Amazing Grace

I'm headed to Philly Saturday night to see Grace Potter, and man, I haven't been as psyched for a show in a long time.

Last summer, I was supposed to get the XPN all about the music fest, for at least two of the days, but some sort of real-life nonsense screwed that up. Anyway, the one and only Brian H waxed eloquent about the fest on some music mailing list, and in particular raved about Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. I had heard of them but hadn't heard many of their songs at that point. But knowing Brian's excellent taste in music, I checked 'em out right away. After finding the excellent studio albums, I also found that these guys pop all their live shows over on archive.org.

A no-brainer, people -- this is a great band in a very classic vein. Grace has a strong bluesy voice and great rock & roll attitude. And, she cranks up the B-3 about as hard as anybody has since the 70s. You may have heard Bonnie Raitt comparisons, but Bonnie never had the balls to make music like this! Lots and lots of good songs, and solid musicianship. You can hear a little Feat, a little Traffic, a little early Fleetwood Mac maybe. Like they said in those old Prego TV commercials: "It's In There"

(And since I'm admittedly a total sucker for a good looking rocker chick and for a B-3 screaming through a Leslie, this is just right in my wheelhouse.)

Recent shows have been opening for Government Mule, so they're relatively short. Here's a decent sounding one from earlier this month:

meantime (dedication ;-)
ah mary
stop the bus
sinking man (unreleased)
water parts 1 and 2

whole show (11/1/07)

Another nice show for your listening pleasure is from the paradise in early 06

sweet hands
mystery train
house of the rising sun/gumbo moon

paradise show 2/18/06

Enjoy!

42,000 on tap at the wayback machine

So last week was an awesome week for music here in the swamps of Jersey but for various reasons I didn't see a single show. I did do some playing, reconnecting with old friends, and that was great.

Looking at the calendar, this could be a great week to get into NYC for some jazz. Joe Lovano is simply a monster: emotion, chops, stage presence, tone, stylistic range/facility. A truly inspiring musician's musician.

Then the weekend offers way too many choices, with Marah, Radiators, Bob Mould all playing Friday and/or Saturday. Posts of each of these coming up soon...perhaps :-)

But I leave you this morning with several links to one of the true marvels of the net, that being the Live Music Archive. Over 42,000(!) live concerts archived and available for free download, often in multiple formats. It's just astonishing.

Anyway, there are of course many old favorites on LMA (2000+ Dead shows, hundreds of Feat, Rads, Ryan Adams) but here are a few more contemporary artists you might be getting into, that have a few shows up on LMA.



Spoon (I'm listening to http://www.archive.org/details/spoon2005-06-09.flac16 at this very moment in fact), Mp3 Sample Sister Jack


Josh Ritter (I have this
show on tap for later, still acoustic I think.)






Grace Potter and the Nocturnals who are just fantastic, as Brian H and many others have written so eloquently about in the past few months...




Marc Broussard who sounds way too soulful, world-weary and wise to be in his 20s. (I saw him at SXSW this year, and stood next to his best friend from high school -- a talkative fun Louisiana kid that I suspect had not yet started shaving! :-)

mp3 sample: Hard Times from 10/12/2006