The Coal Porters - How Dark This Earth Will Shine - 2004
When released this was the first new material from Sid Griffin since Western Electric in 2000 and it is the Coal Porters first studio acoustic bluegrass effort. Reviews of How Dark This Earth Will Shine were incredibly positive and you can read them elsewhere if you check out the reviews on this web site. Know why the band got invited as one of only thirteen acts to showcase at the October 2004 International Bluegrass Music Association’s World of Bluegrass festival in Kentucky and hear how they could bring audiences to their feet (almost) every time. “Morning Song” was released as a single in March 2005 in the UK and received quite alot of airplay!
01. Fair Play Virginia
02. Yonder Over Canaan
03. Morning Song
04. June Apple Breakdown
05. No Tongue Can Tell
06. Leaves On The Trees
07. Maybe I'll Cry Tomorrow
08. Idiot Wind
09. Teenage Kicks / Old Joe Clark
10. Polly
11. New Cut Road
CoCo Carmel is a multitalented artist and musician (Bass, Composer, Engineer, Flute, Producer, Saxophone, Vocals, and photographer).
CoCo had begun her career in London England. She took the road and played across Europe including Germany, Italy and France and back home in England.
After nearly a decade in Europe, CoCo moved back to the United States residing in her home in Los Angeles. She met and later married Delaney Bramlett.
During those years with Delaney, she produced and co/produced many records including her own solo record First Fruit which came out in 2010,
Bobby met CoCo Carmel after her marriage ended with Delaney in 2001. They immediately got to work and began writing and singing and recording and performing.
Beginning in the U.S., CoCo and Bobby played in New Jersey, New York, Alabama and Nashville.
This is CoCo Carmel's first solo record, the artwork is by
Michele Bramlett, the very talented daughter of Delaney. Also appearing
on the record is Bekka Bramlett. This record is chock full of great
songs including "I don't know why", the song Delaney produced on Eric
Clapton's first solo record .
01. What Am I Doin In a Place Like This?
02. Doin' It Right
03. Love Don't Deserve It (to be treated this way)
04. Mother
05. I Don't Know Why
06. Sound Of The City (feat. Delaney Bramlett & Bekka Bramlett)
07. Why Would I do That? (feat. Delaney Bramlett)
08. Go To Him
09. Let Me Put it Another Way (feat. Delaney Bramlett)
10. Imaginary Love
11. Sweet Miss You
12. Only a Game (feat. Delaney Bramlett)
13. Rest In Peace
CoCo Carmel - Vocals, Sax, Bass, Guitar, Percussion, Background Vocals, Strings
Delaney Bramlett - Vocals, Guitar, Percussion, Background Vocals
Bobby Whitlock - Piano, Organ, Slide Guitar (13), Hammond B-3 (11)
Bekka Bramlett - Lead Vocals on tracks 2, 6, 12 and Background Vocals
Mark Karan, Hank Barrio - Guitar
Bobb Gross, Chad Watson - Bass
Al Lichtenstein, David Raven - Drums
John Molo - Drums (11)
Tommy Miles - Bass (12)
David Scott Cohen, Spooner Oldham - Piano
John Fumo - Trumpet
Mike Acosta - Tenor & Bariton Sax
Joni Lane - Background Vocals (12)
Hank Barrio, Kelly McCall Fumo - Background Vocals
Pete Dello and Friends - Into Your Ears - 1971 (...Plus reissued 2016)
Originally issued in 1971 by Nepentha Records—presided over by Kinks/Troggs manager Larry Page—Into Your Ears is the sole full-length offering from Honeybus founder member Pete Dello (assisted by a coterie of close friends).The album is a wonderful, timeless work of incisive, plaintive folk-pop balladry and buoyant, idiosyncratic creations, led along by Dello’s honeyed voice (which eases effortlessly into falsetto) and expertly executed arrangements featuring minor orchestrations.
Into Your Ears represents the zenith of Dello’s songwriting, comprised primarily of tunes written specifically for this project (supplemented by a few tracks intended for Honeybus which were re-cut for the occasion). The songwriting reflects a jovial playfulness, but also feelings of intense lovelorn longing, hope, wistfulness and moments that could serve as a great soundtrack to a break-up (with the brightness of delivery never making them ache with depression).
Everything on Into Your Ears comes from personal life experiences, even if twisted through a unique prism, with the deep emotions, whimsical moments and orchestration that never clutters the arrangements all achieving perfect balance. But, above all, the songs resonate with a pure dedication to “pop” and beckon you to listen in repetition, until they’re at one with your very existence. There’s something present, timeless and at times nearly indescribable about this very special set of songs that can’t be pinpointed by simple equation.
01. It's What You've Got
02. There's Nothing That I Can Do for You
03. I'm a Gambler
04. Harry the Earwig
05. Do I Still Figure in Your Life
06. Uptight Basil
07. Taking the Heart Out of Love
08. On a Time Said Sylie
09. Good Song
10. It's the Way
11. Go Away
12. Arise Sir Henry
13. Taking the Heart Out of Love
14. Uptight Basil
15. Hear Me Lonely
16. Madame Chairman of the Committee
Produced by Ray Ruff and Jimmy Bowen on the Motown imprint Prodigal Records, Delaney Bramlett does a soulful-by-way-of-Macon cover of the Temptations' "I Wish It Would Rain," a good idea to try to break out of Motown with the label's own weaponry and a Top Five hit from 1968. It's an excellent re-working. Bramlett lists in his thank yous about a thousand friends -- no exaggeration -- on the back cover, from Ringo Starr, George Harrison, and Eric Clapton to ex-wife Bonnie Bramlett, but Class Reunion by Delaney Bramlett & Friends is a different clan: Fanny'sPatti Quatro, guitarist Spider Taylor, drummers Stu Perry and Jim Keltner, and a duet with ABC artist Susie Allanson on "For Old Times Sake." Make no mistake, this is more a Delaney Bramlett album like his 1973 CBS outing, Mobius Strip, than a class-reunion project, though it does have a classy sound. The only obvious holdovers from Mobius Strip are Clydie King on backing vocals, songwriter Doug Gilmore, and manager John Bramlett. That being said, this album is very, very strong. "Everyday's a Holiday," the one track written by Bramlett, Peter Spellman, and Doug Gilmore, is a standout among ten funky, thoughtful, engrossing essays of Southern pop. Sometimes changing labels can jump start a career, but Motown was an anomaly, not able to deliver album projects the way it did hit singles in the '60s. Had Delaney Bramlett stayed on CBS and gotten support, a pure pop tune like "You Can't Measure My Love," sounding so much like an earthy Mac Davis, might've been a huge adult contemporary hit. Bramlett goes from sounding like the voice of Eric Clapton by way of Terri Gibbs on "Locked up in Alabama" (keep in mind that Gibbs hit with "Somebody's Knocking" four years after this album) to Ronnie Milsap, who, no coincidence, had a number one country hit on RCA when this album, Class Reunion, was released. As evidenced by the Genesis album of early Delaney & Bonnie and solo Bramlett tracks, the singer can be a chameleon and possesses an uncanny ability to have his own style while copping other voices simultaneously. Songwriter Randy Sharp contributes the last three titles: "Who You Gonna Blame It On," "You Were the Light," and the exquisite duet with Susie Allanson, "For Old Times Sake." What it proves is that Delaney Bramlett has major talent; had he and Bonnie stayed together, had they grown together on their CBS deal, they would have had a clear chance to dominate the charts and become an overwhelming presence in pop music. Class Reunion is a tragedy in that it is so good and so forgotten.
01. Locked Up In Alabama
02. Everyday's A Holiday
03. I Wish It Would Rain
04. It's A Touchy Situation
05. You Can't Measure My Love
06. I Think I Got It
07. Invitation To A Heartbreak
08. For Old Times Sake
09. Who You Gonna Blame It On
10. You Were The Light
Delaney Bramlett - Vocals, Guitars
Spider Tayler - Lead Guitars
Randy Sharp - Guitars
Chuck Rainey, Chris Ethridge - Bass
Rick Sutherland, Jim Hobson - Keyboards
Stu Perry, Jim Keltner - Drums
Sidney Sharp & friends - Strings
Chuck Findley, Ollie Mitchell, Jackie Kelsor, Slyde Hyde, Quitman Dennis - Horns
Clydie King, Sherlie Matthews, Monalisa Young, Susie Allanson, Pat Erickson, Patti Quatro - Backing Vocals
Jennifer Warnes - See Me Feel Me, Touch Me, Heal Me - 1969
Jennifer Warnes is a Grammy- and Oscar-winning American singer, songwriter, arranger, and record producer. With her crystalline alto she has succeeded in several areas of popular music -- as a singer of contemporary pop and country, chart-topping movie themes, and arguably, the most empathic and authoritative interpreter of Leonard Cohen's songs (as evidenced by her 1986, career-defining album Famous Blue Raincoat, exclusively comprised of his work). She's also an in-demand backing vocalist. While she broke into the music business in the late 1960s, and has, on occasion, taken long sabbaticals, she remains active as a backing vocalist, songwriter and recording artist.
Warnes was born in Seattle, Washington and raised in Anaheim, California. She was offered her first recording contract at the age of seven, which her father turned down. She pursued her passion for music by singing in church and at local talent shows and pageants; she attended college on a music scholarship. While opera was her area of expertise, she chose folk music as her first avenue of expression, inspired by the Greenwich Village scene that birthed Joan Baez, Judy Collins, and Bob Dylan. To support her dream, she took whatever gigs were available in musical theater productions and in clubs and coffee houses. In 1967, she auditioned and became a regular cast member of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour as Jennifer Warren, winning her first wide public notice as a singer. She procured her first record deal in 1968 with Parrot and issued her debut, I Can Remember Everything. The record didn't chart but she followed it a year later with See Me, Feel Me, Touch Me, Heal Me, which also failed to chart. Two years later she signed to Reprise Records. In 1971, John Cale produced her third album Jennifer, and introduced her to Cohen, who became a close friend and frequent collaborator until his passing on November 7, 2016. Warnes performed with Cohen on tour as a backing vocalist in the '70s and eventually appeared on six of his albums.
Warnes joined the Arista Records roster under Clive Davis in 1976. Her 1977 single "Right Time of the Night," became a Top Ten pop hit and reached number one on the easy listening charts; it crossed over to place in the Top 40 of the country charts as well. It was drawn from her Arista debut album, Jennifer Warnes. The follow-up, Shot Through the Heart (1979), featured "I Know a Heartache When I See One," a Top Ten country and Top 40 pop and easy listening hit. Warnes' next album was an Arista best-of that fulfilled her contract. Her single "It Goes Like It Goes" was used in the 1979 motion picture Norma Rae, and she won her first Oscar for her performance of Randy Newman's "One More Hour" for Ragtime in 1981. Warnes signed to Island in July of 1982 and released "Up Where We Belong," a duet with Joe Cocker that was used as the theme song for the hit film An Officer and a Gentleman. It hit number one, went platinum, and won both an Oscar and a Golden Globe. Warnes became a go-to singer for cinema after that. She charted with "Nights Are Forever" (from Twilight Zone: The Movie) and the title theme duet (with Chris Thompson) from All the Right Moves. In 1985, she and B.J. Thomas recorded the duet "As Long as We've Got Each Other," the theme song for the TV show Growing Pains. That same year she also sang with composer/cellist Arthur Russell for the album that would become Calling Out of Context. In 1986, she became the first artist signed to the short-lived Cypress Records label, and released the Roscoe Beck-produced Famous Blue Raincoat at the beginning of 1987. It netted a Top 30 single for her reading of "First We Take Manhattan" (featuring guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and released before Cohen even recorded it). She also appeared on Warren Zevon's Sentimental Hygiene. In July, RCA released "(I've Had) The Time of My Life," a duet between Warnes and Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers, as the love theme for the film Dirty Dancing; it too won an Oscar and a Golden Globe. It also topped the charts and went gold. In September she appeared in the star-studded cast of the television special Roy Orbison and Friends: A Black and White Night. Warnes' follow-up to Famous Blue Raincoat took five long years. The Hunter, featuring her own songs and covers, was released in 1992, netting the number three single "Rock You Gently." Also on that set was the non-single track "Way Down Deep," co-written with Cohen. She returned to the cinema with the track "Cold Enough to Snow" for 1993's Life with Mikey.
Warnes didn't release another recording for a decade though she remained active recording for soundtracks and working with Cohen. In 2001, she released The Well, arguably her strongest album. It was recorded with an all-star cast that included Doyle Bramhall II, Vinnie Colaiuta, and Dean Parks. She wrote or co-wrote five of its eleven songs, and arranged everything from strings to backing vocals. Her covers were equally iconic and included the Cindy Walker & Eddy Arnold country standard "You Don’t Know Me," Tom Waits' "Invitation to the Blues," Billy Joel's "And So It Goes," and Arlo Guthrie's "Patriot's Dream." Given its release on an independent label, it scored at Americana radio but didn’t make the pop or country charts. Warnes took time out to care for her mother, who passed in 2003, and in the aftermath, she didn’t feel much like singing. She withdrew from the public eye but continued to work with Cohen. She also very selectively appeared on a few albums by old friends including John Prine, Chris Hillman, and Jude Johnstone. Fans had to make do with these performances, compilations, and reissues during these years. The total output included reissues of albums by Russell and Bert Jansch (she sang on the latter's 1982 Heartbreak). In 2013, RCA Japan reissued Jennifer.
01. Let The Sunshine In
02. Easy To Be Hard
03. Saturday Night At The World
04. Time Is On The Run
05. Old Folks
06. We're Not Gonna Take It
07. Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues
08. Backstreet Girl
09. Weather's Better
10. Tell Me Again I Love Thee
11. Cajun Train
Fairport Convention - A Tree With Roots - Fairport Convention & Friends And The Songs Of Bob Dylan - 2018
A new compilation of vintage covers of Bob Dylan’s work by Fairport Convention and their friends, A Tree With Roots — Fairport Convention And The Songs Of Bob Dylan, will be released on Island on 3 August. It comes just ahead of the 2018 edition of the band’s celebrated Cropredy Festival, which takes place this year from 9-11 August with Fairport themselves in the traditional headlining slot.
In their early days, before they developed their own songwriting, Fairport were much given to covering the work of Dylan, one of their prime influences. 2018 marks the 50th anniversary of the arrival of the American bard’s Basement Tapes acetate in London, from which the nascent English folk group took ‘Million Dollar Bash.’ It also offered up ‘Too Much Of Nothing’ to the Fairport splinter group Fotheringay.
Dylan was also responsible for Fairport’s one UK hit single, ‘Si Tu Dois Partir,’ their version of his ‘If You Gotta Go, Go Now’,’ written in 1964. It prompted an appearance by the band on Top Of The Pops and featured on their third album Unhalfbricking, spending two weeks at No. 21 on the UK singles chart.
That version is on A Tree With Roots along with such Dylan copyrights as ‘Lay Down Your Weary Tune,’ ‘I’ll Keep It With Mine’ and the more widely-celebrated ‘All Along The Watchtower’ and ‘Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.’ Tracks by Fotheringay and Fairport’s former lead singer Sandy Denny are also included.
01. Si Tu Dois Partir 02. Jack O' Diamonds 03. Lay Down Your Weary Tune (Live On John Peel's Top Gear) 04. Dear Landlord 05. Open The Door Richard (David Symonds BBC Session) 06. I'll Keep It With Mine 07. Percy's Song (Live On John Peel's Top Gear) 08. The Ballad Of Easy Rider 09. It Ain’t Me Babe (Demo) 10. George Jackson (Live At The Howff) 11. Tomorrow Is A Long Time (Live From The Royalty Theatre) 12. Days Of 49 (Live At Fairfield Halls, 1973) 13. Down In The Flood (Live At Fairfield Halls, 1973) 14. All Along The Watchtower (Live At Chateau Neuf, 1975) 15. Too Much Of Nothing 16. Million Dollar Bash 17. Knocking On Heaven's Door (Live At The L.A. Troubadour, 1974)
Originally formed in Yorkshire, England, in 1966, Smokie hit the British pop charts several times during the late '70s with updated psychedelic pop, influenced by the band's stay on Mickie Most's Rak Records as well as the writers of most of the band's hit material, Rak's Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman. Vocalist Chris Norman, bassist Terry Utley, and guitarist Alan Silson had played in the Elizabethans, but formed the band Kindness in 1968, with the addition of drummer Pete Spencer. The quartet recorded many singles during the late '60s and early '70s, but failed to show any chart activity until 1975. That year, signed to Rak Records and billed as Smokey, the band hit number three in the U.K. with "If You Think You Know How to Love Me." After another Top Ten hit, "Don't Play Your Rock 'n' Roll to Me," Smokey became Smokie; during 1976, the group scored with three Top 20 hits, including the number five "Living Next Door to Alice." Smokie hit number five both in 1977 ("It's Your Life") and 1978 ("Oh Carol"), but the band's chart run ended by early 1980, and following 1982's Midnight Delight, they disbanded. Both Spencer and Norman continued to work at Rak during the '80s, writing hits for several groups; they re-formed Smokie in 1988, resurfacing with the LP My Heart Is True. Two more albums, All Fired Up and Greatest Hits Live, followed, with the group remaining active throughout the 1990s, issuing new material as well as a number of hits collections.
Smokie are true rock and roll survivors. For over four decades they have dominated the live music scene in Europe. More than that, they are rock and roll frontiersmen, taking their music around the globe, with adoring fans across the continents. This specially curated collection brings together inspired cover versions sprinkled generously with that inimitable Smokie sound. Listen and you will understand why this iconic seventies band has filled auditoria around the world for over four decades.
01. Everytime You Go Away (Paul Young)
02. Hungry Eyes (Eric Carmen)
03. Who'll Stop The Rain (CCR)
04. When You Walk In The Room (The Searchers)
05. No Matter What (Boyzone)
06. Love Hurts (Nazareth)
07. Still The One (Shania Twain)
08. Drift Away (Dobie Gray)
09. Sailing (Rod Stewart)
10. Garden Party (Ricky Nelson)
11. Miss You Nights (Cliff Richard)
12. Just When I Need You Most (Randy VanWarmer)
Did Peppi Marchello, the fearless leader of The Good Rats, know that the end was near? Or was the leader of The World's Most Famous Unknown Band (as Rolling Stone Magazine called them) suddenly, creatively born again?
All that is certain is that the beloved, charismatic Maestro of Long Island precipitously began to pulsate again after years of relative silence. And when he erupted, dozens of new songs from the shrewd to the sublime began to spill forth in a rock and roll volcano that signaled it was time to get his road-hard band back into the studio.
So that is what he did.
Recorded over a two-year period in 2012 and 2013, his new songs cohered into the powerful Afterlife. Taken separately, each song is a unique paean to Peppis peculiar wit and powerful voice. Together, the tracks display a ripened songwriter, a potent poet uniquely capable of bringing us along on his ardent lifes journey. The songs are pure, primal a clever cocktail of rock, p-i-s-s and vinegar refined by blue-collar sensibilities and a love of the craft. It s the stonework swan song that Peppi Marchello wanted to leave behind.
Sadly, after 40 years of recording, Afterlife would be Peppis last billet doux to his adoring family and fans. The historic collection was destined to contain his final written and recorded works.
Anthony Peppi Marchello passed away on July 11, 2013 prior to finishing the album with his sons Stefan and Gene. The songs are personal, powerful, and pure Peppi. In all, they form a final chapter that closes the Good Rats illustrious legend in style and dignity.
01. I'm Still Around
02. She Goes Dirty
03. Washington Lies
04. User
05. Ratcity Slime
06. Alaska
07. Why The World Should Love
08. Vampire Blood Love
09. Politically Correct
10. Afterlife
11. That Was Then, This Is Now
12. Saint Marie
13. No Social Graces
14. White Trash
15. Oh Darlin
With the 2010 release of The Last Euro Tour, the ongoing series of posthumous releases by Spirit continues under the aegis of Floating World Records' Retroworld imprint, having moved from the Acadia label. But Spirit archivist Mick Skidmore is still in charge of preparing vintage tapes of the band for release, and the album chronicles what turned out to be the final European outing by the trio of singer/guitarist Randy California, drummer Ed Cassidy, and bassist/singer Mike Nile in November 1991. They played eight shows in England, Germany, and Austria, and came home with DAT soundboard tapes from which Skidmore has assembled an idealized, lengthy performance containing versions of all but one of the songs performed on the tour. (He deemed neither of the two takes of "Love Tonight" releasable.) Spirit was promoting its then-recently released Tent of Miracles album, and they played half-a-dozen tracks from it, including several written by Nile, who also took lead vocals on them, making him much more than a hired bassist accompanying principals California and Cassidy. Wisely, however, the group also presented an extensive "hits" repertoire, drawing ten songs from the four albums made by the original Spirit lineup, 1968-1970, including such favorites as "Nature's Way" and "I Got a Line on You." The rest consisted largely of blues covers by the likes of Mance Lipscomb and Jimmy Reed, plus the Jimi Hendrix arrangements of songs like "All Along the Watchtower" and "Hey Joe," reminding listeners of California's connection to Hendrix, with whom he played as a teenager. This is not the fully loaded Spirit of the early days, but it is a tight power trio led by California's psychedelic and bluesy guitar leads and Cassidy's powerful drumming, which means it is the version of Spirit that actually maintained the band's name for more than a quarter-century after the breakup of the original lineup, pleasing a lot of fans along the way, many of them in Europe.
CD 1
01. Love From Here
02. Uncle Jack
03. Fresh Garbage
04. Tent of Miracles
05. Nature's Way
06. Like a Rolling Stone
07. Ship of Fools
08. Animal Zoo
09. Darlin' If
10. Miss This Train
11. Hey Joe
12. Zandu
13. Deep In This Land
14. Kokomo
CD 2
01. Downer
02. Stone Lover
03. Mr. Skin
04. Turn to the Right
05. Dark Eyed Woman
06. Old Black Magic
07. Going Up, Going Down
08. All the Same/I Got a Line On You
09. Prelude: Nothing to Hide
10. All Along the Watchtower
11. Wild Things
