Do you find yourself listening to music released that is one or two decades old? Seriously? As I type this I am listening to Imperial Drag. Their self titled debut album was released on Work Records in 1996 which was under the Sony umbrella that eventually folded. On my way to Starbucks this morning I listened to Gram Parsons and Townes Van Zandt.
New music today doesn’t have the heart and soul Gram or Townes has. Songwriting has changed. Nashville writers strip themselves of substance and then shine it all up and call it “country.” Hollywood’s own Grey’s Anatomy induced Hotel Cafe “I am a songwriter” scene is superficial at best. They worship themselves and believe their own bullshit as if it was written straight from the heavens forgetting the rule that writing is re-writing…
Who’s to blame? Well it starts with the labels. They push shit that they throw into a shiny box and give millions of dollars to radio, film and t.v. convincing you the consumer that their product is the best of what is out. …After all, what else are you gonna buy?
To be fair…songwriters today don’t have anything to say. Anything that any of us want is easily obtainable. That throws “struggle” out the window. Love songs today are mostly two dimensional, written in broad generalizations. We are such a technology based society that life experience is extremely diminished causing the art of a story to be constricted to imagination.
Demand better quality. Songwriters today let any song that they write be published. The editing process is no longer a tool in songwriting today. Look at the Troubadour days. Gram Parsons, Eagles, The Birds, Linda Ronstadt, Tom Waits, Jackson Brown, Crosby Stills and Nash, just to name a few all wrote amazing songs because they pushed each other to be great. Mediocrity was not acceptable. If we allow mediocre writing to be sold then we only have mediocre song to listen to.
Earlier this month I had the pleasure of going to see Von Cotton Perform at a benefit show for The Wounded Heroes Fund at the Crystal Palace. It was a CD release party, the band had recorded an EP called Soldiers’ Lullabies. With nearly 400 people in attendance at $100 a head plus donations the band helped raise over $13,000 for the fund.
Living in Los Angeles and loving country music you can’t help but hear about Von Cotton. They are undoubtedly the best country band on this coast. Keeping true to their sound, Von Cotton is what “progressive outlaw” country was in the ’70’s in todays country music enviroment.
Lead by Bakersfield bred Brant Cotton the VC boys played the songs from the Soldiers’ Lullabies EP along with a slide show complementing the songs on the stories and thoughts of our heroes. Along side with Von Cotton was Pedal Steel legend Jay Dee Mannis and Rick “Reno” Stevens(produced Soldiers’ Lullabies) playing acoustic and singing back-ups.
After the first set Von Cotton turned it up another notch by playing their own blend of country classics for two and a half hours straight. “These boys have their own sound,” Mannis said, “After every song I nod my head and smiled thinking this really works well.” I couldn’t agree more. With a packed dance floor the audience got every bit of their monies worth.Brant Cotton(L) JT Ross (R)
Von Cotton is well on their way to success having already been on the Honky Tonk circuit across the states for a better part of a year or so and having already breached the festivals I give it a year at most before Nashville tries to snatch them up.
One of my favorite new artist over that past year or so has been Jamey Johnson. He was a writer for a long time and wrote songs such as “Honky Tonk Bedonky Donk” and “Give It Away.” He then went on to write some tunes that were “real” or “authentic” and put an album out for himself.
The label basically laughed at him. So he released “That Lonesome Song” out on his own. Slowly gaining quite a bit of ground the song “In Color” eventually landing in Billboard Top 10. Jamey received Song Of The Year back in April at the Academy of Country Music.
That Lonesome Song is my favorite record in all genres of music in the past five years. You won’t find a better album.
This gets me to my worry. I recently heard his new single “My Way to You” and immediately heard the Nashville shine on it. Not too worried I went to his website and to my dismay it was changed and corporate stiff looking. The man is getting sucked back into everything that made him leave in the first place. Stay independent. Your better then the shine.
Jamey your fucking up! People liked you for you. Be your own man.
Josh Groban’s Noël claimed an unprecedented fourth straight week at number one, a feat never before accomplished by a holiday album. Elvis Presley set the previous record, three weeks, half a century ago with 1957’s Elvis’ Christmas Album.
For the week ended Sunday, Noël topped the chart and rewrote the record books by selling an incredible 669,000 copies, according to the latest Nielsen SoundScan numbers.
Groban, whose single “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” topped the AC charts this week as well, has sold nearly 2.8 million copies of Noël in its 10-week run. That puts Noël in the lead as the year’s bestselling album, and if the trend holds, it’ll become the first holiday album to top year-end sales in the SoundScan era.
…has nothing to do with this website. Being that gossip travels so fast these days I figured I could bump up my stats while peeps look for the real story.
While you anxiously await their second season on HBO, Flight of the Conchords, a.k.a. hilarious guitar-toting Kiwis Jemaine Clement (JAH-mahhne!) and Bret McKenzie, have announced the release of their debut full-length album, EW.com reports. The yet-to-be titled effort, the follow up to debut EP The Distant Future, which nabbed a Grammy nod for Best Comedy Album, will arrive April 22 via Sub Pop and was recorded in Los Angeles alongside producer Mickey Petralia (Beck, Peaches). A spokesperson was unavailable for comment at press time.
THE HBO SHOW – NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PEOPLE WHO GET OFFENDED
There were FIFTEEN albums that sold in excess of 100,000 the first week of December last year. This year there were EIGHT! And this trend has held for the last couple of weeks, approximately a fifty percent drop-off. Furthermore, four of the eight selling in excess of 100,000 WEREN’T ON A MAJOR LABEL!Sales have tanked even worse in the past few weeks than they have the rest of the year. Including digital, they’re off in the mid-teens!
Do people not want the music? Did everybody get an iPod and start STEALING the music? Is it impossible to create demand? Are things so bad that people only care about the acts of yore, like the Eagles and Garth Brooks?
It was primarily written by John Lennon, though credited to Lennon/McCartney. Lennon wrote the song at a Transcendental Meditation camp when he couldn’t sleep. The Beatles had gone on a retreat to study with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in Rishikesh, India. After three weeks of constant meditation and lectures, Lennon missed his soon-to-be wife, Yoko Ono, and wrote this song. The fact it was recorded at three in the morning enhances the sentiment.The song also mentions famed English author and explorer Sir Walter Raleigh by name in an ironic context, calling him a “stupid git“ for bringing the tobacco plant to England.
I’m so tired, I haven’t slept a wink
I’m so tired, my mind is on the blink
I wonder should I get up and fix myself a drink
No,no,no.
I’m so tired I don’t know what to do
I’m so tired my mind is set on you
I wonder should I call you but I know what you’d do
You’d say I’m putting you on
But it’s no joke, it’s doing me harm
You know I can’t sleep, I can’t stop my brain
You know it’s three weeks, I’m going insane
You know I’d give you everything I’ve got
for a little peace of mind
I’m so tired, I’m feeling so upset
Although I’m so tired I’ll have another cigarette
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh
He was such a stupid git
Brant Cotton(L) JT Ross (R)
