Home Articles posted by Ekkarn (Page 60)

Blues Wednesday: Joanne Shaw Taylor and Mitch Kashmar!

Hot! Yes that describes today’s weather. But it also describes the blues that I listened to this morning on my way to and from Cookstown! On the way there the hotness was supplied by British blues guitarist Joanne Shaw Taylor and on the way back the warmth was provided by the harp of Mitch Kashmar. The Joanne Shaw Taylor album was her debut album White Sugar  and it is great!The album on Ruf Records was recorded at  Jim Gaines’ studio. Gaines has worked with bluesmen like Albert Collins and Stevie Ray Vaughan both of whom are idols of Taylor. He…

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Book 13 – Vince Flynn – Consent to Kill

Yeah finally finished Book 13 for 2011 Consent to Kill by Vince Flynn. Constent to Kill is the sixth book in the Mitch Rapp series by Flynn, The series is now up to Book 11, so I have some reading to do to catch up on the series! Mitch Rapp is a  CIA assassin working deep Black Ops. in the book prior to this one Memorial Day. Rapp saved Washington from a nuclear holocaust and along the way made some very powerful enemies! Now those enemies have put a price on his head and hired a very savvy assassin to…

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Blues: from Canada Soupbone!

So one of the albums that has been on the iPod for the last several weeks is a blues album titled Lead Me On by a five piece blues band hailing from Williams Lake, BC, Canada, Soupbone. The album is quickly becoming a favorite.  Dean Fulton fronts the band and provide lead vocals, great keyboards and harmonica.  His outstanding  keyboard work  is quickly displayed on the album as he takes the lead on the opening track. “Don’t Miss You at All.”  Throughout the album Dean trades leads with sizzling lead guitarist Joel Gyselink.  Gyselink’s guitar work throughout the album is…

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Running with Ben Prestage

Today I noticed that as I went up and down the stairs, my knee did not hurt! Then the rain stopped after work and I thought maybe I’ll try to run! So I cued up the iPod with some blues that I put on it today and took off, hoping to make 30 minutes. Well, I made my goal 33 minutes approximately around 3 miles at slightly over a 10 minute per mile pace. My knee’s not bad and the music One Crow Murder the new album by Ben Prestage was great Here’s what his website says about the album!…

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Blues: Chris Dair – Crossroads to Freedom

So two artists that have been receiving lots of air time on my iPod over the last two weeks are Chris Dair and Don Gallardo. Chris Dair is a British guitarist and the album Crossroads to Freedom is his fourth album but his first dedicated to the blues! Dair started to play guitar at an early age his guitar hero was Manitas De Plata. DePlata ignited Dair’s passion for flamenco guitar. But at age 14 Dair switched passions and feel for the blues and started playing London venues like Ronnie Scotts with John Mayall and John McVie. From that point…

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Blues Wednesday – Matt Schofield – Live From The Archive

So the other night I was reading the albums reviews in Blues Revue and came across the following “Who needs a big band when an organ combo sounds just as good?”  Well I didn’t have to read any further, I just went to Napster and found the album Matt Schofield’s Live from the Archive. Yesterday I listened to the album and loved it and today I went to emusic and downloaded and listened to Schofield’s 2009 release Heads, Tails & Aces and who knows tomorrow I may go back for more!! Matt Schofield is a British blues guitarist. In fact…

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Happy Trails versus Undead

So Friday morning I had the iPod on shuffle and “Who Do You Love” from Quicksilver Messenger Service’s (QMS) Happy Trails album came on. Well,  I decided to switch off shuffle and listen to the whole album! Then since I was in a live album mode,  I listened to Ten Years After’s album Undead. Now it’s Happy Trails vs. Undead. So now it’s John Cipollina’s guitar work versus Alvin Lee . The first side of Happy Trails consists mainly of a performance cover of Bo Diddley’s – aka Ellas McDaniel – “Who Do You Love?”  portions of which were recorded…

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Saturday’s Music Mix – Part 1 – Hot Tuna

So with a night off. I was able to do a little music listening last night. The mix was eclectic. The night started listening to the first studio album from Hot Tuna in twenty some years, Steady as She Goes! For those of you who don;t remember Hot Tuna or simply weren’t around Hot Tuna was a side project of Jefferson Airplane. The main members were Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady. Their first album Hot Tuna was a collection of concerts performed at New Orleans House in Berkeley  in September, 1969, and released in 1970. According to Wikipedia this album…

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Book 10 – The Breach – Patrick Lee

Book 10 of 2011 was Patrick Lee’s The Breach. The Breach is the first book of what’s now a two book series featuring Travis Chase, Paige Campbell and the Breach. The second book, which I read first is Ghost Country. The book is an action adventure book with some sci-fi thrown in. The Breach itself is an anomaly, like a ripe in space, through which entities are sent to Earth from some other vastly more intelligent world. The entity that is the focus of this book is The Whisper. The Whisper knows all and it’s mission is to cause trouble…

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Sterling Koch – Slide Ruler

The second album that I listened to last weekend and through this week was the latest album by Sterling Koch (pronounced “Cook”) Slide Ruler. Koch us a nationally acclaimed lap steel guitarist from Cressona, Pennsylvania. I’ve seen this album on the Roots Music Blues Chart and others and was unsuccessful in finding the album on Rhapsody. I did listen to one of early albums Steel Guitar Blues though and enjoyed that so when I saw Slide Ruler on Napster I quickly put it on the iPod! Koch lap steel playing on the album is terrific and his rhythm section at…

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