Axl's Catch Groove

I am a big fan of Sturgill Simpson, both as an artist and as a producer. Strurgill’s latest production is of his touring drummer, Miles Miller. Miles has a mellow voice that sounds like a Country-fried James Taylor. The arrangements would not have been out of place on a ’70s James Taylor album either. It is soft-rock with a twist of Country. The upbeat tunes have a nice roadhouse vibe. Solid Gold is aptly named – the album is absolutely solid gold.

I recently talked with a friend about the difference between Country music and Americana. My conclusion is that they are pretty similar if you ignore the more pop side of country music. The differences are not so much musical, but other things like:

• Politics – Americana tends to be more liberal and Country music is more conservative
• Venues – Americana thrives in clubs and theaters, whereas Country thrives in arenas, stadiums, and large festivals
• Rural vs. Urban – Americana is not so much urban as it is realistic about rural life, whereas Country music is sentimental and at times dog whistling MAGA values
• Nashville – There seem to be two Nashvilles – the one that churns out hits for Country radio and the one that churns out music for music’s sake; the first is Country music and the second is Americana. A lot of Americana lives outside of Nashville too.
• Songwriting – Americana values singer-songwriters and Country values professional songwriters (often writing by committee)

I could go on and on, but the point here is Miles Miller is in the Americana lane. He wrote all the songs on this album. I tend to be drawn to Americana vs. Country music but don’t draw hard lines. If you like James Taylor and Americana, you will love Miles Miller’s debut Solid Gold.

As part of the press cycle, Miller states:

“Solid Gold is a love story, but about love being around and love leaving. It’s an entire story essentially about wanting to get back to the love you have, realizing you shouldn’t give it away, to love leaving, hitting the road because of it leaving, feeling love on the road, love from home, to realizing you need to keep walking and wish them well. It’s an album about the cycle of a love story that crumbles.”

Miller and Simpson have assembled a great band: Miles Miller on acoustic guitar, drums, and vocals; Laur Joamets (Drivin N Cryin and Sturgill Simpson) on electric guitar; Dave Roe (Nashville session ace) on bass; Mike Rojas on piano (another Nashville session and touring ace); and Mark Howard on acoustic guitar and mandolin. The band beautifully supports Miller’s songwriting. This is an amazing debut from someone I have never heard of. The LP’s hype sticker declares: “MILES MILLER SOLID GOLD – COUNTRY MUSIC’S SECRET WEAPON ARRIVES WITH HIS DEBUT SOLO ALBUM.”

Although, not an essential entry into the Wilco catalog, Cousin is an excellent album. It is an amalgamation of what they do best and therefore a great introduction to Wilco. I was smitten at first listen and it has only gotten better with subsequent listens.

Steven Hyden, in a recent episode of IndieCast, proposed an interesting theory: really good recording artists/bands (he used the term “legacy bands”) have, at best, a 7 to 8 essential album lifespan – the rest of the catalog is non-essential. He was specifically using Wilco as an example. Wilco had an amazing seven album run from 1995 (A.M.) through 2007 (Sky Blue Sky) – I am including their collaboration with Woody Guthrie and Billy Brag (1998’s Mermaid Avenue). Those albums define Wilco – all are masterpieces. Although they have not had a bad album, I would argue that the next seven studio albums (including Cousin) are non-essential. The “essential theory” doesn’t require the albums to be in sequence, like the Wilco example, but that is often the case.

What do I mean by “essential?” An essential album is an album that defines the band and resonates with a fan base and music critics. Most recording artists never have an essential album. When a recording artist does have an essential album it is a big deal. An artist rarely has more than one and even rarer to have multiple essential albums. Wilco is in the esteemed category of having a long string of essential albums. I would argue that they have never made a bad album – merely good albums that are overshadowed by masterpieces. The essential albums make up the core of their catalog.

I recently was turned on to two legacy bands by late-career albums that fans and critics might consider non-essential: The National (2019’s I Am Easy To Find) and Drive-By Truckers (2022’s Welcome 2 Club XIII). These two albums opened the door for me to the bands. I agree there is a core (essential) catalog, but these late-career non-essential albums are still important. In the case of The National, I prefer the late-period albums.

When Wilco released Cruel County without warning in the spring of 2022, I was delighted. It was a pivot back to the Americana music that was their foundation. Although it was not an innovation, it was executed so perfectly that it was as good as anything in their catalog. Despite its excellence, it is hard to argue it is more important (essential) than their earlier works.

Cousin is a pivot back to the experimental spirit of the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot/A Ghost Is Born era. Like Cruel Country, it is not an innovation, but a perfect execution of Wilco.

Cousin is the first time, the band used an outside producer since 2009’s Wilco (The Album): Cate Le Bon. She is a Welsh musician and record producer (e.g., Deerhunter, Kurt Vile, and Devendra Banhart). Per Wilco’s leader Jeff Tweedy:

“There aren’t a whole lot of white male rock groups that feel vibrant in any way to me. I don’t know what they’re singing about. I don’t know what they’re angry about. I don’t know what they care about other than maintaining and protecting their status, and I don’t want that to be the way Wilco looks at itself. It felt really right to ask a woman to produce a record for us because it was an honest way to surrender some of those assumptions.”

From Spin

The collaboration with Cate Le Bon works brilliantly. She brings a new twist on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot/A Ghost Is Born quirkiness that is both fresh and familiar. Based on the Spin article quoted above, the band truly gave the keys to Le Bon and let her drive. The results are a beautiful yet challenging album that is as strong as anything in their catalog despite not being a new innovation. Le Bon appears to have helped Wilco be Wilco. As a bonus, the album is sonically lush – beautifully engineered and mixed.

Here are some quick tales on each track:

• “Infinite Surprise” – welcome back weird Wilco (i.e., Yankee Hotel Foxtrot/A Ghost Is Born era).
• In “Ten Dead” Wilco captures the sadness of our time: another mass shooting and the only sensible response is: “I woke up this morning / And I went back to bed.”
• “Levee” is beautiful gloom.
• “Evicted” without sounding anything like Prince, I couldn’t help thinking about Prince’s “Raspberry Beret.”
• “Sunlight Ends” has the rich sonic vibe of Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark – slick in a good way.
• “A Bowl and a Pudding” has a Nick Drake feel with an ample dose of George Harrison.
• “Cousin” demands to be heard live – it has a nice Tom Petty jangle at the end.
• “Pittsburgh” opens like a Tweedy solo song but quickly goes YHF only to return to the quiet solo acoustic sound and then back to YHF – it is an inspired volley between the two styles.
• “Soldier Child” classic Wilco Folk Rock with a The Ventures guitar riff.
• “Meant to Be” opens like a New Order dance jam only to turn into pure Wilco.

Wilco is one of my favorite bands. They have never disappointed me, but they have underwhelmed me. Cousin is a delightful addition to the Wilco catalog and not underwhelming. The addition of a Cate Le Bon as producer adds a tasty spice to the Wilco hotdish. The fact that a legacy band, nearly three decades deep in their career, is creating material that demands repeated listens and has me craving to hear it performed live is impressive. I would comfortably use Cousin as a calling card of the band to potential fans. Hopefully, it will do what The National’s I Am Easy To Find and Drive-By Truckers’ Welcome 2 Club XIII did for me – open up the rabbit hole to a wonderful recording artist and their catalog to new fans.

The vinyl edition is a nice quiet pressing. It doesn’t sound significantly different from the high-resolution stream. It does have a nice warm analog sound – the digital sharp edges have been rounded. This is a beautifully recorded and mixed album and both the digital stream and vinyl versions deliver that beauty.

POSTSCRIPT: It’s been a few months now since Cousin came out and it still sounds great. I am starting to up my appraisal. This is a consequential album. “Ten Dead” captures the dread of hearing of another mass shooting. Sonically, this album is a mature update of the YHF aesthetic. There is a bias toward the prettier side of Wilco – which is prettier than ever. They sound fully engaged in making art. Every listen reveals and I am impressed. Feeling lucky that a bunch of mature bands are still productive (Wilco, The National, Drive-By Truckers, Dylan, The Stones, etc.). Wilco is entertaining the hell out of me and making me think.

Rose City Band’s (RCB) new album, Garden Party, is a blissed-out Dead-inspired musical anodyne. In these stressful times we need safe and effective painkillers and Garden Party fits the bill perfectly.

I loved RCB’s self-titled debut in 2019. I was less enthusiastic about the sophomore Summerlong in 2020 and the third Earth Trip in 2021. It is not that those two albums were not good, they just didn’t thrill me like the debut. I ignored the latest, Garden Party when it came out this spring. Recently I listened to it again- it gripped me in a similar way as the debut – it is even better.

RCB was originally the brainchild of Ripley Johnson (Wooden Shjips and Moon Duo). It was a studio experiment and not really a band. Over time it has expanded from a studio experiment to a touring band. The studio “band” and the touring band are separate, but related entities. I have yet to see the band live, but evidently, they are great and this new album is said to capture some of the live magic in the studio.

Per the band’s label (Thrill Jockey):

“Rose City Band’s country psychedelic rock evokes the wide-open spaces of the American west and free spirits who call it home.“

The interplay between Ripley Johnson’s guitar and pedal steel guitarist Barry Walker (from the touring band) is gorgeous. In addition to the guitars, there is touring keyboardist Paul Hasenberg and synth-wiz Sanae Yamada (from Moon Duo) adding beautiful textures. Moon Duo’s drummer John Jeffrey holds it all together rhythmically.

The lo-fi sound of the debut is upgraded to Steely Dan-like perfection on Garden Party.

I am a fan of music that can both serve as musical wallpaper providing a gorgeous soundtrack and music worthy of active listening. Ripley Johnson and the band have achieved this high-wire act with Garden Party.

Chris Stapleton is an anomaly in country music, having more in common with Americana than Nashville, yet he is beloved by the country music establishment. Chris plays stadiums, despite his humble style and barely sounds country, he sounds like a ’70s rocker. He isn’t pretty, but he does have a cool outlaw country look.

I am not a big fan, but every time I hear his music I like it. I saw him live at Lollapalooza when he was promoting 2015’s Traveler – he was awesome and he rocked. I saw him perform “Tennessee Whiskey” live with Justin Timberlake on the Jimmy Fallon post-Super Bowl show in Minneapolis (2018) and he completely upstaged JT. Traveler resonated with me, but his subsequent albums fell flat.

He has a new album, Higher, and so I gave it a listen and I like it. It sounds like a well crafted singer-songwriter album from the late 70s. He has soulful vocals that reminds me of a country Al Green. The arrangements and mix are gorgeous (of course they are, Dave Cobb is producing). The guitar solos are short and tasteful (Stapleton plays most of the licks and rhythm). Lyrically, he is an adult – the usual Nashville bro tropes (pickup trucks, getting drunk, hookups, etc.) are absent. In summary, he creates tasty grooves on Higher. Maybe all his albums are this good and I was just not in the right place to appreciate them. If you have not listened to Chris Stapleton, this is a great place to start. If you are a long-time fan you can argue if this is his best yet. This would be a great reference album to test drive a stereo.

If you only have the patience to listen to one song, make it “South Dakota.”

In the late 90s, the Drive-By Truckers (DBT) reinvented southern rock, specifically Lynyrd Skynyrd, with an alternative/indie rock aesthetic – achieving perfection in the early 00s with Southern Rock Opera (2001), Decoration Day (2003) and The Dirty South (2004). The DBT had an insightful take on the modern American South that can be summarized in this lyric:

“Proud of the glory, stare down the shame
Duality of the southern thing”

From the song “The Southern Thing” from 2001’s Southern Rock Opera

Asheville, North Carolina’s Wednesday is updating southern rock for the current decade. Wednesday openly acknowledges their appreciation of the DBT and name-checks the band on Rat Saw Dog’s song “Bath County:.”

“Hittem with a dose of Narcan
Sat right up in the leaned back seat of his
Two door sedan
On the way home, play Drive-By Truckеrs songs real loud
You’ll be my baby ’til my body’s in the ground”

They bring indie rock, grunge, alt-country, and shoegaze to their brand of southern rock. They have also mastered the fine art of melodic-buzz-saw-guitars. I have always been a sucker for melodic-buzz-saw-guitars, for example, Bob Mould (with Hüsker Dü, solo, and Sugar), Smashing Pumpkins, Nirvana, Foo Fighters, The Pixies, etc.

Karly Hartzman, the band’s primary songwriter, also brings a Southern Jewish perspective. She understands the challenges of being Jewish in the South and illustrates it with a novelist detail:

“The kid from the Jewish family got the preacher’s kid pregnant
They sent her off and we never heard too much more about it”

From “Quarry”

At first, I was put off by the squall of guitars, but by song five, I found alt-country comfort in “Chosen to Deserve.” That opened my mind to what the band was doing, and now after listening to the album about ten times, “I get it” and enjoy their point of view. I am intrigued by the stories of dirtbag southern teenagers in the same way as I have enjoyed Springsteen’s blue-collar New Jersey and the Hold Steady’s upper Midwest hood rats. As Steven Hyden’s review points out, the band has a great sense of place.

I thank IndieCast for tipping me off to this album and persuading me to give it a serious try. On my own, I would have never made an effort.

It is great to find a young rock band who, although not shy about their influences, have found their own voice.

In my opinion, the Stones’ golden age (the 70s) ended in 1981 with Tattoo You. I have measured each studio album released over the last four decades (AKA late-period Stones) against their golden age and they have all fallen short. My reaction to each new album, over the last four decades is:

• Likable – I can’t think of a late-period Stones album that I have hated, I have liked them all
• Grateful – just happy they are still alive and capable of producing new material
• Disappointed – although I like the new material, it never lives up to their best work
• Forgettable – after a few weeks of listening it gets put on the shelf and rarely (if ever) listened to again
• Surprising – on the rare occasion I have gone back to a post Tattoo You album, I have been surprised that it is much better than I remember

I like Hackney Diamonds. It is a grower: each rotation sounds a little better and I hear something new. It is as good, if not better than anything in their late period. I took the effort to listen to the six studio albums of new material released between Tattoo You and Hackney Diamonds to verify this was not recency bias – I confirmed it is better than some and about even with others. The late-period is better than I remembered, but not golden, it isn’t fair to compare late-period albums to the 70s masterpieces.

The Stones are giving their all to promote Hackney Diamonds. That being said, I bet only about 1% of the people who attended a Stones stadium show will give a shit about this album. This is a gift to hardcore fans.

The most remarkable thing is that Mick’s voice still sounds excellent and Keef and Ronnie still have some tasty riffs in their fingers. This is a respectable Stones album. Although, it lacks their classic danger (that has been the case for a long time), it is fun, and at least one song, “Sweet Sounds of Heaven,” belongs on my list of 50 best Stones songs (that is an aspirational list – I have yet to make it). This album sounds contemporary without pandering.

Mick Jagger and Keith Richards are is 80. Despite their age, as recently as 2021, when I last saw them live, they remained the greatest live rock band I have ever witnessed. Can the band pull off a late-career recording masterpiece the same way Dylan did at the age of 79 with Rough And Rowdy Ways? Hackney Diamonds is not a masterpiece and won’t overshadow the best in their catalog, but it is a solid Stones album.

My first listen to Hackney Diamonds didn’t hit me. It sounded like an AI version of the Stones with the “make it sound current” dial turned up to 10. But with each subsequent listen it sounds less contrived and is an excellent late-career artistic statement. There are a handful of songs that really resonate with me. It may not be their best since Tatoo You, but it is very satisfying to this old fan. Here is some track-by-track commentary:

“Angry” on the first listen evoked that AI-Stones reaction in me, but with each listen it sounds more naturally Stones to me. Plus it has an epic video.

“Get Close” has a nice contemporary Stones riff. Lots of guitars here. Wonderful sax solo from James King of Fitz and the Tantrums. Elton John is on piano, but he is really buried in the mix – I had to listen very carefully to hear him.

“Depending On You” is a gorgeous acoustic(ish) ballad – a little country. This is an amazing soulful rock vocal from Jagger – his pipes sound amazing (freakish for an 80-year-old rock star). Someone from Nashville needs to cover this.

“Bite My Head Off” is raunchy rock and roll riffs – almost punk rock. Sir Paul McCartney lays down the bass line throughout and has a wonderfully distorted bass solo during the bridge. Again, Jagger’s vocals are amazing. Keef and Ronnie are in a raucous guitar conversation, old dudes proving they still got it. The Replacements would be proud of the old coots.

“Whole Wide World” WTF Mick? What is this? At first, it sounded like a pop song, but the more I listen to it, it is a very clever rock song – damn Gaga should cover this. Lyrically, it has proletariat frustration, but it is also kind of a party anthem. This song that I first dismissed is pretty good.

“Dreamy Skies” is classic country Stones. Just a rock star who needs a break: “I just need some peace from the storm/I got to break away from it all.”

“Mess It Up” the song starts with what I assume is the Charlie Watts (drums) demo tracks – then it kicks into gear as the remaining members flesh it out. When you hear Charlie’s drums for the first time on this album with this song you realize how important he was to Stones’ sound. Interestingly, this is not a rock song but more of an R&B number.

“Live By the Sword” is graced by Bill Wyman (bass), Elton John (piano), and Charlie Watts (drums). You can hear Elton on this track and he sounds badass. But overall this is the least interesting track on the album.

“Driving Me Too Hard” is kind of country. This is a great example of the band sounding contemporary without embarrassing themselves.

“Tell Me Straight” is a gorgeous Keef ballad. He sounds beautifully vulnerable.

“Sweet Sounds of Heaven” is my favorite song on the album. It is classic gospel Stones and includes Lady Gaga on vocals and Stevie Wonder on piano. Below is an epic live performance promoting the album. Hot take: this is a top 50 Stones song. Magnificent.

“Rolling Stone Blues” – The Stones are the original Black Keys/White Stripes. It is easy to forget what a unique and genius interpretation of the blues the Stones are capable of. We are officially reminded of their special gift on this track.

If this is the band’s last studio album, it will be a beautiful goodbye.

Postscript: About 2 months after the release of Hackney Diamonds, the Stones have reissued the album on streaming services with bonus live tracks from their release day promo gig (10/20/23) at the celebrity-studded Racket NYC (e.g.: Christie Brinkley, Elvis Costello and Trevor Noah). It is a short show, seven songs: 3 classic and 4 from Hackney Diamonds. The band sounds fantastic: Keith and Ronnie have epic snarling guitar duels and Jagger sounds as good as ever. I have seen the Stones live several times, for me, Jagger is the greatest rock frontman of all time (sorry Prince and Bruce, you have your virtues too). The fact that he still has it at 80 is freakish. The voice has actually gotten sweeter. The live Hackney Diamonds songs rival the studio cuts. This is an energetic band – the Stones are the best.

This settles it for me, Hackney Diamonds is a very good album, that just got better with these bonus cuts. Top 10 album for 2023 for me.

Bob Dylan At Budokan (1979) is a seminal album in my Dylan fandom. When it came out in early 1979 I was a newly minted Dylan fan (a 20-year-old college sophomore). I had just a few Dylan albums under my belt and was drawn to this album as it looked like the greatest hits live. As a venue, Budokan was known to me from Cheap Trick’s ubiquitous radio hits from their live at Budokan LP.

Bob Dylan At Budokan was love at first sight. I was familiar with about half the songs and I was fascinated by the radical rearrangements. For the songs I was not familiar with, this was my introduction. It served a similar role as Joni Mitchell’s Miles Of Aisles (also a live greatest hits). This was my primary early Dylan education, I played it incessantly.

I was too ignorant to have the conventional critical opinion of the time: this album sucked and Dylan must have lost his mind. The main criticism was the arrangements: it sounded like Bob fronting a Vegas show band (it didn’t help that Dylan was dressed in white like a Vegas Elvis). The performance undermined his legacy – he was washed up and lost in the wilderness. I was too dumb to be scandalized, so I dug the arrangements.

But time has mellowed the hate of Budokon. The revisionist history is that, this is the foundation for the second half of Dylan’s career. From this point forward, Dylan’s live performances would mean radical reinterpretations of his songs – a feature and not a bug. The specific arrangements here foreshadow his Christian born-again gospel chapter. Dylan would make major stylistic changes with each subsequent album. Today, we expect Dylan to trick us. It would be unimaginable in 1979 that Budokan would warrant a box set of the two complete concerts at Nippon Budokan Hall, Tokyo, Japan, February 28 and March 1, 1978 – but like most of Dylan’s left-hand turns into oncoming traffic, time as cured.

Given, how important this album was to my development as a Dylan fan, I am overjoyed to have this set and grateful that it is available on streaming (including in high resolution – I am using Tidal which is streaming MQA 24/96). Yet, as big of a fan as I am of this album, and due to my existential crisis regarding collecting physical music (CDs and LPs), I am not up for shelling out $160 for a 4-CD version (plus I have stopped buying CDs in favor of vinyl and the vinyl version which is nearly $500). A reasonable $40 compromise, assuming you have the original Budokon, is the 16-song vinyl double LP: Another Budokon 1978. It includes the eleven additional songs above plus a few of the songs from the original album, but from the alternate night.

The Complete Budokan is 58 songs (the original was 22 songs). Most of the 36 new songs are repeats as this set documents two back-to-back concerts. However several songs are unique to this set. The audio is remixed from the original 24-channel analog tapes – it sounds great on my high-resolution stream. Since I am streaming, I can’t speak to the packaging, but it looks great (see below) – as is typically the case with Dylan box sets.

I think the most important question is how are the 36 additional songs? The original album pulled songs from both nights. Most of the songs on the original album are repeated on both nights but are not significant in their differences. Eleven songs did not appear on the original album, but some of those are repeated on both nights. The songs that never appeared on the original album are:

• REPOSSESSION BLUES – blues cover
• I THREW IT ALL AWAY (both nights)
• GIRL FROM THE NORTH COUNTRY (both nights)
• TO RAMONA
• ONE OF US MUST KNOW (SOONER OR LATER) (both nights)
• YOU’RE A BIG GIRL NOW (both nights)
• TOMORROW IS A LONG TIME
• A HARD RAIN’S A-GONNA FALL (both nights – instrumental)
• LOVE HER WITH A FEELING – blues cover
•  DON’T BELIEVE YOU (SHE ACTS LIKE WE NEVER HAVE MET)
• THE MAN IN ME

The additions of these songs are great. Plus the sequencing of The Complete Budokan 1978 feels more like an actual concert. The songs that are repeated each night are not significantly different, but it is nice to have two complete concerts. The Complete Budokan 1978 is not essential for the casual fan – the original Budokon is good enough. But if the original Budokon is important to you, then The Complete is a wonderful addition to your obsession.

Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark is an important milestone in my development as a musichead. It is the first album that opened my ears to how artistic pop music can be.

This Record Store Day (RSD) release is a collection of demo recordings of eight of the eleven Court and Spark songs. The recordings are not “never heard before” rarities, but rather come from Joni Mitchell Archives – Vol. 3: The Asylum Years (1972–1975) 5 CD box set that was released in October 2023. This LP is a sampler from that box focused on a section of CD 3.

I have not purchased any of the Joni reissues/archives. My experience with similar Dylan reissues is I spend a lot of money, listen once or twice, and then they gather dust on the shelf. With streaming, I can access the collection for “free.” Don’t worry, Joni has collected plenty of my money over the years. I gave the box a superficial listen on streaming (Tidal) when it first came out. I never really sunk my teeth into it. This RSD release, from this past Black Friday (2023), is the perfect sampler for me, especially its focus on Court and Spark.

Side one of the LP opens with “Piano Suite” which is a medley of “Down To You,” “Court and Spark,” and “Car On A Hill.” It is just Joni’s vocals accompanying herself on piano. It gives me the sense that Joni knew exactly what she sonically wanted Court and Spark (the album) to sound like. The suite was the sonic blueprint for the producer and musicians to work their magic to flesh out Joni’s vision. Not only is it a template of the songs, but it shows how they should weave together to create an album. It is a wonderful glimpse at her creative process. This is the gem of the compilation.

Side one is completed by “People’s Parties.” Here it is just Joni accompanying herself on guitar (including some Joni overdubbed harmonies). Again, it is a pretty clear blueprint for her collaborators.

Side two opens with one of Joni’s greatest hits: “Help Me.” Most of this version is a barebones template of the final product with a solo Joni vocal and guitar. There are some slight lyric differences from the final version. The coolest variation is the song ends with a desperate-sounding cry for help which is absent in the final album version.

“Just Like This Train,” “Raised On Robbery,” and “Trouble Child” are all clear blueprints of the final version (except for “Robbery’s” wonderful overdubbed banshee harmonies).

The Court and Spark Demos are a beautiful gift to Joni fans. I am repeating myself, but I am amazed at how clear a vision Joni had of the final product in these demos. The LP is a fun peek behind Joni’s creative curtain.

Below is a Tidal playlist (24/44.1 MQA) of this RSD LP taken from Joni Mitchell Archives – Vol. 3. Joni is not on Spotify given her disgust of Spotify accommodating material she objects to (similar to the Neil Young boycott of Spotify).

Listen to playlist in TIDAL: JONI MITCHELL Court and Spark Demos RSD BF 2023

I “discovered” David Grisman on his classic jazz bluegrass fusion (which he calls Dawg music) album: Hot Dawg (1979). I “discovered” Jerry Garcia via the Jerry Garcia Band on their 1991 eponymous live album.

This album was originally released as a CD on Grisman’s Acoustic Disc label in August 1998. I have had that CD version for about twenty years – “discovering” the album about five years after it was released. I have been a fan of mandolinist David Grisman and the inspiration for this album, Miles Davis, since the late ‘70s. I became a Jerry Garcia fan in the 90s. I was never much of a Grateful Dead fan, but man am I a fan of all of Jerry’s outside of The Dead music adventures. It is so diverse: country, bluegrass, jazz, soul, rock, multiple configurations, etc.

I am a longtime fan of this album. When I saw that a vinyl edition (2400 copies were pressed) for Record Store Day 2023 Black Friday (RSD) it was immediately prioritized as my number one for RSD.

I got up at 5:30 on Black Friday to increase my odds of acquiring my RSD list from Stinkweeds, my go-to Phoenix indie record store. I was disappointed that Stinkweeds did not even get any – this occasionally happens on RSD due to production or shipping delays. Store owner Kimber Lanning said they would take my name and number and they would text me if it came in. I was hopeful it would show up. Sure enough, I got a text five days later that they had a copy with my name on it. Sadly, predators on Discogs are selling this for double the price.

David Grisman’s contribution to society was creating a jazz/bluegrass/folk fusion that he calls “Dawg music.” He also is a buddy of Jerry Garcia and they have collaborated on several musical projects. On this project David and Jerry are joined by sidemen from David’s regular band (bassist Jim Kerwin, Joe Craven on percussion, and, on two numbers, flutist Matt Eakle), the co-leaders perform three versions of Miles Davis’ “So What,” two of apiece of Milt Jackson’s “Bag’s Groove” and Davis’ “Milestones,” and one of Grisman’s “16/16.”

So What is a rare opportunity to hear Jerry playing jazz (Dawg style) music, a genre which he loved but rarely performed. I am very familiar with the source material as Miles Davis’ Kind Of Blue (and most of his catalog) is an important album to me.

Although songs are repeated across the two discs, the improvisation is significant enough to not be bored by the repetition, but enlightened by David and Jerry’s creativity. This kind of music is gentle enough to play as background music and sophisticated enough to listen with full attention. Although Jerry is the big name here, David is the star of this release. He is to mandolin what Béla Fleck is to banjo. This is a great introduction to Dawg music and to yet another side of Jerry Garcia.

This is a “RSD First” which means the title is found first at indie record stores as part of a Record Store Day but may be released to other retailers or websites at some point in the future. So I would not pay current Discogs prices as this should eventually be available via vinyl at reasonable retail prices.