Music Recommendations

I recall his Behind the Music, and someone said that he's got a great voice for singing great songs, but it's not necessarily going to make bad songs better, or something like that. The context was his career renaissance with Downtown Train, when he hadn't done anything good in a long time. Maybe something to it that might explain the success of the Great American Songbook series.

Every Picture Tells a Story is kind of undeniable as a great album.

A long long time ago, I had a copy of an audience cassette (digitized/crap quality) from the night Stewart and Jeff Beck split up. They had an argument over microphone volume and Stewart walked off the stage. That was Madison Sq Garden and Jeff Beck then did a 45 minute jam that was awesome. It wasn't until 1985 that they "made up" and did the song 'People Get Ready' together. They official version symbolically tells the story

Jeff Beck Truth album featured Rod Stewart as the vocalist. Every song... perfection.

Although Beck was already a star (Yardbirds) and found Stewart, several of the songs on Truth were cowritten by them. The song 'Morning Dew' from that album is pretty much the perfect blend of guitar and voice.

Just saw gary clark jr at treehouse brewery in MA. I've long been a fan and after seeing that show last night he is most definitely one of the best guitar players in the world. He was on fire last night. One of the favorite shows I've seen. Highly recommended checking out gary clark jr if you like blues and guitar.

The venue was awesome in my opinion. It was a smaller place and I'd say there were maybe 1500-2000 people there. I was able to get pretty close and it was just a good mellow show with great vibes. The only negative I had was I honestly didn't like the Treehouse beer that much. It was okay but not my cup of tea which that may sound blasphemous to people who enjoy craft beer since their reputation is as one of the best in NE if not the country/world. That is coming from someone who does enjoy themselves a craft beer but being a Vermonter, give me a Hill Farmstead any day of the week over what I had at Treehouse. I would say I only tried one IPA and one lager at the show so I'm sure they have other ones that I would have liked more. 

Just found a new band you might be interested in. Mugshot. The song "Good People" features the lead from Kanoshi.

Some good underground metal

The new Gillian Welch release is great - as is the Cassandra Jenkins album. I've also discovered Big Thief - great band.

Thoughts from HFStival yesterday at Nats Park

Lit - surprisingly (to me) sounded great. 5 songs including 4 off A Place in the Sun. They knew their role.

Filter - sounded fine. Did 4 songs. If you know Filter at all you can guess the 4. Exactly what I wanted from them.

Tonic - I'd seen them a couple years back and like that time they also sounded very good. Great start.

Violent Femmes - I'm not a huge Violent Femmes guy but they were solid. Brought some much needed weirdness to the bill. I walked away wanting to listen to some more of them which I guess is the point.

Girl Talk - I had seen him before in a small amphitheater in Charlottesville. That or a club is the place for him, not a baseball stadium. Placement on the bill didn't help at all. Mid-bill 40-minute sprint was tough. I can only imagine what the folks dancing in the pit felt like.

Jimmy Eat World - one of the acts I was pumped to see for the first time and they were great. Great set list, great energy. Unfortunately, the first of a few acts that had major technical issues as his vocals cut out between songs, leading to an awkward 3-5 minute scramble to get the mic going.

Liz Phair - So this was originally Garbage but they had to cancel to my great chagrin. I'm not a huge Liz Phair guy. She was... fine? Her vocals were completely lost in the mix which didn't help. Seemed a better fit for a different venue.

Bush - So they were one of my favorite bands growing up. Sixteen Stone was huge for me. I was very scared, but I shouldn't have been. Tremendous energy for a stadium show. Gavin Rossdale plays live he's 30 years younger, it's kind of impressive. Unfortunately, more MAJOR mic issues leading to another long pause, but again, very luckily between songs. Would've liked one or two fewer new songs but what can you do.

Incubus - Third time I've seen them and second in the last few years. They're absolutely awesome live and we're again here. Would you believe they had microphone problems? New bassist was very good, so that was an expected relief. If anything I was disappointed they couldn't play longer. I still hate they don't play much from SCIENCE, but begrudgingly get that it doesn't fit what they do now. They always have a good cover in the setlist and Come Together was great, the later Portishead song being OK. Go see them if you have any interest at all.

Death Cab for Cutie - They're playing Transatlanticism all the way through and nothing else. So they were just good. The "playing an album all the way through" thing is, to me, great for fans of a band to hear some deep cuts, but not the best way to introduce newer ones. Performance aspects were better than I thought they'd be. Solid, but tough acts to follow in Bush and Incubus (he said with this middle school self nodding approvingly).

The Postal Service - also playing Give Up all the way through, which is less of an issue for a band with one album. Lol. Came away wanting to see Jenny Lewis live more than anything. Think I liked them more than Death Cab. Probably their last show ever too so that's kinda cool I guess.

Overall, great day, weather mostly cooperated. Tech issues could've gone way worse. Setlists for those into that kind of thing: www.setlist.fm/festival/2024/hfstival-2024-13d5b125.html