2026 August Music: Rebekka Bakken, Crow and Gazelle, Ike Reilly, Effie Zilch,

Andrew Duncan, Stephen Dayvid McKellar

 

 

Rebekka Bakken is a Norwegian singer with a voice that is reputed to stretch three octaves. Some have called her a jazz singer, but she gets miffed when she’s placed in a box. Her new album Nord explains why she’s resistant to labels. “Mitt Hjerte Alltid Vanker” (“My Heart Always Wanders”) features a frenzied percussive instrumentation topped by haunting, slower vocals that evoke something spooky and ancient. “So Ro” (“So Calm”) similarly suggests something from the mists of time. Especially as dressed up with clarinet, pounding drums, and a splash of didgeridoo. Bakken can also enchant in English, as you can hear in “My Choicest Hours” As you might surmise from these three songs, Bakken might get called a “jazz” singer because her music is simply so different that no one has a better label. To me, though, her powerful voice has been forged in the dramatic Scandinavian past that has spilled into the present. That’s Syrian vocalist Saleh Mahfoud adding Arabic passion in “My Choicest Hours.”

 

 

Crow and Gazelle is the musical and life partnership of Mike McClure and Chrislyn Lawrence. They are about 180 degrees from Rebekka Bakken in that their arrangements are sparse and their vocals built upon close harmonies. Their new album Truth Be Told celebrates connections found, lost, and rebuilt. “The High Road” speculates that maybe life doesn’t move in a straight line, as good an explanation as any for how solid connections sometimes have to come around for a second act. A start, stop, go lick on guitar underscores that sentiment. “Sky is on Fire” is an ominous warning poem set to appropriate music, with vaguely Native American background textures. McClure and Lawrence like to mix poetry with music, but this one could be the soundtrack for the Apocalypse.  Luckily Crow and Gazelle bookend their album with the joyous “Down the Road.” You might wish to check out “Belly of theBeast” as well; as the PR material puts it, it’s where reflection gives way to confrontation.” A lot of folks are wondering where that tipping point is located. McClure expresses the sentiments that a “spiritual war” is gathering steam in which “love, not domination” will triumph. We can only hope that he’s right. Lawrence’s vocals set a gloomy picture of deep-seated divisions, the likes of which some activists think require a more confrontational approach.

 

 

The new LP Blind and Surrounded is something of an Ike Reilly family affair in that his son Shane is now part of the band. That said, Ike doesn’t go in for a lot of roses and rainbows. It’s more like hard luck, gravel-and-spit vocals, and gritty guitar. “Life and Death in East Moline” sounds a bit like an amped up John Prine offering without a wry smile. The lead guitar on “We Better Get Packed” cranks out danger in the form of getting out the door before whatever’s chasing you catches up. The song titles alone tell a story: “Bad Bad Man,” “Who’s Been Hurtin’,” “Gone For Forever….” Even the brighter tune of “New Bad News” has doubt in its DNA. But Ike’s best trick is putting pain and bad times in musical wrappers that make you want to rip up the dance floor before heading down the road.

 

  

San Francisco-based Effie Zilch is the duo of vocalist/guitarist Evanne Barcena and guitarist/producer Steve Wyreman.  As a producer, Wyreman has worked with heavyweights such as Mary J. Blige, Lauryn Hill, and Rihanna, but if you think they have big voices, wait until you hear Barcena. As long as it has a groove– blues, funk, gospel, Motown, rock–Barcenas can sing it, and with gusto. Higher Calling  is the duo’s fifth LP and if it doesn’t get you moving, schedule a hip replacement. “On the Loose” sees Barcenas belting, I’m going to change the game/I’m going to break the rules, and we believe her. She goes for a big gospel sound on the title track, sounding a bit like Mavis Staples, and for funk on “Lover Boy,” though you guess is as good as mine about what the giant duck in her video is trying to convey beyond the assertion, I get what I want. (PS: The name Effie Zilch doesn’t signify anything; it was an invention of journalist Herb Caen.)

 

Not the album cover of Mend

 Last year I was wasting time on the Internet. I ran across a young Scot named Andrew Duncan holding court in London’s Trafalgar Square with his acoustic guitar and in occasional duos and bands with other musicians. This May, I was in London and, lo and behold, there was Duncan still busking in Trafalgar Square. I picked up a copy of Andrew’s CD, Mend. It has eight tracks, so it’s something in between an EP and an LP. Duncan has an inviting voice that’s slightly on the sweet side of things, but he also casts youthful cool. Here he is in London laying down some grooves and loops to sing “Mend.” It takes serious power and more mental agility than I possess to create his one-man band effect. It’s the only complete song from the CD I can find online at present, but he also does amazing covers. Check out his take on “Use Somebody” (Kings of Leon) or with Atticus Blue singing Snow Patrol’s “Chasing Cars.” You’ll notice that the crowd is bigger when Duncan does covers (Adele, Bastille, Coldplay….) Consider that tons of singer songwriters began as buskers working for tips in all kinds of weather. (He and I chatted in the rain under an umbrella.) The lucky ones score a hit so those not paying attention can wonder, “Where did this guy come from?” The streets, my friends, the streets. If there’s any justice, Andrew Duncan will be one of those who break through. Nice guy. Good songs. Great with tech. Strong guitarist. Hard worker. That ought to mean something.

 

 

Steven Dayvid McKellar was born in South Africa and now lives in Los Angeles. He’s an artist in multiple senses of the word. In addition to be a big-voiced singer and a songwriter, he’s also a poet and a painter. His latest EP is Harbor, Volume 2.   “Me and the Trees” is a mix of gentleness and full-blast vocals. Don’t worry about decoding it; McKellar is taking stock of himself. “The Nag in Me” has an introspective late night jazz feel. “My Own Heart” is my personal favorite track. The dark piano and pain in McKellar’s voice accents the reoccurring question How can I have known? That encapsulates both his fears and his hopes. It has just enough ambiguity to make us uncertain that a happy ending will occur.

 

Coming Soon:  Jason Heath, Jordan Whitmore, Frank Viele, new releases from Grey DeLisle and Surrender Hill, and more. (Yeah, I know that sounds like those dumb TV commercials that promise “Up to 60 percent off and more.” (Up to and more being your definition of a basic contradiction!)

 

Rob Weir

Music for Spring 2026: Catrin Finch; Boiled in Lead; Breabach; American MIle; Hallie Grace; Clayton Chaney; Michael Rudd

What could be better than spring and new music releases, including a few Celtic gems?

Catrin Finch hails from Wales, a place that knows a few things about great harp music. Her new Notes to Self has an interesting hook. She uses the prompt of writing letters to herself when she was 13 and went by “Katy,” then transposes the feel of those notes into music for an all-instrumental album. Finch is 45 now, and has learned a few tricks along her path. For instance, many of the tracks use repeating musical patterns topped by bass lines, and looping. There are, at once, memorable melodies and an intimate feel. “13 opens as if a teen is practicing her lessons, but quickly shifts to her mature side in which the strings ring like bells amidst quieter secondary melodies.  Call it where force meets airiness. The video for second single “Kin” takes this a step further. In a girl-is-the-mother-of-the-woman sweep we see footage of Finch as a child practicing before cutting to her as an adult playing “Kin.” The music is majestic with lullaby-like contrast , but we can see her having some fun. (Check out the sneakers!)  She’s more formal on “Clear Sky,” though its ringing strings could also evoke a gentle rain. Most of the record is on the formal side, but “Black Holes” is… well, it’s hard to say. Soundscaping for sure, but with enough structure to make it more than random.  Put simply, Ms. Finch simply commands her instrument.

 

 

 

Does the band Boiled in Lead ring any bells? This Minneapolis-based quartet has been around since 1983, generally (but not always) as either a punk band or some sort of Celtic outfit (Celtic rock/punk/post-punk/world music, etc.). Bass player Drew Miller is the only original member in a band that has changed styles and personnel to follow the direction the musical winds are blowing. Their punk roots notwithstanding, the Boiled in Lead moniker comes from a version of the folk standard “The Two Sisters” as interpreted by Clannad, that gentlest of plugged-in Celts. At one point, BIL was seen as America’s answer to Fairport Convention and Steeleye Span. Later they drew comparisons to Hüsker Dü and more lately to Gogol Bordello.  On King of the Dogwoods BIL opts for a more subdued sound. Former lead vocalist Todd Menton has rejoined the band, Mo Engel now pounds the drums, and Haley Olson Miller plays a fiery fiddle. The song “King of the Dogwoods” does have a bit of early Steeleye vibe, though the song itself is somewhere along the musical spectrum between bluegrass and Goth. It’s about movie monsters and the things that perhaps lurk in the dark woods. Its very ambiguity is a step back from creepy. “Je t’Aime, Helena’’ sounds like something swampy from the bayou. They go full rock and reel on “Haley’s,” but what do you want to do with “Bucimis,” which is Bulgarian for both a folk dance and poison hemlock. It’s more a headbangers' dance than village fa-de-da, though one could imagine a poisoning. There are others built around folk melodies. So, what kind of band in BIL? The word eclectic comes to mind on an album with more variety than Jimmy Fallon.

 

 

I recently saw the Scottish band Breabach in concert and picked up their latest recording, Fás, a Scots Gaelic word that means rejuvenation, sprouting, or growth. The CD is from 2022, but it wasn’t yet part of my collection. I will go on record as saying they are far more exciting live than in the studio, but the song "Fás" is a good way to introduce yourself to a band whose Gaelic name translates “bouncy.” Breabach (bray’-ah-bak) will bounce you right out of your seat when both Calum MacCrimmon and Conal McDonagh put down their Celtic whistles and heft the Highland pipes. “The Old Collection” is a lively tune that shows how the band balance the pipes with normally quieter instruments such as fiddle, guitar, and double bass. The melody and song leads come from the husband/wife team of Ewan Robertson (guitar) and Megan Henderson (fiddle), which Henderson picking up most of the Gaelic-language offerings such as “Fàs” or “Eadar an DàBhràigh” (“Between the two braes), the latter on which she warbles like a fragile bird. “John Mackenzie’s March” is a lovely tune and song about loss. Breabach might not yet have the stature of classic bands like Silly Wizard, the Tannahill Weavers, or Ossian, but they’re getting there! Side Note: When I visited Orkney a few years ago I met Megan's brother and uncle!

 

To move away from Celtic, fans of Southern and country rock should sample American Mile and their album American Dream. “Straight from the Heartland” might make you think these guys are Bread Basket-born, what with talk of dusty roads, a beat-up truck, and a “worn-down home,” but they are based in Los Angeles. Lead singers Eugene Rice and Joe Perez belt out gritty songs and have voices made for arena rock, which is no doubt why they draw comparisons to both Aerosmith and Tom Petty. “Hard Workin’ People” has a soulful, funky feel to a song that celebrates the working class and an appreciation for their challenges. “TuffLivin’” is more of the same message, but their live version is dynamite: two electric lead guitars, bass, and a full drum kit. They’re plugged in, loud, and American Mile has stories to sing about.

 

 

Hallie Grace is an Indie-pop singer, so naturally she gets compared to Taylor Swift, Maggie Rogers, Sara Bareilles, etc.  I suppose that’s inevitable when: (a) she has just released her first full-length album Motivation, and (b) she plays piano as do those better-known figures. Nonetheless, it’s ironic for someone with a song titled “Imma Just Do Me” Motivation contains 11 tracks that investigate life’s ups and downs and what to do when the second of those arise. She should know; she’s had quite a few herself. Grace, now based in Charlotte, is the kind of artist who appeals to Millennials and Zoomers, peppy, kind of sassy, and confident of her abilities. “Vice” has dance grooves but I was more impressed by Grace’s balance of lower, darker tones and her birdlike highs. “Her Fight Remains” is a look at battling disease, especially Epidermolysis Bullosa skin disorder (sometimes called “butterfly skin”). Grace tends to go vocally from gentle to strong. Sometimes the production on her full-tilt vocals comes off as overproduced, but it’s hard to deny that she has a great set of pipes. “When the Rain Falls” reminds me of Patty Griffin and given my enthusiasm for Ms. Griffin consider that’s high praise. 

 

 

Clayton Chaney recently dropped the single, “When the Light Comes In” from his new recording Too Far. It’s a musing on love and religion, but the title alone could be his theme song. He left Arkansas for Los Angeles at age 18, and put performers like Roger Miller aside for meatier material from bands like Dawes. Chaney has a big voice and a fondness for flamboyance. After all, he has a song titled “Something About Los Angeles.” It’s a country-folk song as well, but somehow California country sounds different. It’s cleaner production-wise for one thing, in-the-studio kind of way. I’m fond of title track, “Too Far,” which is about dreams that don't come true, yet has a hopeful edge. Call is stripped down country acoustic that wears its honesty on the guitar stock. It has a homespun feel that hits you like a freight train after some of the glitz wears away. “Roots Grow Deep” has a similar feel and, man, can this dude stretch his voice.

 

 

 

Folks in Western Massachusetts may remember Michael Rudd, who lived here for a time after leaving New Jersey. He lit off for the West and now lives in New Mexico, a place that can stun with its beauty and make you weep over its poverty. He was the principal of a K-8 school at Acoma Pueblo, which has been occupied for over 900 years yet has a poverty rate of around 24 percent. Rudd went back to music after hearing songs in his head; his third studio album Ways of the World samples some of them. It’s an often poetic album that examines the human condition by digging deeper and pondering transcendence rather than the quotidian. If you know New Mexico, a song like “Water” resonates, though Rudd’s deep voice takes us to the depths of the soul. “On My Way”oozes darkness, but again in a contemplative way. Rudd uses strong baritone to sing the blues, bring us down, and lift us up. One example is “There’s a Rainbow in Your Mind.” There’s a rainbow in your mind/You got thunder in your shoes… You got nothing, left to lose. If you want bluesy Americana at a faster tempo try “Not Today.”

 

Rob Weir

 

 

Not Today:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lF844OsFF6k&list=RDlF844OsFF6k&start_radio=1

Dropkick Murphys Meet Woody Guthrie Documentary

 

 

This Machine Rising (2024)

Directed by Dave Stauble and Shawn Howard

https://dropkickmurphys.com , 56 minutes

★★★★

 

What first pops into your mind when someone says, “punk rock?” The Sex Pistols and the nihilism of John Lyndon (aka/ Johnny Rotten)? I hope not; they were a manufactured band, the invention of producer Malcolm McLaren seeking to cash in on a moment in musical history when mainstream rock had gone soft, disco was the rage, corporate music became dominant, protest music was marginalized, and hip-hop hadn’t quite arrived. In the late 70’s, I listened to a lot of punk and sub rosa protest folk because disco made me want to vomit mirror balls. I liked The Ramones, Talking Heads, Velvet Underground, and some edgy UK and German stuff a friend in London routinely challenged me to sample. I never cared for punk culture; guess I was raised to be polite! Not to mention that I’m a pacifist whose idea of a good fight is one at least ten miles from me.

 

The more important point, though, is that punk (and some heavy metal) was/is working-class music. Originally punk espoused a DYI ethos. In an odd way that resonated with folk music, the sort that Pete Seeger used to exhort audiences to “just sing out!” In the 1990s I began to hear Celtic punk rock (Pogues, Flogging Molly, Oi Polloi, early Wolfstone….) A move to Massachusetts made me a Dropkick Murphys fan. If you have negative preconceptions about  punk, the DKMs will destroy many of them. Put simply, the Dropkick Murphys are thoughtful people. You may have seen the name Ken Casey in the news. He’s the booming lead vocalist of Dropkick Murphys who recently visited Ukraine as a part of an aid convoy, has actively heaped opprobrium on Donald Trump, called out a fan wearing a MAGA shirt (and gave him a DKM shirt to wear instead!), raised money for former GOP governor Charlie Baker rather than endorse a Democratic machine candidate, and won a Mass Humanities storyteller award. He and his Dropkick pals (Matt Kelly, Al Barr, James Lynch, Jeff DaRosa, Tim Brennan, and Kevin Rheault, plus producer Ted Hut and manager Jeff Castelaz raise money for the Claddagh Fund to help organizations supporting kids, veterans, and families in crisis. And, if you don’t already know it, the band is Boston-born and bred.

 

You can learn about some of this stuff from their recent documentary that’s free on Dropkick’s YouTube Channel. It’s titled This Machine Rising and its very title confirms a punk/folk connection; it’s a play on the slogan Woody Guthrie had on his guitar: This Machine Kills Fascists. Guthrie wrote so many songs in his lifetime (1912-67) that new ones turn up all the time. Earlier, Dropkick Murphys had its first monster hit, “I’m Shipping Up to Boston,” a 7-line scribbling from Guthrie. Another popular BKM song, “Gonna Be a Blackout Tonight” also used Woody Guthrie’s lyrics. Nora’s son heard it and approached his mother about collaborating with BKM. Billy Bragg, Wilco, Dylan, Springsteen, and others have written music for some of the estimated thousands of unpublished Guthrie lyrics. In 2022, Woody’s sister Nora asked Dropkick Murphys to take a swing at them. What was supposed to be one album–This Machine Still Kills Fascists–organically spawned a second, Okemah Rising.  A national tour began in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in September, and ended in Boston on St. Patrick’s Day 2024.

 

This short document shows Casey’s meticulous approach to going through the Guthrie archives. At times it feels as if the DKMs are more like Ph.D. students than punk rockers. The other thing that will strike viewers is the reverence the band paid to the material; Casey spoke of literally trembling while holding one of Woody’s original songs. Likewise, band members easily discourse on the careful approach they took to developing appropriate tunes to unscored lyrics. In other words, the Murphys interjected serious musicianship into the project, something that alerts us that if punk began as DYI music, it has evolved beyond that ethos. I’ll confess that it thrills me to hear punk raucousness filtered through bagpipes, squeeze boxes, and penny whistle. It’s equally a thrill to hear DKM unplugged as it were. Sometimes they do Guthrie acoustically; at others, Woody’s ghost plugs in with the band.

 

Hardcore DKM fans probably saw this documentary when it debuted last year. If you’ve not seen it, do so to see what good dude punk looks and sounds like.

 

Rob Weir

 

 

 

Music for April and May 2025: Michael Rudd, Ron Pope, Grey DeLisle, Mary Bue, Mar Grimalt

Mary Bue

 

Faithful readers will notice that my posts have been delayed lately. It’s called “being on a book deadline.” Here’s a music column as I didn’t get one written in April. That’s okay, though, as things usually get a little slower in the spring.

 

 

One of the better projects I heard was from Michael Rudd. His path has been a bit twisty. He became a teacher and has been in New Mexico, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and back to New Mexico, where he’s now a principal at Acoma Pueblo, an indigenous adobe settlement atop a dusty high mesa. At some point he began to hear songs and tunes in his sleep. His second solo album, Going to the Mountain contains some of the results from his trip to the liminal side of things. The title track is a Western song that bespeaks his twisting path to full humanity. It opens with the words I know where I’m going/’Cause I know where I’ve been but if that sounds pretty tranquil, hang on. It’s also about a guy always searching for something. It’s a very western song; note I didn’t qualify it as “country.” It’s big and open like his gravelly voice and is as honest as a lot “country” is overly processed. “Before the Demon Comes” is in the same vein. He rocks out on The Far Side.” The thing about dream songs is that they take you to unexpected places, so be prepared to travel.

 

 

Ron Pope has been around a bit too. He comes to us from Nashville via Georgia with a stop at NYU. He and his wife (Blair Clark) founded Brooklyn Basement Records and, if Pope’s name sounds familiar, he scored big time in 2007 with his platinum hit “A Drop in the Ocean.” He hasn’t slowed down a bit. Pope has released two dozen LPs and EPs, has toured, and he and Blair are raising a daughter. Depending on who is telling the story, his music is either Americana, country, or folk. Pope’s most recent LP is titled American Man, American Music, which is as good a label as any as he’s never quite what you anticipate. “Klonopin Zombies”  suggests social commentary on drug abuse, but it’s actually a personal song about how he was not in a good place after his grandmother passed away just eight days after her husband died. As you can see from the live performance, he’s a hard-working musician who’s unafraid to delve into topics mystical, painful, or sublime. Re: the sublime, Pope gives us “In the Morning with the Coffee On,” a love song centered on joyful small things. In a duet with Taylor Bickett, “I’m Not the Devil” he reminds us that he’s a good guy. Yet he also sings about veering from the straight and narrow on “Mama Drove a Mustang” whose blancmange  of rock, bluegrass, and country is atypical for someone with a voice as robust as his. Good stuff.

 

 

 

Grey DeLisle is a comedian, songwriter, and voice actress (Scooby-Doo! DC Comics, video games, etc.) As a singer she once did a tribute project to June Carter Cash, so it won’t surprise you to hear that her new project The Grey Album is a country album or, that as Los Angeles-based artist, she’s unabashed of having been married and divorced three times. DeLisle tells us rockabilly style, “I Can’t Be Kind.” She also sings “Hello, I’m Lonesome,” “Daddy Can You Fix a Broken  Heart,” “The Last Last Time,” and “I’m a Wreck.” In other words, DeLisle is from the old-fashioned heartache tradition of country music. As you will also hear, her vocal styles are insouciant, saucy, and an independent spirit. Credit her with the verve and nerve that gives us the term moxie. 

 

 

 

Mary Bue is another woman of many talents. She is a yoga devotee, has studied psychology, was hailed in 2020 as the best songwriter in Minneapolis, and has made her own Beatles-like pilgrimage to India. Her recent album The Wildness of Living and Dying is like a musical mind meld of her interests. It has themes of what she calls “world-sorrow” plus eco-awareness, expanded consciousness, and a potpourri of styles ranging from “piano poems” to electric instrumentation. The title track is heavy on dark keys and steady drumming, which make a fine contrast to her lovely voice. “Bedding Down with the Deer” has elements of Joni Mitchell in her younger, earthier days, though Bue takes full advantage of today’s mixing capabilities to backfill it with atmosphere. Be sure to check out “The Bones and the Marrow” video to capture Bue in a whirlwind of kinetic energy. She spends most of the video running and imploring us to stand tall amidst the tall pines within an electric arrangement spotted with sing-song mini raps. Mary Bue has (literal) down-to-earth values but she’s no head-in-the-sand blind optimist who is sure things will self-repair. This is her 9^th album and watching the video helps me understand where all her energy comes from.

 

 

Mar Grimalt is a vibrant singer from Mallorca, one of Spain’s Balearic islands. Her album Espurnes I coralls translates “Sparks and Corals,” and that song alone shows us that when you have vocal talent to spare you can create magic with nothing more than a melody and a frame drum. Call her voice the spark and the malleted drum its hard coral contrast. She can also pick up a guitar and pick out “Cançò Final,” a cançò being a folk song in a style linked to 13^th century troubadours. Grimalt sings as a woman sews in the background. Mar Grimlat won’t floor you with power or flashy technology. She has been quoted as saying that we often fail to appreciate what we have because it “weighs us down like tons and tons of concrete.” She should know; her family operates a concrete factory. She’s so retro that that “Reculls des versos” is again voice and frame drum and all the echoes and synth you hear were added in post-production.

 

 

Rob Weir

February 2025 Music: West of Rome, Yahtzee Brown, Chris Walz ,Trendafilka, Jason Carter, Deborah Holland, MahaMaya, Ethel/Moving Sound

 

Is rock and roll making a comeback? West of Rome gets labeled an “indie-rock/alt-country band,” but other than being from Texas, the “alt-country” side isn’t much in evidence on Keep It Fly in the Negative Zone. (The band’s name comes from a record from the late Vic Chestnut.) “Movement in Your Picture” is filled with gritty and grungy swagger. On “Keep it Fly,” vocalist Kevin Higginbotham channels a touch of Robert Plant as lead guitarist Charlie Roadman lets his solos fuzz and burn. The monster in “Face the Beast” is American violence and Old Nick himself is in the front seat of the nightmare hallucination “Take a Ride with the Evil One.” You don’t hear much music like this in Nashville.

 

 

 

 

Yahtzee Brown has a different vibe. He’s just 20 and Take it Back is his debut album. His father was a rock drummer and young Noah Siegel, his non-stage name, grew up hearing 60s and 70s rock and later took in a lot of indie rock. The title track lies in a in-between groove. His vocals and production are smooth, but Michael Lockwood’s bass is so solid it’s like a lead guitar. Echo effects push this song about relationships and troublemakers into a spacey psychedelia space. “I Guess I’m Sorry” shows he also picked up some outlaw country from his Waylon-Willie-Townes-loving parents. He brings buzz and noise to “Watching Over You” and some high-note electric and cacophony to counter his light tenor on “Halloween.” Brown’s split between classic and indie rock will challenge marketers to label him.   

 

---If you want a break from electric guitar, here are some radical changes of pace. 

 

 

 Bluegrass has gotten slick, but Chris Walz turns back the clock on All I Got and Gone, a throwback more in line with the bluegrass and old time songs of the early Folk Revival. Walz teaches at the Old School of Folk Music where he is considered folk music royalty. Listen to his clawhammer banjo on “Going Across the Sea,” playing resonator blues, doing his take on the traditional “Delia,” and grabbing a National steel guitar for a Mississippi John Hurt picking treatment to “See See Rider.” (It starts at 4:44.) To invoke Neil Young, this is a journey to the past (without the thorns).

 

 

 

Much of the music of Trendafilka comes from Georgia, the one whose capital is Tbilisi not Atlanta. Their new album For the Olives also features songs from the Balkans, Greece, Macedonia, and the Russian Steppes. That said, you’re not too far off if you thought Atlanta; the polyphonic singing of this 11-woman a cappella assemblage is based in New Orleans! The polyphonic vocals are Balkans style, meaning they feature 3, 4, and 5-part discrete melodies that blend into something as unfettered as the wild rose that is their namesake. Listen for strategic uses of dissonance, yips, yodels, complexity, and (were in Latin) songs that would be at home in a Romanesque cathedral. It’s a spectacular recording. Try any track from For the Olives and you’ll be hooked on Trendafilka. Start with “Mome Stojie Ju Livadi,” “Oi Na Dubori,” and a live clip of  “Mori Aida.”

 

 

Jason Carter once preferred classical music and nylon strings. On In and Out of Time Carter plays a Space Age-looking harp guitar and experimented with live looping techniques that might have made Bach barf. Carter has been something of a nomad who has visited over 100 countries and has recently lived in Finland, Singapore, and France. Not that he’s home all that often, what with his touring schedule and video projects. In and Out of Time has an international flair. “Finlandia” pays homage to living there, “One” was recorded in Singapore, “I Believe” In Kuwait, others with the Novosibirsk orchestra in Siberia, and so on. The harp guitar on the CD cover has 12 strings and he has apparently just gotten one with 23. That’s at least 17 more than I need!

 

 

 

American-Canadian Deborah Holland once fronted Animal Logic (which included Stewart Copeland of The Police) and has penned soundtracks for TV and movies. She also has an active solo career; I Made it This Far is her 7^th release. It has styling vaguely reminiscent of Carole King. This intriguing release includes “Wildfires,” a reference to ecological lowlights of 2023-24. They scorched over 13 million acres across Canada and turned skies yellow and sooty in the 48 provinces south of the border. (Sorry–couldn’t resist a poke at the wantwit in Washington DC.) In a serious vein, Holland’s dramatic piano, strong voice, accompanying video, and lyrics drive home the pathos of the “long black scars” left behind. The flip side of tragedy is her folky “Thankful,” which she wrote for Thanksgiving 2023, an enumeration of things she and sign-holding others count as blessings. These are the only two songs for which there are videos thus far as the LP drops on March 7. The rest of the album is mix of moving material (“A Long Time Ago”) the country-like (“Circling the Drain”), a celebration of beautiful days (“East Porpoise Bay”), nostalgia in a cheeky-yet-melancholy way (“50 Year Reunions”), and more. As Holland has aged, she has moved through several musical personae. I Made it This Far has more piano, a lush and dramatic counterpart to guitar-centric adult alternative music. She has also transitioned from American to Canadian, courtesy of a job at Langara College in Vancouver. Google her song “I Wanna Be a Canadian.”

 

 

 

My bad! At a very busy time I was sent A New Day  from the MahaMaya Band that got lost in the clutter. I’m really happy I found it. There is such much talk about “fusion” music, even if the final product has only a small burst of electric guitar or a hint of bluegrass. That’s not the case with the MahaMaya Band. At heart it’s a New Delhi-based duo of Mahalakshmi (keys, voice) and Emam (hand drums, guitar) but the “band” expands to wherever modern technology can connect musicians. A New Day spotlights help from other parts of India, Hungary, Poland, California, and New York to add bass, sitar, oud, sarod, and mandocello. The resultant music is ancient and modern, mystical and meditative. Try the title track and “Great Spirit.”

 

 

 

I’m afraid a joint project between the New York City string quartet Ethel and Taiwan’s A Moving Sound seems like a forced marriage because the vocals of Mia Hsieh in the later are too harsh for me. However, whether or not you’ll like it might depend on how much you like the wild lamentations, screams, and atonality of Yoko Ono’s sonic explorations. I realize that Ono is Japanese, not Taiwanese, so listen to “Dynasty Falls” and decide on your own. I love the instrumentals and admire Hsieu’s vocal dexterity and dramatic presentation skills, but I can’t relate to them. 

 

 

 

Coming in March: Mary Bue, Muriel Mwamba, Ron Pope, Michael Rudd, and ???

 

Rob Weir

The Beatles: Get Back Details the End of an Era

 

 

 

The Beatles: Get Back (2021)

Directed by Peter Jackson

WingNut Films/Apple/Disney + 468 minutes (3 episodes of DVDs)

PG-13 (tons of smoking and language)

★★★★

 

It took a while to get my hands on The Beatles: Get Back  whose streaming rights are owned by Disney +. I watched it on DVD on consecutive nights, which is how Disney aired it. I finished on January 30, the 56^th anniversary of The Beatles’ unauthorized 1969 rooftop concert at Apple Corps, the final public appearance of the band.

 

Director Peter Jackson took on a massive project that consumed four years. Even with extensive editing this “documentary” checks in at nearly 8 hours of viewing time. I placed documentary in quotes, though, as there is very little narrative structure, external commentary, or attempt to evaluate what you see. Jackson uses raw footage of a month of The Beatles biting off more than they could chew. 

 

Each member of the band knew they had reached a creative crossroads and that The Beatles had run its course. The film follows the Fab Four’s intention of going out with a bang: a TV show, a film, and a live performance– all in a month. (Ringo Starr had to be on the set for filming of the satirical comedy The Magic Christian.) It didn’t help matters that they intended to record up to 30 songs that didn’t rehash any of their earlier releases, yet had little idea of what they would be. In retrospect the Let It Be album was a miracle.

 

Episode One covers days one through seven. The Beatles assembled in Twickenham Studios, which was supposed to be where the TV show would be recorded and maybe the site of an indoor concert. The band had writers block and disliked barn-like Twickenham. They wasted time goofing off and the new material could only charitably be called rudimentary. The first episode is the only one to rely on archival materials to supplement personal remembrances. Linda Eastman–Paul’s wife two months later–snapped a lot of photos and Yoko Ono was practically glued to John Lennon. There was tension in the studio, but not between John and Paul; George Harrison felt ignored and abruptly quit the band.  

 

Episode Two looks at the hiatus before George rejoined The Beatles, and days 8-16 in the studio. Twickenham was abandoned for the intimate confines of Apple Corps. This served to lift spirits and get creative juices running. The concert was put on hold, though ultimately, the TV plan was the one to go. The Beatles had time to noodle around with everything from their back catalogue to early rock n’ roll, Dylan tunes, old time country, and show music, as the studio wasn’t yet fully equipped. But you can see the joy coming back, especially after Billy Preston joined in to play electric keyboards and light the room with his infectious enthusiasm. The only visible discomfort came from a weird visit from Peter Sellers and from worried producer George Martin. The songs were still rough, but The Beatles even reconsidered doing a concert.

 

Episode Three covers days 17-22; that is, from shaping a handful of songs and  performing a 42–minute rooftop concert that startled and thrilled most people along Savile Row. Spoilsport complaints of crowd ed streets and noise sent police officers to Apple to tell them to stop the concert. This footage is like a cross between Monty Python and Keystone Kops. Then it was back to the studio to finish the album. (How are you going to get a baby grand piano onto a rooftop?)

 

Assessment:  

 

·      Get Back is overly long but its tedious moments reveal how long it takes to make magic out of scraps.

·      There is very little truth to tales of Paul and John feuding, and even less to Paul’s pique over Yoko’s presence. He, in fact, defended Yoko when questions arose whether she was disruptive.

·      It was Paul who insisted that The Beatles should not recycle and it was he who was the most creative. He grew annoyed with the lack of focus in the studio but he also had a heart-to-heart with John and insisted that John was the real leader of the band.

·      Paul played the piano beautifully and was okay as a drummer. Each band member played multiple instruments and Ringo was okay on guitar!

·      Ringo was preoccupied and George clearly wanted out, but what a wonderful moment to see Paul and John grinning through their performances.

·      Peter Jackson was off his game in Get Back. Former students might recall me insisting one of your papers needed sharper focus and better editing. Jackson might have flunked my class!

 

Rob Weir

Music: Caleb Klauder/Reeb Wiilms; Effie Zilch; Michael Des Barres; Les Arrivants; Kylie Fox

Once upon a time country music was a cross between cornpone and old-time hill music. Caleb Klauder and Reeb Willms take us back to those days on Gold in Your Pocket. “He’s Gone” is a flat-picked song with splashes of old time fiddle full of guitar breakouts and 1950s ambience. “Shame Shame Shame” is straight out the Wheeling Jamboree with walking bass and some rapid-fire mandolin. Klauder and Willms hail from Washington State and now live in Portland, Oregon, but songs like “Too FarGone” have a decided Appalachian vibe. Check out the pedal steel and the lyrics of “Gold in Your Pocket” and you’ll know right away that these artists draw more from the past than the stadium rock with a twang that is today’s country music. They do it well, but is this what country audiences want these days? I can say for sure, but Klauder and Willms are a nice change of pace.

 

 Effie Zilch is the name of a San Francisco-based collaboration between Evanne Barcenas and Grammy-winning songwriter/producer Steve Wreyman. On their seven-track EP Multitudes they evoke quite a few other acts, most notably Delaney and Bonnie and JJ Cale. Barcenas has a strong, smoky voice as you can hear on the blues-influenced “Prayin’ Amos.” “One Hundred Years” is quiet and folky, but she airs it out on “Only Fools” like a soul queen and Wryeman lets it rip on guitar. I don’t know their back catalogue, but I note they are often billed as a “rock” band. To my ear, though, Multitudes is more bluesy. Plus, their song “Carousel” would be at home in a honkytonk bar.

 

 

If you really want some rock n’ roll, check out the new record from English actor/musician Michael Des Barres. Its title might sound familiar: It’s Only Rock n’ Roll (But I Like It). It is, of course, the title of a 1974 hit from The Rolling Stones. Des Barres' new project is of 1970s cover songs. Baby Boomers have the new Bob Dylan film, so it’s only fair that Gen X gets its own nostalgia trip. Des Barres shreds some chords on “Search and Destroy” (The Stooges). You’ll also hear “Love is the Drug” (Roxy Music), though Des Barres’ voice bottoms out in a few places, and David Bowie’s “All the Young Dudes.” He’s better on Alice Cooper’s “I’m Eighteen.” Des Barres can still cut wood with his axe but, he’s 76, not 18 and not a young dude. He can shout it out and has a remarkable amount of power for doing so, but he resorts to spectacle and showmanship when he slips out of mid-range tones. That said, he’s probably better at singing 70s’ songs that aging Xers singing along to their car radios to the golden oldies.

 

 

The band Yarn formed in Brooklyn and is now based in North Carolina. It’s a collection of hardworking road warriors who play 170 gigs a year, have 11 albums, yet somehow are relatively unknown. On Born, Blessed, Grateful & Alive Yarn play country, rock out, and sometimes venture into folk music. Yarn’s lineup is both stable and fluid. It is the brainchild of vocalist/guitarist Blake Christiana and includes drummer Robert Bonhomme, and bassist Rick Bugel. Yet is also includes a rotation of electric guitarists, including Andy Falco (Infamous Stringdusters), Matteo Joseph Recchio (Heavy Peace), and Joel Timmons (Sol Driven Train). The album’s title is embedded in the song “These Words,” a sort of country-meets-rock song about being down and out–I lost everything when I lost my mind–and makes an appeal to heaven in the way country songs are prone to do. Christiana has a soothing voice, but the band can bring it. “Turn Off the News” is somewhat evocative of a chill Allman Brothers. It’s probably good that Yarn is now in North Carolina, as they currently have a Southern rock vibe. But they retain a bit of Brooklyn ‘tude.”Play Freebird” is a serious song, but one can’t help but think there’s a bit of satire aimed at the drunken idiots who yell out for a Lynyrd Skynyrd cover at concerts. There might be too much midrange music on this album, but Yarn is a band worth knowing.

 

 

Les Arrivants are a Montreal trio that play classical Arabic and Persian music plus Argentine tango. In keeping with Montreal’s vibrant world music and jazz scenes, the band–Abdul-Wahab Kayyali (oud), Amichai Ben Shalev (concertina-like bandoneon and Hamin Honari (percussion)–are more into precision than attempts at middlebrow arrangements. This is evident in the title track of Toward the Light. The same is true of tangos such as “Bagelissimo,” or on up-tempo compositions such as “City of Ashes.” If you’ve never heard an oud, listen to the last composition. The oud seems as if it was invented to render introspective and melancholy music. Search for some of the trio’s live performances to experience their focus and musicianship in context.

 

 

Kylie Fox draws Joni Mitchell analogies because she’s Canadian and has a jazz soul. She also gets compared to Kate Bush because she’s prone to being unorthodox. Mainly there’s a lot going on inside her musical canvas. As you can see in her official video of “Brandi Baby,” Fox is filled with youthful insouciance and, as you can hear, she has a serious set of pipes. If you’re not convinced, try her title track "Sequoia” It’s an odd hybrid that could be a paean to nature, a warning to preserve it, a backdoor love song, or all three, but there’s no question of Fox’s command of it. “Alberta” is another tree song and why not, young folks these days have a far healthier view of the environment than most of their elders. Besides, I kind of like a singer who can sing about Alberta and an “Armadillo” on the same record. Plus, there’s got to be some synchronicity going on; Joni Mitchell grew up in Saskatchewan and Neal Young in Manitoba. That’s all three prairie provinces folks. And, yep, it’s also a forced analogy! Watch for Kylie Fox; I have a feeling we will be hearing from her.   

 Rob Weir