New Music from Jenny Lewis, The Rosebuds and Ryan Adams

At the end of July, Jenny Lewis released her new album “The Voyager”. A TV and movie actress until she was in her early 20’s, Jenny turned to music and formed the band Rilo Kiley in 1998. The band stayed together till 2011 and produced several albums and a few indie hits. Here’s Jenny playing “Just One of the Guys” from the new album, followed by a video from the Rilo Kiley hit “Portions for Foxes”

The Rosebuds are a band from North Carolina based on the duo of Ivan Howard and Kelly Crisp. They’ve put out a series of albums since 2003, and their latest “Sand+Silence” came out in early August. Here’s “In My Teeth” from the new album, and if you like it try “Esse Quam Videri” (the state motto of North Carolina “To be, rather than to seem”).

On September 9th, Ryan Adams is scheduled to release his new self-titled album. The fact that self-titled albums are most often an artist’s first effort may imply that Adams is looking for a bit of a rebirth 20 years into his career. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Adams talked about his battle with Meniere’s disease and the fact that he’s feeling ready for his first concert tour since 2009. Here’s an audio track of a live performance of “Stay With Me” from the new album, and the official video for “Gimme Something Good” with a spooky story line featuring Elvira – not sure what to make of that.

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Stockholm Take Two – The Boss of Sweden?

Last week we scoured a concert series poster from Stockholm and came up with a Stevie Ray Vaughn tribute singer/player covering Stevie Ray’s version of Jimi Hendrix’s “Voodoo Chile” – a song that Jimi Hendrix himself played in Stockholm in 1969. This week, more covers by acts on this poster trace back to Bruce Springsteen in 1979.

Abalone Dots is a trio of three Swedish women who play bluegrass and country tunes. Last year in a TV performance, the band covered Bruce Springsteen’s “The River” from his 1980 album of the same name. Abalone Dots delivered an abbreviated version, but they sang the lyrics straight up: getting Mary pregnant, working construction and all. Bravo ladies! The band has been a quartet at times, and if you’d like to hear them get their bluegrass on, check out “The Ballad of Lee McKay”.

Believe it or not, another artist on this same poster covered “The River” on a TV show last year too! Micke Rickfors is The Boss’ contemporary, born in December 1948. Though mostly a solo artist throughout his career, Rickfors was a member of The Hollies in the early ’70’s, replacing their original lead singer Allan Clarke. After you watch Micke perform another abbreviated version of “The River”, you can check out his work with The Hollies on “Magic Woman Touch”.

It’s not clear why the Swedes have such affection for “The River”, but while the song never charted as a single in the U.S. it was the biggest hit up to that time for Bruce in both Sweden and Norway. Here is Bruce playing the whole song at the “No Nukes” concert in 1979, a few months before the album was released. The Swedes leave out the break with perhaps the best line in the song, “Is a dream a lie if it don’t come true, or is it something worse …”

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A Guitar Thread Beginning and Ending in Stockholm – Jimi to Stevie Ray to Chris.

A friend just returned from a trip to Stockholm and sent a photo of this poster featuring upcoming acts for, as best we can tell, a series of boat cruises around Stockholm Harbor. Thanks, Rainer!

The first act to catch our eye was “Chris Hiatt Band (US), Stevie Ray Vaughn Comes Alive”. A solid singer and guitarist (check out this video that starts off with a couple of original compositions), Chris usually plays with his band in and around Daytona Beach, Florida. Somewhere along the line his more than faint resemblance to Stevie Ray Vaughn was noticed, as was his ability to throw down a pretty fair imitation of Stevie Ray both as a singer and guitarist. Over the years Hiatt’s tribute concerts to Stevie Ray have become popular in Sweden where he is about to complete his 16th tour.

Here is Chris, dressed a la mode, covering Stevie Ray covering Jimi Hendrix’s “Voodoo Chile”. Check out the behind the back playing at 7:30. As good as Chris is, certainly check out the real McCoy in an amazing Austin City Limits performance (and if you want to see Stevie Ray play behind his back, watch this video beginning at about 3:20).