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Applewood Road – Applewood Road

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I’m spinning the new Applewood Road album for the first time at the moment and I’m totally loving it. Emily Barker, Amy Speace and Amber Rubarth singing original songs live around single microphone at all-analogue Welcome to 1979 studio in Nashville. What’s not to love. The 3-part harmonies are so heavenly beautiful that even horrible songs would sound great and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the song material either. It might not be able to take me back to 1979, but somehow it stops time and for a moment that way too rushed everyday life has to settle for a spot on the sidelines.

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=PxlIYJ6DeFg]

Applewood Road Website

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Chris Bathgate – Old Factory EP

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Not much is happening here. I’m still trying to figure out what’s wrong with me and spent hundreds and hundreds of euros on various blood tests instead of records. The good thing is that I actually may finally have a reason and a perfectly treatable reason why I’ve had that numbness, muscle weakness and horrible lack of energy for almost two years. It remains to be seen whether that is the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but at least I have something that I can work on to make myself feel better. And actually I already do feel a little bit better, but that of course might just be some sort of placebo effect at this point. I sure hope I can finally get the energy levels back up, because it’s been hard enough to just battle through the work days and there just haven’t been anything left for this hobby.

The biggest music news of the year so far is the return of Chris Bathgate and the release of his new EP Old Factory. It’s been five years since we’ve gotten new music from Chris Bathgate, but I’ve listened to a lot of his songs during those five years. I discovered him way too late when that previous album Salt Year came out in 2011, but I instantly fell in love with that record and I soon bought his back catalogue as well. He has become my all-time most listened artist based on last.fm stats during these past five years. If I ever make another all-time favourite album list, his 2007 album A Cork Tale Wake will definitely be one of my first picks. What a masterpiece and Salt Year and Throatsleep aren’t far behind. Chris Bathgate’s new EP Old Factory came out 5th of February on Quite Scientific and it’s a great addition to his catalogue of masterful and intriguing folk releases. This is Calvary from the new EP.

Chris Bathgate Website

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PURSES – Hitchhiker / Wheels On The Run

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I’ve been following the adventures of Drew Beskin since I heard Slowburner by The District Attorneys some years ago. The DA called it a day late last year, but thankfully we now have PURSES ready to hit our hearts (and there was that pretty damn fine album by Party Dolls in between as well). In my imaginary wonderworld, Drew Beskin has the same kind of following as Westerberg, Malkmus, J.Mascis. Not that this really sounds like any of them that much, but he is just damn good and breathes life back to this US indie alt.rock thing that I grew up listening to.

There seems to be a small danger that I’m entering into an excessive praising mode (ok probably already did do that), so let’s just post some music. PURSES just debuted with their first single Hitchhiker / Wheels On The Run and both of these songs are brilliant. For example Hitchhiker is almost overfilled with great things. It kind of has foundation for several great songs, but PURSES blend those ingredients together wonderfully. The debut album Obsess Much is due out in the spring of 2016 on Laser Brains / This Is American Music. And sorry if I made this a one man show. PURSES is a band and a damn fine band. Members have previously played (or still play) in such great bands as Tedo Stone, Crooked Fingers, The District Attorneys, Blue Blood etc. Here are the songs from the first single that is now out and available.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlzE7fLiG8w]

Purses at Facebook

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Richmond Fontaine (duo) & Fernando, Finland Tour in April

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Major news on the One Chord to Another scale. The wonderful Richmond Fontaine will be touring in Finland this April in support of their new album You Can’t Go Back If There Is Nothing To Go Back To. The full band isn’t backing Willy Vlautin on this Finland tour, but I’m 100% sure that these duo performances will still be something really special. A big thanks to 8raita for making this dream come true.

Richmond Fontaine -duo Finland Tour (support Fernando)

5 – Helsinki, FI – Korjaamo
6 – Tampere, FI – Telakka
7 – Turku, FI – Gong

(I’ve heard rumours of another Finnish concert, I’ll add it later if the rumour turns out to be true)

The unfortunate part of this tour is the fact that it’s a farewell tour and record for Richmond Fontaine and we have to say farewell to one of the best band of the past twenty years. I personally joined the party rather late. That was when Fitzgerald came out in 2005, but that instantly won my heart over and I bought most of the back catalogue and have bought all full-lengths they have released after that and enjoyed them all. Ok, I do struggle a bit with The High Country, great lyrics of course, but the music is a little challenging. Winnemucca (2002), Post To Wire (2004) and The Fitzgerald (2005) is my favourite part of their catalog. It might be mostly because those were my introduction to Richmond Fontaine, but whatever the reason, I extremely highly recommend all of those albums. Five heart classics in my books and the rest of the catalog isn’t far behind. Actually Thirteen Cities is so damn good as well that I’m already having seconds thoughts about naming those three above as my favourites. Just listen to all of them.

The new album is due out in March 2016 on Decor Records. The first two outtakes are both absolutely wonderful. This is Wake Up Ray from the forthcoming album.

And here’s one from the support artist Fernando. I’m such an ignorant fool that I haven’t heard about him before, but this does sound mighty good. Another great reason to wait for this tour. In case you need some dreadful namedropping there are people like Peter Buck and Scott McCaughey playing on this record. So the guest musician list is rather impressive, but the most impressive and important part is still Fernando Viciconte’s excellent songwriting. This is The Dogs from the latest Fernando album Leave The Radio On that just came out in Europe on Decor Records.

Richmond Fontaine Website
Fernando Website

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