two

My Listening 2009

Originally posted at Facebook

These are the ones I was just about always happy to find popping up on the iPod. That's all.

Asterisks are for ones I think you may not know yet … and should. The rest are so excellent and well-known … they're just … like … obvious.

Alphabetical by the music maker (but if I had to name My Own Personal Very Best Album of the Year, it would have to be Lord Bring Me Down by The Consolers ... what sorry excuse for a culture would not/could not steer me to them before now?)
______________________________________

An Italian Songbook - Cecilia Bartoli

Sea Change - Beck

For Emma, Forever - Bon Iver

Resurrection of the Bayou Maharajah - James Booker

The List - Rosanne Cash

Lord Bring Me Down - The Consolers*

My Life - Iris Dement

John Wesley Harding - Bob Dylan

Since We Met - Bill Evans Trio

Shake That Thing - Stefan Grossman*

Two Short Stories - Jayber Crow*

Bach Sonatas & Partitas - Gidon Kremer

Oh My God Charlie Darwin - The Low Anthem

The Good Feeling - Dent May & His Magnificent Ukelele*

Shakuhachi; Japanese Flute - Kohachiro Miyata*

The Sunset Tree - The Mountain Goats

The Voice of the Poet - Frank O'Hara

Brighten the Corners - Pavement

Little Grey Sheep - Danny Schmidt*

The Eternal - Sonic Youth

Going Up: The Very Best of the 13th Floor Elevators - 13th Floor Elevators

Wilco (the album) - Wilco

Live at Massey Hall 1971 - Neil Young

hey world

we never need a reason or an occasion for billie holiday

God bless the child that makes her own ...

the world hereabouts

sunday sounds out my window

l. cohen

Dallas Music - Building Leonard Cohen's Backing Band.

What Cohen conveys—a search for the divine, a respect for solitude, a warts-and-all interrogation of the self, a love of poetry—are values that are aren't exactly hallmarks of American pop culture. As Beck confirms, Cohen has always been more appreciated in Europe. But, despite extravagant ticket prices, several additional U.S. shows have been added due to popular demand. There is a palpable—and possibly unexpected—American hunger for Cohen's music and his message.

"Here is a man who some think of as a living legend at this point," Beck says. "Certainly he doesn't. He thinks of himself as a songwriter living in L.A." READ MORE ...

Cohen is coming to Dallas this week, but I won't be there.

I'm remembering a bit of critique once offered by an old friend (now long missing in action). He disapproved of (couldn't stand) Cohen's "oo-wah" girls, the female voices always hovering around his own on the records. They sounded cheap or trashy to him. And they certainly have that not-always-unpleasant effect sometimes. But I've always found those same voices ... endearing ... echoes not just of the mythic Feminine or Beauty but of the girl groups of my youth, like The Shirelles.

Just another thought ... going nowhere in particular. But I hope the folks who get to see and hear L. Cohen in person these days appreciate it to the max.

new bob

New Bob Dylan Album Coming in April | Pitchfork.

As Rolling Stone reports and Dylan's publicist confirms, Bob Dylan will release his follow-up to Modern Times next month. Beyond that, details are characteristically scarce. The ten-song album has no title, release date (beyond "late April"), or cover just yet.

Rolling Stone's David Fricke says it has "a seductive border-cafe feel (courtesy of the accordion on every track) and an emphasis on struggling-love songs." Sample song titles: "I Feel a Change Coming On", "Beyond Here Lies Nothin'", "If You Ever Go to Houston", "This Dream of You", "My Wife's Home Town", "It's All Good". Sample lyric: "I'm listening to Billy Joe Shaver / And I'm reading James Joyce / Some people tell me I got the blood of the land in my voice." Yeah, sounds like a Bob Dylan album.

New Bob is one of the many perks we get for being alive at this time. So let's enjoy it.

good music, great cause

War Child . Org

"War Child protects children in the world's most dangerous war zones who have no-one else to turn to. They live in extreme poverty where conflict has not only destroyed the bricks and mortar of their homes and schools — but has also torn apart the social fabric of the families and communities which they depend on. We believe it is unacceptable that children's lives continue to be torn apart by war. Yet many of the people who die in conflict are children. We're working hard to protect these children and helping them to build themselves a more secure future."

"Straight to Hell"
(Lyrics by Joe Strummer and Mick Jones)

If you can play on the fiddle
How's about a British jig and reel?
Speaking King's English in quotation
As railhead towns feel the steel mills rust water froze
In the generation
Clear as winter ice
This is your paradise

There ain't no need for ya
There ain't no need for ya
Go straight to Hell boys
Go straight to Hell boys

Y'wanna join in a chorus
Of the Amerasian blues?
When it's Christmas out in Ho Chi Minh City
Kiddie say papa papa papa papa papa-san take me home
See me got photo photo
Photograph of you and Mamma Mamma Mamma-san
Of you and Mamma Mamma Mamma-san
Lemme tell ya 'bout your blood bamboo kid.
It ain't Coca-Cola it's rice.

Straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Oh Papa-san
Please take me home
Oh Papa-san
Everybody they wanna go home
So Mamma-san said

You wanna play mind-crazed banjo
On the druggy-drag ragtime U.S.A.?
In Parkland International
Hey! Junkiedom U.S.A.
Where procaine proves the purest rock man groove
and rat poison
The volatile Molotov says-

PSSST...
HEY CHICO WE GOT A MESSAGE FOR YA... SI...
VAMOS VAMOS MUCHACHO
FROM ALPHABET CITY ALL THE WAY A TO Z, DEAD, HEAD

Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Straight to Hell

Oh Papa-San
Please take me home
There ain't no need for ya,
There ain't no need for ya

Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys

Can you cough it up loud and strong
The immigrants
They wanna sing all night long
It could be anywhere
Most likely could be any frontier
Any hemisphere
No man's land
Ain't no asylum here
King Solomon he never lived round here

Straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys
Go straight to Hell, boys

Oh Papa-San
Please take me home
Oh Papa-San
Everybody, they wanna go home now

what a wonderful world

One of the very decent generosities of Michael Gray's Bob Dylan Encyclopedia is that it came with a pdf disk of the ENTIRE 756-page book (not sure if the updated/revised paperback has the disk). So I've been able to travel to far-off San Antone with this trusty and essential reference work by my side.

Well, say, I'm browsing around in there & somehow find myself at the entry on The Plugz and read

and I think, "Hey, that's one performance I'd really like to see. I wonder if ..."

Yeah, so I'm off to YouTube in a flash ... search "letterman dylan plugz" and voila! (as the frenchman said to the ...)

heading out in the morning

"Roadrunner"

"Another Traveling Song"

"On the Road Again"

"Roadrunner"

jayber crow's a pair of acoustical guys

Of Indiana