My friend from high school and fellow CA transplant Mike Byrne tagged me on Facebook with one of the viral notes that has been going around, and this one inspired me to post.  There was no way I could limit it to just 10 albums.  Enjoy!

1. KISS – Destroyer:  3rd grade in 1977, the first real rock and roll I got into

Detroit Rock City

2. The Beatles – Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band:  LOVED The Beatles in grade school

With a Little Help From My Friends

3. Led Zeppelin – Houses of the Holy:  Hearing The Ocean for the first time blew my mind

The Ocean

4. The Grateful Dead – Cornell ‘77:  Its not an album, but it sure is awesome.

New Minglewood Blues

5. Bob Marley & The Wailers – Rastaman Vibration:  My Dad somehow owned this great record – I’ll never forget being curious and digging it out in 5^th grade, dropping the needle and hearing the dub groove for the first time.

Positive Vibration

6. Dire Straits – Alchemy:  Straits!!Strictly speaking this video isn’t from Alchemy, but Knopfler played the same notes every night so it might as well have been.  Knopfler melts Clapton’s face for a few minutes starting at 4:30 and then at 8:00.

7. Pearl Jam – Yield: One of only 4 or 5 cassettes I had when I drove around Europe and Turkey for 3 months in ‘98, their most underrated album and still my favorite.

No Way

8. Thelonious Monk – Monk’s Music:  One perfect melody after another with Hawkins, Monk and ‘Trane trading jams. Purchased in Providence in a bargain bin, played 1000 times.

Epistrophy

9. Joni Mitchell – Blue: well, you know

California

10. Drive-By Truckers – Southern Rock Opera:  My favorite rock band reaching and making anthems work – a masterpiece

Ronnie and Neil

11. The Stooges – Fun House:  Missed this one growing up in the Aerosmith, J Geils, Boston dominated Northeast in the late 70s, discovered it later, now a lot of other things make sense

T.V. Eye

12. Ryan Adams and the Cardinals – Cold Roses:  No artist gets more airtime on my stereo the last few years – this is the record that drew me in.

Easy Plateau

13. Howlin’ Wolf – London Sessions:  Introduced me to the Blues when I found it at age 14 – without that where would I be?

Built For Comfort

14. The Allman Brothers Band – Live at the Fillmore: (hon. mention Derrick and the Dominoes at the Filmore, Band of Gypsies at the Filmore, Santana at the Filmore, and Bill Graham)

In Memory of Elizabeth Reed

15. Bob Dylan – Blood on the Tracks: My favorite album by my favorite artist

You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go

16. Steve Earle and the Del McCoury Band – The Mountain: The greatest bluegrass album ever recorded, and nobody knows it.  The mandolin intro on The Graveyard Shift is precision awesome.

Harlan Man

17. Neil Young with Crazy Horse – Everybody Knows This is Nowhere:  Still thrills me to cue this one up, the soundtrack to a lot of wild times in high school on the tape deck of my ‘78 Pontiac Catalina.

Cowgirl in the Sand

17. Bruce Springsteen – Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.:  A lot of Springsteen albums could be on this list, but this one stands the test of time – the Boss was my guy in the musical wasteland of the early 80s.

Spirit in the Night

18. Miles Davis – Filles de Kilimanjaro: We all wish we were cool, I wish I was Miles.

Frelon Brun (Brown Hornet)

19. Kimmie Rhodes – Love Me Like a Song:  I heard Love and Happiness on public radio late at night in my car, searched out the album, then searched out Kimmie in Austin and became friends. Alec and JJs favorite lullaby, and for that I’ll always be greatful.

Love and Happiness For You

20. Tom Waits – The Heart of Saturday Night:  “Love needs a transfusion, let’s shoot it full of wine – fishin’ for a good time starts with throwin’ in your line.”

New Coat of Paint

21. Tom Petty – Damn the Torpedoes:  A nearly perfect rock and roll record that I never tire of listening to.

Even the Losers

22. Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble – Soul to Soul:  I saw SRV 6 times in concert before he died during my junior year in college.  I had tickets to his final show but I passed on the 3 hour drive from South Bend to Wisconsin because I had just seen him the month before.  The first time I saw him was at a Jazz festival in Massachusetts touring for this album the day I got my driver’s license.

Ain’t Gone ‘N’ Give Up On Love

23. Brian Eno – Music For Airports:  An original Sam-leg (burn by my brother-in-law Sam), this album and red wine has gotten me through that last hour of the JFK-SFO, ATX-SAN, SEA-LAX more times than I care to count.

2/1

Posted: February 24th, 2009 under mp3blog, social networking.
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Jason Isbell is a singer/songwriter from Muscle Shoals Alabama who is best known for his 3 album stint with the Drive-by Truckers (he left the band last year). I’ve seen him live before 3 or 4 times with the Truckers and I caught his phenomenal acoustic show last week (with Browan Lollar on guitar and vocals) at the Mint in Los Angeles presented by an Aquarium Drunkard.

Isbell’s music is both easy and difficult to categorize. Easy: He’s an alt-country singer songwriter from Alabama. Hard: He’s a little bit of Townes Van Zandt (imagery), Bruce Springsteen (symbolism), the Band esp Danko (brawling musicianship), Willie Nelson, Tom Petty (hooks), Dylan (songwriting). With the release of Sirens of the Ditch he’s got a shows worth of great songs to perform, going back to his early Truckers’ songs (Outfit, Goddamn Lonely Love) and before (TVA). He’s also not afraid to do a cover – Dylans The Man in Me was a real highlight last night. He made mention that there “probably aren’t too many cover bands in Los Angeles”, like he was the only one in on the joke.

Another highlight of the evening was the young Marine from Jason’s hometown of Greenhill, Alabama who had driven up from the proving grounds at 29 Palms to see the show. Juxtaposed against Isbell’s poignant intro to Dress Blues where he talked about the empty space a dead soldier could leave in a small southern (anywhere?) town that inspired the song, the young soldier’s presence was moving.

It was a great performance that left me really looking forward to his 2nd solo album which is due out in early ‘09. He mentioned last night that the album is in the can and seemed really happy with it.

If by some Google’s chance in hell the guy taping last night’s show stumbles across this post – hit me up I’d love a copy.  Also MickO leave a comment when you get your film developed and up on Flickr.

Jason Isbell – Dress Blues

Drive-by Truckers – Outfit

Drive-by Truckers – Goddamn Lonely Love

Sirens of the Ditch on Amazon

Posted: November 16th, 2008 under digital music, live music, moblog, mp3blog.
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Ryan Adams and the Cardinals released their new record Cardinology this week.  Ryan Adams has been quite prolific throughout his career, but he hadn’t officially released anything yet in 2008.  Was Cardinology worth the wait?

In a word – YES.  This is one hell of a band ladies and gentlemen, and this album feels like they have finally made their collective creative peace and gone for it – esp. guitarist/vocalist Neil Casal and Ryan.  I’m a sucker for a great harmony, and these two really know how to sing together and are obviously sonically simpatico.  They are also excellent guitarists in an understated, riffy sort of way, and the guitar work is about as solid as I’ve heard from anybody in a long time.  The tradecraft learned while constantly touring really shows – listening to some of the tracks I get the feeling every pick stroke, every pickup mic setting is there for a reason.  And the pedal steel played by John Graboff is as good as any you’ll hear anywhere.

I will admit that on first run through I was somewhat disappointed by the record because the songs themselves are less hooky and don’t all hang together as well as the previous RA albums I play so often.  The catchiest songs are front loaded, and from there they really slow down and become less accessible till you get to a really raw piano only ballad “Stop” for the last track.   But listening to the album a few times (esp on headphones) I at some point “got it”.  Its a lot less about hooks than it is about making a really great band get everything they can out of every track.  Thanks – applause.

That being said the single “Fix It” is right there in the pantheon of great Ryan Adams songs.  The lyrics are genius.  I automatically assumed at first that he was referring to “fixing” a broken relationship (life’s greatest cliche?), but what he’s really referring to is fixing the game of breaking up.  Its dark and funny and personal all at the same time.  And the song itself rocks – I found myself playing it on repeat more than once this week.

I know its not a game

but it feels like losing

when someone you love throws you away.

I’d fix it

if I could

and I’d always win (and you would always lose)

I’d always win in the end

Cardinology – Fix It

Cardinology – Evergreen

Cardinology on Amazon

Review at Aquarium Drunkard

Update:  Someone from the Cardinals followed me on Twitter and just tweeted this sweet live acoustic show:

Posted: October 31st, 2008 under mp3blog.
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MTV just launched a cool site that has legal embeds for their entire music video catalog.  Its also integrated with Flux, which is excellent. Here is a Wilco vid grabbed at random. As of now there doesn’t appear to be any advertising, although I’m betting that will change.

Posted: October 27th, 2008 under digital entertainment, digital music, flux, mp3blog, social networking, work.
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Congrats to my friends at Topspin Media for helping David Byrne and Brian Eno release their new album today.  I’ve been a fan of David Byrne since he wore oversized jackets (“geek is chic”).  I drove 2.5 hours to Indianapolis to see him in college in an old van that had no business being on the road – his music was way ahead of its time and totally blew us away.  And is his show last summer at the Bowl was epic.  Good times.  And I have listened to Eno’s Music For Airports on headphones in coach coming back from somewhere east (and a few times west) of California more times than I can count since my brother-in-law Sam introduced me to it probably a decade ago. I listened to the new album this morning, and I agree with everyone else – it’s great.  You can stream it here for free, and then there are a bunch of options for purchasing direct from the artists’ site itself.

Ambient 1: Music For Airports 1/1

Amazon – Ambient 1/Music For Airports

Posted: August 18th, 2008 under digital entertainment, digital music, live music, mp3blog.
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My cousin Greg Raymond composed this song for our grandmother who is recovering from heart surgery. Get well soon Mim!!

Song For Mim

Posted: August 12th, 2008 under mp3blog.
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There are so many great ways to discover and enjoy music that didn’t exist 10 years ago.  Internet radio, music blogs, social networks, recommendation technology.  The prevailing wisdom is that we need all these new forms of music discovery because Clear Channel killed terrestrial radio in the 90s by rolling up all the good old stations and programming them from an office park in Dallas with lowest common denominator corporate schlock.  Which they basically did.

But it turns out you can’t kill great radio completely.  We Angelenos are fortunate to have an incredible station in Indie 103.1.  Ian Rogers (who knows I dig the alt-country and other forms of cool roots) first tuned me into Chris Morris’s excellent Sunday morning show Watusi Rodeo a few years ago.  Its still my favorite program.  Excellent week in and week out.

Dwight Yoakum – Close Up the Honky Tonks

Steve Earle and the Del McCoury Band – Harlan Man

Johnny Adams – Hell Yes I cheated

Another solid program on 103.1 is Big Sonic Heaven weeknights from 10-12 PM.  I usually tune in a few nights a week while reading or playing Wii.  Its heavy on the Sigur Ros, Portishead and other chill out type stuff.  I bet Mick O tunes in regularly.

Steve Jones from the Sex Pistols has a show called Jonesy’s Jukebox at noon and 6PM. He gets some great long format interviews and guest DJs (Robert Plant, Public Enemy, Spoon, OK Go, Harry Shearer as of late) and plays some great R&B, soul, etc. as well as pre through post punk.

There is also a great DJ (forgot his name) who plays around 7 or 8PM midweek who is totally geeked about rareties, the vinyl-ier the better.  He doesn’t pre-announce the tracks he is going to play,  but he gives a great post-play synopsis including how to find the rare tracks.  They don’t appear to have a page for him on the site so I’m not sure what the show is called, but he’s turned me on the some great rare stuff in the past few weeks.  His setup for Makanda Ken McIntyre’s Cosmos was “get prepared for 5min and 26 sec of sonic perfection.”  I thought so too – check it out (loud works better).  It’s off an Complete United Artists Sessions compilation which is only available new on Makanda’s site (the vinyl is amazing and also hard to come by).

Tenor Saw – Ring the Alarm

Makanda Ken Mcintyre – Cosmos

If you are like me and had given up on ad-supported terrestrial radio, start tuning into 103.1 on your stereo or checking out their live stream on their site.  They run fewer ads than most stations by a longshot, and a lot of the ads they do run seem to be promoting local music events and festivals – like this tribute to Johnny Ramone in Hollywood next weekend that I want to attend (as long as it doesn’t interfere with Broken Ocean’s gig that night at Viper Room).

Amazon links:

Dwight Sings Buck

The Mountain

Hell Yes I Cheated

Tenor Saw Lives On

Posted: July 25th, 2008 under digital music, internet radio, live music, mp3blog.
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Sometimes art and music makes you scratch your head   I didn’t think I much liked The Replacements all this time.  I even went to college in the midwest while they were still together in the late eighties and had lots of friends from the Twin Cities.  I bought their studio greatest hits compilation a bunch of years back and listened to it a few times and basically thought it was unremarkable.

Then last week I pulled a DownThemAll from Aquarium Drunkard straight to a playlist on my ipod for a flight to Denver last week. (Highly recommended quick iPod refresh technique – we can call it Raymonating your iPod).  Luckily for me it included the entire Shit, Shower and Shave compilation, which is a “long-traded compilation” from some live 1989 shows opening for Petty (which wikipedia calls a disastrous tour for an unknown reason).

Holy shit shower and shave, I’m a huge fan!  Sort of a Springsteen everyman point of view (switch out Asbury Park for Sheboygan) with a Waits gift for turning a great metaphor, combined with a Drive-By Truckers brawling drunken coming straight at you live personality and a Ramones intensity.  I can’t get enough of it.  How did I miss these guys for so long?

Chalk up another victory for the mp3blog era – I will definitely be rounding out my collection from some timely reissues of their studio stuff – a positive activity music economy-wise the lousy label greatest hits compilation didn’t trigger 10 years ago.  But I’m preaching at the choir.

I’m not going to bother to rehost the tracks, head over to the AD if you want to check them out.

Posted: July 2nd, 2008 under digital music, live music, mp3blog, portable devices.
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Some fierce music by the Funky Meters off an album that is no longer for sale called The Funky Meters Jam.

The player is courtesy my old comrades at Yahoo, check it out here. You literally drop one line of code in your index file and it can play any mp3 files on your page.

Stretch Your Rubber Band

Groovy Lady

Come Together

photo from Flickr by companyofstorms

Groovy Lady (Single Version) on Amazon

Posted: June 11th, 2008 under mp3blog.
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