics are often absurd in the best Lewis Carroll vein.  He has been both an acoustic performer and full out rock and roller.  “The Man Who Loves the Rain” shows he hasn’t lost a step. 

I’ve included 2 of my fave Hitchcock song from the past. 

Here he is on Letterman in 1980s. The quality of the video isn’t great but the performance is.  Watch for the broken string!

Robyn Hitchcock was a favourite of the late film director Jonathan Demme. They made a documentary in 1998 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storefront_Hitchcock

The wonderful song “1974”  is taken from this movie…   This is probably my favourite Hitchcock song.  

Paul’s Notes

This guy is amazing, I love the song and his voice. I can’t believe that he was ready to pack things up (read below).

Another Covid artifact – he had a great video series – Cross Country Chin Up – pretty amazing, I have included a bit of this series with my notes.

Playing in Wolfville this April!!

Baldwin Cross-Country Chin Up IX

Hey gang. I’m gonna broadcast live on the World Wide Web this Friday night at 9pm ATLANTIC. You can find the program here, hit SET REMINDER to be notified. I hope you can join me for the Cross-Country Chin Up. Hope you’re all staying well.

Baldwin credits fellow singer/songwriter Martha Wainwright with “kinda setting me straight” in a long conversation over dinner when they chanced across each other on the same Québécois TV show and encouraging him not to give up.

After that cathartic encounter, he vowed to keep it honest and “write some songs about this part of the world” and the “unique kind of nuts” to be found in the darkest corners of the Atlantic Provinces. After that, the vivid rural character studies that would eventually make up “Concertos & Serenades” — stories of fishermen dabbling in fiery revenge and the cocaine trade, stoic miners drawing their last breaths underground in Springhill and the colourful regulars stopping by “Gerald Burgess RaceTrac Full Serve Autobody” for gas, a pack of smokes and some chit-chat — started spilling out of him.

Toronto Star 

Singer-songwriter Adam Baldwin has been a mainstay of the Atlantic Canada music scene for over a decade. Starting as a member of rock combo Gloryhound before joining Matt Mays & El Torpedo in 2009, Baldwin’s own music has continued to evolve since his award winning self-titled solo debut EP in 2013.

Julian Taylor – Opening the Sky

Another incredible voice and songwriter. I think we have featured Julian Taylor three times on our show and that is fine with me. This current song is getting lots of airplay on North Americana radio

The lyrics are really interesting on this song, good to give this one a second listen.

JULIAN TAYLOR PRESENTS BEYOND THE RESERVOIR

Story by Howard Druckman | Monday October 17th, 2022

(Full disclosure: My wife happens to be Julian Taylor’s Canadian publicist. So, after a brief introduction, it’ll be just Taylor talking about his album. And I’d be writing this story, this way,  regardless of who his publicist is. Some quotes have been edited for length and clarity.)

It looks like Julian Taylor is poised on the verge of broadening and deepening his international breakthrough of 2020.

That year, his album The Ridge earned more than five million plays on Spotify, praise from the press worldwide, and airplay from Canada and the U.S. to Australia and the U.K. Loaded with soulful Americana and country twang, The Ridge won Taylor the Solo Artist of the Year honour at the Canadian Folk Music Awards; was nominated for two JUNO Awards (Contemporary Folk Album and Indigenous Artist or Group of the Year); and made the Polaris Prize Long List of the 40 best albums in Canada. He also won Best Male Artist at the International Acoustic Music Awards.

https://www.socanmagazine.ca/features/julian-taylor-presents-beyond-the-reservoir/

The final track, “Opening the Sky,” hits fast-forward and imagines the end of life, both the final struggles of a body breaking down and the memories of the life that’s come before. But most urgent is the desire to make sure learnings are passed down to the next generation: “Always love beyond your own comprehension. / In a world that may not see you for all that you are, never forget you have so much power.” The flood of final words of advice and encouragement end with “find time to simply stay still.” When the words repeat, they become the last living moment of the narrator and also a reinforcement of his lasting presence despite death: “Time to simply stay … still.”

https://www.adventuresinamericana.com/the-music-distillery-blog/music-review-julian-taylor-beyond-the-reservoir

SG Goodman

S.G. Goodman’s Southern Storytelling

Again, yet another amazing voice! This time from Kentucky. Glad I found this one, I don’t know much about her, but I would be happy to see her in concert – this would be great! This is from a feature on her in Rolling Stone.

Prior to her solo career, Goodman was part of the band The Savage Radley.[7] Her debut album, Old Time Feeling, was co-produced by Jim James of My Morning Jacket.[5] The album has been described as Americana, folk, country, and rock.[8] She is signed to Verve Forecast Records. In 2021, she, as a solo artist, was inter alia part of the Newport Folk Festival in July.[9]

In June 2022, Goodman released her second album, Teeth Marks, on Verve Forecast.[10] She usually plays with her guitar tuned down a whole step, though some songs on the record were played in this tuning with a capo.[6] The fifth track on the album, “If You Were Someone I Loved” deals with the opioid crisis.[11] Because her debut album was released during the COVID-19 pandemic, Goodman did not headline a tour for the album. As such, her tour for Teeth Marks was her first solo tour.[12]

Kentucky farmer’s daughter writes songs so the world can hear what life is like where she grew up

WHEN S.G. GOODMAN was growing up, her farmer father would plant an annual crop of sweet corn for his three kids, which they later harvested by hand and sold for money to buy their school clothes.

The farm isn’t Goodman’s home anymore: “I live in a house where the backyard is too shaded by these maple trees so that I can’t really grow anything,” she says. But the Murray, Kentucky-based singer-songwriter, 31, maintains a deep connection to the place that shaped her on her debut album, Old Time Feeling. Produced by Goodman with bandmates S. Knox Montgomery and Matthew Rowan, plus fellow Kentuckian Jim James of My Morning Jacket, it’s at once earthy and otherworldly, relaying her personal experiences alongside razor-sharp social commentary about the South.

Rolling Stone

The Dead South – People Are Strange

This band is so incredibly good. I don’t know how I found them, but their music is really different. I didn’t expect to find a blue grass band in Saskatchewan, but happy to feature them. Truly a great band that deserves more exposure.

The Dead South on Bluegrass Purists, New Album ‘Sugar & Joy’ and Being Canada’s “Night Off” Band

The Dead South are arguably Canada’s best-known “bluegrass” band. Their video for “In Hell I’ll Be in Good Company” has been viewed over 150 million times on YouTube, and the band have toured across North America and Europe. They just released their new album, Sugar & Joy, and will be hitting the road hard to support it.

On the surface, the band look like a typical bluegrass ensemble: the members play banjo, cello, guitar and mandolin; they sing in four-part harmony; and their songs tell stories of hard times and broken hearts; and they won the Juno for Traditional Roots Album in 2018 for Illusion & Doubt. But despite what you might have heard, the Dead South aren’t bluegrass — at least, not according to purists.

“We don’t know how to define our sound,” lead singer, guitarist and mandolinist Nate Hilts tells Exclaim! “We’re definitely very inspired by bluegrass music — that’s what kind of started the band. The instrumentation that we brought in was to play a bluegrass style; however, our own personal forms came in, we just started playing music and this is what we came up with. We don’t really know what to identify it as, because it touches on a lot of different places.”

The group have been together since 2012, and although there has been some interchanging of musicians over the years, original members, Nate Hilts, Scott Pringle (mandolin/guitar), Danny Kenyon (cello) and Colton “Crawdaddy” Crawford (banjo), remain in the current lineup. The group recently embarked on their “Served Cold” tour, which Nate expects to last until January 2021, and will see the foursome performing their unique variety of traditional Canadian folk on stages in Germany, the UK, and even the birthplace of bluegrass music, Raleigh, NC.

Easy Listening for Jerks Pt. 1 and 2 (2022-present)

Days Of Lavender – People Who Care

The lead singer of Days of Lavender grew up here in Ottawa. Daniela has a magical voice and it is great to listen to them at the beginning of a very creative musical career – I hope!

🔮We’re a band that plays wholesome electronic music in Vancouver 

Days of Lavender is the Vancouver-based duo project of producer and bassist Stephen Clarke and singer/songwriter Daniela Mae. They mix their love of 80s synth pop, electronic, gospel and folk music to guide you on a meditative sci-fi ride you won’t want to get off. In the last year of playing together they have released 6 songs, played for private parties, public events and two BC music festivals. In March 2022, they started an event series in collaboration with DJ Chachøu called InnerSpace: A Cosmic Arts Journey, which showcases the work of local visual artists and includes wellness classes, dance performances, DJs and their own live music.

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Old Fellas New Music Episode 25 Notes

Week 25

Gillian Welch and David Rawlings – Señor

This is taken from  the 2020 album, All the Good Times (Are Past & Gone).  This won the duo a 2021 Grammy award for Best Folk Album.  It features cover versions and traditional songs.

This is a cover of a 1978 Bob Dylan song.   

Bon Enfant – Magie

Appearing seemingly out of nowhere on Nov. 1, 2019, the debut album by quintet Bon Enfant made quite a splash in an already-rich album release season. Featuring the core singer-songwriter duo of Daphné Brissette, of Canailles fame, and Guillaume Chiasson, of Ponctuation, the Bon Enfant album made its way to our ears with shimmering soft-rock, replete with catchy choruses. Daphné Brisette spoke to us about their unexpected critical success.

Bon Enfant is already busy writing the songs for their next project, while touring an increasing number of dates over the next year. “We’ll play all the festivals!” Brissette promises.

Story by Philippe Renaud | January 21, 2020

Aldous Harding – The Barrel

Aldous Harding – The Barrel from 2019 album “Designer”

Hannah Sian Topp , known professionally as Aldous Harding, is a New Zealand folk singer-songwriter, based in Cardiff, Wales.

This profile does an excellent job of capturing this singer.

Things You (Possibly) Didn’t Know About Aldous Harding

1 May 2019

By Triple R volunteer writer Katherine Smyrk

People seem to have a hard time pinning down 29 year old New Zealand musician Aldous Harding. Her first, self-titled album was described as ‘gothic folk’. Then Party hit the airwaves and people scrambled to pin its sound to the ground. One Guardian reviewer labelled it ‘mesmeric, folk-adjacent’. Now, her third album, Designer, is out to thwart your attempts at classification again. And yet, her music is only becoming more and more popular. Maybe listeners like that she is undefinable; maybe they like that she can be a jazz crooner, Kate Bush and the Wicked Witch of the West in one album.

More here

Here is the official video for The Barrel which has a nice unhinged feel to it 

Yo-Yo Ma and Jeremy Dutcher –  Honor Song

write-up by Heather Swail

As soon as I heard that Yo-Yo Ma had a new album that featured Jeremy Dutcher I took a listen and then another. 
Just released, Ma’s album “Notes for the Future” features Dutcher and other artists representing 5 continents. Yo-Yo Ma’s site tells us that the album and its collaborators “explore our fears and hopes, reminding us that the future is ours to shape, together.” The nine tracks feature vocals in Arabic, Zapotec, Catalan, Paiwan, Spanish, Mi’kmaq, Wolastoqey, Ewe, Maori and English.”Honor Song” is a Mi’kmaq anthem. Dutcher’s haunting tones and MA’s cello bring you to another place, and also remind you where you are.

Notes for the Future brings together extraordinary artists from five continents: across nine tracks, Ma joins Angélique Kidjo, Mashrou’ Leila + Narcy, Tunde Olaniran, Jeremy Dutcher, Andrea Motis, ABAO, Lila Downs, and Marlon Williams to explore our fears and hopes, reminding us that the future is ours to shape, together.

Evie Sands – Leap of Faith

Evie Sands – Leap of Faith “Get Out Of Your Own Way” 2020

Evie Sands was born in Brooklyn, New York 1946  and has had a long and interesting career on the fringes of pop music.

When the pub quiz question comes up, be prepared: The guy who wrote Wild Thing, Chip Taylor, is the brother of actor Jon Voight and therefore the uncle of Angelina Jolie. For bonus points, he also wrote the country song Angel of the Morning which was a big hit for Merrilee Rush and further popularised by Olivia Newton-John and Juice Newton.

Unfortunately it wasn’t a hit for the first person who recorded it, the sometimes remarkable and largely overlooked Evie Sands.

Then again, it seemed Sands was doomed to never get a hit despite her impassioned voice and assured delivery.

More here

Here’s her classic from the 60’s, “Take Me For A little While”

She’s still at it 55 years later   

The Paranoid Style – A Goddamn Impossible Way of life

Write-up by Brian McGuire

Ok I have a song/band and I will give a script. Here go’s

So there is no wonder why the best band in America: Wussy which will be the subject of another broadcast totally lives The Paranoid Style. The name of the band comes from a famous article by American historian Richard Hofstadter  called ” The Paranoid Style in American Politics “. The lovely and committed rock and rollers have day jobs. I think they are cool progressive lobbyists and their music shadows their political interests. But they are kick ass and to their credit these lovelies are moonlighting.

Critical reception[edit] – Wikipedia

Robert Christgau gave the Paranoid Style’s 2013 EP The Power of Our Proven System an A- grade. In his review, Christgau wrote that “this band has yet to release a dull song” and that on the EP, the band “mine[s] a pop-rock vein that braces Nelson’s cleanly uncrystalline articulation against Bracy’s noisier guitar and a straight four that doesn’t quit.” He later gave Rock and Roll Just Can’t Recall an A grade, Rolling Disclosure an A- grade, Underworld U.S.A. an A- grade, and A Goddamn Impossible Way of Life an A grade.[6][7][8]

Jennifer Castle – Justice

Jennifer Castle – Justice from 2020 album Monarch Season

This song has the distinction of being the shortest song played on this venerable podcast. Jennifer Castle is a Canadian singer-songwriter based in Toronto, Ontario.  She has released music since 2006 and has been on the  Polaris shortlist.

For those with the time or inclination, here is Castle performing a set in 2018 at Massey Hall.

Rina Sawayama – Enter Sandman

This is an incredible project and the only time we have played Metallica on this show. A great compilation by 53 artists with several versions of Enter Sandman.

Both The Metallica Blacklist and the deluxe anniversary release of The Black Album (14 CDs, six LPs, six DVDs, and more) will be released on September 10th. Along with the Weezer, Isbell, and J Balvin covers, the Blacklist also features contributions from Miley Cyrus, St. Vincent, Jon Pardi, Yo-Yo Ma, Elton John, Phoebe Bridgers, Chris Stapleton, and dozens of other artists.

Rolling Stone

Rina Sawayama is the latest artist to cover Metallica for the band’s forthcoming compilation The Metallica Blacklist. Sawayama’s contribution to the project is a cover of “Enter Sandman.”

The Metallica Blacklist is out September 10 and includes additional covers from Phoebe Bridgers, Weezer, J Balvin, Miley Cyrus, St. Vincent, and many others.

Jeff Tweedy – Bad Day Lately

Jeff Tweedy – Bad Day Lately  from 2020 Love Is the King

Jeff  Tweedy  is an American songwriter, musician, author, and record producer best known as the singer and guitarist of the band Wilco.  This song is from his  4th solo album.  He started making this album after COVID hit and a Wilco tour was cancelled.

Judging by his pants? pajamas?…. This a truly COVID era video!    

Wew will be back next week with Episode 26!!

Old Fellas New Music Episode 23 Notes

This week’s tracks

Valley – Oh shit … are we in Love?

Status/Non Status – Find a Home

Elwins – For Love to Come and Find You(Don’t Wait)

Anika – Change

Wapums – Sunray

Angelique Kidjo – Africa One of a Kind

Milky Chance – Colorado

El Michels Affair – Zaharila

Dan Mangan – Troubled Mind


Valley – Oh shit … are we in Love?

After 21- 22 weeks of the podcast, the time has come to repeat some fine artists.  Here is Valley with their brand spanking new release, “ Oh shit … are we in Love?” 

Status/Non Status – Find a Home 

snippets from a CBC article (Holly Gordon · CBC Music · Posted: Jun 08, 2021 9:00 AM ET)

How a new EP and name are helping Status/Non-Status interrogate the effects of colonization

The band formerly known as Whoop-Szo questions who holds status — and who doesn’t

‘It’s been my whole life in many ways, but the reconnection process to culture, it’s been 10 or 15 years as well…. And I’ve learned a lot about my family and our history and the true stories around that, why maybe we were disconnected.’ — Adam Sturgeon (Savanah Sewell)

“The first song I wrote was called ‘Boozhoo,’ and I was just learning how to say the word hello [in Anishinaabemowin],” says Adam Sturgeon, lead singer of Status/Non-Status.

“‘Find a Home’ is a song about loving yourself, I think. It’s a traveling song, sort of — I think you can feel that. And so that was bringing me some sort of solace in that experience where you’re in that doldrum of wonderment. But it was comfortable and it’s kind of an older song that I was writing and reworking and yeah, just about accepting and loving yourself wherever you are on your journey.


Elwins – For Love to Come and Find You(Don’t Wait)

We have played The Elwins before as well and we are including this track as  The Elwins finally returned to the stage a couple of weeks ago to do 2 shows at the Phoenix Theatre in Toronto.

This song is taken from the 2021 ep  release  IV More  

Anika – Change

From Album of the Year website – how can you do this, it is only September!

On Change, Anika delivers a call to action that she takes to heart. Though her first solo album in over a decade is indebted to the spooky, surreal sounds of her early solo releases and her work with Exploded View, it also sheds a decidedly different light on her music. Since much of her 2010 debut album and 2013 EP consisted of frosty covers of ’60s pop songs that ranged from ironic to heartbroken, listeners actually got to know more of Anika as a songwriter on Exploded View‘s albums, where she expounded on timely and timeless subjects in elliptical but gripping fashion. Even though she recorded Change with her bandmate Martin Thulin, it’s apparent that this is a solo album: Its songs are leaner and more flexible than her work with Exploded View


Wapums – Sunray

Bob heard Wapums – Sunray on the always dependable CBC radio 3.  There isn’t a lot of info available on the internet about this artist but here is the link to the artist’s Bandcamp page.

https://wampums.bandcamp.com/album/sunray-3 

This is First Nations music at its finest.  

Angelique Kidjo – Africa One of a Kind

Album – Mother Nature

Africa, One Of A Kind

Kicking off our Back To School special with a song featuring @angeliquekidjo and @YoYo_Ma

Angelique wanted to drop out of school but her dad wasn’t having it. 

The singer and activist went on to found Batonga, an organization that supports higher education for girls in Africa.

Mother Nature finds 4-time GRAMMY-winner Angelique Kidjo joining forces with some of the most captivating young creators of West African music, Afrobeats, Afro-pop, hip hop and r&b, and represents a newly heightened awareness of her own musical legacy and remarkable influence she’s had on younger generations

She has a great website where there is lots to explore.

Angelique Sings for the Opening Ceremony of the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo

Angelique Kidjo – UNICEF – no Pata Pata Official Video

Covid 19 video – what to do to stay safe from Covid – no touch time

This is a great song that I added to the extended version of the show. From her website:

UNICEF is excited to announce the official release of Angelique Kidjo’s music video for “Pata Pata”, a fresh take on Miriam Makeba’s 1967 hit song. Once called the “world’s most defiantly joyful song”, Makeba’s ‘Pata Pata’ has been re-recorded by UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, Angélique Kidjo, to spread information about COVID-19, with a focus on hundreds of millions of people in remote communities around the world. 


Milky Chance – Colorado

Milky Chance is a German rock band who seemed to combine the vocals of Fontaines DC  with the instrumentation of The Cars.

This track was heard on an Alt Nation  live concert set from the Bottle Rocket Festival in Napa Valley.  The crowd there seemed to know this 2021 song thoroughly as they lustily sang along…

Here’s the studio version  

El Michels Affair – Zaharila

Album – Yeti Season 2021

this song is described as ‘languid, psyched-out’

El Michels Affair – Zaharila

I had to keep in this paragraph about the inspiration for Yeti Season – this is from Rolling Stone:

Covid upended that rhythm last spring. Suddenly, the kids were home 24/7, and Michels was looking for ways to fill the time while still finding ways to clock hours in the studio. He was also cut off from the close friends and collaborators who had been an integral part of El Michels Affair’s music and his own personal support system. So, one day last year as the snow was falling in Rhinebeck, he got out an old Yeti costume and decided to chase his kids around the yard. 

Rolling Stone Magazine

Dan Mangan – Troubled Mind

Dan Magnan  is a Juno award winning Canadian musician. He has toured extensively throughout North America, Europe and Australia, having released 5 studio LPs

The song “Troubled Mind”  is taken from his 2018 lp “More or Less” The video is kinda fun  

In 2017, Magnan started Side Door  concert company where artists could put on shows online.  Little did he know that three years later due to COVID, these types of shows would take off on platforms like Zoom.

How Dan Mangan’s Side Door Is Paving the Way for the Brave New World of Live Music

“I do believe that this new world is going to stick around,” he says of the company’s highly profitable livestreams

How Dan Mangan's Side Door Is Paving the Way for the Brave New World of Live Music

When Vancouver songwriter Dan Mangan co-founded the concert company Side Door in 2017, he thought he was creating an “Airbnb for gigs” — an online platform to allow artists and unconventional venues to connect and put on DIY shows. Once coronavirus lockdowns began, however, he quickly realized that he had accidentally stumbled onto the perfect platform for interactive online shows.

By Alex Hudson Published May 21, 2020 Exclaim! Magazine