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).

Here’s an interesting coincidence: the YouTube video with the most views of Jimi himself playing Voodoo Chile is from a 1969 concert in … Stockholm!

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Sean Lennon, Charlotte Kemp Muhl and The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger

Sean Lennon, youngest son of John, together with Sean’s collaborator and long-time girlfriend Charlotte Kemp Muhl, are about to release their third full-length album “Midnight Sun” later this month. Their work together is put out as The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger (GOASTT), and the first track released from the new album is “Moth to the Flame”. The video has a strange and elaborate story line, and it might be best to close your eyes to really hear the music which is equally as elaborate (the song kicks in about 2:00 into the video).

Kemp Muhl began a modeling career as a teenager, and she is possessed of a beautiful singing voice that meshes perfectly with Sean’s and of the ability to make simple, tasteful contributions on a wide range of instruments. These live studio performances of “Jardin de Luxumbourg” and “Lavender Road” show off the pair’s vocals, subtle backing instrumentation, and cerebral lyrics. Try taking your eyes off Kemp Muhl – Sean can’t.

Both Lennon and Kemp Muhl have other projects. One of Lennon’s is Mystical Weapons, where he teamed up with drummer Greg Saunier of Deerhoof for an album of psychedelic instrumental tunes in 2013. The video for “Colony Collapse Disorder” has all the right visuals – especially to accompany the retro guitar riffs that come in at about 2:00. Kemp Muhl and childhood friend Eden Rice combined their ethereal vocals on the album “Black Hole Lace” in 2012.

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Our Beatles Homage – “And I Love Her”

Over the past few weeks the Beatles have been celebrated and remembered as the 50th anniversaries of their Ed Sullivan Show appearance and first U.S. concerts were observed. So, we’ve got to do our Beatles homage too!

Thanks to Dave for turning us on to this clip from the Late Show with David Letterman featuring Broken Bells covering “And I Love Her”. The ballad is from the Fab Four’s third album “A Hard Day’s Night”. The TV set featuring Ringo Starr’s drumming is a cute idea.

But wait, that TV set may be more than just a cute idea. I’m guessing that Danger Mouse and James Mercer saw this video as they planned their staging. It’s a clip from the movie “A Hard Day’s Night”.

This beautiful song was covered by many, many artists over the years. Here’s an interesting cover from the late jazz legend Sarah Vaughn taped in 1969. She recorded a totally different arrangement of the song on a 1981 album of Beatles covers.

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All Hail Seattle – Home of Super Bowl Champions and Music

Not only is Seattle home to the 2014 Super Bowl champion Seahawks, but it’s also home to one of the most prolific music scenes in the U.S. The list of Seattle musicians spans many genres and many eras, and an interesting music / Super Bowl connection is that the owner of the Seahawks, Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, also financed Seattle’s EMP Museum originally known as Experience Music Project.

Bing Crosby was born in Tacoma, Washington in 1923, and Quincy Jones moved to Seattle as a young boy in the 1940s. But perhaps Seattle is most identified with Jimi Hendrix. Here is a mash-up video of Jimi’s best charting single, his cover of Bob Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower”.

Hendrix is a tough act to follow, but Seattle also gave birth to Grunge, and Kurt Cobain of Nirvana was born not far away in Aberdeen, Washington. Nirvana was chosen for the 2014 class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their first year of eligibility, and this is the song that began an era.

A Seattle oddity of the 1990’s was The Presidents of the United States of America. Their biggest hit was “Peaches”, but it’s hard to beat “Lump” for a great hook. After watching the original, check out Weird Al’s “Gump”.

A current Seattle favorite, and feature of an earlier blog post, is blue-eyed soul singer Allen Stone, but at the recent Grammy Awards a big winner was rapper Macklemore. Pardon the language in this video, but nearly a half-billion people have viewed the unpretentious sense of humor of this new phenom.

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Going Way Back With That Eminent Hipster, Donald Fagen

Just in time for the recent holidays, Donald Fagen published his memoir “Eminent Hipsters”. The book’s first chapter introduces us to one of his earliest musical influences, The Boswell Sisters. Fagen lauds them saying, “…when I became familiar with the early work of Connie and her two sisters, I discovered that the Boswells had created a body of work rivaling that of Duke Ellington”. High praise to say the least.

One Boswells song that Fagen discusses is “Heebie Jeebies”, a tune originally recorded by Louis Armstrong and His Hot Five in 1926 and covered by The Boswell Sisters in 1929. Below are the original by Armstrong and the Boswells’ version, with their tight harmonies and brisk rhythms. By the way, while of questionable historical accuracy, the Armstrong version is sometimes cited as the first scat singing on record (it comes at about 1:50).

Lest you worry that Fagen’s effusive tribute to The Boswell Sisters evidences any lack of respect for Duke Ellington, Steely Dan’s third album “Pretzel Logic” included a cover of Ellington’s first record to make the charts “East St. Louis Toodle-Oo”. Here is Ellington’s original from 1927 featuring the song’s co-writer, trumpeter Bubber Miley, and Steely Dan’s 1974 cover with guitar wizard Jeff Baxter’s imitation of a muted trumpet.

And here’s one more nod by Fagen to the Duke. Fagen’s most recent solo album, 2012’s “Sunken Condos”, featured the track “Weather in My Head”. When Fagen played the tune live on “Late Night with David Letterman”, what was that photo on the front of his electric piano? None other than the Duke and his orchestra!