Black Sabbath feature, Boston Globe, Aug. 8, 2013

With Ozzy back, Black Sabbath rages on

By Scott McLennan

 Globe Correspondent     August 08, 2013

Iommi, Osbourne, Butler--We three kings

 

The question posed on the first track of the new Black Sabbath album “13” — “Is it the end of the beginning or the beginning of the end?” — seems far less existential after speaking with the band’s guitarist Tony Iommi.

“I’m with the people who I started with. And now we’re finishing it where it started,” Iommi says. “It feels comfortable.”

Iommi, reached by phone earlier this month during a tour stop in Palm Beach, Fla., says “it’s a shame” that drummer Bill Ward isn’t part of this reunion of the original Black Sabbath lineup, but that being together with singer Ozzy Osbourne and bassist Geezer Butler has surpassed expectations, both his and everyone else’s, as the band is awash in commercial success and critical acclaim.

Iommi didn’t put any finality to Black Sabbath, but all of the principals are in their mid-60s and the guitarist has been battling cancer throughout this reunion.

Black Sabbath formed in 1968, and Iommi is the only member to be part of every lineup, as the original quartet crumbled with Osbourne’s departure in 1979. In the ensuing years, Butler and Ward would also flit in and out of Black Sabbath as Iommi soldiered on, sometimes triumphantly as he did with singer Ronnie James Dio, sometimes erratically with a revolving cast of singers ranging from Tony Martin to Ian Gillan.

“There have been great lineups that I enjoyed. The albums I made with Dio, I really enjoyed that,” Iommi says. “But this is great to be back with Ozzy.”

And fans agree, making “13” Black Sabbath’s first chart-topping record in the US. The band released “13” in June and will be featuring tracks from this first full-fledged outing with Osbourne in 35 years alongside such classic cuts as “War Pigs,” “Iron Man,” and “Paranoid” when Black Sabbath performs Monday at the Comcast Center in Mansfield.

Black Sabbath fired Osbourne in 1979 after the band’s tour behind the “Never Say Die!” record released the previous year. The original lineup regrouped for a couple of one-offs before a full reunion tour in 1997. Though the original lineup mounted additional reunion jaunts, it could not pull together new material, save for two studio tracks tacked onto the “Reunion” concert album. By 2002, Osbourne was off and running with his hit reality TV show. In 2006, Iommi and Butler resumed work with Dio, Osbourne’s original replacement in Black Sabbath, and that partnership flourished until the singer’s death in 2010.

Iommi, Osbourne, and Butler — along with drummer Tommy Clufetos filling in for Ward, who could not come to business terms with his band mates — raised the Black Sabbath banner last year for a few shows which preceded an announcement that the band was working on a new album with producer Rick Rubin.

Iommi credits Rubin for having Black Sabbath return to the sound of its early groundbreaking albums, records that are considered the cornerstones of heavy metal yet infused with jazz and blues influences.

“Rick asked us to wipe out the last 40 years,” Iommi says. “He said approach this like it was the second Black Sabbath album. It was difficult at first.”

Not only did Rubin guide the band back to its roots, the producer also convinced Black Sabbath to use Rage Against the Machine drummer Brad Wilk for the sessions (though Clufetos from Osbourne’s solo band is back in the fold for the tour).

“We tried various drummers, but they were not right for what we wanted,” Iommi says. “[Wilk] was nervous when we first met him. He had never played with us, and Rage Against the Machine is quite different. But after playing with us for a few days, he fit right in.”

Connecting with younger metal heads and heavy-music fans does not seem to be a problem for Black Sabbath. At a recent Heavy Metal Thursday, the weekly multi-band showcase held at Ralph’s Diner in Worcester, musicians and mavens there alike bowed down at the Sabbath altar.

“They started all the dark imagery and doom tunes. You had Led Zeppelin and Blue Cheer maybe playing a similar style back then, but they didn’t take in the whole imagery and dark, evil lyrics,” says Faces of Bayon guitarist Matt Smith.

Wren Leader, a booster of the Mass. metal scene, credits Iommi in particular for being the architect of that recognizable sound.

“It’s simple, but it’s not simple,” says Leader, singing Iommi’s chugging riff from 1971’s “Into the Void.” “You hear that all over the place.”

For a band that has written so much about impending doom, Black Sabbath certainly knows how to gracefully capture what is important to its members. Iommi was diagnosed with lymphoma in 2012, and says that making the new Black Sabbath album took on a sense of urgency. The sessions also proved to be therapeutic.

“It pushed me to be creative and took my mind off of what I was going through,” Iommi says. “It helped to have the band there, just laughing and joking.”

All through the recording and touring, Black Sabbath has worked around Iommi's ongoing treatment.
Iommi says that he expected the new album to do well commercially, figuring there would be a curiosity factor for what a new Sabbath album with Ozzy would sound like. But he did not expect it to be a top seller around the world.

“Getting a successful album was a great boost and a bonus,” Iommi says. “We just made a record that felt right for us.”
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com.

Slim Cessna's Auto Club feature, Providence Journal, Aug. 4, 2013

Music: Slim Cessna’s Auto Club to perform at The Met Café in Pawtucket 

Slim Cessna's Auto Club (Gary Isaacs photo)

By Scott McLennan

Special to the Journal

 A recent conversation with singer and band leader Slim Cessna brought to mind a line from Bob Dylan’s “Joey.”

“Always on the outside of whatever side there was.”

Slim Cessna’s Auto Club has been playing a fiery brand of rocking country music for 21 years, but hasn’t capitalized on various roots-rock trends the way that bands as different as Wilco and the Avett Brothers have been able to.

“Every two years something else comes along that’s popular and sort of what we do. It started with alternative country and now you’re seeing how banjo is popular,” Cessna says. “We have a banjo.”
But nobody will confuse Slim Cessna’s Auto Club with Mumford and Sons when the former plays Wednesday at Met Café in Pawtucket. The show will also feature the Sterling Sisters, a Gothic country band that includes Cessna’s son George, and Providence’s the ’mericans.

But the perennial outsiders in SCAC know the ins-and-outs of country, gospel, folk, and primal rock ’n’ roll. And those influences and styles get balled up in songs that never lack imagination.

During a spell in the early 2000s, Cessna lived in Providence and conjured the album “The Bloudy Tenent Truth & Peace,” a fictional history of Rhode Island (though one with an obvious nod to Roger Williams).

“How much of history do you think is true?” Cessna asks. “I mean, we know the characters are real, but what happened is tougher to know. It’s a lot more fun to have creative license.”

While in Rhode Island, Cessna was also part of the Blackstone Valley Sinners, and says he stays in touch with his Ocean State music connections such as Joe Fletcher even though Cessna is back in his native Colorado.

“Unentitled” is the last batch of original material from Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, and is full of moral parables and modern folklore (and for the totally uninitiated, the band will have copies of its primer “SCAC 102” made for a European tour available at its upcoming East Coast shows).

Cessna says growing up around church music taught him that gospel is as moving as rock ’n’ roll.
“Even if you’re not a believer, the music is powerful,” he says of the church traditions he learned as he was also listening to rock as a kid.

But Cessna says his first musical goal was to make a country band with his buddies.

“We were not good at it, and it turned into its own thing,” he says. “There are no rules.”

The first song on “Unentitled,” “Three Bloodhounds Two Shepherds One Fila Brasileiro,” upends bluegrass traditions for a sprawling bit of folkloric fable-building. A sinister rock ’n’ roll vibe courses through “Last Black Scarf.” And Cessna sounds like he is singing “Hallelujah Anyway” from the pulpit.

Cessna brings the fervor, and since 1999, Munly J Munly has been bringing the tunes to SCAC.
“He’s an amazing storyteller and into the folk tradition. He can write a great murder ballad and is familiar with so many American traditions,” Cessna says. “He wasn’t joining the band to be the songwriter, but got tossed into it. He’s just better at it than I am.”

The solid songs, multifaceted arrangements that include upright bass, pedal steel guitar, keys, drums and aforementioned banjo, plus the impassioned delivery of Cessna and Munly on vocals combine for word-of-mouth buzz that has helped SCAC build a following even though it can’t shake that outsider status.

“We just play all the time,” Cessna says. “I think we are for whoever likes experimental music. And they find us.”

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1.

Tedeschi Trucks Band/Black Crowes concert review, Boston Globe, Aug. 1, 2013

Double dose of rock with Tedeschi Trucks, Black Crowes

By Scott McLennan

Globe Staff   August 01, 2013

Several facets of good ol’ guitar boogie were on display when the Tedeschi Trucks Band and the Black Crowes brought their joint tour to the Bank of America Pavilion on Tuesday.

After a bit of greasy blues rock from the London Souls, the 11-piece Tedeschi Trucks ensemble played an explosive set that featured several songs from the forthcoming “Made Up Mind” album.

Together now for three years, the TTB is playing and writing at its highest level to date. The energy of the live performances has found its way into structure of the new songs, so there was far less searching for the right blend of tight precision and unleashed passion. Instead, the band intuitively coursed through the material with a polished finesse.

Guitarist Derek Trucks is the band’s anchor, carving indelible solos into every song. But the rest of the group is just as vital to the TTB’s overall vibe. Susan Tedeschi’s vocal work perfectly complements her husband’s guitar prowess, and the two exquisitely move the band through funky and soulful turns.

Opening with “Made Up Mind,” the TTB showed how much more propulsive its new songs are, a message reiterated with the closing whirlwind “The Storm.” Yet the band’s ability to move with a lighter touch was still intact on the new “It’s So Heavy.”

The TTB’s namesake leaders each took a spotlight turn, Trucks delivering a jazz-bent “Nobody’s Free” that featured tandem play with saxophonist Kebbi Williams, and Tedeschi plying a bouncy R&B tone with the new “Part of Me.”

The Black Crowes followed with a set that reached deeply into the band’s catalog as well as showcased some of its best-known songs. Singer Chris Robinson was the cheery pied piper tying together the glimmering psychedelia of “Peace Anyway” and “She Gave Good Sunflower” with the muscular boogie of “Remedy” and “Hard to Handle,” which now sandwiches an additional cover of “Hush”.

Guitarists Rich Robinson and Jackie Greene and keyboard player Adam MacDougall each had loads of solo time, especially on a sprawling “Wiser Time.” But the Crowes also pulled together solid ensemble work on an acoustic version of “She Talks to Angels” and a luminous “Girl From a Pawnshop.”

The Crowes and the TTB may have different styles, but they share a common ground, which they explored during the encore when the two bands (and London Souls guitarist Tash Neal) joined forces on rock ’n’ soul blowouts “Let’s Go Get Stoned” and “Turn on Your Love Light.”
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1.

Yes preview, Providence Journal, July 28, 2013

Legendary progressive-rock band Yes plays Twin River 

The reconstituted Yes, from left, Steve Howe, Geoff Downes, Jon Davison, Alan White, and Chris Squire. 

 

By Scott McLennan

Special to the Journal

The prog-rock luminaries of Yes are partially re-creating, partially re-imaging their 1970s heyday on a tour that has the band performing entire groundbreaking albums from the era.

Before it was the owner of a lonely heart, Yes conceived grand, thematic albums, and will be presenting two of them — “Close to the Edge” and “The Yes Album” — Friday at Twin River in Lincoln (other stops on the tour also get “Going for the One,” but casino venues have time restrictions on concerts).

Bassist Chris Squire, the only member of Yes to be in every lineup of the band since its 1968 inception, says that while the group is playing faithful renditions of the studio recordings, the outcomes are inevitably influenced by the musicians now in the band.

In 1971, Tony Kaye played the keyboard parts on “The Yes Album,” and Rick Wakeman handled the task on 1972’s “Close to the Edge.” Current keyboard player Geoff Downes has a history with Yes, joining in 1980 for the “Drama” record, and later reconnecting with the band in 2011.

“He’s going to cover the parts of Tony Kaye and Rick Wakeman but play with his own flavors,” Squire says of Downes.

Drummer Alan White likewise did not join Yes until right after “Close to the Edge” was recorded, but has been with the band since.

But the most significant change in Yes comes in the vocals department. Founding member Jon

Anderson was the recognizable voice of Yes from its beginning until 2004. Last year, Jon Davison became the second singer to take on Anderson’s role.

“The real good news is that Jon Davison is doing a fantastic job,” Squire says. “Our audience really likes him.”

While “whole album” concerts have become popular over the past few years, Yes had not done such a show before, playing every song in the order it appears on a given full-length.

“We try to honor the originals as much as possible. Some of these songs got stretched out live. We consciously went about restructuring songs to their original format. We took some of the jamming out of it,” Squire says.

The trade-off is hearing guitarist Steve Howe perform all of “The Yes Album,” his first outing with the band, one in which it made a seismic shift toward the orchestrated and classical motifs that would shape the band’s music for the remainder of the decade.

With “Close to the Edge,” Yes arguably hit its perfect balance of long-form exploring and melodic grandeur.

Squire says that it is common now for him to see a new generation of Yes fans showing up at his concerts. “Kids of the original fans are getting into the music,” he says. “That’s good for me.”

The overall health of the Yes-dom will be on display Saturday in Camden, N.J., for the first Yestival, a day of music by likeminded bands such as Volto!, which feature’s Tool’s Danny Carey, and Carl Palmer’s ELP Legacy playing alongside Yes.

“It’s something we wanted to do for years, and if it all goes well, in 2014 we’ll tour with a festival,” Squire says.

There’s also the possibility that the Squire-Howe-White-Downes-Davison lineup will make a new Yes album.

“One of the good things about having had people come in and out of the band is that whenever a new member comes in he has his own ideas, and that will give a slightly different slant to what Yes actually does,” Squire says, using the example of guitarist Trevor Rabin’s entrance in 1983, which triggered a hard turn into a sleeker sound that produced the band’s only #1 hit in the United States, “Owner of a Lonely Heart.”

“Whatever we make will be made organically,” Squire says. “You can’t force new music.”

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1.
Yes

Friday, 8 p.m.

Twin River Casino Event Center, 100 Twin River Rd., Lincoln

$45-$125, www.ticketmaster.com. (877) 827-4837

 

 

Summer Arts Weekend review, Boston Globe, July 28, 2013

Music review

Summer Arts show revels in diversity, dancing

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent   July 28, 2013

Angelique Kidjo performing at Copley Square (Boston Globe photo)

 
The second annual Summer Arts Weekend turned Copley Square into a world dance party Saturday night, with pipers, drummers, horn players, and the sumptuous voice of headliner Angelique Kidjo transcending genre and ethnic boundaries.

Ukulele player Jake Shimabukuro, Galician piper Carlos Nunez, Italian blues guitarist Noe Socha, the world-music mash-up troupe Red Baraat, Boston’s own Session Americana, and Benin’s Kidjo supplied more than eight hours of rhythm-rich music that at times had the audience lined hand-in-hand dancing around the park. Then there were times when the music held that same crowd in rapt attention, as when Berklee-trained Socha dug into Django Reinhardt’s “Nuages” or Barrence Whitfield tapped the emotional resonance of Merle Haggard’s “Irma Jackson” with Session Americana.

The plaza at Copley Square was packed by the time Shima-bukuro wrapped up his set with George Harrison’s “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” a tune that transferred quite nicely to uke.
Nunez and his band followed with one mesmerizing tune after the other, bending the bagpipe tradition to summon Middle Eastern and Latin American influences alongside the Celtic core of his work.

 

Boston violinist Katie McNally and a cadre of local pipers joined Nunez for a few numbers. McNally touched on the significance of the festival’s broad sense of community happening so close to where the city suffered tragedy just months ago at the Boston Marathon.

 

Socha was not scheduled to play Saturday, but caused such a buzz with his set on the preceding night that organizers brought him back. And once again he sparked the crowd with a mixed bag of soul, blues, and jazz, all played with a flowing ease and intense passion.

Brooklyn’s Red Baraat stormed the stage with a sound that fused hip-hop, jazz, and Indian folk music for something that was greater than the sum of its parts and simply impossible not to move to.

The Session Americana set turned into a celebration of the diversity in Boston’s music scene. The Session ensemble first played its own “Raking Through the Ashes,” giving the festival a taste of the tight-knit musicianship the group has for years displayed at the Lizard Lounge in Cambridge. Then the ensemble welcomed Ryan Montbleau, Nicole Nelson, Zoe Christiansen, Zach Sherwin, and Whitfield, who each played a couple of songs with the group.

Montbleau, Nelson, and Whitfield sang songs that spanned New Orleans soul, pop, and country. Sherwin performed comic raps, and clarinet player Christiansen led the band through klezmer numbers, further expanding the band’s brand of “Americana.”

Kidjo closed the show with a fiery set that started with a few contemplative ballads that showcased the depth of her band then launched into a dance party.

Kidjo invited Shimabukuro on stage for a sweet rendition of “Over the Rainbow.” Kidjo also covered Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song,” but was at her most infectious grooving to her own tunes, and at one point had audience members on stage grooving right along with her.

Summer Arts Weekend continued Sunday with the Boston Landmarks Orchestra, Alison Krauss, and others.
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. 

 

Robert Plant concert review, Boston Globe, July 26, 2013

Robert Plant gives old songs new life

By Scott McLennan 

Globe Correspondent  

July 26, 2013

We’ve heard from the Stones and a Beatle already this summer, and on Thursday, Robert Plant continued the invasion of vintage Brits.

Yet playing with his latest ensemble, the Sensational Shape Shifters, Plant hardly seemed tethered to the past, even as his show at the Bank of America Pavilion was heavy on material from his days in Led Zeppelin. And when Plant went back to Zep, he went way back, focusing on songs from that band’s first four albums.

Yet with the Shape Shifters, Plant found fresh ways into the classics, such as having “Whole Lotta Love” erupt from a swampy blues, or whipping “Four Sticks” into a world beat frenzy with the aid of Gambian Shape Shifter Juldeh Camara, who played a variety of African instruments during the set.

Plant also reached back in his catalog of solo albums. A sleek “In the Mood,” for example, followed the thunder of “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” that opened the concert.

Plant was strong in voice through the 90-minute set and remains an easygoing, yet captivating front man.

He made a few jokes at the expense of Journey and the Rolling Stones, and told a few tales, particularly when introducing classic blues numbers such as “Spoonful” and “Fixin’ to Die.”

But for the most part he simply fell into the music, which he guided through acoustic ballads — “Going to California” being the gem — and techno-flourished tunes, such as the sinister-sounding “Tin Pan Valley.”

The band stretched out on songs such as “The Enchanter” and “Another Tribe,” bringing to life deeper tracks from Plant’s catalog.

But the show peaked with a clutch of Zep tunes toward the end. There, Plant captured and connected the cosmic swirl that links his past to his present.

The rearranged “Whole Lotta Love” and a finale of “Rock and Roll” likewise satisfied the crowd but let Plant remain an inventive artist.

Phosphorescent opened the show with a nice set of sprawling, cinematic tunes.
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com

 

A bevy of Boston by Beat posts

Peter Malick, left, and Butch Norton

 

 

 

 

Recently in the Boston by Beat blog, I checked in on Brookline-bred guitarist Peter Maclick's new adventures with the Luxury Wafers record label he started in L.A. with his wife, the reunion of Boston funk band Chucklehead, and some great new work being done by the band Fixed Bayonets. There's also a new video from rising star Kingsley Flood. You can check out all of those posts by clicking here.

'Beyond a Love Supreme,' book review, Boston Globe, July 22, 2013

‘Beyond a Love Supreme’ by Tony Whyton

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent   July 22, 2013

Tony Whyton’s “Beyond a Love Supreme: John Coltrane and the Legacy of an Album” is as baffling as its subject is illuminating.

Whyton, a professor of jazz and musical cultures at Salford University in England, presents four interlocking essays about John Coltrane’s 1964 masterpiece, “A Love Supreme,” which in sum attempt to provide fresh insight into the work’s influence on jazz as well as on a broader culture.

Whyton culls and reiterates various musical, spiritual, political, and social assessments that “A Love Supreme” has generated, and he decides that somehow all of the viewpoints have stifled “critical listening,” which sounds contradictory; it seems that the mountain of scholarship available to Whyton for commentary is the byproduct of much critical listening.

Just how vexing a slog it can be getting through the book is illustrated in Whyton’s conclusion: “By moving beyond ‘A Love Supreme’ we can understand how recordings have the potential to be viewed both as reified objects with dominant or fixed meanings and as fluid cultural signifiers.”

This is both a “no kidding” observation and cop-out on Whyton’s part to assess or challenge the significance of the album today. He is even neutral on the radical adoptions of “A Love Supreme” as sacred text and political statement, occurrences that now seem more quaint than relevant, yet merit the comment, “Rather than seeking to challenge the deification of Coltrane, I suggest that perhaps it is more useful to examine why musicians and audiences feel the need to treat the artist as divine and perpetuate mythologies in this way.”

So why not follow that thread?

Instead, we get an essay on jazz “binaries,” another on canonical works, one on the reception of Coltrane’s work made after “A Love Supreme,” and a finale focused on the album’s influence on other forms of art.

In his first chapter, “Elation-Elegance-Exaltation,” Whyton is convinced that jazz studies are populated with “either/or” dichotomies: Are records or concerts most valuable; is composition or improvisation most relevant; and so on. And while he ably finds opposing points of view, there is never a compelling case to believe that such a black-and-white narrative is the norm, and a listener can easily appreciate the album on some sort of middle ground. Likewise, Whyton never posits why “A Love Supreme” alone undermines these perceived binaries.

In chapter 2, “From Reification to Deification,” Whyton maintains that canonizing “A Love Supreme” is a problem. But the tendency to make “best-of” lists is not just a jazz phenomenon or even just a music phenomenon. Whyton is correct in asserting that any boilerplate understanding of “A Love Supreme” will never replace an engaged listening to the album, but he is not convincing in arguing that canonization precludes such a listen.

Coltrane’s pivot toward the avant-garde after “A Love Supreme” was a bold move, and Whyton is at his most cogent discussing the upheavals caused by “Ascension,” “Interstellar Space” and “The Olatunji Concert.” Writing about the saxophonist’s wailing arrangement of “My Favorite Things” — his pre-“Supreme” melodic signature — for the “Olatunji Concert,” Whyton asserts that Coltrane uses a bit of his past to help listeners relate to his present.

In his last chapter, “A Love Supreme Remixed,” Whyton observes the impact of Coltrane’s masterwork on other art forms. He airs interesting discussions on Coltrane poetry and how the mere appropriation of or allusion to the album’s title can influence the reception of a book or film.

But Whyton makes dubious claims when he writes about “ideological control” of the work. For instance, Whyton considers Wynton Marsalis’s version of the suite recorded in 2004 as an attempt to cancel out Coltrane’s avant-gardism and assert “Coltrane as the hero of the neo-traditionalist mainstream.”

Whyton’s survey ultimately brings nothing new to consider about “A Love Supreme” and his framework — faulty or not — could have just as easily fit any jazz album held up as a classic.

BEYOND A LOVE SUPREME

Author:

Tony Whyton

Publisher:

Oxford University

Number of pages:

132 pp.

Book price:

$17.95

 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com.

Pokey LaFarge feature, Boston Globe, July 18, 2013

Pokey LaFarge’s ‘riverboat chic’

 

Pokey LaFarge

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent    July 18, 2013

Pokey LaFarge’s music works on a couple of levels. With a cursory listen, it’s obvious that LaFarge and his band are drawing from a well of musical history. The pluck-pluck rhythms, woozy cornet blasts, and LaFarge’s Midwestern croon are evocative of a trip down the Mississippi, and have been dubbed “riverboat chic.”

But dig a little deeper and LaFarge’s music is hardly a museum-quality re-creation; it’s as much a mongrel as anything you’d consider truly American. Jazz, blues, and country collide in LaFarge’s music. He trades purity for alchemy and ends up with something that is ultimately contemporary.

“I’m an evolutionary musician,” says LaFarge when reached by phone while traveling through East Tennessee on a tour that brings his band to Boston on Saturday. “I learned my roots, but want to be my own person. I’m not trying to copy anybody. But it’s important to evolve through preservation.”

LaFarge says that in his teens he listened to a lot of the same sorts of classic rock most kids latch onto, but once he discovered the blues, he became far more interested in that. As he studied more styles of traditional music, he was left to wonder why so few of his generation were as enthusiastic as he was about roots music.

“I found out who I am through my curiosity,” he says. “Through music, I learned about my country, and I learned about people.”

But what he’s seen among his peers is either a complete rejection of the past or ambivalence toward it.

“I’m in my 30s. A lot of people my age are not listening to older music. It’s like they are ashamed of the past. I talk up the great things this country has to offer. There is a diversity to be proud of,” he says, and targets what he considers one of the problems: “Corporations are running the country and telling us what our culture is.’’

LaFarge says he is most popular in the working-class venues he plays in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana.

“I relate to people there and my music goes over better there than in other places,” he says.

One shock to the system of the St. Louis musician was seeing how the South is producing a fraction of the traditional music it once did.

“There’s just a lot of crappy pop country music being made in places that used to put out such good music,” he says.

LaFarge sets aside polemics in his music and instead tells stories, about good times and bad times, that touch upon the American character.

For example, his new self-titled record opens with “Central Time,” a cheery ode to no-coast dwellers. There are songs about summer in the city, Kentucky sweethearts, and the devil’s temptations.

As Caitlin Rose, who provided harmony vocals for two songs on LaFarge’s new album, says, “I’m not into the idea of throwbacks, and I don’t think he is. He is so much more genuine than that.”

Rose calls LaFarge a “born entertainer,” and his live shows certainly spread his appeal among a grassroots network of music fans. This year, LaFarge is drawing even more attention. He has performed on an album by and opened concerts for Jack White, whose Third Man Records released LaFarge’s album. This week LaFarge performed on the “Late Show With David Letterman.” One of LaFarge’s songs made it onto the “Lone Ranger” soundtrack, and he and members of his band landed a cameo in the film.

LaFarge says this album, which follows the acclaimed “Middle of Everywhere” and “Riverboat Soul” records, is his most crafted to date. Ketch Secor of Old Crow Medicine Show co-produced the record, and LaFarge says it was the first time he spent more than two days in the studio working on a project.

“Having Ketch there was great. He knows me and he knows my music,” LaFarge says. “He wasn’t always right, but he inspired me.”

And even though LaFarge spent more time taking advantage of the studio, he did not derail the easy feel of his earlier work. If anything, the use of strings, clarinet, and piano simply add nuance to LaFarge’s music.

“Songs should be natural. Some may take five minutes to write, most take longer, but it doesn’t matter as long as it sounds natural,” he says.

Songwriting to this point, LaFarge says, has been about learning about himself and the world around him. Moving forward, he wants to write more songs that add commentary to the mix.

“I look forward to being more socially conscious in songs,” he says. “There are a lot of things that need to be talked about.”
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1.

Outside the Box music review, Boston Globe, July 22, 2013

Music Review

Outside the Box music tells Boston stories

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent   July 22, 2013

Mighty Mighty Bosstones' Dicky Barrett (Boston Globe photo)

 
The finale to concerts held on the Boston Common as part of the Outside the Box arts festival could not have had a more pronounced Boston accent, as the Mighty Mighty Bosstones, the Lemonheads, and Buffalo Tom drew thousands to the free show in the park Saturday evening.

Say what you will about Aerosmith, Boston, the J. Geils Band, and Dropkick Murphys, but the Mighty Mighty Bosstones is the most Boston of Boston bands. The ska-core crew sang about city history with “Rascal King”; its own experiences forming a band in the city on “Toxic Toast” and “Dr. D”; growing up in the city with “Sunday Afternoons on Wisdom Ave.”; and the fight to preserve the city’s character with “I Want My City Back” and “They Came to Boston.”

As just those Hub-centric tunes show, the overall 27-song set list spanned the Bosstones’ career. And even though the band performs just a fraction of the number of concerts it did in its ’90s heyday, the nine men clad in plaid now scattered around the world rather than raising hell together on Queensberry Street can still pull together a tight show, one that easily shifts from provocative commentary to sheer exuberance.

Early in the nearly two-hour-long concert, the Bosstones dusted off the rarity “The Common Decency,” a song reintroduced during December’s Hometown Throwdown shows at the House of Blues but since tightened up into a simmering reggae meditation about the need for people to get along. The sentiment seemed to go over as the pockets of moshers and families there to see the concert were able to stake out respective areas close to the stage.

The concert was a swirl of old ska-core gems such as “Kinder Words” and “Hell of a Hat”; big hits such as “The Impression That I Get” (fleshed out with six teenage horn players from Ipswich); and newer songs such as “They Will Need Music” and “Like a Shotgun.”

A celebratory vibe carried into the encores with guest appearances by Dropkick Murphys guitarist James Lynch on “The Daylights” and “A Pretty Sad Excuse” and Bim Skala Bim trombonist Vinnie Nobile on “The Old School Off the Bright.” The Bosstones also used the occasion to announce that this year’s Throwdown is set for Dec. 27-29.

The Bosstones were not alone in expanding ranks Saturday. Buffalo Tom began the trend by inviting Lemonheads leader Evan Dando onstage to sing “Thirteen,” Big Star’s ode to adolescence.

Buffalo Tom’s hourlong opening set was a trove of indie-pop craftsmanship that wove in psychedelic, Brit-pop, and country influences. Bill Janovitz appropriately threw himself into “Summer,” sweltering heat be damned. And while the weather whacked out guitar tunings, Buffalo Tom still conjured the exuberant tumble of “Treehouse” and ache of “I’m Allowed.”

Dando’s current version of the Lemonheads includes guitarist Chris Brokaw, on a break from the Come reunion tour, and drummer Todd Philips, known for his work in Bullet LaVolta and Juliana Hatfield’s band, who sent out a Tweet announcing the show Saturday was his first in Boston in more than a decade.

The set also included an appearance by original Lemonhead Ben Deily playing guitar and singing on “Don’t Tell Yourself” and “Uhhh,” songs where the Lemonheads were still in the throes of punk rock as the band worked on sharper indie-pop writing.

In “Hannah and Gabi” and “Hospital,’’ you could hear how the Lemonheads’ sound matured into a dark romanticism. And with “It’s a Shame About Ray” and “Into Your Arms” you were left wondering why the Lemonheads aren’t a few more steps up the recognition ladder.
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com

Something Bloody metal fest preview, Providence Journal, July 21, 2013

Something Bloody Metal Fest gives Rhode Island fans a place to bang their heads

By Scott McLennan

Special to the Journal

A particularly aggressive, purposefully abrasive and awfully loud brand of music that has spent most of the last decade in the underground is finally getting its day in the sun — literally.

The Something Bloody Metal Fest will feature an outdoor stage at Dusk, the Providence music nightclub that has put Rhode Island on the heavy-metal map. Dusk has been running a weekly heavy-metal night on Wednesdays for more than a year and the fest will use the club’s indoor stage as well as a temporary outdoor set-up to present 30 bands next weekend.

The weekly series has cultivated homegrown talent such as Bog of the Infidel and Witch King as well as provided an Ocean State stop for traveling bands within this tight-knit and independent music scene.

Something Bloody Metal Fest celebrates all of that. Among the top-billed acts are Dawnbringer from Illinois, Dehumanized and Malignancy from New York, Satan’s Satyrs from Virginia, and Cauchemar from Canada. But the top spot on Sunday goes to Phlegm, a Providence death-metal troupe that disbanded 10 years ago and is reuniting for the fest. And local metal maven Bob Otis will be playing both days, first with Lolita Black, and then on Sunday with I, Destroyer.

“We were limited to 30 bands. There were quite a few bands we talked about, and just had to pick,” says Tom Sly, who plays in Thrillhouse and first approached Dusk about booking metal bands there in 2011. “We wanted to focus on the local scene and bring together the bands that helped us get going. And then get bands like Dehumanized, bands we really enjoy and who influenced us.”

Dusk owner Rick Sunderland has been impressed by the metal community he has welcomed into the club. In the three years that he has operated the venue, Sunderland has always wanted to stage an outdoor festival on the property, and the metal option seemed the one most likely to succeed, he says.

“It’s hard, aggressive music, but the audience is incredible. They are the most chill, awesome people who enjoy intense music,” says Sunderland, who books rock and dance music as well at Dusk. “There’s never been a problem.”

Singer Mallika Sundaramurthy will be performing at the fest Saturday with her band Abnormality, which has grown from a local attraction in Massachusetts into a touring juggernaut with a fan base spread across the country and into Europe. She traces the roots of her success back to a time when she and Sly and Providence’s Corey Gomes, who has produced two music videos for Abnormality, were putting on concerts in fans’ basements.

“It’s a community where people form lasting relationships. We’ve been helped and we want to help by putting on awesome shows,” she says. Abnormality has played the Dusk metal series and Sundaramurthy helped land some of the bands coming to the fest.

Traveling around the country, Sundaramurthy has seen that what metal bands can tap into in New England does not exist everywhere.

“We’ll go to places where there are only two death-metal bands in town and they only play together,” she says. “There’s a lot of talent in this scene.”

And it’s diverse talent. The newer strains of metal are both more brash and more technically complex than previous generations of loud. As Something Bloody’s lineup illustrates, metal runs a gamut from the punishing brutality of the death-metal style to the more cerebral and groove-oriented strains such as Gothic doom metal and lava-like stoner rock.

“Metal is the only genre I can think of that totally subsumes other styles. You can play jazz-metal or classical-metal or punk-metal. I think that’s what attracts musicians to metal. It challenges you,” Sly says.

And within the metal underground, it’s common to see the different sub-styles mixed together.
Progressive-metal band Dawnbringer, for example, most recently released the flowing, melodic concept album “Into the Lair of the Sun God,” which sounds exactly opposite to the guttural blurts and blasts of Phlegm.

“I think variety is taken for granted these days on a festival billing and for the most part fans seem to embrace that,” says Dawnbringer’s Chris Black. “Of course there will be the hardliners in any crowd, but in the Internet age and especially in New England I think the fans have a broad palate.”

Black has played in and produced a variety of metal bands, and at this stage doesn’t even wonder if a particular project “is metal enough.”

“It’s never a question I ask myself nowadays.” Black says. “Heavy metal is part of my intuition, and I have learned to trust both completely.”

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1.
Something Bloody Metal Fest
Saturday at 2 pm.
Sunday at 4 pm.
Dusk, 301 Harris Ave.,
Providence
$19.99 per day; $34.99
for two-day ticket.
brownpapertickets.com
(401) 714-0444
For daily lineups, see the
Facebook page for Something Bloody metal nights

Eagles concert review, Providence Journal, July 20, 2013

Home > features > entertainment

Concert Review: Eagles play with their history in rockin' set at Comcast Center 

By SCOTT McLENNAN

Special to the Journal

MANSFIELD — On its current “History of the Eagles” tour, the famously fractured band displays how it evolved and derailed, tracing a chronological path from cowboy songs to tunes of glitz and decay, simultaneously mythologizing itself and setting up a parable for the 1970s, when the Eagles truly soared.

Playing Friday at the Comcast Center, The Eagles divided the concert into two halves. The first focused on the peaceful, easy feeling of the band’s first few albums that crested with such hits as “One of These Nights” and “Take it to the Limit.” Part two picked up on the slick and jaded material from “Hotel California” and “The Long Run.” The band also nicely fleshed out the second set with material from guitarist Joe Walsh’s career outside of the Eagles (though tossing in a tune from the “Hell Freezes Over” reunion set from 1994 seemed superfluous).

History is written by the winners, as they say, and the Eagles took advantage of that by reconfiguring some of the story line. For instance, original Eagles guitarist Bernie Leadon was welcomed back into the fold for the first time since departing in 1975, and allowed to play during the first set. Walsh, who replaced Leadon, joined in on the early cuts as well, though Leadon was mothballed for the second set until the encores.

Such decisions fall to Eagles founders Glenn Frey and Don Henley. Those two opened the concert with an acoustic version of “Saturday Night.” That and other deep cuts such as “Train Leaves Here This Morning” and the “Doolin-Dalton” material from the “Desperado” record were nice detours from previous tours that focused on the hits.

The segment of early songs also unfolded like a blueprint for today’s pop country and bro-folk.

Video clips of Frey and Henley talking about the early days of the Eagles were almost mockumentary bits, given the self-aggrandizing tone of the history lessons. Better were the onstage stories about how the Eagles connected to a California music scene of the early 1970s populated with Linda Ronstadt, Jackson Browne, and original Eagles bassist and Poco member Randy Meisner.

The creeping cynicism of the latter-day Eagles surfaced early in the second set with the opening number “Pretty Maids All in a Row.” While Frey pumped up the crowd with a sing-along version of “Heartache Tonight,” it was Walsh who stormed the gates for the show’s second half; and really, wasn’t that his job when joining the Eagles, to be the wild guitarist?

Actually, all of the roles were well played and comfortably predictable. The band simply tweaked the script a little, and gave the packed house a somewhat fresh way to view the Eagles story.

 

Furthur at Bank of America Pavilion, Boston, July 17, 2013

Furthur

Jerry Garcia wasn't kidding when he spoke of the "X factor" that turned Grateful Dead concerts transcendent. The joke at the time, of course, was that it wasn't the X, but three other letters responsible for the madhouse revelry available for the taking at a Dead concert.

But since Garcia's death in 1995, the remaining members of the Grateful Dead have never really taken the band's music into the places it once did_ especially into those bittersweet spaces of simultaneous gain and loss Garcia so beautifully articulated with his playing and singing on pieces such as "Birdsong," "Sugaree," and "He's Gone."

Two of those songs_ "Sugaree" and "He's Gone"_ plus a whole lot more Garcia-identified material filled the set list when Furthur opened a two-night stand at the Bank of America Pavilion in Boston on Wednesday, July 17 (the band is back on the 18th).

Recap for you all keeping score: Furthur is the band that guitarist Bob Weir and bassist Phil Lesh, both of the Grateful Dead, put together in 2009. By that point, there had been several iterations of post-Jerry bands involving various original members. The last time all four survivors_ drummers Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart plus Lesh and Weir_ threw down was a 2008 tour that had Warren Haynes playing lead guitar. Those shows were tentative affairs, as if the Dead was not sure what direction to head. Furthur settled the question by hiring John Kadlecik, who played the part of Jerry in Dark Star Orchestra, a Grateful Dead cover band.

In taking the preservationist route, Furthur is a consistently pleasing band, though one less likely to peer over the edge. Song selections are drawn up in advance to create concerts with a discernible flow, whereas the original Grateful Dead made it up as the shows went along; sometimes you ended up in paradise, sometimes you ended up beneath a tangled heap of busted notes.

That being said, Furthur is still an old-school band more in service to the music than to a showbiz ideal and is as apt to have off nights as it is stellar ones _ a true sign of what you'd call "real music."

Thursday was an on night for the troupe. Weir seemed to be the leader on this occasion, taking a lot of the lead vocals and showcasing his signature tunes. After warming up the first set with "Passenger" and "Crazy Fingers," Weir triggered a nice, flowing sequence of shuffling shuck and jive with "I Need a Miracle" that bled  into the Willie Dixon-Howlin' Wolf signature "Wang Dang Doodle" and ended up at "Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo."

Kadlecik did his job picking the Jerry parts and soloing in Garcia mode, but the most memorable leads and solos of the night came from keyboard player Jeff Chimenti, a veteran of Weir's band Ratdog.

The only clunker in the first set came when Lesh sang Ryan Adam's "Let it Ride." The rest of the band gingerly worked through the arrangement as Lesh bleated out the lyrics. Weir salvaged the set with a lovely take on Garcia's "Sugaree" that tweaked the vocal arrangement in a manner that let him work his way into the tune's emotional core without having to retrace Garcia's original path.

The second set was a relaxed, sprawling web. Weir again stepped up, opening the set with his epic "Weather Report Suite." One of the nice things about Furthur is its willingness to perform songs the Dead did not play when Garcia was alive. With Garcia, the band would usually only play "Let it Grow," otherwise known as "Part II" of the suite. Furthur does the whole thing, starting with the pastoral prelude.

The entire second set focused on vintage Grateful Dead, no songs past 1973. Weir stayed heavy in the mix even through Kadlecik's turns on "He's Gone" and "New Speedway Boogie," the latter setting a blues tone that would thicken on Weir's reading of "Black Peter" toward the end of the concert.

"Uncle John's Band" served as a mid-set anthem, with the gang vocals swelling the song's sense of idealism.

After working in lush grooves for nearly two hours, the band rocked out the finale with a version of "Not Fade Away" that sandwiched "Going Down the Road Feeling Bad," a sequence that had  drummer Joe Russo making crafty rhythm shifts.

For its encore, Furthur played "Ripple," a pretty bow for a nicely put-together package.

Shakespearean Jazz Show, Boston by Beat, July 16, 2013

The Shakespearean Jazz show brings together the words of Shakepeare and the jazz of New Orleans. Conceived at Emerson College (with help from students at Berklee College of Music), the Shakespearean Jazz Show lets the Bard's words fly, according to Alex Ates, who conceived the show. To read an interview with Ates, click here.

Phil Anselmo CD review, Boston Globe, July 16, 2013

Philip H. Anselmo and the Illegals, ‘Walk Through Exits Only’

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent  

July 16, 2013

On “Walk Through Exits Only,” Phil Anselmo expands his heavy-metal empire, taking over a piece of tough, guttural turf that sounds distinctly different from his previous work with Pantera, Down, and Superjoint Ritual. Credited to Philip H. Anselmo & the Illegals, “Exits” is a raw brand of battle metal full of barking vocals, squealing guitars, and martial rhythms. Despite his place among metal royalty, Anselmo remains a convincing outsider, partially because he doesn’t exclude himself from his own rants. On “Betrayed,” Anselmo asks how he could have slept soundly after acknowledging “mass obliquity” around him. On the title track, as Anselmo bemoans corrosion in music he bellows, “Everybody ruins music, not just me.” The difference between Anselmo and others is that he sets out to fix whatever ruination he sees. Judging from “Exits,” complacency is the enemy, and to that end, Anselmo tears down, builds up, and howls on. (Out Tuesday)
ESSENTIAL “Walk Through Exits Only”

Philip H. Anselmo & the Illegals perform Aug. 13 at the Palladium in Worcester.

Los Lobos review, Boston Globe, July 14, 2013

MUSIC REVIEW

Outside the Box opens with festive spirit

By Scott McLennan

 Globe correspondent    July 14, 2013

Los Lonely Boys (Boston Globe photo)

 
Los Lobos, Los Lonely Boys, and Alejandro Escovedo christened the main stage of the Outside the Box festival, heating up the Boston Common on a Saturday afternoon with a spirited package of Mex-American roots rock.

Though the three bands are currently touring together, the interplay among them fed into the festival spirit of generating artistic sparks that occur in unique musical settings and partnerships.
Outside the Box’s uniqueness stems from its sheer size — a week of free music, dance, and theater performances on multiple stages in the Common and at City Hall Plaza.

Mingling with fans before his set, Escovedo said the festival was good for Boston as the city recovers from the Marathon bombings. During his show, he dedicated the ballad “Sensitive Boys” to those affected by that tragedy.

The crowd was still pretty thin for Escovedo’s opening set, but that did not deter the singer from delivering a gale-force cover of Neil Young’s “Like A Hurricane.”

Los Lonely Boys followed, hitting the stage earlier than planned and deploying an hour of jam-heavy blues rock that eventually lured out Los Lobos sax man Steve Berlin, then guitarist David Hidalgo and drummer Enrique “Bugs” Gonzalez. The Lobos-Lonely tandem delivered a jazz-inflected version of “Friday Night,” which built a nice contrast into the set. Los Lonely Boys’ guitarist and singer Henry Garza turned most numbers into extended jams with bassist Jojo Garza, though all of the free flowing playing gathered up nicely for a finale of the band’s signature hit “Heaven.”

Los Lobos remains a vibrant and versatile live act. The acoustic beginnings from last year’s shows around these parts, for instance, were shelved and the band came out rocking with “Will the Wolf Survive?”

Hidalgo and fellow guitarists Cesar Rosas and Louie Perez crafted rich textures whether playing a folksy cumbia or a gritty blues. The band divvied up its set between popular numbers such as “The Neighborhood” and “Matter of Time” and guest shots and cover songs.

Escovedo joined Los Lobos to play “Rebel Kind,” a song from his days in the True Believers, and “Rosalie” (which Escovedo says he wrote after hearing Rosas’s song of the same name).

All of the Los Lonely Boys joined Los Lobos, turning “Don’t Worry Baby” into a sprawling roadhouse blowout. Boston blues howler Barrence Whitfield joined the band on “Georgia Slop”

Even with all of the great songs it has penned, Los Lobos still has fun digging into other artists’ bags. On Saturday, Rosas sang “Papa Was a Rolling Stone” which transitioned into Hidalgo’s take on “One Way Out.”

Los Lobos also stirred the crowd, which had swelled from the point it was at when Escovedo began the show, with the Grateful Dead’s “Bertha” and then later delivered its best-known cover, “La Bamba” (which itself contained a bit of the Rascal’s “Good Lovin’.”)

The three simpatico bands gave Outside the Box an appropriately festive start for a lengthy celebration of the arts.
 

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1

Gogol Bordello feature, Providence Journal, July 14, 2013

Gogol Bordello

July 14, 2013 01:00 AM

By Scott McLennan

Special to The Journal

 

Eugene Hütz laughs when asked if he considers himself “a citizen of the world.” “Citizen of the world?

"That makes me think of someone in a tuxedo and cocktail in hand,” Hütz says when reached in Norway where he was on tour with his band Gogol Bordello.

As anyone who has ever seen Gogol Bordello knows, Hütz is more of a shirtless and jug-of-wine kind of guy. But when it comes to music, Hütz is a globetrotter, pouring European and Latin folk styles into a percolating mix that smacks of punk audacity even as it revels in Gypsy rhythms.
Gogol Bordello is set to release its sixth studio album “Pura Vida Conspiracy” on July 23 and will be at Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel just ahead of that on July 21.

Hütz, who was born in Kiev and moved to the U.S. in 1991, has been at the center of Gogol Bordello since its start in 1999 when a bunch of immigrant musicians banded together in Brooklyn. The group’s membership has been evolving, though it has kept a focus on matching multiethnic roots with contemporary edge.

Around the time Gogol Bordello made its previous album, “Trans-Continental Hustle,” Hütz moved to Brazil, but it wasn’t until “Pura Vida Conspiracy” that the dynamics of the change really set in.

“I think in general, the last few years as a band have been about extracting wisdom out of psychodrama. The touring cliché of sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll applied,” Hütz says. “I called the last record ‘Trans-Continental Hustle’ because it encapsulated the endless departures and arrivals and drunken goodbyes.”

While at first worried that having the band members scattered around the world would hurt Gogol Bordello, Hütz says that quite the opposite happened.

“Not being in the same neighborhood extracted the unifying qualities of the band. This album feels like dancing around the fire together,” Hütz says. “Before, I think people saw a songwriter with a band. But this is a band, and that’s a precious feeling to acquire, that feeling of dancing around the fire. You can’t pay for that. It happens by being in the trenches together.”

That feeling translated into songs on “Pura Vida Conspiracy” that seemingly conjure a modern folklore that blends rustic storytelling with contemporary commentary. The songs range from the uplifting “Malandrino” and “We Rise Again” to the cautionary “The Way You Name Your Ship” and “John the Conqueror.”

Gogol Bordello is still a sprawling affair of eight members with accordion and violin spicing the material, which typically gallops in a manner befitting the band’s frenetic live shows. But “Pura Vida Conspiracy” does offer a bit more restraint than previous Gogol blowouts.

“Every record we make is quite different from the one that comes before it,” Hütz says. “The big moment on this one was realizing that great artistic truth that the whole world knows that less is more. We were very close to proving the opposite. For a while we looked like we would be successful with more is more.”

Hütz says that studying Eastern philosophy led him to the fresh attitude with the band. And Hütz is careful to not let audience expectations steer the group.

“When you’re on stage, you’re subject to people projecting what they think of you. You can oblige that and let them live out their fantasies, or you can develop authentically,” Hütz says, adding that he noticed the problem after being in the films “Everything Is Illuminated” and “Filth and Wisdom.” “That’s why I left movies. I didn’t want to be typecast as the crazy Russian guy.”

But certainly there are forces in the entertainment business telling Hütz that duplicating successful formulas is the way to go. And he says that is true, there are those people who would be happy if Gogol Bordello just kept re-making its breakthrough “Gypsy Punks” record.

“That’s what kung fu is for,” he says.

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter ScottMcLennan1.

The Neighborhoods feature, Providence Journal, July 7, 2013

The Neighborhoods to perform at Ocean Mist in Wakefield

July 07, 2013 12:01 AM 

The Neighborhoods, from left, Lee Harrington, Dave Minehan, and Johnny Lynch

By Scott McLennan

Special to The Journal

When the Neighborhoods called it quits after 14 years in 1992, Johnny Lynch was a sophomore in high school, unaware of the Boston band and its wild ride from the local-music underground to nationally released album, tour with the Ramones, and gig opening for David Bowie at Sullivan Stadium in Foxboro.

But today, Lynch, in the estimation of Neighborhoods founder David Minehan, is the band’s whip-cracker. In 2004, guitarist Minehan and bassist Lee Harrington, who joined the Neighborhoods in 1982 and remained in the lineup until the “farewell show,” revived the band with Lynch on drums. By that point, Lynch was not only an accomplished player but also a ’Hoods obsessive.

“He’s the Neighborhoods historian. If I flub a line, he’ll shout it out from behind the kit,” Minehan says of Lynch. “He’s like one of those baseball stats freaks, but for rock ’n’ roll.”

With Minehan busy at the helm of Woolly Mammoth recording studio in Waltham, Mass., and Harrington now a lawyer having returned to school after the band’s initial breakup, the Neighborhoods play only about a half-dozen shows a year, and the next one happens Saturday at the Ocean Mist in Wakefield.

Lynch was playing drums in the band Naked Sams when he first met Minehan in 2000.

“I told an older friend that I was recording with Dave Minehan, and he asked me what I thought of the Neighborhoods. I knew the name, but didn’t own anything or know the music, so he gave me a couple of tapes,” Lynch recalls.

That lit a fuse for Lynch who started gathering all of the Neighborhoods music he could find, enamored by the band’s blend of classic-rock reach, punk attitude, and power-pop catchiness. He studied bootleg concert recordings and listened to all of the official releases, a string that began with the 1980 single “Prettiest Girl,” which remains a signature tune for the band.

Minehan and Lynch stayed friendly, having not only a musical bond but a shared love of the movies “Spinal Tap” and “The Exorcist.” In 2002, Minehan wanted Lynch to join him at a party where Harrington was going to be.

“It was birthday party for a friend of theirs. Lee had moved back to Boston,” says Lynch, who ended up jamming with the ’Hoods that night. “The first time I met Lee, I played music with him.”
Minehan says that he will keep playing ’Hoods’ gigs as long as the band can meet the standard it set with its original incarnation (and if you need a reminder of just how good the Neighborhoods were live, grab “The Last Rat,” a recording of the band’s 1992 farewell concert at the Rat in Boston). So far, he’s been pleased.

“It defies expectations,” Minehan says. “We live in a society where there’s a lot of pressure to say, ‘You’re past your prime.’ And I get it. I remember being 18 and watching musicians who were 27 and thinking to myself, ‘Oh, please.’ But I feel that what we’re doing is a very real thing.”

Minehan also marvels at the fans who may not be as driven as Lynch but are still hungry for the ’Hoods catalog which runs from the happy-go-lucky “Pure and Easy” to the barbed “King of Rats.”

And that catalog is destined to expand with the release of a new album next year as well as the official release of “Last of the Mohicans,” which consists of songs the Neighborhoods worked on as a follow-up to its self-titled major-label debut produced by Aerosmith’s Brad Whitford and put out in 1991 on Third Stone Records, an imprint started by actor Michael Douglas for Atlantic Records.

Minehan takes the blame for delays in getting out new ’Hoods music, explaining that he ends up working on everyone else’s music at Woolly Mammoth before thinking of his own.
“I’m the cobbler whose child has no shoes,” Minehan says.

Lynch, who was interviewed separately, phrased it differently: “He’s the carpenter who can’t work on his own house.”

But Lynch is confident the new album will get done, and it’s important to him that it does for two reasons.

“I love this band,” he says. “Yeah I’m the drummer, but I’m also a big fan.”

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1

James Hunter feature, Portland Press Herald, July 4, 2013

James Hunter echoes past, takes now 'Minute By Minute'

The British R&B singer/guitarist and his band play Asylum on Saturday.

The James Hunter Six

By SCOTT McLENNAN

James Hunter is looking forward to the backlash.

 

"That's when you know you've really made it," says Hunter, punctuating the quip with the rascally laugh that fills a conversation with the British R&B singer/guitarist when reached by phone recently while on tour in California.

Since re-igniting his music career in his 40s with the 2006 album "People Gonna Talk," Hunter, 50, can seemingly do no wrong. His work became a bridge between modern British soul-pop associated with Amy Winehouse and Adele, and the American R&B and soul revival spearheaded by Daptone Records and artists such as Sharon Jones, Lee Fields and Charles Bradley.

But amid the rush to love his classic sound, Hunter wonders if he's actually always being heard.

"People have said nice things about me for the wrong reasons," he says. "One review praised my swing, early rock and jump blues. I'd argue that person was being nice, but didn't really get what I do."

The James Hunter Six will play Saturday at Asylum in Portland, a recently booked date as Hunter scrambled to remake a tour to promote his new album, "Minute by Minute." He was originally scheduled to open for Sharon Jones at several East Coast concerts, but those dates were canceled in early June when Jones revealed she was seeking treatment for cancer of the bile duct.

Hunter lost his wife to cancer in 2011, but she played a big part in the making of "Minute By Minute."

"It might make for a good story to say that making the album was therapeutic, but a lot of the work came when she was doing well," Hunter said. "She was in the studio a lot with me. She wasn't a musician, but she'd say things -- 'That's not quite there yet.' It was fantastic that she was there for that."

Hunter made "Minute by Minute" in the U.S. -- a first for him -- and worked with producer Gabe Roth, who co-founded the Daptone label.

"He made us sound punchier and in your face. It's subtle," Hunter says.

Hunter grew up a fan of soul music and performed in nightclubs around his native England. He caught the attention of Van Morrison, who brought Hunter into his band in the mid-'90s. (Morrison also appears on Hunter's 1996 record, "Believe What I Say.") He finally scored an American release -- and a Grammy nomination -- when Rounder Records put out "People Gonna Talk."

Hunter typically takes a less-is-more approach to his expressive singing and guitar playing, creating a crackling immediacy to his music even as it echoes the past.

"I don't try and sound like old records. If anything, I try and capture the spirit of that music," he says, adding with a laugh, "It's like how an actor will nick something he's seen somewhere else for his own performance."

Scott McLennan is a freelance writer. He can be reached at:
smclennan1010@gmail.com
Twitter: @ScottMcLennan1

Speedy Ortiz CD review, Boston by Beat, July 1, 2013

Speedy Ortiz is a DIY dynamo out of Northampton, MA, and its debut full-length is a wonderfully jagged display of indie-rock poetry. Check out my review in the Boston by Beat blog here.

The Mowgli's feature, Providence Journal, June 30, 2013

The Mowgli’s spin mid-20s angst into pure pop sunshine 

The Mowgli's

 

By Scott McLennan

Special to The Journal

Published: 30 June 2013 12:01 AM

It’s not surprising when Katie Jayne Earl tells you she has “Help Me, Rhonda” playing in the background while handling a phone interview about her band, the Mowgli’s. After all, the dreamy pop of the Beach Boys is but one of the many feel-good ingredients the Mowgli’s stirred into the band’s national debut “Waiting for the Dawn.”

“Our parents passed down their music to us,” Earl says of the eight friends who formed the Mowgli’s a few years back, conspicuously copping the retro groovieness of their Southern California surroundings.

Oddly enough, the song that garnered the Mowgli’s a hit looks to another part of the Golden State. “San Francisco” is an unironic slice of pop sunshine that begins with the line “I’ve been in love with love,” and uses the “L” word enough times to make even Paul McCartney blush.

“We were just sitting around hippie-ing out,” Earl says of the Mowgli’s decision to scrape the angst off its alt-rock. Last year the band put out a record with many of the songs that ended up on “Waiting for the Dawn,” among them the inspirational “Carry Your Will” (“Let your faith guide your fate”) and optimistic “The Great Divide” (“And when the sun brings in the morning, I know today will be better than the last”). Even the breakup-inspired “Love is Easy” manages to produce a balm.

Yet these are not songs bubbling up through syrup, as many are actually born out of anxiety and fear. Earl and her band mates are in their 20s, and she says they have a lot of friends who feel like the traditional ways of getting ahead and growing independent are broken. The ideal of going to college, finding a job, and getting a place to live has turned into the reality of incurring a mountain of debt, working at some place just to get by, and returning to a bedroom at parents’ homes.

“We’re all just going through the emotional turmoil most people go through in their mid-20s,” Earl says. “We combat that with music and hopefully we make the listener feel less alone.”

The soaring vocal harmonies the Mowgli’s generate certainly are the equivalent of a sonic group hug.

The layers of keys and guitars likewise conjure the warmth of chamber pop even as the band likes to keep its infectious energy fairly unbridled.

But not everything is honeyed on “Waiting for the Dawn.” “Time” is a bit of sparse folk strumming laced with frustrations, most expressed as bluntly as “I don’t like time, time is making me old.”

“We’re not worried about sounding hip, or cool, or abstract,” Earl says of her band’s earnestness.
But the Mowgli’s message is getting through. The band has been on a few buzzworthy tours already and knows it has a busy fall with a run of shows with fellow up-and-comers Walk the Moon. The promotional trek for the recently released “Waiting for the Dawn” brings the Mowgli’s (so named after the main character in Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book”) to the free concert series at Waterplace Park in Providence on Friday, July 5.

“Our intention was not to sound vintage or classic,” Earl says. “We just wrote songs to make people happy.”

The Mowgli’s will perform at 7:30 p.m. Friday, July 5, at Waterplace Park, Memorial Boulevard and Exchange Street, Providence.

Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1

Come concert review, Boston Globe, June 30, 2013

Music Review

Come reunion is dark and celebratory

By Scott McLennan

Globe Correspondent   June 30, 2013

Thalia Zedek performing at the Sinclair (Photo by Josh Reynolds)

The celebratory intent behind Come’s show Thursday at the Sinclair did not cool the music’s simmering dread.

As a reminder of the original (and lasting) impact of Come’s post-punk narcotic blues, Matador Records recently reissued “Eleven: Eleven,” the 1993 debut from the Boston band formed by Thalia Zedek, Chris Brokaw, Sean O’Brien, and Arthur Johnson.

The original Come quartet reconvened for a short tour that focuses on material from that dark beauty of a debut as well as earlier singles and the follow-up, “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” after which bassist O’Brien and drummer Johnson left the band.

Come’s original lineup has not played too often in recent years, yet looked and sounded comfortable on the Sinclair stage. By the fourth song, “SVK,” guitarists Brokaw and Zedek were huddling with O’Brien in front of the drums to conjure big, organic jams.

The harrowing “Submerge” — with Zedek pleading “Just relax,” as if you could — capped an opening suite of “Eleven: Eleven” material that began with the grim “Dead Molly,” a thrashing “William,” spectral “Bell,” and the aforementioned “SVK.” It was a run of songs full of shifting tones and textures that showed just how far Come can stretch out without losing its core ache, as well as just how resonant this 20-year-old material remains.

Come then went back to its very beginning with “Last Mistake,” with Brokaw spinning tumbleweed guitar riffs against Zedek’s droning harmonica and haunted vocals. In a bookending effect, Come followed with “Cimarron,” the last song completed by the original quartet.

The band paired the meandering “Let’s Get Lost” and punkier “In/Out” of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” for another well-crafted display of texture and contrast.

Zedek dedicated the loping and quizzical “Fast Piss Blues” to her mother, who was at the show, before the band steered into the rocky terrain of “Car” and a version of “Off to One Side” that began with Zedek and Brokaw crafting a hypnotic guitar jam.

Come ended its return to home turf with the slow collapse of “Brand New Vein” and the Swell Maps’ cover “Loin of the Surf,” a speedy instrumental that was the closest thing Come came to flashing a musical smile.

The trio 27 opened with 45 minutes of slow-brewed indie-pop. Guitarist and bassist Ayal Naor and drummer Terri Christopher created wide open spaces for singer and guitarist Maria Christopher to unfurl the songs. The band bridged the fragile and the tumultuous during its set.
Scott McLennan can be reached at smclennan1010@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @ScottMcLennan1