up I9n Smoke

While it was captured over the course a single night, there’s a rich lifetime’s worth of music packed into The Iron Man: Live at Smoke. If it’s a slight overstatement to say that the album represents an autobiography in song, that’s only because 82-year-old jazz master Harold Mabern tells his story in every note that he plays. That’s as true of the melodies he’s been interpreting for more then half a century – as many of the tunes on The Iron Man are – as it is of the always inspired music that flows spontaneously from the great pianist’s fingers.

The Blue Smoke comes rolling across the Smoky Mountains, the area of Tennessee that Dolly Parton calls home. She named her 42nd studio album after that smoke she also used it for the name of her 2014 tour of Australia and New Zealand, where this 2014 album first appeared (it saw stateside release later in the summer) and while it's not autobiographical, it certainly adds up to a tidy portrait of Parton in 2014. Unlike some of her new millennial albums, Blue Smoke doesn't specialize in one specific sound it is neither a bluegrass nor pop record but rather splits the difference, touching upon each sound, along with threading in other signatures like superstar duets with old friends (Kenny Rogers and Willie Nelson both show up, singing songs that appear on their own 2013 albums) and splashy, silly covers of recent pop hits (this time, it's a version of Bon Jovi's "Lay Your Hands on Me").

A band from Yorkshire, formed in 1965 under the name The Shots, was also called Chords Five. Since 1967 - The Smoke (which means London in local slang). It's Smoke Time is their only LP from 1967 + singles. The very first forty-five My Friend Jack immortalized The Smoke in the annals of psychedelia - not so much because of its musical merits, but thanks to the line "My friend Jack eats sugar lamps", which caused indignation of the BBC censorship, which banned the song and unwittingly enveloped The Smoke in an atmosphere of heroism. As a result, The Smoke boycotted by radio stations were able to achieve greater popularity on the continent, especially in Germany - where the album It's Smoke Time was released, which has not yet been released in England. The band's subsequent UK releases did not generate the same hype as My Friend Jack. An interesting song is Utterly Simple, written by Dave Mason and featured on the Traffic album "Dear Mr. Fantasy". Although it was never released as a single, it can be heard on various psychedelic compilations. The preserved material paints The Smoke as a musically diverse, rather tough (sometimes garage) band capable of composing a good melody, conveying concert drive to the listener and knowing the measure when using studio effects. After the breakup of the band, none of its members left any noticeable traces in music anymore, with the exception of drummer Jeff Gill, who became the sound engineer of the famous disco band Boney M.

It’s easy to get the impression that the youth of today are all going for the short cuts. The easy way to show biz through talent- and gameshows. But that’s of course not true. Most of them have the same need to express themselves in a true and honest way as the youth of the generations before them. 21 year old Swedish singer/songwriter Ellen Sundberg wouldn’t even dream of participating in any of those shows. Ellen Sundberg creates her music because she can and has that deep need to express herself. And we listen to Ellen because we need her and because she moves us.

Formed in 1977, X is pushing up against a half century as a band, watching their friends in the Germs, the Bags, Black Flag and even chart toppers the Go-Go's come and go. Sure, X hasn't been totally active that entire time, but no one, especially the band themselves, expected their run to last as long as it has. If you've read this far, you're more than likely familiar with X—the Los Angeles band with a now-classic debut LP named after their hometown that helped set the standard for arty punk and influenced a generation, expanding the movement in SoCal to the far reaches of the world in the late '70s and early '80s. Between the duelling John Doe and Exene Cervenka vocals, the Americana-influenced early punk riffs and the great songwriting, X cemented their place as a key band of the early punk movement, one that could be said in the same breath as Talking Heads, Ramones, and Television.

Formed in 1977, X is pushing up against a half century as a band, watching their friends in the Germs, the Bags, Black Flag and even chart toppers the Go-Go's come and go. Sure, X hasn't been totally active that entire time, but no one, especially the band themselves, expected their run to last as long as it has. If you've read this far, you're more than likely familiar with X—the Los Angeles band with a now-classic debut LP named after their hometown that helped set the standard for arty punk and influenced a generation, expanding the movement in SoCal to the far reaches of the world in the late '70s and early '80s. Between the duelling John Doe and Exene Cervenka vocals, the Americana-influenced early punk riffs and the great songwriting, X cemented their place as a key band of the early punk movement, one that could be said in the same breath as Talking Heads, Ramones, and Television.