Gov't Mule brought their Halloween Extravaganza from the East Coast to the East Bay last week and played our newly re-opened and fabulous Fox Theater in downtown Oakland. It was the Mule debut for my friend Wayne and he brought with him the guitarist from local rockers The Real Nasty. We knew we were in for something special (3 yearsago they covered Led Zep's "Houses of the Holy" record, then a Pink Floyd spectacular in 2008 and a bunch of Rolling Stones last year.) Who would it be this year?
A lot of catching up to do on Boegerweb.com. Seems that much of the stuff I need to "offload" onto the web winds up on Facebook. I will try and do better. A cool project from the summer of 2010 was new site for Hot Rize founder and Grammy winner Tim O'Brien.
The new TimObrien.net site is built with Drupal and runs on my new cloud server at LiquidWeb. I will need to write about the hosting in a different post. Anyway, Tim's new site has some cool features and new innovations from Superclean. We already have a Drupal music site for another musician (and friend of Tim's) in the works for a November launch that uses a lot of the same features.
Tim's site now has integrated e-commerce so you can buy his cd's and dvd's with very sensible flat rate shipping. Makes sense to double/triple up! We also have some cool audio streamers, an online forum, email list sign-up, video and image galleries, news and blog, awesome tour dates section w/ custom live map (similar to the one for Danny Barnes), online press kit and more.
The site has been performing well and averages 300 visitors a day. I see some of the fan mail that comes in and folks are really into this guy... and love his new album "Chicken & Egg." He just did some Hot Rize reunion shows too and people were freakin' with happiness. It's been a pleasure working with Tim's team. Go check out his site!
My wife and I happily blew off Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival for the second year in a row (we didn't miss a day for the first 8) with the stipulation we would enjoy Flaming Lips instead at the amazing and fabulous Fox Theatre in Oakland. This is a trade I would make every time. I think the Flaming Lips are the best and most important live act on the planet. Who else delivers such and intense balance of pure entertainment, high art, and rockin' great music?
Plus, they are just so damned COOL. They are their own roadies... you see Wayne Coyne and the boys on the stage moving stuff around and setting up their props. Smiling and saying hello. Wayne even gives us a little courtesy info-piece before the their show. ("We use an insane amount of strobes. If you feel like they are effecting you in a bad way... don't look at them!")
Their stage show has really evolved. We still get all of the confetti and bouncing balls... and mega-strobes... and a very improved video backdrop. The visual theme also included a lot of orange. All of the amps and the side-stage dancers were in orange. The video feature a beautiful dancing naked lady and the band actually emerged from her vagina. I don't make this shit up. We also had a lot of lasers (our show had Wayne shooting lasers out of his giant rubber hands at a mirror ball, the next night's audience all got little pen-lasers upon entry and did the same trick.)
I just connected with an old friend who complained that there isn't any new music worth listening to these days... or if there is, he can't find it. My biggest problem is keeping up with all of the cool new music and I always have my ear to the ground for new sounds.
[there used to be a streaming playlist here but since Apple bought Lala and promptly destroyed it, you can't see or hear it anymore]
To make it a little easier for him, I was inspired to make this playlist of "Modern Classics," which I define as relatively new music that has proven it's staying power. Everything on this list is roughly 10 years old (1998-2000) and nearly all of these artists are actively creating today.
RL Burnside - During the 90's, R.L.'s Mississippi Hill Country Blues (aka "dirty blues") gained exposure thanks to collaborations with the Jon Spencer Blues Explosion. R.L. has an incredible, deep voice and is a groove-master on acoustic and electric guitar. This track is from 'Wish I Was In Heaven Sitting Down' (2000) which is essentially a remix album of earlier material. You've heard other remix stuff on The Sopranos. Unfortunately R.L. got his wish and is up in Heaven now, hopefully sitting down.
Macy Gray - This is by far the most mainstream track on this list but she cannot be ignored. The world was ripe for a new diva and 'On How Life Is' (1999) still stands... although these days my attention shifts to Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings.
Sly and Robbie w/ Howie B - Drum-n-bass producer meets drum and bass legends for an awesome trip/hop/dub record in 1999.
Eels - The George W. Bush campaign in 2000 cited this record 'Daisies of the Galaxy' as inappropriate (profanity) music marketed toward children when handed out in a Gore campaign goodie bag. The way I see it, it's just great fun for the whole family with songs like "I Like Birds," It's A Motherfucker," and "Tiger In My Tank" but you can opt for the cleaned up version with "It's A Monstertrucker."
Beta Band - First full-length album 'The Beta Band' (1999) didn't get the same respect as the EP's that preceded it but I think it was more imaginative. At the time, they seemed to be the most promising new band in the world. (You might recall their track in the film "High Fidelity" where Cusack wows his record store audience.) A couple albums and years later, they suddenly break up!! Our household is still devastated. A couple of the members have re-joined as The Aliens.
Bad Livers - 'Blood and Mood' (2000) was a totally ground-breaking album that went virtually unnoticed until recently, when this track "Death Trip" showed up on HBO's True Blood last year. The fanmail is still coming in! (I'm their webguy) Maybe their marketing strategy wasn't lined up properly -- they played old-timey sounding music on an alt-rock label (Quarterstick) then switched to a bluegrass label (Sugar Hill) where they gradually brought in rock and electronic influences. 'Blood and Mood' was tragically their swan song record but exponentially expanded the sonic pallet of alt.country.
Calexico - 'The Black Light' (1998) sounds like Neil Young, in psychadelic regalia, wandered into a spaghetti western with a band of mariachies... navigating the ghost towns of the American west. This record makes you want to take a massive roadtrip into the unknown. They've made many fine albums since -- and they are an impressive touring band -- but this record stands by itself as a Sonoran Desert masterpiece.
Latin Playboys - A core duo from Los Lobos (Hidalgo/Perez) joins forces with the binaural production team of Mitchell Froom and Tchad Blake (Tom Waits' 'Bone Machine, Suzanne Vega, Paul McCartney, among others) for their second record together 'Dose' (1999). Like Calexico, it's sounds very cinematic and mysterious... but more of an urban trip.
Amon Tobin - Known previously as Cujo, 'Supermodified' from 2000 captures his evolution from cut-and-paste lounge to funky electronic constructs. It's complete freakout music that you can't resist dancing to.
Queens of the Stone Age - QotSA is my favorite band and I think they just keep getting better! With that said, their amazing second record 'Rated R' from 2000 has many favorites including the wicked "Monsters In The Parasol," the T. Rex-ish "Auto Pilot" w/ grunge legend Mark Lanegan, and the epic "I Think I Lost My Headache." I chose this track because I think it best sets the direction they go from here.... soon sealing the deal as the new saviors of rock and roll with 2002's 'Songs for the Deaf.'
Radiohead - The other saviors of rock experiment with electronica on 'Kid A' (2000)... a huge influence on the music world. I'm not a huge Radiohead fan myself but this record is an obvious milestone in the evolution of modern rock.
Flaming Lips - In 1999, 'The Soft Bulletin' indicated that The Flaming Lips (who used to suck) had suddenly became one of the most important recording artists on the planet. This was confirmed 3 years later with 'Yoshime Battles The Pink Robots,' which I will argue is the best record of the 00's.
Sufjan Stevens - His self-made debut 'A Sun Came' (2000) is a triumph in lo-fi. This is artsy, experimental folk rock with balls. It sounds like it was recorded in about 14 different countries but was made on a 4-track somewhere in the upper midwest.
Tom Waits - 'Mule Variations' (1999) was Tom Waits' comeback after a long hiatus, and he has been prolific ever since. A guy that worked at my local cafe in San Francisco played on here and related stories as the sessions went by. He played the "bones." The whole album is great -- and I like the next one 'Blood Money' even better -- but this track "What's He Building In There" is a must-have classic.
Lambchop - This is the lush, gently raging sound from the fringes of Nashville. Back in the days of 'What Another Man Spills'(1998) Lambchop was a 14-piece band with strings, horns, 2 basses, piano, piano and f/x guitar centered around Kurt Wagner, who is some kind of soft-spoken supergenius.
Here it is folks.... the all-new Danny Barnes site just in time for next week's major label release of "Pizza Box."
Not only have I had the distinct pleasure of working with my favorite musician for several years now... I've had the opportunity to work with his new management at RedLight, who also manage Phish, Dave Matthews Band, and Ben Harper among others. Truly an adventure. Check out the site because we have his new songs (and some old ones) streaming right there on the page and you can also download a high-res MP3 of "Caveman" for free.
Other features of the site include: live twitter feed on front page, integration w/ Facebook so you can use your FB i.d. to comment on the site, cool mapping features in the gigs section, and much more. Also trying to retain some old features such as "Ask Danny Barnes" and pulling in the blog from the Folktronics site. So if you are looking for Folktronics, it's here on DannyBarnes.com
The new record is phenom. My new favorite song is "Road" but ask me tomorrow and I will tell you it's "Bone." The closer "Sparta, TN" should be all over the freakin' radio. Another favorite is "Lifeline" that appears on the pre-order package and I think the digital download package but not sure. Anyway... please enjoy!
Just launched a new website for one of my all-time favorites -- Bad Livers -- who are playing shows together again.
This site is built with Drupal 6 and is totally interactive. It's also integrated with Facebook so that Facebook users can comment on the site without having to create a new account.
They will be in the Bay Area next month and might actually rehearse on my front porch. Let me tell you... this 1907 porch was MADE for Bad Livers. Tom... better send me back the DAT deck!
Merle Saunders passed away yesterday. R.I.P., big guy.
I once had an interesting run-in with Merle's family at his 65th birthday party/show at the Fillmore in San Francisco.
Kari and I were chilling in the upstairs "poster room" during the show. A group of folks -- who clearly didn't look like tonight's show-goers -- were getting together for a giant family photo. They were dressed to the 9's. The matriarch of the clan was trying to get them all into the frame, and it was apparent that SHE should be the centerpiece of the photo (given that Merle was onstage at the time.)
So I went over and offered my services (I do this a lot, a hobby I picked up since I tend to live in touristy places), got her into the shot, stood up on a chair, and assuming it turned out at the printers I took a very fine family portrait of Merle Saunders' clan. My absolute pleasure!
For those who don't know, Merle was an awesome, soulful B-3 Hammond Organ player who worked w/ Jerry Garcia a lot in the 70's and was also instrumental in Garcia's recovery in 1987 after his coma episode. The man could play the organ but I think it was his heart that had the most impact on the music around him. My favorite stuff w/ Garcia and Saunders is the Reconstruction band (large band w/ horns) they had going in the late 70's and of course the Garcia/Saunders outfit from earlier in that decade. Finally, those two guys are reunited and jazzin' up the afterlife.
Unfortunately, I didn't have the energy to make it down to see my pal Matt's (aka Stinkbait, aka by co-conspirator in Holeworld) band open up for the Dandy Warhols at the Warfield on Saturday night, smack in the middle of Hardly Strictly weekend. A near miss. And then Datnoff (another friend from Hood River) passed through town the following week, but another near miss.
Backstage at the Warfield, Matt remembered my story about meeting King Crimson there (backstage is actually underneath the stage) and sends along this snapshot of Adrian Belew's signature. My old story goes: I was actually carrying on a conversation w/ Adrian Belew (I was guest of Tim, their lighting guy) when drummer Pat Mastelotto called out to me in excitement regarding my Bad Livers t-shirt. He told me how he had moved to Austin and wanted to join Mark Rubin's klezmer project, but was flat-out rejected. I can hear Rubin now: "NOPE, don't need a drummer!"
I asked Matt for a song for Boegerweb and he obliged... follow the link below for a remix of an Upsidedown song by a member of the Dandy Warhols, who Matt assures me is the best band in the world. Of course we know he's wrong -- Queens of the Stone Age are, hands down -- but otherwise he may be right. Go ahead and stream it or download it, stick it in your pod, listen and enjoy.
