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When Lanegan left us early this year with his mini album called Here Comes The Weird Chill it was just for a brief period to quickly hint what might be a creative peak of his career. On this new album he took only one song off of the Here Comes The Weird Chill (Methamphetamine Blues) and added a busload of new ones. Sonically, Bubblegum is an immediate continuation of Here Comes The Weird Chill, but with even more focus and even more great songs. His past solo albums were all somehow downbeat and it seemed that the crazy rocking days of early Screaming Trees (where he was a singer) were long gone. But, this one changes it all! If songs are not raw full with energy a-la The Stooges, then they are full of suspense, waiting to burst out of your speakers. Production is raw and Mark did it himself. I can’t help thinking that Mark was influenced by the new blues scene and all those crazy garage rockers from Memphis along with obvious influences in Tom Waits and Captain Beefheart. But don’t be scared – this album is good for everyday listening in every place, every occasion, suitable for any mood – bubblegum in one word! Another interesting appearance is backing vocal of PJ Harvey. I was never too impressed by her solo albums, but whenever I heard her as a backup singer (here and recently on Giant Sand and Gordon Gano records), I totally love it. http://www.marklanegan.com/ is his official site, but much more interesting stuff is on his fan page http://www.onewhiskey.com/. His label streams his latest video on-line – it’s really worth checking out.



In this episode, we heard one song from the new album by Chuck Prophet where he covers Waylons Jennings’ Dreaming My Dreams song by song. It’s a very interesting project in which Prophet not only celebrates Waylon’s songwriting talent, but also twists musical genres and brings out surprising arrangements in each and every song. We quickly flip through the Manchild 3, graphic novel by Brian Walsby and hear songs by his band Double Negative and from the Melvins CD that comes free with Brian’s new book. We also have a brand new album out of Cleveland area, Introducing… by Living Stereo. Today’s show is dedicated to Jim Jones, Cleveland musician who was responsible for the mid-eighties sound of Pere Ubu. Jones died on February 25 in his home after a cardiac failure.
The new Little Lighthouse (Flashlite) announces a brand new cd for Scott Reynolds, former vocalist of All. This time Scott is accompanied with members of Mercury Rev and Flaming Lips in a new band called The Steaming Beast. We also have a brand new recording from our Utah favorites, The Rubes. Another cool CD for this week is a gorgeous compilation record of Rijeka rock scene, one of the most consistent and most productive rock scenes in 80s Yugoslavia. In this episode, we sample some obvious and some not so obvious choices from that CD.
Today’s Flashlite edition of The Little Lighthouse brings several new albums: brand new Fleshtones rocking like they never did before, new North Mississippi Allstars and new Paul Kelly’s album. Paul will play live in Cleveland on March 1st at the House of Blues, so it’s a great opportunity for me to finally see a guy who wrote some really important albums when I was a teen. We also present a brand new demo of the My Buddy Moose member V(atroslav)! Also, checkout a beautiful Eckman, Race and Brokaw song with some important Baton Rouge toponyms!
The second Flashlite brings you a brand new band from Australia, Mona Lisa Overdrive, new songs by Mad Dukes, James Luther Dickinson and Willy DeVille. Also, checkout our “lecture series” on Blackburn and Snow. Today’s show is dedicated to John Stewart who passed away in January.