Magic

Five years ago, Bruce Springsteen brought the mighty forces of the E Street Band back into the studio to record their first album of new material together since the 1984 phenomenon which was Born In The U.S.A. The result was 2002's The Rising. The album is fueled by the gospel-tinged R&B and straight forward rock & roll which has been the E Street Band's trademark since the early days in Asbury Park. Springsteen himself injected his poetry of abandon, hope and redemption into these songs of reflection on a post-9/11 existence. In the few short years following, Springsteen released another album of intimate, confronting solo work reminiscent of Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad titled Devils & Dust. Shortly after, Springsteen hired a group of lesser-known musicians from New Jersey and New York, augmented by Patti Scialfa, Soozie Tyrell, and The Miami Horns to record in an informal setting the songs made popular by folk musician Pete Seeger. The resulting interpretation, We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, became Springsteen's first album of completely non-Springsteen material and won the Grammy award for Best Traditional Folk Album in February.



The Boss has explored many facets of the American musical landscape in the past five years and now he returns accompanied by the E Street Band with the appropriately titled Magic. The album doesn't release until October 2nd, but iTunes is making the opening track and first single "Radio Nowhere" available to download for FREE for a very limited time. It's a tasty helping of straight-on-til-the-dawn American rock & roll as only E Street can bring.

Tailgates and substitutes

I remember reading somewhere recently that a proper bloggers should never use a title for a post which has nothing to do with the content of the post itself. Don't get me wrong, blogger etiquette is one area where I hope to grow and thrive one day. However, I'll leave it to the home viewers to decide for themselves how the words of this post's title fit in with the content of this piece of blogosphere...

Photos courtesy of co-pilot and the mustard room collaborator Jason Rockey.

Hope to see y'all at the next go-round.

Folksplodin' like an atomic chicken

Get the kids outta bed and grab some nickels! We're havin' a FOLKSPLOSION!

SHIRTLESS BIDDLES. FLYING J & THE PILOTS. SCOTT HENSLEY.
Three acts. One night. Zero calories.

FOLKSPLOSION SPECIAL: Bring your own screen-printable t-shirt for your own one-of-a-kind Folksplosion! Logo T-Shirt

It's all happing at THE STRANGE BREW COFFEE HOUSE this FRIDAY!
Friday, August 17th, 2007 | 7pm to 9pm
The Strange Brew Coffee House
4800 W. Smith Valley Road
Greenwood, Indiana

An aural supplement, episode 7

Running Time: 1:03:50 | File Size 59 MB
Download: .mp3
To subscribe to this podcast: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ARockeyHomeCompanionPodcast

After a brief hiatus, your host Joel returns to intrude on your daily grind with a few morsels of audible goodness. This month, he has invited his very good friends, The Brothers Kyburz, to play some of their favorite musical selections. You'll surely dance, cry and giggle like an eleven year old as they reminisce of days of yore.

1. Oliver Onions “Zorro is Back”
2. Rocky Votolato “White Daisies Passing”
3. The Polyphonic Spree “Section 20 (Light to Follow)”
4. 16 Horsepower “Black Soul Choir”
5. Bonefish Sam & His Power Orchestra “Mr. T Adventure Story”
6. Violent Femmes “Old Mother Reagan”
7. Andrew Bird “Fake Palindromes”
8. Regina Spektor “Dusseldorf”
9. Acoustic Nausea “Rex”
10. The Little Ones “Lovers Who Uncover”
11. Derek Webb “I Wanna Marry You All Over Again”
12. Silversun Pickups “Lazy Eye”
13. Joel Rockey “Fool's Honey (Live)"
14. The Decemberists “Sons & Daughters"

Creepy candy camping trip

Last week, Miranda and I took an excursion from all of that which has distracted us in recent weeks and drove up and along the shores of the mighty Lake Michigan. We spent a couple nights camping and fighting off mosquitoes when we weren't bumming around on the beach. We also spent a day in Chicago and stayed a while in a hotel room watching way too much cable television before investing hours of our lives into discovering a magical land of stylish decor and big savings known simply as IKEA. During those lost of hours of learning what not to wear and flying with the conchords, we were subjected to a creepy new add for M&M's candy which encourages lonely viewers at home to become an M&M. I'm uncertain as to what in particular caused my wife to be so unsettled by this ad. Whether it be The The's song "This Is The Day" or the very thought of surrendering to the idea of discovering her inner M&M, I don't know. All I know is that somewhere in the formula, these ad wizards managed to forge a key to derailing my wife's emotional stability. I had to find a worthy ally to meet this adversary head on. In no time, the mighty alliance of Burt Bacharach and Herb Alpert brought the inner M&M's and their campaign for the worldwide domination of souls to their milk chocolatey knees with joyous absurdity! Hoorah! Hoorah!