It's a wonderful life, this life of music
From the category archives:
Ryan Adams & The Cardinals on tour… standing on the shoulders of giants.
You know, by all accounts, it’s been a different Ryan Adams that has posted on Foggy lately. Having been on tour with Oasis for the last while, it seems like Ryan’s… well… maturing. And healthier than he’s been in a while.
And I don’t [...]
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As another week draws to a close, and I head down the coast (and offline) for the weekend, I thought I would throw up a quick music roundup of those songs that have been spinning incessantly on my iTunes this week. So here you go…
Motel Motel – Mexico
Motel Motel… these guys deserve to be bigger.
Listen [...]
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You know, oftentimes when band’s reform, they simply rest on their laurels and end up reliving their glory days, touring and touring on old material.
Not The Verve though. The Verve have put themselves out there, and recently released their new album, entitled “Forth“. And damned if I’m not enjoying this one.
This, the band’s fourth album, [...]
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Joseph Arthur (self-portrait)
Once upon a time, Joseph Arthur was one of my favourite artists, right up there with Ryan Adams. But then, something happened. I don’t know what it was, and I’m not pointing any fingers here… after all, it might just have been the case that we were growing apart. People do that, you [...]
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… And yes, I know exactly what a huge statement that is to make. But I’m making it anyway. Only a band that excited me this much could have brought me out of my semi-hiding on this blog. I heard them, and I simply had to get out a post straight away.
God, I’ve missed that [...]
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Unfortunately, and in keeping with the general lack of time around these parts lately, this post might need to be a bit short. But on Friday night, I saw one of my top 5 shows that I’ve ever seen at the Tivoli… Death Cab for Cutie. And what a set it was.
An Horse kicked off [...]
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Here’s me, not one post earlier, saying that things were going to be quite around here for the next week or two. Yet here I am, putting up a second post today! Truth is, I’ve had an unexpected opening in my schedule, and with a spare hour before my next meeting now, I thought I [...]
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It’s been a while, I know… but hey, as some would say, “Shit got real“, you know? And, unfortunately, blogging has had to take a second seat lately. Hopefully, this won’t be the case for too much longer… but for the next week, at least, things will continue to be pretty quiet around here.
That said, [...]
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Under The Radar is a column inspired by material sent in by the readers of Burgo’s Blog, alerting me to music that I may not have otherwise heard. If you’d like to let me know about some of your favourite tunes that I may not know about, then drop a line to the email address [...]
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Wow. It has been one hectic week, and at this stage it doesn’t look like there’s any sign of easing up. Which is disappointing, as it means blogging has had to take a back seat, and I’ve received some cracking pitches recently from some great bands flying Under The Radar. Hopefully (!), I’ll be able [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here on Burgo’s Blog. For today’s show, I’ve decided to post one of the most requested sets from my readers: Radiohead, performing live at the BBC Radio Theatre, on April 1, 2008.
Long-time readers of this blog might remember that when Radiohead’s “In Rainbows” finally arrived, I was… well, [...]
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This is just a short note to let you all know that there’s a new Tallest Man On Earth song out – see my last post on this dude here – titled “A Field of Birds”… and it’s a killer tune.
The song’s been released as a theme song for the site, Yellow Bird Project; a [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here at Burgo’s Blog. For today’s post – and largely due to the fact that I’ve just watched “August Rush” again – I thought I would post something slightly different; a 2004 show, where guitar virtuoso Kaki King performed, lived at the Ironhorse.
Now, I’m pretty sure this show [...]
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It’s been a while since I put a Tuesday Trio up on this blog, and seeing as I was going through some of the messages to have landed in my inbox lately that have alerted me to new music, I thought: Why not? So, for today’s tunes, we’ll be looking at tracks from The Avett [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here at Burgo’s Blog. For this week’s post, I decided to revisit a past Live Music Friday post, from April, where I featured The National live on the Radio Inter Black Sessions. In that post, I mentioned that they had followed up from that show with another show [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here at Burgo’s Blog. Thanks to all the regular readers who were patient while I took my week off from posting… it was much needed, and I think it did me a world of good.
For this week’s Live Music Friday, I decided to post a show from 2005, [...]
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I think I might regret this, but I’ve decided to take this week off from posting here. It’s probably not the best timing for a decision like this; especially considering the fact that one of my favourite music bloggers – Captain Obvious – was only the other day gracious enough to mention me in one [...]
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Aaaah… La Blogotheque, you’ve done it again. If you’ve read my blog for any period of time, you might have noticed my love for the Takeaway Shows that La Blogotheque puts out.
This is no exception.
Bon Iver, now more than Justin Vernon… a full band. And Vincent Moon has filmed them… beautifully. I don’t think there’s [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here at Burgo’s Blog. Today, we’ll be featuring someone a little closer to my (adoptive) home… Australian musician, Xavier Rudd.
One of my favourite shows of 2007 was an Xavier Rudd gig on the Gold Coast… in fact, I even put up a post about it, although that post [...]
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The New York Fund (image credit: www.gregorynolan.com)
So, there’s this band called The New York Fund, and you need to listen to them. Seriously. I’m not kidding. If you want to hear music that excites you, then this should be it.
Previously incaranated as the band Cherryfalls – circa 2003-2005 – after a slight line-up change, the [...]
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So I was all set for a Calexico “Live Music Friday” post today, and then at the last minute, an email came through pointing me towards this NME article, which in turn led me to the BBC Radio 1 site, which – finally – pointed me towards this set: Coldplay, performing live from the Brixton [...]
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Joe Pug – a startling debut (photo credit: Amber Meairs)
One of the most impressive debuts of the year for me, Joe Pug’s “Nation of Heat” EP – which was released last month – is quickly becoming my album of the year so far.
It’s not often that I’ll throw around Dylanesque comparisons, let alone twice [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here on Burgo’s Blog… unfortunately, due to time constraints, this post might be a bit short… but still packed full of great tunes.
Today, I thought we would get a bit soulful, and listen to the silky smooth sounds of Amos Lee, live on KCRW’s “Morning Becomes Eclectic” show.
I [...]
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So by now, if you’ve read this blog for any amount of time, you would know my love affair with the band Dispatch. Dispatch was, I think, probably the first band that I really obsessed over. Ultimately, they were everything that I wanted to be in the music world; they were the epitome of my [...]
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So, I realised the other day that this blog has now been live for over 6 months on this domain (not including the few months I was on a Wordpress hosted domain), and I thought now was as good a time as any to take a step back, and look at some of the tunes [...]
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Welcome back to another Live Music Friday here at Burgoblog.com. For today’s post, I thought we would get a little motown. A little funky. A little bluesy. A little… well… everything, with a show from G Love & Special Sauce.
One of my favourite live shows of 2008 so far has been a night spent with [...]
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What that extremely long and convoluted title alludes to is the fact that, for me, May 2008 has proven to contain an absolute dearth of good new music. Aside from the new Death Cab album and Frightened Rabbit release, not much sparked interest from me this month, and that might have been noticed in the [...]
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Possibly the post that I receive the most emails about on this blog was my past post about the Counting Crows performance on WXPN’s World Cafe Friday.
I don’t think that a a single week has gone by, since that post was published, where I don’t get an email asking me for the rest of [...]
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“Later… with Jools Holland” constantly impresses, and most who have read this blog for any period of time would know my love for the show.
Their most recent show was no surprise. Not only were we treated to The Raconteurs performing “Salute Your Solution” and “Consoler of the Lonely” on the show itself, but in addition, [...]
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I’m in serious mourning here. Somehow, the fact that Howie Day was in Brisbane – or even Australia, for that matter – opening for Whitley completely flew under my radar, and I only found out after it was too late. To put this into perspective, Howie Day is one of my ultimate “hope and pray [...]
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Death Cab For Cutie have just released their new album, “Narrow Stairs”
So Death Cab for Cutie has finally released the much anticipated, “Narrow Stairs”, which I originally wrote about in my post, “Some Death Cab-related goodness“, and the first thing that I noticed was that I was obviously wrong: the track “Casino Blues” that [...]
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Langhorne Slim is an artist who has me excited; the quintessential “everyman” performer, he is a singer who seems to truly embrace his flaws… and then run with them.
Langhorne Slim (photo credit: Crackerfarm)
The 27-year-old Slim, aka Sean Scolnick, is a proponent of that frenetic folk-rock of which I’m such a fan; but he manages to [...]
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Just so that everyone knows, my iPod has officially given up the ghost, completely and utterly without warning. With most of my music on there, this is severely going to impact posting, and – quite frankly, more importantly – completely bums me out. Anyone want to start a “donate to help Matthew buy another iPod [...]
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Continuing my recent love affair with Scottish musicians, today’s post deals with the, quite frankly, brilliant band from Glasgow, Frightened Rabbit.
Frightened Rabbit have released their new album, “The Midnight Organ Fight”.
Yesterday I finally recieved my copy of Frightened Rabbit’s new album, “The Midnight Organ Fight“, following a month of extreme expectation after I was exposed [...]
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Yes, you read that right. Malcolm Middleton is easily my favourite Scotsman, and that’s saying something. While still predominantly known for his work with the – albeit, brilliant – Arab Strap, his solo output since leaving that outfit has been, in my opinion, nothing short of consistent excellence.
Malcolm Middleton has just released his new [...]
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Wow. It’s been a busy few days, which means that I haven’t been able to get onto the blog much lately, so I apologise for not replying to comments here and there. Unfortunately it’s going to be just as busy a week this week, with another trip down to Sydney in the works. This time [...]
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Time for another Live Music Friday! Following on from our Alex & Angela Dezen post here, and The National Black Sessions post here, today we’ll be following up with a Bob Schneider show from 2002.
Bob Schneider, live at Antones, 2002
Bob Schneider… always an electrifying live show…
Bob Schneider is, quite possibly, one of my favourite singer-songwriters [...]
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Romantica
Knowing my passion for Ryan Adams, a post featuring these guys shouldn’t come as a surprise. After Romantica’s “America” album was featured on Paste Magazine’s “Top 100 Albums of 2007″, comparisons began popping up between Romantica’s singer/songwriter Ben Kyle, and both Ryan Adams and Jeff Tweedy just about everywhere… heady company indeed.
When I first heard [...]
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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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Wow. That week went fast. I can’t believe it’s time for another Live Music Friday. Following on from our Alex & Angela Dezen/Damnwells post here, I thought that today we’d feature a show from The National.
The National Black Sessions
The National (image credit: David Greenwald)
Aah, those Frenchmen. I swear, whether it’s my favourite La Blogotheque videos [...]
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Chris Bathgate (image credit: Quite Scientific)
A product of the Ann Arbor folk-scene, Chris Bathgate is enjoying some serious spins on my playlist lately; which really isn’t all that surprising, when you consider that Chris counts Will Oldham and Jeff Tweedy amongst his many admirers… after all, two of my favourite artists can’t be wrong.
Last [...]
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Over the years, I’ve amassed quite a large collection of live shows of my favourite artists… thank god for all those tapers out there who share their wealth with those of us who can’t make it to the show! When I was living in South Africa, those tapers pretty much managed to get through the [...]
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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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Ryan Adams has left us a parting gift. Unfortunately, I think this signals the end of his blog.
But he’s left us a parting gift.
And it’s a beautiful thing.
The guy makes me ache.
Goodbye Ryan.
Goodbye Wilson.
Goodbye Barnabus, and Foggy. (if you’ve been reading his blog, you’ll know what that’s about).
It was great meeting you all.
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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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