Mp3s: The Long Winters in Allston, MA
Posted on November 13, 2006 at 12:01 am | No Comments
Thanks to this show, I can now pinpoint the exact date I became an unabashed fan of The Long Winters, as opposed to the casual admirer I’d been since their second record, 2003’s “When I Pretend To Fall“. While my appreciation for the songs of John Roderick & his Seattle mates was upped much further when their third album, “Putting the Days to Bed“, arrived from Barsuk this past July, it wasn’t until six weeks back that I really and truly got ’em. As the last note of their set faded on that last day of September, I made a beeline to their merch table to fill in any gaps, nearly amped enough (but not quite flush enough) to blow some cash on all the vinyl versions, which they noted were all now available there for the first time. So tempting for a wax-junkie, but I instead opted for their debut disc, 2002’s “The Worst You Can Do Is Harm“. Glad I did, as a couple of my faves from the set below reside there. It’s always refreshing when a band’s live show is evenly balanced between the old and the new.
Also refreshing? A frontman who is as genuinely engaging as he is talented. I’d heard tell of Mr. Roderick’s coherently goofy on-stage wit, and he definitely brought it with him to Harper’s Ferry that night. The banter entertained nearly as much as the songs themselves, and none of it forced, all of it delivered genially and sincerely. The guy’s as comfortable as can be up there, even as he’s good-naturedly insulting an audience member’s misguided fashion sense. If I ever get sick of the the band’s songs (and even with the amount I’ve listened to all three discs since the show, there’s no danger of that), the Long Winters’ live show ensured I’ll be seeing them again when and if they return to our coast…
Here’s their set…
Live at Harper’s Ferry
Allston, MA
Saturday, September 30th, 2006
01. intro
02. Rich Wife
03. banter 1
04. Shapes
05. banter 2
06. (It’s A) Departure
07. banter 3
08. Carparts
09. banter 4
10. Honest
11. New Girl
12. banter 5
13. Hindsight
14. banter 6
15. Scared Straight
16. Cinnamon
17. banter 7
18. Nora
19. banter 8
20. Blue Diamonds
21. banter 9
22. Jazz Jam
23. Stupid
24. Fire Island, AK
25. banter 10
26. Pushover
27. banter 11
28. Unsalted Butter
29. banter 12
30. Medicine Cabinet Pirate
Some Long Winters linkage…
Their own site, MySpace page, Wikipedia entry, and Barsuk Records page. Baby, You Got a Stew Goin’! was at the Bowery Ballroom show in NYC (the night before Boston),and offers up some words and pictures. And from that Bowery show, here’s a video clip of the improvised “Blues Jam“, which mutated to a jokey jazz jam the next night. I fear what other flavors of jam they opened up at subsequent shows. Official video action: Fire Island, AK (also on YouTube), and the unedited version of older vid “Blue Diamonds” (quicktime). Mp3: The Long Winters – “Pushover“. A few mp3s from their previous discs are available here at Barsuk, and here at their own site. Just a couple weeks ago the band played a few songs on NPR’s World Cafe. Stream live versions of “Teaspoon”, “Honest”, and “Fire Island, AK” from this page. Check out this excellent John Roderick interview that PopMatters shared last month. The band spends the rest of this month in Europe before a homecoming gig in Seattle on November 30th.
again with the fine print… If anyone has an issue with this live set being made available, just say the word (contact info in the ‘nac faq). Recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav and then edited to 192kbps mp3s. Mp3s are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.
Mp3s: Rose Melberg live in Allston
Posted on November 6, 2006 at 12:01 am | 1 Comment
I’ve been in love with Rose Melberg’s voice and songwriting since the first few notes of Tiger Trap’s self-titled K Records debut back in 1992, and feared I’d never get to see her play live when they broke up the following year. With her on the west coast and me up in Vermont, I held out hope that she’d head east with one of her follow-up projects, as half of guitars-n-harmonies duo the Softies or with trio Go Sailor. My wish came true in the summer of ’94 when the Softies came through Burlington on a tour with Crayon, and it was as special as I’d imagined. Her voice always hits me just right, and in person it’s hard to imagine a prettier sound.
Twelve years is way too long to wait for a second fix, but while Rose has been writing and releasing songs all along (solo and with her bands), I’ve been missing her rare live appearances. Distance and motherhood have kept her off any roads near Boston in recent years (she took an almost five-year live break until 2005), and when her newest (and to my ears, most beautiful) solo album “Cast Away The Clouds” came out last Spring I quietly wished she’d tour for it. Months passed with only a couple dates on the wrong side of the continent (she currently makes her home in Vancouver), until word came from record label Double Agent that she’d be doing a few east coast shows in October… and one was about a block from my house.
Although it was a Sunday, I’d rarely seen a night with so many great shows going on in the Boston area at the same time. There were at least three other lineups I might have seen, and all were courtesy of the excellent North East Sticks Together (N.E.S.T) Fest going on that week. But with Rose in town (and also a N.E.S.T. event), there was really no internal debate about my evening plans. All the competing musical choices resulted in a sparser crowd at O’Brien’s than I’d have otherwise expected, but one that was no less appreciative. The lighter attendance may also have been due to the unusual performer/venue combo: the Allston bar is more often host to far louder lineups, so pretty-pop fans might have been out of the loop or too far from the T for this one.
On this night, the loudest sound during Rose’s set may have been O’Brien’s cash register, or even the squeaky bathroom door, which almost act as instruments on these recordings. Also accompanying Rose’s voice and guitar is keyboardist and backing vocalist Nick Krgovich (of P:ano), who is a big part of the reason that “Cast Away The Clouds” is as gorgeous as it is. Here’s their wonderful set…
Live at O’Briens, Allston, MA
on Sunday, October 15th, 2006
1. Ciao Allston
(by Ellie Marshall with Christmas)
2. Things That We Do
3. Irene
4. Take Some Time
5. Putty In Your Hands
6. The Orchard
7. Cold Sea
8. Something Else
9. Golden Gate Bridge
10. Me & the Bees
11. Cast Away the Clouds
12. Coldest Night of the Year
(by Mann & Weill via Vashti Bunyan)
13. Each New Day
Some Rose-y links…
Her Double Agent page, MySpace page, and Wikipedia entry. Stream the lead-off track from “Cast Away The Clouds”, “Take Some Time“, over at NPR, which chose it as a song of the day back in May. The stellar WMBR radio program “Phoning It In” had Rose performing on the phone in July. Unfortunately the ‘listen‘ link is broken at the moment. Get on that, Nadav! 🙂Go have a listen. Speaking of “Phoning It In”, go listen to recent appearances from Portastatic‘s Mac McCaughan and Centro-matic‘s Will Johnson. Those links, thankfully, are very much in service.Download an mp3 of Rose covering Anne Briggs’ “The Time Has Come“, courtesy of Double Agent. In a September guest post on The Rawking Refuses To Stop, Chad from Everybody Cares, Everybody Understands comes up with collaborative gold in the form of Rose guesting on a performance of “The Biggest Lie” with Elliott Smith in Tempe, Arizona back in 1996. Not only is there audio, there’s video. Brilliantly heartbreaking. All sorts of other YouTubey goodness: The video for “Take Some Time“, along with a live performance of the song in NYC last June. There’s also a live clip of her doing “Irene” at NYC’s Cake Shop in April, “My Broken Heart” in San Francisco in May, and a little April on-stage Softies reunion in Seattle. Last but hardly least: Pick up your very own copy of “Cast Away The Clouds“, which you can listen to while sipping from your stylish Rose Melberg coffee mug.
the fine print… If anyone has an issue with this live set being made available, just say the word (contact info in the ‘nac faq). Recorded with a Sony ECM-719 mic and a Sony MZ-RH10 minidisc, converted to .wav and then edited to 192kbps mp3s. Mp3s are made available for a limited time, and are not reposted once removed.