Bob Dylan :: Hero Blues (Freewheelin’ Outtake), December 6, 1962

Happy birthday to your hero and mine, the forever inscrutable Bob Dylan. For more than five decades, he's brilliantly confounded expectations and confused audiences in an extremely entertaining manner. And that seems to have been his intention all along, judging from this firecracker of a song, recorded way back in 1962 during the sessions for his sophomore LP, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. He's addressing a ladyfriend, but he may as well be talking to his public:

Well, when I . . .

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SIRIUS/XMU :: Aquarium Drunkard Show (Noon EST, Channel 35)

Our weekly two hour show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35, can be heard twice every Friday — Noon EST with an encore broadcast at Midnight EST. Ghost Capital guests this week sourcing tracks from the new AD/GC mix, African Women Sing.

SIRIUS 342: Jean Michel Bernard . . .

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AD Presents :: African Women Sing (A Mixtape)

African Women Sing: the fifth installment of our ongoing mixtape collaboration with Nick Barbery of the Portland, OR based, Ghost Capital. At 31 tracks, the following mix celebrates the rich and varied female driven music of the African continent - past and present.

Download: African Women Sing (Ghost Capital V - A Mixtape) - zipped folder

1. Mariem Salec (Sahrawi, West Sahara) - What Am I Longing For?
2. Les Amazones de Guinee - Soungouroun Baya
3. Sophia Ben & The Eagles Lupopo (Kenya)- See . . .

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Amen Dunes :: Love

So these are love songs. That’s what Damon McMahon – the factor and force behind Amen Dunes – says, and I think I believe him. It’s an audacious move to name your biggest, boldest artistic statement after one of life’s biggest, boldest mysteries. But McMahon has one thing and one thing exactly on his side: He knows that love is a mystery . . .

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Alexis Zoumbas :: Lament For Epirus, 1926-1928

The recordings by Greek violinist Alexis Zoumbas contained on this fantastic reissue are close to a century old, but they sound as though they could've been somehow broadcast from some pre-industrial age even further back. Of course, that's not the case -- in fact, the music here was captured not on some pastoral Greek landscape, but in New York City. But the evocative, mystical quality of Zoumbas' playing takes the mind out of modernity and into the past.

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Steve Colt :: Dynamite (1968)

                                                                                         Daammnnnn. Dig this'un. Big Beat Records, 1968.

Steve Colt :: Dynamite

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Wax Wonders :: The Bob Seger System & The Last Heard

"East Side Story" (1966) isn't Bob Seger's debut record (that honor goes to the bizarre pro-war "Ballad Of The Yellow Beret" - an opinion he soon reversed via a record we'll hear in a bit), but it is a fully realized recording that makes plain from the opening fuzz guitar and bongos it ain't messing around. Framed by an incredible groove, the track is tied together by Bob's extraordinary lyric, coupled with the incredibly powerful 'no's' of the chorus. And while it was picked up for national release by Cameo Records, perhaps the message was still too odious for the masses (although the record was a massive hit in Detroit).

Bob Seger & The Last Heard :: East Side Story

Bob went on to release a few more singles (including the cool Xmas novelty "Sock It To Me Santa"), but it was 1967's "Heavy Music" that seemed poised to propel the group into stardom. With a soulful groove that swings HARD, exceptional vocals (by both Bob and angelic backing singers, Honey Ltd.) this record should have been massive. Once again, it was a local smash in Detroit.

Bob Seger & The Last Heard :: Heavy Music

By 1968, Cameo had given up on Bob, but he was soon picked up by a much larger label; Los Angeles powerhouse Capitol Records. Bob's first release for Capitol could not have been less commercial, though. One of the most powerful anti-war tracks ever laid to tape,"2+2=?" completely reverses Seger's views on the Vietnam war. The vocal intensity alone matches that of Roky Erickson. The record may not have been a hit, but god DAMN does it hit hard with a message is just as relevant today.

The Bob Seger System :: 2 + 2 = ?

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Famous L. Renfroe :: Children

“A long time ago I used to hear spiritual singers singing beautiful songs and I wanted to be a singer too. I first started my musical career by singing in small local groups in my hometown of Memphis, Tennessee. In the year 1968 I came to Seattle and started singing with local groups, but failed to find one that was stable enough to record (with) so I decided to cut an album by myself. The music was written and produced by myself who except for the drum parts, done the entire record.” - Famous L. Renfroe

The above . . .

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John Cale :: Heartbreak Hotel (Musical Express, 1981)

In the mid-70s, John Cale recorded a trio of solo albums for Island Records. Ever the forerunner of avant-garde, Cale concocted a heady brew of proto-punk, glam and art pop aided by the likes of  Phil Manzanera and Brian Eno. One of the more singular moments of this era appears on the 1975 album Slow Dazzle, wherein Cale delivers a harrowing cover of the King’s “Heartbreak Hotel.” Already nocturnal in its original form, Cale exorcises the . . .

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Nico Icon :: Documentary (1995)

"She was almost proud of the fact that her teeth were rotten, that her hair was grey...her skin was bad, she had needle tracks all over. She liked that. That was her aesthetic."

The above quote, attributed to  James Young - Nico's keyboard player from 1981-86 - summarizes the often harrowing watch that is filmmaker  Susanne Ofteringer's 1995 documentary, Nico Icon. It was Young who penned the fascinating on-the road-with-Nico . . .

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Jerry Jeff Walker :: About Her Eyes

The man behind “Mr. Bojangles,” songwriter Jerry Jeff Walker is best known for his progressive country work, a catalog that puts him squarely in league with Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, and Michael Martin Murphey. But Walker’s psychedelic credentials are firmly established too, going back to his early work with Circus Maximus, and wonderfully evidenced by his 1969 LP Five Years Gone. Included in a recent CD reissue by Raven Records alongside Mr. Bojangles and Bein’ Free, the album carefully folds psychedelic . . .

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SIRIUS/XMU :: Aquarium Drunkard Show (Noon EST, Channel 35)

Our weekly two hour show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35, can be heard twice every Friday — Noon EST with an encore broadcast at Midnight EST.

SIRIUS 341: Jean Michel Bernard — Générique Stephane ++ Pappy's Haunted House - Dude ++ Jimmy Thomas - Springtime ++ The Paragons - Abba ++ Big Star - Back Of A Car ++ The Soul Inc. - Love Me When I'm Down ++ Billy Lamont - Sweet Thang ++ Donn Shinn & The Soul Agents - A Minor Explosion ++ T.L. Barrett And Youth . . .

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AD Presents: Damien Jurado @ The Bootleg – May 18

If you have yet to check out Damien Jurado's new LP,  Brothers And Sisters Of The Eternal Son, you need to remedy that. And while you're at it, download Other People's Songs - his covers collaboration with frequent running buddy and producer, Richard Swift. Jurado is presently touring behind

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Neil Young :: A Letter Home

In almost 50 years full of sharp stylistic left turns and confounding career moves, A Letter Home has to be in Neil Young's top 10 most Neil Young-y moments. In case you missed it, Neil has spent the last year or so heavily promoting PONO, a new digital music delivery system that is allegedly as high-quality as it gets. So is his first post-PONO release an audiophile's dream come . . .

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