Category Archives: Country

Great news: As predicted, Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival returns to MASS MoCA in 2011

Posted on December 17, 2010 | Leave a comment

When Wilco arrived at MASS MoCA last summer, the band even took over the museum's sign. (Photos copyright 2010, Steven P. Marsh)

Fantastic festival can only get better

We don’t like to brag (well, okay, sometimes we do), but Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone? predicted that Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival would become an annual event — even before this year’s inaugural gathering wrapped up.

Wilco HQ announced the news with an email this morning:

Greetings and Happy Holidays. We’ve got a last bit of news before heading home for the break. The big story here is that Solid Sound 2011 is officially ON and happening the weekend of June 24-26, once again at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA. if you were there last year, we know you’ll be back. If not, well, this year you should know better. Ticket information and more will be announced on January 18. So keep an eye and ear out.

Safe travels and sweet holidays to you all. Thanks again for another great year in Wilcoworld. We’ll see you in 2011 with what will undoubtedly be a whole bunch of news regarding Wilco tours, records, the festival and so on. Cheers.

the HQ Staff

This years three-day event was held  in mid-August. It gave thousands of fans of all ages the run of the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA) in the Berkshires town of North Adams, Mass. Participants got to hear lots of music from Wilco, the side projects of band members like Jeff Tweedy, Nels Cline, Pat Sansone, their friends, and got to sample comedians and films along with the spectacular art on the gritty former factory campus. It was well run, well curated and surprisingly chill.

The music was great, the scheduling tight without being overwhelming, the facilities were superb and the food and drink never seemed to run out. Everything worked together to make it one of the best and most memorable festivals around.

Wilco perfoms on the main stage in Joe's Field at MASS MoCA.

Museum management was thrilled to have as many as 5,000 well-behaved patrons on site at once, and obviously saw the festival as something worth bringing back. Museum Director Joe Thompson was singing the praises of the event all weekend, and made no secret of the fact that he supported the idea of doing it again in 2011.

And Cline brimmed with excitement about the festival when we spoke with him at Joe’s Pub in New York City, where he and fiancee Yuka Honda were checking out Sean Lennon and Charlotte Kemp Muhl‘s new project, The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger.

Next year’s festival is earlier in the summer — June instead of August. So save the date and stay tuned for an update in a month.

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Posted in Art, Blues, Concerts, Contemporary, Contemporary Classical, Country, Folk, Humor, Jazz, Music, News, Opera, Pop and Rock, Punk, Recordings, World Music

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Lucinda Black Bear: tonight’s the night

Posted on November 5, 2010 | Leave a comment

Lucinda Black Bear at the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn. (Copyright 2010, Steven P. Marsh)

Lucinda Black Bear‘s new album, Knives, was officially released on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 2. But for the Brooklyn-based band’s New York fans, Friday, Nov. 5, is the day to elect LBB to most-favored-band status.

If you don’t know Lucinda Black Bear, you should. Check out “Percival,” a track from the new album, by following this link. The new disk is full of great tunes. And read more about the band right here on Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone?

The melodic, country-inflected folk-rock ensemble is celebrating the new album with a show at 92Y Tribeca, 200 Hudson Street. You can be sure that frontman Christian Gibbs and his stalwart bandmates will rock the house with selections from the great new album (available now on iTunes, eMusic, CD Baby and, of course, at the venue) and old favorites.

8 p.m., Friday, Nov. 5. 92Y Tribeca, 200 Hudson St., Manhattan. Tickets for the show are $12. Call (212) 601-1000 or click here. Cheyenne frontman Beau Jennings performing a solo set at 9. LBB is slated to take the stage at 10.

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M Shanghai String Band playing in Nyack

Posted on October 4, 2010 | Leave a comment

M Shanghai String Band: old-timey joy. (Photos copyright 2010, Steven P. Marsh)

Acoustic country-folk collective kicks off GraceMusic’s 41st season of Great Music in a Great Space

The fantastic M Shanghai String Band brings its old-timey, joyous country folk sounds to Nyack, N.Y., to kick off the 41st season of GraceMusic on Sunday, Oct. 17.

Richard Morris steps up to the mic for a solo with M Shanghai String Band.

Visit the M Shanghai String Band MySpace page to hear samples of the band’s music.

Every member of this Brooklyn-based acoustic collective — which at times puts as many as 11 musicians onstage at once — is an accomplished musician in her or his own right. Many of them are involved in other bands, too. So when they mass their awesome talents together onstage as M Shanghai String Band, they put on a roof-raising, rollicking good show.

The band, which takes its name from the Williamsburg, Brooklyn, Chinese restaurant where it began in 2002, has an old-fashioned Grand Old Opry-style performance aesthetic. Players crowd around a single mic, stepping up to take turns on leads and solos. The music, likewise, is deeply rooted in the old-fashioned American musical traditions that spawned the Opry, their repertoire includes mostly original material that deals with issues both timeless and contemporary in often humorous ways.

The band is a fan favorite at Jalopy Theatre and School of Music in Red Hook, Brooklyn, a hotbed of traditional music.

Don’t miss this show. Will You Miss Me When I’m Gone? is a huge fan of this band. (Full disclosure: We serve on the GraceMusic board and are friends with one of the players.) Make a day of it by visiting Nyack early in the day for brunch or lunch, and then settle in for a great session of foot-stomping music in a lovely space.

We guarantee you’ll have a good time  — including the great meet-the-artists reception afterward!

4 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 17. GraceMusic, Grace Episcopal Church, 130 First Avenue, Nyack, N.Y. (845) 358-1297. Tickets at the door only: $15 for adults, $10 for seniors, $5 for students.

Patty Hughes, Austin Hughes and Matt Schickele of M Shanghai String Band.

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Posted in Concerts, Country, Folk, Music

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Legendary Ronee Blakley to play her first New York City gig in 20 years

Posted on September 26, 2010 | Leave a comment

 

Ronee Blakley in Ropbert Altman's "Nashville."

 

TICKET UPDATE: $25, CLICK HERE

Showtime update: Starts at 7:30, Marie Gabrielle opens

We just got some amazing news in our inbox. It was in the form of a note from the great singer/actress Ronee Blakely. She’s returning to New York City to perform next month — for the first time in two decades.

She writes:

I’m coming in to NYC to play the Bitter End Oct 13 … I hope you’ll come to the show.
Thanks.
Ronee

How awesome is that?

For those you don’t remember, Ronee produced two amazing albums, Ronee Blakley and Welcome, for Elektra in the 1970s. They were rereleased by Collector’s Choice in 2006. She’s also revered for her acting — particularly her portrayal of Loretta Lynn-esque country singer Barbara Jean in Robert Altman’s 1975 film Nashville. She also recorded the duet “Hurricane” with Bob Dylan for his 1975 album Desire, and was part of Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue, which also had its genesis in 1975.

Her October show will celebrate the release of two new albums, The River Nile, a pop record, and Grief Holes, an experimental collection in tribute to her mother, who died last year. Both are available from CD Baby.

This show is not to be missed. It’s a one-time-only event that’s slated to happen at 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 13 at The Bitter End, 147 Bleecker Street (between Thompson and LaGuardia), New York City. No ticket price has been announced, but call the club at (212) 673-7030 or email info@bitterend.com for more information.

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Posted in Concerts, Country, Folk, Jazz, Music, News, Recordings

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Marah and The Madison Square Gardeners rock The Bowery Electric

Posted on August 21, 2010 | Leave a comment

Marah at The Bowery Electric on Aug. 20, 2010. (Photos copyright 2010, Steven P. Marsh)

Marah’s personnel may change, but the sound remains solid

Dave Bielanko of Marah.

Dave Bielanko is the only original member left in roots-rock band Marah. The Philadelphia-area native has always had trouble keeping a stable lineup, though until the 2008 release of Angels of Destruction!, his older brother and co-songwriter Serge Bielanko (click here for his blog) was a constant.

Dave Bielanko and Christine Smith.

Nowadays the core of the band, based in Brooklyn, naturally, is Dave and South Ozone Park, Queens, native Christine Smith, who’s been with the band for a few years now. It’s pretty clear that Dave is the driving force, because Marah has kept its artistic core through almost every change in rhythm section (except for that brief Britpop detour on 2002’s Float Away With The Friday Night Gods, which was really just an unfortunate product of Dave choosing the wrong producer).

More on Marah and The Madison Square Gardeners after the jump

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Posted in Concerts, Country, Music, Pop and Rock

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Artist as audience: Pat Sansone checks out the boss’ day job

Posted on August 16, 2010 | Leave a comment

Pat Sansone of Wilco couldn’t stay away from Joe’s Field at MASS Moca on Sunday afternoon during boss Jeff Tweedy‘s solo set, the closing show of the fantastic Solid Sound Festival.

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Posted in Blues, Country, Folk, Music, Pop and Rock, Uncategorized

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Artist as audience: Scott McCaughey

Posted on August 16, 2010 | Leave a comment

Scott McCaughey of The Baseball Project and innumerable other bands (Young Fresh Fellows, etc.) stops to chat with fans before the Jeff Tweedy solo set that closes out the Solid Sound Festival on Sunday at MASS MoCA.

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Jeff Tweedy solo

Posted on August 15, 2010 | 1 comment

Jeff Tweedy kicked off the last live set of the Solid Sound Festival with “Out of Tune.”

Meanwhile, management of the venue at MASS MoCA says there were just over 5,000 people on Joe’s Field for Wilco‘s amazing set on Saturday night. And there was room for many, many more.

Can you say: the start of an annual tradition? Stay tuned. It just might happen.

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The Autumn Defense: A Move Indoors

Posted on August 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

Wilco side project The Autumn Defensedidn’t let the threat of rain dampen their spirits. They moved inside to the Hunter Center at MASS MoCA and kept the crowd — which had to deal with lines to get in — happy with a great set.

They ended with a Big Star cover, “You Can’t Have Me.”

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Wilco amazes at Solid Sound Festival

Posted on August 15, 2010 | Leave a comment

Wilco could have played all night Saturday and nobody would have complained.

Okay, maybe a neighbor or two above Joe’s Field, the venue for the mainstage shows.

Wilco created the Solid Sound Festival at MASS MoCA, so it’s not a surprise that it is a great event. But it’s the friendliest, least commercialized music festival I can remember. It’s a very pleasant surprise.

Wilco played nearly 2 1/2 hours with just a short break before the encore set. You can find a set list elsewhere (I’ll try to find a good link when I’m at a computer), but suffice to say that every album was represented. (I was hoping for “Passenger Side” from A.M., but didn’t get that.)

This show was no sell-the-new-CD trip. Jeff Tweedy and company were having a great time and it showed.

Here’s hoping they make the Solid Sound Festival an annual thing. It’s a great core concept and MASS MoCA is a perfect, well-run venue for it.

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