I saw Yuma Sun on a small stage last Thrursday, they were good. They’re a very promising band. A bit rough around the edges, as expected from a young/new band, but very playful and very exciting. They have a vision and they are on their way.
They call their music “prairie rock”, and they fit the bill. It’s not country rock in The Eagles vein, but more a StanRidgeway/Wall of Voodoo (but without the 80s snaredrum sounds) twangy italian western influence. With an emphasis on the rock part.
They are right now in the middle of a release tour for their album, Romanza. Go see them if you can.
Yuma Sun are:
Jaran Hereid – Akustisk gitar & vokal Bjørn Ognøy – Baritongitar Andreas Dyraas – Trommer Jonas Konrad Knudsen – Bass Espen Lund – Gitar
My favourite from the new record is the opening track Another Day:
The most inspiring type of entertainer for me has always been somebody like Jimmie Rodgers, somebody who could do it alone and was totally original. He was combining elements of blues and hillbilly sounds before anyone else had thought of it. He recorded at the same time as Blind Willie McTell but he wasn’t just another white boy singing black. That was his great genius and he was there first… he sang in a plaintive voice and style and he’s outlasted them all. ~Bob Dylan
“He was a performer of force without precedent with a sound as lonesome and mystical as it was dynamic. He gives hope to the vanquished and humility to the mighty.” ~Bob Dylan
James Charles “Jimmie” Rodgers (September 8, 1897 – May 26, 1933) was an American country singer in the early 20th century known most widely for his rhythmic yodeling. Among the first country music superstars and pioneers, Rodgers was also known as “The Singing Brakeman”, “The Blue Yodeler”, and “The Father of Country Music”.
From allmusic.com – David Vinopal:
His brass plaque in the Country Music Hall of Fame reads, “Jimmie Rodgers‘ name stands foremost in the country music field as the man who started it all.” This is a fair assessment. The “Singing Brakeman” and the “Mississippi Blue Yodeler,” whose six-year career was cut short by tuberculosis, became the first nationally known star of country music and the direct influence of many later performers, from Hank Snow, Ernest Tubb, and Hank Williams to Lefty Frizzell and Merle Haggard. Rodgers sang about rounders and gamblers, bounders and ramblers — and he knew what he sang about. … read more @ allmusic.com
In 1997 Bob Dylan put together a tribute compilation of major artists covering Rodgers’ songs, “The Songs of Jimmie Rodgers, A Tribute”. The artists included Bono, Alison Krauss & Union Station, Jerry Garcia, Dickey Betts, Dwight Yoakam, Aaron Neville, John Mellencamp, Willie Nelson and others.Dylan had earlier once remarked, “The songs were different than the norm. They had more of an individual nature and an elevated conscience… I was drawn to their power.”
Rodgers was one of the biggest stars of American music between 1927 and 1933, arguably doing more to popularize blues than any other performer of his time.
Rodgers influenced many later blues artists, among them Muddy Waters, Big Bill Broonzy, and Chester Arthur Burnett, better known as Howlin’ Wolf. Jimmie Rodgers was Wolf’s childhood idol. Wolf tried to emulate Rodgers’s yodel, but found that his efforts sounded more like a growl or a howl. “I couldn’t do no yodelin’,” Barry Gifford quoted him as saying in Rolling Stone, “so I turned to howlin’. And it’s done me just fine.”
Rodgers’ influence can also be heard in artists including Tommy Johnson, the Mississippi Sheiks, and Mississippi John Hurt, whose “Let the Mermaids Flirt With Me” is based on Rodgers’ hit “Waiting On A Train”.
In May 2010, a second marker, on the Mississippi Country Music Trail, was erected near Rodgers’ gravesite, marking his role as The Father of Country Music
Shine your light Movin’ on You burned so bright Roll on, John
Finally….. it’s here!
Although it’s way too early to pass judgement.. this has to be a classic!
We got “Early Roman Kings” a couple of weeks ago, and “Duquesne Whistle” ~1,5 weeks ago. Both songs bore witness of greatness. iTunes have been streaming Tempest all week.. but now it’s finally available for everyone.
I’ve burned through it 3 times today.. still rolling as I write this.. GREAT stuff!
It is surely way better that “Together Through Life” & feels better than “Modern Times” as well. Comparison with L&T & TOOM will have to wait…
Some facts from Wikipedia:
Released
September 10, 2012
September 7, 2012
Recorded
January–March 2012 at Groove Masters Studios in Santa Monica, California
The cover art for Tempest incorporates a red tinted photograph of a statue located at the base of the Pallas-Athene Fountain in front of the Austrian Parliament Building in Vienna. The statue is one of four figures on the intermediate platform of the fountain bowl personifying the main rivers of Austria-Hungary: the Danube, the Inn, the Elbe, and the Moldau.The figure shown on the album cover represents the Moldau.The sculpture was created by Carl Kundmann between 1893 and 1902 based on architect Theophil Hansen’s original plans.
Critical reception:
In his review in Rolling Stone magazine, Will Hermes gave the album five out of five stars, calling it “musically varied and full of curveballs” and “the single darkest record in Dylan’s catalog.”According to Hermes, the album draws upon elements common throughout Dylan’s career—especially the last three albums—with music that is “built from traditional forms and drawing on eternal themes: love, struggle, death.” Hermes continues:
“Lyrically, Dylan is at the top of his game, joking around, dropping wordplay and allegories that evade pat readings and quoting other folks’ words like a freestyle rapper on fire. “Narrow Way” is one of Dylan’s most potent rockers in years, and it borrows a chorus from the Mississippi Sheiks’ 1934 blues “You’ll Work Down to Me Someday”. “Scarlet Town” draws on verses by 19th-century Quaker poet and abolitionist John Greenleaf Whittier; and allusions to Louis Armstrong and the Isley Brothers pop up elsewhere.” ~Will Hermes
According to Hermes, the two most powerful songs on the album are “Tempest” and “Roll On, John”. The title track, about the sinking of the RMS Titanic, is a 14-minute epic consisting of 45 verses and no chorus, with an Irish melody supported by accordion and fiddle. The song depicts a series of horrifying scenes—of passengers falling into the icy waters, dead bodies “already floating”, men turning against other men in murderous acts—presented against acts of bravery, such as one man “offering his lifeboat seat to a crippled child.”The closing track, according to Hermes, is a “prayer from one great artist to another”,and stands as a reminder that “Dylan now stands virtually alone among his 1960s peers. His own final act, meanwhile, rolls on. It’s a thing to behold.”
In his review for American Songwriter, Jim Beviglia gave the album four and a half out of five stars, calling it “the kind of meaty offering that his most ardent fans desire most.”The deceptively gentle instrumental passage at the start of “Duquesne Whistle”, Beviglia observes, is a perfect opening to an album of “sudden juxtapositions and mood shifts that occur not just within songs but sometimes within verses.”Through the easy tempo of “Soon After Midnight”, the grinding blues of “Narrow Way”, the soulful guitar lines of “Long and Wasted Years”, and the remorseless biting lyrics of “Pay In Blood”, Dylan captures “humanity, in all of its flawed glory, at every turn.”The musical antecedents of some of these songs are transparent: “Duquesne Whistle” from “Thunder on the Mountain”, “Scarlet Town” from “Ain’t Talkin'”, “Tin Angel” from “Man in the Long Black Coat”, “Early Roman Kings” from the blues classic “Mannish Boy”, and “Pay In Blood” from “Idiot Wind” or “Like a Rolling Stone”. Dylan’s singing is strong on the album, especially on songs like “Long and Wasted Years”, where he toys with the phrasing of each line, teasing out “every bit of hurt in this tale of love gone wrong.” “His voice may be shredded,” Breviglia observes, “but he can still interpret a song like no other.”
In his review in the Los Angeles Times, Randall Roberts wrote, “Few American writers, save Mark Twain, have spoken so eloquently and consistently at such a steady, honest clip, and the evidence continues on Tempest.” According to Randall, the album reveals a “master storyteller” at work as Dylan “continues to explore the various strands of early American roots music that he internalized as he matured.”
“At their best, new songs such as “Scarlet Town,” “Tin Angel” and “Roll On, John” show an artist swirling in musical repetition and the joy of longevity. Each is longer than seven minutes and each deserves to be heard again the moment it ends. He mixes these longer narratives with a few four-minute, expertly crafted gems that float like whittled wooden birds come to life—especially “Long and Wasted Years,” a bitter song about a dead marriage.” ~Randall Roberts
In his review in The Guardian, Alexis Petridis gave the album four out of five stars, but downplayed some of the superlatives offered by other reviewers who have compared Tempest to some of Dylan’s finest work.
In his review in The Sun, Simon Cosyns gave the album five out of five stars, calling it “a magnificent beast of an album”.According to Cosyns, the album “continues Dylan’s rich vein of late-career form” and in some ways surpasses his recent albums based on “sheer lyrical and vocal power while managing to stretch the familiar old timey sonic palette in all sorts of unexpected ways.”
In his review in The Telegraph, Neil McCormick called the album “among his best ever”. According to McCormick, the songs on Tempest reveal a Dylan “genuinely fired up by the possibilities of language” and that the entire album “resounds with snappy jokes and dark ruminations, vivid sketches and philosophical asides.”McCormick continued:
“Tempest is certainly his strongest and most distinctive album in a decade. The sound is a distillation of the jump blues, railroad boogie, archaic country and lush folk that Dylan has been honing since 2001’s Love and Theft, played with swagger and character by his live ensemble and snappily produced by the man himself. A notoriously impatient recording artist, Dylan seems to have found a style that suits his working methods. Drawing on the early 20th-century Americana that first grabbed his attention as a young man (and that he celebrated in his Theme Time Radio Hour shows) and surrounding himself with slick, intuitive musicians capable of charging these nostalgic grooves with contemporary energy, his late-period albums.” ~Neil McCormick
“Bob Dylan’s fantastic new album opens with a train song. Given the wrath to come and the often elemental ire that accompanies it, not to mention all the bloodshed, madness, death, chaos and assorted disasters that will shortly be forthcoming, you may be surprised that what’s clattering along the tracks here isn’t the ominous engine of a slow train coming, a locomotive of doom and retribution, souls wailing in a caboose crowded with the forlorn damned and other people like them. …
…the sheer tenderness of the closing “Roll On, John” is as much of a shock as a mere surprise. A belated tribute to John Lennon, the song’s as direct and heartfelt as anything Dylan’s written probably since “Sara”, whose occasional gaucheness it recalls, as Dylan roams over Lennon’s career, “from the Liverpool docks to the red-light Hamburg streets”, quoting from Lennon and Beatles’ songs along the way, including “A Day In The Life”, “The Ballad Of John And Yoko” and “Come Together”. The affection expressed for Lennon in the song is tangible, makes it glow like a force-field, and by the end is totally disarming. “Your bones are weary, you’re about to breathe your last,” Dylan sings to his dead friend. “Lord you know how hard that bit can be,” before moving onto a spine-tingling elegiac chorus: “Shine a light/Move it on/You burned so bright/Roll on, John”.
Charles Hardin Holley (September 7, 1936 – February 3, 1959), known professionally as Buddy Holly, was an American singer-songwriter and a pioneer of rock and roll. Although his success lasted only a year and a half before his death in an airplane crash, Holly is described by critic Bruce Eder as “the single most influential creative force in early rock and roll.”His works and innovations inspired and influenced contemporary and later musicians, notably The Beatles, Elvis Costello, The Rolling Stones, Don McLean, Bob Dylan, and Eric Clapton, and exerted a profound influence on popular music.Holly was among the first group of inductees to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked Holly #13 among “The 100 Greatest Artists of All Time”.
Holly saw Elvis Presley sing in Lubbock in 1955, and began to incorporate a rockabilly style, similar to the Sun Records sound, which had a strong rhythm acoustic and slap bass.On October 15, 1955, Holly, along with Bob Montgomery and Larry Welborn, opened the bill for Presleyin Lubbock, catching the eye of a Nashville talent scout.Holly’s transition to rock continued when he opened for Bill Haley & His Comets at a local show organized by Eddie Crandall, the manager for Marty Robbins.
Following this performance, Decca Records signed him to a contract in February 1956, misspelling his name as “Holly”. He thereafter adopted the misspelled name for his professional career. Holly formed his own band, later to be called The Crickets, consisting of Holly (lead guitar and vocals), Niki Sullivan (guitar), Joe B. Mauldin (bass), and Jerry Allison (drums). They went to Nashville for three recording sessions with producer Owen Bradley.However, Holly chafed under a restrictive atmosphere that allowed him little input.Among the tracks he recorded was an early version of “That’ll Be The Day“, which took its title from a line that John Wayne‘s character says repeatedly in the 1956 film The Searchers (GREAT film…~Egil). ………………
From allmusic – Bruce Eder:
Buddy Holly is perhaps the most anomalous legend of ’50s rock & roll — he had his share of hits, and he achieved major rock & roll stardom, but his importance transcends any sales figures or even the particulars of any one song (or group of songs) that he wrote or recorded. Holly was unique, his legendary status and his impact on popular music all the more extraordinary for having been achieved in barely 18 months. Among his rivals, Bill Haley was there first and established rock & roll music; Elvis Presley objectified the sexuality implicit in the music, selling hundreds of millions of records in the process, and defined one aspect of the youth and charisma needed for stardom; and Chuck Berry defined the music’s roots in blues along with some of the finer points of its sexuality, and its youthful orientation (and, in the process, intermixed all of these elements). Holly‘s influence was just as far-reaching as these others, if far more subtle and more distinctly musical in nature. In a career lasting from the spring of 1957 until the winter of 1958-1959 — less time than Elvis had at the top before the army took him (and less time, in fact, than Elvis spent in the army) — Holly became the single most influential creative force in early rock & roll. Read more @ allmusic ……..
some Influence:
A 17-year-old Bob Dylan attended the January 31, 1959, show, two nights before Holly’s death. Dylan referred to this in his 1998 Grammy acceptance speech for his Time out of Mind being named Album of the Year:
“And I just want to say that when I was sixteen or seventeen years old, I went to see Buddy Holly play at Duluth National Guard Armory and I was three feet away from him…and he LOOKED at me. And I just have some sort of feeling that he was — I don’t know how or why — but I know he was with us all the time we were making this record in some kind of way.”
Keith Richards attended one of Holly’s performances, where he heard “Not Fade Away” for the first time.The Rolling Stones had an early hit covering the song.
Holly influenced many other singers during and after a career that lasted barely two years. Keith Richards once said Holly had “an influence on everybody.”In an August 24, 1978, Rolling Stone interview, Bruce Springsteen told Dave Marsh, “I play Buddy Holly every night before I go on; that keeps me honest.”
The Grateful Dead performed “Not Fade Away” 530 times over the course of their career, making it their seventh most-performed song.The song also appears on eight of their official live recording releases.
Don McLean‘s popular 1971 ballad “American Pie” is inspired by Holly and the day of the plane crash.The American Pie album is dedicated to Holly.
On September 7, 1994 (Holly’s 58th birthday), Weezer released their single, “Buddy Holly“.
A showman’s life is a smokey bar and The fevered chase of a tiny star It’s a hotel room and a lonely wife From what I’ve seen of a showman’s life
Nobody told me about this part They told me all about the pretty girls and the wine and The money and the good times No mention of all the wear and tear on an old honkey-tonker’s heart Well, I might have known it But nobody told me about this part ~”A Showman’s life” (one of his best songs)
Buddy Miller (born September 6, 1952 in Fairborn, Ohio) is a country singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist and producer, currently living in Nashville, Tennessee. Miller is married to and has recorded with singer-songwriter Julie Miller.
Miller formed the Buddy Miller Band, which included singer-songwriter Shawn Colvin on vocals and guitar.
Buddy Miller has also produced albums for a number of artists. During 2006 Solomon Burke came over to Miller’s house at Nashville to record his country album ‘Nashville’ on which Emmylou Harris, Patty Griffin, Gillian Welch and Dolly Parton appear as duet partners.
He has a signature acoustic guitar made by the Fender company, and frequently uses vintage Wandre electric guitars.
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From allmusic.com – Johnny Lofthus:
Soulful Americana songwriter, singer, and producer Buddy Miller began his career in the early ’60s as an upright bassist in high-school bluegrass combos. Later, he traveled the back roads of America as an acoustic guitarist, eventually landing in New York City, where his Buddy Miller Band included a young Shawn Colvin on vocals and guitar. He also forged an enduring relationship with country-rock iconoclast Jim Lauderdale. Miller eventually landed in Nashville, where he did session guitar and vocal work on albums by Lauderdale, Victoria Williams, and Heather Myles, among others. He self-produced his criminally overlooked solo debut, Your Love and Other Lies (Hightone, 1995), and followed it with 1997’s equally superb Poison Love.
By this point Miller was the lead guitarist in Emmylou Harris’ band, and Harris returned the favor with backing vocals throughout Poison Love. …. .. read more @ allmuic.com
