Annie Clark, better known as St. Vincent, shared an acoustic rendition of her song “New York” during the Brooklyn Academy of Music‘s Virtual Gala held this week. The performance will be available via livestream through May 20.
Due to the Covid19 pandemic, BAM held their annual gala online, which included performances and tributes from Cate Blanchett, Zadie Smith and Jeanne Donovan Fisher.
For todays Jerry Sunday installment, we look back at the November 16, 1991 performance by Jerry Garcia Band at The Knickerbocker Arena (aka The Knick) in Albany. Now known as The Times Union Center, this show brought Deadheads back to Albany eight months after the Grateful Dead’s three-night run in March.
Jerry was joined by John Kahn (bass), Melvin Seals (keyboards), David Kemper (drums), and Jaclyn LaBranch and Gloria Jones (backing vocals).
As noted by Colin Parsons, you can observe Garcia’s having technical problems with his guitar Tiger during “Lay Down Sally” and leaving the stage. Steve Parish worked on teh guitar with a visibly upset Garcia, who eventually went back out on the stage with his Wolf guitar. The band didn’t miss a beat and kept playing while waiting for Jerry to rejoin them.
Jerry Garcia Band at The Knick, Albany, NY – November 16, 1991
Set One: Cats Under the Stars, Stop That Train, You Never Can Tell, Run For the Roses, Money Honey, My Sisters and Brothers, Let’s Spend the Night Together
Set Two: Lay Down Sally, Waiting for a Miracle, Think, And It Stoned Me, Ain’t No Bread In the Breadbox, Shining Star, Tangled Up In Blue
Helena Hallberg drops “Last Love” to pick us up from where we left off in NYC coffee shops crooning breakups in back alley poetics over bouquets of taunting stanzas. Somewhere between sober and sauced, the disobedient tempo paces folk to a spirited jazz gig in a backroom; challenging the distance between breakups and landslides.
If contemporary feminist acuity impaled the deck to lull and roar all together “I am not here to be your mother, I am not your teacher,” Hallberg’s “Last Love” is an ode to one’s own time. This time she cuts a mischievous long finger to self-realization in the full glory of independence.
Social distancing suddenly doesn’t feel so lonely but instead a sigh of relief for a party of one. If you’re looking for a tack you can play over and over to a thousand different mood sets, Hallberg will cover you in a blanket with the thought of wherever you are is exactly where you’re meant to be if you just own it. If only transistor radios weren’t extinct but mercifully Hallberg’s uptempo asserts itself with the same temporal defiance on Spotify as it might on vinyl.
In the meantime of Hallberg’s next music release, check out her weekly live streams and stay updated with her latest content via Facebook and Instagram.
On the latest installment of Touchdowns All Day with Jon Barber, the guitartist for the Disco Biscuits sits down with bandmate Allen Aucoin. The drummer and Barber have an incredibly candid conversation that goes deep into Allen’s Cajun family life and growing up around the military with his father in the Special Forces.
Tune in to hear about his family’s crawfish boils in Germany, his healthy lifestyle, meditation and rudimentary drumming practices, influences, and more in this TDAD exclusive interview.
As Biscuits fans are aware, these two episodes (let alone one) have more Allen vocal mic input than the last 14 years of Disco Biscuits shows combined.
A sample exchange between the two bandmates includes:
Jon Barber: “The fans sent in a bunch of questions & they are all kind of scratching at the surface of: Are you a superhero?” And, it ends up you kinda are, in a weird way.”
Allen Aucoin: “Yeah, I had a keyboard player named Dr. Dan that I used to play with. He called me The Special Forces of Drums.”
Tune into TDAD through the podcast website, Apple or tune in to Spotify below.
Spaghetti Eastern Music, a genre-leaping solo project from NYC and Woodstock guitarist/keyboardist Sal Cataldi has released his latest single “Peace Within.” An ambient piece that slowly unfolds in a series of waves, this aural meditation gives the listener an instrumental chapter of chill with an apt tonic for these troubled times.
Using an echoey piano, vibraphone and phased strings, ones that could be a lost track from Eno’s “Another Green World,” Cataldi provides a soothing musical bedrock. This is complemented with sustained drones from a duo of Ebow guitars, drenched in reverb, setting the stage for the lead guitar which propels the searching melody of the piece. The calming and cavernous ambience created is periodically shocked and heightened with heavily processed, thunderous percussive accents.
Cataldi’s cheekily titled debut album, Sketches of Spam, and his January 2020 single, “Her Lemon Peel Raincoat (Because It’s Raining),” have drawn notice from critics at a multitude of prestige outlets like The New York Times, Time Out NY, Jazz Times and The Huffington Post.
The single is available for download and streaming via Bandcamp, CD Baby, iTunes, Spotify. The track was recorded by Cataldi during the Covid19 crisis at the studio aboard his houseboat in Port Washington, Long Island, Houseboat Garlic Knot Studios, and at his Sonic Garden in West Saugerties, right down the road from Big Pink. The track was mixed and mastered by Grammy-winning engineer Bob Stander at Parcheesi Studios.
The Empire State Building synced its lights to Billy Joel’s “Miami 2017” for a unique music-to-light show that served as the surprise finale to Robin Hood and iHeartRadio’s “Rise Up New York” virtual telethon on Friday, May 15, hosted by Tina Fey.
Beginning Monday, May 18, Nugs TV will kick off the free weekly series moe.ron Mondays. The first edition features moe.’s performance at Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, CO on July 12, 2018. Two sets of seamless jamming are in store, including an encore featuring members of Pigeons Playing Ping Pong.
Fans are asked to consider donating to the moe. organization via 2nu.gs/moeTouring and MusiCares Relief Fund via 2nu.gs/moeMusicCares.
Setlist via Phantasytour
Set 1: Seat Of My Pants> Who You Calling Scared> Captain America> Buster> Pastorus*> Silver Sun> Akimbo> ATL> Puebla
Set 2: Plane Crash> Buster> Four> Skrunk> Prestige Worldwide> Silver Sun> Plane Crash> Letter Home> Wind it up
Encore: Fame^
*official title of segue/jam debuted at Summer Camp 5/26/18
^w/ Greg Ormont & Jeremy Schon on guitar / vox from Pigeons Playing Ping Pong
Prince’s estate, sitting on a trove of unreleased Paisley Park studio recordings as well as video footage, will stream the March 30, 1985 ‘Purple Rain’ show from Syracuse at The Carrier Dome which will be livestreamed on Prince’s YouTube channel from Thursday, May 14 until Sunday, May 17.
The album from the show will be available for purchase digitally for the first time on Friday. Donations will benefit the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund and Google will match donations up to $5 million.
“Hello Syracuse and the World,” Prince says to open the show. “My name is Prince, and I’m here to play with you.”
A Thursday pre-party kicks off at 6pm with Prince & the Revolution drummer Bobby Z with a live Q&A with the Current’s Andrea Swensson.
The Carrier Dome concert also aired live to more than 12 million viewers in Europe through Eurovision and became a hot bootleg shortly after.
Setlist: Let’s Go Crazy, Delirious, 1999, Little Red Corvette, Take Me With U, Do Me, Baby, Irresistible Bitch, Possessed, How Come U Don’t Call Me Anymore?, Let’s Pretend We’re Married, International Lover, God, Computer Blue, Darling Nikki, The Beautiful Ones, When Doves Cry, I Would Die 4 U, Baby I’m A Star, Purple Rain
As announced by Grateful Dead archivist David Lemieux, this week’s Shakedown Stream will feature the June 17, 1991 show from Giants Stadium. You can tune in on Friday night starting at 8pm ET on the Grateful Dead’s YouTube channel.
On that night Little Feat opened the show and “Dark Star” was teased a few times and jammed out of “Drums,” a first since 1974. Read an in depth review of the 1991 Grateful Dead show at Giants Stadium here.
Setlist: Eyes Of The World, Walkin’ Blues, Brown Eyed Women, When I Paint My Masterpiece, Loose Lucy, Cassidy, Might As Well Saint Of Circumstance-> Ship of Fools-> Truckin’-> New Speedway Boogie-> Uncle John’s Band-> Drums-> Jam-> China Doll-> Playin’ In The Band Reprise-> Sugar Magnolia
Encore: The Weight
Additionally, the Dead’s series “All The Years Live” has released footage of the show opener from June 14, 1991, at Robert F. Kennedy Stadium in D.C., “Cold Rain and Snow.” Lemieux has been sharing videos from previous releases will be shared, with unreleased videos coming soon as well.
Nearly two years after the release of their last studio effort, Teddy Midnight has announced an all-new EP with Airdnb, due out May 29. The first single, “My Eyes,” was released this past week and is group’s first collection to be produced, recorded, and mixed entirely in their new Brooklyn studio.
The forthcoming EP is a departure from the disco/house sound of their last release, French Press from 2018, and explores producers Sean Silva and Adam Magnan’s influence from the rhythms of drum n bass, jungle, and hip-hop. The trio spent the past year and a half writing and recording using vintage synths and live instrumentation as the basis for the record. Over the course of the EP’s 5 tracks, the group navigates new sonic territory to bring break-neck tempos and fresh atmosphere to their already diverse repertoire. Guest vocalists Lars Viola and David Schnurman are featured on two separate tracks with instrumentals filling the three remaining spots.
Additionally, the band has debuted a music video for “My Eyes,” in which each member performs via a digital video conference call. The video was recorded during the eighth week of COVID-19 quarantine in New York City.
The single “My Eyes” features New York City rapper Lars Viola in his first collaboration with the group. As the name Airdnb would suggest, the hip-hop track showcases the Teddy Midnight take on drum n bass grooves while leaving plenty of space for MC Lars to paint a picture of a stressful world in need of sweet release from everyday anxieties. His thoughtful discourse is driven by live drums and capped off with impassioned synth work by keyboard player Danny Caridi.
Amidst the COVID-19 outbreak, Teddy Midnight is working to reschedule their postponed spring tour dates with more fresh music to come. After successful winter dates with jamtronica leaders The New Deal and others, newly scheduled shows will highlight material from Airdnb and continue to feature their ever expanding live-production sound.