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Music

Winged Wheel “Big Hotel”

August 15, 2024
Music

Another in a long line of terrific recommendations from Tracy Wilson’s Courtesy Desk newsletter, Winged Wheel’s “Big Hotel”, is, as she describes:

Impenetrable echoes rumble and then evaporate in hypnotizing swirls as if a raincloud is trying to extinguish a volcanic river of neon molten rock. Willy Wonka could play any portion of Big Hotel in his unsettling boat ride tunnel and I think accomplish the same mesmerizing yet mind expanding journey.

I get serious A Storm In Heaven-era Verve vibes, too. This is one that I’ve streamed enough to buy.

Jack White’s “No Name” LP

August 13, 2024
Music

A few weeks back, Jack White released a new record as a giveaway for anyone buying something from one of the Third Man Records shops. Clear vinyl, white label, plain sleeve. I guess owning and operating an in-house vinyl pressing plant has some advantages. After the release, the Third Man social media accounts seemed to promote ripping it and posting it online, hence these youtube embeds of the record. It’s a good one. A lot of the talk was about “a return to the White Stripes”, which isn’t completely off-base because these are mostly blues songs, but the band on these songs is bigger and the sound is not as raw-raw.

As an aside, I went to the store in Nashville a few years ago and it’s a really cool spot.

The album has since had an official release, streaming and physically, which is cool for me. I’ve played it enough that I’ll probably by a copy.

Bozeman 1

August 13, 2024
Music, photos

Most of my work travels will be driving but I caught a flyer for a quick trip to Bozeman, MT. As a full-sized fellow, plane travel is not my preferred mode, and I caught a couple of classic “business flyer” snafus along my way.

I’m sure I’ll get over it at some point, but seeing major US cities from the air still gets me stoked. Chicago is cool-looking (and some outrageous gate arrival luck let me make my connecting flight to Bozeman despite a big delay getting out of Richmond).

The California wildfires had laid a big blanket of smoke on Bozeman and it looked like I was going to be denied the full “Big Sky Country” experience. It was still neat to see, as I’d never been to this part of the country before.

I hit the ground a grabbed a beer and couple of slices to fuel up for the list of places I wanted to hit before the working started.

Unfortunately, the comic shop I had on my list wasn’t open, and this cool-looking record shop was closed Mo-We for the month of July.

I didn’t get totally shut out though, as Cactus Records was there for me to scratch my travel shopping itch.

David Nance and Mowed Sound

July 1, 2024
Music

Every so often I hear a record that is so good and so confident in the choices that I’m compelled to replay it over and over. David Nance & Mowed Sound has been in the heaviest of Heavy Rotations for me lately. Like Steve Gunn with his Allman Brothers sliders goosed a little bit. There is so much cool guitar on this record!

Ducks Ltd. at Richmond Music Hall 4/2/2024

April 3, 2024
fun, Music, photos

The Richmond Music Hall is a nice room for bands.

Ducks Ltd. is a new-ish band to me (thanks, CHope) and I’m glad I went out for the show on a Tuesday night.

The sound has lots of ringing guitars and I’d mention The Clean, Soft Pack, and maybe some XTC as points of reference (2 of those 3 bands are faves of mine).

Here’s to live music!

Omni – “Souvenir”

February 16, 2024
fun, Music

Very exciting! New Omni album out today. I’ve really enjoyed the angular guitar noises they make and have been absolutely kicking myself for not getting out to see them when they came through RVA a few years ago. It was one of those extra-dumb “I just don’t want to” moves, too, rather than having other plans I couldn’t get out of.

I’m not making that mistake again. They’ll be here in 10 days and touring this record, so I I have some homework to do. I wonder what the merch situation will be?

Widowspeak and Duster at The Broadberry 4/8/2023

April 9, 2023
fun, Music, photos

It’s been a long, long time since I had to stand in line to get into a venue a half-hour after the doors opened, but I guess that is what happens when a show sells out weeks early and the crowd is an odd mix of Youngs and Olds.

Widowspeak opened and they were fantastic. I missed them when they came through town last year (thanks, covid). They’re a great live band and I’m looking forward to seeing them again. It was neat, because they’re definitely a guitar band, and the lead player was ripping sick riffs, but they weren’t blowing out the room. It was dialed in so you could appreciate the shredding and the chill vibe of their music. 5 stars.

Duster has been riding their Numero-fueled resurgence hard the last couple of years. The success of the reissue campaign has led to a couple of really good new albums and some touring. It’s still wild to me that a band like this, definitively cool, is playing a club date in Richmond, Va. They were also great. I’m not as familiar with their whole catalog, but it was easy to enjoy. The overall set was louder than Widowspeak, but the chill groove of the songs was still easy to get into. Also surprising was the number of under-21 kids that came out. I don’t think Duster is featured in any weird social media phenomena, it might really just be the kids discovering a band that came and went before they were born. You love to see it.

I’ll also include a picture of Widowspeak featuring the goddamn Broadberry pole that is right in front of the stage(!) and a wider shot of Duster featuring the most phones I’ve ever seen at a club show. It was wild.

Joe Pernice with my coffee

March 6, 2023
Music

Joe Pernice is going to play a couple of shows to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Pernice Brother’s debut album “Overcome By Happiness”.

He’s been playing short morning warm-ups on Instagram live and they’re a perfect accompaniment to a hot cup of coffee.

I’m not going to be able to get to any of the shows but I 100% pre-ordered the vinyl reissue. It’s a sweet deluxe package with a book and some extra tracks. I’m geeked.