Saturday, May 2, 2009

AND THEY'RE OFF...The Brass Hat Group's Homage to -THE 135H KENTUCKY DERBY!

In honor of today's Kentucky Derby (I must say this is pretty sweet website, if like horse racing as I do or not, it's def. worth a look), which was won by 50:1 long long longshot "Mine That Bird" and is why we are going to be sharing with you the audio (downloadable track "Jockey Full of Bourbon") and video from the Jim Jarmusch film Down by Law, which happens to star none other than Tom Waits! He is actually in this video, which I also must say is pretty cool. I hope you enjoy the music and if want more info on the race click on the New York Times link. Please enjoy it all and have a mint julep on me (figuratively of course, because we really don't want to mess with the mojo working scent that I got going on), as I am heading to see Ben Harper in like 30 minutes...w00t!

Tom Waits "Jockey Full of Bourbon" - Rain Dogs (c) 1985

(The Cover Art is from http://www.funpic.hu/ and from what I saw, "Mickey You're Next!")


Tom Waits "Jockey Full of Bourbon" ~ Down by Law (1986) - Jim Jarmusch

(I know I already went out on a limb and agreed Ginger looks like Nico as seen there, but she also has some pictures that kinda make her look A LOT LIKE this babe in the bed, you tell me? Either way Ginger is looking hotter and hotter these days and it pains me to say that, but it's so true, if you don't who or what I'm talking about and you like pretty girls or are just curious at to what a Nicoesqe looking Georgia Peach (that's an Allman Brother's reference you pervs so get your head out of the gutter numskulls)



Tom Waits is in the film Down by Law, in which this music video above is from. Here is a little backgroud about the film from AllMovie.com:

"Down by Law by Jim Jarmusch follows his groundbreaking Stranger Than Paradise with another rambling, character-driven film with a twisted sense of humor. Set in a seedy New Orleans summer, Down By Law details the meeting of three unlikely convicts and their just as unlikely escape. Zack (Tom Waits) is an out-of-work DJ who is accused of murder when a body is found in the trunk of a stolen car he was hired to drive across town. Jack (John Lurie) is a pimp set up for a fall by a competitor. These two sullen souls are locked in a cell with Roberto (Roberto Benigni), a cheerful Italian immigrant who happens to have killed a man. The chemistry between the members of this loosely bound "team" is fascinating: Zack and Jack are forever laughing at Roberto, yet they rely on his energy and good will to escape their dire situation. The three mismatched miscreants eventually bust out of jail and head into the Louisiana bayous. Tired and hungry, they separate to search for food: Waits goes one way, Lurie another, and the frightened Benigni decides to risk stepping into a ramshackle diner. Somehow or other, he winds up in the arms of gorgeous Italian girl Nicoletta Braschi -- and is even able to provide new clothes and escape routes for his astonished comrades! "

Posted by Unknown at 5/02/2009 06:38:00 PM 0 comments
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Friday, May 1, 2009

I Knew We Shoulda Turned Left At Alberquerque! Phoenix is that way...




Today is Friday and it's been long, tiresome week in these here parts. So as a treat to my loyal fans, you Phoenix loving folks, 'qui parles Français.' Like Bugs said, you got to turn left at Alberquerque to hit Phoenix...or is it right? Ugh, I'm so useless without GPS.

Anyhow as if Bonaroo wasn't going to be reason enough for me to attend with our friends Brett Dennen, Outernational, Ben Harper, Wilco, Neko Case...Phoenix is going to be at Bonnaroo! Bonnaroo for those of you aren't familiar with it, is like a very expensive, but also very good variant on what began with Woodstock that 1969, panomime of a year, sexually charged numerials as the Mets win the World Series and craziness is bascially everywhere in the state of New York, which sounds like an oxymoronic statement. FYI, those things are giving me the déjà vu(s).

This year's Bonnaroo list as it stands as of May 1st, 2009 is seen below, taken directly off their official website. Buy tickets now or they go up, just like everything else in this world; if we can't sell you on quality, we will sell you on fear. I am feeling a bit old, all of 34 and a month, but this is one year I shall not miss. I guess I will figure out the lodging, camping, and all that jazz stuff between now and then. Also, for those of you worried about the high sticker pricer of the 4 day festival they had been running a payment plan, which sadly it turns out, had its last day to enroll being April 4th. What about us procratinators?!!? We are always getting it good, though not that good (isn't that Becks bending over Posh in that linked photo? Right on mate!)

So anyway lest it be all doom and gloom like I was saying Phoenix is going on tour for their new album Wolfgang Amadeaus Phoenix and here are the dates as they currently stand (these things are ALWAYS subject to change so don't despair too much if you aren't on the list):

  • 6/12 Manchester, TN - Bonnaroo
  • 6/13 Chicago, IL - Park West
  • 6/15 Toronto, ON - Phoenix Concert Theater
  • 6/16 Montreal, QC - Les Saints
  • 6/17 Boston, MA - Paradise Rock Club
  • 6/19 New York, NY - Terminal 5
  • 6/21 Washington, DC - Rock and Roll Hotel
  • 6/23 Minneapolis, MN - Varsity
  • 6/25 Denver, CO - Bluebird
  • 6/27 San Francisco, CA - Regency Center, Grand Ballroom
  • 6/28 Los Angeles, CA - Wiltern
And like I mentioned above there is always Bonnaroo with the following list of bands and surly a few extra last minutes 'major league surprises' like when the Police,the band, not the Reno 911 kids showed up.

Here is what is on tap for the Bonnaroo 2009 so far:
WOW...WOW! That is a lot of music and maybe the $240 price tag or whatever it is these days might not be such a bad deal after all...did I say WOW!?!!?

And to close the night out I wanted to leave you all with a few songs that I will make available personally out of my own record (well mp3/CD/etc...) collection:

Enjoy! Bon Nuit Mon Petites Chous-Chous!


"Rally" - It's Never Been Like That 2006
(Cover Art - "cuore" 7" x 13" mixed media 2004 by sanithna phansavanh)


"(You Can't Blame It On) Anybody" - Alphabetical (2004)
(Cover Art - Ginger Lindsey (c) 2009 - contact Brass Hat Group for add. info)


"School Rules" - United (2000)
(Cover Art - "homeward" Marvin The Paranoid Android unknown looking figurine by sanithna phansavanh)

Posted by Unknown at 5/01/2009 11:25:00 PM 0 comments
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Can a concert poster be art? Well let's see...

This is the poster for Chris Cornell's Wiltern Theater Show on May 3rd, 2009
So what you all think...is that art or just an advert?
I think it's pretty f'ing hot whatever you label it. F@#$ labels, they just seem to get in the way of what can be really cool and honest and sincere creative outputs. As my boy Miles Solay of Outernational said and this is how I feel about "genres":

I Don't Want To Hear
The Same Ole Sound
I'm Ready For The

SHOWDOWN!
Posted by Unknown at 5/01/2009 07:21:00 AM 0 comments
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Thursday, April 30, 2009

Put Down Your Wii and Tell Us What Makes A Real Life "GUITAR HERO?″

According to Chris Cornell's promotion/publicity agency (who is a combo of Sacks & Co. and Red Light Management, this from Sacks & Co. who I have to say really are awesome in keeping us at the Brass Hat Group in the loop and whom without, we would not be providing you nearly the level or attention to detail that we love and hope that you all do as well):

Wanted to send along a Chris Cornell update.

Last night Chris Cornell played a sold out show at Seattle’s Showbox. Good friend and former Soundgarden bandmate Kim Thayil was at the show with Chris
(see Chris’s tweet: http://twitter.com/chriscornell) as was Queensryche’s Chris DeGarmo.

See photo Kim, Chris, and Chris.

(click on this image to download)

Chris’s Scream Tour Live
Tour
4/28 Commodore Ballroom Vancouver, BC
4/29 Crystal Ballroom Portland, OR
5/1 Grand Ballroom San Francisco, CA
5/2 House of Blues Anaheim, CA
5/3 Wiltern Theatre Los Angeles, CA

Sites
www.chriscornell.com
www.myspace.com/chriscornell

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I also wanted to share with you all what was so freely given to me. This is a clean download and directly from the record label. This is a live version of "Scream" acoustic off of the Scream album (2009) - available for purchase at that link.

(cover art - "cherie" 9x12 mixed media 2004 sanithna phansavanh - available at http://tinyurl.com/c69ax2 thanks to The Brass Hat Group)

In addition, I wanted to give a little shout-out to Kim Thayil who is for all practical purposes a rock guitarist G-d for those of you not familiar with his work. Rolling Stone Magazine listed him in the top 100 best guitarists of all-time. And much of that 'Seattle - Grunge Sound' you so often hear referenced comes from the styling of people like Kim and few others. Kim was not just an awesome Soundgarden guitarist, but her wrote the co-wrote lyrics, music and plenty for many tons of their songs:
  • "Hunted Down" (Screaming Life) ... music
  • "Nothing to Say" (Screaming Life) ... music
  • "Tears To Forget" (Screaming Life) ... music (co-written)
  • "Little Joe" (Screaming Life) ... music
  • "Hand of God" (Screaming Life) ... music
  • "Kingdom of Come" (Fopp) ... credited to Soundgarden
  • "Flower" (Ultramega OK) ... music
  • "All Your Lies" (Ultramega OK) ... music (co-written)
  • "Circle of Power" (Ultramega OK) ... music
  • "Incessant Mace" (Ultramega OK) ... music
  • "Hands All Over" (Louder Than Love) ... music
  • "Get on the Snake" (Louder Than Love) ... music
  • "Heretic" (Loudest Love) ... music
  • "Jesus Christ Pose" (Badmotorfinger) ... music (co-written)
  • "Room a Thousand Years Wide" (Badmotorfinger) ... lyrics
  • "New Damage" (Badmotorfinger) ... music (co-written)
  • "My Wave" (Superunknown) ... music (co-written)
  • "Superunknown" (Superunknown) ... music (co-written)
  • "Limo Wreck" (Superunknown) ... music (co-written)
  • "Kickstand" (Superunknown) ... music
  • "Never the Machine Forever" (Down on the Upside) ... music and lyrics


According to much of what you find about the etymology of Soundgarden is as follows:

Although he was born in Seattle in 1960, Thayil grew up in the Chicago. Kim Thayil met Hiro Yamamoto at Rich East High School in Park Forest in Chicago. After graduation, they moved to Washington together where they went to the University of Washington (located in Seattle), where he studied philosopy. Hiro and Kim met Chris Cornell while at school at UW and in 1984 the three formed Soundgarden in 1984.

Kim is in my opinon, without the famous quotes or lists or awards, one of the best rock guitarists of all-time and a big reason I was such a huge fan of Soundgarden. His guitar and Chris's vocals and I was sold.

Here is a photo of Kim during his Soundgarden days:











(Truth be known they were all big Beatles fans, much like fellow Seattle grunger Kurt Cobain -see MSN.com Bio for this factoid)




There is Thurston Moore (see his MySpace page linked here for details of the now) of Sonic Youth:

















There is Stone Gossard (see his MySpace page for details of the now) of Pearl Jam:















Obviously there was also Kurt Cobain (see this link for his Official posthumous page) of Nirvana. They still more than anyone get the credit and the hate for the grunge sound, scene and aftermath of all that arose from those years. Kurt also, who for a variety of reasons gets most of the press regarding the guitar sound, especially by the main stream media masses. While I know this might appear blasphemous, Kurt was not nearly the technical guitarist the others listed above are. Though I have to admit I was/am as big a Nirvana fan as the rest of them - them being the people who either totally became grunge or hated it with such a passion that George Bush - the first one- made mention of it in one of his speeches.

Starting in 1993, about 2 months before 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' hit the market and Nirvana played the good ole Masquerade with its 'Heaven' - 'Hell' and 'Purgatory' levels (live music on the top floor, dance club with all kinds of debauchery on the bottom floor and a bar and billard's room as well, a real eye opener for a 16 year old suburban white kid who's idea of wild and crazy at the time consisted of shaving my head for a sign of sol
idarity for the High School soccer team.

























Post Script: Had it not been for my friend Gray who used to give me rides home from school from good old Dunwoody High School and had a tape cassette player, I would never had been exposed to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Dinosaur (before they became Jr. and still had Lou Barlow in the band), Soundgarden, Shonen Knife, Sebadoh (after Dinosaur broke and became Dinosaur Jr.), Eric's Trip, Superchunk, a lot of stuff from the Raleigh music scene and lot of other bands that never seemed to catch on like Nihilist, still the angriest band I have ever seen live. as well as getting to see the the film "1991: The Year Punk Rock Broke", which opened my eyes into what I believed being real, and a true grunge slacker was about (in keeping with that it seems Amazon only sells this movie in VHS lol) .
Posted by Unknown at 4/30/2009 12:05:00 AM 0 comments
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Sunday, April 26, 2009

ED HARCOURT - "Women, Wine, and Snuff" (by J. Keats)

"Women, Wine, and Snuff"

GIVE me women, wine, and snuff
Untill I cry out "hold, enough!"
You may do so sans objection
Till the day of resurrection:
For, bless my beard, they aye shall be
My beloved Trinity.

by John Keats
(Posthumous and fugitive Poems - Circa 1820)

In listening to the music of Ed Harcourt one easily comes to the conclusion that if he and Keats were in a room together, during those final years, this type of poem/work that might have been discussed and drank over. John Keats is one of my favorite poets/writers and I would more quickly associate him with Janis Joplin, Elliot Smith or Jeff Buckley, than the living, breathing, soul searching music of Ed Harcourt. I have put a song below, that I find is ALWAYS on my IPOD playlist, in some form or another. It's the kind of music that 'riddles my phantasms'.

I first stumbled across Ed Harcourt's music like 4 years ago and you know when you are a kid and find something that you think is like the most important find since Lewis and Clark found the Pacific coast and lived to make it back east side to tell about it. Like when I used to find 4 leaf clovers I would rush inside and tell my mom, my sister, I would begin the preserving process because it meant I was now 'lucky' and now close to finding that pot of 'gold' (still waiting on those two swags to hit), but as least I found Ed Harcourt's music. I remember having to tell almost all of my friends, even my MySpace friends who were like 'what is that song?'

(Steph that is a shout-out to you for your always impatient, fired up music tastes - you know that is why we all love you ;p).

I hope you all enjoy the Sunday song of the day and a list of Ed Harcourt's music, which shows a May 5th EP (hopefully a tour will follow right?). Ed is like Tom Waits in many ways not to box him in, but just the opposite, because he usually is caught playing the piano, but he also plays numerous keyboard instruments as well as the guitar and percussion. This is someone that if you have heard of already, you're pretty cool and if you are hearing him for the first time you're pretty lucky (like finding several of those quad leafed clovers in a single search)!

His official website is: http://www.edharcourt.com/
His MySpace is http://www.myspace.com/60667424


"Until Tomorrow Then" by Ed Harcourt

(cover photo: Ginger Lindsey - "There She Goes..." PS4/Elements 7.0/After FX CS4 (c) 2009 - BHG)
Posted by Unknown at 4/26/2009 07:37:00 PM 0 comments
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