Tag Archives: Green On Red

Flashlite #708

Lamont Dozier

Today we have new singles from Speedways, Breanna Barbara, Sunfruits, More Kicks and Ruby The Hatchet. Harlan T Bobo has a great new record called Porch Songs. Over in Hoboken, NJ, in the earliest episodes of our show, we were listening to The Special Pillow quite frequently. They are back with the new album. Introducing today Crossword Smiles from Michigan. We also pay a tribute to Van Christian, legendary Tucson musician who passed away on July 6th this year.

Strange Notes – Scene of the Crime;
The Speedways – Shoulda Known;
Breanna Barbara – Diamond Light;
The Americans – The Day I Let You Down;
Tony Molina – Not Worth Knowing;
Crossword Smiles – Parallel Lines;
Deslondes – Ways & Means;
Gentleman Jesse – The Best;
Sunfruits – Sunfruits;
Sunfruits – Made To Love;
More Kicks – The Wind Up;
3rd Secret – Right Stuff;
Dream Machine – Prisoner of His Mind;
Ruby The Hatchet – Thruster;
The Special Pillow – Access Denied;
The Special Pillow – Poison Apples;
Harlan T Bobo – Free;
Naked Prey – Rawhead;
Friends of Dean Martinez – All the Pretty Horses;
mssv – June 16th.

Flashlite #595

Bob Dylan

Today at the lighthouse we have nothing but the heavyweight legends of rock’n’roll, all mostly with the new material. We start off with Bob Dylan and Neil Young. Bob has a new record and Neil released unpublished recordings from 1975. We also have two ex members of Green on Red with new records for each of them: Chris Cacavas and Chuck Prophet. Their buddy from the same scene, Russ Tolman, who used to be in True West also has a new single out. Their buddy from the same town, Howe Gelb, has a piano solo record and we check it out. Our good friend from Louisiana, a legendary songwriter in his own right, Damien Youth has a new band Belladonna Lovers and we check it out in this episode of the show. We close the show with the new projects from the Trotsky Icepick camp. They are extraordinarily active these days: Vitus Matare and John Rosewall have a new album as Petrified Max and John Talley Jones is with Strikeslip.

Chris Cacavas – Truth;
Neil Young – Vacancy;
Bob Dylan – Goodbye Jimmy Reed;
Bob Dylan – Standing in the Doorway;
Giant Sand – Warm Storm;
Howe Gelb – Steadfast;
Russ Tolman – The Trees Are In Love With You;
True West – You;
Green On Red – We Shall Overcome;
Chris Cacavas – We Can Dream;
Chuck Prophet – Womankind;
The Stone Roses – Sally Cinnamon;
Damien Youth – Susie Cinnamon;
Belladonna Lovers – Frankenstein Head;
Petrified Max – Snowshoe;
Strikeslip – Stuporstar;
Trotsky Icepick – Imaging Neptune.

Flashlite #499

Amanda ShiresToday we start off with the new music from the Texan violin player Amanda Shires. Then we introduce the new blues singer Shemekia Copeland. A star studded line up helps her on the new record, including Steve Cropper, John Prine, Rhiannon Giddens and Emmylou Harris. Jon S. Williams from City of Cool has some new recordings that he sent to us, so we check that out too. Dan Stuart (ex Green On Red) is back with the new record and legendary songwriter and graphic novelist Peter Blegvad is also back with new music. Dot Dash from Washington are back with the new album Proto Retro. We introduce John Brodeur from New York with his Bird Streets and a duet featuring Lia Pamina and Dario Persi from Italy. Nicole Atkins is live in Cleveland.

Cross Brothers – Crashing Down;
Amanda Shires – Break Out the Champagne;
Shemekia Copeland – One I Love;
Kevin Gordon – One I Love;
Jon S Williams – Poor Ned;
Jon S Williams – In Group;
Bird Streets – Same Dream;
Nicole Atkins (Live in CLE);
Peter Blegvad – Karen;
Peter Blegvad – Had To Be Bad;
Dan Stuart – A Killer Now;
Dan Stuart – Expat. Blues;
Giant Sand – Curse Of A Thousand Flames;
Dot Dash – 10,000 Days;
Dot Dash – TV Radio;
Lia Pamina & Dario Persi – So Far Tonight.

Flashlite #367

Kevin Junior - The Chamber StringsWe start off today with the new Swedish quartet Honeymoon Disease with a cool, denim-clad, straightforward rock’n’roll sound. Javier Escovedo, of Zeros and True Believers, brother of Alejandro has a new record as well. We introduce King Mud, a duet from from Fort Wayne, IN. Legendary Dan Stuart is back with a new band and a follow up to his great album Deliverance of Marlowe Billings hecho en Mexico. Our Italian friends Cheap Wine, who never shied away from naming Green On Red as their biggest influence are back with their second live album that contains longer, improvisational pieces. And in the end, we say goodbye to the rock’n’roll legend Giorgio Gomelsky who passed away in January. He helped the career of Yardbirds when we worked as their manager and producer over in the swinging 60s London.

7-Odds – Run To Your Mama;
Honeymoon Disease – You’re Too Late;
Javier Escovedo – It Ain’t Easy;
Ricked Wicky – Guts;
Royal Headache – Electric Shock;
King Mud – War Dancers;
Dan Stuart – Hola Guapa;
Green On Red – Black Night;
Sacri Cuori – La Florida (feat- Evan Lurie);
Cheap Wine – Waiting On The Door;
Lilly Hiatt – Far Away;
Yardbirds – Got To Hurry;
Yardbirds – For Your Love;
Blossom Toes – Peace Loving Man;
Julie Driscoll – This Wheel’s On Fire;
Bernays Propaganda – Laži me, laži me.

Flashlite #289

Bruno Subiotto, Roger N. OutIt’s a heavy show today. We start off with OBN III’s from Austin TX, lead by Orville Bateman Neeley III. Their new album Third Time To Harm, which is loud add diverse love letter to rock’n’roll. Speaking about rocking, one of the strongest bands in Yugoslavia was The Spoons from Pula. Their singer Bruno Subiotto continued his career as a singer in numerous bands, and also as an actor. His new band is called Roger N. Out which we feature in today’s show. San Pedro Slim is also a new name in our show. He comes from San Pedro, sings the blues and plays a mean harmonica. Chuck Prophet’s new single is also featured today. It’s a heavy show today, but we finish with an incredible, soft new arrangement of Laura Nyro’s Been On A Train. This features Rickie Lee Jones on vocals and will be out on the upcoming Billy Child’s record Reimagining Laura Nyro.

Laura Nyro – Been On A Train;
Patto – Hold Me Back;
OBN IIIs – Parasites;
Blue Oyster Cult – Betty Lou’s Got A New Pair of Shoes;
Bob Mosley – The Joker;
The Spoons – Sooner or Later;
Roger N. Out – Ride Me;
Morgen – Welcome to the Void;
Powder Monkeys – I Thank You;
Sam and Dave – I Thank You;
J.B. Lenoir – The Whale (Blues Alphabet);
San Pedro Slim – Someday I Won’t Care;
Chuck Prophet – Lonely Desolation;
The Chamber Strings – I’ll Die Before She Leaves (Live in CLE);
Billy Childs Feat. Rickie Lee Jones – Been On A Train.

Instrumental bed music: Frank Zappa – Duodenum is dedicated to my dad.

Flashlite #286

Andy KentlerToday we introduce two new names from Australia. Andy Kentler and the Metal Babies from Sydney. We also introduce Paul Myers and John Moremen from San Francisco. Their name is of course The Paul and John, which I guess is a pretty fortunate combination. But an album that will blow your mind this week is a duet by the legendary Chris Cacavas and Edward Abbiati. Cacavas is of course one of the founding members of The Green On Red and Abbiati is a rocker from Switzerland. And don’t loose out of your sites a new band from Salt Lake City called Six Weeks In The Pine.

The Downsiders – Old Black Crow;
Andy Kentler – Lillian Roxon
Atlantic Thrills – Blind Lead The Blind;
Reigning Sound – Baby, It’s Too Late;
The Short Kuts – Hold It Baby;
The Trashed Romeos – Hold It Baby;
Chris Cacavas – The Stage;
Chris Cacavas And Edward Abbiati – Long Dark Sky;
The Paul and John – Can’t Be Too Careful;
The Cavestompers – Limousine;
BB King – Goin’ South (Calypso Blues) (Blues Alphabet);
Amy LaVere – Self Made Orphan;
Heartless Bastards – Gray (Live in CLE);
Empire – All These Things;
Gold Bears – Memo;
The Metal Babies – All a Waste of Time;
Six Feet In The Pine – Hit The Floor Jack.

Flashlite #272

KojaToday we start off with The Strungs and their new album called Nothing is Possible and we interleave two of their tunes with the twenty year old records from Guided By Voices. Then we check out some new tunes from Hollis Brown and Jimbo Mathus. Denney and The Jets is the new band in our show from Nashville TN and John Murry is here for the first time as well. After Graceless Age, his acclaimed LP from two years ago, Murry has a new EP featuring Chuck Prophet (ex Green On Red). Disciplin A Kitchme is also back with another great new digital single.

The Fluid – She Don’t Understand;
The Splatterheads – Cry Baby;
The Strungs – Listening to Your Twenty Year Old Records;
Guided By Voices – Queen Of Cans And Jars;
The Strungs – Here Come the Black Holes;
Guided By Voices – They’re Not Witches;
Sweet Apple – Under The Liquor Store (feat Robert Pollard);
Hollis Brown – New Age;
Denney and The Jets – Hooked;
Green on Red – Ballad Of Guy Fawkes;
John Murry – Glass Slipper (featuring Chuck Prophet);
Jimbo Mathus And the Tri-State Coalition – Dark Night of the Soul;
Eamon McGrath – Runaways;
Disciplin A Kitchme – Ovisnik o moci;
Jon Langford – Streets of Your Town (Live in CLE);
The Go-Betweens – Streets of Your Town;
John Lee Hooker – Shake It Baby (Blues Alphabet);
Bob Dylan – Dirge.

Flashlite #259

CaseworkerToday we have have nice balance between very young and older bands. From the old guard, we have The Fleshtones with their new album Leave of Talent. Koja and Disciplin A Kitchme are back with a brand new single and a new line up that includes a harmonica. Legendary punk band from San Pedro The Last are also back with their new full length album Danger which has been announced several times in the past seven years and now it’s finally out. It contains some of the older tunes that were planned for their unreleased album Look Again in 1980. In our last show we had John Petkovic with Sweet Apple and Dave Swanson with a live recording with his Rainy Day Saints. Both of them used to be in Death of Samantha. That band (without Swanson, but with the original bass player David James), reunited for several shows in the past two years and now they put out a double lp with entitled If Memory Serves Us Well which is a recording of their band practice before hitting the concert halls. New bands today are Cretin Stompers from Memphis (via Brooklyn) and Caseworker, lead by a nice couple Eimer and Conor Devlin, kind of a mellow California band like Mellow Drunk or American Music Club. Speaking of them, we have two news: Mark Eitzel recorded an album in Ray Davies’ Konk Studios in North London and their original producer, drummer and guitar player Tom Mallon passed away. We pay a special tribute to him today. And finally, we have two very young bands from the Cincinnati/Covington/Newport area – The Yugos and The Debauchees. Dan Stuart from Green on Red gave them some really generous compliments – so we check them out.

American Music Club – Bad Liquor;
Cretin Stompers – Eye Of The Storm;
The Fleshtones – Roofarama;
The Split Squad – Tinker Tailor (Live in CLE);
Terry Reid – Tinker Tailor;
Bobby Blue Bland – I’ll Take Care Of You;
Mellow Drunk – A Different Color On My Door;
Caseworker – Notes From The Summer…;
Death of Samantha – Conviction;
The Last – Difference;
The Yugos – Dream Away;
The Debauchees – I’ve Got Energy;
The Slummers – Bowery Boy;
Mark Eitzel – Oh Mercy;
Thin White Rope – They’re Hanging Me Tonight;
American Music Club – Electric Light;
Disciplin A Kitchme – Samo disciplina.

Chris Cacavas – Love’s Been Re-Discontinued (Cactus Head)

Chris Cacavas - Love's Been Re-DiscontinuedChris Cacavas (ex Green On Red) had an album back in 2009 called Love’s Been Discontinued which we pronounced as the best album that year at The Little Lighthouse. This year, Chris Cacavas returned with an album which he called Love’s Been Re-Discontinued which was very similar to the 2009, not just in title. The songs on the new album were left over from the material written for the 2009 album and Cacavas felt a need to go back to those songs again.

Chris’ words are in italic for the rest of this text: Yes, at the time between 2007 and 2009 I recorded over twenty basic tracks with bass, guitar and drums. I was working on about fifteen of them doing vocals, overdubs etc. and in the end twelve of them ended up on Love’s Been Discontinued. At the beginning of this year (2013) I went back to revisit and complete the rest of those songs and those ten tracks are now on Love’s Been Re-Discontinued.

The lyrics in both of those record seem to talk about a break up. But it turns out, the topic does not necessarily relates to something that Chris experienced in his life. To be honest I’ve only had two “real” or long term relationships in my life. I’m happy to say I’m still in the second and although there have been hard times that brought us to the brink of breaking up we’ve decided to dedicate ourselves to each other and to investing the time and conscious effort to maintain a healthy, happy and respectful relationship. At the moment it’s working very well! I think you only need one real love or one devastating breakup for song material to last a lifetime.

Chris believes in love, muses about it and wants to learn about it. I believe love is real although I can’t tell you exactly what “love” is. I think it means so many things to so many people but I do believe the common thread for the definition of love comes from the first love we experienced and that came, of course, from our parents. I’m sure some would say “But my parents didn’t love me” and I can only say they loved you to the best of their ability. This is a very complex subject and I am certainly no scholar but I’m still willing to learn. Like death belongs to life so do breakups belong to relationships. Clearly the younger a man or woman is the less knowledge they have about relationships – what does this person want from me? What do I want from this person? What is the importance of companionship? What am I willing to compromise / sacrifice to be in this relationship? And do I make these compromises unconditionally? It’s a learning process and with any lesson more teachers and experiences give you more insight and confidence to decide what is best for you. Often people will go from one dysfunctional relationship to the next and usually blame the partner for the failure of the relationship without looking at the one constant that was in every relationship – themselves. “Happily Ever After” and “Until Death Do Us Part” are both lovely concepts that look good on paper but, sadly, don’t work that well in the real world. I think it’s a very individual thing. Some couples want their partnership to be recognized and certified by the church and others are willing to make a lifelong commitment to each other without this tradition. Both are okay by me, whatever works for those couples – hetero or gay. I would say breakups have less to do with rebellion and more to do with personal turmoil.

When I asked Chris what was the criteria for the song inclusion between the 2009 record and this new one, he was relieved that I stopped grilling him about the subject of love. Back to the record *phew*. With the 2009 release I wanted to use the crème de la crème and I wanted the record to be listenable from beginning to end, to have a flow that you wouldn’t want to change in a playlist or with your players shuffle feature. As I started working on the songs I noticed some were a bit too heavy (musically) and others weren’t really complete with lyrics and so on and in the end the songs that ended up on Love’s Been Discontinued pretty much chose themselves, that is to say, they rose like cream to the top ! With Love’s Been ReDiscontinued I took all the remaining tracks and and finished lyrics, sang them, added a few overdubs and that was it! Unfortunately there would have been another twelve (instead of ten) songs but due to technical difficulties two songs had disappeared from the hard drive, oh well.

I had the clever idea to call this record “Love’s Been Re-Discontinued” because the songs are from the same session as the previous release. In retrospect, I probably should have treated it as it’s own individual entity and not the step brother of Love’s Been Discontinued – and not just because people I trust have told me so…

So, it’s clear from Chris’s answers that he did not have an ambition to create two volumes with deep examination and (re-examination) on love and breakup, but rather the topic and songs somehow chose themselves like that. It’s one of those things where the art truly realizes itself in the ears of a beholder. We can choose to listen to it as a collection of strong songs, or a topical examination of love. In any case, both of the records are among the strongest material that’s been recorded by Chris since the earliest days with Green on Red. It is hard not to notice, though, that both Chris and his former band-mate Dan Stuart recently put out excellent records that are deep studies on the subject of love and in particular discontinuities and turmoil that happen as love evolves. Dan used a pseudonym of Marlowe Billings, but it is apparent that he is writing about the troubles he was going through directly, while Cacavas’ records are a bit more fictional based on an interview I had with him. Art is impossible to quantify, and we should not even try to understand which approach is better. In any case, Stuart and Cacavas are still capable of creating striking pieces of art, perhaps they are stronger at that than ever.

Dan Stuart – The Deliverance of Marlowe Billings

Dan Stuart - The Deliverance of Marlowe Billings After several years of personal hell, Dan Stuart is finally back. His old band, legendary Green On Red, disbanded in 1992, and Dan tried to continue solo. After a record with Al Perry in 1993 and the first solo album in 1995, Dan disappeared from the music business.

There were many different stories and legends on what he was going through in those years, but it wasn’t until ten years later that we heard of Dan again. He first regrouped with Green On Red to play a few shows in Europe and USA (a live DVD came out of that), and then put out a record with Steve Wynn (a studio and live sequels to their legendary Danny And Dusty project) and one with the producer JD Foster (in an ad-hoc band called The Slummers). Now, Mr. Stuart is back with a masterpiece – new LP called The Deliverance of Marlowe Billings.

Apparently, Marlowe Billings is Dan’s alter ego, which he uses sometimes in his new home in Mexico. I read in Uncut that he has found new energy over there after living in New York and separating from his wife. These stories should be taken with a grain of salt, since Dan posted on his facebook that some of the claims were false in that article.

We can read poetical interpretations of this story in the lyrics of the new record, though. Dan is singing “I miss the city and I miss the lights, I miss my family all over the night. But New York’s a liar, we both know it’s true, just like your lover whose soul understands you. I’ll never go back to that cold hard ground, where everyone’s searching for what can’t be found”.

These words can be found in the opening song of the new record and they are certainly dark, but the mood of the record overall is far from being disconsolate. This is the main difference between Dan’s old record Can O’ Worms from 1995 and this one today. While Can O’ Worms is a deep dark record of a man loosing a grip of his own fate, Deliverance is a record of a man who’s back in control. By realizing that he was looking for what can’t be found, Dan liberated his soul and now, on the new record we can also find lighthearted tunes such as Gap-toothed Girl or Gonna Change – a beautiful Brill-Building sunshine pop with disarming oo-la-lah’s .

Another record that calls for comparisons is also Love’s Been Discontinued by Dan’s old band-mate Chris Cacavas, which came out in 2009 and which I pronounced the album of the year in the Little Lighthouse year end list of that season. I still don’t know what was going on in Cacavas’ private life at the time, but if I trust the lyrics, its a very honest record of a man who has recently went through a break up. One thing that is common to Cacavas’ Love’s Been Discontinued and Dan’s Deliverance can be summed up in Dan’s words: “yes, love will kill you, so why pretend”. Turn it into some really cool art and see what happens. “You can never steal this poet’s soul.” This brings me to a film I like, called Singles back in 1992. There’s a mime over there who can’t shut up and says: “love disappears, baby”.

I must also add at the end that the musicianship on this record is truly exceptional. The band backing up ol’ Dan is the Italian group Sacri Cuori and the sound is thick and full. Surely, a part of the credit for this great sounding record also must go to JD Foster. Foster and Antonio Gramentieri from Sacri Couri were also with Dan in The Slummers. It looks like the new record leaves Dan in a very healthy place and I have a feeling we can expect more great stuff from Dan and the boys in the near future. Right now, you can enjoy this disc and also see Dan Stuart who is touring Europe currently.

First published on rockxs.com.