Sound Cloud Sunday – March 31, 2019

Sound Cloud Sunday March 31, 2019

Where did a quarter of the year go to already? We were just watching the ball drop and now we’ve already cleaned up the glass and bracing for it to fall again in no time! If nothing else, our advancement towards the summer at least makes the music seem a little more optimistic as we shed our winter coats of discontentment and move out into the sun. Sound Cloud Sunday gives you these delicious optimistic and sunny tracks to improve your day and remind you that everything is just groovy as all get out here on Laurel Canyon Radio.

The Goat Roper Rodeo Band – Desert Flower

Hometown:      Rhuddian, Wales

Album:  From their album “Tall Grass” released March 18 on Old Pup Records.

Review Snippet: “With refreshing, startling vocal harmonies and quirky song writing skills, these young’uns can roll out a fab sombre number just as well as an upbeat one, the Goat Roper Rodeo Band possess a uniqueness and quality that promises success and lovers of this old timey sound are simply going to love this.” (Maverick magazine)

Website:   https://www.goatroperrodeoband.co.uk/

Tim Moxam – Goodbye, Already

Hometown:      Toronto, Canada

Album:  From his album “ Marlborough Hall” on Roaring Girl Records, released Friday.  

Review Snippet:   Take into account Versprille’s dreamcatcher lyrics, which namedrop pentacles and wizened wanderers and push the 60s Laurel Canyon pop they’ve explored as part of Vetiver into the cocaine 70s. But Moon Tides is also rife with 80s signifiers that range from Cocteau Twins to Benny Mardones. 

Next Time In LA:  June 5 at the Bootleg Theatre. 

Website:   http://www.timmoxam.com/

Hawthorn – The Way It Goes

Hometown:      Boston, MA

Album:  Their debut album “Maggie Willow” was self-released on March 8.    

Review Snippet:

Website: https://www.themusicofhawthorn.com/

Hugo Barriol – Oh My

Hometown:      Paris, France

Album:  From his debut album “Yellow” released in February on Naïve Records. 

Review Snippet:

Website: https://www.facebook.com/pg/HugoBarriolmusic/

Trapper Schoepp (featuring Nicole Atkins) – What  You Do To Her

Hometown:   Milwaukee, WI     

Album:  From the album “Prime Time Illusion” released in January on Xtra Mile Records. 

Review Snippet:  PRIMETIME ILLUSION further sees Schoepp confronting the way we live today head on by touching upon an array of undeniably provocative issues, tackling each with blunt honesty and empathy. “What You Do To Her” – featuring duet vocals from the great Nicole Atkins – presents the grim story of sexual assault’s continued impact in our communities and serves as a call to action in the cultural fight against sexual violence, while a cover of “Freight Train” – originally written and performed by San Francisco alt-rockers Sister Double Happiness – powerfully chronicles the grim realities faced by those suffering with AIDS.

Website:   http://trapperschoepp.com/

Fairground Saints – Somewhere Down The Line

Hometown:  Nashville via Los Angeles

Album:  From their EP “Magic” on Sony Music.

Review Snippet: They had already earned acclaim from NPR, Huffington Post, and more as early recordings “Can’t Control The Weather” and “Turn This Car Around” amassed millions of streams. Moreover, they toured alongside everyone from Brothers Osborne and Sara Evans to Scotty McCreery and Kip Moore—who after hearing them for the first time invited them to open for him. Touting a striking singular sound, they pave a musical highway between Laurel Canyon and Music City, finding a shortcut to universal bliss by way of country, pop, and rock. These three lifelong musicians transmit real stories through real instrumentation and make a real connection.

Website:   https://www.fairgroundsaints.com/

The Northern Lights – Six Strings And A Song

Hometown:     

Album:  From the album “The Northern Lights” out February 19  

Review Snippet:

Website:   

The Currys – Los Angeles

Hometown:      Charlottesville, VA 

Album:  “This Side of the Glass” was released on March 1 (self-released).   B

Review Snippet:  For their third album, This Side of the Glass (2019), The Currys teamed up with producer/guitarist Sam Whedon and engineer Stewart Myers (Jason Mraz, Parachute) to map new terrain. As ever, the band’s three-part family harmonies provide the organic, lived-in feel of roots music, but the album aspires to a greater variety of form and orchestration than earlier releases. The songs defy any neat categorization: the country nostalgia of “Gulf Coast Home” complements the folk-pop sensibility of “Pin You Down,” while the guitars and gang vocals of “Soon Enough” pay unmistakable homage to Paul Simon’s “Graceland.”

Website:   https://thecurrysmusic.com/

Gary Shiebler – Shut Up Train

Hometown:      Nashville via San Diego.

Album:  From his debut album “When The West Steals Your Heart” released March 20 on Coyote Dreams.    

Review Snippet:   San Diego native Gary Shiebler was last heard from on last year’s When the West Steals Your Heart, a project with his Nashville band Thursday Night Fishing Club. On that two-disc release, Shiebler displayed, on several ear-catching acoustic and alt-country tunes, a knack for capturing catchy, lightweight melodies written about ordinary life and ordinary people, then recording them with the warm harmonies and smooth instrumental expertise typical of Nashville artist

Website:   

Den Of Ashes – Silver Dreams

Hometown:      Hermosa Beach, CA

Album:  From the artist, Ash, his debut album “California” released March 1 on Starry Eyed Records.   

Review Snippet: Den of Ashes is the name of singer/songwriter Ash. He is the grandson of early country and western performers John & “Texas Peggy” Clemens / The Wyoming Ramblers circa 1940s-1950s who shared the stage and friendships with The Carter Family, Johnny Cash, Tex Ritter and Patsy Cline.

Den of Ashes is a unique and intimate exploration into the human condition. The moody melodic songs are about lost 
moments in time. Like a photograph,Ash see pictures when he writes and articulates them into lyrics. Each song holds 
a unique mood. There is a rare loneliness that within the deep rich vocals and western tonality. All of these songs collectively exist in the Den of Ashes.

Website:  https://www.denofashes.com/

Rayo Brothers – Colorado

Hometown:      Lafayette, Lousiana

Album:  From their second album “Victim And Villain” released last Friday on Noveau Electric Records.    

Review Snippet:

Website: https://www.rayobrothers.com/

Victor Krummenacher – Skin And Bones

Hometown:      San Francisco, CA via Riverside, CA 

Album:  From the album “Blue Pacific”

Review Snippet:  This spring Victor Krummenacher will be releasing his latest album, Blue Pacific. This will mark his ninth solo effort away from his two co-founding bands – the pioneering indie-rock group Camper Van Beethoven and the art-rock collective, Monks of Doom. The inception of this emotionally-charged project started nearly a year after his divorce, and, as it turns out, it’s one-part exorcism and one-part an effort to heal and put it all behind him.

“It was a really difficult album to make, some of the basics were recorded three times,” Krummenacher admits. “I went through two other drummers before settling on Michael Urbano. There was a lot of tension this time, and [co-producer] Bruce Kaphan seriously went all out to help make the best album we think we could do.”

Despite the fact this record was a direct result of so much pain, heartache and hurdles, musically it turns out to be one of Krummenacher’s most rewarding efforts of his lengthy career – be it solo, or with his other bands. “There was a lot of time put into this one,” the musician reveals, “and I don’t know if I can really do much better in as far as writing or recording. Between the emotional context and the difficulty in getting all the aspects of the recording taken care of, it was one of the hardest projects I’ve worked on.”

From beautifully reflective numbers such as “No One Left To Remember, No One Left To Tell,” “Skin & Bones” and “Nowhere Out There On The Line” to the sturdier, high-energy tracks like “The Prettiest Train,” “Some Time Ago,” “Lawrence in the Desert” and the infectious title track, this is an album that satisfies on so many levels. Throughout this sprawling effort, Krummenacher channels a number of the musicians and bands that have influenced him over the years, such as The Stones, The Dead, The E Street Band, Elvis Costello, The Flying Burrito Brothers and, perhaps more than any other, Pete Townshend. In fact, he admits, “There’s actually a lot of reference to Townshend on this album. He was the big hero when I was very young and first getting into music, and I think his expository writing affected me a lot more than I realized growing up.”

“These songs are more autobiographical and directly honest than anything I’ve done. I tried to leave enough ambiguity in them to keep them from being memoir specific, but most of the detail in here come from my experiences directly. It seemed like the more direct I was, the more resonant the songs became. My perspective is pretty odd at this point, when you do something this raw it’s hard to maintain one. But I know also it’s as good and focused as I can do, and that I got a lot of good musicians to help elevate these songs to a place I wasn’t sure they could reach.”

Victor Krummenacher’s Blue Pacific will be available March 1st on 2-LP vinyl on three sides (limited to 200 copies), CD, digital and streaming formats via Veritas Recordings.

Next Time in LA:  Wild Honey Backyard show April 7 in Eagle Rock,

Website: http://www.victorkrummenacher.com/

Chicken Wire Empire – Summer And Me

Hometown:     Milwaukee, WI 

Album:  From their second album “What Moves Mountains” self-released  on January 1.

Review Snippet:  “What Moves Mountains,” Chicken Wire Empire: Coming out the first day of 2019 — as if daring other artists to make a more spirited album this year — the progressive bluegrass band’s latest is so infectious it had me hollering out loud by the time fiery finish “Going Down the Road Feeling Bad” was blasting from my car speakers. 

Website:   https://www.chickenwireempire.com/

Ocie Elliot – We All Fall In

Hometown:      Victoria, BC 

Album:  From their EP “We All Fall In”  released February 8 on Nettwerk Records. 

Review Snippet: heir unique blend of contemporary and indie folk music is influenced by artists such as Gillian Welch, Simon & Garfunkel and Angus and Julia Stone, and born of the natural landscape of Canada’s wild west coast.

Website:  https://www.ocieelliott.com/

Old Mexico – Black Matador

Hometown:      Los Angeles 

Album:  From their eponymous EP on Union Zero. 

Review Snippet: It’s a trio with Trans Van Santos (aka Mark Matos) and jazz drummer Dave Mihaly, and lead single “The Old Ones” features sax by Michael Bello. Some of Dead Meadow’s permastoned psych-rock sound is in the mix, but there’s also a huge free-jazz influence at play here. Here’s how Jason Simon says it all came together: “In 2016 I was invited to San Francisco to perform at the Family Folk Explosion, a ‘Last Waltz’ style concert series hosted by Van Santos. I picked a number of unrecorded material and songs from my last solo album to perform. During rehearsal I was taken with the looser/jazzier interpretations of the songs I brought.” From there, the trio kept jamming and Old Mexico was born.

Van Santos adds, “I kind of took the Neil Young approach that he took with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young: his composition “Helpless” could have easily been on his own albums but it became a CSNY song on record. He still plays it live with his solo band, in the same way that you can hear the Old Mexico songs interpreted by our ‘main projects.’ It’s a matter of interpretation. These are some of our songs, as interpreted by this band we formed called Old Mexico.”

Old Mexico’s self-titled debut album comes out January 11 via Union Zero (pre-order). Listen to the premiere of “The Old Ones” below.

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