Wild Wednesday Morning Shuffle - Bad Hombre Mix

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Time to reveal our guests for Week 2 of the E2TG 7th Anniversary Residency at The 5 Spot. This one will be held Thursday June 14, 2018. That's Flag Day, so if you bring a gently used flag, you can get in for just $5.00.  Otherwise, the admission is $5.00.

Ted Drozdowski has been a favorite of mine, since the first time I saw him leave the stage, use a wine glass as a slide, and generally take Hill Country blues into the stratosphere.  I once saw him walk off the stage at the old Family Wash, do the aforementioned wine glass trick, walk out the front door, come back in the side door and get back on stage will playing the whole time. He has a new configuration called Ted Drozdowski's Psychedelic Circus, and I am thrilled to have them for my show!

The End Men. If you have been following E2TG for awhile, you will recognize the name The End Men. Led by Matthew Hendershot and Livia Ranalli, Brooklyn, New York band The End Men have their own unique and rocking take on blues music. In late 2011, early 2012 - when Ear to the Ground was just an infant music blog, I was introduced to their music. Getting to know them and their music was a key factor in my continuing to press on through those early days. They were the E2TG Band of the Year in 2013 (the first Band of the Year that I selected myself). The End Men last played Nashville (I believe) was in September 2014 (at The Basement for the all-day post-Americana show that The Basement put on.  It is high time they came back! You do not want to miss this!

Opening the show is TBA! I've seen TBA several times, and every time it is a completely different experience. Kind of like Sour Du Jour.  Seriously, I can't tell you yet who the opener is going to be, but I guarantee it will be good!  Plan to get there early!

On to the Wild Wednesday Shuffle!  Remember, on Wednesday, our shuffle comes from all the songs I have stored on my phone. So, it can be new music, classics, from the E2TG archives etc.

Monday Morning Music Shuffle - A Few of My Favorite Things 2013 Mix - Part Five

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Stupid winter bugs.... well, I was out sick Friday - so no shuffle.  But, today's shuffle includes music I would have featured on that day - plus a few more.   I'm actually going to be away for the rest of the week.  Ear to the Ground will return Monday December 30 to present the 3rd Annual Band of the Year award (for the first time not based upon a poll).

Let's get to the music...

Tuesday Morning Music Shuffle - A Few of Favorite Things 2013 Mix - Part Two

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First of all... Tuesday? Really? Just Tuesday?

Second... how about a couple of my favorite Christmas songs...

 

 

 

Third... Rest in Peace to Mr. Ray Price. In seeing some of the news reports, I was most struck at how his voice held up into his late 70s/early 80s. So smooth...  Thanks for the music.

 

 

 

 

Now... to today's music...

Friday Morning Music Shuffle - Superstar Mix

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We've reached the end of the week.  To get us into the weekend, I have a long list of additions to the E2TG Hall of Fall, and a pretty sweet little music shuffle.

E2TG Hall of Fame:
13. The Foresters (Bethany, CT) (ed. note: Some may say they are too young for a Hall of Fame, but it's my Hall of Fame, and by their inspiring dedication to their craft, they have already earned their place - even as I acknowledge their best work is ahead of them - I think that is true for most if not all of our inductees)
14. Those Mockingbirds (Montclair, NJ)
15. You and Me (Montreal, QC)
16. MAKAR (New York, NY)
17. The Gypsy West (Brooklyn, NY)
18. Tipi Valley (Swansea, UK)
19. Jo Wymer (Freehold, NJ)
20. Sci-Fi Romance















The inductees will continue. There are still some major favorites of mine who have not been added  yet.  Rest assured this will be rectified sooner than later.  I want to make more progress on the Hall of Fame Page before I add too many more. 

Here's the Shuffle-

Ear to the Ground _ 2+

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May 15, 2011

This is my very first post, and I don't know exactly how this is going to work.  A more informative post will follow, but I want to see how this works.

If you are reading this, it worked just fine.  If not, well - it didn't.  Or something....

- Work-in-Progress



Somehow, I missed that this past Wednesday marked the two year anniversary of Ear to the Ground.

I just want to give a huge shout out and thanks to ALL the awesome people I've met as a result of writing this. Blogging can at times feel like shouting into a void, but what has kept me going besides all of the great music I've "discovered and uncovered" are the new friends I've met along the way.  

As I've often said, I'm all about looking ahead while carrying forward the legacy of the past. Okay, I don't know that I've ever said that, but I'm saying it now.

So... no big to-do.  How about some music...

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Friday Morning Music Shuffle - Heavy Metal Drummer Mix

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Good morning - er afternoon.  After two days of Non-Shuffles, I turned the Shuffle mode back on and came up with some songs to get us through the last day of the work week...

Pre-Shuffle:  We started things off with another track from the fantastic self-titled EP by The Foresters - a track called "Alone".  Next, we had a fun little triad of songs which featured two more songs from The Lucky Jukebox Brigade's album Pretty Well Damned.  In between, "Taffy" and "Carnivultures", we had Sinatra's version of Gershwin's classic Someone to Watch Over Me.  It was really cool how well those three songs worked together.  We closed out the pre-shuffle with a track from Odd Man Out, the Killing Kuddles' album we reviewed on Wednesday. 




Coming up after the JUMP, we have a shuffle which includes two cover songs and an Arrested Development reference...

Monday Morning Music Shuffle - Let's Make History Mix

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Well, it seems like I actually made progress last week - presenting more tracks on the blog than I added to the Playlist.  Then, this weekend came along...  There is a seemingly endless amount of really good to great music out there, and the list keeps growing.

Meanwhile, my album review to do list keep growing, while the free time seems to dwindle. So, I'll keep at it... 

 The Pre-Shuffle included another track from the minuteflag EP.  "Candy Rush" is a wild jazzy, punk rock jam of an instrumental.  We followed that with some more great bluesy folk pop from our friends Val and James who record as You and Me - this time we heard "Today is Gonna Be a Better Day".  NOSE! demonstrating the timeless art of "Hamboning".  We heard a classic.  Harry James and His Orchestra doing "Blues" from An American in Paris composed by - you guessed it - George Gershwin. We closed out the Pre-Shuffle with all 10 minutes of "Go Girls (Complete)" from the Go Girl album by Dog Without Warning.

 Shuffle comes up right after the jump.... JUMP!

Tuesday Morning Music Shuffle - Avant Guard Dogs Mix

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It's festival announcement time. We'd love to hear from our Readers about which festival lineup you are most excited to see. I'll be honest for most of the major festivals, probably 90% of the lineup seems almost obligatory.  By that, I don't necessarily mean it's bad music, just that there seems to be a core group of bands who you know are going to be at every major festival.  So, we're most interested in any artists who you were surprised to see on a festival line-up.  

Let's get to it:  This morning, we had four songs in our pre-shuffle shuffle and four song in our Shuffle shuffle.

Pre-shuffle:  we continue to dig on the Dog Without Warning album Go Girl.  Today, we heard Pacific Time Zone which more of an alt-country feel to it then some of the other songs we've heard from the album.  We also had another great song from the self-titled You and Me album. We heard a newish track from our good friend Galen Wade via Soundcloud, and the pre-shuffle closed out with another great track from The Lucky Jukebox Brigade - he heard Flip which the band performed for this year's CXCW.

Now, let's get to the Shuffle - it's after the Jump

Monday Morning Music Shuffle - Fools in Love Mix

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No fooling, today's pre-shuffle shuffle and Shuffle Shuffle have an interesting and entertaining mix of music.  We are short on time so let's get to it.  Remember, as per our new habit, we have created a handy-dandy playlist which represents most of the songs in the daily shuffle.  The video playlist is posted at the very bottom of this post.

Pre-shuffle-wise we have the only non-instrumental track off the legendary Minuteflag EP which was released back in '85 and featured members of SST bands Minutemen and Black Flag.  The song Fetch the Water is included below.

We also have a song from Porgy and Bess composed by George Gershwin and performed by the great Sarah Vaughan along with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

We have our first taste of the new album by Taco Land.  Look for much more on this great album in the days and weeks to come.

And we close out the pre-shuffle with another track from Dog Without Warning  who came to our attention via CXCW.

Now the shuffle:

Thursday Morning Music Shuffle - Terrorist Mop Sink Mix

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Well, we stand here at the tail-end of the first quarter or 2013.  One thing that regular readers of this blog may have noticed is that we have yet to have Featured Artist or Band of the Month or anything like that.  As this year got underway, and due to a variety of circumstances, we decided to step back and decide how we wanted to proceed. I think we've worked it out, and stay tuned.  In the next couple of days, we will be rolling out a brand new feature....

In the meantime, we moved around some songs and added a pretty cool sampler to our current playlist.  Pre-shuffle we had a couple more songs from the You and Me album by You and Me (Val and James). Plus we had a classic from Mr. Nick Lowe (which is included in the Playlist at the bottom of this post), The Harmonica Lewinskies (also represented in the Playlist) and Southern Culture on the Skids.  

The Shuffle Shuffle is ready for you after the Jump

Monday Morning Music Shuffle - Island Life Mix

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Whew! It's been awhile hasn't it?  Been around the world and back... or at least around Georgia and back.  Got back into Nashville in time to catch The End Men and The Slaughterhouse Chorus at fooBar last night. Word to the wise, if you get the chance to see either or both of these bands live, take it.  It was so amazingly awesome to finally meet Matthew and Liv from The End Men in person. They definitely rocked the house.  And yes this means I will have to tag The End Men... again... they are currently the second most tagged term on Ear to the Ground.

But, let's get back to what we do best... or most... or something... Pre-shuffle featured: Secret County (which I couldn't find represented on YouTube, NY Dolls, Jill Sobule and John Doe, Chad VanGaalen, Japandroids, The Grisly Hand, Phil Norman, Little and Ashley and Tim Lee 3.

Shuffle after jump:

Friday (It was barely still morning) Music Shuffle - Quiet Please Mix

Late morning and busy day, so we will make this quick.

First up with have another great song from our Ear to the Ground Presents: Volume 1 compilation, which you can download for free - Go get it!

Today's song is Cry With Me by You and Me. (Stream the song, below and then grab it via the compilation.

cry with me by You and Me



Second of all is the classic Garageland from The Clash's self-titled album.  "Back in the garage, with the bullshit detector".

  

And finally, we have a stellar track from Dinosaur, Jr. main man, J Mascis.  I've Been Thinking is a b-side to the Circle single from last year.

 

Have a great weekend!

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Friday Morning Music Shuffle - Camp Crystal Lake Mix

 The songs (not the recordings) in today's shuffle are an average of 44 years old.  Our set includes two classics from my youth and two recent covers of songs from before my youth.


Sex and Dying in High Society by X is from their debut Los Angeles.  "So you marry your daddy
with a different name"

Please Do Not Go by Violent Femmes from their eponymous debut. "Tell ya, man, I'm stuck on this lovely girl Of course to me, she mean all t' world"

Love in Vain performed here by our good friends You & Me is a cover of a 1937 Robert Johnson song which was also covered by The Stones on Let It Bleed.  "Well I followed her to the station
With a suitcase in my hand" 

The Ocean performed here by Laura Veirs and her husband Tucker Martine (as Mount Analog) is a cover of the Led Zeppelin song from House of the Holy. Trivia: Tucker Martine (like my friend Rex Silo moved from Nashville to Boulder, Colorado). "Singing in the sunshine, laughing in the rain.
Hitting on the moonshine, rocking in the brain."

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Bonus Music Shuffle - Institutional Mix

Had to walk to the bank at lunch time and wanted to share my soundtrack with you - just because


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Mozipedia : The Encyclopedia of Morrissey and the Smiths No Synopsis Available

Live From Austin TX: Lucinda Williams A gifted songwriter and fiercely uncompromising artist, Lucinda Williams was beginning to earn a degree of commercial acceptance comparable to the critical acclaim she'd been receiving for years in 1998 with the release of her Grammy-winning album Car Whe

X (The Band) - The Unheard Music X was one of the finest and most widely acclaimed American rock bands of the 1980s. Rising out of the Los Angeles punk rock scene, X merged punk, rockabilly, blues, and country flavors into a revved-up sound that at once celebrated and deconstructed American pop culture, and the group's lyrics -- written by singer Exene Cervenka and bassist/vocalist John Doe -- used beat-influenced poetry to examine life along the margins in one of America's most privileged cities. X became a major draw in their hometown, and their first two independently released albums, Los Angeles and Wild Gift, each managed the then-remarkable feat of selling over 50,000 copies each. However, as the group's popularity steadily grew and they began to expand the boundaries of the underground music community, the band found themselves faced with the question of how to bring their sound to the mass audience without compromising their music (or their principles) in the process. The Unheard Music is a documentary that combines live footage of the band and interviews with the four members (as well as their friends and families) with surreal music videos and montages of newsreel footage and vintage television commercials which help to illustrate X's uphill struggle against the music industry. The year The Unheard Music was released, guitarist and founding member Billy Zoom left the band, and X soldiered on with guitarist Tony Gilkyson before calling it a day in 1988. However, the group briefly reunited with Gilkyson in 1993, recording two albums (one studio, one live), and in 1998, Billy Zoom made his long-awaited return to X's lineup for a series of enthusiastically received live dates. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Friday Morning Music Shuffle - Stinkin' Badges Mix

Ha! It's Friday. My first Friday at work in at least three weeks.  I decided to spin some tracks from my Ear to the Ground-related playlist which features Bands and Artists who have been featured here in some way (Bands of the Week, ETTG Recommends, etc.) I'm up to 83 songs on this list and hope to increase that number soon.

Band o' the Week alum Brother Howe are up first with the title track of the EP linked to below.  Heaven is My Retirement Plan.  The EP also features a cover version of the Weezer song Undone (The Sweater Song).

Next,  friends of the blog, Valerie Giroux and James LeMay (aka You & Me), get funky with Head Up High. Check out the song and download it for free at Bandcamp by using the widget below. Black Moon  is a Wilco cover by Joseph Mooradian who was featured on a Soundcloud sampler some months ago. I need to do another one of those.  He is a first year college student and the younger brother of 1/2 of Forest Mountain Hymnal (who have also been featured here.)  Here a widget thingy from the cloud....

Black Moon (Wilco Cover) by Joseph Mooradian

 

It's You & Me back again and showing off their bluesier side with Running Like Hell. Finally, this morning, it's BenSem aka Ben Semmens with a track from his album Western Lights which you can add to your collection by purchasing and dowloading at the pic-link below. The song is called Free. The album it comes from will set you back about 9 bucks (totally worth it!)

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Tuesday Morning Music Shuffle - Sassafras Mix

Added some songs to the MP3 player last night - 13 total - several holiday songs, and some not so much.  There remains this sense of winding down, but I feel a desire to keep the momentum going. There has been a lot of fog so far this season and this morning the fog or mist made a cool morning feel downright cold.

Song #1 of the day:  Bradley Manning is the United States Army soldier charged in the Wikileaks scandal. Cass McCombs is a critically acclaimed American songwriter and performer.  

Bradley Manning is a song by Cass McCombs. 

(click on album cover to get Humor Risk, the latest by Cass McCombs)


Song #2 of the day: It Ain't Necessarily So is a Gershwin composition from the musical Porgy and Bess.  The songs has been covered by everyone from Cher to Bronski Beat and Sting to Hugh Laurie.   The version today comes from the Chairman of the Board himself Frank Sinatra.

  (click on album cover to get Radio Days (1949) Frank Sinatra sings Gershwin)

Song #3 of the day: The Little Drummer Boy was first recorded by The Trapp Family Singers and popularized by the Harry Simone Chorale. It has been covered many, many times by everyone from Joan Jett & the Blackhearts to The Wiggles and Jimi Hendrix to the Veggie Tales.  Todays version comes from an 80s era Nashville band called Raging Fire. 


Raging Fire - The Little Drummer Boy (1986) by Allen in Tennessee


Song #4 of the day: A repeat from last week, but a damn fine song - Band of the Year nominees You and Me show off the bluesier side of their sound with the track Running Like Hell .

  Running Like Hell by You and Me


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Best of Cass McCombs Best of Cass McCombs

Frank Sinatra: The Early Years [5 Discs] One of the greatest crooners the world's ever heard also had some acting chops, as evidenced by the early work in this collection. Includes Double Dynamite (1951/80 min.), It Happened in Brooklyn (1947/103 min.), Step Lively (1944/88 min.), Higher