Last night Jon Stewart and The Daily Show went out in style after 16 years of greatness.  To close out the finale, Stewart asked Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band to come on and perform a song request:  Land of Hope and Dreams (which segued into Born to Run).  As usual with the artist and the E Street Band, it was a joyous event, culminating in Stewart, his family, friends, staff and colleagues all dancing along and singing the chorus of Born to Run.  And there was joy amongst the tears.

Watch below as Stewart introduces Springsteen as:  “[a]n artist I really admire said that he thinks of his career as a long conversation with the audience, a dialogue. And I really like that metaphor for many different reasons. But the main one is, because it takes away the idea of finality.  This show isn’t ending. We’re merely taking a small pause in the conversation. A conversation which, by the way, I have hogged … I’ve really been dominating this in a really selfish way. So rather than saying goodbye, or goodnight, I’m just gonna say: I’m gonna go get a drink, and I’m sure I’ll see you guys before I leave.  So here it is. My moment of zen.”

Classy to the end.

We’ve been fans of Brooklyn’s Helado Negro ever since we first heard his great song Ghost Dance over two years ago.  But we became even bigger fans after catching his superb croon-filled sets as opener on label-mate Sufjan Stevens’ recent tour.  Helado Negro has just released a new video for his emotive song Young, Latin and Proud.  About the song, Roberto Carlos Lange (he is Helado Negro) has said “contemporary Latino culture is underrepresented and consistently confused with cliches that haunt more commercial representations.  My interest in creating this song was always a private one, a possible dialogue between me and a very young me. Singing me to sleep after a long day, letting me know that it’s okay to be young, Latin and proud.”  The minimalist animation of the video below limns well the subtly powerful song.  To be both we say: bravo!

We’ll take it!  While our first choice for a new album release would be The National, we will take any and all other options where the band’s brilliant lyricist/singer, Matt Berninger, participates throughout.  Today Berninger and Brent Knopf (Menomena/Ramona Falls) have announced their new collaboration dubbed “EL VY” (“pronounced like a plural of Elvis; rhymes with ‘hell pie’”) and will soon release (on October 30th) their debut album entitled Return to the Moon on 4AD.  To boot, the duo will follow up the album release with North American and European tour dates.  Be still our hearts.  The dates can be found way below after the album’s tracklist.

As the PR for the album describes, Berninger and Knopf became friends while touring small West Coast clubs together nearly a decade ago. Thereafter they sent each other music and ultimately found time to record Return to the Moon this past winter and spring. Per the PR, Return to the Moon features “Berninger’s darkly funny, lyrical storytelling and his immediately identifiable sense of melody, offset by Knopf’s playful, architectural arrangements and inventive production.”  “This record is more autobiographical than anything else I’ve written,” says Berninger, “but the details aren’t true. It’s written in the voices of a few invented characters, composites of different people – myself, my wife, and other people I was thinking about.” The duo go on further to say that each of their main bands are preparing new music, Return to the Moon gives “a glimpse into an alternate musical universe.”  To get a feel, EL VY has offered up a lyric video to the title track, as seen below.  As described in the PR, it’s a more playful/poppy musical environment in which Berninger still shines.

We love everything about Return to the Moon, and hereby deign it our Song of the Week.

Pre-orders can be had for digital and vinyl/CD formats.  .

Tracklisting:

1. Return to the Moon (Political Song for Didi Bloome to Sing, with Crescendo)
2. I’m the Man to Be
3. Paul is Alive
4. Need a Friend
5. Silent Ivy Hotel
6. No Time to Crank the Sun
7. It’s a Game
8. Sleepin’ Light (feat. Ural Thomas)
9. Sad Case
10. Happiness, Missouri
11. Careless

EL VY Tour Dates:

11-02-03 Portland, OR – Doug Fir Lounge
11-04 Seattle, WA – Neumos
11-06 San Francisco, CA – The Independent
11-07 Los Angeles, CA – Troubadour
11-10 Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer
11-11 Washington, DC – 9:30 Club
11-13 New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom
11-14 Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg
11-15 Boston, MA – The Sinclair
11-16 Montreal, Québec – Theatre Fairmount
11-17 Toronto, Ontario – Opera House
11-19 Chicago, IL – Metro
11-20 Milwaukee, WI – Turner Hall Ballroom
11-21 Minneapolis, MN – First Avenue
12-01 Copenhagen, Denmark – Pumpehuse
12-02 Hamburg, Germany – Knust
12-03 Amsterdam, Netherlands – Melkweg
12-04 Cologne, Germany – Kantine
12-06 Berlin, Germany – Astra
12-07 Brussels, Belgium – AB
12-08 Paris, France – Trabendo
12-10 London, England – Electric Ballroom
12-12 Manchester, England – Gorilla
12-13 Dublin, Ireland – Whelans

We’ve been wrapped up in life’s rich pageant and periscoping house concerts (led by Joseph Arthur–more on that soon).  And all the while the musical juggernaut gathered steam around the world as summer shifted into overdrive.

For example, the Newport Folk Festival took place two weekends ago, and it came to a close when Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Dawes and a host of artists joined to memorialize Bob Dylan’s seminal “electric” set at the same festival exactly 50 years prior.  During that historic 1965 set, Dylan blew caution to the wind and shocked the folked-up crowd with an electrical instrument set that forever changed rock n’ roll (and folk) music as we know it.  That’s all.  In 2015 the artists on stage at Newport paid tribute and entitled the set ’65 Revisited.  Even from afar, it was a sight filled with sounds to behold.

’65 Revisited (setlist below) began with some song entitled Mr. Tambourine Man, performed by the great Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings.  Next up was All I Really Want to Do, as done up by Willie Watson.  Welch and Rawlings then performed one of our favorite songs of all time, It’s All Over Now Baby Blue.  Robyn Hitchock later played Visions of Johanna, which he dubbed “possibly the greatest song ever written, that’s all.”  Dawes then joined for a raucous Maggie’s Farm and a crowd-sing Like a Rolling Stone.  And history was made yet again.

Oh to have been there.  In the meantime feast below on fan videos of much of the above.  So very good.

’65 Revisited

“Mr. Tambourine Man” – Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings
“All I Really Want to Do” – Willie Watson
“Love Minus Zero” – Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, and Willie Watson
“It’s All Over Now Baby Blue” – Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings
“Maggie’s Farm” – Dawes
“Takes a Train to Cry” – Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Gillian Welch, Dawes, and Al Kooper
“Tom’s Thumbs Blues” – Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Gillian Welch, Dawes, Dave Rawlings, Al Kooper, Hozier, and First Aid Kit
“Outlaw Blues” – Deer Tick, Dawes, Al Kooper
“Just Like a Woman” – Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Dawes, Al Kooper, and Blake Mills
“Visions of Johanna” – Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Dawes, Al Kooper, and Robyn Hitchcock
“Sooner or Later One of Us Must Know” – Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Dawes, Al Kooper
“Like a Rolling Stone” – Gillian Welch, Dave Rawlings, Dawes, Al Kooper
“Rainy Day Woman” – All artists

After years of gestation and toil, Tad Wagner (Buellton) has today released his debut solo album entitled Free Enough.  We’ll have a full review soon, but after only a couple of listens we are hopelessly mired in the album’s sweet wonders.  The multi-talented Wagner provided most of the instrumentals and vocals on the album, along with all of the artwork, design and hand-lettering.  The album was deftly produced by Raymond Richards (Local Natives, The Parson Red Heads), who also added nice instrumental accents, including additive pedal steel and dobro touches.

As you’ll find, the album dreamily floats around and through your ears, though its winsome sounds belie the underlying heartache and catharsis of the lyrics.  Fans of the Beach Boys, Beatles and Elliott Smith (a shame they all had such tiny followings) will feel right at home while listening to Free Enough.

To get a feel for Free Enough, check out the just-released video for the wondrous, dulcet track Wonder below. Afterwards, check out our prior missive regarding the album’s quintessential Coney Island video.

And then, please, do yourselves a favor on this fine Friday, and go pick up the album HERE.

We have written about Canada’s multi-talented Chilly Gonzalez before.  Historically, Gonzalez has collaborated well with the likes of Drake, Feist, Peaches, Mocky, and a host of others along the way.  He also has recently collaborated with CBC Music to record the Canadian Music Masterclasses – Songs in the Key of Eh.  Check out the most recent video in that series below, in which he breaks down and analyzes melody and motif in the music of Leonard Cohen, Bach, Shania Twain (yup), Drake, and Feist, and then mashes up the latter two cleverly.  Heady stuff from Gonzalez.

In support of their new, critically-acclaimed album How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful, Florence + The Machine’s tour will alight in California in October and feature a return to the comparatively-intimate Santa Barbara Bowl on October 20th.  In support of the album, the band has just released the cinematic double-feature video for album tracks Queen of Peace and Long & Lost.  Director Vincent Haycock shot the short film on the isle of Easdale.  The video flaunts leader Florence Welch’s considerable acting skills in emotionally charged scenes of violence, healing and mourning.  Not for the weak of heart, but well composed and sung.  Welch is one of the more powerful singers in pop-rock, and we can’t wait to hear her unleash it live at our Bowl on October 20th.

Today all-time faves Elbow have released a new EP entitled Lost Worker Bee, consisting of four new songs all based upon their home town of Manchester.

About the EP, band-leader Guy Garvey had this to say:

“[E]lbow are involved in various solo projects and collaborative endeavours for the next few months and we just felt we really wanted to get ‘something’ away to tide fans over until the next album. We’ve always loved the EP as a format and we’ve enjoyed making this one so much I wouldn’t be surprised if there was another before long. All the songs on this EP are set in Manchester city centre. Manchester’s symbol has been the worker bee for hundreds of years and the lead track is about finding love far away from home. Far from being just a stop gap this is one of our proudest releases.”

To help present, the band has released the heartwarming video for the title-track.  Check it out below.  We love everything about it and the song (Garvey’s usual fine lyrics and vocals, the horns, the added electronic bits–everything).   Here’s hoping Garvey has found/finds his queen.  In the throes of summer, we admit we’ve become lost worker bees ourselves.  Excuse us while we take a stroll.