Best of What’s New

It’s Saturday, which means the time has come again to take a fresh look at newly released music. All highlighted tunes appear on albums that came out yesterday (Sep 9).

Flogging Molly/Lead The Way

Irish-American Celtic punk band Flogging Molly, founded in 1997, are kicking off this week’s new music revue. I had only heard of their name but hadn’t been aware of their music. From their AllMusic bio: Los Angeles-based seven-piece Flogging Molly are an interesting mix of traditional Irish music and spunky punk rock. Former Fastway acoustic guitarist/frontman and Dublin native Dave King formed the band with fiddle player Bridget Regan, guitarist Dennis Casey, accordion player (and former pro skateboarder) Matt Hensley, bassist Nathen Maxwell, drummer George Schwindt, and mandolinist Bob Schmidt…Their rowdy folk-rock punk revival sound has been compared to the likes of other Irish bands such as the Pogues and Black 47, but the raucous septet opted for its own unique brashness that defied genre lines. Flogging Molly’s debut studio album Swagger was released in March 2000. The band’s international breakthrough came in March 2008 with their fourth album Float. In the U.S. it peaked at no. 4 on the Billboard 200 and charted within the top 50 in various European countries, including Austria, Germany, The Netherlands, Finland and Sweden. Lead The Way, credited to Maxwell, Regan, King, Casey and Hensley, is from the group’s seventh and latest album Anthem. I love the combination of Irish folk music and rock, which in addition to The Pogues reminds me of Dropkick Murphys.

The Afghan Whigs/A Line Of Shots

The Afghan Whigs are a rock band from Cincinnati, Ohio. Initially formed in late 1986 by Greg Dulli (vocals, rhythm guitar), Rick McCollum (lead guitar), John Curley (bass) and Steve Earle (drums) (no relation to the “other” Steve Earle), the group released six albums until their breakup in 2001. A first reunion in 2006 was short-lived and led to the release of two new tracks that were included on a compilation titled Unbreakable: A Retrospective 1990–2006. The Afghan Wigs came together again in December 2011 and have since released three additional albums including their new one How Do You Burn? Dulli and Curley remain in the band’s current lineup, which also includes Rick Nelson (keyboards, strings, guitar, backing vocals), Christopher Thorn (guitar) and Patrick Keeler (drums). Here’s A Line Of Shots, a track off the group’s new album, penned by Dulli. Nice tune!

The Amazons/Bloodrush

The Amazons are a British rock band formed in 2014. From their Apple Music profile: Playing an arena-sized brand of indie that combines the grandeur of Arcade Fire with the muscle of Nirvana, the Amazons crafted catchy, melodic anthems built for singalongs. At the time of their formation, vocalist Matt Thomson, guitarist Chris Alderton, and bassist Elliot Briggs were already in a group together, but when they recruited Josef “Joe” Emmet — who is also a bassist — on drums, the Reading band was born. Building a grassroots following in their local scene, Thomson, then working at a supermarket, would slip demo CDs into shoppers’ baskets. Their debut EP, 2015’s Don’t You Wanna, was produced by Catherine Marks, who’d previously worked with Wolf Alice and White Lies. In May 2017, The Amazons released their eponymous debut album, which was an instant success in the UK on the Official Albums Chart where it reached no. 8. Two years later, sophomore release Future Dust followed. Once again, it made the top 10 in the UK charts, peaking at no. 9. Bloodrush is a tune from the band’s third and latest album How Will I Know If Heaven Will Find Me? This is great melodic indie rock!

Julian Lennon/Save Me

My last pick for this week is another tune from Julian Lennon’s new album Jude, which is now out. Back in July, I featured Breathe, one of the tracks that had been released upfront. Jude is Lennon’s seventh studio album and his first in 11 years. The title is a nod to the legendary song ‘Hey Jude,’ by The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney to comfort 5-year-old Julian following his parents’ separation, according to an announcement on Lennon’s website. “Many of these songs have been in the works for several years, so it almost feels like a coming-of-age album,” said Lennon. With great respect for the overwhelming significance of the song written for me, the title JUDE conveys the very real journey of my life that these tracks represent.” Until I learned about Jude a few months ago, I hadn’t thought we would see new music from Lennon, given his other activities over the past 20-plus years, including photography, publishing children’s books and producing film documentaries. Here’s the opener Save Me, co-written by Gregory Darling and Lennon. I really like what I’m hearing here and look forward to checking out the rest of the album!

Here’s a Spotify playlist of the above and a few additional tracks.

Sources: Wikipedia; AllMusic; Apple Music; Julian Lennon website; YouTube; Spotify

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The Sunday Six

A Sunday morning (at least in my neck of the woods in lovely central New Jersey, U.S.A.) means another Sunday Six is in store. I’m also introducing a new technical feature. Alternatively, you could call it catching up with 21st century technology: Embedded Spotify playlists. Admittedly, I shamefully stole the idea from fellow bloggers like Music Enthusiast, Aphoristic Album Reviews and Eclectic Music Lover, who have been using embedded Spotify playlists forever. With that being said, let’s get to the six random tunes I picked for this installment. Hope you enjoy – and look for the paylist at the end!

Tangerine Dream/Para Guy

I’d like to kick it off with some electronic music, a genre that with a few exceptions like Jean-Michel Jarre and Klaus Schulze I’ve pretty much ignored in the past. That being said, I’ve always liked spacy music. That’s part of the reason Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were and The Dark Side of the Moon are among my all-time favorite albums. This brings me to electronic music pioneers Tangerine Dream, founded by Edgar Froese in 1967 in Berlin, Germany. According to their website, the group’s fifth studio album Phaedra from February 1974 became a milestone in electronic music and one of more than 100 studio albums they have released over the past 50-plus years. Para Guy is a from Tangerine Dream’s most recent EP Probe 6-8 that appeared a few weeks ago on November 26. The track is credited to band leader Thorsten Quaeschning, co-members Hoshiko Yamane and Paul Frick, as well as Froese who passed away in January 2015. Another current member of Tangerine Dream’s current line-up, which has been in place since Froese’s death, is Ulrich Schnauss.

Bob Dylan/Ballad of a Thin Man

If you asked me about my favorite Bob Dylan record, I’d pick Highway 61 Revisited, his sixth studio album from August 1965. Admittedly, the big caveat is my knowledge of Mr. Zimmerman’s catalog continues to have significant gaps. Regardless, I can’t imagine Dylan connoisseurs would argue over an album packed with gems, such as Like a Rolling Stone, Tombstone Blues, Desolation Row and Ballad of a Thin Man. According to Songfacts, While speculation remains rampant as to who “Mr. Jones” is and what exactly this song is supposed to mean, there is no definitive answer at this time. Shockingly, Dylan hasn’t hepled to clarify things. Asked about Mr. Jones at a press conference in 1965, he reportedly said, “I’m not going to tell you his first name. I’d get sued.” When prompted what the man does for a living, Zimmi answered, “He’s a pinboy. He also wears suspenders.” Frankly, I don’t really care much about any deeper meaning here, I just love everything about this tune: Dylan’s cynically sounding voice; the music, especially the keyboard; and the song’s dark feel!

Blind Melon/No Rain

Next let’s turn to the ’90s and a tune I’ve always found cool: No Rain by Blind Melon. The song is from the American rock band’s eponymous debut album that appeared in September 1992. It became their breakthrough single and biggest hit, climbing to no. 20 on the Billboard Hot 100; topping the charts in Canada; reaching no. 8 and no. 15 in Australia and New Zealand, respectively; and charting in various European countries. The tune is credited to all members of the band at the time: Shannon Hoon (lead vocals, acoustic guitar, percussion), Rogers Stevens (lead guitar), Christopher Thorn (rhythm guitar), Brad Smith (bass, backing vocals) and Glen Graham (drums), as well as producer Rick Parashar. Blind Mellon are still around, though they were inactive between 1999 and 2006 and 2008 and 2010. I guess in part this explains their modest catalog, which to date only includes three studio albums, a live record and a few compilations. That said, Blind Mellon have released four singles since 2019. The band’s current members include Stevens, Thorn and Graham, along with Travis Warren (lead vocals, acoustic guitar) and Nathan Towne (bass, backing vocals).

Pete Townshend/Give Blood

While the massive and monotonous drums on Face the Face, the lead single off Pete Townshend’s White City: A Novel, took a few listens before I found them cool, I immediately dug his fourth solo album when it came out in November 1985. I still do and wrote about it here back in February. Give Blood is the album’s excellent opener and also became its second single. Asked about the tune, following is what Townshend said, according to Wikipedia: Give Blood was one of the tracks I didn’t even play on. I brought in Simon Phillips [dums – CMM], Pino Palladino [bass -CMM] and David Gilmour [guitar – CMM] simply because I wanted to see my three favourite musicians of the time playing on something and, in fact, I didn’t have a song for them to work on, and sat down very, very quickly and rifled threw [sic] a box of stuff, said to Dave, “Do one of those kind of ricky-ticky-ricky-ticky things, and I’ll shout ‘Give Blood!’ in the microphone every five minutes and let’s see what happens.” And that’s what happened. Then I constructed the song around what they did.

Boz Scaggs/I’ve Got Your Love

When my streaming music provider served up I’ve Got Your Love by Boz Scaggs the other day, I immediately loved the tune’s soulful feel. Written solely by Scaggs, this song is from Come On Home, a studio album he released in April 1997. Even though Scaggs has put out records since 1965, sadly, the only tunes I can name are his two biggest hits Lowdown and Lido Shuffle, which were both included on his best-selling album Silk Degrees that came out in February 1976. Scaggs, who also played on the first two albums of Steve Miller Band in 1968, apparently remains active to this day. Damn, I’ve Got Your Love is such a great tune – so glad it was brought to me!

Elton John/Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding

For the sixth and final tune of this week’s zig-zag music journey, I picked a real classic off my favorite Elton John album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road from October 1973: Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding. Borrowing from a previous post I did in December 2020, here’s what I said about the album’s magnificent opener: The first part is an instrumental of music John felt he’d like to be played at his funeral – one wonders a bit in what state of mind he was! It’s followed by Love Lies Bleeding, which Songfacts describes as an angry song about a broken relationship. Had it not been fused together with Funeral, something producer Gus Dudgeon had come up with, I would have included Love Lies Bleeding in my previous post about great Elton John rockers. While due to the total length of over just 11 minutes the track initially wasn’t released as a single, it became a fan favorite and staple of John’s live set lists. It’s easy to understand why!

And here it is…drum roll…Christian’s Music Musings is embracing 21st-century technology…my first embedded Spotify list. Take that Apple Music, despite my brilliant computer skills, I couldn’t figure out how to embed playlists using your platform so I won’t, at least not for playlist embeds!

Sources: Wikipedia; Tangerine Dream website; Songfacts; YouTube