February 28 All Vinyl's Day 2010

1. Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn - Pickin' Wild Mountain Berries
2. Joanna Newsom - Colleen
3. Michael Hurley - You're a Dog; Don't Talk to Me
4. Elizabeth Cotten - Willie
5. Tom Rush - Barb'ry Allen
6. Albert King - Please Love Me
7. Karen Dalton - In The Evening (It's So Hard to Tell Who's Gonna Love You The best)
8. Hoyt Axton - Lay Lady Lay
9. Tom Waits - Diamonds on my Windshield
10. Fred Neil - Ba-di-da
11. Jim Croce - New York is Not My Home
12. Donovan - Colours
13. Kitty Wells - it Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels
14. Johnny Cash and Gordon Lightfoot - For Lovin' Me
15. History of Country Music - Hank Williams
16. Willie Nelson - Uncloudy Day
17. Will Oldham - Do what You Will Do
18. Woody Guthrie - John Henry
19. Arlo Guthrie - Gabriel's Mother's Hiway Ballad #16 Blues
20. Buffy Sainte Marie - The Piney Wood Hills
21. Neil Young - Harvest
22. Townes Van Zandt - Dollar Bill Blues
23. Joan Baez - Black is the Color
24. Vashti Bunyan - Where I like To Stand
25. Bob Dylan - Tonight, I'll be Staying here With You
26. Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys - When You Are Lonely
27. Merle Haggard - Frankie and Johnny
28. Sticks Mcghee - Wine Blues
29. Nancy Ames - The Water is Wide
30. Ian and Sylvia - Song For Canada
31. T. Rex - Fist Heart Mighty Dawn Dart
32.

February 21, 2010

1. The Blithe Sons - The Resting Wall by the Stream
2. Neil Young - The Emperor of Wyoming
3. Daniel Higgs - Untitled I
4. The Books - The Lemon of Pink
5. Ian Matthews - Tried So Hard
6. Devendra Banhart & Jana Hunter - Crystal Lariat
7. Fred Neil - Look Over Yonder
8. Headless Heroes - Blues Run the Game
9. Buffy Sainte-Marie - Winter Boy
10. Vetiver - Red Lantern Girls
11. Low - Sunflower
12. Espers - Trollslanda
13. Paul Simon - Flowers Never Bend with the Rainfall
14. Dezurik Sisters - Go to Sleep My Darling
15. Woods - Night Creature
16. A Cid Symphony - Loadusphone Number 3
17. Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal
18. Barn Owl - The Twirling Tusks of The Mouth of God
19. Mark McGuire -Burning Leaves
20. Helena Espvall & Masaki Batoh - Uti Var Hage

Thursday Morning

Hello, friends.

Thought I'd share some folky thoughts and think of ways to think harder while I'm working. I've been listening to a compilation of Michael Hurley's unreleased output, from right after the release of his first album to the release of his second, called Parsnip Snips. Wonderful alliterative title, wonderful psychedelic album art from Mr. Hurley himself, and even better lo-fi, ahead-of-its-time songwriting.

I picked this album up (along with four others that I will mention shortly) during my stay in NYC. It is a cliche to say that this city has everything, but in terms of the availability of great, heavy-gram folk records, it is most assuredly above the curve.

Parsnip Snips contains recordings covering a seven-year period yet it achieves a meditative cohesion that would make the most polished of studio bands jealous. Listening to this record, it is easy to forget that these songs were written forty years ago. You hear traces of contemporary songwriters like Bonnie Prince Billy, Neutral Milk Hotel's Jeff Mangum and Vetiver's Andy Cabic that make you realize: these artists did not emerge from some vacuum of modern genius as some hipsters might like to believe. Michael Hurley was doing what these musicians do now before most of them were born and (I am sure) inspired them as they grew.

These songs sound like they were recorded in a musty apartment somewhere with PA's, four tracks and mics crammed into a space barely large enough for the single, cross-legged artist in its center. These are simple, earnest songs that you'd sing to yourself when you are alone, feeling pitiful and at your loneliest but still happy to be alive.

The stand out track from side one, "Don't Blame it On Me," asks the object of the speaker's desire to forgive him for loving her. "Don't blame it on me/I ain't guilty, can't you see?/Don't blame it on me/blame it all on yourself." How can he help loving her? She is perfect in the singer's mind. A sweet sentiment that celebrates life and love, but underlain with a deep sense of melancholy. The listener understands that he is not merely expressing his love; he is actually being blamed for loving her. She has moved on and he is stuck in place; he simply needs her to understand why.

Reading a little too much into the song? Probably. Coloring it with my own experiences and bias? Definitely. But isn't that why we love folk music? Because it reminds us of ourselves, of the good and the bad, the connections between ourselves and people that lived a hundred years ago? I think so. Check out Parsnip Snips and draw your own conclusions...

I picked up a few more choice records for our listeners (and my own) enjoyment: Karen Dalton's first record, It's So Hard to Tell Who's Going to Love You the Best, which, yes, I already had in digital form (you can't blame me for wanting to kick back with a beer and a smoke and listen to the needle click into groove on "Sweet Substitute" at two in the morning, can you?); When I'm Gone, a collection of early Elizabeth Cotten recordings; and two Townes Van Zandt albums: The double LP, Live at the Old Quarter Houston, Texas and a mid-career LP, Flying Shoes.

Both TVZ albums are great, but Live at the Old Quarter wins the gold. Flying Shoes nicely illustrates the problem with many of Townes' studio recordings: an overabundance of overdubs and too much polish. Due to his disdain for the studio process, Van Zandt allowed his producers to do whatever they pleased with his music, with little to no input from him. This resulted in a string of overproduced albums that (almost) succeed in disguising the simple beauty of their songs.

Townes is the type of singer that sounds best in a stuffy bar with one mic and a big ol' hollow guitar, not with an early-model MOOG accompaniment and enough backup musicians to restock the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Which is exactly why Live at the Old Quarter is the superior album. One singer. One guitar. A barroom full of drunk cowboys and adoring fans.

Well, that's all the bullshit I can come up with this morning. So here's something for all you Fred Neil fans....

Valentine's Edition

1. Christine and Katherine Ship - Sea Lion Woman
2. Bessie Smith - Hustlin' Dan
3. Michael Yonkers - Damsel Fair and Your Angel
4. Shirley Collins & Dolly Collins - Fare Thee Well My Dearest Dear
5. Samara Lubelski - Keeper of Beauty
6. Os Mutantes - Baby
7. CocoRosie - Haitian Love Songs
8. Michael Hurley - Don't Blame it on Me
9. Collie Ryan - Who in the Doorway
10. Joan Baez - Love is Just a Four Letter Word
11. Ed Askew - Love is Everyone
12. Elizabeth Cotten - Jenny
13. Meg Baird - The Waltze of the Tennis Players
14. Howlin' Wolf - Back Door Man
15. Neil Young - Cowgirl in the Sand
16. Bob Dylan - Sad-Eyed Lady of The Lowlands
17. Joni Mitchell - Ladies of the Canyon
18. Maureeny Wishfull - 5 Verses For my Love
19. Townes Van Zandt - Brand New Companion
20. Doug Martsch - Stay
21. Loretta Lynn - I Can't Keep Away From You
22. Jackson C. Frank - Spanish Moss
23. Tim Buckley - Love From Room 109 at the islander (On Pacific Coast Highway)
24. Karen Dalton - Sweet Substitute
25. Josephine Foster - She Sweeps With Many-Colored Brooms
26. The Incredible String Band - First Girl I loved
27. Iron & Wine - Bird Stealing Bread
28. Mark Fry - Lutes And Flutes

Purple Travels 2/7/10

1. Fursaxa - Purple Fantasy
2. Pete Seeger & Arlo Guthrie - Hills of Glenshee
3. Jess Morris - Goodbye Ol' Paint
4. Paul Simon - Duncan
5. Lucky Dragons - Mirror Friends
6. Sharron Kraus - The Peacock's Wing
7. John Hammond - Little Birdie
8. Viking Moses - Sole Command of the Day
9. Rio en Medio - Frontier
10. Brethren of the Free Spirit - All Things are from Him, through Him and in Him
11. Tommy Settlers & His Blues Moaner - Big Bed Bug (Bed Bug Blue)
12. Devendra Banhart - Soon is Good
13. Samamidon - Falsehearted Chicken
14. Roger Green - Both Sides Now
15. MV & EE with the Golden Road - Easy Livin'
16. Bibio - The Ephemeral Bluebell
17. Philippos Pyros - Mandra (Shepherd's Tune)
18. Judy Collins - Albatross
19. Pete Seeger - Where Have All the Flowers Gone
20. Nelstone's Hawaiians - Fatal Flower Garden
21. Sibylle Bair - Colour Green
22. Simon Finn - Big White Car
23. Cannon's Jug Stompers - Feather Bed
24. Feathers - Past the Moon
25. Meg Baird - Dear Companion
26. Angels of Light - Purple Creek

And you thought all that gurgling in Sung Tongs was somethin' else...

Nice New Song, Newsom

I can hear your cooing from the grave, Marika, especially since you (as well as I, and many, many of us) are rejoicing with the news of Joanna Newsom's triple LP Have One On Me coming out on February 23rd. For any of you who do any internet shopping, or are obsessed with this woman as much as I am, you can pre-order the album on Drag City.

Drag City also has two new tracks up for listening: One is the soulful "Good Intentions Paving Company," a rollicking piano number, which I find to be a pleasant new sound and direction coming from Newsom. What I like about this track is that it doesn't feel over-produced, there's still a rawness to it, but within it Newsom seems to promise us that she wants to expand her sound even more, painting a fresh coat of twangy, Americana to her ever-expansive canvas. I think I hear some echos of Joni Mitchell here. But go listen for yourself.
A song called “'81”was up the other week, adding to her collection of beautiful pastorals, fitting right in as a more polished Milk-Eyed Mender-era song.

I have a feeling that we'll see Newsom shooting in lots of different directions here, and it already seems like it will be a wonderful thing for her. From these two tracks alone, she stays true to her past while forging ahead with new experiments. Not to mention that both songs, especially “Good Intentions Paving Company,” showcase new facets of Newsom’s singular voice.

It's been 4 years, and I am so ready Joanna. Did I mention triple LP!!!

Down Home Cooking With a Folksplosion Friend

Check out this blog by one of our Folksplosion Friends:

Fermented Grapes

Homestyle chili, sweet chocolates and one ginger cat.

Cackle Sisters

The Amazing Dezurik Sisters and their eccentric symphonic sound.

Check this out, it is truly amazing. We just don't make this model, anymore.

Oh-Detta!

MMM MMM MMM, sweet voice sweet sentiment.

Elizabeth Cotten and Pete Seeger

Singalong with Pete and Elizabeth. Old trains and graves, graveyards and buried love.

Karen Dalton

Karen in Colorado with those sweet sweet Colorado rains. This is where I'd like to live once I've lived long enough to start living.

Townes

Oh Townes, I love you.

Tim Buckley