Costello's Show is a Spectacle here in NYC

My kids and I stumbled across a massive display of posters advertising Elvis Costello's Sundance show "Spectacle," right in the heart of the Times Square subway station a week or so ago. There's at least 15 large posters in a row, so massive that I came up the stairs and stopped short in my tracks it was so impressive...and as of yesterday, it was still there. Wow. Then today, I gasped as I was reading the New York Times, flipped a page on the A section, and came across a full color full back page ad for tonight's episode. Double Wow!


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Three Dazzling Instrumentalists at The Blue Note, WNYC

I had the privilege of seeing the first performance by a dazzling new trio made up of Mark O'Connor, John Patitucci & Julian Lage last night at the Blue Note. It was stunning music, with each player pushing the next to new heights. As with all things O'Connor, this was a night of American music, blurring the boundaries between folk, jazz, classical, and other worlds. One minute one heard an Appalachian moan, the next a western theme, followed by something from the streets of New Orleans, gypsy music, and, of course, modernist New York music. I was blown away.

This afternoon the trio appeared on WNYC's Soundcheck. Here they are with host John Schaefer, who begged them to find a name. I nominate the one their parents gave them: O'Connor, Patitucci, & Loge has a ring to it, in my opinion.



They're at the Blue Note tonight and tomorrow as well. My advice? Do not miss them since these are the only dates currently planned with this incredible trio.

To Spain w/ Josh Rouse!

On these cold, dark December days, Josh Rouse's new album 'El Turista' (March 9 / Yep Roc Records) transports me to a warm afternoon on the Mediterranean shore. The music is incredible, immersed in Spanish, Brazilian, and Cuban influences but encompassing Josh's signature sense of melody.

Download the mp3 "I Will Live On Islands" for yourself here.



Check out these embeddable Takeaway Show clips from La Blogotheque:

Josh Rouse - Oh, look what the sun did / Duerde Mobila - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

Josh Rouse - Cotton Eyed Joe / Valencia - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

Josh Rouse - I Will live on Islands... - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

Josh Rouse - Quiet Town / Mesie Julian - A Take Away Show from La Blogotheque on Vimeo.

Getting To Know: Butch Walker!

Butch Walker played three sold-out nights at Joe's Pub last weekend, and lucky for us, he's been in town all week. He came to our holiday party on Monday, and yesterday I was treated to a private show of some songs from his brilliant new album 'I Liked You Better When You Had No Heart' at the offices of Crush management. In the meantime, I've gotten to geek out w/ Butch on a variety of subjects ranging from music to music photography to George Jones to more music to kids to the Rolling Stones to even more music!

I'm looking forward to more quality hang time w/ Butch in the new year. Watch this space for more revelations.

TuneCore Loves Rock & Roll, Joan Jett, Shore Fire

We were immensely proud to get our copy of the TuneCore Sales Certification Award for Joan Jett selling over 100,000 songs via TuneCore. Click here to find out more about the awards. Here's our own Chris Taillie and Nancie Martin, who worked on the campaign for Joan, with the newly minted award. If you come to visit, look on your left as you come through the front door and you'll find it hanging prominently. Thank you, TuneCore!

For Him and the Girls (and the guys, too)

A few of has had the pleasure of seeing our client Hawksley Workman play last night as part of a brief tour around the US celebrating the imminent release here of 'For Him and the Girls.' That album was the Juno Award-winning Canadian singer-songwriter's debut 10 years ago, and it's well worth hearing, as are the rest of his dramatic, passionate songs, like "Maniacs," and his intense performances.

The capacity crowd of Hawksley adorers at City Winery knew every word, and made numerous requests, which he was happy to indulge. And we were happy to spend a little time with him backstage, as captured in the photo below. (We'll attribute the slight blurring to one too many glasses from the wine list.)

From left, that's me, Hawksley, his sole bandmate Todd Lumley, Andy Silva, Diana D'Angelo and Nora Lyons.

Tom Russell @ Joe's Pub, Oct 3

Fresh from his appearance on the now infamous Oct 2nd episode of The Late Show w/ David Letterman, Tom Russell delivered a bada$$ badlands performance of music from a catalog that spans over three decades and an incredible twenty records. The phenomenal sound at Joe's Pub allowed Tom's crisp vocals and Thad Beckman's mean finger-picking to resonate around his Russell's characteristically dark narratives. Check out the Letterman performance here.


The highlight of the evening was undoubtedly an impromptu duet with Rosalie Sorrels, who was in the audience, performing Townes Van Zandt's "Snowing On Raton." Here's a photo of Tom with Rosalie backstage:

Stop The Show

Built To Spill, Shore Fire client and one of my favorite bands, is in town for 4 nights of shows in NYC, playing music from their 7-record catalog including tracks from 'There Is No Enemy,' their newest album, out last week.

Andy and I caught their first NYC show at Webster Hall last night and it was excellent. We walked in while the band played "The Plan," - I can't think of a better way to start a show (and an album). Highlight of the one and a half hour set was an encore of the gloriously slow-burning, guitar-charged (albeit shortened version of) "Stop The Show," from 'Perfect From Now On.' The band sent us home with an 11-minute version of "Conventional Wisdom," full of gratuitous guitar soloing (I mean that in the best way possible).

Not the best pic I've ever taken, but it will have to do:

Bring on your wrecking ball

Take a good look, America. Giants Stadium will soon be demolished and really, no one but Bruce Springsteen could give it a proper farewell.

Check out what Jon Pareles had to say about Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's final performance of their 5 night run at Giants Stadium in his stellar New York Times review.

Here's our very own Elizabeth Lutz enjoying the show with her awesome mom.

It's never easy to say goodbye to an old friend (or a 1970s sports arena/stadium). As I contemplated "Wrecking Ball" lyrics, I started thinking about all my fond memories of Giants Stadium, where I saw my first Bruce Springsteen concert. It was a bittersweet moment. Perhaps, had I brought my binocs, I would have done a better job of looking at the bright side of things. (That's my buddy Nils sporting the Casio, not the binocs.)

Luckily, Bruce Springsteen will be back in November. And although Giants Stadium will no longer be open, this tramp will still have wonderful memories.

Everybody In The House, Sing Along

Quick update to Chris's post about the Hennessy Artistry Series: a video clip of Common, The Roots and Q-Tip blending Bonita.



I personally also loved hearing Caron Wheeler of Soul II Soul with The Roots. "Back To Life" has always been a song I associate with good times, and Wednesday night at Terminal 5 sure was one.

Like celebrity photos? See some here.

Myron Walden gets funky

Myron Walden blew the roof off of Fat Cat last Friday night (which is hard to do since Fat Cat's a basement club!) with his band Countryfied. They mixed funk, soul, blues, gospel, jazz, and rock and roll into an intoxicating, high energy show and Myron was working hard onstage. Jared Gold was incredible on organ and Kenneth Salters amazed on the drums. If you're into Booker T & The MGs or Jimmy Smith, you'll be into Myron Walden's Countryfied. As he reminded us, both musically and in his comments between the songs, he grew up in the south, and you can feel it listening to his playing.

Here I am with Myron and Shore Fire's own Miyako Hannan:



Here's Myron wailing:

Bonita Applebum

It was a pleasure attending Hennessy's Artistry Series last night in NYC at Terminal 5. The show, featuring The Roots, Common and many guests, was excellent. A highlight, and something I can now cross off of my "Must See" musical check list: Q-Tip performing "Bonita Applebum," with the Roots and Common, no less! Q-Tip's 'The Renaissance' and his "experimental" album 'Kamaal The Abstract' (a release delayed by over 9 years, finally released last month) have been some of my fave albums of the year. Seeing him live last night, performing ATCQ's first single, was the icing on the cake.

Diana's Texas tour

This weekend was filled with good food, good music and good weather. Friday I was in Austin to catch Todd Snider at Austin City Limits Festival and Bob Schneider at Antone's.
I also caught Them Crooked Vultures and Reckless Kelly!!

Crowd watching Todd.

Bob with the packed house at Antone's.
Don't miss Bob solo in NYC 10/7 @ The Living Room and 10/8 at City Winery.

On Saturday I headed to Houston for Hennessy Artistry 2009 Series featuring Elizabeth The Band, Makano, Common, and The Roots plus Icon Big Daddy Kane and closing out the night on a sexy note surprise guest Al B Sure. Here's Nancie S. Martin, Michael Lavigne and I on the black carpet.

This (part of The Roots band) is not a tuba!

Wine + Music= Good Evening

Nick Baily and I had an amazing time at Nitty Gritty Dirt Band founding member John McEuen's solo show at City Winery this week. He is just as funny as he is a talented musician and we left there even more excited for NGDB's show at BB Kings on Oct 6th.


This was my first time at City Winery and I fell in love with this new space with its wine and cheese pairings, flat breads, and wonderful acoustics. If you haven't checked it out yet be sure to do so on Oct 8th for Bob Schneider's show!

High Wide & Handsome at the Highline Ballroom: Loudon Wainwright III and co. put on a night to remember

Tuesday night was an incredible on, with the one-time-only 'High Wide & Handsome: The Charlie Poole Project' concert in NYC, featuring a who's who of NYC's acoustic best and of Loudon Wainwright III's talented family. The cast (it felt like a narrative musical at times) included family members Rufus and Martha Wainwright, Lucy Wainwright Roche, Maggie Roche, Terre Roche, Dave Roche and Suzzy Roche, plus multi-instrumentalists Chaim Tannenbaum and Sufjan Stevens-collaborator Rob Moose, along with Greg Cohen (bass), Erik Friedlander (cello), Paul Asaro (piano) and producer Dick Connette (harmonium). A country pioneer and bootlegger, Poole would've been pleased about the night, though he likely would have stuck to the bar.

The Roches harmonies were gorgeous, Martha and Rufus each sang lead on a song, and Lucy proved to have an incredibly gorgeous voice. The atmosphere felt like a cross between a multimedia history lesson replete with slides, a family reunion, a musical theater narrative, storytelling session, and a hootenany. Here's Rufus leading the band at one point:



Spotted in the crowd were liner note writer Greil Marcus, New Lost City Rambler John Cohen, Holy Modal Rambler Peter Stampfel, and singer Jenni Muldaur.

Loudon and Lucy were kind enough to pose with me:



Oh and Loudon closed with a rollicking version of his own "Dead Skunk (In The Middle of The Road)." Utterly appropriate considering Charlie's fondness for humor and novelty songs.

O'Connor & Strings

Mark O'Connor, virtuoso musician, tireless educator and scholar, skilled composer and more, stopped by the office last week. We got to discuss and learn about O'Connor's chock-a-block schedule for the next six months. Here, he poses in front of a recent Strings Magazine cover story focused on his new, insurgent violin method (recently written about in the New Yorker) with some of the PR team, l-r: Andy Silva, Matt Amoroso, Nick Baily and Nancie Martin.

Me and Gary Go are out and about in NYC this week

Fresh in from touring the US on a radio promo tour, Gary Go arrived in NYC this weekend and it's been nonstop ever since.

Yesterday, Gary performed at the Apple store in SoHo (photo above). He performed several songs from his self-titled debut album on just his iPhone alongside Andreas Larsen on acoustic guitar. He also showed his self-produced videos and played his iTunes single of the week "Wonderful."

Today, Gary and I (photo below) traveled to Weehawken to visit the studio where he recorded the album with News 12 New Jersey. Then following a great interview with ABC News Now - where Gary was told his single could make a great theme song for "Grey's Anatomy" - we stopped by Sirius XM to check out a performance by David Gray in the space Gary will takeover tomorrow.

Gary - with Andreas, his iphone and a few surprise props to ensure the "Go" experience - will perform a private showcase at Sirius XM at 6:30pm.

Hit me up if you'd like to come!

Russell Visits Office

We got to spend some time with storytellin' man-in-black Tom Russell, seen below with Shore Fire's Matt Hanks on the left and Nick Loss-Eaton on the right. Tom's sweet and lovely wife Nadine made it by too. Tom's career high album Blood and Candle Smoke is coming next month on Shout! Factory, and it's chock full of scenes from Tom's colorful life and much more, stories that have earned him the title of the "writer's musician" with fans like Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Annie Prouxl, Luis Urrea, Ken Bruen and more.

A Sneak Peek at Woodstock's Most Intimate Images

If you tuned in to NY1 this morning you got a quick preview of the Morrison Hotel Gallery's new exhibit celebrating the 40th anniversary of Woodstock. Here's a shot of MHG co-owner Peter Blachley and NY1's Stephanie Simon (who's due in Oct - congrats Stephanie!) at the gallery.



Another partner at Morrison Hotel Gallery, Henry Diltz, was the official photographer at Woodstock and had unparelleled access to the set-up and performances. Henry and Woodstock producer Michael Lang will attend the official opening of this new exhibit this Thursday evening at The Morrison Hotel Gallery's 313 Bowery location. Come check it out!

Miriam Linna says: a couple of rockin' cats!

I had a blast and saw tons of old friends at the first night of Ponderosa Stomp's three night NYC visit a couple of weeks ago up at Lincoln Center, the snazzy soul night. I just got a note from the amazing Miriam Linna who with her husband Billy Miller run Norton Records, the inspirational label that's keeping real rock and roll alive - "The Home of Wild Rock." What a thrill:

"Hi! Sorting through snapshots from Lincoln Center! Here's one of a couple of rockin' cats!
Best, Miriam"

That's me on left with Legacy's Rob Santos. I promise we didn't coordinate our outfits beforehand. P.s. over my shoulder, that's Lincoln Center's series booker Bill Bragin.

Marcus Roberts Radio Magic, Day Two

As Mark Satlof recently noted in this space, Marcus Roberts is in town for a string of shows at Jazz At Lincoln Center's Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola (thru July 26) that the NY Times has already called "extremely gratifying." Yesterday, Marcus visited WNYC's Leonard Lopate Show - today, it was NPR's Piano Jazz. Marcus joined guest host and bassist extraordinaire Christian McBride for a wide-ranging conversation that touched on the pair's history together, and Marcus' plans for the future. And the tunes were sublime. This episode of Piano Jazz won't air for a few months; in the mean time, here's a photo of Christian and Marcus snapped just after the taping.

Marcus Roberts' Terrific Turn on Leonard Lopate Show

Believe it or not, Marcus Roberts and his trio had never done a live radio gig before their appearance today on WNYC radio's Leonard Lopate. Lopate's one of the best interviewers around and he's particularly great with musicians. Between Robert's erudite discussion of his music and Lopate's obvious enthusiasm and knowldege, it was a great listen bolstered by a pair of live performances. You can take a look below for video.

By the way Marcus and the trio (Rodney Jordan, bass; Jason Marsalis, drums) killed last night at the opening set of their six night stand at Jazz at Lincoln Centers Dizzy Club Coca-Cola, playing mostly material from their new album New Orleans Meets Harlem Vol 1.

An "Old Soul" drops by SFM HQ, Plays NYC

We were thrilled to have Chicago-based and LA-minded soul-funker Danny Chaimson stop by Shore Fire HQ last week. Danny (third from L in the orange shirt) was in town to play a show at Piano's last Monday (a great video of which is below) and do a bit of press, the highlight of which was definitely Danny inventing a song at 3 in the morning, live on national radio, about someone getting arrested for spitting in a police officer's Egg McMuffin.



Danny live! He's not this blurry in person, promise

As you can see, Danny's got humor, musical skill, and soul in spades. All of that's shining in full force on his debut album, Young Blood, Old Soul, out August 11th on Cold Classic Records.

What's yellow and shines like a star? It's Ledisi.

This past Sunday felt like the real first day of summer. The sun was shining and Nora, my friend Brian, and I headed to Central Park to watch Ledisi perform at Summerstage. She performed two new tracks from her upcoming album 'Turn Me Loose' and KILLED it! She even went into the crowd to make sure people were dancing.

Check out Nate Chinen's thoughts in this review.

Great minds think alike. Here's our rainbow of Chuck Taylors: Ledisi at top in yellow, Nora in pink, me in red and Brian in black.

Costello, Lauderdale and gang Sweep the Floor at Letterman

Elvis Costello corralled a few of his musician friends for a jaunty performance of Sulphur to Sugarcane last week on the Late Show with David Letterman. It was all strings for the song from Elvis' new album Secret, Profane & Sugarcane (#13 on the Billboard 200 this week...WOW!). Besides Jim Lauderdale (seen here outside the dressing room), a great singer and writer in his on right, the rest of the band was string slinger extraordinaire Larry Campbell and go-to Nashville double bassist Dennis Crouch. Costello sat for an interview with Dave before his performance.

Elvis and the Sugarcanes (musicians from the new album) played a tour de force two and a half hour set last night at the Beacon Theater, only the second show of the tour...I already got a great email from a Costello-watcher saying "Please tell me that somebody captured last night's show for posterity, whether legally or, uh, otherwise. What an incredible band, and what an amazingly perfect choice of back-catalog material to showcase it." The point is: Don't miss this show when it comes your way.

The Soul of John Black Lets Loose in NYC

The Soul of John Black brought the funk last night in an eclectic set at NYC's Sullivan Hall. He ranged from R&B jams to hard electric blues and from what he calls "country funk" to rock, varying things up and crossing genre boundaries at will. It was a fantastic set and I was able to snap a few photos:

Kendel Carson Stirs it Up At The Living Room

Mark Satlof, Nick Baily and I went out to the Living Room last night to see our new client Kendel Carson for the first time, and I think I speak for all of us when I say she blew us away.

Her magnetic stage presence and beautiful voice were incredible to see live, and her inventive fiddling was truly something else.

She mostly played tracks off her new album 'Alright Dynamite,' out June 23, but she ended dueting with co-conspirator Chip Taylor on covers of his famous songs "Angel of the Morning" and a raucous "Wild Thing." Taylor also produced and wrote most of the songs for Kendel's record.

Here's a shot of all of us at dinner after the show, it was truly beauty and the beasts...



Left to right: Chip Taylor, Nick Baily, Me, Mark Satlof and Kendel Carson

Booker T and The Roots kill at The Highline

I wish i had some pictures of this, but my camera was out of batteries.

Last night, following an appearance on Jimmy Fallon, Booker T. sat in with The Roots during their weekly jam session at the Highline Ballroom. It was, quite simply, amazing.

Booker was on point during the opening jam session, backed up a quartet of up-and-coming young rappers, and really stretched his legs on the classic Booker T. & The MG's song "Melting Pot" (which the Roots have covered in the past). As they were playing "Melting Pot," Black Thought dropped the lyrics to Kool G. Rap's "Men At Work". The capacity crowd went crazy for it.

But it didn't stop there- Booker T. stayed on as Grand Puba of Brand Nubian came up for two songs, including 'What Goes Around', which is one of my favorite raps from the 90s, and "Slow Down" (with the band covering the beat from Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians' "What I am"). Booker T. wound things up after John Forte, formerly of the Fugees, came out for 3 songs.

Seeing one of my musical idols perform with a handful of my OTHER music idols was definitely a 'holy cow' type moment.

Booker is on Fallon for one more night tonight. Don't miss it!

Enthralling Jones at Living Room

Diana Jone's was enthralling last night at the Living Room where the Nashville-based singer and songwriter channeled a by-gone Appalachia. You can love songs on record, but there's just no substitute for watching as words pour out of a pure-voiced singer's mouth...I was entranced with Jone's plaintive singing and lyrical gift for a story. You must listen (carefully please) to Henry Russell's Last Words right now!

Diana's set was mostly drawn from her new Better Times Will Come (May 19 on Proper American), a quiet, searching album that's already making big waves in the UK.

Here's me (left) with Diana and radio guru Brad Hunt, and below that with Proper honcho Lisa Best.

Amy Speace has killer style

We all know the saying that great minds think alike, but on Monday, Shore Fire client Amy Speace, Diana D'Angelo and I proved that great minds sometimes dress alike, too. Having the chance to meet with Amy on Monday was a bright spot in an otherwise gloomy, rainy day here in Brooklyn – we talked about Amy's brilliant new album 'The Killer In Me,' Jersey pride, her experiences teaching songwriting and her past work as a Shakespearean actress. I got to geek out a bit with her on the latter subject, though thankfully she didn't make me read her the sonnet I'd attempted to write about 'Killer.'

Shore Fire's Diana D'Angelo, Amy Speace, and I get a kick out of rain boots

I got a second dose of Amy later Monday night at her killer (yes, pun intended) set at The Living Room. Amy shared a hilarious story about meeting 'Project Runway' star and fashion guru Tim Gunn on an airplane recently, which nearly caused me to fall off my chair due to excessive jealousy. I certainly like to think Mr. Gunn would approve of our galoshes.

SxSW In Full Swing, And Rock.

It looks like perfect wide open clear Texas skies for the third day in a row now in Austin, as SxSW delivers its usual intoxicating blend of good food, seeing lots of old friends and meeting new ones, and of course more great music packed into one place then you can get your head around. Though this year, the trip started off in pitch black darkness, as my colleague Matt Hanks and I both caught the same pre-dawn flight out of New York.


Thanks to some crack on-time work by the folks at American, I was able to turn an 11:00am landing into an just barely on-time arrival for my noon "Promotions, Publicity, and Press" panel at the convention center. It was a new format for me, instead of the traditional panel with a moderator, the room was set up as a series of round table discussions with attendees, arranged in a "speed dating" format where each of us stopped in to chat with a new group every 10 minutes and share some insights and answer some questions on getting started with music publicity.


It was well timed -- we've been spending a lot of time on the topic lately with the launch of Shore Fire D.I.Y., a one-on-one educational program for the music community designed to help new and up and coming artists learn to do their own publicity and online marketing. Take a look, we're excited about it.

Next up were some musical highlights from artists of our own, starting with a blazing mid-day set from London's Sons Of Albion. Here's (from left) bassist Gones, drummer Francisco De Sousa, frontman Logan Plant, and guitarist Nuno Miguel. They're playing Friday and Saturday night too, followed by a three night stand in New York next week.


Equally hard-working is the lovely and talented "incendiary Telecaster-wielder" (so says the Statesman) Sarah Borges and her band The Broken Singles, who are performing an incredible eight times this week in Austin. I had the pleasure of catching them twice in one night, first as they joined an all star cast including Jimmy Vaughan and a host of Texas Tornados veterans for the Doug Sahm tribute at Antones, and then as they brought they house down for their show at Mother Eagans. Sorry it's a little blurry, they move pretty fast when they get going:



Meanwhile, Tina Dico was having a busy day of interviews and live performances of songs from her "stunning" new release before her showcase set. Here's Tina and bandmate Helgi Jonsson practicing a little harmony on the piano bench:


Later on, I got a chance to catch up with Rocco Deluca, who followed up a scorching performance on Leno last week with a powerful duo set at La Zona Rosa.


And it's only Friday morning, with a whole slate of interesting shows and appearances still to come. I haven't even had time to dig into some BBQ yet -- we must be just getting started.