Jakey Lou Williams was born and raised in West Virginia, USA. His Japanese born mother and his US Naval officer father were constantly on the move. Eventually settling in San Diego, the Williams family put their roots down. Jake and his sister took to the California culture and lifestyle as if born into it. Jake’s mother, recognizing that her son had tremendous musical talent, encouraged Jake to learn classical piano at an early age. However, his sister was instrumental in showing Jake that a world beyond classical music existed. She played Jake her favorite hard rock artists like Jimi Hendrix, Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. Soon Jake had switched to guitar as his instrument of choice and started on his road to becoming the legend that he is now. Unfortunately, his mentor and sister passed away in a motorcycle accident. But her influence was already established in her kid brother Jake.
During high school, he formed a band called Teaser changing his name to Jake E Lee. The band developed a large following in the Southern California area. Jake caught the eye of guitarist and good friend Warren DiMartini, and soon DiMartini was asking Jake for lessons. He also caught the eye of Stephen Pearcy the lead singer of a San Diego band called Mickey Rat. Pearcy asked Jake to join his band as lead guitarist, and he accepted. They changed the band’s name to Ratt, moved to L.A. and began playing the L.A. club circuit. The band’s established a huge fan base and much acclaim followed. However, Jake decided that Ratt didn’t fit the style of the music he wanted to play and decided to leave the group. DiMartini replaced him on Jake’s recommendation.
Jake played a few shows as lead guitarist of Rough Cutt, until Ronnie James Dio discovered his incredible talents. They planned to work together until Ozzy Osbourne interrupted them. He asked Jake to audition for his band following the sad passing of Randy Rhoads. Jake knew that Randy’s shoes were hard to fill, but he believed he was able to fill them. Ozzy auditioned around 500 other guitarists from around the world, eventually choosing Jake to fill the void of Randy Rhoads. Jake flew to England for rehearsal, and then went on tour with the legendary madman Ozzy Osbourne.
For the next four years, Jake recorded, wrote and toured with Ozzy. They released “Bark at the Moon”, which eventually went multi-platinum, and quickly quieted critics who said Rhoads could never be replaced. The “Ultimate Sin” album followed, which was another huge success for Ozzy. Osbourne, at the time was going through his well-documented drug and alcohol periods, and during a rehearsal fired Jake in the middle of one of his rages. Contrary to common belief, however, Ozzy and Jake remain good friends to this day. Ozzy has recently talked to Jake about a possible reunion, although Jake has repeatedly turned him down.
After the Ozzy Osbourne madness, Jake decided to take a well-earned break. He wanted to spend more time with his wife and daughter. As soon as word spread that Jake had left Ozzy’s band, the phone calls came in fast and furious. Nothing interested Jake, however, until he received a phone call from ex-Black Sabbath lead singer Ray Gillen. Gillen was hoping to form a blues-based metal band with Lee, and Lee responded. Together, they recruited bassist Greg Chaisson and drummer Eric Singer, and formed Badlands.
Badlands released their first album in 1989, self-titled “Badlands”. It was a mix of blues and hard rock, powered by hard-driving guitar riffs, receiving amazing critical acclaim as well as fantastic sales. The band toured worldwide to support the album, and followed it up with “Voodoo Highway”. This album was an even deeper dive into the blues, and again received much acclaim from critics. However, due to health issues, Ray left Badlands, and was replaced by John West. This incarnation proved not to be one that Jake wanted and Badlands disbanded. Unfortunately, Ray Gillen would eventually pass away due to complications caused by AIDS. In the year 2000, however, “Dusk” was released, which was recorded live in earlier sessions with Ray Gillen.
The passing of his friend Ray as well personal issues persuaded Jake to move away from the scene for a while. During this period of reflection, he was invited to play on many albums but only now has decided to re-launch his career.
Working with Kevin Churko and Ron Mancuso in Las Vegas, Jake E Lee’s spectacular new band ‘Red Dragon Cartel’ has recorded its’ eponymous first album for release on Frontiers Records in early 2014. The band features Darren Smith on lead vocals, Jonus Fairley on drums, Ron Mancuso on Bass and of course Jake E Lee on lead guitar. The album also features guest appearances from Robin Zander of ‘Cheap Trick’, Maria Brink from ‘In this Moment’ and many other all star musicians who appear on this album.
This amazing virtuoso guitarist with his new band will once again grace the rock world with his fire burning even brighter. Get ready for Jake E Lee’s Red Dragon Cartel to blast your head off in 2014.
Spinners should bring cuts that feature horn(s). Range of genre is encouraged…
PURGE
Purge was formed in Chicago in late 2006. It all began when guitarist/ vocalist Bernardo “Burns” Mendia crossed paths with drummer Rob Martin. The two were very ambitious and determined to create a buzz in the local area. Just a few months later, at only age 16, they quickly released a 5 song demo “Simply Gorgastic”. The released was a huge success and they soon became known by locals and all over Myspace for their sheer brutality at such a young age! In early 2007 the lineup was complete acquiring Bill Russell on bass and Josh Wheelock on rhythm guitar. Now, establishing their sound with brutal speeds and bone crushing breakdowns, the band was ready to take it to the next level.
They immediately began performing live all over northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin playing with big names such as Cannibal Corpse, Satyricon, The Faceless, Cradle of Filth, Obscura and many more. Purge was also featured in 2009 Blasphemer Festival. Soon after they released another demo featuring they’re hit song “The Urge to Purge” as well as “Artistic Torture”. Purge was really beginning to create a name for themselves in Chicago land catching the attention of Pit Magazine and Rebel Access TV. Unfortunately, in early 2009 the band decided to take a break for personal and financial reasons.
In early 2012 Purge reformed, re-releasing their hit single “The Urge to Purge”, determined to move up. The band quickly began playing shows all over Chicago land to re-establish their name, performing with reputable bands like Deicide, Nile, Cannibal Corpse, Decrepit Birth, Job for a Cowboy, Between the Buried and Me and many more, not to mention being a part of Summer Slaughter Fest 2012 in Milwaukee, WI. Purge is also regularly played on Rebel Radio, The Kat 105.5 WKAN and Max Ink Radio! Having just released their new EP “Beyond The Unknown”, Purge is determined to crush the metal scene with technical guitar passages racing across the fret board and rumbling break downs sure to melt off anyone’s face. PURGE is now stronger than ever, stunning audiences with their raw energy, insane riffs and professional musicianship. This band is guaranteed blow you away!
Guerilla is the greatest band you have never heard of. As much as these four mid-twenty year old guys would like to say they don’t give a shit, they have been playing music together since they could barely play their instruments. Guerilla plays music for the people – and by people I mean punks, 90’s music addicts, and anyone who will still get drunk on a Wednesday. As much as they enjoy playing at some of the more well known venues of Chicago, they would much rather have you catch them in some random guys basement. If the gritty chants and powerful riffs don’t get you hooked the first time you see them, then their sexy guitar shreds and occasional sax wailing will. It’s hard to sift through all the crap music and bands blowing smoke up your ass these days, so we’ll make it easy for you. Go listen to Guerilla.
Like Elastica with extra vitriol and a dash of grandeur.” – MTV Music Blog
Clinical Trials is the electro-grunge offspring of Somer Bingham, a self-produced multi-instrumentalist and a powerful performer who recently brought her grungy edge & likable personality to Showtime’s docu-series The Real L Word. Both Bingham and the music of Clinical Trials can be similarly described: fueled by punk, tinged with sexuality, and dangerously charming.
The other half of this riotous duo is pop-punk, riot-grrl inspired drummer Stacey Lee, a powerhouse behind the drums. With every bang on her kit, she adds her own touch of femininist-A.D.D to the male-dominated genre of rock n roll, inspired by the likes of Janet Weiss (Sleater-Kinney, Quasi, Wild Flag) and Stella Mozgawa (Warpaint). As a combined force, these two ladies put out more volume and sonic pleasantries than most 4 piece bands.
Taking inspiration from the energy of Nirvana, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and PJ Harvey, Clinical Trials oozes an intoxicating dysphoria that breeds in a world of whiskey waterfalls & post-punk pop. “If only Frances Bean would make up with Courtney – they would probably enjoy checking out this band together.” – Dave Cromwell, The Deli Magazine
Everything is better when it’s home-made. And it don’t get more down home or DIY than AJ Gaither. From the building of the instruments to the writing of the songs and making of the albums, everything about this “one man junk band” is lo-tech and hands on.
The sound is cold lonely bars and old empty barns, highways and heartaches. From raging high octane foot stompin’ brag songs to slow and soulful songs about struggle and being homesick, every bit of it is drenched in whiskey and hard living.
The instruments are old cigar boxes and scrap lumber, spare bolts and wood screws. Each is one unique in tone and appearance. A large feed bucket and a wooden mallet provide the kick drum, accompanied by a junk snare drum rigged to be played by foot. All built by the same hands that play them.
Often referred to by his peers as “the hardest working musician in Kansas City”, you will be hard pressed to find any solo musical performer that plays as many shows a year and exudes so much energy on stage night after night. The love for his craft is blatantly apparent.
Born in southern Arkansas AJ spent his early childhood in a rural community known as Locust Bayou. After growing up while moving around northern Arkansas and Memphis, at age 18 (to avoid arrest in the previously mentioned states) he found himself living in Kansas City KS. After 13 years of knuckle busting on old cars to make a dollar he formed the hillbilly two piece The Fall Down Drunks, who after releasing one album, “13 Shots”, and a brief amount of touring disbanded in the end of 2011.
In an effort to bring as much energy, sound and originality as he could while performing solo, he chose the path of a DIY multi-instrumentalist. Marking this transition was the release of his first solo album “Half-Lit & Whole Hearted” in 2012. He currently travels back roads and haunts biker bars, honky-tonks and dives of the South and Midwest, or anyplace with a good supply of whiskey and folks to lend an ear.
Look for the brand new album “Home Made” to be released Spring of 2013.
Donna the Buffalo’s feel-good, groove-oriented, danceable and often socially conscious music all began over twenty years ago with roots in old time fiddle music that evolved into a soulful electric Americana mix infused with elements of cajun/ zydeco, rock, folk, reggae, and country. Donna the Buffalo is known for touring the country remaining fiercely independent as one of the industry’s most diverse roots-music bands and has “earned a reputation as one of the most respected, eclectic and hardest-working acts today,” praises Encore.
Forming in 2013, four Chicago rock scene veterans teamed up to form Ignition Control. Bass player Mike Durso combined forces with guitarist Jim Wiora and singer/guitarist Lou Parrini. After an amicable parting of ways with original drummer, Carrie Lilligan, Jim’s brother Matt Wiora stepped up to take over duties on …the skins.
All together this foursome has over 30 years of stage experience and is thrilled to bring the party-on good times soundtrack of the open road cruise known as Van Rock to all of you!
We will fill your cruising vessel’s musical tank with a premium grade rocktane . We’ll airbrush the aural mural that’ll make you want to crank that custom sound system, roll down the windows and feel the wind in your bitchin’ sideburns. It’s all hard riffs, swinging rhythms, thunderous beats, soulful melodies, hypnotic jams, catchy hooks and bluesy vocals. So take a roll of the fuzzy dice and come dig the grooves that only Ignition Control is laying down. Ride on.
Milwaukee-based indie-pop rockers, Ivy Spokes, bring a sound they like to call “bio-digital” to the world. Formed in 2011 around the talents of Brandon Arndt, Hans Blanc and Phil Cowan, Ivy Spokes gives their audience a hearty portion of pop with a side of rock n’ roll. After independently releasing their 2011 debut EP, Chaos to Cosmos, which featured WAMI (Wisconsin Area Music Industry) Song of the Year Award Nominated song “In Dreams”, the band has immersed themselves in the Midwest scene, constantly writing and playing shows. Their guys are currently finishing up writing their next album to be released early 2014.
Zachariah N DeVries, a.k.a SpeedFlask, dropped out of school to travel around the US to attend music festivals. After a summer of traveling, he decided to go back to school to learn music theory and is currently pursuing music production at Recording Radio Film Connection.
Brooklyn rockers Walking Shapes have come a long way since their formation in late 2012. The band released their debut LP, Mixtape Vol. 1, on July 30 (via No Shame Records), had a residency at Pianos in NYC, and garnered truckloads of critical support from across the US for their bass-heavy, atmospheric rock aesthetic and frenetic live shows.
The band churns out brash anthemic rockers, steeped in hefty doses of melancholy sentiment and often complex world-weary narratives. But the band isn’t’ afraid to lighten up, and a few of their tracks could even be described as sunny, fuzz-filled rockers. Even these lighter songs, though, have an undercurrent of restlessness and uncertainty to them, as if the music itself wasn’t quite sure where it was heading. But far from feeling as though the band is just wandering aimlessly around the studio, the songs on Mixtape Vol. 1 pulse with a self-described “analog-meets-digital” heartbeat.
Virgin Mobile Meth Lab is a fast paced, highly addictive rock-n-roll band based in the seedy part of the South Bend, Indiana music scene. Featuring former and current members of Urinal Mints, Ass Puppets, Negative Nancy, Knuckle Deep and Orion’s Fury, this band is well diversed when cooking up this highly potent rock. In the vein of the Dwarves, Supersuckers, The Stooges and Turbonegro, you’ll get strung out and pulling tricks to get all the VMML that you can.
Snow tha Product, a native of California, but resident of Texas, is an underground phenomenon and sensation taking the scene by storm in a way that has put male MCs on alert. She’s a beauty and a beast – looks and lyrical skills on the microphone, respectively. Physical stature aside, she stands as tall as any female MC in the game and can wreck a track in fluent Spanish or English with a handful of male MCs trying to match her lyrical level, as she did on Capea El Dough P City Remix.
Let us be forthcoming about 22-year-old, Claudia A. Feliciano. We’d put her up against any female MC in the game, and we’re confident she’d give anyone of them a run for their money… or take their money. She’s a versatile, bilingual lyricist who can fluently chop you up in English or Spanish, so take your pick. She has the swag, attitude, fine-ass looks and in-your-face rhyming abilities to be a hip-hop sensation in the U.S. or Latin America, if only the industry could, as Snow would say it, wake they’re game up.
For now, Feliciano, better known to the streets as Snow Tha Product, is going to have to settle for being an international underground buzz-maker. We’re not exaggerating. You can find her on anything from videos with major-label Spanish-pop sensations like Jaime Kohen, to hit rap videos in Latin America to underground Mic Passes in Texas.
Everything we want in a Latino – excuse us – Latina, hip-hop artist.
“I am versatile and even though I’ve been taught the industry wants you to pick a lane and stay there, I’m too hyperactive for that. I’m going to just swang this Cadillac I call a career.”
Follow Snow Tha Product on MySpace and catch her web shows there every Wednesday at 9 p.m. CST. You can also catch her on Twitter, and download her free mixtape, Run Up or Shut Up here.
Very few Minnesota rock & roll bands, in the days before Prince and Grammy-winning producers Jimmy “Jam” Harris and Terry Lewis made the scene, managed to successfully steal even a slight serving of the nation’s auditory attention. Among such acts were the Trashmen, the Gestures, the Castaways and Crow. Before their precarious perching on the charts, Crow was known as South 40: Dave Wagner (vocals), Dave “Kink” Middlemist (organ), Harry Nehls (drums) and the brothers Dick Wiegand (guitar) and Larry Wiegand (bass), a twin cities bar band known for playing hard edged R & B. The formation of South 40 can be credited to the merging of two of Minneapolis’ favorite mid-sixties rock bands: the Rave-Ons and Jokers Wild. The album, South 40 Live At Someplace Else! (Metrobeat MBS-1000) contained such rock standards as “Fire,” “You Keep Me Hangin’ On,” “Get Out Of My Life Woman” and “99 ½” as well as several excellent originals such as “I Want Sunshine,” “If No Love,” “What’s Happenin’?” and “Goin’ Someplace Else.” Even then the group exhibited a very original style, combining the best of soul music, R & B, straight-ahead rock & roll. South 40 never received a lot of local airplay, so to speak, but did garner a bit of recognition in the outlying areas like Fargo, North Dakota and Duluth Minnesota.
The band’s big break came when it took first place in a “contest for rock bands” sponsored by the National Ballroom Operators Association in Des Moines, Iowa on September 29th, 1968. The prize – a recording session with Columbia Records. Three judges presided over N.B.O.A. contest that night, one was Timothy Kehr, former booking agent of the Rave-Ons. It came down to South 40 and the Fabulous Flippers, split even, until Kehr cast the deciding vote.
On January 31st, 1969, Crow entered the Columbia Recording Studio in Chicago for the first time, to begin what would be a bittersweet roller coaster ride that would last the next two-and-a-half years. Several changes had occurred in the four-month interim since winning the N.B.O.A. deal. Most notably was the name change. The guys, as one, decided to make it on a national level, South 40 just wasn’t going to cut it. But why Crow? “Well, a crow is a kind of funky bird,” recalled Kink Middlemist. “It’s a scavenger, a nasty hard-hitting kind of bird and our music is kind of that way. Also, it’s a short name, one that’s easy to remember.” Enough said.
Along with the name change came a personnel one too. Harry Nehls had received a good offer to join the local Minneapolis group T.C. Atlantic, so he left. After searching through the Minneapolis Musician’s Union entourage, Michael Malazgar was settled on. Denny Craswell (of the Castaways) had been the group’s first choice, but he had to finish up a few prior commitments with Blackwood Apology, of which he was a member. He would join the other four in about a month. Mike Malasgar was on the five-song session in Chicago, however. The five songs recorded during that cold January day were: “Time To Make A Turn,” “Busy Day,” “Gonna Leave A Mark,” “White Eyes” and “Evil Woman.” Columbia Records passed on Crow after hearing the demos. “Columbia had specked us the free time,” said Larry, “but they never promised records would come of the deal. I’m sure they had visions of Dave being another Gary Puckett, who was big for them at the time. We were a little bit too funky for them though. I’m sure that’s why they passed.”
Unbeknownst to Crow, Bob Monaco had been at the sessions that day listening and observing. Bob was the A & R man for Dunwich Productions. He liked what he heard in the group and called up Bruce Brantseg and expressed interest. Monaco notified his partners Bill Traut and Jim Golden, who were financial “brains” at Dunwich. The two began shopping Crow around to numerous major labels: Liberty, Elektra, Atlantic and Amaret.
‘Atlantic almost signed us,” said Dave. “They had Atlantic on the line and Amaret on the other. Amaret was decided upon because Traut and Golden felt we’d get buried with the larger Atlantic, who had so many other things going on. Of course we wanted to go with the bigger company of the two but nobody listened to us. In a matter of months, it turned out to be the biggest mistake we ever made. Amaret just couldn’t cover us. There was no way they could possibly follow us up with product in all the towns we traveled to. If the kids couldn’t find the product in their local record stores to buy, they’d forget about us real fast. That’s the bottom line.”
“Amaret got a hold of our songs and decided (on their own) to add horns to get more of a ‘Chicago’ sound like the Buckinghams,” said Dick. They had their own thoughts as to how to make our music sound better. I remember us arguing amongst ourselves about whether we wanted horns in our music or not. The bottom line was; if we didn’t have the horns in it, they weren’t going to put it out. That plucked our strings. The more we listened to the deal, the fatter it sounded. So we thought, ‘Well as long as these guys are pulling the strings as far as money goes – let’s get the record out.’ We figured we could regain control later on. At the time, I don’t think we thought the record would get as big as it did.”
With Denny Craswell finally in their ranks, Crow was brought into the Great Lakes Recording studio in Sparta, Michigan to begin work on what was to be their first album, Crow Music (Amaret ST 5002). “Time To Make A Turn” / “Busy Day” was chosen to begin the vinyl voyage for Crow. “I was dead set against Amaret releasing ‘Time…’ as our debut single from day one,” Dave said. “I knew it wasn’t a hit single. They went ahead and put it out, and it didn’t do much of anything.”
“Finally, they listened to us and released ‘Evil Woman.’ The record broke out in a major market (Seattle) in October and by year’s end, sold upwards of 600,000 copies. Billboard always quotes the song as making it to number 19, but Cashbox had it at number 7. Either way those kinds of sales were a commercial success in anyone’s book!”
With an album and a hit single both selling well, the band changed its base of operations temporarily, moving part and parcel to Chicago in the summer of 1969. There the guys accepted every job they could find. Monaco and Brantseg soon obliged the five by sending them on a major concert circuit to plug their released material. The band headlined the fourth annual Denver Teenage Fair (“Pop Expo ’69”), a major outdoor festival in Olympia, Washington called Sky River, and hit a certain peak for itself by appearing in concert with Janis Joplin in November. Spirits ran high and national fame seemed assured.
Crow continued to soar throughout 1970, a year in which the band grossed in excess of $200,000- a far cry from the $3000 a man it made in its days as South 40. By May 1970, their second album Crow by Crow (Amaret ST 5006) had been released and included superb songs, particularly “Cottage Cheese,” which included some of the old interplay between bass and drums the group had found so successful in the past. “Slow Down,” and “Gone Gone Gone” were also included which were a couple of old tunes penned by Larry Williams and the Everly Brothers, respectively. We were told the second album basically paid for itself, but not much more than that,” said Larry, “Traut and Golden put up all the money for the records, putting themselves on the hook. Once they got that back, they were supposed to give us what was left over. Funny-there never seemed to be anything left over. I don’t know how much money was ever made or lost, to this day. Maybe they didn’t recoup their money. I highly doubt it though, with sales in excess of a million-and-a-half records on both 45s and albums.”
Following the success of “Evil Woman,” two singles were released in 1970: “Cottage Cheese” and “Don’t Try To Lay No Boogie Woogie On The King OF Rock And Roll,” both of which managed to get no higher than the 50s on Billboard’s magic monitor of single hits (#56 and #52 respectively). By the dawn of 1971, things had changed for Crow. The singles were still coming out, but they weren’t making the charts, despite the release of their third album Mosaic (Amaret ST 5009) which included some interesting material. It contained the group’s recent single, “King Of Rock And Roll,” another old rock & roll number as well as “Easy Street,” a jazz flavored song, and “I Need Love” which featured Middlemist and L. Wiegand’s weird vocal harmonies, in a call and response format.
Between late 1969 and early 1971, the list of performers that Crow either opened for, or actually headlined with, read like a who’s who list of rock stars of the day. Crow shared the bill with Blood, Sweat & Tears, Jefferson Airplane, Three Dog Night, Steve Miller Band, Bo Diddley, Steppenwolf, Eric Burdon & War, Janis Joplin (three separate times) and Iron Butterfly to name a few. They also played at some of the most prestigious clubs and concert halls around, including the Whisky A Go Go in Los Angeles, both Fillmore’s East and West, Ungano’s, et al. The group was working more than ever, but seemed to be enjoying it less.
We were becoming more and more disillusioned with Amaret by the day,” said Dave. “We fought with them (particularly Kenny Myers who ran Amaret) over our artistic direction. We had some really good material for what was to be our fourth album all ready. But Kenny turned it all down saying it wasn’t commercial enough, or it wasn’t this or that. I honestly felt it was really good material – probably some of our best, but it never saw the light of day.”
“Dave Aderly of Elektra Records became very interested in our group. In fact they wanted to sign us, but Amaret wouldn’t let us go – They wouldn’t release us from our contract. They fought back and forth for quite some time. Dave wanted to produce us badly, which could’ve been a really big turning point for us. Finally, Amaret said that they’d let us out of our contract, but we couldn’t use the name Crow. Well a lot of sense that would’ve made for us. Crow was what we were known by! Elektra felt the same way. They didn’t want us without the name either.”
Dick- “We were so tangled up in financial bullshit, that I think we lost focus as to why we were really there – for the music. Once again, we gave up control. Instead of being ourselves, and what got us there in the first place, we started listening to the Myers and the Goldens in the business end. They weren’t players, just people trying to figure out what would sell.”
The first signs that crow was floundering for an alternate identity revealed itself in the summer of 1971 at the First Open Air Celebration in Midway Stadium in St. Paul. Crow sported three female singers backing Wagner. Despite the new found vocal versatility and its consequent impact on the group’s show, the Midway Stadium performance was Crow’s last major appearance in the Twin Cities area.
In the closing months of 1971, Dave Wagner, feeling there was absolutely no way out of financial and managerial mess Crow was in, said “To hell with it,” and left the group for good. Larry, Dick, Denny and Kink picked up Mick Stanhope (former drummer and vocalist for White Lightning), female singers; Gwen Matthews and Debbie Oldenwald, and conga player Chico Perez (from the Buttons and several other bands) and tried desperately to make a go of what was fading rapidly.
In February, 1972, we made a small 20-day tour of the Midwest,” Larry said. “We hit colleges throughout Oklahoma, Colorado, Missouri and Illinois. The band sounded the same, but the singing was entirely different. Mick’s voice was very good, but a lot higher than Dave’s was. To be honest, I think most of the people that came to see us had come to hear the hits (and Dave’s vocals) and were let down after listening to us. Our final performance, at the Coffman Memorial Union on the University of Minnesota campus, was a benefit for Rapid City, South Dakota flood victims on June 26th.”
Financially we were in trouble with the government and our management (to the rough tune of about $25,000),” said Dick, “so rather than trying to plow our way through this without Dave, we just decided to put on the brakes and call it a day. We’d gone years trying to get where we were and this is what happened. It left a pretty bad taste (at least for me) for a while. I fully attribute the collapse of Crow to a bunch of kids, not knowing anything about business, putting our names on the bottom line and having it all catch up with us.”
“It was a real education for me,” said Larry, “being in Crow, or even the whole series of groups leading up to Crow, having the success and losing it. If we just would’ve been ourselves more… stuck with what made us start in the beginning. The band musically was never in trouble. The material and business decisions were our downfall. It was a real learning experience. It reached a point where it was almost painful to see everything go into the toilet after working so hard. I honestly learned more in those two years about the ‘big leagues’ than I could’ve ever learned anywhere else. I had a great time, flying around, playing with the biggies. How many other 20 year-olds can say that?”
In 1972, Amaret released a Best Of Crow (Amaret AST 5012) sort of as an epitaph to a band that flashed ever so briefly. Eight or nine months after Dave Wagner had left Crow, Kenny Myers called him up to inform him that Amaret had been sold to MGM records. Myers worked out a deal with MGM whereas Dave could release a solo album. Dave-“He asked me if I’d be interested. I thought well, I hadn’t done much of anything musically for the last couple of months, why not? They’d totally pay for everything, all my expense for the two weeks I’d be out in California.”
“He sent me a list of material to choose from, about 20 songs. One of the songs he insisted I re-record was a Micky Newbury tune we had done as Crow called ‘Mobile Blues.’
I worked with some top-notch musicians while out there, but I think the song sounded like shit compared to the way we used to do it. But Myers was happy the way I did it the second time because it’s been done his way. He’d been with Mercury Records for years and was sure he knew how to pick the hits. Basically, MGM was fulfilling its obligatory contract to get the album (Dave Wagner d/b/a) out. They had no interest in really backing the project.”
From 1983 to the present, Crow now plays predominantly all original crow hits and some new crow originals.
“We’re not ones to shy away from rock and roll cliches, we’re embracing them.” says The Meanwhile lead singer/guitar player Brian McDonnell. “I mean, it’s really all been done, right? When Ozzy bit the head off that dove, that was pretty much the final chapter. From then on, it’s all just been a rehash of the same old shit.”
Apparently, the Chicago based guitar-rock quartet is either too jaded or too lazy to explore new territory on their way to the rock and roll middle. Sounding like the exact sum of their musical influences, The Meanwhile manages to blend rock, pop, alt-country, punk, garage, disco, soul, new-wave, grunge, metal, folk and jazz into the most bleached-white vanilla imaginable. It’s quite incredible that any 4 people with such respectable résumés and diverse influences could homogenize it all into something so.. um… ordinary.
Interestingly, it’s not like the band doesn’t have talent. Take bass player/back-up singer Eric Korte for example. His four-octave voice and three-octave bass drive half of The Meanwhile rhythm section. You might think his ability to hit notes that only a canine can hear (both vocally and on bass) would underpin the foundation of a very special band, but you’d be sadly mistaken.
The same is true for percussionist James DeFrain. With a past that includes a stint as a high-wire drummer for a now-defunct traveling circus (law suits pending), DeFrain’s inventive beats, on paper, should propel this band into the stratosphere. Unfortunately, they do not.
“Why should I play another note when I’m not done with this one?” says The Meanwhile lead guitar player Michael Paeth. The unconventional axe-slinger has been known to two-hand tap on a single note and routinely bends a C# up to… another C#. But even his fret board fury manages to somehow add absolutely nothing to The Meanwhile’s granola musical palate.
With vocal comparisons to the likes of Johnny Cash, Bruce Springsteen and Paul Westerberg, lead singer Brian McDonnell has a voice that is completely fresh, simultaneously familiar and instantly forgettable. Why his vocals try so hard but add so little to The Meanwhile’s sound is a mystery that the band clearly doesn’t care to solve.
Whether The Meanwhile were clever enough to pick such a middle-of-the-road name on purpose is doubtful, but somehow the name manages to perfectly encompass everything, and nothing, that the band is about. The real question, and the one that begs the audience to further investigate The Meanwhile, is how long they can manage to be riders of the rock and roll coat tails. With this much talent and this many influences maybe The Meanwhile will one day burst their mediocrity bubble and blaze their own musical trail of melodic noise…. or maybe not.
As one of the pioneers of jazz-rock — perhaps the pioneer in the ears of some — Larry Coryell deserves a special place in the history books. He brought what amounted to a nearly alien sensibility to jazz electric guitar playing in the 1960s, a hard-edged, cutting tone, phrasing and note-bending that owed as much to blues, rock and even country as it did to earlier, smoother bop influences. Yet as a true eclectic, armed with a brilliant technique, he is comfortable in almost every style, covering almost every base from the most decibel-heavy, distortion-laden electric work to the most delicate, soothing, intricate lines on acoustic guitar. Unfortunately, a lot of his most crucial electric work from the ’60s and ’70s is missing on CD, tied up by the erratic reissue schemes of Vanguard, RCA and other labels, and by jazz-rock’s myopically low level of status in the CD era (although that mindset is slowly changing).
Born in Galveston, Texas on April 2, 1943 Coryell grew up in the Seattle, Washington area where his mother introduced him to the piano at the tender age of 4. He switched to guitar and played rock music while in his teens. He didn’t consider himself good enough to pursue a music career and studied journalism at The University of Washington while simultaneously taking private guitar lessons. By 1965 he had relocated to New York City and began taking classical guitar lessons which would figure prominently in later stages of his career. Although citing Chet Atkins and Chuck Berry as early influences he also took cues from jazzmen such as John Coltrane and Wes Montgomery. He was also inspired by the popular music of the day by the Beatles, The Byrds and Bob Dylan and worked diligently to meld both rock and jazz stylings into his technique. This was reflected on his debut recording performance on drummer Chico Hamilton’s album ” The Dealer” where he sounded like chuck Berry at times with his almost distorted “fat” tone. Also in 1966 he formed a psychedelic band called The Free Spirits on which he also sang vocals, played the sitar and did most of the composing. Although conceptually the band’s music conformed to the psychedelic formula with titles like “Bad News Cat” and” I’m Gonna Be Free” it foreshadowed jazz rock with more complex soloing by Coryell and Sax/flute player Jim Pepper. However, it wasn’t until three years later after apprenticing on albums by Vibraphonist Gary Burton and flutist Herbie Mann and gigging with the likes of Jack Bruce and others that Coryell established his multifarious musical voice, releasing two solo albums which mixed jazz, classical and rock ingredients. In late 1969 he recorded “Spaces”, the album for which he is most noted. It was a guitar blow-out which also included John McLaughlin who was also sitting on the fence between rock and jazz at the time and the cogitative result formed what many aficionados consider to be the embryo from which the fusion jazz movement of the 1970s emerged. It contained insane tempos and fiery guitar exchanges which were often beyond category not to mention some innovating acoustic bass work by Miroslav Vitous and power drumming by Billy Cobham both of whom were to make contributions to Jazz rock throughout the `70s.
His career, however, began in era of guitar rock, where he was able to rise for a time with legends such as Jimi Hendrix, Carlos Santana, and Eric Clapton. As this era came to a close, his musical expression took him on a diverse journey, and though he did not receive the level of commercial fame the aformentioned musicians had, he was still able to make his mark in music by way of the jazz & fusion world. His music continues to influence musicians and fans internationally and will continue to do so for a very long time.
From the depths of Chicago, the Coma Boys are establishing themselves as a raucous new rock band. Mixing the grit and energy of 60s and 70s punk rock with various genres, from soul to blues, the Boys boast a high energy stage show, catchy songs, and great hooks.
Leading the Coma Boys is singer/songwriter Reverend Trent Stevenson, combining glam rock charm with Detroit Punk Rock madness. Fellow songwriter/guitarist Brandon Reed adds a mix of screaming blues and sneering punk to the mayhem. The thunderous rhythm section propels the band forward with the melodic grooves of bassist Patrick O’Keefe and the precision attack of Mike Szymanski.
The Coma Boys are on a mission to restore rock to its glorious and subversive roots!
“Formed somewhere between yesterday’s hangover and today’s buzz, Dripping Slits is a raucous blend of rock ‘n’ roll method and madness hailing from Middle-of-Nowhere, Illinois that is sure to arouse your senses with an overdose of venomous guitar riffs, thundering percussion, and plenty of gutteral groove and grit.”
“Chicago based Crown Vics have been performing throughout the Midwest and beyond, dedicating themselves to the earliest roots Rock & Roll/Rhythm & Blues. Their musical repertoire is based off of the early 1950’s, “Birth of Rock & Roll”, period of American music. Concentrating on the obscure, less traveled musical gems, the Crown Vics deliver a musical vibe and show reminiscent of an era dominated by electrified guitars, wailing saxes and…the Big Beat!”
Chicago based band plays straight up, traditional rockabilly played with the intensity of a speeding freight train heading right for the edge of the cliff!
Rachel Marie entertains as a singer/songwriter & plays acoustic guitar, ukulele, and keyboard. She is also lead singer for the Rachel Marie Band, along with the very impressive Daniel (DJ) Arrigo on lead guitar and top notch Chris Arrigo on percussion. Rachel regularly sang as a church cantor at age 11. She learned to play clarinet, trumpet, trombone & baritone. She spent 3 yrs. in Mundelein High School’s show choir. She received numerous callbacks for American Idol and The Voice.
In retrospect, perhaps the mullet wasn’t the finest hairstyle every invented. I will also concede that parachute pants may not have been quite as cool as we thought. The eighties weren’t all bad though as New Wave turned ever so slowly into post-modern rock and then transformed itself into alternative music. It gave us 24 hour news, sports, music television, and the films of John Hughes including Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Sixteen Candles and of course The Breakfast Club, which made all of us want to live in a small suburb just outside of Chicago.
Fronted by honey voiced Lyndsay Evans, who controls the stage like the Divas of old ( I’m talking Aretha not X-Tina ) and ably backed by Adam Edar on guitar, Jenna Joanis on drums, Brad Schubert on bass, and Roscoe Evans on keyboards, Sexy Ester is no flash in the pan. They’ve already payed a lot of dues slugging it out in the smaller clubs and dives all over the Midwest. The new CD, “Monomania”, is fast becoming a staple of college radio and the venues are getting bigger and bigger – Sexy Ester is certainly going to have folks talking for a while – or at least until mullets come back into style!
J-Livi & The Party is a Chicago based Brass Band that focusses on playing nothing but funk and hip/hop. Their biggest influence stems from artists to have come from Chicago. Any artist that has become famous from Chicago, J-Livi and his Party People have been influenced by them one way or another. J-Livi & The Party plays music from the 70’s, 80’s 90’s & today. You can think of the band as a Pep Band on steroids. The main of goal of the band is to make every performance a party atmosphere, while maintaining a high level of musicianship. This band can party, and they are the loudest and baddest band in town.
“These master musicians are coming together for the first time in this particular entity. They are working on their online presence for the moment it stands on the individual resume and reputations. Here is a quick bio on the band;
All of their lives fiddler Darol Anger, guitarist Grant Gordy, and mandolinist Joe Walsh have found themselves moving from place to place, inhabiting one city or town and then moving to another, along the way getting to intimately know the varied terrains that make up our vast country. Musically, they’ve kept up the same pattern, each living at times in the worlds of bluegrass, and old-time, blues, and jazz, on their way to mastery of their chosen instruments, and all the while learning to speak the varied musical languages that make up American roots music. In the ever stable and unmoving bass player Karl Doty they’ve found a kindred musical spirit, one who is as open to exploration as he is rock solid. Making a musical home for themselves in the under-explored space around and between the great American roots styles, this quartet draws from all of their varied backgrounds (Grammy-nominated fiddle music, bluegrass, indie/pop grass, new acoustic string band, jazz and classical music) in crafting a sound all their own.”
Dom Flemons is the “American Songster,” pulling from traditions of old-time folk music to create new sounds. Having performed music professionally since 2005, he has played live for over one million people just within the past three years. As part of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, which he co-founded with Rhiannon Giddens and Justin Robinson, he has played at a variety of festivals spanning from the Newport Folk Festival to Bonnaroo, in addition to renowned venues such as the Grand Ole Opry.
Raised in Phoenix, Arizona, Dom’s involvement with music began by playing percussion in his high school band. After picking up the guitar and harmonica as a teenager, he began to play in local coffee houses and became a regular performer on the Arizona folk music scene. Dom wrote his own songs and produced 25 albums of singer-songwriters and slam poets in the Phoenix area, including six albums of his own, during this time. He took a brief break from playing music in order to pursue slam poetry (he majored in English at Northern Arizona University) and performed in two national poetry slams in 2002 and 2003. Aside from exploring slam poetry, he spent his early adulthood listening to records and discovering a love of folk music, blues, jazz, jug band music, country music and ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll. Dom became interested in folk musicians such as Phil Ochs, Dave Van Ronk and Mike Seeger, as well as musicians such as Mississippi John Hurt, Howlin’ Wolf, Hank Williams, Chuck Berry and Carl Perkins. After stepping away from the slam poetry scene, he rekindled his interest in music, this time focusing on the old-time blues music of the pre-WWII era.
A multi-instrumentalist, Dom plays banjo, guitar, harmonica, fife, bones, bass drum, snare drum and quills, in addition to singing. He says that he incorporates his background in percussion to his banjo playing. Dom’s banjo repertoire includes not only clawhammer but also tenor and three-finger styles of playing. He first picked up the instrument when he borrowed a five-string banjo from a friend who had removed the instrument’s fifth string. As a founding member of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, an African-American string band, Dom was able to explore his interest in bringing traditional music to new audiences. The band won a GRAMMY for its 2011 album Genuine Negro Jig and was nominated for its most recent album, Leaving Eden, in 2012.
After recording two solo records with Music Maker Relief Foundation, Dom is set to work on his third solo effort, which is untitled as of yet. He says he would like to use the traditional forms of music he has heard and immersed himself in over the years to create new soundscapes that generate interest in old-time folk music. Focusing very much on creating music that is rooted in history but taking a contemporary approach, Dom hopes to reexamine what traditional music can become.
“Kindred spirits to Reverend Peyton are John Lee Hooker and RL Burnside.” – The Washington Post
2019 BMA Award Nominees The Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band are the greatest country-blues band in the world. Led by Reverend Peyton, who most consider to be the premier finger picker playing today. He has earned a reputation as both a singularly compelling performer and a persuasive evangelist for the rootsy, country blues styles that captured his imagination early in life and inspired him and his band to make pilgrimages to Clarksdale, Mississippi to study under such blues masters as T-Model Ford, Robert Belfour and David “Honeyboy” Edwards. Now The Big Damn Band is back with an explosive new record and world tour. Reverend Peyton’s guitar work on the new record Poor Until Payday is phenomenal and howls the blues. Poor Until Payday is a bluesy ode to the blue collar, working class and it delvers in spades!
Movits! is the hip-hop act from Luleå, Sweden, which, with an eclectic mix of rap, beats and horns have succeeded in laying the world at their feet. In just two albums, they have taken their music from the small town in Norrbotten, a place at the same latitude as Fairbanks, Alaska, to world metropolises like New York, Tokyo, Paris and Shanghai. Nothing unusual perhaps for a band from a country that produced more musical success stories per capita than any other in the world. But add to that that Movits! have done it in Swedish and you get a story that stands hard to match. Everything, however, began with a boy’s room in the Luleå suburb of Herstön.
A boy’s room and two brothers. Johan and Anders Rensfeldt started making music together in the early 2000s. Under the name of Planeten Jorden they released the EP “Frihetssånger i retroadidas” in 2004. It had an acoustic sound with influences of Swedish folksinging and reggae, Anders’ stripped down beats spiced with Johan’s melodical rap. The album was well received and the brothers were invited to join Riksteatern on a summer tour. With them they took the friend and saxophonist Joakim Nilsson, who later became a permanent member of the constellation.
Working on their first album, Movits! happened to hear a recording of Benny Goodman’s “Sing sing sing”. That experience came to put a big mark on the development of the band’s music. The energy of the horns and the intensity of the drumming replaced the djembe and melodica and overnight Movits!’ distinctive sound was created. With a new name they released their debut album “Äppelknyckarjazz” in the fall of 2008. An album which gave them good press and a prize at the Swedish Manifest Awards.
Tours in Sweden and Scandinavia followed on the album, but the big breakthrough came with an appearance on the U.S. TV show “the Colbert Report” in the summer of 2009. It was a pure coincidence that the show’s namesake Stephen Colbert had found Movits! video for “Fel del av garden” but a coincidense that resulted in an invitation to participate in the program. What happened next is modern music history.
Sales of “Äppelknyckarjazz”, which then was only available on import via Amazon, went up by 85,000%. When the record was released on US iTunes it instantly reached the first place in the hip hop category, ahead of giants like Kanye West and Eminem. In an instance Movits! went from being an unknown act to becoming a global concern.
After two years of touring in both Europe and the United States Movits! released their sophomore album “Ut ur min skalle/Out of my head.” With a heavier and more solid sound, the gold single “Sammy Davis Jr.” and the platinum single “Na na nah!” the album cemented the band’s status in the world. The album was critically acclaimed and got nominations in both the P3Guld and Grammy Awards in Sweden.
Movits! have continued to broaden their horizon and today the band tours in Scandinavia and Europe, Japan and the USA. Live the trio is often expanded with David Fraenckel on trombone and Petter Olofsson on bass. The band is notorious for always delivering fast paced and energetic live shows, whether they are on a festival stage in front of 10,000 people, or at a club in front of 100.
In the spring of 2013, Movits! once again entered the studio to record a new album. “Huvudet bland molnen/Head among the clouds” is scheduled to be released in the fall of 2013.The singles “Röksignaler/Smoke signals”, “Nitroglycerin” and “Limousin”, shows a development of the sound that has become synonymous with the band. But it still beats, horns and rap. And it is still in Swedish.
“We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You playing small doesn’t serve the world. There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We were born to manifest the glory that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
Conniption is an American Heavy Metal band from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, formed in December 2007. The band is known for tight musicianship and captivating live performances, blending New Wave of British Heavy Metal and American Hard Rock, fitting into the Thrash Metal sub-genre. Conniption emerged with an old school 80’s thrash sound on their debut A METHOD TO MADNESS, prompting critics to compare the band to 1980’s – era Iron Maiden. Their style evolved quickly from there, as AMTM was more of a full-length demo, it was released just six months after the band formed. Influenced by heavy metal, hard rock, and progressive rock, they released KAMIKAZE on May 18, 2013. Conniption went right back to work, recording their third album TIME HAS COME, releasing it on December 13, 2013.
Romantic Rebel started off in 2012 as a project between siblings KT and Alex and quickly became a full time venture in six very short months. The Chicago, IL based duo immediately began writing a catalog of original material siting influences such as Van Halen and Aerosmith. The band tapped former Smashing Pumpkins touring drummer Matt Walker and entered the studio to record a four song demo at world renowned CRC Studios (Chicago, IL) in September of 2012.
Becoming a promotion machine, the group immediately started booking shows, passing out demos, and filmed a video for the lead track “Dirty Love Song”. Front woman KT started using social media tactics to get their music in the hands of many industry people, as well as, many well known hard rock bands. One such person was Tim King, bassist for the heavy Rock band SOiL and Director of A&R at Pavement Entertainment. Tim immediately brought the project to Pavement President Mark Nawara. “I told Mark there was something special in this band and we should develop them” states King. “I knew with some hard work we could have the next successful female fronted rock act on our hands”. Pavement quickly snatched up the band and re-entered CRC Studios to re-work the track “Dirty Love Song”.
“The experience was awesome” says guitarist Alex Vincent. “Dirty Love song came to life in a whole new way”. Vocalist KT chimes in: “The experience of taking our music to new heights was an exciting process and taught us a great deal about the songwriting process”
NONNIE PARRY is a trio once described by a major media outlet as “The laziest band in Chicago” and they hold it close to their heart. They make fuzzy, distorted lo-fi goth pop punk. Their latest single, “Karen Greenlee,” is about the real life Karen Greenlee, who was known as an “unrepentant necrophile” and was arrested and convicted for robbing a hearse and having sexual contact with the dead body.
Mona Feel is the Chicago four piece project comprised of guitarist Travis Thomason, vocalist Matt Stevenson, bassist Justin Fors, and drummer Tim Fahey. Formed in early 2013, the band has cultivated their sound from their respective Indie Rock backgrounds, combining impeccable rhythm and technical structure. The composite of the corresponding forces results in what the band describes as art rock and they play it for humans of all types, because it would be impolite not to.
“Seasick Mama explodes with a rough, unbridled voice as she romps about the stage, shifting between a fragile breathiness to a wild punk scream reminiscent of Gwen Stefani’s early days.” – Sofar Sounds
“…stalked the stage, pouring out violent and sometimes howling emotions in her vocals. She led the charge, even playing a large drum out front, bashing away with drumsticks on the drum head and the outer ring.” – Star News
“We just stumbled upon this very cool cover of Tom Waits’ “Going Out West” by Brooklyn artist Seasick Mama and couldn’t help but blog about it.” – Deli Magazine
“Work hard, play hard” became the focus of our interview.” – Live Fast Magazine
“Maher a 20-something-year-old rock n roll enthusiast with a knack for pressing the boundaries of imagination has been living in a luxurious mid western pad located in the beautiful state of Pennslyvania. The Brooklyn native began the project in September, inviting a plethora of musicians, photographers and aspiring-whatevers to come out and to simply, create. ” — Allied Styles
Hatched in the twilight months of ought nine, these five young men came from all corners of the US looking to do one thing: knock the dust off roots music.
A freewheelin’, trashgrassin’, folk tornado, the Whiskey Shivers take traditional instrumentation, soak it in gasoline and send it into outer space. Breakneck speeds, killer grooves and impeccable musicianship: it’s enough to make Bill Monroe himself do a double-take as he spins in his grave.
With upright bass, fiddle, washboard, banjo, guitar, and reasonably priced merchandise, Whiskey Shivers adds a fine layer of grit on top of the hard-driving rhythms of traditional bluegrass. They’ve been called everything from “trashgrass” to “hardcore roots” to “crazy-assed redneck music” — whatever the words, the meaning is the same: Whiskey Shivers brings the house down.
Please File Under:”Twang”… The Abbeys’ Mike Cohen & Jeff Janulis have wandered through the fields of Americana, mixing their close harmonies with a measure of twang and a few dashes of pop. Joined by long time bassist Carl Lubicz, drummer James Hurley and guitarist Rich Maisel, they also double as “THE WHATEVERLY BROS.”, paying due reverence to Don and Phil and their amazing songbook.
Prichard Harter is a progressive Bluegrass/Americana band based in Chicagoland. Prichard Harter’s inimitable style stems from the song writing team of mandolin player Cheyne Heaton and guitarist Matt Augustine. The duo’s diverse writing styles lend a captivating dynamic to their compositions, which are filled out by bassist Jake Carmany, guitarist Tommy Cantwell, and percussionist Cole Oosthuizen.
