Tuesday, May 19, 2026

Dallas Good's final recorded project due from Yep Roc on June 26th

Dallas Good's Were The Watchtowers, feat. Kurt Vile, John Doe, Yo La Tengo, Jon Spencer and others, will be released June 26.  

From Yep Roc HQ...

Yep Roc is honoured to announce the June 26th wide-release of Were The Watchtowers, the final recorded work of Dallas Good, completed before his unexpected passing in February 2022. Written and recorded slowly over more than a decade with Richard Reed Parry, the project captures a deeply collaborative, cosmic strain of psychedelic Americana. Guest appearances include Neko Case, Kurt Vile, Yo La Tengo, Jim Jarmusch, John Doe, Jon Spencer, Scott McCaughey, Gary Louris and Margaret Atwood. 

Listen to the single "Echo the Part" (below) and order a physical copy on White vinyl or CD at https://goodparry.lnk.to/echothepart.


ES:MO launch Sunshine In My Bones @ Hugh's Room, Saturday

Elizabeth Shepherd and Michael Occhipinti will be playing songs from their latest ES:MO recording at Hugh's Room on Saturday. 

ES:MO (Elizabeth Shepherd & Michael Occhipinti) 
at Hugh's Room (296 Broadview Avenue)
Saturday, May 23
Show at 8pm, Doors at 7pm
$30+ in advance, $37+at the door

Elizabeth Shepherd and Michael Occhipinti (ES:MO) have been featured in each other's projects for almost a decade, with Elizabeth being the vocalist and pianist for Michael Occhipinti's The Universe of John Lennon, and Michael touring as the guitarist in Elizabeth's group promoting her albums Montreal and The Signal.  Their duo album, The Weight of Hope, was nominated for a 2022 JUNO award and we can’t wait to hear their new album to be released at Hugh’s Room on Saturday May 23. Get tickets right here

Check out the new video for the ES:MO version of Jason Isbell's "If We Were Vampires" along with a few tracks from the Sunshine In My Bones album out now. Get the album right here.

 







Happy Birthday Cecil McBee!

Celebrating the 91st birthday of bass boss Cecil McBee with a short doc, an interview and a couple of classic performances. 






Monday, May 18, 2026

R.I.P Isaac "Ike" Willis, 1955-2026

Sadly, singer/guitarist Ike Willis – a longtime Frank Zappa collaborator – has passed away at 70. He'll be greatly missed.




Velour Underground continues May residency @ The Baby G, Tuesday

Flowers Of Hell members become Velour Underground to play your Reed/Cale faves at The Baby G on Tuesdays 8 pm to 12 midnight.

Here's the scoop... 
Lou Reed championed Toronto’s Flowers Of Hell, so this May they’ll be performing two sets of Velvet Underground songs at The Baby G (1608 Dundas St. West) every Tuesday in May as The Velour Underground. Expect fan favourites and a changing array of deep cuts each week, plus a light show. With the similar capacities of the Baby G and NYC’s Max’s Kansas City where the Velvets did their 1970 residency, this is as close as you can get to the real experience! Take a walk on the wild side! 

100 tickets available in advance (no charge via Dice right here), remaining tickets available at the door on a first come-first served basis. Doors open at 8 pm. Velour Underground residency at The Baby G continues May 19 and May 26. Check out The Velour Underground in action below. 

 





Happy Birthday Mark Mothersbaugh of DEVO!

Celebrating the birthday of DEVO mainman Mark Mothersbaugh with a few interviews and a tour of his music studio and devices.












Ichi-Bons salute The Sonics & Mel Dorsey on new Ugly Pop seven-inch

Check out The Ichi-Bons' performances of "The Witch" and "Little Lil" along with the original versions below.  

Here's the scoop from Ugly Pop HQ...
Ugly Pop is very pleased to announce our second single from the finest group playing in Toronto today, the mighty Ichi-Bons! Tearing it up on two potent slabs of their patented Desperate Rock'n'Roll, Ichi-Bons are joined here by sax savage Spencer Evoy for maximum blaze. Topside's a delicious, delirious take on an obscure Mel Dorsey rocker from '59, while anybody with an ear for this music will recognize the flip's all-time Sonics scorcher. This is a one-time only pressing of 400. (UGLY POP UP085). 

You can get it directly from the Ichi-Bons at their show with The Deltas at Toronto's Legendary Horseshoe Tavern on Friday (May 22) or you can mail order a copy via Big Cartel right here. While you're there, grab a copy of Ichi-Bons guitarist Mamoru Banzai's new "Strollin' At Dawn" 3-song solo instrumental EP – which should appeal to fans of Link Wray – also on Ugly Pop available here
 




Get tickets for The Ichi-Bons' double-bill with The Deltas at the Horseshoe Friday (May 22) right here.


Sunday, May 17, 2026

Remembering singer/songwriter Jesse Winchester on his birthday

Raising a glass to singer/songwriter extraordinaire Jesse Winchester with a few interviews and performances.








Gary Stewart pre-RCA archival comp due from Delmore in July

Delmore's new Gary Stewart rarities disc One Track Mind makes an ace companion for Jimmy McDonough's new biography of the late honky tonk hero. 

Previously unreleased, pre-RCA recordings by the once, future and forever King Of The Honky-Tonks. For nearly two decades, we obsessively scoured the vaults of multiple publishing houses along Music Row, and the endless archives of Gary's closest friend, Tommy Schwartz, all in search of elusive performances rumoured to exist. One Track Mind is Delmore's third deep dive into the Gary Stewart legacy, which began with the Grandma's Roadhouse LP in 2010.

One Track Mind (out July 17 via Nashville's Delmore Recording Society) finds Gary toward the beginning of his career as a songwriter—newly arrived in Nashville from Fort Pierce, Florida, signing first with Cedarwood and then Forrest Hills publishing. Working primarily with early songwriting partner Bill Eldridge, several tunes heard on this collection would be recorded by luminaries of the genre, including Del Reeves ("One Track Mind"), Cal Smith ("You Can't Housebreak a Tomcat"), Jack Greene ("There's a Whole Lot About a Woman (A Man Don't Know)") and Nat Stuckey ("The Snuff Queen”). But no one sang these songs like Gary Stewart.

Also included are a handful of stripped down departures from the Nashville sound. Recorded in Gary's Williamson County, TN trailer, "Beautiful River" is a gorgeous, solo ballad, complete with his signature whistling. Alongside it is a guitar-vocal demo of "The Snuff Queen" -sourced from a beat-to-hell acetate disc- that puts an altogether different country-blues spin on this early Gary classic. (The studio version of "The Snuff Queen", was released as a B side by Kapp in 1970, and later included on the 1975 MCA compilation LP, "You're Not The Woman You Used To Be"). The LP culminates in a jaw dropping, early recording of "Williamson County", which is unlike anything Gary recorded before or since. A singular performance that needs to be heard to be believed, and almost unrecognizable from the polished version recorded for 1975’s Out of Hand, Gary’s debut LP for RCA. The whereabouts of the other songs Gary recorded that day remains a mystery.

What isn't a mystery is that Gary sings every song here with everything he's got. Whether you're new to the powerful artistry of Gary Stewart, or a long time obsessive, there's much to love within these fully loaded grooves. Delmore couldn't be prouder to have the opportunity to bring more Gary Stewart music into the world.

The digital / CD release contains four bonus tracks, including the complete legendary Mowtown session. Delmore released the first two Motown numbers as a Record Store Day vinyl only single in 2018. Gary's demo of the Four Tops classic "I Can't Help Myself" (Sugar Pie, Honeybunch), is heard here for the first time, and all three are making their digital debuts.

Last month, a definitive biography, Gary Stewart: I Am From the Honky-Tonks, was published by Jimmy McDonough (author of the New York Times bestseller Shakey: Neil Young's Biography). Read more about Jimmy McDonough's Gary Stewart biography on The Perlich Post right here. And check out an interview with Jimmy McDonough over here.

Is the Country Music Hall Of Fame next? It's about damn time. 

Pre-order a copy of Gary Stewart's One Track Mind via Bandcamp right here. Check out a short documentary on Gary Stewart following the track listing below. 




Gary Stewart – One Track Mind

1. One Track Mind

2. Kings And Queens

3. Woman Will Tear The Heart Right Out Of A Man

4. Big Bad Train

5. Living The Life Of A Dog

6. Don't Put A Poor Hand On Me

7. Her Apple Pie

8. My Mind Is On You

9. Iron Bar Motel 02:46

10. The Bottom Of The Pile

11. There's A Whole Lot About A Woman (A Man Don't Know)

12. If You Come Back Darling

13. You Can't Housebreak A Tomcat

14. The Snuff Queen (acetate)

15. Beautiful River (trailer demo)

16. Williamson County






Saturday, May 16, 2026

Brown Horse @ The Monarch Tavern, Saturday

Promising UK country rockers Brown Horse hit the Monarch Tavern with the well-crafted songs from their Total Dive album out now. Doors at 7 pm!

Here's the scoop...

Brown Horse is a Norwich-based country rock band. Rooted in a collaborative approach to songwriting, the six-piece mix guitar-driven 90s alternative rock with the folk and country sounds of the 70s.

In April 2026 Brown Horse released their third album Total Dive on Loose Records. Their strongest and most grounded work to date, it showcases a new level of skill and assurance in the Norwich band’s thoughtful lyricism and musicality. Leaning away from the playfulness and eclecticism of their previous works, Total Dive sees Brown Horse step forward into the darkness with a cautious optimism. With songs from each of the four members (Patrick Turner, Nyle Holihan, Emma Tovell and Rowan Braham) the writing charts a world of small revelations and painful changes. As they move confidently between searing noise and delicate reflection, Brown Horse take time to note the beauty and agony of the mundane; the death rattle of a vending machine, headlights flashing in the eyes of a road-killed fox, the heather-pink of a winter sky. 

The new album is the clearest expression yet of Brown Horse’s unique sound - somewhere between Jay Farrar's darker impulses of Uncle Tupelo's country rock, the raw intimacy of early Cat Power, and the haunted landscapes of Magnolia Electric Co., while embracing the self-possessed noisiness of alt rock trailblazers like Built to Spill and The Breeders. Bolstered by the playing of Norwich drummer, Ben Rodwell, and the vocal harmonies of Leeds-based musician, Neve Cariad, Total Dive is the sound of a band coming fully into their own. These are songs inhabited by wide Norfolk skies, thousands of shared miles on the road, the noise of heartbreak and humour, and the echoing silence of long hours spent in strange in-between places.

Tickets for Brown Horse's much-anticipated Toronto show at the Monarch Tavern (12 Clinton) tonight (Saturday, May 16) are $27.75 and available here. Doors open at 7 pm. Check out a couple of Brown Horse's videos after the impressive title track from their Total Dive album below.   





Happy 80th Birthday Robert Fripp!

Celebrating the 80th birthday of guitarist Robert Fripp with a few interviews and more. Cheers Robert!








Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan's compositions get the spotlight on new multi-artist comp

Ace Records has gathered 19 stellar covers of songs by Tom Waits & Kathleen Brennan for Where The Willow and The Dogwood Grow. 

Here's the scoop... 

With undeniable cultural gravity, the team of Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan join luminaries such as Bob Dylan, Chuck Berry, Randy Newman, Carole King and Gerry Goffin, Leonard Cohen, Lee Hazlewood, Brian Wilson and Laura Nyro in Ace Records’ long-running series of multi-artist compilations celebrating the great American songwriters of the modern era. Hundreds of artists from all walks of music have recorded songs from Waits and Brennan’s matchless catalogue, 19 of the finest of which comprise the hand-picked selection Where The Willow and The Dogwood Grow (out May 29th), including many chosen by the songwriters themselves.

Few artists have remapped the terrain of popular music, and culture at large, like Tom Waits. Over the course of five decades, he has forged a singular aesthetic that defies genre and turns the marginal into myth. His work is neither fully inside nor outside the mainstream tradition but moves restlessly between them, drawing from vaudeville, blues, jazz, folk, theatre – and just about anything else that catches his ear – to craft something wholly his own. His influence reverberates not just through the underground and avant-garde, but across theatre, film, literature, and visual art. With his long-time creative partner and wife Kathleen Brennan, he has dismantled and reassembled the idea of song itself, crafting works that exist as both raw expression and high art. This collection honours not only the extraordinary versatility of Waits and Brennan’s songwriting, but the importance of an artist who continues to haunt and inspire from the edges inward.

Ace’s selection is sequenced chronologically by song, opening with Bruce Springsteen’s live recording of ‘Jersey Girl’, Waits’ ode to Brennan from 1980’s Heartattack And Vine, and closing with folk matriarch Joan Baez’s version of Waits and Brennan’s anti-war ‘Day After Tomorrow’ from Waits’ more recent Real Gone. “All the great things that came out of New Jersey don’t hold a candle to Kathleen Brennan, at least not in Tom’s eyes,” Bob Dylan said on his Theme Time Radio Hour show. “She rescued me,” reflected Waits in an interview for The Guardian. “Maybe I rescued her too, that’s often how it works. Upshot is that we both got into the same leaky boat. Everybody knows she’s the brains behind Pa, as Dylan might have said. I’m just the figurehead. She’s the one who’s steering the ship.”

In addition to “steering the ship”, Brennan became Waits’ songwriting partner. The couple’s first-released joint composition, ‘Hang Down Your Head’ from Rain Dogs, is heard here in a raunchy rendition by country-blues heroine Lucinda Williams. Elsewhere, performers from the worlds of jazz, blues, gospel, soul and rock put their own stamps on great songs with which Waits devotees will be familiar on Swordfishtrombones, Rain Dogs, Franks Wild Years, Big Time, Bone Machine, Mule Variations, Real Gone and Orphans. Pride of place – because it’s a particular favourite of Waits and proved incredibly challenging to license – goes to the heart-wrenching recording of ‘Down There By The Train’ from Johnny Cash’s late-life masterpiece American Recordings.

Made with the blessing, approval and involvement of Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan, Where The Willow And The Dogwood Grow is an essential collection for any fan of this remarkable artist’s unique work.

Where The Willow and The Dogwood Grow: 

Words & Music by Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan

1. JERSEY GIRL - BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE E STREET BAND

2. 16 SHELLS FROM A THIRTY-OUGHT-SIX - BOB SEGER & THE SILVER BULLET BAND

3. GIN-SOAKED BOY - SOUTHSIDE JOHNNY & THE ASBURY JUKES

4. JOCKEY FULL OF BOURBON - LOS LOBOS

5. HANG DOWN YOUR HEAD - LUCINDA WILLIAMS

6. TEMPTATION - DIANA KRALL

7. YESTERDAY IS HERE - BETTYE LAVETTE

8. WAY DOWN IN THE HOLE - THE BLIND BOYS OF ALABAMA

9. STRANGE WEATHER - MARIANNE FAITHFULL

10. I DON'T WANNA GROW UP - RAMONES

11. DOWN THERE BY THE TRAIN - JOHNNY CASH

12. HOUSE WHERE NOBODY LIVES - KING ERNEST

13. PICTURE IN A FRAME - WILLIE NELSON

14. HOLD ON - MADISON CUNNINGHAM

15. THE LONG WAY HOME - NORAH JONES

16. 2:19 - JOHN HAMMOND

17. DIAMOND IN YOUR MIND - SOLOMON BURKE

18. TRAMPLED ROSE - ALISON KRAUSS / ROBERT PLANT

19. DAY AFTER TOMORROW - JOAN BAEZ

Get a copy of Where The Willow and The Dogwood Grow directly from Ace Records right here. Check out a few alternate performances by some of the artists included. 







Friday, May 15, 2026

David Letterman gives Late Show host Stephen Colbert proper send off

With one week to go on The Late Show, host Stephen Colbert joined David Letterman on the roof of NYC's Ed Sullivan Theatre. 



R.I.P. soul legend Clarence Carter, 1936-2026

Sadly, soul singer/songwriter Clarence Carter has passed away at 90. He'll be greatly missed. 








Happy Birthday Karin Krog!

Celebrating the birthday of Norwegian jazz vocalist Karin Krog with a unique take on "Caravan," a short doc, and more! 










Two For The Weekend: Jon Spencer

Check out "Orange Slice Blues" and "Knock 'em Out" off Jon Spencer's new album. Catch him live in T.O. this September!

 

Songs of Personal Loss And Protest


Picking up where 2024’s mini–LP SICK OF BEING SICK left off, Jon tears it up with KENDALL WIND on bass and SPIDER BOWMAN on drums (also famously the rhythm section of Woodstock’s punk powerhouse The Bobby Lees). They deliver garage punk for today — hyper-driven soul and powerhouse groove, beats hard as diamonds and slick as ice, fuzz bass in your face, and an avalanche of uncontrollable urges, pushing Jon’s latest outbursts — hollering, drooling, sexified crooning, and vociferously lamenting these difficult times — to new levels of rock’n’roll expressionism. SONGS OF PERSONAL LOSS AND PROTEST is the New New Super Heavy Rock for Hard Times.

 SONGS OF PERSONAL LOSS AND PROTEST is set for release on June 12th on vinyl, CD (with bonus tracks), and all digital platforms via Shove Records, Bronze Rat Records in the EU/UK, and Sony Japan in Japan. Stream/Pre-order here: https://shoverecords.lnk.to/knockemout


Check out "Orange Slice Blues" and "Knock 'Em Out" below. 

Don't miss Jon Spencer live in Ontario! Catch him September 8th in Ottawa, September 10th in Toronto, and September 11th in Hamilton. Tickets go on sale May 15th at 10AM right here: https://www.weare-inthefuture.com/jon-spencer-ontario/




Thursday, May 14, 2026

Eric Chenaux, Rafael Toral, Masahiro Takahashi @ Standard Time, Thursday

Eric Chenaux & Ryan Driver split the impressive TONE triple bill with Rafael Toral & Masahiro Takahashi with Brodie West!


ERIC CHENAUX & RYAN DRIVER 
Constellation Records' guitarist & singer Eric Chenaux returns home to Toronto for a foray with long-time collaborator Ryan Driver. Gentle acoustic guitar notes stretch out & ripple underneath electric psych inspired meanderings. Eric's voice weaves seamlessly among this textural landscape, like a silk sheet in the wind. Every movement is subtle, yet beautiful. A storyteller from a slower time, a player from the jazz tradition borrowing gracefully from the folk form. Two sonic ramblers existing out of time, but in step with their own hearts. 

RAFAEL TORAL 
Portuguese experimental guitarist & synthesist Rafael Toral comes to town in support of his newest record on Drag City, “Traveling Light”. A collection of jazz standards put through Toral’s elongated ambient treatments. Notes stretch and crackle as they become humming landscapes. Ethereal drones emerge out of woozy jazz phrases. Throughout his close to 40 year career he’s built a plethora of home brew electronic instruments that now work in conversation with his guitar work. Together this intricate textural & rhythmic dance moves his work into a totally other sonic universe where it feels like a rare bird sending its bent coos & tweets back to earth from a distant space station. Rafael catches these errant notes and arranges them perfectly. Don’t miss this! 

MASAHIRO TAKAHASHI with BRODIE WEST
Toronto-based Japanese composer-musician Masahiro Takahashi has been crafting gently spellbinding pieces that simultaneously embrace electronic abstraction and a palpable, even brittle, humanity. His delicate and evocative landscapes always seem to be illuminated in vibrant magic hour tones as golden synth lines emanate from between soft flickers of acoustic instrumentation. He has released music on an array of labels, such as Not Not Fun, JJ Funhouse, Slow Editions and his 2026 record In Another on Telephone Explosion Records. He also composes for films and art installations.

Get tickets for the TONE presentation right here. Check out a couple of performances below. 
 





Remembering Sidney Bechet on his birthday

Remembering clarinet king Sidney Bechet on his birthday with a few Haitian-influenced swingers and a documentary.






R.I.P. Terry Stamp, 1945-2026

Sadly, singer/guitarist Terry Stamp of proto-punk legends Third World War has passed away. He'll be greatly missed!







LINKS
It's Psychedelic Baby Magazine Interview with Third World War's Terry Stamp



John Hollenbeck's George @ The Rex Jazz Bar, May 14-16

Drummer John Hollenbeck's experimental jazz crew George continue their weekend stint at the Rex tonight through Saturday. 

John Hollenbeck's George

at The Rex (194 Queen St. West)

Thursday (May 14) through Saturday (May 16)

Tickets/info: https://www.therex.ca/events/george-zeawd


GEORGE is what happens when groove meets inquiry — when analog warmth and digital edge blur into something both unexpected and deeply human. Formed by composer/drummer John Hollenbeck during the stillness of the pandemic, the quartet quickly became a fully realized ensemble.

Featuring Anna Webber (tenor saxophone, flute), Sarah Rossy (voice, synthesizer), Chiquita Magic (synthesizers, voice), and John Hollenbeck (drums, composition), GEORGE creates music that lives in the margins — between vintage funk and futuristic electronica, jazz and art-pop, structure and improvisation. As DownBeat noted, “Magic happens in the margins and the middle.” As Pitchfork observed, when the band locks in, its energy is “as infectious as a perfect pop tune.”

But GEORGE isn’t just about sound — it’s about resonance.

The band is named in tribute to George Floyd — in remembrance of his life and the violence that ended it. The name also resonates with a wide constellation of Georges: the Greek georgos (“earthworker”), George Washington Carver, George Clinton, George Orwell, Georgia O’Keeffe, George Saunders, George Lewis, George Gervin. Saints and revolutionaries. Artists and outsiders. The name carries history, contradiction, groove, and gravity.

These themes are woven seamlessly into performances audiences describe as sublime, immersive, surprising, and deeply nourishing.

Their debut album, Letters to George (Out Of Your Head Records, 2023), was praised by AllMusic as “a remarkable debut” featuring “captivating, provocative compositions.” In 2026, GEORGE releases Looking for Consonance, also on Out Of Your Head Records,  recorded at Hansa Studios in Berlin. The album expands the band’s sonic world while deepening its emotional and political clarity. From groove-driven pieces like “bounce,” to the diasporic offering “Nassam Alayna-LHawa,” to “Norma (in support of reproductive autonomy),” the music moves fluidly between celebration and reflection, tension and release.

Live, GEORGE is immersive, dynamic, and deeply felt. Wordless vocal harmonies dissolve into microtonal synth textures. Tenor saxophone lines soar over rhythmic frameworks that are both tight and expansive. Drums shift from whisper to thunder. The band’s compact instrumentation belies a vast sonic palette — at times orchestral, at times intimate.

Each member brings a singular voice:

Anna Webber is a flutist, saxophonist, and composer whose interests and work live in the aesthetic overlap between avant-garde jazz and new classical music. She was recently named a 2021 Berlin Prize Fellow and was voted the top “Rising Star” flutist in the 2020 Downbeat Critic’s Poll. 

Sarah Rossy is a vocalist, keyboardist, composer and producer based in Montreal, Canada. Sarah's practice combines live electronic processing with jazz, folk, and Arabic music to create autobiographical, ethereal, and socially-outspoken soundscapes. Recent themes in Sarah's work include ancestral continua, intergenerational linkage and community healing. A debut audiovisual album, a tender autobiographical soundscape imagined through a kaleidoscopic electronic jazz lens entitled 'OF WHO WE HAVE BECOME', is set for release in 2024.

SPECIAL GUEST: Yvonne Rogers is a pianist, composer, and multimedia artist from Maine, now based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work is rooted in improvisation and play, blending avant-garde jazz with contemporary composition and intuitive, textural exploration. Described as a “fresh, new voice on piano” (The Free Jazz Collective), she leads her own projects — including her 2023 debut album Seeds, a suite of lyrical, playful and collaborative music — and appears on trumpet-leader Adam O’Farrill’s 2026 album ELEPHANT, where her piano and synthesizer work contributes to the quartet’s fluid, genre-blurring sound.

Genre-crossing composer/percussionist John Hollenbeck, renowned in both the jazz and new-music worlds, has gained widespread recognition as the driving force behind the unclassifiable Claudia Quintet and the ambitious John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, groups with roots in jazz, world music, and contemporary composition. He has earned six GRAMMY nominations and has worked with many of the world's leading musicians in jazz including Bob Brookmeyer, Fred Hersch, Tony Malaby, and is well known in new-music circles for his long-time collaboration with Meredith Monk.

Together, they deliver music that is inventive yet deeply human — groove-centered, emotionally generous, and instantly engaging. 

For more info and dates, check out John Hollenbeck's site: https://johnhollenbeck.com/band/george/. Check out a couple of George performances and a recent recording below. 






Wednesday, May 13, 2026

The Return of Drumheller! @ The Tranzac Club, Wednesday

Nick Fraser reconnects with Drumheller pals Brodie West, Doug Tielli, Rob Clutton & Eric Chenaux at the Tranzac tonight at 7 pm.







Remembering composer/arranger Gil Evans on his birthday

Remembering Toronto-born composer/arranger Gil Evans on his birthday with a documentary and a few recordings.







90s Nostalgia: A remastered version of Eleventh Dream Day's Lived To Tell?

Seems like Eleventh Dream Day's 1991 album Lived To Tell is way overdue for a properly remastered vinyl reissue.


Here's the scoop...

The resurrection of Lived To Tell (originally titled Trips We Lived To Tell, dumbed down at the suggestion of Atlantic Records) truly beggars belief (in that your belief goes broke trying to believe the story). For many years, the band groused about the mastering of the original Atlantic release - not the recording, not the mix - the mastering. Page even got involved at one point reaching out to former EDD/Atlantic publicist Tim Sommer as to the possible whereabouts of the original tapes. A response was not forthcoming. Then one day, random fellow Fred G notifies us that he recently purchased the contents of a storage locker in California that had belonged to the late recording engineer Paul McKenna. Inside, he informed us, were a bunch of DATs from the Lived To Tell sessions. An insane bolt from the blue? Is your belief beggared? 

Fast forward to 2026, and the good people of Comedy Minus One Records (check out their entire Eleventh Dream Day product line right here) have liberated the original majesty of one of the Dream Day's very best records. Listen here to the ripened guitar interplay, the luxurious low end, the hectoring of a menacing Rizzo impossibly sweetened by Bean accompaniment. And of course the whole pulverizing attack. Am I chalking it up to the remastering? Honestly Page is not 100% clear what "remastering" means, and is easily swayed by the power of suggestion. Maybe CMO or Rick can offer the sonic context. Short of that, listen here...







The Necessary Evils vs. The Seeds

James Arthur's Necessary Evils add a greasy-grimey 90s wallop to The Seeds gem "The Gypsy Plays The Drums"



Tuesday, May 12, 2026

Happy Birthday Ronnie Foster!

Celebrating the birthday of Buffalo-born Hammond hero Ronnie Foster with "Mystic Brew" and more. Cheers Ronnie! 






Rodney Crowell's "lost" album Then Again set for release in June

Rodney felt the time is right for the songs he cut in 2005 with Guy Clark and Emmylou Harris to be released as Then Again. 

Here's the scoop on Then Again...

“I guess you could call it a lost album,” says Rodney Crowell. “I stumbled upon it in my vault at home. I’d forgotten about it completely.” He’s referring to Then Again, which he recorded and shelved two decades ago before moving off into new directions. Since then, the album has been biding its time, waiting for the moment when its songs would hit hardest. And they hit incredibly hard now, largely because age and experience have granted Crowell a richer perspective. “I’m glad I put it on the shelf, because now is the time for it. It may not be the time for it for the rest of the world, but it’s time for it for me. That’s why I wanted to call it Then Again. I thought that was a clever way of saying that what was happening then is happening now.

Back in 2006, Crowell was in high cotton. He was coming off a trilogy of albums—The Houston Kid in 2001, Fate’s Right Hand in 2003, The Outsider in 2005—that re-established him as a fearless voice in Americana and attracted new generations of fans drawn to his compassionate storytelling, his detail-laden songwriting, and his eloquent outrage over political injustices. In 2005 he went into Treasure Isle Studios in Nashville to record what would become Then Again. But when he heard the masters, something didn’t feel quite right. The band was smokin’ hot and the songs sounded good, but the album just didn’t move him and he struggled to figure out exactly what was wrong or what was missing. Twenty years later, when he found the album in his vaults, he couldn’t remember exactly what tripped him up. He decided it was finally time, if only because “I heard a record I wasn’t sick of. I was no longer sick of myself. That’s what 20 years will do for you.”

Once lost and now found, Then Again is something the Rodney Crowell of the 2000s could never have predicted but something the Rodney Crowell of the 2020s recognizes instinctively: a work of nuance, insight, and sensitivity that considers death but celebrates life. “I’m trying to understand that this spirit of mine is going to leave this body and go off somewhere else. I’ve got a pretty good idea that it’s going to be someplace good, but I still need to perfect some part of my spiritual journey here before I check out. I can see that in these songs now.”

Rodney Crowell's Then Again is out 6/26 via New West Records. Check the tracklisting followed by "Are You One Of Us" featuring the voice of Guy Clark below. You can pre-order copies on vinyl (or CD) right here


Rodney Crowell - Then Again

Side A 

I Won’t Lie

Are You One of Us? (feat. Guy Clark)

If I Could Speak To Leonard

Bring It on Home To Memphis

The Ballad of Artemis and Orion

Side B

Sing Your Heart Out (feat. Kieran Goss & Annie Kinsella)

Whatcha Gonna Do Now #2 (feat. Lyle Lovett & Chely Wright)

The Has-Been Vents His Spleen

40 Winters

Go Light a Candle (feat. Emmylou Harris & Lera Lynn)



Monday, May 11, 2026

Nick Fraser's Special Topics @ The Tranzac Club, Monday

Drummer deluxe Nick Fraser gets down improv-style with Max Stover, Kae Murphy & Josh Cole at the Tranzac tonight at 9:30 pm




Nick returns to the Tranzac with Drumheller featuring Brodie West & Eric Chenaux on Wednesday (May 13) at 7 pm. PWYC!




Rare Dan Penn & Homer Banks recordings released on 7" vinyl by Soul4Real

Soul4Real eschews dancefloor fodder for deep soul slow burners with choice demos from Dan Penn & Homer Banks.