Band of the Month – February 2012 – Polls are Open

It’s that time again.  Conveniently located on the left side bar <—–left——– of the blog is a Poll which will allow you, dear reader, to vote for your favorite Band of the Week from February 2012.  To help you out here is a handy dandy recap….  Enjoy!

Week 1 – Hailing from Brooklyn – The Gypsy West offer up music for the revolution:

A fun cover of Talking Heads – Life During Wartime

The Gypsy West as Talking Heads – Life During Wartime from The Gypsy West on Vimeo.

The Band’s own There are Rules

The Gypsy West – There Are Rules live @ the Bowery Electric from The Gypsy West on Vimeo.

Week 2:  Leicester’s own – Citizen Smith played hard melodic rock.

The catchy Uncle Jack:

Here is an acoustic version of ‘D‘:

 Week 3: We went into the woods (and we never came back) with NJ band The Amboys.

 Here is Ashley Meets the Wolf:

Here is In the Woods:

Week 4 is California based The Weekend Forecast.

Here is the Dexterish I’m Done:

 

 

 A Demo version of the Song Right: 

 

You are now better informed than the average U.S citizen…. Go VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Leap Day Wednesday Morning Music Shuffle – Not Ready Mix

It’s Leap Day – it only comes around once every four years, and it’s way cooler than the Presidential Elections.

So let us leap (yes, I did that) into a nifty little shuffle…

Kafka (no not the early 20th Century German writer, this Kafka is a alt-rock singer/songwriter from Burnley, Lancashire UK.   He writes passionate and driving songs.  The song is Jump Down from the album Mysterious Skin..  Give Kafka a try.

  <—– Mysterious Skin – Kafka – (Amazon.com)

The Drums are a Brooklyn-based band.  On Valentine’s Day, they released a cover of The Ronettes Do I Love You.  They have new music coming soon, but below is a link to last year’s Portamento album.

  <—-Portamento by The Drums @ Amazon.com

Band of Skulls are a UK band. They rock out on the track Death by Diamonds and Pearls from 2009’s Baby Darling Doll Face Honey.  They have a brand-spanking new album available now called Sweet Sour.

 <—–Baby Darling Doll Face Honey by Band of Skulls on Amazon (once you check out this album navigate around Amazon to check out Sweet Sour.

Finally, we have Just Stuph from our main man, H.C. representin’ the 6-1-5 via the 2-5-1.

 https://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F33904062 Just Stuph by Hayden Coleman Music

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Tuesday Morning Music Shuffle – Cement Mixer Mix

“Music hath charms, they say, but in some people’s hands it becomes a savage beast.” – Joe Jackson

Over 30 songs were added to the mix last night which brings our February final tally to over 100.  We shuffled up all those February adds and this is what came out.

We begin our musical journey in Bristol, UK with the Indie, Shoegaze, Noisepop band The Fauns who were once a Band of the Week here at Ear to the Ground.  Today, we have the Mastermind Mix of the song Cool Stuff. The lush original version can be found on the band’s self-titled album:

 <——The Fauns by The Fauns get your #shoegaze on at Amazon.com

Tim Horn Prayer are an Indie/Folk/Punk/Bluegrass band from Denver, Colorado. Crime Scene Cleanup Team is a rollicking, dark little number from the band’s 2010 album Get Busy Dying.

<——-Get Busy Dying by Tim Horn Prayer at Amazon.com

Justin and the Salty Dogs come from Chicago and their Yodel heavy song Postman Blues is next up on today’s shuffle:

  http://cache.reverbnation.com/widgets/swf/40/pro_widget.swf?id=artist_1375028&posted_by=&skin_id=PWAS1005&background_color=EEEEEE&border_color=000000&auto_play=false&shuffle=false&song_ids=7569830<——Use the ReverbNation widget to check out Postman Blues

Finally, we have Long Beach via San Diego band Delta Spirit singing about the French Quarter of New Orleans in a song from the band’s 2006 EP, I Think I Found It.

<—Pre-order the Self-Titled Album by Delta Spirit at Amazon.com due March 12.

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Monday Morning Music Shuffle – No Newts Mix

It’s Monday here in Downtown Nashville, and Newt is going to be here today.  Right across the street from me. Sooooo excited…. *yawn*

In other news, as we wrap up the month of February (I will be adding the last batch of songs for the month tonight), I thought we would hit the Way Back machine and head back to January 2012. Remember when…ah nostalgia..

Shuffle of songs added in January 2012…

The Only Living Boy in New York by Simon and Garfunkel from the Bridge Over Troubled Water album. “I get the news I need on the weather report.”

<—–Bridge Over Troubled Water – Simon and Garfunkel via Amazon.com

Three Times A Midnight   by MAKAR from the Funeral Genius album.  “I’ll take you on a suicide drive.”

<—- Funeral Genius – MAKAR (with the scary west coast aggressive panhandling bird) via Amazon.com

Have You Ever Seen the Rain? by Joan Jett covering The Minutemen Creedence Clearwater Revival from Joan’s The Hit List cover album.  “Someone told me long ago, there’s a calm before the storm.”

 

<—-3 different versions of Have You Ever Seen the Rain? via Amazon.com

And finally, a song about the guy who walked on the moon and blew his lines at the very moment Burris Weems the protagonist of Greg Matthews’ novel Little Red Rooster was born.  Neil Armstrong by The Dexateens from their 2007 album Hardwire Healing.  “Well it’s cold in July when you’re up in the sky…”

  <—–Hardwire Healing by The Dexateens via Amazon.com

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Neil Armstrong Neil Armstrong

Creedence Clearwater Revival Have You Ever Seen the Rain Description not provided.

Band of the Week: Year 2, Month 3, Week 4: The Weekend Forecast

Way way back in May 2011 (the first month of this blogs existence), we did a brief notice about a band called The Weekend Forecast.  At the time, they were a brand new band, and just a few snippets of songs had been released via YouTube clips. We promised to keep our Ear to the Ground and to report back on the band.  


We had called that post “Rumblings” – meaning you put your ear to the ground, and sometimes you’ll hear a distant sound of something approaching, and though you may not be sure exactly what that something may be, you keep listening.  It can take patience, and something that sound may end up being something of little significance, but, I’ve found, sometimes it is well worth the wait.


And so… we flash forward to February 2012, and The Weekend Forecast have put out an album and video.  And now that they are Band of the Week on Ear to the Ground, the sky’s the limit.


First up, is the video for the first song on the album, “Sun, Doubt & Scenic Routes”.  The song is I’m Done and the video is a play on the Intro to the television series, Dexter.

 And yes, since you asked (blogging can be a lonely business, so sometimes we have to imagine our readers asking questions), that is Benji Schwimmer, season 2 winner of So You Think You Can Dance?.  

The album is out and available right here, right now:




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Friday Morming Music Shuffle – ♂ ♀ Mix

Yesterday was a good day for driving with the windows down and blasting tunes just up to the point where the sound begins to distort. 

We’ve reached the end of another week. I know this is a symptom of old age, but man, time sure is flying.  It’s almost March.  Later today or tomorrow, I will be unveiling our 4th and final Band of the Week for February, and next week sometime, we will begin the task of naming our Band of the Month.

Before we get to today’s shuffle, I had a treat in my Inbox this morning – a freshly minted track from Band of the Year Runner-Up Ubiquity Machine – the first from a forthcoming EP.  I can’t wait for all of you to hear it.

To the Shuffle——–>

♫♪ #1 – It ain’t no big thing… Do flip out… sweet, sweet beats – It’s Just Stuph from Hayden Coleman Music – check it out!

http://bandcamp.com/EmbeddedPlayer/v=2/album=3908295771/size=grande3/bgcol=FFFFFF/linkcol=4285BB/ ♪♫ #2 – It seems like it’s been forever since we’ve had The End Men show up in a morning shuffle, whatever, it’s been too long.  Build It Up is the title track from the band’s excellent EP, and it is the song, I first heard, and I was reminded how, when I heard the first few bars, I KNEW that I had just discovered a new fave!

<——-Built It Up (EP) by The End Men – on Amazon.com

♪ ♫ #3 – I heard a couple of reports on NPR this morning about difficulties in other countries over elections.  Here is the US – voting tends to divide us.  But, here at Ear to the Ground we march to the beat of our own drummer(s).  Less than a month ago, The End Men and this next band were engaged in a bitter, hard fought vote to be named Band of the Month, but at the end of the day, once all the votes had been counted and all the challenges and protests had been heard, the two bands were able to put aside their differences and come together….(I’m tearing up now which you can’t see so it loses it’s effect).

Belong Here  comes from the Funeral Genius album by February Band of the Month MAKAR.

<————Funeral Genius by MAKAR – on Amazon.com

♪♫ #4 – Finally – we go to the first EP  of the Accomplices series by recent Band of the Week, The Gypsy West.  Accomplices I and II are available from Bandcamp and volume III is coming soon. The  concept series tells a story and amazing enough the first volume contains two covers which contribute to the overall tale being told.   Today we have one of those covers – Richard Cory was originally on the Simon and Garfunkel album Sound of Silence – based upon the Edwin Arlington Robinson 1897 poem. Here the band makes it their own.

http://cache.reverbnation.com/widgets/swf/40/pro_widget.swf?id=artist_160100&posted_by=&skin_id=PWAS1005&background_color=EEEEEE&border_color=000000&auto_play=false&shuffle=false&song_ids=9812215
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Thursday Morning Music Shuffle – 3.5 Degrees Mix

I read somewhere that due to the explosive of social networking – primarily Facebook, the degrees of separation between all human beings has been reduced from 6 to 3.5.  I have no idea if that is true, but it sounds right.  It is always odd when a “Friend Suggestion” comes up and the person and I have mutual friends who come from entirely different parts of my life. 

This also falls in line with my philosophy that music is all about connections, and that no matter how diverse and random my music collection is, there is always a way to connect any one artist to another.

First up, Have Mercy is a stand-out track on the Jack White produced Van Lear Rose by Loretta Lynn. What a great collaboration this turned out to be.
 
  <—– Loretta Lynn – Van Lear Rose (amazon.com)

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Next up is the hard to google band called The Men – they released a stunning album called Leave Home in 2011 and have a new album due out in early March called Open Your Heart. They play hard, loud music with compromise. Today we have a stand out track from the Leave Home LP “( )”.
  <—The Men – Leave Home (amazon.com)

Finally, completing our interesting three song shuffle and proving that the drugs were really good or really bad back in the mid sixties, we have a track whose working title was Tough Apple, but which ended up being called 2000 Light Years from Home and it comes from the Stones’ album Their Satanic Majesties Request.  

<—– The Rolling Stones – Their Satanic Majesties Request (amazon.com)

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A Festivus for the Rest of Us* – CXCW 2012

Annually, cool musically inclined people and various and sundry hipsters load up their VW vans and what not and make a pilgrimage to Austin, Texas for the South by Southwest Music Festival (SXSW).  Pretty cool, I’ve heard.  But what about the rest of us.  Those with 9 to 5 jobs, those who are financially or geographically challenged or even those of us who would rather just hang around our homes, apartments, shacks and hovels?  Well sure that has always been a option, but come on – admit it, a tiny (or not so tiny) of you is jealous of the cool musicians and bloggers and hangers-on who take to Facebook and Twitter and Instagram or whatever and go on and on about the incredible diverse and exciting musical offerings. Where was I?

Oh yeah, Announcing Couch By Couch West – the alternative to South By South West!

A wide selection of bands and artists have or are recording videos of themselves in their apartments (couches are optional) and submitting those to the Couch By Couch West headquarters.   March 11-18th, you can sit back, relax – pop open a beverage of your choice and watch some fine, fine tuneage.

Some of your favorite Ear to the Ground related bands like The End Men, The Dead Exs, Those Mockingbirds and Don Ryan among many, many more. 

So tune in – here the linkage.

BANDS:  It is not too late – get busy with some videos and send them in.  See the website for more information.

*Apologies to Frank Costanza.

h/t as usual to Popa’s Tunes.

Wednesday Morning Music Shuffle – All Fall Down Mix

So for Christians, this is the season of Lent, and I’m hearing a lot of people talking about what they are giving up.  So here at Ear to the Ground, we’ve made a decision.  From now until Easter we will not post any music by Justin Bieber. It’s going to be difficult, but I guess the idea is that such sacrifice will bring us closer to God.   So here we go with the first of many Bieber-free music shuffles.

First we have Streetwalker by Delta Spirit.  The song comes from the band’s first EP – I Think I’ve Found It.  A newer version of the sound was included on the full-length debut album Ode to Sunshine which we have linked below.  We got the EP version off a no longer available Noisetrade download.

<—Delta Spirit – Ode to Sunshine LP

Next up, we have the brand new Jack White solo track Love Interruption from his forthcoming album Blunderbuss – which was also the title of a Will & the Bushmen album.  Coincidence?

< Jack White – Love Interruption single

After Jack White, we got a fine rollicking country-flavored track which we got via Popa’s Tunes Popakazooza 2012 volume 2.  Nikki Sue & the Bad News are yet another great New Jersey band.  Here’s a link to the band’s website.

Our current Band of the Week are back with In the Woods  from their Led into the Wood – seven song EP.

<The Amboys – Led into the Woods EP

And finally we have The Signal by E L E M I N T. The original version is on the Poet Tree EP.

<E L E M I N T – Poet Tree EP

We listened to the Broadcast remix of the song by our Soundcloud friend Galen Wade which you can hear here: https://player.soundcloud.com/player.swf?url=http%3A%2F%2Fapi.soundcloud.com%2Ftracks%2F35502001 Elemint – The Signal [ Broadcast Remix by Galen Wade ] by Galen Wade

Fat Tuesday Morning Music Shuffle – Thorazine Mix

Welcome to the working week.  After a productive President’s Day of studying Presidential trivia and decorating the President’s Day shrub and taking part in at least six different President’s Day parades, we are back at it for another, albeit short, week.

We first caught up with Taco Land back last year when they were our Band of the Week and went on to a fifth place finish in the Band of the Year competition. We’ve recently been able to add some more great music from the San Antonio based band’s Heart of Texas album and today we feature Lost and Found. Taco Land, which is now the duo of Joseph Russell and Jerry Lafere, write and play smart and smooth indie rock.

 

Our second and fourth songs from today’s shuffle comes from the 2006 album Four Thieves Gone – The Robbinsville Sessions by The Avett Brothers.  First up with have a cheerful little number The Lowering (A Sad Day in Greenvilletown).

Townes Van Zandt was a national treasure.  To say he was under appreciated in his lifetime is a gross understatement.  He suffered from a variety of mental health issues and substance abuse problems, and eventually, these problems slowed his once prolific musical output.  Today’s song is the painfully fractured gem Sanitarium Blues which was released posthumously on the A Far Cry from Dead album.

 

We close it out with another song from The Avett Brothers’ Four Thieves Gone album, this is one Matrimony. The Avett Brothers will be appearing at this years Bonnaroo festival.

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