Band of Heathens - Green Grass of California

I have to confess I know nothing about the Band of Heathens, Mike Ritchie played this last Sunday on his Celtic Radio show (Mike Ritchie On Sunday, , along with many other great tracks and I have been enjoying listening to both this band and the others Mike played that I do not really know.

I think this is a bit Jayhawks, Gram and certainly for me Cowboy Junkies.

Great sound.



I loved this live version:



Another good track:

Norma MacDonald - Old Future

I have to confess I know very little about Norma MacDonald. Her bio is quite interesting:

Born in Cape Breton, MacDonald is a staple of the Halifax music scene. Her fourth album, Burn the Tapes (2015) was included in the Polaris Prize 2016 “Longer List”. It debuted at #3 on the national Earshot Folk/Roots chart the week of its release and stayed there for months. It was nominated as Americana/Bluegrass album of the year by Music Nova Scotia. MacDonald’s third album Morning you Wake received glowing reviews in Canada, the U.S and Europe.  It received three Music Nova Scotia nominations in 2011 (Female Solo, Folk and Country/Bluegrass Recording of the Year).

MacDonald is a frequent collaborator, having sung on dozens of albums by her contemporaries, and is a member of the Halifax folk-rock supergroup Bend the River. When not behind the mic, Norma works as an ER nurse and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree.

 Mike Ritchie played a track from her forthcoming lp Old Future on sunday and I was really taken with it. That track was Your Wedding Day  (crying through your ex’s wedding (even though you know leaving was the right thing)  and it was absolutely outstanding, unfortunately I cannot as yet find a link to that track but hopefully I will be able to update this post in due course. I will be checking out her lp.

Meanwhile another couple of tracks, one the lead from Old Future.

Lucinda Williams - Good Souls Better Angels

I don't really know where you start with Lucinda Williams, amazing songwriter, great singer, maverick, punk, rocker....the Iggy pop of Americana!

Thank you to Mike Ritchie for most of this post. Mike presents a great show on Celtic Music Radio on a Sunday, always starting with a Neil Young track and playing outstanding music. Mike is alos a stalwart of the live music scene in Glasgow and beyond.

http://www.celticmusicradio.net

I would encourage you to check his show out, I am sure you wont regret it.

 The lastest release by Lucinda is described as a "tough and vivid and tender release" and I will just quote Mike below:

This gruff and gritty, rough and tough, politically-charged 12-track album - with trademark shards of tenderness and hope - muscles and hustles its way in to the already-impressive Lucinda Williams' catalogue stretching back some 40 years.

It is timely and offers a base for plenty of discussion as she rails against the unfairness life stirs up, a bombardment of global dangers, domestic abuse, family heartaches, tapping all the while into her love of Robert Johnson songs and Delta blues' power to marvellous effect.

Produced in Nashville by Ray (Car Wheels On A Gravel Road co-producer) Kennedy, her 15th album is strengthened infinitely by the quality co-writing that the triple Grammy-Award winner has enjoyed with husband/manager, Tom Overby. This is something she "always dreamed of - a relationship with someone I could create with."

We're not taken back to her childhood this time round as Williams is focused on tackling in song a world she sees as falling apart. Typically, she never writes obliquely or without candour: the difficulties are confronted, the guilty lambasted - the US president gets a mauling in Man Without A Soul.

Yet, unsurprisingly, the hard-times' songs are stamped with her own brand of real regret plus a never-far-from-the-surface dream of things getting better, as stoutly declared on the gorgeous groove of When The Way Gets Dark: "Don't give up / you have a reason to carry on."

With touring band Stuart Mathis (guitar), David Sutton (bass) and Butch Norton on drums it was inevitable the album would sound live and each player gets plenty of space to excel, complementing Williams' ragged and dusty vocals that seem to be swept into place at all the right moments.
Bad News Blues and Bone Of Contention swagger like hell but switch to Pray The Devil and you'll encounter a track shrouded by a Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds' brooding vibe shattered only by Mathis' fiery guitar.

Williams tackles depression on Big Black Train. The pace drops, her voice cracks like she's not going to reach the end of the verse and her intuitive band cushion her pain. Melancholy is commandeered gloriously again on Shadows And Doubts, which addresses the growing pitfalls of social media engagement.

The lady from Louisiana expertly navigates the album with verve, subtlety and a glow all of her own yielding potent, gutsy outbursts and signature, low-key, affecting tracks like the final song, Good Souls, where she implores: "Keep me with all of those / who help me find strength / when I'm feeling hopeless / who guide me along /and help me stay strong and fearless." 

Strong and fearless is a description that fits Lucinda Williams perfectly on this raw and vivid collection.

With Ray Kennedy producing (check out his work with Steve Earle which I will be posting on soon, and the craft of Lucinda it is hard to see where it could go wrong and this album does not disappoint.

And from the magnificent Car Wheels on a Gravel Road