Holy shit! I am practically crying, the music gods are being so good to me. Just discovered a band which is killing my brain cells and making me enjoy it! They are called The Claudettes and are out of Chicago and I am in love! Lordy, I must have somehow done something really really good. If I could only figure out what it was…
Goldband Studios is gone. Here I have been spending the past few years singing the praises of Research Turtles— I call them the boys from Lake Charles— without realizing that the city/town/parish also was home to Eddie Shuler and Goldband. Dumb me. I have known of Goldband since I was in college, having found them through That Dorm Guy who was somehow plugged into anything and everything musical. I look back now at him and wonder how he was able to find so much music in a land with pretty much nothing but Billboard Magazine to guide him, but he did.
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Not the political future, which has turned out bad enough, but the music future which is floundering. I saw it going awry in 1992 when I left the retail record business as it morphed to a “music industry” I never recognized. I tried to make sense of it then, wondering why the decisions being made by not just major labels but by what then was becoming an entertainment conglomerate were so unerringly ridiculous. I need to watch the documentary on Tower Records, All Things Must Pass, in detail. I need to revisit the individual instances which brought down radio, records and everything else entertainment around our ears. I need to understand who was in power, if indeed anyone was, and who made the monumental mistakes which gave us the chaos we now have.
Nothing says Christmas like a curmudgeon and nobody is more of one than Jaimie Vernon which makes me wish I knew some of the stories behind his long career in music and, also, in life. Regaling you with tales of chicken wire and whoopee cushions would make this a lot easier to write— nothing like fart jokes to liven up your reading— but it is Christmas season and I must put aside the slings and arrows, as humorous as they might be.
Goddamn Jim of Seattle… I no sooner put last week’s column to bed and here he comes along with an album which has had me up nights and all weekend with “We are the Elders… We Are the Elders… We are the Elders…” running through my head on a constant loop. I can’t stop it and it would drive me crazy if I didn’t love it so much. See, ol’ Jim came up with this idea… well, maybe I should tell you about his last album because sure as shootin’ you either have not heard it or have forgotten.
After last night’s No Small Children gig, drummer Nicola B made a statement I have been waiting to hear for the past couple of decades. Remarking about the previous night’s show in Seattle at The Central Tavern, she said that they had “turned the room.”. Basically, it means that while, at first, no one paid much attention, by the last song, everyone was on board. Even dancing, she said (quite enthusiastically, I might add).
Jesus, is 2013 great or what? I’m dancing, crying, thinking, sweating, burping and bopping thanks to a handful of musicians who have me freaking out, they’re so good. I know I said 2012 was good. And it was! Hell, it still is, musically. Musicians put out some of the best music I’d heard last year, but goddamn it, 2013 is smokin’ hot! Seriously! And excuse me for a sec whilst I dance the happy dance. You see, No Small Children‘s anthemic Might Get Up Slow is playing right now and will for a few times more because I need some uppers! Shee-it, this is good! In another time, this would be topping the charts and rocking kids out! Even famed ex-radio disc jockey Robert W. Walker sez “Fuh-reeking great!” Jeez, I’m sounding like Barnum & Bailey here, but sometimes you have to let loose, you know?
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It’s coming! It’s almost here and you probably don’t even know it. Like that stealthy Sequestering thing the good ol’ boys slipped into the budget bill without anyone noticing, Sweet Relief is readying their third compilation album— on the sly, as it were. Don’t know anything about it? I’m not surprised. Producer/Engineer (and sometimes musician) Sheldon Gomberg has held the information close to his vest and the people at Sweet Relief (and Vanguard Records) are only on the cusp of letting the dogs out. But it’s coming. July 9th.
Bullseye Records of Canada
Segarini: Don't Believe a Word I Say 