NPR + Bonnaroo = yes + please.

NPR went to Bonnaroo and recorded a whole bunch of shows from the festival and has them up on their website for all of us to enjoy, over and over again (for free!). Thanks to Chelsey for sending me the link to The Avett Brothers show (amazing). Click HERE to see what other shows are offered and then listen to any or all. I'm looking forward to listening to several shows, such as: Dan Deacon, The Flaming Lips, The Gaslight Anthem, John Butler Trio, Norah Jones, LCD Soundsystem, Local Natives, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Mumford & Sons, The National, John Prine, Regina Spektor, She and Him, and The XX.

Enjoy (it won't be hard).

they're all good hearted with good intentions...

I've been sitting on the new 500 Miles to Memphis album for a couple months now, having no real excuse for not playing it, except for maybe subconsciously I knew it was going to be a classic Summer album and wanted to wait until then to enjoy it...

Some people know this Cincinnati based band (their name comes from Cincinnati being 500 miles from Memphis) because "All My Friends are Crazy," off their first album, Sunshine in a Shot Glass, was featured on Rock Band. They've got a little bit of Lucero, The Avett Brothers and Son Volt in them, as well as a whole bunch of energy. They teeter the line between country and rock and though some folks call them "cowpunk" there's no punk to what they're putting out. After a tremendous weekend on the Missouri River with a great group of friends, the Rock Band featured song seems so very appropriate. And now I'm off to explore their new album as well as the Gaslight Anthem album that came out on the 15th...more on that soon...

All My Friends Are Crazy


crazy in the best of ways.

BS

go on. click it.

Enjoy Mumford & Sons La Blogotheque Take Away Session by clicking here. It's absolutely fantastic. Thanks Aaron.

music = universal.

BS

summer begins.

It's the first day of summer. Yes + please. The four tunes below have kick started my summer solstice day...hope they do the same for you.

Langhorne Slim - Say Yes


Roman Candle - Another Summer


Jimmy Eat World - A Praise Chorus


Better Than Ezra - This Time of Year


say yes.

no one gets off without paying the ride.

While driving back from Fargo last week I heard Tracey Thorn on The World Cafe with David Dye. It was a dark and rainy morning and the tunes she played off her new album, Love and Its Opposite, fit in perfectly. Thorn and her husband, Ben Watt, put their group Everything But the Girl on hold when they had twins in the late nineties and this is her second solo album since then. Her take on love and relationships as the years go by is hard-hitting and truthful and her voice is absolutely wonderful. Here's the first track off the album, called Oh, the Divorces!

Oh, the Divorces!


sad but awesome.

BS

under the covers, chapter twenty-five: a hard rain's a gonna fall.

Featured in this chapter is Bob Dylan's epic tune "A Hard Rain's A-gonna Fall" and covered (tremendously, I might add) by Jason Mraz (yes, Jason Mraz). Dylan's been quoted as saying, when explaining this song, that "a hard rain's a-gonna fall means something's gonna happen." Right on.

Mraz's version is off the Listen to Bob Dylan: A Tribute Album. The Format do a faaaaaaaantastic cover of Simple Twist of Fate on that same album and it may just have to be a future chapter.

Dylan


Mraz



and I'll tell and think it and speak it and breathe it.

we fell asleep in the middle of the fury...

Thanks to Margaret, via All Songs Considered, for introducing me to Sleigh Bells. Pitchfork reviewed their first album, Treats, in mid-May and rated it quite high. It's experimental, it's pop, it's techno, it's rap, and it's totally outside my musical comfort zone and I love it.

Tell Em


Kids


enjoy.

BS

i'm gonna take on this world, i'm gonna make you love me, if you let me...

JP Chrissie and the Fairground Boys' primary contributors are JP Jones and Chrissie Hynde (of the Pretenders). I heard their debut single, If You Let Me, on the World Cafe today and nearly pulled over to just listen harder. I am now anxiously awaiting the album release in August (the single won't be out til July). Here's a live performance of the single and a link to a NY Daily News article about them. Click on their band name above for their myspace page.

If You Let Me


music saves.

under the covers chapter twenty-four: tell me are you a christian child? ma'am, I am tonight.

I was doing laundry today and Marc Cohn's Walking In Memphis found it's way into my head...which led me to youtube...which led me to this chapter of under the covers. First up, a live version of the original and then covered by 2009 Swedish Idol runner-up Calle Kristiansson. I'm in the mood to have my feet ten feet off of Beale, and you know, that line "when you haven't got a prayer, you've got a prayer in Memphis" just gets me every time. Enjoy.

Marc Cohn


Calle Kristiansson


sing loud cause you're still alive.

BS