Sunday Shopping Mix

So shortly after the birth of our third son Peter, my wife said that she had had it with grocery shopping and since I know what I’ll eat or want, I can do the shopping! So for the last 24 years I have done the grocery shopping. I usually go on Sunday mornings and typically over the last several years I’ve made a playlist exported it to the MP3 player and listen while I shop! Recently, I just put the player on random and listen to what’s there! Today I took the old ZenV and the mix contained some music…

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Forgotten Music Friday

After the trip to the basement to browse through the vinyl, I came up with five albums to put on the turntable and listen to and remember when. Tonight I listened to one side of each of the albums. The albums were: An Anthology of British Blues, featuring various British blues musicians, Lord Sutch and His Heavy Friends, The Souther Hillman Furay Band, A Long Time Comin’ The Electric Flag, and David Buskin. As I said, An Anthology of British Blues released on Immediate Records in 1970 was a collection some of the best in British blues and featured tracks…

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Blues Wednesday – Coco, Shorty and Bernard

Today was a mixed blues day, I started by going to the Roots Music Report and looking at the Blues chart. A couple of musicians with new albums stood out one I knew Coco Montoya and the other not so much, one of those artist, where I know the name not the music, Guitar Shorty. So I downloaded both the albums and started the day with Coco Montoya’s new CD I Want it All Back. I first heard Coco Montoya’s guitar on John Mayall’s album Chicago Line, which is an outstanding album and Montoya’s guitar playing is one of the…

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Thursday – Mixed Bag

So Thursday’s eclectic mix started with three CDs I picked up at the Dollar Tree the other night. First up was a self-titled album Tribaljazz from a band that I had never heard of,  but the sticker on the cover said it was John Densmore’s (drummer of The Doors) band so, aside from the price, that was good enough reason for me to pick it up. The band is a great eclectic jazz band lead by John Densmore on drums and Art Ellis on flute and the rest of the band is composed of musicians from around the world. John…

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Blues Wednesday – Irish Blues

So in honor of St. Patrick’s Day and my McCloskey ancestors, yes, they are the ones that my wife keeps finding newspaper articles about often being arrested in Beverly. Mostly for drunk and disorderly behavior including, my great-grandmother Margaret McCloskey Ashton, I listened to some Irish blues men,  Rory Gallagher and Gary Moore. Now Rory Gallagher is one of those artist that I’ve heard the name and never really listened to their music, while Garry Moore I’ve heard and really like. The Gallagher album that I chose was Live at Montreux and is a collection of recording made during his…

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Old Friends – Ten Years After

One of my favorite bands from the 60’s and early 70’s was Ten Years After and not just because of Alvin Lee’s guitar wizardry. No, while I liked the overall blues rock feel of the band and loved tracks like “Good Morning, Little School Girl” and “Woke up this Morning”‘ I also liked that the rest of the bands members could play and  the strong  jazz influences on their early  albums particularly on the second release  Undead. I loved the track  “Woodchopper’s Ball”. A cover of the Woody Herman hit. The band was the first band booked by the  Chrysalis…

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Ten Years After – Then and Now

Ten Years After –  Then and Now One of my favorite bands from the 60’s and early 70’s was Ten Years After and not just because of Alvin Lee’s guitar wizardry. No, while I liked the overall blues rock feel of the band and loved tracks like “Good Morning, Little School Girl” and “Woke up this Morning” ‘ I also liked that the rest of the bands members could play and  the strong  jazz influences on their early  albums particularly on the second release  Undead. I loved the track  “Woodchopper’s Ball”. A cover of the Woody Herman hit. Ten Years…

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Blues Wednesday – Sean Costello

So like Joe Crookston, I’ve always seen the name Sean Costello as a hot new bluesman but I’ve never really sought out his music.  So the other day as I was thinking about what I would listen to today his name popped into my head. So I went to emusic to see what they had there and they had most of his releases. Then I did some research and discovered that he died from an accidental drug overdose on April 15, 2008 the eve of his 29th birthday. His family later revealed that he suffered from bipolar disorder and set…

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Blues Wednesday – Mike Zito

So I was thinking about what to listen to yesterday on blues Wednesday a little Tab Benoit, Dave Hole, Buddy Guy – well maybe I’ll check out the Blues Radio Chart and see what looks good number 23 looks interesting Mike Zito so I went to Rhapsody and downloaded his 2009 release Pearl River and was not disappointed!  Pearl River is Zito’s second major record release following on the heels of his first Eclecto Grove Records release Today. The St. Louis native Zito has had several independent releases and toured and shared the stage with some of my favorites  Tab…

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Blues Wednesday – Moreland and Arbuckle

So, I was on the No Depression website the other day and on the sidebar was an advertisement for a new CD  Flood by Moreland and Arbuckle, it looked interesting so I headed over to emusic.com and searched for the CD and found it and downloaded several of the songs and all I can say is WOW! Mississippi Delta Blues at its finest! The trio consists of leaders Aaron Moreland on guitars, Dustin Arbuckle on harp and vocals and drummer Brad Horner. You can read the band’s bio at their website. While they are from Wichita, Kansas they live in…

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