Warner Music Canada announced this week that Fortune’s Favour, the latest album from St. John’s NL based group Great Big Sea has been certified gold in Canada. Fortune’s Favour is Great Big Sea’s ninth studio release since their 1995 debut, Up. It is a testament to the band’s popularity that every album they have recorded has now been certified gold or platinum in Canada.
Fortune’s Favour was produced by Juno-award winner singer/songwriter/producer Hawksley Workman and features the album’s first single, “Walk On The Moon,” which became the soundtrack for a series of Olympic highlight videos posted on youtube by fans. The band’s current US single, “Here and Now,” is enjoying extensive airplay. Fortune’s Favour continues to push the boundaries of music and art by marrying the traditional music of Newfoundland with their own pop explorations.
One of the most explosive live bands currently on the music scene, Great Big Sea regularly garners media praise and will continue to tour the US throughout the fall with Canadian dates to follow through year’s end.
“Walk on the Moon,” Great Big Sea: Canadian Folk Rockers take one small step for romance on this starry-eyed track from the new Fortune’s Favour.”–Brian Mansfield, USA Today
“With Fortune’s Favour, produced by the enigmatic Hawksley, the band is fusing those signature elements with a vibrance and energy that makes old sailor songs and standard pop forms fresh and engaging.” -Holly Gleason, The Vineyard Gazette
Great Big Sea was recently invited to perform in support of the Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Waterkeeper’s event in Canada. They will appear on NPR’s World Café this October.
Great Big Sea US Tour:
October 3rd: Los Angeles, CA–House of Blues
October 4th: Santa Barbara, CA–Lobero Theatre
October 5th: San Luis Obispo, CA–Cal Poly Tech Theatre
October 7th: Tucson, AZ–Rialto Theatre
October 8th: Albuquerque, NM–El Ray Theatre
October 9th: Denver, CO–Paramount Theatre
October 10th: Murray, UT–Murray Theatre
October 11th: Boise, ID–Egyptian Theatre
October 12th: Portland, OR–Aladdin Theatre
October 22nd: Rochester, NY–German House
October 23rd: Keene, NH–The Colonial Theatre
October 24th: Boston, MA–The Orpheum
October 26th: Charlotte, NC–Dana Auditorium
October 28th: Atlanta, GA–Variety Playhouse
October 29th: Raleigh, NC–Fletcher Theatre
October 30th: South Orange, NJ–South Orange PAC
October 31st: Burlington, VT–Flynn Theatre
November 1st: Portland, ME–Merrill Auditorium
November 2nd: Lebanon, NH–Opera House
Here’s the band performing a tune off the new album:
“Make you Crazy” is the single from the upcoming Brett Dennen release Hope for the Hopeless out October 21 on Downtown Records. The song features the legendary Femi Kuti.
A very appropriate song for what’s going on all around us. Check it out:
Brett Dennen - “Make You Crazy”
www.brettdennen.net
Www.myspace.com/brettdennen
Check out a live performance of the song:
With a resume that spans over 20 years in the music industry, one would think that a veteran musician and ex-Dream Syndicate Frontman like Steve Wynn couldn’t learn any new tricks. Well, that idea is far from true with his newest release, Crossing Dragon Bridge.
For his eighth solo record, Steve found his inspiration in Slovenia with producer Chris Eckman. Performing the album’s guitars, bass, stylophone and lead vocals, Steve claims that this record sounds more like the sounds he hears inside of his head that anything else he has ever made before. Paying homage to his Eastern European excursion, Crossing Dragon Bridge, gives new character to a classic sound.
Steaming Audio:
Pigeonhole Carrie Rodriguez at your peril. Sure, she’s done a lot of duets. She plays a fiddle (a mean one at that.) She’s recorded songs with a pleasing, folksy twang. But don’t think you know what you’re getting.
Not yet 30, and with a critically-acclaimed solo record and several well-received duet records in her wake, the classically trained singer/songwriter has just begun flexing her artistic muscles, still figuring out how far her talents will take her. If you’re looking for someone playing it safe and sticking to tried-and-true ways of music making, as the title of Rodriguez’s daring new album aptly states, SHE AIN’T ME.
“Because I took some chances, wrote with some new people and actually co-wrote most of the songs on the album, it’s very different,” Rodriguez notes.
Also different: Malcolm Burn’s dense production, bulging with thoughtful details, yet always serving the song. “If the song doesn’t hold up on its own, without all the production, he doesn’t want to have anything to do with it,” Rodriguez says. “And he was much more into the vibe than perfection—which is good for me, because my tendency is to try to make things perfect.”
The songs on SHE AIN’T ME, Rodriguez’s second solo outing for Manhattan/Back Porch, come from an introspective place, rife with self-assessment and questioning. “It comes from having to really look within yourself when you’re forced to be alone, and to not be afraid of that process,” Rodriguez says. “Taking some time off from the road this year to write allowed me to do some growing and reflecting that I often put aside when I’m touring all the time.”
Long before Carrie Rodriguez was a fiddle-toting, mandoguitar-slinging Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter, she was a junior violin student in Austin, Texas, absorbing the influences of an opera-obsessed mom and folk-singing dad. “In kindergarten, we had a pilot program at my public elementary school to teach five year olds Suzuki violin lessons,” Rodriguez recalls. “They would give the lessons during naptime, and I must have gotten out to go to the bathroom. And I remember walking down the hallway and hearing these violins scratching out ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.’ I was immediately drawn to that and came home and told mom I wanted to take violin lessons.
“Also,” she adds, “I really hated naptime.”
Group lessons soon led to private lessons, which led Carrie to a conservatory program at Oberlin. Enter Lyle Lovett, a family friend, who invited Carrie to sit in with his band at soundcheck in Cleveland, an experience that was both inspiring and frustrating. “My feel was awful and I knew it,” she recalls. “But I was mesmerized by [Lovett fiddler] Andrea Zonn. I wanted to do what she was doing.”
Rodriguez transferred to Boston’s Berklee College of Music, where she found no shortage of resources for transforming “violin” into “fiddle. “Casey Driessen is now one of the greatest American fiddle players on the scene (plays with Bela Fleck, Tim O’Brien), and he was my roommate,” Rodriguez recalls. “He taught me one of the first fiddle tunes I ever learned.”
Berklee also set the table for a love of collaboration, which led to three duet records (and many touring miles) with singer/songwriter Chip Taylor, who was instrumental in helping Carrie to realize her debut album, SEVEN ANGELS ON A BICYCLE. The Associated Press raved, ““…her voice has a character few achieve. Rather than a support player taking a minor turn, she uses her first solo album to mark her ground as a singular talent.” For SHE AIN’T ME, Rodriguez knew it was time to form new collaborations and she ended up with an impressive list of co-writers, including Gary Louris (Jayhawks), Dan Wilson (Semisonic), Jim Boquist (Son Volt) and Mary Gauthier.
“I feel the most comfortable when I have someone to react to,” Rodriguez says. “The process was completely different with each person I wrote with. For example, with Mary Gauthier we sat down one rainy afternoon in New York City and wrote the entire song, more or less. With Dan Wilson we just came up with a little melody and a few snippets of words while we were in the same room. Later, I wrote the verses, he came up with a great chorus, and we put the song together via e-mail and a few phone calls.”
Lucinda Williams wasn’t among the co-writers, but she makes her presence felt, singing backup on “Mask of Moses” while singing Carrie’s praises elsewhere. After receiving a copy of SEVEN ANGELS ON A BICYCLE from Chip Taylor, Lucinda told the New York Times “…I have to say I am very impressed. She’s got something unique in her voice that’s very subtle and a little smoky and sweet. I detect a certain wisdom in her, and yet a sense of wonder as well.” Rodriguez recalls, “Lucinda had sent me this beautiful email, saying how much she loved my record, and how she really saw something special there. And if I ever wanted to open up for her, that’d be great. It was like, wow! Merry Christmas!”
Rodriguez subsequently toured with Williams, and also sat in on fiddle during Lucinda’s sets. And it was on the heels of a night out with Williams that Rodriguez met Malcolm Burn—whose work she’d admired on Emmylou Harris’s WRECKING BALL (engineer and musician) and Chris Whitley’s LIVING WITH THE LAW (producer and musician)– for an early chat about her next record. “I was pretty hung-over that morning, in my pajamas, looking like a train wreck,” Rodriguez admits. “And Malcolm comes over, looking all dapper in his vintage three-piece suit.”
Appearances were quickly dismissed as Malcolm made spot-on suggestions about Carrie’s songs, and offered production ideas that made her feel her own project would be a worthy addition to the “desert island discs” Burn has already recorded. “I knew immediately that this was the guy,” she recalls.
The result is a record that lives up to its name—an expectation-confounding statement, equal parts organic folk and expansive atmosphere, yet one that comes closest to revealing what Carrie Rodriguez is all about. Think you already know? Think again.
Listen Here
Link to Official Site:
http://www.carrierodriguez.com
Carrie Rodriguez on MySpace
http://www.myspace.com/carrielrodriguez
Like Music? Got 3 million dollars to spare? Check this out:
The Archive from Sean Dunne on Vimeo.
Pigeonhole Carrie Rodriguez at your peril. Sure, she’s done a lot of duets. She plays a fiddle (a mean one at that.) She’s recorded songs with a pleasing, folksy twang. But don’t think you know what you’re getting.
Not yet 30, and with a critically-acclaimed solo record and several well-received duet records in her wake, the classically trained singer/songwriter has just begun flexing her artistic muscles, still figuring out how far her talents will take her. If you’re looking for someone playing it safe and sticking to tried-and-true ways of music making, as the title of Rodriguez’s daring new album aptly states, SHE AIN’T ME.
Stream “She Ain’t Me”
“Because I took some chances, wrote with some new people and actually co-wrote most of the songs on the album, it’s very different,” Rodriguez notes.
Also different: Malcolm Burn’s dense production, bulging with thoughtful details, yet always serving the song. “If the song doesn’t hold up on its own, without all the production, he doesn’t want to have anything to do with it,” Rodriguez says. “And he was much more into the vibe than perfection—which is good for me, because my tendency is to try to make things perfect.”
The songs on SHE AIN’T ME, Rodriguez’s second solo outing for Manhattan/Back Porch, come from an introspective place, rife with self-assessment and questioning. “It comes from having to really look within yourself when you’re forced to be alone, and to not be afraid of that process,” Rodriguez says. “Taking some time off from the road this year to write allowed me to do some growing and reflecting that I often put aside when I’m touring all the time.”
Long before Carrie Rodriguez was a fiddle-toting, mandoguitar-slinging Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter, she was a junior violin student in Austin, Texas, absorbing the influences of an opera-obsessed mom and folk-singing dad. “In kindergarten, we had a pilot program at my public elementary school to teach five year olds Suzuki violin lessons,” Rodriguez recalls. “They would give the lessons during naptime, and I must have gotten out to go to the bathroom. And I remember walking down the hallway and hearing these violins scratching out ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.’ I was immediately drawn to that and came home and told mom I wanted to take violin lessons.
“Also,” she adds, “I really hated naptime.”
Group lessons soon led to private lessons, which led Carrie to a conservatory program at Oberlin. Enter Lyle Lovett, a family friend, who invited Carrie to sit in with his band at soundcheck in Cleveland, an experience that was both inspiring and frustrating. “My feel was awful and I knew it,” she recalls. “But I was mesmerized by [Lovett fiddler] Andrea Zonn. I wanted to do what she was doing.”
Stream “El Dorado”
Rodriguez transferred to Boston’s Berklee College of Music, where she found no shortage of resources for transforming “violin” into “fiddle. “Casey Driessen is now one of the greatest American fiddle players on the scene (plays with Bela Fleck, Tim O’Brien), and he was my roommate,” Rodriguez recalls. “He taught me one of the first fiddle tunes I ever learned.”
Berklee also set the table for a love of collaboration, which led to three duet records (and many touring miles) with singer/songwriter Chip Taylor, who was instrumental in helping Carrie to realize her debut album, SEVEN ANGELS ON A BICYCLE. The Associated Press raved, ““…her voice has a character few achieve. Rather than a support player taking a minor turn, she uses her first solo album to mark her ground as a singular talent.” For SHE AIN’T ME, Rodriguez knew it was time to form new collaborations and she ended up with an impressive list of co-writers, including Gary Louris (Jayhawks), Dan Wilson (Semisonic), Jim Boquist (Son Volt) and Mary Gauthier.
“I feel the most comfortable when I have someone to react to,” Rodriguez says. “The process was completely different with each person I wrote with. For example, with Mary Gauthier we sat down one rainy afternoon in New York City and wrote the entire song, more or less. With Dan Wilson we just came up with a little melody and a few snippets of words while we were in the same room. Later, I wrote the verses, he came up with a great chorus, and we put the song together via e-mail and a few phone calls.”
Lucinda Williams wasn’t among the co-writers, but she makes her presence felt, singing backup on “Mask of Moses” while singing Carrie’s praises elsewhere. After receiving a copy of SEVEN ANGELS ON A BICYCLE from Chip Taylor, Lucinda told the New York Times “…I have to say I am very impressed. She’s got something unique in her voice that’s very subtle and a little smoky and sweet. I detect a certain wisdom in her, and yet a sense of wonder as well.” Rodriguez recalls, “Lucinda had sent me this beautiful email, saying how much she loved my record, and how she really saw something special there. And if I ever wanted to open up for her, that’d be great. It was like, wow! Merry Christmas!”
Rodriguez subsequently toured with Williams, and also sat in on fiddle during Lucinda’s sets. And it was on the heels of a night out with Williams that Rodriguez met Malcolm Burn—whose work she’d admired on Emmylou Harris’s WRECKING BALL (engineer and musician) and Chris Whitley’s LIVING WITH THE LAW (producer and musician)– for an early chat about her next record. “I was pretty hung-over that morning, in my pajamas, looking like a train wreck,” Rodriguez admits. “And Malcolm comes over, looking all dapper in his vintage three-piece suit.”
Appearances were quickly dismissed as Malcolm made spot-on suggestions about Carrie’s songs, and offered production ideas that made her feel her own project would be a worthy addition to the “desert island discs” Burn has already recorded. “I knew immediately that this was the guy,” she recalls.
The result is a record that lives up to its name—an expectation-confounding statement, equal parts organic folk and expansive atmosphere, yet one that comes closest to revealing what Carrie Rodriguez is all about. Think you already know? Think again.
Link to Official Site:
http://www.carrierodriguez.com
Carrie Rodriguez on MySpace
http://www.myspace.com/carrielrodriguez
Tour Dates:
8/06 Joe¹s Pub - New York, NY Lucinda Black Bear
8/08 Tin Angel – Philadelphia, PA w/ Laura Cantrell
8/10 Mountain Stage – Charleston, WV
8/28 The Seasons Performance Center - The Seasons Music Festival Yakima, WA multi-act event
8/30 Pig Out in the Park – Spokane, WA multi-act festival
9/03 One Longfellow Square – Portland, ME w/ Mark Erelli
9/04 WAMC Performing Arts Studio’s Linda Norris Auditorium – Albany, NY
9/07 Narrows Festival of The Arts - Fall River, MA multi-act festival
9/19 The Soiled Dove Underground – Denver, CO
9/20 Lake City Wine and Music Festival – Lake City, CO multi-act festival
10/18 Lobero Theatre - Santa Barbara, CA w/ Austin Jug Band
10/24 The Sooner Theatre – Norman, OK support to Ruthie Foster
10/25 Houston Women¹s Festival – Houston, TX multi-act festival
Lauren Ianuzzi ain’t just a pint-sized Jersey girl with thick brown curls, a pearly-white smile and sparkling enthusiasm. She ain’t girlie girl vanilla either. The Bergen County-bred songstress boasts a hustler-like spirit with the vocal chops to match, and there’s no mistaking her tenacity as she madly croons, “I will turn up the heat” in the sultry funk flavors of “Sweat,” one of the many self-penned tunes by the twenty-two-year-old Ianuzzi. She’s been tellin’ it like it is for a long time now. It’s now the world’s turn to catch up and turn an ear.
She’s previously co-written songs with songwriters such as Jeff Franzel (*NSYNC, Taylor Dayne), Martin Briley (Celine Dion), and Elisa Korenne (Super Sweet Sixteen), while also having recorded with producers such as Adrian Gurvitz (Sheryl Crow, CeCe Winans), Jim Beanz and Charlie Brown (Justin Timberlake, Nelly Furtado), the Noize Trip team (Fergie, The Roots), and Visionary Music Group (Destiny’s Child, Elton John). In January 2008, Ianuzzi opened for Train frontman Pat Monahan and Grammy-nominated songwriter Emily King at the Sundance Film Festival. She also performed at the 25th anniversary gala for the Operation Smile charity in Virginia Beach, VA, where she opened for the Beach Boys with her original song, “Show Me That Smile.” Ianuzzi is currently putting the finishing touches on her first EP.
Shake up a little of Nikka Costa’s sexy brashness with the smooth soul of Prince and Jill Scott, and add a dash of Carole King — Lauren Ianuzzi will sate you.
You ready to meet this Jersey Girl?
If you like it when the buzz about a performer ends up being all true – stay tuned to Lori Michaels. Her full-length CD debut, “Living My Life Out Loud,” (Reform Records) couldn’t be more aptly titled, period – and is available now.
She’s been singing and dancing since she could talk and walk. But Michaels’ career launched into new orbit in 2006, following her official “Coming Out” party at the House of Blues’ Club Worship in Atlantic City. It was a House of Blues first, and a turning point for Michaels in her evolution to in-demand solo artist and nationwide headliner with her head-turning Me & The Girls shows. By the summer of 2007, she was signing on to record with a new label –- and the songs haven’t stopped coming to her ever since.
In a time when coming out has evolved from something equated with fear to something much more about freedom, Michaels has freed her artistic soul to deliver “Living My Life Out Loud.” It is a testament to, above all else, her love of the song – whether that means writing, arranging and performing the vocals (lead and backgrounds), showcasing her talents on the piano/keys, or overseeing production with the best in the business to leave listeners breathless.
Amy Macdonald will tell you that it’s all Pete Doherty’s fault. No, it’s down to Red Hot Chili Peppers. Or do we finger Fran Healy of Travis? Nah, sod it, let’s blame Ewan McGregor and Jake Gyllenhaal. They’re movie stars, proper ones. They’re used to shouldering serious responsibility.
If it weren’t for these artists, Amy Macdonald wouldn’t be the teen-sensation singer-songwriter she is now. She’d still be kicking round Glasgow, an undergraduate at university, studying social sciences with an emphasis on geography. The highlight of her year would continue to be her annual pilgrimage to T In The Park, whereat she and her mates would party under canvas for 48 hours, forget their own names, and maybe see some bands.
Last year, with Wilkinson producing in Soho and rock legend Bob Clearmountain mixing in Los Angeles, Amy Macdonald recorded her debut album. It’s brimming with great tunes. As well as This Is The Life there’s Mr Rock & Roll, sung in Amy’s rich, bell-clear, gutsy vocal and possessing a compelling rhythmic punch and a chorus surely set to wow those T In The Park masses. Barrowland Ballroom Ð studded with honky-tonk piano and blaring brass is her fast-paced, skiffling tribute to the iconic Glasgow venue and memories of many a great gig (Razorlight, Babyshambles again, Travis again…).
Footballer’s Wife takes ominous strings, thunderous drums and a haunting vocal and uses them to wallop a pop culture that encourages silly young women (Chantelle, Colleen) to write their autobiographies. ‘They’re only 19, 20 years old or something Ð I don’t know how anybody could write their lifestory at this age. It’s pathetic.’ Ever the patriot, Amy has recorded a version of a modern Scottish folk classic, Caledonia. She’s heard that Paolo Nuttini has sung the song live, but Amy doesn’t care. The song moves her. And that’s all she wants from songs, whether other people’s or ones she’s written herself.
Josh Ritter is a relatively new singer-songwriter who released a fantastic record called The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter in 2007. He’s slotted in as a Folk musician and his influences are pretty clearly people like Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen, but his sound on this album is full and backed by a band. The first song on the album is “To the dogs or whoever” and features a rapid fire vocal performance that seems like it might be challenge to sing, but is neverless catchy and immediately endearing. Check out the song and hopefully more of this talented young musician:
Josh Ritter - “To The Dogs Or Whoever” (right click, save as)
http://www.myspace.com/joshritter
Mp3s are for sampling purposes only. They are left up for a limited time. If you like the music, please support these artists. If you represent an artist or a label and would prefer that the link to an mp3 be removed, please email us at media@watchmojo.com
The Bees are a Folk/Rock band out of the UK and don’t get much coverage at all in the States. Its too bad, they’re an original and talented band that have some great songs. I must admit I hadn’t heard of these guys until I saw this video, which is pretty awesome, and I liked it enough to search them out and listen to the whole of their new album. The video is a crazy combination of animation and the band members playing their instruments whilst cruising around in a magic bus… You gotta see it:
PLAY
