Archive: 2009

“Whenever I am not touring, I’m back in Oklahoma,” says 22-year-old singer-songwriter Samantha Crain, who, along with her band, The Midnight Shivers, just released her first full-length, Songs in the Night. When you hear Crain’s voice for the first time, it’s easy to imagine her sitting on a front porch in Shawnee, Oklahoma—not New York or L.A. —just living the good life. Because that’s what Crain’s music does—it takes you to a special place where you just want to let everything slide.

For the first time in 37 years there won’t be a big-time jazz festival in New York City this summer. Principal sponsor JVC has stopped sponsoring jazz festivals due to the economy and Festival Network – who produced last summer’s JVC Jazz Festival – is currently struggling to survive. Ben Sisario of the New York […]

Over the last few years Levon Helm has become somewhat of a fixture on the live music scene that we’ve almost taken for granted his recent health troubles that came close to taking his distinctive voice away. The former drummer for The Band is in the midst of a career renaissance of sorts that has […]

We’d like to welcome back U-Melt keyboard ace Zac Lasher for the second set of entries from the Tour Diary he kept for Hidden Track. On Monday, Zac wrote about U-Melt’s journey through Chicago, De Kalb and Madison. For part two, Zac takes us behind the scenes of the band’s trip to Colorado…

4/20 – On the road to Des Moines, IA

The only thing more boring than driving hundreds and hundreds of miles with nothing to look at but fields of corn as far as the eye can see is driving hundreds and hundreds of miles with nothing to look at but fields of dirt where the corn has yet to really start growing.

Whenever we come out to this part of the country, I am amazed not only by the vastness and emptiness of it all, but by the sameness of it all. From the windows of a van, America is a giant cornfield broken up by concrete oases of corporate consumption – these little paved squares where McDonalds, Arby’s, Hardee’s, Pizza Huts, Taco Bells, and Dairy Queens and the like serve their mass produced food-products along side the BPs and Shells and Mobils — Wal-Marts, K-Marts and Days Inns and Super 8s and Motel 6s and Econo Lodges and Travelodges and and and… These areas are completely devoid of culture, completely devoid of any local color or characteristic other than the different sports team and University logos that can be found emblazoned on trucker caps and sweatshirts and blankets that they sell at the T/A or Pilot or whichever truck stop happens to be at that particular junction.

America. Fuck yeah.

READ ON for more of Zac Lasher from U-Melt’s Tour Diary…

The Allman Brothers Band continued their massive 2009 with a star-studded affair at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles last night. Tom Petty joined the band for a cover of Highway 61 Revisited along with his fellow Heartbreaker bandmates Mike Campbell and Benmont Tench. Petty toured with the Allmans back in 2006. Also, Bruce Willis […]

Last Week’s Sauce is a recurring column featuring recordings of shows that took place the previous week. Thanks to JDS for this week’s photo.

Artist & Title: Animal Liberation Orchestra – Purple Rain
Date & Venue: 2009-05-16 – Life Is Good Festival, San Francisco CA
Taper & Show Download: Todd Fleisher

This past weekend at the Life Is Good Festival in SF, Martin Sexton took over lead vocal duties during ALO’s set for this fantastic rendition of a Prince classic. Purple Rain is somewhat of a live staple in Sexton’s solo repertoire. ALO next appears at the Desert Rocks Music Festival in Moab Utah on Saturday May 23rd. Look for Martin Sexton at Mountain Jam on Sunday.

READ ON for more entries from the likes of Cracker and The Breakfast…

Legendary guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan covers Little Feat’s Sailin’ Shoes backed by an all-star band featuring Chaka Khan, Maria McKee, Rosemary Butler, Omar Hakim, Arnold McCuller, Hiram Bullock, David Sanborn and Van Dyke Parks for an episode of NBC’s Night Music back in 1988… Stevie Ray Vaughan – Sailin’ Shoes [HT – cahnmedia]

God Street Wine toured the US aggressively, but they only played overseas once. In 1997, the quintet headed to Paris for two weeks of gigs at the Chesterfield Cafe to work on the material that would become their fourth studio album. A few days ago, longtime GSW fan Eric Budke uploaded a pristine soundboard recording […]

The Allman Brothers Band performing at the Fox Theater in Oakland, CA on May 12th, 2009.

Summer 2009 will no doubt go down in musical history.  In addition to legendary artists such as The Dead and Phish touring, music festivals are shooting up like wildflowers (now more than 15 major festivals spread across the country).  With Bonnaroo Music Festival tickets alone costing upwards of $250 and the economy heading into the […]

Having just wrapped a ten city east coast tour, Marco Benevento quickly announces a new run of summer club shows and festival appearances in June and July. The Brooklyn-based pianist’s upcoming dates will be highlighted by his first ever appearance at Carnegie Hall in New York City on June 20, opening with his trio by […]

On June 4th, Kentucky-born songwriter Ben Sollee will help redefine regional touring by strapping his 1930’s Kay cello to his bicycle and pedal 26 miles from Lexington to Frankfort, KY – then onward to a different Appalachia town nightly until reaching Bonnaroo on June 11th. “I always felt like I was missing something during the […]

San Francisco based rockers Tea Leaf Green are gearing up for a new live release that shows their softer, more stripped down side.  Taking the stage without the aid of amplifiers is something the band enjoys doing so much, they invented themselves an alter-ego, cleverly dubbed “Coffee Bean Brown,” to channel their acoustic energies. The […]

Conor Oberst and  The Mystic Valley Band, Bat For Lashes, Los Campesinos! and The Avett Brothers have been added to the bill for the 2009 Outside Lands Festival. The three-day festival is set to take place at San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park August 28-30, as previously reported. Other artists just added to the lineup include […]

After the Nirvana revolution, you couldn’t even get two of those 80’s hair bands on a stage together in any house bigger than 5,000.  Well if you do the decade math and now some of those same bands that rocked big ampitheaters in the 90’s are doing it again today (with the help of $20 lawn and back reserved pavilion tickets).   The one thing is, that of these bands (NIN) sounded mighty relevant while the other (Jane’s Addiction) appeared to be going through the motions on this Phoenix date of the cleverly coined NIN/JA tour.

Back in the fall, we hinted that the venerable roots and Americana magazine, now webzine, No Depression would be hosting their own music festival this summer in Seattle, WA. Well, after months of waiting the folks at No Depression have finally revealed the details of their first ever festie that will take place at Marymoor […]

Over the past decade, Longtime HT favorite Marco Benevento has performed at dozens of different venues all over New York City, but the 31-year-old keyboardist has never played in the most of famous one of ’em all… until June 20. On June 20, the Marco Benevento Trio will open for British jazz-pop artist Jamie Cullum […]

Okay, so there’s this band, Soulive, from upstate New York. (Why is New York the only state with an official “Upstate” section? This state is huge, diverse, beautiful and historic, but most of that is “upstate”, isn’t it?)

Anyway, Soulive, a band I had heard of but never actually heard. They appeared at Bonnaroo in 04 and 06, but you know how festival schedules are. Just like good television, they seem to program all the good stuff at the same time. I missed the Roo in 2004. In 2006 they appeared in This Tent after Mike Doughty’s Band. Problem was, I caught the first few songs of Be Your Own Pet in That Tent which led to an acoustic set by Rusted Root on the Sonic Stage and, boom, next thing you know Soulive is in the helicopter being ferried to the fancy Nashville hotel and I’ve missed the opportunity. Not that I’m complaining, you understand. I’m just saying.

So I go over to the Doug Fir lounge to finally check these guys out, and boy am I glad I did. Especially in the warm, cozy environs of the Doug. A basement space with real Douglas fir logs and a real retro feel was the perfect place for the set that Soulive put on Sunday night.

The opening act was billed as The Nigel Hall Band and announced from the stage (by Soulive drummer Alan Evans) the same way. Hall came out solo at first, sat behind the keyboard and half whispered to the crowd, “Lend me your souls for a while, I promise I’ll get them right back to you”.

READ ON for more of A.J.’s review of Soulive in Portland…

Medeski, Martin & Wood – Amber Gris

Going too far carries a gravitas that came to fruition in the excesses of 20th century rock. Hell, some of our favorite musicians have long straddled the line between life and death. Some, to such a degree (far too many great icons from Hendrix to Cobain), have died when that line was finally crossed. But this Rimbaud type tendency to burn across the poetic sky as some sort of mythical druggy superman before crashing down to earth as a lowly mortal dates back to the Dawn of Man (or the Dawn of Tripped-Out Man as I recently wrote, in reference to a heady band of new psychedelic warriors).

Johnny Depp has played many characters that willfully blur the line between life and death on a daily basis—characters as twisted and deformed as Raoul Duke aka Hunter S. Thompson, or the actor’s recent musical romp through the evil world of Sweeney Todd. But his characterization of John Wilmot, the 2nd Earl of Rochester, a 17th century poet, sex fiend and scoundrel, gave film buffs a real taste of pure pirate-like behavior that far overshadowed his work as the loveable rogue in the Disney Caribbean trilogy. Yes, but I prefer the Bad Guy on film (Vader over Kenobi) as the bent mind seems more human.

Indeed, Depp behaves like a man on his last waltz through Dante’s Inferno. Every Day. Every Footstep. Every Drink from the Bottle. Every Leer and Sneer. He has contempt for ordinary society, and in his cavalier way, Depp’s character towers above the film that documents his sordid life in this week’s Hidden Flick, The Libertine.

READ ON for more on this week’s Hidden Flick – The Libertine…