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newportfolkfest

John Prine and Iris DeMent - In Spite of Ourselves.

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americasgreatoutdoors

Yesterday President Obama designated three new national monuments honoring our country’s civil rights history. The new monuments will protect historic sites in Alabama and South Carolina that played an important role in American history stretching from the Civil War to the civil rights movement. President Obama also expanded the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument in southwestern Oregon and Northern California, and added six new units to the California Coastal National Monument – protecting critical biodiversity, important cultural resources and vital wildlife habitat. Learn more: https://on.doi.gov/2iMUFdH

Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument In 1963, Birmingham was the epicenter of the American Civil Rights Movement. Activists like Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, Rev. Ralph Abernathy, Sr., and countless unnamed heroes gathered there to demand equality for all people. The activists planned nonviolent marches and protests for Project C (for Confrontation), or the Birmingham campaign.

The new Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument includes the A.G. Gaston Motel, the headquarters for Project C. Dr. King and his colleagues announced the negotiated resolution of the campaign in the motel courtyard on May 10, 1963. Hours later, a bomb exploded near the suite where Dr. King had stayed.

Freedom Riders National Monument On Mother’s Day 1961, a Freedom Riders bus was attacked at the Greyhound Bus Station in Anniston, Alabama. The Freedom Riders remained on board the bus at the station while a mob struck it with bats and pipes and slashed the bus tires. As the bus moved away from the station and out of town, the mob, including members of the Ku Klux Klan, followed. When the bus broke down six miles outside of Anniston on Route 202, the mob resumed terrorizing the Freedom Riders. The bus was firebombed and members of the mob tried holding the doors shut to trap the Freedom Riders inside. Eventually the Freedom Riders were able to make it off the burning bus but continued to be harassed until Alabama State Troopers dispersed the crowd.

The Freedom Riders were a group of civil rights activists, both African American and Caucasian, who tested integration laws on the interstate bus system. The Freedom Riders National Monument includes the former Greyhound Bus Station in Anniston and the bus burning site in Calhoun County.

Reconstruction Era National Monument The Reconstruction Era began during the Civil War and lasted until the dawn of Jim Crow racial segregation in the 1890s. It remains one of the most complicated and poorly understood periods in American History. During Reconstruction, four million African Americans, newly freed from bondage, sought to integrate themselves into free society, struggling to find their place in the educational, economic and political life of the country.

The new Reconstruction Era National Monument includes four sites in South Carolina’s Beaufort County.

Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument Located in southwestern Oregon and established in 2000, Cascade-Siskiyou was the first monument designated solely for the preservation of its biodiversity. The monument is an ecological wonder, home to an incredible variety of rare and endemic plant and animal species, and representing a rich mosaic of forests, grasslands, shrub lands, and wet meadows at the convergence of three mountain ranges. Today’s expansion builds upon the original monument’s goal to protect the area’s extraordinary biodiversity. Photo by @mypubliclands.

California Coastal National Monument Established in 2000 to protect marine wildlife habitat just offshore of California’s iconic coastline, California Coastal National Monument was expanded in 2014 to include Point Arena-Stornetta – its first onshore unit. Today’s expansion of 6 spectacular places along the coast will preserve important habitat for coastal plants and animals, and protect cultural sites that provide insight into the people who lived along the California coast thousands of years ago. Many of the new sites of the monument are also culturally and spiritually important to local tribes. Photo by @mypubliclands.

snlgifs

nbcsnl

Chancellor Merkel dropped by Update to address Donald Trump being named TIME’s Person of the Year.

2016 - Music Favorites of the Year - Part 2

Continuing on with my favorite albums and songs of 2016...

Peaceful Album of the Year:

Mutual Benefit - Skip a Sinking Stone

This was maybe my most listened to album of the year. I couldn’t tell you a single lyric or hook. But every time I put it on I get swept away. It’s like covering yourself in a thick blanket and sipping a hot toddy. It’s like slipping into a natural hot spring.

Best Produced Album of the Year:

Junius Meyvant - Floating Harmonies

About 2 months after I left Kex Hostel in Iceland in 2014, Junius Meyvant played a tiny show there for Iceland Airwaves festival. 2 years later, his full length debut is finally here. It does not disappoint. The interplay between strings, horns, his fully bearded voice, are all perfectly done. Like Quincy Jones by way of the land of ice and snow.

Songs of the Year:

David Wax Museum - Guesthouse

There is a delightful lyric construction, I don’t know if there is a word for it, in this song.

“I have a simple request Hope it's not an imposition Hope it's not an imposition I have a simple request”

Repeating and inverting the phrases throughout, in this simple song about asking for a place to crash. The horns, synth, drums, just drive this pulsing song. It sounds like LA. It makes me want to call up an old friend and ask to crash in their guesthouse.

LP - Strange

LP had the most powerful voice I heard in 2016. This one is an anthem for anyone who feels strange, weird, or different. It is impossible not to feel inspired, I’m talking female coming of age empowerment movie montage inspired, by this song. And then it ends with a bitchin’ harmonica solo.

Honorable Mentions:

Sturgill Simpson - A Sailor’s Guide to Earth

Whitney - Light Upon the Lake

Mo Kenney - In My Dreams

Night Moves - Pennied Days

Caveman - Otero War

Oh Pep! - Stadium Cake

Al Scorch - Circle Round the Signs.

Chris Staples - Golden Age

I’m sure I missed so much, which is why I look forward to end of the year music recaps so much. I didn’t even mention albums by major acts like Radiohead, Wilco, Kanye, the surprisingly good returns of Red Hot Chili Peppers and Green Day. Already I’m turned onto The Avalanches, The Weeknd, Car Seat Headrest, and so much more. But now, on to the Xmas tunes!

#mutual benefit #oh pep!#junius meyvant #lp #david wax museum #sturgill simpson #night moves #whitney #2016 #best of 2016

2016 - Music Favorites of the Year - Part 1

Early December always seems still too early for “Best of the Year 2016.” As other music outlets start writing their recaps and sharing their year-end lists, I discover an abundance of new material to check out. For example, one of my most listened to albums this year was Saintseneca’s “Such Things,” which came out last year and I only found out about reading a ‘year end’ list. But alas, I’ll likely spend the rest of the month listening to Christmas tunes, and if I wait too long it’ll be 2017. So here it is.

2016 was a great year for music. Great for established artists. Great for new artists. Great for horns. Good for strings. Probably a down year for hand clapping. Light on banjos.

However, 2016 can easily be divided in two. Pre-November and post-November. After 11/9, it took me a while to enjoy anything. Everything seemed insignificant. But ultimately the silence was deafening, and as always, I needed to seek refuge in music. Luckily, I found two albums that were instrumental in helping me cope.

Post Election Albums of the Year:

A Tribe Called Quest - We the People

While I consider myself ATCQ fan, I admit I had no idea they were working on a new album before it was announced that they would be playing SNL with host Dave Chappelle. Watching two older rappers on what is always a terrible stage for live music, I remember thinking, “this is... pretty good… Are they saying ‘all you Mexicans you must go’?” Lo and behold, they were. This album is solid throughout. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve found myself listening to less and less hip hop. Unless you were Run the Jewels, Kendrick Lamar, or Pusha T, I probably haven’t heard your rap album from the past 5 years. This album turned me around. I liked everything about it.

Charles Bradley - Changes

2016 was cruel. In March, Charles Bradley released Changes. In October he was diagnosed with stomach cancer. In November, cancer took Sharon Jones. When it came out, I liked this album. After the election, I needed this album. The album opens with Charles’s take on “God Bless America,” with the introduction:

“Hello, this is Charles Bradley. A brother that came from the hard licks of life. That knows that America is my home. America, you've been real honest, hurt and sweet to me. But I wouldn't change it for the world. Just know that all the pains that I've been through, it made me stronger to stand strong and know that America represents love for all humanity and the world I say from my heart”

This album is a strong as everything else in his catalogue. The band is tight, the songs are solid, and Charles voice is as soulful as ever.

Pop Albums of the Year:

Lucius - Good Grief

Lucius followed up their amazing folk heavy debut album Wildewoman with the poppy Good Grief. Hooky, catchy, sing-along ready. Good in headphones. Good on a road trip. Good at a party.

Kishi Bashi - Sonderlust

Kishi Bashi easily wins the title for album title of the year. ‘Sonder’ is “the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own.” On this album, Kishi Bashi mines 80’s pop influences as a means for his violin explorations, choral explosions, and joyous singing. The opening track m’lover is as good as anything he has done.

Growing Up Album of the Year:

Andrew Bird - Are You Serious?

A few years ago, I realized Andrew Bird was my favorite artist. Since Break it Yourself, everything he has put out has been spectacular. He continues his streak with Are You Serious? One of my favorite things about Bird is his willingness to tinker and keep using elements of his songs. He breaks this down in his Spotify album Are We Not Burning on how he has worked and reworked a song, now “Capsized,” over the years.

Continue on to Part II, featuring Mutual Benefit, LP, and more... including my best of 2016 playlist!

#2016 #best of 2016 #a tribe called quest #charles bradley #lucius #andrew bird #kishi bashi

newportfolkfest

Here’s some Folk Family love – Johnny Cash & Joni Mitchell covering Bob Dylan.

eugenetrepanier

markrichardson

In a lifetime of walking in the woods, plains, gullies, mountains, I have found that the body has no more vulnerable sense than being lost… . It’s happened often enough that I don’t feel panic. I feel absolutely vulnerable and recognize it’s the best state of mind for a writer whether in the woods or the studio. Your mind feels a rush of images and ideas. You have acquired humility by accident. Feeling bright-eyed, confident and arrogant doesn’t do this job unless you’re writing the memoir of a narcissist. You are far better off being lost in your work and writing over your head. You don’t know where you are as a point of view unless you go beyond yourself. It has been said that there is an intense similarity in people’s biographies. It’s our dreams and visions that separate us. You don’t want to be writing unless you’re giving your life to it.

Jim Harrison in The Ancient Minstrel (via markrichardson)

americansongwriter

Stream New Jeff Buckley Demo Collection You and I

You and I is a ten-song collection that Buckley recorded in 1993, just after the singer-songwriter had signed with Columbia Records. The demos – eight of which are covers – were recorded as a way for Buckley to demonstrate the musical direction of his first album to his label. That debut album – 1994’s Grace – would go on to be Buckley’s only studio release before the young artist tragically died in 1997.

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