One more thing to do before those year-end lists. It’s time to celebrate 20 years of Bloodshot Records. They have given us a huge amount of wonderful music during their existence and they are still one of the finest labels out there. While No One Was Looking – Toasting 20 Years of Bloodshot Records is a new compilation where 38 excellent artists cover classic songs from the Bloodshot Records catalogue. There are way too many great versions to mention, but I really enjoyed (for example) Samantha Crain’s rendition of Cold Forgiver by Ha Ha Tonka, Possessed by Paul James singing I Came Around by Murder by Death and Superchunk covering one of my all-time favourite songs, Come Pick Me Up by Ryan Adams. The list could go on and on. This one below is also excellent. Blitzen Trapper doing another Ryan Adams classic To Be Young (Is To Be Sad, Is To Be High).

Bloodshot Records sure do have a great history, but even more importantly, they are still relevant today and have released a lot of great music during the year 2014. I haven’t really featured their fall releases on the blog even though I’ve been listening to them a lot. So maybe it’s to make amends and shortly go through some of them now.

First we have excellent songwriter Cory Branan and his new should-be hit record called No-Hit Wonder. A really strong record and also a candidate for those year end lists. This is the opener You Make Me that also features mr. Jason Isbell.

Moving on to Luke Winslow-King and his awesome old-fashioned tunes that are timeless and refreshing. His new album Everlasting Arms is absolutely adorable. This is the gorgeous title track Everlasting Arms.

After that it’s time go into darker, but equally beautiful surroundings. Bloodshot’s Danish recruit Maggie Björklund also has a new album out and available. This album called Shaken might not be the closest match with my heart, but it’s still rather convincing effort and I wouldn’t be least bit surprised if someone thinks this is the best piece of music that has been released during the year. Especially this Fro Fro Heart that features Kurt Wagner from Lambchop is just stunning and leaves me speechless.

Bloodshot Records Website

I should start making those year-end lists, but I still have a few dozen 2014 releases that I haven’t featured at all. Some that even might appear on those lists. So I try to shortly go through some of them before writing those lists later in December.

Red Jacket Mine is a Seattle-based group that has been featured here a few times over the years. Their new EP called Pure Delight came out a few weeks ago and I’ve been fully enjoying their soulful rock once again. Here is my favourite songs from the new one. It’s called Crow and features Shane Tutmarc on co-lead vocals.

Red Jacket Mine Website

Staying in Seattle. Next we have Paul Gonzenbach. He had his albums available for name your price deal at Bandcamp earlier in the year. I picked up four of them and paid 5-6 dollars. Which was criminally small amount based on how much I’ve enjoyed them during this latter part of 2014. Paul Gonzenbach used to be in The Jim Yoshii Pile-Up, but nowadays he is releasing fabulous music under his own name. My favourite out of these is last year’s Notify Your Friends: Everything Ends, but his 2014 releases are also excellent. This one is the opener from the album Drew Breath and it’s called Breakneck Speed.

Paul Gonzenbach at Bandcamp

Moving on Tucson Arizona where French born Naïm Amor is making some rather magical albums and film scores. His new album Hear The Walls has been a bit of a surprise favourite here at the onechord.net headquarters. It can turn the dark anxiety of Finnish fall / early winter into something serene, but colourful. This beautiful record is now out on Fort Lowell Records. This is Turn The Magic On from that lovely album.

And here’s a little short film about the man and guitars.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWpmyogl53k]

Naïm Amor Website

Why aren’t The Perfectos the famous? I really love this stuff. I first got into The Perfectos through John Davey. He was a guest at Youngblood podcast and he chatted about The Perfectos with the host(s). Then they played this song:

Ok, that might not be the second coming of the Christ or anything like that, but it’s a damn wonderful pop song and that’s all I needed to hear. I picked up everything from their Bandcamp, paid a few dollars and after that I’ve been a fan of The Perfectos. They are from Kentucky and have released four releases that are all truly enjoyable. Their 2014 release is called Songbirds & Wolves and this is a little different from (but equally magnificent) that rockin’ power pop of Better Off This Way. Here’s a pretty song from the new EP called Portrait.

The Perfectos at Facebook

And because John Davey led me to this, I suppose it would be a good thing to post a song from John’s wonderful new album Living is Trying. This has been one of my favourites during this fall/early winter and most likely will appear on my end of the year list when I make them later in December. This is the opener Left Arm from the new John Davey album.

John Davey at Facebook

I really love finding new music with the help of artists I love and this was a perfect example. Sometimes I think that I should try to make some sort of artist’s choice column where my favourite musicians would recommend their own favourite songwriters/bands. Ok, not exactly original idea and I’m not sure would musicians have any interest in wasting their time recommending someone else’s music instead of chatting about their own. This is probably not going to happen, but it’s something that I would personally love.