as i mentioned in my last post, i went out to see billy strings the other night. my first large venue concert in about 18 months. having attended a number of social events since then, and mentioning this fact to a few people i regard as being reasonably well informed in music, i was somewhat surprised to find that hardly anyone had ever heard of him.
for the uninitiated, the next inevitable follow up question to me would be’ what kind of music is it?’. and my awkward response would be something like ‘well, it’s bluegrass, but then it isn’t’. at their very musical core, billy and his three cohorts are top notch bluegrass musicians. stripped down to their acoustic guitar, banjo, upright bass and mandolin, they can dial up classic bluegrass numbers that would make bill monroe proud. however, through the use of pickups and other gizmos, they can easily electronically ramp it up to jam band rock riffs. the whole show was spent going back and forth between these two extremes very comfortably and effectively. and it was fairly relentless, in a good way. other than a 15 minute set break, they really never stopped playing for a full three hours.
i was curious to see what the crowd would be like, as billy is 28 but many of the people i know that follow him are my age (not 28). i wasn’t really surprised to find the atmosphere in the parking lot to be akin to a dead show. in fact, the venue – legend valley (formerly known as buckeye lake), was where i last saw the grateful dead.
i brought the redeyegin twins with me, who are close to billy’s age. they had heard of him, but were not familiar with his music. well, they are now, and i think they are converted.
he is touring all summer, so if you are looking for something new to add to your concert schedule this year, i highly encourage you to check them out. it was easily one of the best shows i have seen in a long time.
maybe you are going somewhere this summer where you can kick back and try to read a book or two. and maybe you were looking for something to expand your musical knowledge as well. i know that is on my agenda soon, so send me some suggestions if you have time. here are a few things i have read in the last few months that you might find of interest.
chris hillman – ‘time between’
this is an autobiography, chronicling his entire career, which is fairly substantial. if you are a fan of the byrds, the flying burrito brothers, gram parsons, and even his foray into country with the desert rose band, then i think you will find this engrossing. as with most musician biographies, he starts off with his childhood, and then gets into how he got started in the music business. as an aside, i should note that i usually skim through the early sections like this, as i usually find them to be only moderately useful in understanding their later careers. more on that later. but once he gets to the explosive path to stardom for the byrds, and how the original group crashed so early, you start to get hooked. throughout the entire book, chris is humble and fair to his musical partners. this is not a sex, drugs and rock n roll tell all, but rather a true and multi talented musician trying to let everyone know how it all went down on a musical level.
one things he mentions is that there are only a few people who knew gram parsons best, himself and emmylou harris being two of the three, and he delves into their relationship, both bad and good. i was not at all familiar with his career after the flying burrito brothers, specifically the desert rose band, but it was interesting to see how he kept things going, and then dealt with some health issues he suffered and eventually survived. because at the end of the day, he is a rock and roll survivor, and a voice of reason in what is often an unreasonable career.
my only quibble is his need to give an accounting of all the various bend members in all of the iterations of all the various bands he was in, and sometimes you just lose track of who they are. but overall it is a labor of love about the music he made, and the stories he felt were worth telling.
jeff tweedy – ‘how to write one song’
partially a follow up to his autobiography from a couple of years back, partially a companion piece to his solo album he put out in january, it is mainly a tutorial from a prolific songwriter to anybody interested in understanding his approach to the craft, and how to incorporate it into their own process. as a tweedy/wilco fan, i found it very interesting. it helps explain his unique lyrics and the sheer volume of his work. he pretty much writes every day. if you are thinking ‘well, i am not a songwriter, and have no intentions of being one’, i can say that there are life lessons in there if you choose to be open minded, which i hope i am. he has a very disciplined approach, every day. and i think that if you approach every day with whatever inspires you and set aside time like he does, you can have a better chance of achieving your goals.
richard thompson – ‘beeswing’
another autobiography, this one spanning his early life up until 1975. i assume there will be a follow up book for the rest of his career. but fans of thompson, of which i am certainly one, will know that this was maybe the most groundbreaking part of his career. his membership in fairport convention is very important, and he goes into great detail about how that band evolved and grew over time. analogies are often useless in the music world, but i do not think it is too far of a stretch to give a rough equivalency to their american counterparts – the band. both were at the forefront in organically fusing folk and rock traditions into a unique and honest way. the difference of course being that fairport folk inspirations were from the english and celtic lexicon.
there is also the explanation of why he eventually left fairport convention and went out on his own to a solo career, partially with his wife linda thompson. and then their eventual divorce.
like chris hillman above, he really steers away from the tell all aspect you often find in rock books, and instead is humble and honest with himself and his own shortcomings. it is a very well written book in my opinion. i am looking forward to the next one.
barney hoskyns – ‘small town talk’
this is probably one of the best chronicles of the musical history of a small town in new york called woodstock. i had read it before, and it has been out a while, but i thought i would tackle it again as i am going to woodstock in a couple of weeks to go see the above mentioned richard thompson play at levon helm’s barn for a two night run. kind of a bucket list thing. if you are interested in dylan’s post motorcycle crash period, the band’s early years, basement tapes, albert grossman, van morrison moondance period, and so much more, you may find this interesting. it is not about the famed concert, which as you may know was not actually held at woodstock. it is about a small town that had a rich musical and artistic community way before dylan got there, and a unique character that survives to this day.
holly george-warren – ‘janis, her life and music’
i am only partially through this one, and so i will give a full review soon, but so far it is as advertised – a full and fair rendering of her amazing and tragic career. at this point she is still in high school, but contrary to my opinion above, it is real clear that her early life very much informed the demons that would haunt her until her untimely death. as i was reading the other day i wondered if there were any good documentaries covering the same material, and so i watched this last night:
hope you enjoy. let’s go see some live music. heading out to see billy strings this friday.
redeyegin 