The Velvet Rut

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Purchase: Van Morrison–Veedun Fleece [CD--Re-Mastered w/Bonus Tracks]

I don’t quite know where it all began. Riding back into C’ville late last night with the moon hanging big, bright, and three quarter full … Interstate 64 all lit up and this single cloud appearing like a wolf riding through the night sky, racing as if to swallow the moon whole. Listening to Son Volt’s American Central Dust and feeling the beautiful sadness of Jay Farrar’s lyric just opened up the whole damn crack in my heart. It’s a strange thing to explain when you can just sit and marvel at the world, it’s wholeness and emptiness, and the only markers along the way end up being the large green interstate exit signs announcing places familiar and unknown [depending upon which part of the road you've already traveled.]

And maybe it comes off as having little or no explanation but I sat up until 4 in the morning sipping wine and listening to Bob Martin records, John Prine records, Fred Eaglesmith records, The Animals, Keith Morris, Paul Curreri, Kris Kristofferson, and Chris Knight. And to dreams, ragged and blue, I closed with the Faces. Kind of sent things off with a ballsy, bombastic blast … a blast that led to waking with an immediate desire to watch the Wes Anderson classic Rushmore for what must be the fourth or fifth time in as many months.

“Ooh La La” is how it all ends once the curtain falls on Max’s play. It’s a song that always captures my heart and makes it dance every time.  And that’s where my morning took turn. If Jay Farrar captured the brilliance of sadness beneath a declining moon racing the wolves of midnight, then Ronnie Lane shot the autumn morning full of sunshine and brilliance of a lighter sort. I listened to “How Come” and “Single Saddle”, “Never Can Tell” and “Ain’t No Lady”. Songs opened up and led me in new directions. I watched the whole of the BBC documentary The Passing Show : The Life and Music of Ronnie Lane [which you can find on YouTube in six 10-minutes segments] … until all returned back to the same beautiful sadness that I had discovered the night before.

Two songs in particular cut a strange path through the woods leading back to that moonlit highway. The stunning “Tin and Tambourine” from the 1974 release Ronnie Lane’s Slim Chance and the song that you know find before you … “Done This One Before”. Never released on a proper album, “Done This One Before” was one of two B-sides on Lane’s first, post-Faces hit single, for the aforementioned “How Come”. So glad that it lives on in this video performance.

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“Well, in the morning, we’ll have to pretend again, smiling. / You’ll be my good friend again, hold me. / The light comes a-creeping in the morning, the curtain will rise again. / I know, I know, because I’ve done this one before.”

This shit is blowing my mind … because it has reminded me of the personal when it comes to music. You follow a path that begins with a feeling and it can lead you to the strangest places. Somehow … on a Monday night on the edge of the Blue Ridge … I found my way from beautiful sadness back around again. It’s a story … albeit not the strongest of stories perhaps, but it’s a story all the same. Stick to the script and let the unexpected come along and do what it needs to do …I believe I’ve done this one before.

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Purchase: Ronnie Lane–Ronnie Lane’s Slim Chance [Import CD]

Truth and Salvage Company

I’m attempting to get some things done today while out of town and away from my office. So consider this one to be written on the run.  Luckily I’ll be back in C’ville in time to catch the first of two noteworthy shows on my dance card at The Southern this week.  I’ll be dropping a few words about Those Darlins’ upcoming return to town sometime tomorrow [they're performing on Wednesday], but I’ll begin this week from the road with a band who seemingly lives its life on the road as Truth and Salvage Company hit The Southern tomorrow [Tuesday Oct. 19].

Comprised of six L.A. transplants whose roots are firmly planted in the American South [three of the band's members re-located to Los Angeles from Asheville, NC and a fourth hails from Tupelo, Mississippi), Truth and Salvage Company started making a name for themselves a few years back when they caught the ear of Black Crowes' frontman Chris Robinson.  Invited to join the Crowes as an opening act on their 2009 tour, Truth and Salvage also landed a record deal on Robinson's Silver Arrow Records which released the band's self-titled debut in May of last year [an album that Chris Robinson also produced].  A sophomore follow-up is in the works for the spring of 2012.

Featuring four singer-songwriters, a veritable plethora of harmonies, and a sound that mixes Laurel Canyon country with the sweet leaf aroma of Southern rock [or is that the other way around?], Truth and Salvage Company provides the perfect soundtrack for a road trip over landscapes of early autumn highways, sunbathed in oranges, yellows, reds and greens, and the windows rolled wide on a warm breeze blowing down the mountain.  Or as I like to call it … the drive back HOME.

Truth and Salvage Company performs at The Southern in Charlottesville tomorrow night.  With special guest opening acts Brian Wright and Grace Woodroofe.  Doors at 8pm.  Tickets :  $10 adv / $12 door.  Buy tickets HERE.  And check out the video for “Pure Mountain Angel”,  from the band’s debut release, below.  It’s an almost guaranteed set closer.

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Purchase: Truth and Salvage Company–S/T [vinyl]

From the darker side of Americana comes the music of Portland, Oregon’s Richmond Fontaine.  Songwriter Willy Vlautin has crafted what can only be described as a “song-novel” with the release of the band’s latest album The High Country.  Maybe I’m taking the easy way out but what the hell … let me just give it to you as the arrow flies because I’m not sure I can begin to give this album a proper introduction without stumbling around searching for the words [quoted excerpt below from the press materials for The High Country]:

“THE HIGH COUNTRY is a Gothic love story between a mechanic and an auto parts store counter girl, whose secret love inspires an effort to escape the darkness of the world that surrounds them — drugs, violence, madness, loneliness, and desperation set against a backdrop of endless logging roads and the remains of a forest brutalized by logging. In this story of light vs. dark, Vlautin has woven a tale where fuck-ups and freaks demonize the lives of innocents.”

So yeah … don’t come around looking for the sunshine amongst the trajectory of The High Country’s seventeen tracks because it just isn’t there.  Instead these are the tales of those souls found at the graying edge of the fringes. These are gritty stories that we might wish to ignore but only because they are so real it’s hard to look them straight in the eyes. No other record released this year [with the possible exception of Josh T. Pearson's lamenting masterpiece The Last of the Country Gentlemen] dares to gravitate in this realm of tortured landscapes and haunted lives more directly than this novella turned album from Richmond Fontaine.  Quite possibly as points of reference, if you find yourself a fan of the recent film “Winter’s Bone” or are drawn to the works of David Lynch and Cormac McCarthy [to a lesser degree on both accounts] then you’ll be at home with The High Country’s sense of bleak, rural music noir.

Willy Vlautin just might be one of the best songwriters you’ve never heard of and Richmond Fontaine deserves to be in the discussion as one of America’s premiere alt-country acts.  The High Country is never going to be an album for the casual listener.  The whole of the record challenges the sensibilities of what an album of song and music should be.  We are presented with an unconventional approach to narrative … but in doing so Richmond Fontaine stands up for the art of making music in the face of being another piece of cookie-cutter, commercial crap stamped out for the masses and Top 40 radio.  The High Country dares to be original and as such it receives high marks in my book.  In the end, Richmond Fontaine has created what will be one of my favorite album releases of 2011.

Here’s the video for the first single from The High Country. “Lost in the Trees” [one of the album's rare rocking moments] captures the story’s backdrop of a Pacific Northwest backwoods and gives it a soundtrack set to a driving, gravelly growl.  The moving pictures just add to the sense of something both desperate and sinister.  You just kind of get the feeling this ain’t gonna end well.  The High Country is available now on CD or as a digital download and will be released on vinyl on November 15th via Diverse Records.

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Pre-Order: Richmond Fontaine–The High Country [vinyl]

Deer Tick [photo by Scott Alario]

The countdown is on for the release of Deer Tick’s fourth album Divine Providence which hits stores on October 24th on Partisan Records.  I’ve been digging on Deer Tick since being introduced to the band’s sophomore record Born on Flag Day a couple years back and things just keep getting better and better.  I do have to say that I’m also surprised by the fact that these guys haven’t made a stop in C’ville yet.  Put ‘em together with a nice bill that included Jonny Corndawg and maybe even Caitlin Rose and I can promise you that it would be a stomper fo’ sure!  Somebody make that happen would ya?

In the meantime I’ve got a couple Deer Tick and Divine Providence related goodies to pass along.  The boys from Providence, Rhode Island made their second appearance on The Late Show with David Letterman last night, performing “Main Street” off the forthcoming record.  Check it below.  Scroll on down just a little bit farther and you’ll find a little take-away track to fill your new music fix in the form of the closing track from Divine Providence,  “Miss K”.  T-minus ten days, three hours, and twenty minutes … and counting … just in case you’re keeping track at home.

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MP3: Deer Tick–Miss K
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Pre-Order:  Deer Tick–Divine Providence [Limited Edition vinyl]

Malcolm Holcombe [photo by Ray Kennedy]

Raw.  Ragged.   Wrapped in the resonance of blues and smoke.  These are the American voices that I often come back to again and again.  I want an honest song and I want it sung by an honest artist.  If there was a stage to stand on or a chair to sit upon, in the absence of amplification or electronic gadgets, with the assistance of string and wood and a voice to carry the words, nothing would be lost in the translation.  There’s power and glory and something so real in that notion, that it should never be ignored.  I chose to celebrate those whose music comes from the heart and soul.  The folksinger’s song is sung from the ages past, present, and yet to come … and of Malcolm Holcombe I assuredly would sing most loudly.

I first came upon Holcombe’s music while spending some time down in an Asheville, North Carolina back in the late 90′s.  WNCW was blasting on the beat-up stereo in my equally beat-up pickup truck and out of the blue comes this voice that sounded like the mountains and the ghosts of mountains.  A voice that grabs you by the back of your being with a burning, burly growl.  I drove around Asheville until the DJ back-announced the set and I waited for the name that belonged to a song about “pages rockin’ justice in a cradle”.  Malcolm Holcolmbe.  I bought the only record I could find that same day.  If you don’t own A Hundred Lies, you should.  Holcombe is a gawd damn poet and A Hundred Lies is his first collection of greatness.

I interviewed the man once when I was working in radio back in the early to mid aughts.  It’s a voice on the other end of the phone line you won’t soon forget.  And even in the years since I’ve noticed that Holcombe has stuck to his guns in more recent interviews.  Ask him about his music and he’ll tell you today what he told me then … it’s all folk music … plain and simple.  Some things never change.  Wind, rain, time, booze, and smoke.  They can wear down the edges.  Smooth what once was sharp and ragged.  But that voice rises in the storm.  Calls out through the din of bars and music halls.  Carries a story from the long, hard road.  For an hour or two you’re wrapped in tales.  Take a moment to stop and listen.  Malcolm Holcombe is one of those guys that demands to be heard.

Maybe Rolling Stone magazine has said it better.  Lucinda Williams and Steve Earle have jumped to the defense.  I’ve merely strung together a few sensations and brief personal sketches that mean something to me and the music in my head.  I feel like I’ve spent a lifetime listening to Malcolm Holcombe.  I’ve got a few lives left for whatever yarn he’s got to spin.  It’s the best that I can give one of the honest, brilliant voices in my estimation … in the face of the fact that a world races to some different tune more often than not and speeds right on by the power of a well-crafted song.  As for me?  I’ll be sitting at the corner table, sipping a bourbon by candlelight, listening to the voice of original, beaten beauty.

“Down in the Woods” appears on Malcolm Holcombe’s latest release To Drink the Rain which was released back in February of this year on Music Road Records.  Holcombe will be appearing at The Mockingbird Roots Music Hall in Staunton, VA this Friday, October 14th.  8:30pm.  Tickets are $12 adv / $14 day of show. [buy tickets HERE]

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[video courtesy of Music Fog]
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Purchase: Malcolm Holcombe–To Drink the Rain [CD or Digital Download]

Paul Curreri

I never did say goodbye.  I guess that’s because I still kinda feel like we’ll all see each other again.  But know this … and I say it often to whomever will listen.  In a small little city like Charlottesville that seems to have an abundance of talent often in greater proportion to its size, Paul Curreri is the top of the tops and one of the most gifted artists I’ve come to know [even if the knowing was in the most occasionally casual kind of way].  From the cozy confines of C’ville to the European metro of Berlin, his hat now hangs its home.  He is missed.  Give our best to Dev.  In the end … I often tend … to avoid the finality of goodbye.  So I will instead extend … a hearty fare thee well … in happiness and success, music and life.  You deserve it all in spades.  Til our paths cross again …

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“Poor Little Motorbike” is the latest from Paul Curreri’s forthcoming release The Big Shitty [which is due out in the UK later this month on Tin Angel Records- for those of us stateside I cannot be sure of the same as we may have to wait a little longer].  The video for “Poor Little Motorbike” was shot and directed by Aaron Farrington.  Enjoy the ride!  [and for addition shits and giggles, check out Paul's tumblr blog Walking in the Shoes of My Face ... it brings a smile to my face]

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Official Site:  Paul Curreri

Over the past month, as I’ve been breathing some life back into this little Rut O’ Mine, I’ve been reminded of a ton of great musical highlights from the previous year that I shamefully neglected to share with you all.  Maybe I just needed some time to collect some new tales to tell.  Whatever the case may be, there’s no doubting that one of the best shows I saw between last September and the present has to be Jeff Tweedy’s solo performance at The Paramount Theater here in Charlottesville back on December 8th of last year.  There are a slew of runner-ups, but this one was the cat’s whiskers and the cat’s meow.

This performance was the second solo show from the Wilco frontman that I had seen at the Paramount since moving to Charlottesville back in 2006 and I kinda think someone [either Tweedy or the musical powers that be] finds a nice match between our little town and Tweedy’s music because we’ve also had Wilco here twice [at the Pavilion both times] and that ain’t too shabby for a city of 40,000+.  And if you’ll remember, Tweedy only did three East Coast shows on this particular run … NYC, Tarrytown, NY, and C’ville.  So yeah…I kinda dig it here.  And Jeff Tweedy … I kinda dig his thing too.

I won’t go into an entire show breakdown [I'll be saving that for a time in the near future], but some of the choice treat[s] from the evening came during the five-song encore which featured Wilco bandmates John Stirratt and Pat Sansone joining Tweedy on  “At My Window Sad and Lonely” and then the whole of The Autumn Defense [the evening's opening act] sitting in for the final four show closers.  We got “California Stars”, “Passenger Side”, and the Doug Sahm cover “Give Back the Keys to My Heart”.  And then we got this…

On the 30th anniversary of John Lennon’s untimely death [and just days short of the 40th anniversary of the song's release] … Tweedy pulls out a cover of Lennon’s “God” from John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band.  It was goose-bump inducing stuff.  Raise the hair on the back of your neck.  Maybe there was even a tear or two.  Fucking beautiful.  Thanks Jeff.

MP3: Jeff Tweedy–God (John Lennon cover)

Gold Leaves [photo by Kyle Johnson]

Catch Gold Leaves, the new musical project of Seattle-based songwriter Grant Olsen, on tour this fall opening for A.A. Bondy. [Olsen is also half of the indie folk duo Arthur & Yu]. For Charlottesville locals that means not missing out on November 18th when A.A. Bond, along with Gold Leaves, hits The Southern Music Hall. And yes, I’m kind of excited that A.A. Bondy is coming back around. I missed his show at The Southern a couple years back. I will not be making the same mistake twice. Buy tickets (only ten bucks!!) HERE.

To further your introduction here are two tracks from Gold Leaves’ debut release The Ornament which was released back in August on the Sub Pop imprint label Hardly Art Records. Enjoy.

MP3: Gold Leaves–Cruel and Kind
MP3: Gold Leaves–The Ornament
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Purchase: Gold Leaves–The Ornament [CD or LP]

Man O Man was I feeling rough last night.  Thought I was coming done with the flu.  I really should have been in bed, but I’m kinda glad I couldn’t sleep.  I was flipping through the channels near the midnight hour and luckily landed on Conan just in time to catch Portugal. The Man light up the boob tube with their national TV debut.

“So American” appears on Portugal. The Man’s latest release [and major label debut] In the Mountain In the Cloud [Atlantic Records].  The band just kicked off their World Tour last night in Santa Clara, CA and they will be making their way across North America in the coming weeks with a scheduled tour stop right here in Charlottesville on October 26th at The Jefferson Theater.  With special guests Alberta Cross.  Snag tickets HERE before this things sells out. [And just in case you're wondering...I'm feeling much better today...flu scare averted].

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Purchase:  Portugal. The Man–In the Mountain In the Cloud [Vinyl]