The Top Ten Songs of the Week for Saturday, May 20, 2017 welcomes back Calico the band, returning to the chart in the number one. Calico have a new album, Under Blue Skies, due July 21, 2017. They top the chart this week with a California Country version of “California Dreamin’”. The Mastersons continue the west coast drive with the track “Highway 1” from their Transient Lullaby album. More new music from Friday, May 19, 2017 releases comes from Low Cut Connie who...
Sarah Shook and the Disarmers (from the album Sidelong)
Sarah Shook and the Disarmers are a Country band out of North Carolina that wear their Rock’n’Roll smirk like a tattoo. The band’s latest Bloodshot Records release, Sidelong, takes a bite (“Nothin' Feels Right but Doin' Wrong”), rights history (“No Name”), listens to time tick on lonely (“Keep the Home Fires Burnin'”), and wakes up to reality (“Fuck Up”). Sarah Shook and t...
Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors (from the album Souvenir)
Physically, Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors call East Nashville, Tennessee home. Musically, they are residents of the world, the songs of Souvenir,, their recent release, are the sounds coming from car windows down any street, heard through the walls of the apartment next door, and the spot where fingers stop dialing in radio stations across multiple formats. The tracks on Souvenir have a universal understanding, Drew’s warm vocals...
Kasey Chambers (from the album Dragonfly)
Kasey Chambers follows the success of her 2014 recording, Bittersweet, by doubling up her musical attack with a two-disc set in Dragonfly, her recent album release. Kasey Chambers looks to the cut “Ain’t No Little Girl” as the guiding light for Dragonfly. It was the first song written for the album and became a beacon for its theme. Friends acquired over a two-decade long career stopped by the recordings in Dragonfly with Keith Urban...
Lydia Loveless can pen a lyric that crawls up your spine and gets you twitching with its truth. For the video of “Same to You”, she moves closer to the edge, chronicling a crumbling romance as the video depicts creepy crawlers moving into the love nest and snippets of memories haunt the tale.
Memphis Soul soundtracks Pokey LaFarge as he spins through city streets attempting to sort out where it all went wrong for love in “Must Be a Reason”. The song is from his recently released album, Manic Revelations.
Midnight Vesta are offering Second Chances with their recently released album. The Canadian Folk Rock collective gives a do-over through their video for the title track, wondering what kind of body and soul they will inhabit if they come back.
Mipso (from the album Coming Down the Mountain)
After forming in 2011 as a duo then a trio, Mipso presented its sound with a nod to the softer side of mountain music. Though Bluegrass traditions were easily found in the sound of Mipso, the Chapel Hill, North Carolina-based band were more of a Folk collective, a quiet ensemble that held its songs as fragile creations. Coming Down the Mountain, the latest album release from Mipso, is a confident step that broadens their sound. The album gives ...
The Wooden Sky (from the album Swimming in Strange Waters)
Over the course of five albums, The Wooden Sky has sculpted a sound. The Toronto, Canada-based band uses notes like brush strokes, allowing the songs to hold touches of Folk, Country, Indie Rock, and Soul without being defined by any particular genre or style. Swimming in Strange Waters takes its first steps with determination, the title track opening the album with solid beats and fractured slashes of distorted chords that stay in pl...
Matt Jaffe and the Distractions (from the album California’s Burning)
Vivid imagery stages the songs of Matt Jaffe and the Distractions on California’s Burning, their recent release. The literary style of Matt’s words is set out over a visceral attack of music from the San Francisco, California-based three-piece. Musically, the Roots of Matt Jaffe is influenced by SoCal Punk Rock and Rockabilly giving the songs on California’s Burning a raw foundation for its tales Sci...
Barrence Whitfield and the Savages (from the album Dig Thy Savage Soul) - Somewhere back in time, Barrence Whitfield and the Savages struck chords for the power of rock'n'roll. The Boston-based band approached their music from a clinical path. The Savages kept their studies to the main avenues of investigation: Rockabilly, Roots, Jump Blues, Indie Rock, Funk, Soul and a whole lot of stop-hey-whats-that-sound.The men in the band decided on a major path and they were given supportive nods in lie...
Allison Moorer (from the album Down to Believing) - Allison Moorer has released Down to Believing, her ninth studio album. “Thunderstorm and Hurricane” rumbles with the thunder of bass drums and the quiver of cellos, a bombastic confessional, big and bold and aching with pain and strife. Allison Moorer cashes in her crystal ball for a wrecking ball on “I Lost My Crystal Ball,” an 80s-style cowboy rocker that crashes again the wall with tons of guilty Telecas...
ALBERT KING (FROM THE ALBUM BORN UNDER A BAD SIGN)
Debut albums are important; the right songs, players, producer, sessions, studio, etc. Albert King had recorded for a number of other labels, making Born Under A Bad Sign his debut for Stax Records. Mr King was a good fit with the Stax label team of Al Bell, Estelle Axton and Jim Stewart, its songwriters Booker T. Jones and William Bell, and backing players from Booker T & The M.G.’s and the Memphis Horns. On its release, Born Under...
Duane Allman was gone before the music he made took over the world. The brothers Allman, Duane and younger brother Gregg, were from Macon, GA. Gregg got a guitar first but Duane learned quicker. The brothers went to Nashville for summers to visit grandma, seeing B.B. King and soaking up sound. As time went on Duane immersed himself in the guitar, quitting the high school to stay home during the days and learn his instrument. The brothers formed The Allman Joys moving the band to Nashville then...
Top Ten Reasons We Love Leonard Cohen (9-21-34 to -11-7-16)
The written words of Leonard Cohen came from the pen of a man who considered himself a poet and novelist. His writings began in the 1950’s and kept Leonard behind a typewriter until Folk music became the vehicle for his art. Leonard Cohen moved to NYC to work as a musician, playing live at the urging of Judy Collins, who had a hit with “Suzanne” from his first recording, Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967). The words of L...
Top Ten Reasons We Love Leon Russell (4-2-42 to -11-13-16)
The keyboard work and vocals of Leon Russell put the Oklahoma musician on the radio under his own name though his true work in the music industry was backing other artists on stage and studio. Leon began playing in a band at fourteen years old with his band The Starlighters. Alongside other Tulsa, OK teens such as J.J. Cale, Chuck Blackwell, Leo Feathers, and Johnny Williams, the group was influential in tin 1958, becoming a member in...
