It's a wonderful life, this life of music
From the category archives:
Billy Bragg recently performed a live set on PRI’s “Fair Game”
Billy Bragg, the “working class hero”, recently performed a set on one of my favourite shows, PRI’s “Fair Game“. And it was stunning.
I truly feel that Bragg has been responsible for some of the best protest songs that we’ve heard in the last 30 years… [...]
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After almost a week off from the blogosphere, there are a few songs that I haven’t told you about… so we’ll just jump right in…
Matthew Ryan – American Dirt & Gone For Good
Matthew Ryan… don’t call it a comeback!
Matthew Ryan has – for the most part – flown under the mainstream radar, even though he’s [...]
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I’m off to Sydney for the rest of the week, and probably won’t manage to post until next week. I know, I’ll miss you too.
But to help stave off withdrawal symptoms, here’s a short – extremely short – but sweet tune trio.
Brett Young
Brett Young has just released his self-titled EP
Unbelievably, Brett Young is still, as [...]
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Shannon Hoon with Blind Melon at Woodstock ‘94.
After a 12 year hiatus following Shannon’s death, Blind Melon are back.
Blind Melon, possibly one of the most influential bands in my life, are back, and releasing a new album at the end of this month. And I’m not sure how I’m feeling about this…
Shannon Hoon, the original [...]
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It’s been a while since a Friday Roundup, so why not?
The Dodos – Ashley
The Dodos have just released new track, “Ashley”
Aah, The Dodos. They look set to become a feature in the Friday Round-up, after appearing in our last round-up here. Yesterday, The Dodos released their new single from the – quite frankly, brilliant – [...]
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The War On Drugs has just released their EP, “Barrel of Batteries”
The consistently great Secretly Canadian label has just released a 5 track EP by the – unbelievably still little-known – band The War On Drugs, entitled “Barrel of Batteries“.
And it’s frikkin’ great.
Secretly Canadian have this habit of signing your new favourite band. And The [...]
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Pennywise’s new album, “Reason To Believe”, is out now on Myspace.
Although you probably wouldn’t know it much reading through the posts on this blog, I used to be into punk. And I mean big into punk. For a few years there, it was all I cared about. Nowadays, only certain punk bands have made it [...]
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… is out. And damn, it’s hot.
The Raconteurs new album, “Consolers of the Lonely” is out now.
As much as I hate bowing to the Websheriff, after reading of the heckling that’s going on regarding this release here, here and here, I think it might be easier not to post a song.
But, if you can get [...]
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So last night, I went to another show.
If I was to give you clues as to the show, I would probably say:
1) The performer absolutely wails on guitar.
2) The performer has probably the most pure voice you’ll ever hear. Able to leap and soar in ways uncommon in contemporary music.
3) The performer has some [...]
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This will be quite a quickie, but I’ve just seen that the latest Sun Kil Moon album, “April“, is now streaming over at Myspace, for the next two days only.
Sun Kil Moon – Mark Kozelek
If you haven’t heard any tracks off the forthcoming “April” album, head over that way and take a listen. Sun Kil [...]
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As mentioned yesterday, on Sunday I headed across to the Brisbane Riverstage, for an evening with Jack Johnson, Matt Costa, and Will Conner. And – despite my longtime love affair with Jack Johnson, and my (extremely) tenuous connection with him via my friend Farryl Purkiss (Farryl and Jack once composed a song together, a fact [...]
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Remember that old post I wrote, about other bands hopping onto the “free download” bandwagon? Well, for the second time in as many days (check out the first regarding the Nine Inch Nails, “Ghosts”, here), I’m linking to it again. Why? Because The Charlatans have come through on their word, releasing their entire new album, [...]
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Nine Inch Nails have just released Ghosts I-IV
I’m not sure how I didn’t catch whiff of this earlier, but Trent Reznor has done it again. Despite poor results from his “pay what you want for it” release with Saul Williams (“The Inevitable Rise And Liberation Of NiggyTardust“, which was available for download last year), Trent [...]
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It’s been a long, long week. Sometimes things just don’t seem to go your way, you know?
But today is Sunday, and tomorrow’s a clean slate. So, things are looking up already, aren’t they? And with that tone of optimism, let’s jump straight into another tune trio.
The Heavenly States – The Race
The Heavenly States
The Heavenly [...]
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A friend recently alerted me to the fact that a new Margot & The Nuclear So and So’s track is floating around the wide wide world of the internets, and it is with much pleasure that I present it below.
Margot and The Nuclear So and So’s
Margot and The Nuclear So and So’s are a band [...]
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The Magnetic Fields (with Stephin Merritt – middle)
For close on twenty years now, Stephin Merritt has been recording what can only be described as pop masterpieces under the name “Magnetic Fields”. Stephen’s songs have a way of crawling inside you, and then filling you with raw emotion until you explode. Cliched that may be, but [...]
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So if you’ve read my past post, “30 South African bands you SHOULD hear”, you would know my extreme love for the band, Perez. If you haven’t read it though (and can’t be bothered to click through to that link), here’s a short recap:
Perez were, without question, my favourite South African band of all [...]
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Firstly, apologies for the lack of regular posting this week. I had my head buried in spreadsheets for most of it, and conferences took up the remainder. That said, the week is drawing to an end, and reports have been filed, so last night was a celebration.
Today? Today is the morning after.
So what am I [...]
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Back in the day, I used to be a pretty big Alexisonfire fan. In fact, when I’m feeling like a bit of anger is called for, I still am. So it was with interest that I awaited the sophomore release from Alexisonfire’s guitarist, Dallas Green, under his acoustic side project called “City and Colour“.
And [...]
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Thank god for WXPN – as usual they’ve brought the goods with NPR’s latest World Cafe show, featuring Counting Crows live, previewing eight (yes, I said eight) songs from their forthcoming album, Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings.
(Counting Crows previewed Saturday Nights and Sunday Mornings on WXPN World Cafe)
We’ve already previewed some of the new [...]
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I’m off down the coast for the weekend, with a lot of things to be sorted out before leaving; so this Friday’s post will be a round-up post. Lazy? Perhaps. Awesome tunes? Definitely.
Here’s a round-up of what’s been heating up our speakers this week:
Patrick Park – Here We Are
Rapidly becoming a firm favourite [...]
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One of my favourite music shows, “Later… with Jools Holland“, has just reached a milestone this month, broadcasting it’s 200th episode.
Times Online has a great article about the night in question, and also a bit of background information on the show:
The cake has been sitting all day in the middle of Studio 1 at BBC [...]
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The Damnwells (2006) Photo by Heather Conley
Those who have read this blog for a while might have noticed subtle hints of my slight obsession with the band, “The Damnwells“. And when lead singer Alex Dezen dropped a new song on their myspace page, it became clear to me that yet another post was needed. But [...]
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(Aside: 3 posts in 1 day? I know, it’s a regular explosion over here!)
Ah. Scott Adams. The dude is simply amazing.
For those out of the loop, Scott Adams is the creator of the famous “Dilbert” cartoon strips. But unless you subscribe to his blog, you probably aren’t aware of just how damn hip [...]
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Post-A-Day Week: It’s not often over a weekend that I’ll be sent enough songs to make up a week of posts. So, this week, I’ve decided to put up a post a day, as opposed to lumping them all into one confusing mess, as I am wont to do.
If you prefer the big mass posts, [...]
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Post-A-Day Week: It’s not often over a weekend that I’ll be sent enough songs to make up a week of posts. So, this week, I’ve decided to put up a post a day, as opposed to lumping them all into one confusing mess, as I am wont to do.
If you prefer the big mass posts, [...]
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Post-A-Day Week: It’s not often over a weekend that I’ll be sent enough songs to make up a week of posts. So, this week, I’ve decided to put up a post a day, as opposed to lumping them all into one confusing mess, as I am wont to do.
If you prefer the big mass [...]
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Yeah, yeah; I know the elitest snobs will have something to say about such a mainstream band appearing on this blog, but cmon… who here can honestly claim that Counting Crows didn’t soundtrack much of their life?
While Hard Candy was certainly a slight falter in the Counting Crows trajectory (apart from, of course, the Ryan [...]
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