Zig at the gig podcasts

Interview with Bennet Cerven of The Trouble Notes.   Hailing from three different continents, The Trouble Notes blend folk traditions from around the world with a driving, modern energy that transports audiences on a musical journey like no other. Their signature sound, led by Bennet Cerven's virtuosic violin melodies, combined with Florian Eisenschmidt's dynamic guitar rhythms and Julian Lardis' powerful percussion, creates a truly immersive live experience. Having played at some of the world's most iconic festivals—including Glastonbury, Boomtown, and Fusion Festival—their performances are not to be missed. TICKETS for Thursday July 3RD Negative Space Cleveland OH:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-trouble-notes-at-negative-space-cleveland-tickets-1286009261319     The Trouble Note's Info  https://thetroublenotes.com/ https://www.facebook.com/TheTroubleNotes/

Interview with John Leon of The Royal Arctic Institute. John returns for the third time to talk about The Royal Arctic Institute's new self titled album.  The Royal Arctic Institute is a cinematic instrumental post-jazz group from New York City. They have been recording and releasing records since 2017. Since forming in 2016, the band has been a revolving door of different musicians comprising several different lineups. The current lineup is composed of drummer Lyle Hysen (Das Damen, Arthur Lee), guitarists John Leon (Roky Erickson, Summer Wardrobe, Abra Moore) and Chris Robertson (Elk City, James Mastro), and bassist David Motamed (Das Damen, Two Dollar Guitar, Arthur Lee, Townes Van Zandt). The band name is a reference to the fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman. All four members of the Royal Arctic Institute have spent decades playing in various ensembles, working as studio musicians, backing musicians, and touring musicians. This self-titled fourth full-length recording from The Royal Arctic Institute is the first to include guitarist Chris Robertson. According to the band, Robertson is a crucial addition to the group, as he provides an added dimension to The Royal Arctic Institute sound and creative process, particularly because this debuts the group as a two guitar quintet. The decision to present this new album as a self-titled record is tightly connected to the band's excitement about their current musical direction. The new album also marks the first time The Royal Arctic Institute is working with Ray Ketchum of Magic Door Recording. Ketchum, often noted for his engineering and recording work on the last handful of Guided by Voices albums, helped steer the band towards an approach which allowed for a rich and fully developed sonic experience. Ketchum's keen and well attuned ear in the studio made it possible for The Royal Arctic Institute to focus more on the nuances they had been developing on previous releases, something apparent on “Twigs Of Cries, Feathers Of Sobs.” As guitarist John Leon points out:         https://www.theroyalarctic.com/

Pete Francis founding member of Dispatch returns to Zig At The Gig. Tickets for June 13th. Pete Francis Tickets for June 13th Winchester Lakewood OH   Long Legged Fly C-Level and Pete Francis Pre- Save Link https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/clevel/long-legged-fly-feat-pete-francis Pete Francis Heimbold grew up in Riverside, Connecticut, taking early influence from the reggae music of Bob Marley along with classic songwriters like Van Morrison and Joni Mitchell. While attending Middlebury College in Vermont, he connected with fellow musicians Chad Urmston and Brad Corrigan. The trio formed Dispatch, a rangy roots-inspired indie band who became a fixture of the East Coast club, festival, and jam circuits. Between 1996 and their 2002 hiatus, Dispatch released four studio albums and a live record, building a sizable audience through heavy touring and grassroots promotion. Francis stepped out in 2001 to make his solo debut with So They Say, an album that bore some resemblance to his work in Dispatch and contained several songs they had played live together. When the group officially announced their hiatus, he kicked into gear, issuing a prolific string of albums through his Dragon Crest imprint. In addition to solo releases like 2003's Untold and 2008's Iron Sea and the Cavalry, he also teamed up with Craig Dreyer for the 2006 joint album Everything is One. Meanwhile, Dispatch continued to gain new followers despite their hiatus and in 2007, they reunited for a charity concert at New York's Madison Square Garden. After a surprise sellout, two more dates were added, both of which also sold out. Francis then teamed up with fellow New Englanders Barefoot Truth for a 2009 EP, then issued his fifth solo album, The Movie We Are In, in 2010.  In 2011, Dispatch officially reformed and resumed touring and recording. Although the band occupied much of his focus, Francis continued to record on his own, releasing 2013's Immodal Implozego and a 2015 compilation, Dragon Crest Collective, Vol. 1. In 2019, after three more studio albums with Dispatch, Francis left his longtime group and resumed his solo career in earnest. For a few years he focused on singles and EPs like Humble Down and Sun Fuzz, both of which were released in 2021. He also built his own home studio and began self-producing his music. With its vibrant electronic sounds and drum loops, 2023's PTRN SKY! marked a tonal shift for Francis and was his first home-recorded album. The following April he explored his reggae influences on the sunny EP Neon Light Blind.

Interview with Steve Short of Brahctopus and formally of Stationary Pebbles. June 13th Pete Francis of Dispatch with C-Level, and Brahctopus at The Winchester Lakewood OH.  Pete Francis Tickets About Brahctopus. Brahctopus is fronted by a ukulele-wielding vocalist with a passion for lyricism. Three unique guitarists and a keyboard wizard feed off one another for ripping solos and lifting harmonies while the bass and drums create rhythmic bliss. The most recent release is an episodic concept album that coincides with the first volume of a graphic novel, the Proto Terrestrial Freedom Movement. Available on all streaming outlets! www.brahctopus.com  

Interview with Ryan Fletterick of Songs For An Unknown God.   Songs For An Unknown God" is the musical project of Cleveland-based folk singer-songwriter Ryan Fletterick. He is known for his evocative storytelling and stripped-down acoustic style. Ryan's music is described as a blend of confession and meditation, with songs that aim for the soul rather than the charts. Wax Mage Vinyls https://waxmage.com/products/songs-for-an-unknown-god-100-miles   Tickets June 13th Pete Francis, C-Level, Songs for Unknown God, and Brahctopus https://www.ticketweb.com/event/pete-francis-of-dispatch-the-winchester-tickets/14338833?utm_source=AllEvents.in&utm_medium=event-discovery-platform&utm_campaign=lakewood-events&fbclid=IwY2xjawKQ0RpleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETFNaG4wSG5zekhoU0ZITDU0AR4XHNyU_5f4vhFHaTeu5Qk8HJQPBDFyyIfqAFcnVraB5aAeXzWkXRxhJrucQQ_aem_bhIXCC5WaldgghTt1pS25A

Brooklyn-based goth-folk duo Charming Disaster's upcoming album The Double—their seventh full-length release—explores the world that exists behind the one we know, featuring songs inspired by nature, mortality, magic, ritual, and literary genres ranging from science fiction to Victorian horror. The new album was co-produced by band members Ellia Bisker and Jeff Morris with longtime collaborator, recording engineer Don Godwin. All but one of the ten tracks were recorded at Tonal Park in Takoma Park, MD, with one song recorded by circus music composer Peter Bufano in Boston, MA. The Double will be released on CD, as a 12-inch colored vinyl LP, and on all digital platforms on May 16, 2025. The vinyl will be released in a 2-disc package that also includes Charming Disaster's 2024 compilation Time Ghost, a collection of singles released over the last decade.   The Double invites listeners to step across the border of an alternate reality, where spells are cast, time travel is possible, plants are taking over civilization, and vampires lurk in the shadows. Adventures in the darkness lie beyond the threshold.   The album's ten songs include “Black Locust,” a lullaby about mortality; “New Moon,” a magical nature ritual; “Trick of the Light,” a reimagining of Bram Stoker's Dracula; “Time Machine,” in which Charming Disaster change the past and start over again; “Scavengers,” a walk in the woods with vultures and bones; “Beautiful Night,” a defiant response to struggles with depression; “Vitriol,” a tribute to artist Thomas Little, who turns guns into ink; “Haunted Lighthouse,” a swashbuckling sea voyage; “Gang of Two,” a true crime adventure; and “Green Things,” a love letter to what grows between the cracks (and its inevitable takeover).   The album features an array of talented collaborators. Co-producer Don Godwin, who has worked on Charming Disaster's entire discography, contributed bass, drums, and horns as well as engineering and mixing. “Haunted Lighthouse” features Broadway percussionist Mike Dobson along with circus composer Peter Bufano, who played piano and accordion and engineered the track at Cirkestra World Headquarters in Boston, MA (with additional tracking at Tonal Park). “Scavengers” features cello recorded by Kate Wakefield of the duo Lung, who also created the string arrangement for “Beautiful Night.” Stefan Zeniuk of Gato Logo contributed saxophone to “Green Things.”   In conjunction with The Double, Charming Disaster is releasing the second edition of their “oracle deck” (similar to a Tarot deck). The Charming Disaster Oracle Deck contains 72 cards (including 12 new cards for the second edition), each representing one of the songs from Charming Disaster's discography. The cards feature illustrations commissioned from more than thirty different artists. The deck can be used as a divination tool, or as a visual accompaniment to Charming Disaster's music. The duo themselves use these cards in their live performances to determine the set through the element of chance.   Charming Disaster was formed by Bisker and Morris in 2012, inspired by the gothic humor of Edward Gorey and Tim Burton, the murder ballads of the American Folk tradition, and the dramatic flair of the cabaret. Together the duo write songs that tell stories about myth, magic, and mortality, using two voices to explore dark narratives and characters with a playfully macabre sensibility.   On their critically acclaimed albums Love, Crime & Other Trouble (2015), Cautionary Tales (2017), and SPELLS + RITUALS (2019), Charming Disaster explored death, crime, folklore, and the occult. On Our Lady of Radium (2022), they turned their attention to science and explored the life and discoveries of pioneering scientist Marie Curie. On Super Natural History (2023), they united the natural world and the metaphysical realm in a musical cabinet of curiosities.   The duo put out two releases in 2024: Time Ghost, an album-length collection of songs released as singles between 2013 and 2024; and Dance Me to the End of Bela Lugosi's Lovesong, an EP of covers paying tribute to a few of the band's influences: Leonard Cohen's “Dance Me to the End of Love,” “Bela Lugosi's Dead” by Bauhaus, and The Cure's “Lovesong.”   In Charming Disaster's live shows, the duo combine vocal harmonies and clever lyrics with ukulele, guitar, and foot percussion, with a cabaret-influenced performance style that straddles the line between concert and theatre and has been described as “haunted vaudeville” (Splice Magazine). Charming Disaster's music has been featured on the spooky hit podcast Welcome to Night Vale. They have opened for legendary cello-rock ensemble Rasputina, Goth icon Voltaire, and Amanda Palmer's punk cabaret duo The Dresden Dolls. Their concerts have captivated audiences across the United States and in Europe. They have appeared alongside storytellers, comedians, fire eaters, puppets, burlesque artists, poets, and circus performers. Recent appearances have included Joe's Pub in NYC, Atlanta's massive pop culture convention Dragon Con, Brooklyn's historic Green-Wood Cemetery, the Rochester Fringe Festival, Philadelphia's Science History Institute, the Edgar Allan Poe Museum in Richmond, VA, Cleveland's WizbangCircus Theatre, and the Coney Island Sideshow stage, as well as sundry bars, art galleries, theatres, bookstores, libraries, train cars, mausoleums, and museums.   LINKS: Website: www.charmingdisaster.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/charmingdisaster Instagram: http://instagram.com/charmingdisasterband YouTube: http://youtube.com/charmingdisasterband Bandcamp: http://charmingdisaster.bandcamp.com Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/artist/1RjkfhamohczSXjFy5WcZh   The Double preorder link: charmingdisaster.bandcamp.com/album/the-double     Tickets : Charming Disaster at The Foundry Cleveland June 5th with Cowboy Princess Brigade https://www.ticketweb.com/event/charming-disaster-cowboy-princess-brigade-the-foundry-tickets/14325923?utm_medium=affiliate&irgwc=1&clickid=yKYzFM2SwxycTOrRPc1Gt0d7UksRjjwhTXGA2E0&camefrom=CFC_BUYAT_219208&impradid=219208&REFERRAL_ID=tmfeedbuyat219208&wt.mc_id=aff_BUYAT_219208&utm_source=219208-Bandsintown&impradname=Bandsintown&ircid=4272   C-Level Pete Francis Tickets : https://www.ticketweb.com/event/peter-francis-of-dispatch-the-winchester-tickets/14338833?utm_source=AllEvents.in&utm_medium=event-discovery-platform&utm_campaign=lakewood-events  

Knox Chandler's career has spanned for over four decades including long stints as a member of The Psychedelic Furs, Siouxsie and the Banshees and the Cyndi Lauper band, extraordinary experiences in recording and performing live around the world. Chandler's also performed, recorded, arranged and produced, working with acts such as REM, Depeche Mode, Grace Jones, Marianne Faithful, Natalie Merchant, Tricky, The Creatures, Dave Gahan Paper Monsters and The Golden Palominos etc. Knox spent a decade residing in Berlin, Germany, while he explored sound-scaping.  He developed a technique he calls “Soundribbons, which he recorded and performed in its own right as well as applying it to different genres and mediums . He composed, recorded, toured, produced, and wrote string arrangements for Herbert Grönemeyer, Jesper Munk, Pure Reason Revolution, The Still, TAU, Miss Kenichi and the Sun, Mars William's Albert Ayler Xmas, Rita Redshoes, Them There, The Night, etc. While living in Germany received a Post Graduate certification in education and was the head of the guitar department at BIMM College. Chandler returned to the States to be near family and now resides in the New Haven Connecticut area. The Sound is the solo debut of much-travelled musician / producer / arranger / painter Knox Chandler. This project is a musical / visual memoir depicting the shift in his surroundings from the urban to the rural, specifically the Connecticut shoreline off the Long Island Sound and the impact of this dramatic change of environment on his consciousness and the art-work that leads to.   At The Sound ‘s core is Chandler's “Soundribbon” style of meditative, powerfully cinematic instrumental performance on guitar, accompanied by upright bass and percussion which comprises the audio component of the release. The visual portion is a book of paintings, photographs, sketches and written meditations, interpreting nature through technology. The blending of these mediums is Knox's attempt to make the diaristic intent of his music explicit. The Sound is being released on Knox's new label Blue Elastic on May 30. The album is available on digital download and on streaming platforms on its own, or the book comes with a download code. https://knoxchandler.bandcamp.com/ https://knoxchandlermusic.com/ https://www.facebook.com/knox.chandler.3/ https://www.instagram.com/knoxchandler/     C-Level Pete Francis Tickets : https://www.ticketweb.com/event/peter-francis-of-dispatch-the-winchester-tickets/14338833?utm_source=AllEvents.in&utm_medium=event-discovery-platform&utm_campaign=lakewood-events  

Toby Radloff  is a former file clerk and actor who became a minor celebrity owing to his appearances in Cleveland writer Harvey Pekar's autobiographical comic book series American Splendor. Radloff has a distinctive manner of speech and quirky mannerisms.He is a self-proclaimed "Genuine Nerd". Career Radloff met Pekar in 1980 when Radloff was hired at Cleveland's Veterans Administration Hospital, and shortly became a recurring character in American Splendor. Television profiles of Pekar at work at the VA Hospital, in which Radloff appeared, led to Radloff being featured as a "special correspondent" in a few short comedic pieces on MTV in the late 1980s about Cleveland and White Castle hamburgers (a particular favorite of Radloff's).Radloff was also a frequent guest on a local Cleveland cable access show, The Eddie Marshall Show. Radloff is a huge admirer of the 1984 film Revenge of the Nerds, which he estimated in 2003 to have seen at least 25 times; his enthusiasm for the film was documented in the American Splendor comic (and in a number of scenes in the American Splendor film). Radloff's public persona as a "Genuine Nerd", cemented by his appearances on MTV, led to his starring roles as Harold Kunkle in the comedy horror film Killer Nerd (1991) and its sequel Bride of Killer Nerd (1992) Toby's Info toby.radloff https://www.waynealanharold.com     C-Level Pete Francis Tickets June 13th Winchester Lakewood OH

Interview with Joe Adducci of Souled American. April 19th Souled American at Negative Space Cleveland OH Tickets  "There are cult bands and then there's Souled American. In 1988, the Illinois group arguably invented "alternative country" with the album Fe. While the alt-country sound is widely recognized as Southern roots rock with an indie-punk sensibility — largely defined by Uncle Tupelo's No Depression released two years later — Souled American's early music feels as if it was formed in a vacuum, inspired by the time-stretching space of reggae. But over the course of the following decade, Souled American's music grew increasingly slow, insular and esoteric. Although Fe, Flubber and Around the Horn are inarguably more accessible, upbeat and even sometimes fun, if you've never heard this music before, it actually makes sense to start at the end." NPR MUSIC.   Souled American Info: https://www.souledamerican.net/       C-Level Pete Francis June 13th Winchester Lakewood OH

On And On is the 3rd studio album from the post-genre power trio mssv featuring the legendary rhythm team of drummer Stephen Hodges (Tom Waits, Mavis Staples, David Lynch) and bassist mike watt (MINUTEMEN, fIREHOSE, Stooges) alongside the unique and iconoclastic guitar of its genre-bending bandleader, Mike Baggetta. On And On features brand new songs that were written by Baggetta before their 58-show 2023 US tour and performed every night, recorded and produced by Chris Schlarb at BIG EGO Studio in Long Beach, CA immediately after. The album comes out on BIG EGO Records on 12” LP vinyl, digital download and streaming services on Friday, March 7, 2025 and features artwork by John Herndon (Tortoise).  Featured in the works on this album is a band-improvised song and, on the vinyl issue only, six more band-improvised interludes. These improvised, then recomposed, instrumentals had their parts recorded separately by each member, then edited down, recombined and recomposed by Baggetta'. They serve as an important connective tissue between the songs on each side, turning On And On into an exciting and trippy psychedelic fever dream of a concept album. This serves to really bring out the story of On And On: at its heart it is an album where all the works combine to create an endless episodic journey through the temporal and seemingly fleeting nature of society, personality, music, and life and death on Earth, only to realize that all of these are also endlessly repeating. Seven of the eight new songs feature vocals from Baggetta, now much more comfortable in his vocal role from the previous mssv album Human Reaction. The wordcraft heard here in On And On goes a lot deeper than his previous lyric writing, while still remaining wholly individual in its exploratory playfulness. The subject matter here, while being universally relatable, is rife with personal references, stories of his and the band's friends and relationships, and one song “Despair & Hilarity” including lyrics written by one of Baggetta's most important musical collaborators Steve Gigante (7 Year Rabbit Cycle, W-S Burn, THETEETHE).  Continuing to explore the seemingly endless depths of Hodges' and watt's musicianship and skill over the many tours and albums in mssv has grown an instantly identifiable sound from Baggetta's songwriting for this band. But the trust that has formed between them, that comes from long-running musical partnerships, has also made it possible for mssv to explore more interesting ways to incorporate improvised music into the lives of their songs, innovating their music in new ways while still keeping the fearless nature of each musician and this band fully intact. On And On skillfully combines all of these elements into a newly evolved lens for the music of mssv, deftly displayed in this album as a high concept love letter to everyday life. April 13th mssv Beachland Cleveland OH Tickets https://www.beachlandballroom.com/e/14076233/mssv-well/ mikebaggetta.com https://mainsteamstopvalve.com/  

MikelParis™ (pronounced MichaelParis” – one word, initial caps) is a multifaceted artist who performs as keyboardist, percussionist and backup singer for the celebrated American rock band O.A.R. for nearly two decades. He is also the producer and host of “TuneTrek” and “Music Drink Stories,” docu-series that follow MP across the U.S. unearthing music gems in history's hidden corners; from the echoing halls of haunted country inns to the majestic ambience of castles and museums. https://www.mikelparis.com  

Interview with: James Cook of Captain's Audio Project   New release by Portland Oregon songwriter James Cook. This collection of finely crafted tracks is titled “Waiting For The Moon”, and will be available on vinyl, CD, and digitally online. Release date is February 21st, 2025. The original concept for the recording was to be basic and raw, recorded live with tenor guitar and vocals. With decades of experience playing vintage jazz and swing on the upright bass, James' sense of timing made it all to easy to embellish and round out the recording with other great musicians. First, James added the warm and sultry anchor notes on his 100 year old upright bass. James's Info: trashcan.joe.5  

Interview with Steve Traina about his new book La Cave.  Steve took time off from childhood activities just long enough to start and run a small business, help raise six kids, and perform various other adult activities. It was just a phase. In his spare time he also managed craft a 30-plus year career as a minor league and college D1 umpire, and fit in an ongoing 22 years as the on-air host of the music history show Steve's Folk Radio Show on WRUW-FM 91.1 in Cleveland. Now that he can form a baseball team with his nine grandchildren, he realized the foolishness of it all and, between grandfatherly duties, reverted to his childhood dream of sitting around reading and writing. In these pursuits he is guided by his ever-vigilant editor Ethel the Very Large Cat.   About the La Cave Book : In a dingy basement music club in inner-city Cleveland, something incredible happened, and kept happening throughout the ‘60s. Except it didn't just “happen.” It was created by a slightly-built visionary named Stanley Kain, and he named this happening “La Cave.” Stan's vision was the future and its language was written in musical notation, fueled by post-adolescent angst amidst a backdrop of the military draft, war, race riots, and social upheaval in general. For a buck, maybe two, suburban kids, college students and other young adults could absorb the wisdom of their elders – future musical Hall of Famers, still unknown, perched behind guitars, mere feet away on a tiny stage, dispensing that wisdom with a 4/4 beat. Performers like The Velvet Underground, Neil Young, Gordon Lightfoot, Moby Grape, The Fugs and countless others were the professors of this new ideology. Mix in political drama, street theater, psychedelic drugs and cheap beer, and you have a microcosm of 1960s America. You have La Cave. History was made nightly, and was it ever fun!   https://www.lacavebook.com/   Steve's info steve-traina 

Nikki O'Neill, an R&B/Americana singer-songwriter and guitarist based in Chicago, is releasing her third solo album, Stories I Only Tell My Friends. It's being issued on Blackbird Record Label on March 14, 2025 on 12” LP vinyl, CD, digital download and streaming. This interweaving of Soul, Americana, Rock, Gospel and Blues is an integral part of O'Neill's sound, and likely due to her upbringing. “I was born in L.A., but grew up mostly in Stockholm, Sweden with a Russian grandmother and Polish mother,” she says. “Both of them, and also my father, grew up with war and had a history of constantly moving from one country and one apartment to another. My mom was young when she had me, and music seemed to be her source of joy. She loved listening to all kinds of artists, from Al Green to Santana, Dinah Washington, Stevie Wonder, John Lennon, and the Traveling Wilbury's. I soaked it all up like a sponge. I started making up songs when I was twelve, and first picked up a guitar when I was 16. I loved going to record stores, and when Prince's Purple Rain album came out, I bought it immediately and listened to it religiously. Then a friend and drummer in my first band introduced me to Sly Stone. The way Prince and Sly fused soul and rock, and were leaders of multi-racial bands with male and female musicians was tremendously influential.” O'Neill moved from Stockholm to New York City where she mostly played guitar in other bands. She relocated to Los Angeles after meeting Rich Lackowski at a music trade show. O'Neill became a solo artist, and the couple (now married) eventually became members of L.A.'s small, but supportive Americana artist community. After self-releasing her 2017 solo EP, Love Will Lead You Home (with songs co-written by lyricist Paul Menser), she regularly performed around L.A. with Lackowski in their 4-piece band, and was signed to Blackbird Record Label in August, 2020. In October that same year, she released World is Waiting, her second solo album and label debut. With touring opportunities erased by the pandemic and California becoming unaffordable, they packed up their instruments into her little red Honda Fit and drove to Lackowski's hometown of Chicago. “It took me a while to get rooted in Chicago, meet musicians and start writing again, but I also didn't want my songs to sound like leftovers from the last album,” O'Neill says. “I wanted to find out how Chicago would inspire me.” Stories I Only Tell My Friends is eloquent testimony to the inspiration she found.   Nikki's Info :  https://nikkioneill.com https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5FA6InY3pide4vE_YFEmYw/featured?view_as=public http://www.instagram.com/nikkioneillguitar http://www.facebook.com/nikkioneillmusic https://nikkioneill.bandcamp.com https://music.apple.com/us/artist/nikki-oneill/274063501 https://open.spotify.com/artist/6AJzwE3ASiLk4z10P3245T?si=KJZg1M00TA-DdVhRCXcr- gSiLk4z10P3245T https://www.bandsintown.com/a/7592729 https://bsky.app/profile/nikkioneill.bsky.social  

Interview with Kevin Shields Of Detention. Detention was one of the first and best bands of the ‘80s New Jersey hardcore punk explosion. Their wonderfully tasteless “Dead Rock 'n Rollers” single became the college radio cult classic of 1983. The song's 97 seconds of primal Ramones-style speed-punk mocked the demise of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, John Lennon, Keith Moon, Elvis Presley, Jim Morrison, Sid Vicious, John Belushi, and John Bonham — who “played the drug game and couldn't maintain.” They even foretold the drug-related heart attack of Jim Carroll, famous for “All The People Who Died,” screaming, “What are you waiting for? Do it!” Saving the best for last, “Dead Rock 'n Rollers” raised the obvious question: “Why couldn't it be Barry Manilow?” The Detention story goes back to Central Jersey, to the Shields family home in Hillsborough Township, about 20 minutes from the “culture capital” of New Brunswick. Kevin Shields, the fourth of five sons, grew up listening to his older brothers' sophisticated record collection of hippie music that ranged from Blue Cheer to King Crimson. Kevin recalls: “Early on, I knew that rock ‘n roll was something special. I was fascinated.”  “I enlisted in the Coast Guard when I was 17. I was out on my own. I was always a music guy and realized music was getting stale with Genesis and whatnot. I read all the magazines, and the ads in the back, so I sent money to these labels, and came home with albums like Never Mind the Bollocks and Rocket to Russia, and singles by the Slickee Boys and MX-80 Sound. But the coup d'grace was when we stationed in Alameda and I went wild in San Francisco. I went to the Mabuhay Gardens like three nights a week, seeing all the legendary West Coast bands: DKs, DOA, Black Flag. I got thrashed on the education of seeing live bands.”   When Kevin returned home in 1981, he was inspired to make music. “Detention came about because I decided to be a player not a spectator,” he explains. “The easiest way was to recruit my family, so I turned to my brothers. I bought a bass, but I didn't know how to play it. My brother Paul suggested I get in touch with this guitarist Rodney Matejek. He showed me how to play simply, and within months we started coming up with riffs, and what would become songs came very quickly.”  The band — Kevin, Rodney, frontman Paul Shields, and drummer Daniel Shields — played their first show at Raritan Manor on the Somerville Circle, hosted by a young Matt Pinfield in his first radio DJ gig at WRSU (Rutgers). It was a noisy and chaotic affair, with people rolling on the floor — until police arrived and stopped the mayhem. “We were given 100 bucks, and we promised never to play there again,” Kevin says with a grin.  Kevin offers some backstory: “Rob Roth, god bless his pointed head, he had a vision. He got us into the studio in Roselle Park, and he paid for it. All we had to do was get good recordings of the two songs, including the B-side “El Salvador.” It came out great. My brother Paul certainly had the lungs for the job! Those 500 copies got us gigs and got us a lot of notice.” In 1985, Detention released a self-produced self-titled album before disbanding. Kevin's Info https://www.leftfordeadrecords.com dead-rock-n-rollers    

Interview with Alexander Hacke and Danielle de Picciotto ! Part 4  hackedepicciotto are Alexander Hacke and Danielle de Picciotto. Both are legends of their own making: Danielle de Picciotto moved to Berlin in 1987, to become the lead singer of the band „Space Cowboys“, the co-initiator of the Love Parade, a collaborator of the Ocean Club with Gudrun Gut, and Alexander's partner in crime. Alexander Hacke is founding member and bass player of Einstürzende Neubauten. The artist couple, romantically married in 2006, has creatively interacted with countless international projects for almost 2 decades now besides regularly releasing their own compositions. Their live shows are, to put it mildly, intense. Danielle specializes in unusual instruments such as the Hurdy Gurdy, the auto harp and the cemence besides playing the violin and piano; Alexander is master of the bass, guitar and drums. Together they create beautiful, existentialistic, acoustic soundscapes, which roar and vibrate simultaneously leaving their audiences shaken but overjoyed. Danielle, author of two books, writes most of their lyrics, be it the poetic spoken word moments or the momentous choirs they compose together. Alexander Hacke, an excellent throat singer and vocalist, growls his grnarly, rumbling cries that float eerily over their nomadic desert drones, with screeching birds, bees or wild wind accompanying slow, heavy riffs that start as a whisper and end in a volcanic, rolling wave of apocalyptic frenzy. The collage of this mixed with melancholic, translucent harmonies, very heavy & low bass chords, and electronics are a mesmerizing universe of sound and emotion which has generated an ever growing group of enthusiastic listeners. The Best of hackedepicciotto (Live in Napoli) showcases live interpretations of music from across their career. The album includes reinterpretations of tracks from all of their studio albums: Keepsakes (2023), a tender exploration of friendship and loss, The Silver Threshold (2021), their defiant reaction to the pandemic, Perseverantia (2016), which dealt with the artists nomadic lifestyle, Menetekel (2017), which embodies their collective despair at the state of the world, and powerful energy of The Current (2020), recorded by the Irish Sea. Hackedepicciotto's Info https://www.hackedepicciotto.de/ Hear The Current here https://hackedepicciotto.bandcamp.com/  

Interview with Karen and Don Peris of Innocence Mission.   The first studio album from the innocence mission in four years, Midwinter Swimmers sounds immediately like an old friend. At the same time, it's a new kind of adventure for the beloved Pennsylvania band of high school friends Karen Peris, Don Peris, and Mike Bitts, having both an expansive, cinematic quality and the strange, lo-fi beauty of a newly discovered vintage folk/pop album, brimming with melody. Midwinter Swimmers is being released November 29 by Therese Records in North America, Bella Union in the U.K. and PVine in Japan. “It's like it was recorded at Western Electric in the 60's, and makes me think of Vashti Bunyan or Sibylle Baier, but also has these emotional bursts of orchestration and drums and harmony coming in - the sound of the innocence mission never stops getting richer”, writes one early listener and friend. Lead single and album opening song ‘This Thread Is a Green Street' is a perfect entrance into the innocence mission's sound and sensibility. Karen Peris describes it as “a sort of envisioning the landscape as a world of doorways, that might allow us to locate memory or to be nearer in some way to people we miss. And the transportive quality of scenes we might come upon in the natural world, or even in everyday objects- a sewing thread when I'm mending something could remind me of a street map. One of the things about recording it was, how to find this feeling inside the sound, and how to find the half-remembered beauty of sing-alongs of our 1970's childhoods. There's a search in recording that goes on being elusive, in a good way.” ‘This Thread...' is the first of a trio of songs on the new album (the second being the title song) about missing a loved one who is away, and of how love can transcend distance, Karen says. Piano melodies and high electric with strummed nylon string guitars make a glimmery soundtrack for ‘Midwinter Swimmers', a happy-sad song of hopefulness about seeing an absent loved one soon. It takes place during an instant when swimmers seen at a distance through tears are refracted and appear as something beautiful and moving. Something of this feeling is echoed in the recording, made with a spontaneity and a sense of trying to capture a single moment and hold it up to the light. This attentiveness to small detail typifies the way the innocence mission's songs look closely at everyday moments as miraculous worlds of their own. Karen's words stand on their own as poetry, with a particular sense of place and color, of the visual, that communicate universal experiences of change and loss, and of love, hope, and gratitude. Walking is a recurrent happening in Peris' songs, as she finds herself taking walks on most days of the year, and looking up into trees, which continue to be another feature of her lyrics. In one verse of closing song ‘A Different Day', she relates a favorite sycamore tree to an imaginary appaloosa horse that she might ride to visit a friend, underlining her hope that she could be made into a stronger, more courageous person who is without anxiety. This same hope of personal transformation is present in ‘Orange of the Westering Sun', which recalls being in California to record the innocence mission's first two albums. “This was at Joni Mitchell's house, and the air always smelled like lilies so it became Easter-like, which may have been one of the reasons that there was the feeling of being at the start of something”, Karen remembers. (In a full-circle experience, Karen, whose first favorite song at five years old was ‘Both Sides Now' was invited by Joni to sing on her album Night Ride Home, an honor she treasures.) On the opposite US coast, a favorite place visited by the Peris family called Two Lights in Cape Elizabeth is the setting of the dynamic and ambient ‘The Camera Divides the Coast of Maine'. Karen explains the song is “thinking about the nature of place in regard to time - when we think of going back, is it as if to visit an earlier time in our lives? I often think of the Ivan Lalic poem that says something like: Is this a street or years?” Here, and throughout the album, there is a palpable emotion inherent in Karen's voice, and in the distinctive combination of Don's luminous, high electric guitar lines with Karen's low (baritone and nylon string), rhythmic guitar and piano playing. Their longtime friend Mike Bitts adds a further dimension of upright and electric bass. ‘There is a companionship about Karen's voice,' Don Peris says, ‘and a realistic joy and gratitude, in the midst of life's difficulties, that she is expressing here on songs like ‘Sisters and Brothers'. I feel bolstered and comforted by them'. Innocence Mission Info theinnocencemission.com  www.facebook.com/innocence-mission-111422858887453/timeline/https://www.instagram.com/theinnocencemission/  

Interview with Ollee Owens.   Canadian soul/blues powerhouse singer Ollee Owens announces the release of her new album, Nowhere to Hide, on October 25th through her Ollee Owens Music label imprint. The first single from Nowhere to Hide, “Some Days,” was released on August 30. Produced by Bobby Blazier, the music on Nowhere to Hide is also graced by the presence of Muscle Shoals all-star guitarist Will McFarlane on eight of the album's eleven tracks. “The writing of ‘Some Days' came out of a desire to acknowledge the ups and downs of our day-to-day experiences and at the same time call out the resilience of the human spirit no matter what we come up against,” Owens says. “Sonically, we imagined it as a blues-infused song that leaves the listener feeling happy. It was recorded in Nashville with some of the best session musicians in Music City: Chris Rodriguez, Craig Young, Bobby Blazier, and DeMarco Johnson. The energy in the room that day was palpable as the song began to take shape, capturing exactly what I heard in my head when we wrote the song, resulting in a soulful and hope-filled anthem.” After returning to music a decade ago and releasing 2022's Cannot Be Unheard, the Calgary-based blues/rock singer is better than ever with her latest dazzling, down-to-earth studio album Nowhere to Hide. It's one teeming with stylish, sophisticated jewels mined from blues, rock, and soul. Nowhere to Hide features eight co-writing credits by Owens and a few covers, including Bob Dylan's "Lord Protect My Child." Whether it's Owens' confident delivery fueling the driving title track, the infectious "Some Days," or the deliciously well-crafted "Shivers and Butterflies," Owens is as dynamic as the eleven-track album is flawless. "I learned so much," Owens says of the creative process, "especially, vocally, as there was real opportunity to dig deeper and embody the lyrics." Nowhere to Hide, recorded at Nashville's Sweetbriar Studio and Gnome Studios, shines with help from a who's who of acclaimed Nashville session musicians Blazier brought to the album. "Bobby has an incredible ability to bring people together," Owens says of Blazier. "We all got in the studio together, gave it everything we got, and made some great music." That great music derives from Owens' backstory in the farming community of New Bothwell, Manitoba. As a teen, she gravitated toward Dylan, Delta Blues, The Staple Singers, and Etta James. "When I came back to creating music, I really realized the depth and influence that particular style of music had on me," Owens says of her early listening habits. Owens and her husband started their family early and had three daughters, one of whom has a cognitive disability. After some soul-searching, and realizing her daughter had exceptional needs, she took a hiatus from music. "I focused on being present and engaged for my daughters," she says. As a result, "Lord Protect My Child" strikes an emotional chord as Owens pours her soul into it. "That song has really become close to my heart," she says. "My daughter is twenty-three now, but there's still a lot of vulnerability there. The desire for protecting and taking care of her will never go away." Owens will be playing a Canadian concert in October celebrating the release of Nowhere to Hide and has plans for further touring in the spring. She's also performed at the Roots Blues and BBQ Festival in Drumheller, Alberta, and Calgary's National Music Centre, among several other venues. Now with Nowhere to Hide, Owens will have a larger fan base thanks to an amazing album you would be wise to experience wherever you get your music.    Ollee's Info /https://olleeowens.com/  

Robert Kidney of The Numbers Band 15-60-75 : Part 2 on Zig At The Gig. Robert Kidney founding member, singer songwriter, composer, and guitarist for the Number band. The Numbers Band (a.k.a. 15-60-75) are an American blues rock[1] and experimental rock band formed in Kent, Ohio, United States in 1969. They are part of the 'Akron Sound' that sprang forth from their home state. The original personnel were Robert Kidney (guitar, lead vocals), the Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde's brother Terry Hynde (saxophone), Hank Smith (guitar, keyboards), Greg Colbert (bass) and Tim Hudson (drums). Chris Butler, from Tin Huey and The Waitresses, also played in the band for a stint as a bassist. They premiered as a live act at the local nightspot The Kove in July 1970. Later, they incorporated jazzy influences as well and they have stuck with their sound ever since. By 1972, Gerald Casale, future co-founder of Devo (bass), and David Robinson were added to the lineup. Casale was thrown out after wearing a monkey mask onstage. Due to interior pressures, Kidney terminated the project by year's end and joined his brother Jack's band, King of Hearts. However, King of Hearts reformed as a new Numbers Band a few weeks later with a retooled lineup that consisted of the Kidney brothers, Hynde, Drake Gleason (bass) and Jay Brown (drums). After two years of playing gigs, Brown left the band and Robinson came back. Michael Stacey (guitar), was added prior to the cutting of their 1976 live album Jimmy Bell's Still in Town. The following year, Gleason was replaced by Bart Johnson (bass). The Numbers Band, like most of the other Ohioans, never became renowned nationally and were not signed by the major labels. ENDURE: Outliers on Water Street out now! https://www.numbersband.com/shop Robert's info https://www.numbersband.com/ http://www.robertkidney.com/  

Interview with Maura Pond of Luna Honey Luna Honey was originally formed in 2017 in Washington, DC by Maura Pond and Levi Flack who had informally begun playing together in Flack's basement and set a goal to write an album's worth of music. The pair met Benjamin Schurr (Ruah, Br'er, Nyxy Nyx), founder of BLIGHT.records, when his band Br'er opened a show for Arto Lindsay at the Black Cat and he soon after agreed to record and produce them. When they'd finished recording their debut album, Peace Will Grind You Down, Ben insisted that the pair begin performing live, agreed to fill in temporarily, then became a permanent member along with baritone sax player Madeline Billhimer. The four-piece line-up recorded Peace Lives, a live recording of songs mostly from their first album. Billhimer left the band during the recording of their next full-length album, Ballast. Schurr, who was born in Philadelphia, moved back to his home city in 2019 with Flack following shortly after. Christmas Eve of 2019, Pond's aunt shared she had months to live and asked her to write her some music to help accept her transition, asking that it could be released after her death. Still living in DC, Pond recruited Ben to come down to her house in Anacostia and record an intense week of highly improvised sessions. The two worked around the clock on what would become the fourth album Luna Honey, Branches. After the pandemic hit in 2020, Pond moved back to her hometown of Richmond, VA to be closer to her parents and Schurr followed. All three band members commuted back and forth between Richmond and Philadelphia continuing to write songs. Parables was written during the period of geographic separation across DC, Philadelphia, and Richmond. Three months after moving to Richmond, Pond's mother passed after an over a decade long fight with cancer. In the wake of her mother's passing, Pond had found comfort in the solo work of longtime Swans guitarist Norman Westberg and ended up striking up a long-distance collaboration. Aftermath resulted, a meditation on grief and what is left behind. In 2022, Pond and Schurr moved to Philadelphia, finally reuniting the band within the same city. Re-energized after living through the difficulties during COVID and the past several years, the three began recording a new crop of songs that would make up the majority of Bound, with the goal of capturing the raw, powerful energy of their live shows. Luna Honey's art emerges from the creative tension between the death of the ego and the exploration of the subconscious with the pragmatism and discipline of punching the clock and getting the work done. http://www.lunahoney.com http://facebook.com/lunahoneymusic http://www.instagram.com/lunahoneymusic linktr.ee/lunahoneymusic https://open.spotify.com/artist/3kz45E0sd0kFgZIfQNwm2F https://lunahoney.bandcamp.com/album/bound  

Interview with Kerry Jones Of Death Doula. Death Doula's new album Love Spells available on all streaming platforms.   Love Spells is the debut album from Death Doula, a dusky Art-Rock band hailing from Portland, Oregon. The new album was recorded at Jackpot Studios by Adam Lee (Built to Spill, Sleater- Kinney) and mixed by Bob Cheek, (Deftones, Band of Horses). It's being released as a digital download and via streaming platforms by Death Doula Records on October 11. Kerry Jones had a crush on his best friend. Kyle List didn't mind, he asked her to come collaborate at his tiny home studio anyway. By the end of the night, they were in love and had created a demo of “Disembark”, which would be lead single from Love Spells. Three weeks later, he moved to Portland to live with her, with no plan beyond an intuition that the music would take them somewhere. Fast forwarding two years later, they recruited the veteran rhythm section of Keith Vidal on bass (Marjorie Faire, Nyles Lannon) and Adam Kozie on drums (Pollens, Crystal Beth) and adopted the name “Death Doula.” The music they've created shows their shared love of artists like Can, Television, Jeff Buckley, The Cranberries, Deerhunter, Kate Bush, The Sundays and Deftones, while remaining altogether sonically new. After having their lives dramatically reshaped during the pandemic, the members of Death Doula approach music with an intensity that can only come from having spent a lifetime wanting it. Kerry and Kyle have an 11 year age difference. Keith and Kyle have a 22 year age difference. Each member pours their lifetime of experience into performances that place emotion and groove first.“In a world so algorithmized it's numb,” says Kerry “we just want to make people feel something again.” https://deathdoula.bandcamp.com/ https://www.instagram.com/deathdoulaband/?img_index=1  

Interview with Rust County Revival About Rust County Revival ":Somewhere between the former stomping grounds of blues legend Robert Lockwood Jr. and the modern-day, blues-inspired rockers The Black Keys comes an original Rock ‘N' Roll experience, which attempts to blend elements of both the old and the new and feels authentic as well. Bob (guitar/vocals), Russ (drums), Stu (guitar/vocals), and Tim (bass) strive to deliver a unique blend of Rock and Blues soaked in gasoline for your eardrums. Formed in the post-pandemic world on the mean streets of Seven Hills, four musicians set out to deliver freakish blues and familiar grooves to your soul. RCR brings a multitude of expressions and influences to the stage. From hard-hitting Rock and Grunge to old-school Blues with a modern spin. Mainly we just enjoy writing and playing music inspired by artists we admire."   UPCOMING SHOWS Dec. 19 – Emerging Sounds Showcase @ Rialto Theatre (Akron, OH) – Doors: 7 p.m. Jan. 17 – Front St. Social (Berea, OH) – Doors: 6:30 p.m. https://rustcountyrevival.com / https://www.facebook.com/RustCountyRevival https://www.instagram.com/rustcountyrevival  

Final Passion is the solo project of Cailyn Maeve, an independent artist making music from her tiny bedroom in Cleveland, OH. Originally from Houston, TX, Cailyn fronted the punk band Fail Mary for several years before relocating to Cleveland in the midst of her transition, where she began work on the project. Final Passion's first self-produced solo single, “Perpetual Motion” released October 2023, and was followed up by the EP “we will figure it out” in September 2024.   https://www.finalpassion.net  

Formed in 2004 The Old Ceremony has survived longer than many marriages. They've reinvented themselves again and again, beginning as an eleven-piece mini-orchestra, slimming down to a five-piece touring machine (guitar, bass, drums, vibraphone/keys, violin), and now –  in their 20th year together – creating a fresh, energized record that incorporates the visceral (“Valerie Solanas”), the meditative (“North American Grain”), the philosophical (“Too Big To Fail”), and a nod back to their noir-ish beginnings (“Lonely Mayor”). Songwriter and vocalist/guitarist Django Haskins' gift for incisive, colorful lyrics and melodies is on full display throughout, whether it be an unhinged first-person tale of shooting Andy Warhol or the melancholy last act of a long-closeted politician. He writes with empathy and precision that occasionally calls to mind the source of the band's name, Leonard Cohen, among others. In fact, the songs contained in Earthbound are culled from the 115 new songs Haskins penned during the pandemic. When tossed into the well-seasoned cauldron of the band's collective musical voices, they transform from one person's songs into something else: the sound of a band that has created together for two decades, through highs and lows, busy years of touring and slow years of child-rearing and mask wearing.  The Old Ceremony has seen their share of highlights: sharing bills with the Jayhawks, CAKE, Squirrel Nut Zippers, Mountain Goats, Chuck Berry, Giant Sand, and many more; touring the U.S., Canada, and Europe; building their stature in the fertile Chapel Hill/Durham scene one cinematic performance at a time. Meanwhile band leader Django Haskins in addition to participating in the Big Star tribute tours, co-wrote and recorded an album of Folk-Rock originals with the Jayhawks' Gary Louris under the name “Au Pair.” Earthbound is destined to be another highlight to add to the list, a musical recommitment ceremony among five musicians who share a life in song.       The Old Ceremony's info  www.theoldceremony.com www.facebook.com/theoldceremony www.instagram.com/theoldceremonyofficial https://open.spotify.com/artist/21PmWnK0ROD7G4nGvYCmDj  

Interview with Binnie Klein of In These Trees and Tartie In These Trees is an alternative indie music project led by Binnie Klein. Klein's lyrical stories are suffused with human longing and memory, and pair gracefully with soulful melodies from the artists who perform her work. With her extensive background in music as a radio DJ and a career in writing, Klein seeks to elevate her words through collaboration with rising artists. "Orchard" is her premier single inspired by her audio memoir, 10 Days in Newark, with music by Australian artist, Tartie. In These Trees and Tartie now have 5 singles out (Orchard, Sky, Ocean, Quiver, Hailstorm, and Ablaze). The album, THE QUIVER, is planned for November 2023. As a long-time DJ at free-form radio station WPKN, Binnie receives many promotional CD's from hopeful artists. She tries to listen to most of them, just in case there is a gem that will fit with her show's eclectic mix. When Australian singer/songwriter Tartie sent a few tunes, Binnie chose “Winter's Girl” to play on her show. The two women, decades apart in age, began to chat on Zoom — about dogs, about music, about politics, finding a wonderful symmetry. Binnie encouraged Tartie to finish up a rough mix of “Ablaze,” about the Australian wildfires, and asked if Tartie might take a look at some lyrics. “Orchard” emerged from that question, and a great geographic distance, and a pandemic — the song, and many others -- began to take shape, with help from producer David Baron of Sun Mountain Studios. https://www.inthesetrees.com  

Interview with Arlen Roth 2024 Arlen Roth is a true guitar legend; part of the list of who he's recorded and toured with contains folks like Simon & Garfunkel (together and individually), John Prine, Phoebe Snow, Bob Dylan, Bee Gees, Don McLean, Levon Helm, Ry Cooder, Duane Eddy, Danny Gatton, Janis Ian, Dusty Springfield, John Sebastian, Johnny Winter and countless more. He also appeared with Ramblin' Jack Elliot and Patti Smith in the Martin Scorcese Rolling Thunder film, created the guitar parts and was consultant and teacher to Ralph Macchio for the legendary blues film, Crossroads. In 2016, he wrote and performed an acoustic guitar piece with Daveed Diggs and Leslie Odom, Jr. of Hamilton for ESPN. Arlen was voted in the Top 100 most Influential guitarists of all time by Vintage Guitar Magazine and top 50 all-time acoustic guitarists by Gibson.com. Now, on Arlen Roth's 20th solo album and his fifth all-acoustic offering, he's bringing rootsy acoustic music to new heights on Playing Out the String, set for release September 27 and distributed by MVD. The new album was recorded, mixed and mastered by Alex Salzman, who also contributes keyboards to the mix.  Arlen's previous album, Super Soul Session, with bass legend Jerry Jemmott, sat atop the Blues and Soul charts for 22 straight weeks, and was in the Top 5 for 55 straight weeks this past year. Arlen has also been at the forefront of guitar and music education, with 10 best-selling books, and he was the first-ever to offer video instruction with the giants of the music industry through his “Hot Licks” company, which he started in 1979, and has had millions of students worldwide. His column for Guitar Player magazine was voted #1 by the largest margin of readers from 1982 to 1992, and was also turned into a best-selling book, Hot Guitar. On Playing Out the String,  this all-acoustic, mostly solo album is very personal to Arlen and is really like getting an up-close "at home" concert in your living room. On it, he paints with broad strokes across several genres of music he loves. From "Old Timey" Norman Blake material to country blues from Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee and Tampa Red; he even makes you feel at home with Nilsson's "Everybody's Talkin'" and gives his 12-string guitar a workout on the archetypical, "Walk Right In." https://www.arlenroth.com  

Interview with Jeff Lang 2024 Australian guitarist-songwriter-vocalist-producer, Jeff Lang has built a reputation for making startling music that is accomplished, intricate, gutsy, melodic and loaded with soul. Often taking unexpected turns, he has consistently inspired his audiences by creating a stylistically diverse catalog of over 25 albums. Jeff has mischievously called his music ‘Disturbed Folk.' One writer referred to him as a “quiet achiever.” But the overall impression one has from observing Jeff's lengthy career is that of a driven man who keeps his head down, playing and recording music as if his very life depends on it. Outside of his homeland, Jeff has toured the UK, Europe, Japan, India, China, South Africa, New Zealand and Canada as well as concentrated work in the U.S., where he has played upwards of 300 shows, living there for 6 months at a time. He has appeared on prestigious American radio programs A Prairie Home Companion, Mountain Stage and Acoustic Café. Jeff has shared stages with Bob Dylan, Dr. John, Richard Thompson, Bonnie Raitt, Ani Di Franco, Chris Whitley, Albert Collins, Loudon Wainwright III, Greg Brown, John Butler, AR Rahman and Bob Geldolf, among many others. Jeff has delivered show-stopping performances at festivals all across the globe: The Dublin Blues Festival, Philadelphia Folk Festival, Quebec City Music Festival, Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, Winterhawk Bluegrass Festival, Fuji Rock, Glastonbury, Echo Park China, Ottawa BluesFest as well as on his home turf at Port Fairy, Woodford, Bluesfest Byron Bay and Womadelaide. Jeff Lang's unique musical vision easily finds a home in myriad settings, from large festival stages to the intimate, long-running Ann Arbor, Michigan club The Ark to the Sydney Opera House. Most importantly, Jeff Lang has achieved what is a rarity in the cluttered world of contemporary sounds: his own voice. Jeff's info https://jefflang.com.au  

Robin Hyperius Blake of Hyperius Blake and The Sound Experiment  Talk about operation DOOMSday a tribute show to the legendary MF DOOM    Event description  Friday November 8th Hyperius Blake and The Sound Experiment joined by local MC's Maddstarr being one of them.  Hit the stage at The Crobar A3244 St Clair Ave, Cleveland, OH, United States, 44114    To pay tribute to the legendary MF DOOM !!!

 Interview with Eric Earley of Blitzen Trapper 2024   Launched roughly two decades ago in Portland, OR, Blitzen Trapper garnered early attention with a series of self-released albums before breaking out internationally with a pair of critically acclaimed LPs (2007's Wild Mountain Nation and 2008's Furr) that would cement their status at the forefront of the modern indie folk revival. Rolling Stone hailed the band's “hazy, psychedelic Americana,” while NPR praised their “explosive live performances and infectious roots-rock swagger,” and The New York Times compared their songs to Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, and Neil Young. Dates with Fleet Foxes, Wilco, and Dawes followed, as did festival appearances at Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Newport Folk, and Coachella, among others. In the years to come, the band would go on to release six more similarly lauded studio albums, culminating with 2020's Holy Smokes Future Jokes, which Mojo proclaimed “sound[s] like the Beatles at Big Pink.” There are numbers so vast they exceed the scope of human reckoning, concepts so immeasurable they surpass our capacity to understand. On their radiant new album, 100's of 1000's, Millions of Billions, Blitzen Trapper make peace with the unknowable, surrendering themselves to forces beyond their control as they explore the infinite with a broad mind and an open heart. Inspired by singer/songwriter Eric Earley's fascination with Buddhist texts and meditation (the title comes from a phrase that appears over and over in the Mahayana sutras), the album offers a captivating take on rebirth and transcendence, and the circularity of existence, navigating its way through the space beyond dreams and reality, beyond gods and mortals, beyond life and death. The songs here are as sincere as they are surreal, rooted in rich character studies and deep reflection, and unfolding like a riddle-filled journey that asks many questions and offers no answers. The production is intoxicating to match, blending lo-fi intimacy and trippy psychedelia into a mesmerizing swirl of analog and electronic sounds. Add it all together and the result is a gorgeous, sprawling collection wrapped in lush layers of synthesizers and washed out electric guitars–a poignant, expansive exploration of perception and purpose that manages to look both forwards and backwards all at once. Grog Shop Show Info  NOV-4-24 https://grogshop.gs/tm-event/blitzen-trapper/ Blitzen Trapper Info  https://www.blitzentrapper.net/

Interview with saxophonist Chris Greene For saxophonist Chris Greene, turning 50 was a double milestone. It inspired him to look back on his career and the strides he has made as an independent jazz artist. It also inspired him to reflect on his life as a husband, father and family man. Little did he know how happily those two worlds would collide.   Greene was working at home on music for his excellent new album, Conversance, when his attentive 12-year-old son Alex, a talented pianist and drummer and major Star Wars fan, played a melody for him inspired by one of the tunes his old man was playing. The elder Greene liked it so much, he decided to use it as the A section of the song, a six-measure blues in 6/4 time with a bridge. "It was a perfect fit," he says. "It really made the tune."  Dad properly gave his son a co-writing credit and called the song "The Emperor Strikes Back," also a nod back to Chris' earlier composition, "Future Emperor of Evanston." There are numerous high points on Conversance, but none as high as this one for the older half of this rare father-son collaboration. Greene, the pride of Evanston, Illinois, has been one of the Midwest's most popular jazz artists since his quartet in 2005. The group, featuring pianist Damian Espinosa, bassist Marc Piane and drummer Steve Corley, was voted best jazz band in Chicago in a poll by the alternative weekly, the Chicago Reader. A fan friendly artist with strong ties to the community, Greene has gifted his followers with a trio of mixtapes by the group that were recorded live various clubs and jazz festivals. Those recordings, dubbed Playtime I, II and III serve as sidebars to his regular efforts, as do a pair of subsequent albums released under the tag PlaySPACE. Following the single "Beyhive Traffic Blues," featuring emcee D2G, Conversance is the first-ever jazz release for Pravda Records, a prized indie of eclectic leanings that has been releasing recordings since 1984. It is the Chris Green Quartet's first studio album in seven years.       Chris Greene's Info  chrisgreenejazz.com instagram.com/chrisgreenejazz facebook.com/chrisgreenejazzthreads.com/chrisgreenejazz youtube.com/@chrisgreenejazz

  PULSARS mark the end of that era. Leader Dave Trumfio (vocals, guitar, synths production and most anything else) and his younger brother Harry (drums) grew up playing music in a suburban Chicago basement.  While still in his teens, Dave abandoned college-level music production and engineering studies to focus on songwriting and artist endeavors; his native talents soon found him an apprenticeship at Seagrape Studios working with talents as disparate as house music pioneer Mr Fingers, British first-wave stalwarts The Pretty Things and dub plate sessions with the legendary reggae producer / musician Niney The Observer . . . all within months of his first real go behind the mixing desk. Chicago's past musical glories felt far in the past then, replaced by a sea of skinny tie power pop bands, poofy hair metal combos of some timidity and a few rough-hewn exponents of sub-Buzzcocks punk and Fiorucci-ready new wave.  Ignoring it all, Dave ran a small studio in a shared house he rented with friends before taking the risky - and expensive - plunge into opening a 'real' studio on the northwest corner of Wicker Park, soon to burst into a degree of infamy due to a small contingent of cult heroes who lived there for cheap rent and cheaper bars - Liz Phair, Eleventh Dream Day, Big Black, Urge Overkill, Tortoise et al. Daves role in all of this was minimal by nature; he preferred to record acts from farther afield - Billy Bragg, then-recent Chicago transplants Wilco, The Mekons, Young Marble Giants guitarist and songwriter Stuart Moxham, Barbara Manning, Captain Beefhearts main man Gary Lucas, an array of other acts from Iceland, Australia and all corners of the UK.  Business was good, and it grew.  A quick writer of odd pop ditties, one day Dave called in his brother Harry and recorded - in a single afternoon session - a set of nine demos known.  The story's been related countless times, but within weeks the band was opening for Oasis and found itself being courted by a dozen labels. Their few local shows were undefinable. Dave played guitar and sang, Harry drummed triggered a reel of additional music, often with video backing . . . which dazzled spectators in that pre-laptop era.  After months of negotiations, the band signed a multi-million deal with Almo Sounds, a new label begun by A&M founders Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss and distributed by Geffen.  It was - and likely still is - the largest deal ever offered to an emerging Chicago musical act. The band engaged in numerous tours to support their self-titled debut, playing with Sean Lennon & Cibo Matto, Blur, Supergrass, and many others, as well as seemingly infinite jaunts to Japan, where Dave and Harry were hailed as heroes of subversive minimalist pop - the ecstatic screams of young fans at the first few notes of Submission To The Master& at first bewildering the brothers.  Suddenly, the Almo Sounds deal with Geffen fell apart at the start of a tour supporting then-current sensations Weezer.  Promotion was pulled; radio support for the first single from the album collapsed in a mere moment. Due to contractual vagaries, the band was allowed to complete a second (unreleased) album just before the label folded.  And that was it, until the news of the 2021 release of Pulsar Transmissions", a collection of unheard songs and versions that the band recorded before and during their short-term deal.  Rolling Stone offered their self titled debut ;Pulsars as one of the 40 greatest albums ever recorded by an act with one real album:     PULSARS's Info Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/pulsarsband/?hl=en X / Twitter:  https://x.com/PulsarsBand Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/pulsarsofficial/  

Dave Hill is a comedian, writer, musician, actor, radio host, and man-about-town originally from Cleveland, Ohio but now living in New York City in a totally sweet apartment with a party deck and everything. Hot chicks come over to hang out and eat cheese plates and stuff with him all the time and it's awesome.   Anyway, on the show business front, Dave has appeared on Netflix's The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Adult Swim's Joe Pera Talks with You Amazon's The Tick, Peacock TV's Girls5Eva, Comedy Central's @midnightand Inside Amy Schumer programs, TBS' Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, TV Land's The Jim Gaffigan Show, and TruTV's Comedy Knockout among a bunch of others. He is a frequent on-air host for HBO and Cinemax and has been on channels like MTV, VH1, BBC-America, and the Sundance Channel a whole bunch too. Dave also starred in his own television program The King of Miami on the Mojo Network, which was cancelled even though Dave really liked it. The show also aired in the United Kingdom on Sky TV's Film24 Channel. And you can still watch The King of Miami on Hulu too, which Dave is super pumped about. Oh, and Dave was a correspondent on Hoppus on Music starring Blink 182's Mark Hoppus on the Fuse channel, which ruled. Dave has been on other shows and in obscure movies too but let's keep moving for now.   Dave performs live comedy over the world and has appeared at such festivals as the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, SXSW, San Francisco Sketchfest, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the U.S. Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Sasquatch Festival, Bumbershoot, Bonnaroo, the Bridgetown Comedy Festival in Portland, the Crap Comedy Festival in Oslo, Outside Lands in San Francisco, and then some other ones too. He has also performed comedy at Sing Sing Correctional Facility twice and even ripped some guitar solos inside a Mexican prison a couple times too. In 2007, Variety magazine named Dave one of their “10 Comedians to Watch,” something he still won't shut up about. Some things are hard to let go of. Dave hosted his own radio show The Goddamn Dave Hill Show on WFMU in Jersey City, New Jersey every Monday night from 9pm to midnight for years and now hosts the podcast Dave Hill's Podcasting Incident, which is also broadcast on the UK's Fubar Radio, So...You're Canadian with Dave Hill, and History Fluffer, on which he is joined by Jim Biederman, Jodi Lennon, and Chris Gersbeck. Dave is also a frequent contributor to public radio's Live from Here with Chris Thile and  This American Life. He has also appeared on podcasts like WTF with Marc Maron, The Adam Carolla Show, The Nerdist, and then roughly 78 other ones besides those. Dave is the author of four books, including his brand new book The Awesome Game: One Man's Incredible, Globe-Crushing Hockey Odyssey, in addition to Parking the Moose (Doubleday Canada/Penguin Random House 2019), Tasteful Nudes (St. Martins Press, 2012) and Dave Hill Doesn't Live Here Anymore (Blue Rider Press 2016). He has also written for the New York Times, GQ, Salon, The Paris Review, McSweeney's, New York Observer, The Cleveland Plain Dealer, VICE, Guitar World, and a bunch of other places too. Comedy legend Dick Cavett called Dave “a major figure among American comic writers, past and present,” which is pretty much the coolest thing that has ever happened as far as Dave is concerned. Dave is also a musician who currently sings and plays guitar in the power pop band Valley Lodge, whose song “Go” is the theme song to HBO's Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, and the psych/garage rock band Painted Doll. He was also a member of Cleveland rock bands Sons of Elvis and Cobra Verde as well as Diamondsnake, a heavy metal band with Moby. Additionally, Dave has played guitar for Walter Schreifels and muscle metal band Thor and bass for Lucy Wainwright Roche and former Faith No More singer Chuck Mosley. He also contributed musical scores to films such as Dirty Deeds, Shoot First and Pray You Live, and then some other ones besides those two. Dave's Info  https://www.davehillonline.com  

The Frans are a public transit-inspired rock band from Cleveland, USA. Their self-titled record was released on March 2nd, 2024. For more information and to become a "Franiac", check us out on social media and other instruments of addiction: https://linktr.ee/thefrans   SEP 19TH Gabriel Xavier & The Neon Saints (Album Release Show) Cleveland OHLink https://www.facebook.com/share/yTKk1L6V2Zuid2Zm/  C-Level Frans cross over track link (To Be Here when finished )

Interview with Evan Taylor  Bernie Worrell Orchestra bandleader. Evan Taylor whose latest production is the posthumous Bernie Worrell: Wave From The WOOniverse about this release and some of his other diverse musical endeavors.   Bernie Worrell: Wave From The WOOniverse is a double album concocted in fourteen cities, issued on 12” LP vinyl a day after Bernie's birthday, (April 19) on Record Store Day 2024 by Org Music in conjunction with Loantaka Records as a Record Store Day “exclusive.” As of June 28 it's also available via streaming platforms. The release will be accompanied by a bound-to-be viral video of the title track directed by Los Angeles-based dancer, Madeline Riley.           Taylor has remained behind the scenes for most of his career. He worked in various capacities with Worrell, mike watt, Money Mark, Theresa Wayman (Warpaint), King Tuff, The Chapin Sisters, and Jimmy Destri of Blondie. He has made 1960's country-influenced records with members of Black Flag, participated in eclectic recording projects and performed with practically every member of Talking Heads. Evan's also released a string of critically acclaimed singles as part of the Art-Rock duo Purple Witch of Culver.  Evan has never identified with the archetype of “cosmic Funkateer.” He grew up with diverse tastes that ran from The Beach Boys to Prince. As a producer his brand has been “staying off-brand.” In 2022, Taylor was presented with a unique opportunity he felt he had been preparing for his entire career. Bernie Worrell: Wave From The WOOniverse addresses the abundance of unfinished work Bernie Worrell, a prolific writer and visionary, left behind when he passed away in 2016. These compositions remained untouched for a period of decades, collecting dust on reels of two-inch analog tape.    Eventually, the tapes were re-examined to analyze Bernie's nuanced and creative method. After a period of deep reflection, the Bernie Worrell estate decided it was time to complete his vision. With a series of Bernie's collaborators, contemporaries, and friends including Bootsy Collins, Sean Ono Lennon, Jerry Harrison (Talking Heads), Leo Nocentelli (The Meters), Fred Schneider (B52s), Miho Hatori (Cibo Matto), Steve Scales, Marc Ribot, Fred Wesley (James Brown, Parliament), Marco Benevento, Stanton Moore (Galactic), Steven Bernstein, Daru Jones (Jack White), Will Calhoun (Living Colour, mike watt, Norwood Fisher (Fishbone), Jared Samuel Elioseff, Kyp Malone and Jaleel Bunton (TV on the Radio),  Binky Griptite (Dap Kings), Nick Montoya, Paul Dooely, Alecia Chakour, Smokey Hormel, Ana Becker, Eric McFadden (Sgt. Splendor), Sarah La Puerta, Michael Rueben and many more innovators his initiative was completed with dedication to preserving the integrity of the magic which makes Bernie a beloved extraordinary soul. Also included on the album is a previously unreleased Funkadelic track, “Contusion,” which showcases Bernie's masterful work with the group.   https://loantaka-records.com/ . http://evantaylormusic.com.

Hailing from New Jersey, singer/songwriter SAMMY KAY has lived the kind of romantic life that can only be found in song. With the highest of highs, and the lowest of lows, KAY returned to his home state after years in Brooklyn and Los Angeles, as well as traveling the world playing in and working for a myriad of bands (Gaslight Anthem and Bouncing Souls among them).   The Kilograms  Joe Gittleman of The Mighty Might Boss tones and  Sammy Kay have formed a new band together called The Kilograms. The band has released their first song called “Who Am I”. The song is off the Black Sand Relief: A Benefit for Michelle Ska and the People of Mauicompilation album. The Kilograms will be releasing a full album soon.   Tickets to The Kilograms with C-Level and Rubik's Groove at Mahalls Lakewood OH Sep 4th  https://mahalls20lanes.com/event/the-kilograms/ Sammy Kay's and The Kilograms info sammykaynj july-1960 https://www.facebook.com/p/The-Kilograms-61552101741122/ https://thekilograms.bandcamp.com/album/ep    

Pamela McNeill knew from an early age that music would be her life. She joined her first rock band at 16 and learned quickly how to connect with her audience. A native of Winona, Minnesota, Pamela resides in Minneapolis. Her career has taken her all over the world including four years in the UK as a backing singer for Rick Astley, performing with him at Royal Albert Hall and The London Palladium for the Royal Family and appearing on many television shows such as BBC's “Top of the Pops”. As a prolific songwriter, she wrote her first song at 15 and has written for and with a wide range of other artists including Wynonna Judd, Jim Peterik and Yanni, and has co-written tracks with fellow songwriters such as Pam Tillis and Bobby E. Boyd. Pamela began releasing albums in 1999 and to date has released seven studio albums. She has headlined theaters and festivals across the country in support of her music and has opened for artists including Etta James, Little River Band, Atlanta Rhythm Section and BTO, to name a few. Pamela is excited to release "Wave After Wave," her eighth original studio recording on Farm to Label Record, July 26th (color vinyl) and August 2nd (digital). In 2024, she was honored by being inducted into the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame.   Pam's Info https://www.pamelamcneill.com    

Interview with Fresh Out Of The Box a NYC based comedy group. Featuring Abigail Stories, Gene Morgan, Igor Reyes, Josh Sorell, and Matt Leazer. Fresh Out Of The Box is playing in Cleveland at Imposters Theater Aug 12th 7:30PM.   SHOW INFO: https://www.thisiscleveland.com/locations/imposters-theater Fresh Out Of The Box INFO https://freshouttheboxcomedy.wordpress.com https://www.instagram.com/freshouttheboxcomedy/?locale=bz-hans&hl=am-et   Fresh out the Box has one of the highest scores on showscore.com for sketch comedy shows on Off-Broadway, Fresh out the Box is one of the most critically acclaimed sketch comedy shows in New York City. Going on tour for the first time, Fresh out the Box will make audiences laugh with its original sketches and great characters. Family friendly entertainment for everyone, FOTB: Always funny, Always Fresh, Same Box. Cast: Gene Morgan, Chrissy Taylor, Josh Sorell, Igor Reyes, Matt Leazer, Olivia Casper, Leah Jansen, Abigail Schories, Shanon Lindsey

Interview with Karen Haglof. One Hand Up is a collection of 14 songs that cover widely ranging sonic territory. The writing and production started prior to 2020 and was delayed by the pandemic. Because of a renewed interest in visual art, many of the songs on One Hand Up will be accompanied by visual components: hand-drawn 2D animation, motion graphics and video clips, addin up to a mixed media extravaganza. Prior to her career in medicine, Karen had been an active participant in the much-vaunted Minneapolis indie rock scene that gave the world the Replacements, Soul Asylum and Bob Mould's Husker Du among many others. Eventually, she left the MidWest for Manhattan and joined renowned avant-garde composer Rhys Chatham's Ensemble, one of the city's seminal guitar army / orchestras, leaving to join the Band of Susans with other veterans of Chatham's crew. After serving a stint a kitchen staff at the early years of East Village institution the Great Jones Café (and creating its legendary brunch menu), she entered medical school and didn't seriously pick up a guitar for decades. She returned to making music in 2014, while still actively practicing medicine with the Western Holiday EP following it with Perseverance and Grace, Palomino Steady Rocking, Tobiano Over the next four years gaining praise from outlets like NPR's All Things Considered, Guitar Girl Magazine, and Popdose among many others. Karon's info  http://karenhaglof.com  

Mike Dillon is a percussionist, vibraphonist, bandleader, singer-songwriter, and vocalist born in San Antonio Texas. He is a member of Critters Buggins, Les Claypool's Fancy Band, and Garage A Trois. He has performed with many musicians including Ani DiFranco, Galactic, Brave Combo, Karl Denson's Tiny Universe, Marco Benevento, Clutch, Claude Coleman Jr., and New Orleans musicians Kevin O'Day, Johnny Vidacovich, James  Singleton, and Ricky Lee Jones. Mike Dillon & Punkadelick makes its recorded debut with Inflorescence, an album of heady, instrumental rock highlighting a band deep in the throes of creative freedom, road tested and wild. Consisting of 10 tracks in 42-minutes, it's an expansive, focused and fearless collection, representing a world where Duke Ellington and Augustus Pablo rub shoulders with crate-digger exotica, the freak-funk of Parliament and the ‘anything fits' outsider ethos of acid-fried punks like The Meat Puppets. A trio featuring Mike Dillon (Ricki Lee Jones, Ani DiFranco, Les Claypool) on vibraphone, marimba, Prophet 6, congas, and bongos, Brian Haas (Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey) on Fender Rhodes, piano, bass Moog and melodica and Nikki Glaspie (Beyonce) on drums, cymbals and vocals, Punkadelick is the unified vision of six hands creating a world that often sounds like the work of an ensemble three times the size. During 2020 and 2021, while many music venues were still shuttered, the group began touring, sweating their way through cuts Dillon and Haas had composed during quarantine writing sessions. Locking in on stage, it quickly became clear the band was functioning at a level that made the hair on their arms stand at attention—even for three live music veterans accustomed to life on the road.   July 27th Mike and Punkadelick are playing the Grog shop in Cleveland OH tickets here! https://grogshop.gs/event-details/13536034/mike-dillon-punkadelic-hello-3d-c-level/   Mike's Info https://www.mikedillonvibes.com/  

The first podcast ever with Melt-Banana !? Interview with Yako and Agata of Melt Banana.   Melt-Banana is a Japanese noise rock band that is known for playing extremely fast noise rock and hardcore punk mixed with experimental, electronica and pop-based song structures.   Since forming in 1992 the band has released ten albums and toured worldwide extensively. Besides making their music, MELT-BANANA hopes to empower and encourage their fans and fellow musicians by example. They've foregone the convention of a full band line-up for over a decade and recorded and toured as a two-piece since 2012. Yako's wildly careening, staccato vocals ignore every convention of Pop and Alternative singing, guided solely by her own unique artistic vision. For 25 years, they've been in the vanguard of bedroom players and Egg Punks facing the challenge of mixing homespun digital creations with live instrumentation head-on with consistently brilliant results. While Melt-Banana has explicitly explained the meaning behind the album's title, 3 + 5, prime numbers symbolize mathematical integrity and independence, which could represent?   Melt-Banana's Info  http://www.melt-banana.net/ https://www.patreon.com/melt_banana https://www.facebook.com/Melt-Banana-192954987398661    https://www.youtube.com/user/xxxMELTBANANAxxx https://twitter.com/melt_banana/ https://www.instagram.com/melt_banana/ http://www.a-zap.com/  

Boris Pelekh (Boris Peleh′; born Boris Fridrikhovich Pelekh, Russian: Борис Фридрихович Пелех, 17 November 1981) is a singer-songwriter, composer, guitarist, most notable as the guitarist of the Gypsy Punk band Golgol Bordello. He moved to New York City in 1991, at 9, and joined Gogol Bordello in 2015. Aside from his work in Gogol Bordello, he also worked with the Nickoldoenon duo Nat and Alex Wolf from 2008 to 2011. Pelekh is the frontman, guitarist, and primary songwriter of the rock band Hey Guy and now Boris and The Joy. July 24th Catch Boris live at Negative Space Cleveland OH.  https://www.facebook.com/share/1UHhwnUGeviWpBxE Boris's info https://borisandthejoy.com

Interview with Charlie Musselwhite. Mississippi-born, Memphis-raised, Grammy Award-winning music legend Charlie Musselwhite doesn't just sing and play the blues; he is, in every sense of the word, a bluesman. Growing up, he not only learned the music first-hand from many of the genre's most influential artists, he also absorbed the lifestyle. “It's an attitude,” Musselwhite says of playing the blues. “A way of living life.” Over the course of his six-decade career, Musselwhite has released nearly 40 albums. He is renowned worldwide as a master harmonica player, a seasoned, truth-telling vocalist and an original songwriter rooted deep within the blues tradition. As many of his fans know, he's also a country blues guitarist of great depth, warmth and subtlety. Charlie's info https://www.charliemusselwhite.com Shows https://www.charliemusselwhite.com/shows  

Interview with Don Rauf of Life In A Blender Don returns to talk about Life In A Blender's new album Bent By The Weather.   DON RAUF loves W.C. Fields, Preston Sturges, and Nikola Tesla. He lives with his lovely beekeeping wife, Monique, and his cartooning, surrealistic son, Leo. He is a writer whose books include Killer Lipstick and Other Spy Gadgets. He is the proud founder of The Blowhole Theater, an annual Brooklyn variety show featuring the Blowhole Theater Players and their characters Puckerballs the Garbage Can Elf, Scottish Jesus, and Abraham Lincoln. Life In a Blender A SHORT HISTORY For over 25 years, Life in a Blender has been the canvas for singer and songwriter Don Rauf's blackly comic landscapes. The group has released albums ranging from screaming punk to orchestrated chamber pop, and has brought the high theatrics of its live act to stages from Berlin to Austin to Toronto to Brooklyn and Seattle. Don Rauf formed the band with high school friend Dave Moody (then bassist, now cellist), and within a couple of years had acquired the drumming services of Ken Meyer. Guitarist Al Houghton and bassist Mark Lerner joined in 1992, and violinist Rebecca Weiner Tompkins signed on in 1993. While the band's core lineup has remained remarkably constant for the past 18 years, the list of former members, guest artists, and collaborators includes Chris Butler (The Waitresses, Tin Huey), Chris Rael (Church of Betty), Jonathan Gregg, John Linnell (They Might Be Giants), Gavin Smith (Les Sans Culottes), Susan Hwang (Debutante Hour), Brian Dewan, and Olivier Conan (Chicha Libre, Las Rubias Del Norte). Life in a Blender's "Friend from Quebec" was featured in Michael Moore's Canadian Bacon, and "Mobile Wash Unit" appeared in Sara Lamm's documentary, Dr. Bronner's Magic Soapbox. The band's most recent album, SATSUMA, is being released on November 20, 2020. Don's Info http://www.lifeinablender.net/index.html    lifeinablender  

Interview with Steve Dawson 2024. Ghosts is the sixth solo album from Chicago-based musician and songwriter Steve Dawson. It's being released June 7 on venerable Chicago label Pravda Records on CD, 12” LP vinyl, digital download and on streaming platforms. Steve's info  http://www.stevedawsonmusic.com http://www.instagram.com/stevdawso https://www.youtube.com/c/SteveDawsonMusic https://www.facebook.com/steve.dawson1 https://twitter.com/stevejdawson  

Interview with Chelsea Nenni of Late Slip. Late Slip's ringleader, Chelsea Nenni, was born on the East Coast but grew up in California. Elvis Presley was her first love and Tom Petty's “Free Fallin'” her first favorite song. She studied opera in college, but Gwen Stefani gave her the guts to be in a band. Nenni moved to New York City in her mid-20's to pursue a life onstage. There she weaved through singing Sondheim, 1920's jazz, and then, during an especially fierce winter, taught herself how to play guitar. What started as a means to stave off seasonal depression turned into a vessel for big feelings. Now armed with a handful of chords, pangs of unrequited love and homesickness turned into the first Late Slip songs. I Love You is the first full-length album from Brooklyn-based retro-pop outfit, Late Slip. Thealbum was produced at the hands of Lewis Pesacov (Best Coast, FIDLAR, Nikki Lane, Poolside)and is being released on 12” LP vinyl, CD, as a digital download, and via streaming platforms, June 7 th on Party Mermaid Records. Pesacov's transportive production delivers a nostalgic soundscape with a little bit of twang, alittle bit of surf, and a whole lotta heart. Nenni's sun-soaked, tear-stained gems tap into the tenderness we tend to lock away. I Love You offers the invitation to cozy up close, let your feelings flow, and dance it all away.   Late Slip's Info Website: https://lateslipmusic.com/  Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/7e5N34OVNyOB26btN8p9Ly  Bandcamp: https://lateslip.bandcamp.com  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lateslip /  Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/lateslip  

Interview with Angelo Moore, aka Dr. Madd Vibe!   Angelo Moore is an American musician best known for his work as lead singer and saxophonist for the Los Angeles ska and funk metal band Fishbone. Moore also performs and records under the stage name Dr. Madd Vibe.   Angelo's info https://www.drmadvibe.com/shows drmaddvibe   May 19th Cleveland OH, Angelo Moore and C-Level Show Info  https://thewinchestermusictavern.com/tm-event/angelo-moore-of-fishbone/

Interview with David Nagler of As For the Future. As For the Future is a new Brazilian music-inspired group based in NYC. Drawing on avariety of styles – bossa nova, samba, MPB (Música popular brasileira) – andcombining them with rock, jazz, folk, and soul influences, the group mates their distinctive sound with vibrant, original lyrics. As For the Future's self-titled / self-produced debut album will be released on Friday,June 14 on their own As For the Future Music imprint. The record will be available ondigital/streaming, LP, and Deluxe Edition CD featuring nine bonus tracks (alternatemixes, dub versions, and edits). Over 90% of the record was recorded entirely remotely at an assortment of home &professional studios. The record was mixed by D. James Goodwin As For the Future's Info instagram.com/asforthefuture soundcloud.com/asforthefuture facebook.com/asforthefuture tiktok.com/@asforthefuture youtube.com/@AsForTheFuture asforthefuture.bandcamp.com

Interview with Mark Scully of WORLDSUCKS   The world sucks—but it doesn't have to. WORLDSUCKS is a band born from friendship and fueled by frustration. Our songs and shows deal with the injustices of the world, channeling our own fury and seeking out others who feel a similar sense of rage and exasperation. This is activism rock, just one action of many we're trying to take to stand up for the liberation of all people. We are not hopeless—justice is inevitable.  WORLDSUCKS is the ongoing evolution of 30 years of friendship and music making between Mark (guitar/vocals) and Nick (drums/vocals). Our music expands and deepens along with our consciousness. As part of that sonic exploration comes Tony Doucet, whose bass playing and creativity is adding new dimensions to the WORLDSUCKS sound. Now it's 2024 and we are armed with a new single, "NO!/GO!", that showcases our progression and our way forward, ferocious and frustrated as ever at the world around us. Eight new sonic onslaughts will be recorded this year, with a new album due out in 2025.  WORLDSUCKS is heavy music for heavy times. Power to the people.   5/29 Cincinnati OH 5/30 Youngstown OH SHOW INFO IN LINKS WORLDSUCKS'S info  worldsucks worldsucks https://www.instagram.com/worldsucks66/?img_index=1 https://worldsucks.bandcamp.com/    

Interview with Kate Dedinsky & Adam Grindler of The Baker's Basement Cleveland alternative folk duo the Baker's Basement (tBB) features the eclectic musical stylings of vocalist/drummer Kate Dedinsky and vocalist/guitarist Adam Grindler.  At their rhythmic core pulses an orange striped, homemade, bucket-drum concoction, the funky back beat on which Dedinsky performs standing up with both swagger and sway.  The duo's intimate sound, rooted in a whimsical flavor of Americana music and topped with playful vocal layers often volleyed to-and-fro across the stage, offers a humorous yet heart-wrenching sonic signature that's altogether their own. A hidden gem of the midwest, tBB's affectionate and direct spoken word vocal delivery bounces atop their unusual percussive foundation of odds & ends, a drum apparatus that the group calls the “Tempeh Kit”—when matched with Grindler's acoustic & electric guitar methods, both finger picked and strummed, their playful and oscillating sound is solidified. Between songs, the duo endears themselves to their audience through storytelling and fond recollections of past creative experiments.  All and all, a performance by this dynamic pair is an invitation into an intimate world of creative fancy and captivating chemistry nurtured over years of playing both stages and street corners. Always active live and in studio, tBB released back to back singles in February & March of 2024: “Love I Can Love” & “Sure Enough Another Swell,” a glimpse into their forthcoming record “Down Down Domino" which is set to release in late 2024.   TBB performs the midwest and beyond, and has shared bills with artists such as Melvin Seals (of the Jerry Garcia Band) and Keller Williams through multiple festival appearances at Nelson Ledges Quarry Park.  TBB has also appeared at Cleveland's Brite Winter Festival & Ingenuity Fest in addition to residencies at Cedar Point.  Recently the music video for their song “Wild Wild Sheep”, which the band scripted, filmed, and directed, was nominated at the 2023 Cordillera Film Festival in Reno, Nevada     Show Info: Johnny Habu & The Baker's Basement, Aqua Cherry, and Ziggy D of C-Level at The Five o'Clock Loung in Lakewood, OH April 7th, 9PM Free show  https://www.facebook.com/events/1918286711941376  Baker's Basement Info: https://thebakersbasement.com/home  

Zig At The Gig with Straight Gone, Silvia Mori, OrangeG, The RedLines, The Plutophonics, Mindful Dynasty. Ziggy D of C-Level embarks on a mini solo tour and wants to share the new friends he made!  Show info 4/1/24 Straight Gone, Ziggy D from C-Level, & Silvia Mori at Dirty Dungarees Laundromat And Bar. Straight Gone, Ziggy D from C-Level, & Silvia Mori at Dirty Dungarees Laundromat And Bar. 4/2/24The Plutophonics, Ziggy D from C-Level, & Mindful Dynasty at Gate Keeper Games  The Plutophonics, Ziggy D from C-Level, & Mindful Dynasty at Gate Keeper Games 4/3/24The Redlines, Ziggy D of C-Level, Clever Medicine, OrangeG at Poetry Lounge   The Bands info:  The Plutophonics ThePlutophonics The RedLines https://www.facebook.com/theredlines  Mindful Dynasty  mindfuldynasty   OrangeG orangegmusic Straight Gone straightgoneband Silvia Mori https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100087376164409    

Out of the Nowhere. Into the Here is the sublime second album by singer, songwriter, and performer Stephen Bluhm. It'll be available as both a vocal version and a companion all- instrumental set. Recorded, mixed, and produced by Bluhm and featuring a host of gifted guest musicians, the orchestral opus is an elaborate aural feast of strings, horns, flutes, piano, reed instruments, and other timelessly evocative musical sounds — ambitious, but intimate and confiding as well. Out of the Nowhere. Into the Here is being released on 12” LP vinyl, CD, digital download, streaming platforms and 2xCD set including both vocal and instrumental versions on April 19. The instrumental version is being released separately on the same date on digital download and streaming platforms. While Bluhm has been “making songs ever since I can remember,” in his teenage years it was his older siblings' Lou Reed and David Bowie records that ignited his adolescent musical obsession. While attending Temple University, he took the plunge into live music via campus open-mic nights and from there burst upon the bustling Philadelphia scene, prompting the Philadelphia City Paper to dub him “an old soul, writing Tin Pan Alley-ish fare and singing croon-y folk jazz  in a voice that'd make Morrisey swoon.” Relocating to New York's Hudson Valley, he further honed his expressive performing style: Belying the serious slants of some of his songs, Bluhm's shows often find him dancing madly among delighted audience members. “The music (and Stephen) is utterly charming,” raves famed musical theater actor and composer Tom Judson, one of Bluhm's avowed fans, about Out of the Nowhere. Into the Here. “The halting, clipped vocals, with a sudden appearance of sumptuous string writing, are unexpected and elegant. The music, at first blush, appears naïve. But on a close listen, it's very assured, and complex writing. And the arrangements are really just wonderful. Sufjan Stevens meets Kurt Weill meets Stephen Foster.” “As I put these songs and arrangements together for the album, I became more and more confident in them,” says Bluhm. “I just hope people sense the beauty in them, the genuineness that I put into them.” With one listen to Out of the Nowhere. Into the Here, no doubt people will sense exactly that. Stephen's Info https://linktr.ee/stephenbluhm Bandcamp: https://stephenbluhm.bandcamp.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stephenbluhm/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100066550085802 stephenbluhm.fun