Tag: folk

Daily Dose: Sandy Denny, “Who Knows Where Time Goes (1968)”

Have you ever felt like memories were yours because someone you loved spoke of them so often? This album is like that. It causes deja vu.

I have flashbacks of laying on my stomach in shag carpet beside my mother as a young woman, elbows dug into the ground and propping up our hands that hold chubby cheeks tired from grinning ear to ear. Our legs, bent 90 degrees toward the ceiling, kicking back and forth in idle curiosity with a flexibility we only get for a short time, a symptom of sumptuously careless youth.

These memories aren’t mine but they sure are real when I listen to this album. And song, in particular, makes me miss my mother more than ever.

Daily Dose: Gregory Alan Isakov, “Caves”

There are few musicians I’m more devoted to than Gregory Alan Isakov. I’ve seen him live numerous times, and the poster they doled out at his last Fillmore show is one of the few I’ve deemed worth the framing price.

Evening Machines, his forthcoming album, is officially released October 5th, but a few singles are now streaming. “Caves” has been a replayer for me this week, and, in my attempt to put my money where my mouth is and buy more music, I’ve pre-ordered a special autographed copy.

Daily Dose: Max Garcia Conover, “week 72 // rich man”

Max Garcia Conover is from Portland, Maine, and he releases weekly songs through Patreon that are beautiful. Beautiful in the way that poetry makes truth immediate and gives it shape. Beautiful in the way that it reminds us how music is a living, daily ritual. Beautiful in the way it reinforces constancy and the importance of repition to creating something worth having–a body of work by which he will be remembered fondly.

I hope he finds himself in California soon, so I can find my way to this concept performed live.

Daily Dose: Valley Maker, “A Couple Days”

I love Valley Maker so much I just pre-ordered Rhododendron (set to release 10.12.18) while writing this post. Seattle-based, gritty folk artist Austin Crane wrote his first eponymous album as part of his PhD work in Human Geography. His music is smart and addictive, with its soothing  rhythmic inspections into the human core. Now signed onto a new label, Frenchkiss, and in the production hands of Chaz Bear (Toro Y Moi) and Trevor Spencer (Father John Misty), I’m excited to see how he expands on this next album.

If you want to see him live, he comes through California in December: at Cafe du Nord in San Francisco on December 10th; Resident in Los Angeles on December 11th; and Soda Bar in San Diego on December 12th. I highly recommend seeing him in any of these appropriately intimate venues.