East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam

Going to see Tom Russell at Club Passim next Tuesday, September 20. Maybe you should, too.

Here's East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam.

Susan Cattaneo at Sally O'Brien's

Isn't it great when you hear a new musician--well, new to you--and you can't wait to share? Hey, you gotta check this out.

That's what happened to me today when I got this email from someone named Dino C giving me a link to the No Depression site.

Susan Cattaneo is local, as in local to Boston. She teaches songwriting at Berklee, but we won't hold that against her. She doesn't have any videos or other rich media I could steal, so you have to go to her MySpace site to get a good dose of her.

Check out Love Takes What It Takes which starts with a real hard country rock opening and eases into a nice country melody with some pretty standard passages, which all sounds kind of negative the way I just wrote that but her voice and lyrics are sweet and nice and all together it's got the makings of a pop hit. Wrecking Ball is hard and mean and beat up just like the title. Get Back The Longing features Mark Erelli, another local musician who someday, someday, will really get his due. If he's on the disc, it's worth a listen.

She'll be playing at Sally O'Brien's for the next every other Tuesday starting tonight.

Her Band:
Mike Barry: Guitar, vocals
Milt Reder: Guitar
Mark Hickox: Bass
Dave Mattacks: Drums

Her album is Brave and Wild and you can get it here.

On the record:
Lorne Entress: Drums
Duke Levine: Guitar
Kevin Barry: Guitar
Richard Gates: Bass
Dave Limina: Piano and organ
Dave Sholl: Saxophone
Mark Erelli: Lead and background vocals, mandolin on "Get Back The Longing"

Girls Guns and Glory: 667

You can catch them tomorrow night at The Pressman in Portsmouth, NH and on the 23rd at the Paradise.

Check out Audrey Ryan this Thursday (9.24) at TT the Bear

I saw Audrey Ryan open for The Bittersweets at Club Passim a couple of months ago, and strongly suggest if you get the chance to see her perform to take the opp. I'm on her email list and got this. Just read it and you get an idea of what she's like. Check out her music here.

Here's a YouTube vid of her from a few years ago. She's an eclectic performer. The night I saw her she played accordion, a few percussion instruments, and she worked with a digital loop gizmo to accompany her music.



Here's her email:

So even though I promised to cease playing local shows before my CD release on October 17th I still got offered a few I couldn't resist. I'll be playing tomorrow night at TTs the Bears with Elizabeth and the Catapult which is an indie rock outfit from NYC.

Thursday, September 24th @9pm
TT the Bears
Brookline Ave, Cambridge
9:15 - Audrey
10:30- For Orange Nichole
11:30- Elizabeth and the Catapult

Tix are $10 and it's 18+

I also recently did something I've never done before which is agree to be apart of a "competition" or more specifically a battle of the bands. In general I find these sort of things to be sort of asinine, after all how can you compare different kinds of bands? It's usually apples and oranges...but anyway, I did the first round of the "River Rising Star 09'" competition sponsored by The River 92.5 FM and well...I won...

so the finals are next month on Thursday, October 15th, venue TBA... However, I'd like to emphasize that I'd really just like all my friends and other people who appreciate my music (don't like the word "fans") to come to my dual CD release and documentary premiere of "the Loft Show Upstairs" movie. This is the show not to miss so please put it on your calender, plus there's even free beer and wine!! So how could you not go?

CD RELEASE:
Saturday, October 17th @7:30pm
The Sanctuary @ the Clarendon Hill Presbyterian Church
155 Powderhouse Blvd.
Somerville

(near Tufts, public transportation from Davis Square, or bus to Teele Square)

$5 general admission;
$10 admission and copy of new CD “I Know, I Know”

Schedule:
7:30pm- opener “Gretel”
8:30pm- Audrey Ryan
9:45pm- screening of documentary “Loft Show Upstairs” (40 minutes)

We will be providing free snacks and drinks including beer and wine while supplies last.

Thanks,
Audrey

And here's a bonus: A YouTube vid of Elizabeth and the Catapult.

Coco & Lafe on the Blue Plate Special

Coco and Lafe, who are buskers you can see routinely around and about Boston during the summer, are doing a live performance on WDVX in front of a live audience tomorrow 4.24), to be broadcast across Tennessee and Kentucky and the whole wide world through a Webcast.

Details: 12 noon eastern (for those in Europe and down under, you’ll have to do the math).

From an email: We’re actually performing at a new, high tech performance venue called “The Square” (as it is located at 4 Market Square in Knoxville, Tennessee). Fred Eaglesmith and Joe Lamay/Sherri Reese will also be performing.

You can connect here or at their Website here.

Good luck, you guys. And if you're sitting in your cube tomorrow at noon with nothing better to do because, oh, I don't know, maybe one of your biggest customers or clients is about to go belly-up, give Coco and Lafe a listen.

Coco and Lafe back in Boston

With the sun and good weather, the people are out on the streets in Boston again.

Tourists, squinting at those tourist maps and Freedom Trail brochures.

Those crazy Christians with their easels and connect-the-dots/color-by-the-numbers brand of salvation.

And I saw today that Coco and Lafe were back, playing their music outside the Borders on Downtown Crossing.

I saw them last year. Nice fun people who love their music and love performing. They play a lot of folksy covers--Bob Dylan, John Prine, Lyle Lovett--plus their own tunes. They have a great song called, Let's Get Away.

The chorus goes like this:

Let's get away
And go to China
Let's get away
To Casablanca
Let's get away
Forget the budget
Let's get away
Just you and me

They told me today they were back for the summer, and they'd be playing around Boston today. A schedule of where they're going to be playing can be found on their site.

Busking is tough work. If you see them around stop and give a listen, throw them a dollar or two, or even buy their new CD, Dream Streets, a compilation of their 12 most-requested songs.