And the beat goes on...while things are slowly shifting to a new normal, I continue to work on myself. "Yes" that's what a pandemic is for, among other things. As you can see by the above image I have been playing around with my Instagram apps. The pursuit of excellence never falters, LOL Yeah, there's that. Time to release the Id! R.I.P. Larry Kramer - rebel with a cause The actions of some, do not reflect the opinions of all Remember the time reality became virtual? Stop asking people who have not been where you are going for directions Here are the details about my first concert: David Bowie & The Tubes, 1983, Tacoma Dome, I was 17 Territory: Hikes and trails, walk upon this earth Congratulations to Sasha Pieterse of Pretty Little Liars fame on being due in October Remember karma is a bigger bitch than you ever thought you were
Woman Crush of the Week - Lady Gaga for "Rain on Me" a great anthem of positivity for these challenging times. "Yes" I know Ariana Grande is part of it too, but she's too young and not interesting enough for me. I applaud Twitter, if you have to ask why Google that sh!t Now tell me how you being told to put your dog on a leash is a threat to your life? For those of you who text and never make real plans, this is your moment What came first the chicken or the egg? The chicken, eggs can't cum, duh! Cut or uncut? I'm talking about your sandwiches, jeeze! Wanna know how I like mine, follow me here: https://www.instagram.com/michaelshinafelt/?hl=en https://twitter.com/MShinafelt
During this downtime I've been thinking a lot about one of my favorite old Hollywood haunts Musso & Frank. I miss it, with it's great atmosphere, delicious food and amazing martini's. Thus today's Hump Day & Chill is brought to you by the martini, to be precise the Meryl Martini as concocted by one Meryl Streep during a performance of The Ladies Who Lunch in celebration of Stephen Sondheim's 90th Birthday. Honestly I do think Streep is missing a branding opportunity here, she really should explore the Meryl Martini concept, I'd bet she'd make a killing doing it. In the meantime, break out your own martini magic and Hump Day & Chill to one of these absolutely fabulous concoctions. Make mine gin straight up, two olives please. Thank You!!! Musso and Frank on the WWW: http://www.mussoandfrankgrill.com/
Just Because it's the Tuesday after Memorial Day, Just Because the sun is warm & Just Because, well he's Man Candy all the way. I bequeath you Cole Sprouse in his workout clothes! Cole as many of you know (or don't) is Jughead Jones on Riverdale based on the Archie Comic Book characters, that airs on the CW Network (say it three times fast, I double dog dare you!) While I have never seen Riverdale I really feel like I, nah, I've heard it's a great show, but I only have time to watch so many things. I think seeing Cole in his workout clothes is all the Jughead Jones I need post Memorial Day. Thus I dub Cole a peanut butter cup his official Man Candy name. Why? Because I devour peanut butter cups, think about it, but no too much... Enjoy your day! Cole on IG - https://www.instagram.com/colesprouse/?hl=en
ADDICTIVE POWER OF WEALTH IN THESE DIFFICULT TIMES
Premiering Now at American Songwriter, Socially Distant-Shot Video from 5/29 Album Release A Different War
Finds Widely Acclaimed Blues-Rocker Addressing the Isolation that Comes with Addiction
RadioWoodstock 100.1 WDST Celebrates Album Release Day with ‘Sofa Sessions’ Livestream Concert Event, 5/29 @ 7 p.m. ET
"Danielia Cotton has not had it easy. But lucky for us, she channels her pain and suffering into kick-ass musical creations we can all enjoy.” - Guitar World
The music video for widely acclaimed blues-rocker DANIELIA COTTON’s new stomping anthem, CHEAP HIGH, from next week’s album release, A Different War, premieres today at American Songwriter, noting how “Cotton’s raspy voice is tinged with anger and frustration, but she channels her powerful vocal delivery into a cathartic triumph by the song’s end.”
Cotton drew on childhood memories of surviving as a poor multi-racial youth in an upper middle-class New Jersey community. While creating the video, she was astonished witnessing the addictive power of a “cheap high” surge through our communities during the pandemic, further highlighting our economic disparities.
“Right now there are so many people in their homes with no money coming, yet they’re frantically ordering all kinds of items online,” says Cotton. “It’s still going on. It’s even coming down to buying ridiculous things like designer brands for masks. It’s crazy. And then there are those who wear masks made from a handkerchief because that’s all they’ve got.”
Writing CHEAP HIGH, now active at Triple A radio, made Cotton think a lot about the things she didn’t have as a kid – like running water, which she went without until she was in high school. And not having traditional heating, instead having to chop wood for the stove with her sister when they came home from track practice. And being laughed at by the other kids in junior high for wearing cheap supermarket sneakers. The result was that spending became a formidable drug for her that substituted for other substances she found less desirable. The song speaks not only to personal unhappiness arising from greed but also to the dangers of a society mired in an economic disparity that even the pandemic cannot break.
“We haven’t had such a disparity between the rich and the poor like this in a long time,” she says. “Showing off things to prove you have money is a cheap high. That’s where we all are right now. Spending is an epidemic in our country, but what makes you truly happy in life is people and love.
The pandemic shutdown limited filming inside her Manhattan apartment and on the building’s roof deck, just her and videographer Ray Foley, socially distanced from each other during the entire process. Fittingly, the song is about isolation − the isolation that comes with any addiction, such as spending, and when one is besieged by self-doubt. The video forcefully conveys that sense of isolation and emptiness, courtesy of COVID-19.
CHEAP HIGH is the second single from A Different War, her most politically chargedalbum in a widely heralded career that has drawn praise from the New York Times, Billboard, the Los Angeles Times,NPR, and USA Today, among many others.Set for release May 29 on all major digital platforms through Cottontown Music, the album will be celebrated that evening by RadioWoodstock 100.1 with a Sofa Sessions Livestream Concert Event at 7 p.m. ET. Watch it here.
A Different War finds Cotton, whose voice gives her songs “stunning power” (No Depression), speaking to these extraordinary times by unloading her sin while the world around her is gripped in a turbulent spin. Cotton frames the six-song opus by confronting race, gender, and wealth − deeply personal and pervasive issues that have plagued folks like her for an eternity.
A Different War will be available May 29 at Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon, and where music is consumed on-line.
The band that played a major role in the evolution of power pop and are considered a forerunner of punk rock readies two of their most popular albums
This summer they will reissue two classic albums: "Now" on July 10th and "Jumpin' In the Night" on August 7th.
NOW (CD, July 10th)
While it took a long and torturous five years for the Flamin' Groovies to find their way back to an American record deal with Shake Some Action, a year and a half later the band had a follow-up ready, and while 1978's Flamin' Groovies Now isn't quite as cohesive as the album that preceded it, in many respects the band sounds at once tighter and more relaxed, with some time on the road firming up the rhythm section while giving the songs a bit more room to swing (which wasn't one of the strong suits of the British Invasion bands that provided their aural template). The band lost guitarist James Ferrell during the post-Shake Some Action tour, but former Charlatans picker Mike Wilhelm proved to be a more than simpatico replacement on these sessions, and while leader Cyril Jordan didn't come up with another new song as transcendent as "Shake Some Action," "All I Wanted" comes pretty close. But it's significant that most of the songs on Flamin' Groovies Now are covers, and while all of them are played with love, enthusiasm, and the right period flair (especially the Beatles' "There's a Place," Paul Revere & the Raiders' "Ups and Downs," and "Move It," an early U.K. hit for Cliff Richard), they give the album a feeling of being padded, and just because covering the Rolling Stones rarity "Blue Turns to Grey" was a good idea didn't mean the Flamin' Groovies had any business tackling "Paint It Black." All in all, Flamin' Groovies Now is a terrific-sounding record that captures a fine band when it was in great form, but it also makes clear that the gremlins that often dogged the Groovies in the studio (namely their inability to make a 100 percent satisfying album) hadn't gone away.
JUMPIN' IN THE NIGHT (CD, August 7th)
The third and last of the Flamin' Groovies late-'70s albums for Sire, Jumpin' in the Night storms out of the gate with the title song, a top-shelf rocker that brings the muscle of the Flamingo-era lineup of the Groovies to the more style-conscious British Invasion sonics of Cyril Jordan's version. Though Jumpin' in the Night never rocks that hard or that well again, it does sound decidedly tighter and tougher than 1978's Flamin' Groovies Now, and guitarist Mike Wilhelm, a new addition to the Now lineup, is much better integrated into their wall of guitars, with the Groovies sounding more solid than they did a year before. But while Jumpin' in the Night finds the Flamin' Groovies sounding better than ever, the material unfortunately lets them down. It's no wonder why the Flamin' Groovies loved the Byrds -- both were American bands who fell in love with the sounds of British rock and crafted their own variation on the style -- but three Byrds covers on this album is about two too many (especially given how clunky David Wright's drumming sounds on "5D"), and though having the Groovies tackle "Absolutely Sweet Marie" and "Please Please Me" sounds good on paper, the audible results are a bit underwhelming. (On the other hand, their cover of "Werewolves of London" is better than anyone had a right to expect.) The production and engineering by Roger Bechirian is crisp and flattering to the guitars, but lacks the resonance of Dave Edmunds' more layered approach on Shake Some Action and Now. A great band, the Flamin' Groovies often seemed to have a hard time reconciling their best qualities with the record-making process, and Jumpin' in the Night is probably the best example of this dilemma, though it has more than enough worthwhile moments to compensate.
For songwriters, Nashville has The Bluebird Cafe, Los Angeles has the Troubadour, and Austin has The Saxon Pub... A home for the likes of Wille Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Bonnie Raitt, Jerry Jeff Walker, Rodney Crowell,
Ray Wylie Hubbard, Stephen Bruton and many more.
Nothing Stays the Same celebrates the last 30 years of live music in Austin, Texas, while also examining the challenges faced by musicians and music venues in one of the fastest-growing and most popular cities in the country, all through the lens of the legendary Saxon Pub.
With iconic venues closing each year due to rising rents and property taxes in the Live Music Capital of the World, the writing is on the wall for the Saxon Pub, a mainstay in live music since 1990. Soon being forced to a new space - akin to closure for most clubs - its owner, its regulars and staff and its beloved musicians such as local luminaries Joe Ely, Bobby Whitlock, Bob Schneider, Patrice Pike, Guy Forsyth, Hector Ward, Carolyn Wonderland, The Resentments, Johnny Nicholas, W.C. Clark, Robynn Shayne and others, turn to face the music until they learn their fate might not be sealed after all.
Call it divine intervention or a stroke of good luck, the Saxon could live to see another day if it plays its cards right...
Universal in its appeal...as noted in the Austin Chronicle, "There is still something universal about the challenges facing (Saxon) owner/manager Joe Ables and all the regulars - onstage and in the audience", mirroring a situation found in cities across America (Seattle, San Francisco, Denver, Brooklyn, etc) rising rents, property taxes and gentrification of arts districts and the downtown result in clubs closing and artists and musicians being forced to move out of town.
In 2019, Nothing Stays the Samemade its world premiere at SXSW and was the "Audience Award Winner" in the 24 Beats Per Second categories. It also won "Best Texas Film" at the 2019 Hill Country Film Festival. That same year the film was nominated for "Best Texas Independent Film" by the Houston Film Critics Society and was an official selection of the Dallas International Film Festival and the Lost River Film Festival.
"...both an exceptional document of a unique Austin venue, anchored by remarkable live footage and artist interviews, and a treatise on maintaining a city's values and priorities amid rapid growth." - Doug Freeman, Austin Chronicle
"Jeff Sandmann's SXSW 2019 Audience Award-winning documentary is just as much a tribute to Austin's musicians as it is to the legendary live music venue established almost 30 years ago in the state capital of Texas." - Joe Friar, Houston Film Critics Society
