The jam band genre is often less focused on the style of music played by the band and more focused on the community the band has with its audience. These communities, which are typically built through extensive touring, allow bands like Eufórquestra to eschew traditional artist-label relationships for more direct, fan-to-artist connections.
Michael Roeder
Michael Roeder is a self-proclaimed “music savant.” When he’s not writing for Little Village he blogs at playbsides.com.
Posted inAlbum Reviews
Album Reviews: The White Elephant – Cocaine Love Letter
Cocaine Love Letter was born while the band was taking some downtime. Rohr and bandmate Ron Coleman both ended up writing a bunch of acoustic demos during this time and decided to turn them into three albums, which will all eventually be released for free on their website…
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Album Reviews: Item 9 & The Mad Hatters – III
Item 9 & The Mad Hatters was originally a cover band called Old Style, but in 2010 they added lead vocalist Adam Maxwell to the mix and made the transition to original tunes. The time spent honing their chops playing a variety of musical genres in Old Style paid off and is highlighted in the band’s newest album, III, a funky stew of seemingly every rock and roll ingredient.
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Album Reviews: Twins – Tomboys on Parade
My passion for music started to deepen when I discovered The Beatles in sixth grade. For the first time, I wanted to know everything about a band. This love of The Beatles opened the door for my appreciation of bands who were clearly influenced by the Fab Four. Often grouped under the genre of “power pop,” I was a sucker for bands like The Smithereens, Urge Overkill and Game Theory.
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Album Review: Bedroom Shrine – No Déjà Vu
If you are a follower of the music website daytrotter.com, you have already been exposed to Johnnie Cluney’s illustrations, which give the site its signature pen-and-ink look. What you might not be aware of, however, is Cluney’s work as a musician with his band Bedroom Shrine. The group’s debut full-length album, No Déjà Vu, is a product of the Quad Cities’ tight-knit music community. No Déjà Vu is the first release for Iowa’s newest record label, Cartouche Records, run by Davenport’s Ragged Record…
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Album Reviews – Lake Street Dive – Bad Self Portraits
Recently, buzz has been building around the band Lake Street Dive. It started with an unexpected appearance on the Colbert Report on Feb. 5, where Stephen Colbert asked the band if they were ready for the “Colbert Bump”—the reported spike in popularity guests and topics receive after being featured on the show.
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Album Reviews: The Surf Zombies – It’s a…THING!
The Surf Zombies are back with their fourth album, It’s A… THING!, which marks the second album featuring their current band lineup: Founding member Brook Hoover is on guitar along with Ian Williams from the Wheelers and the Blendours, also on guitar. There is also Tyler Russell on drums and Trevor Treiber from the Blendours on bass, replacing…
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Album Reviews: Death Ships – Turn of the Century EP
In interviews with R.E.M. around the time of their ‘92 album Automatic For The People, the band commented that it was difficult to write good uptempo…
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Album Reviews: Greg Brown – The Iowa Waltz, 30th anniversary edition
It is apropos that I’m writing this while sitting in a quiet corner of a warm house during the holidays, revisiting Greg Brown’s 1981 album The Iowa Waltz with…
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Album Reviews: The Pines with Dave Simonett and Erik Koskinen – “Highwayman” Single
It was Glen Campbell who first approached Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson about recording a version of the Jimmy…
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Album Review: Har-di-Har – Hard Parent/Thick Child EP
In the laundry, shorts and t-shirts remind me that summer is over. After a brief mourning for the lost season, I banish them to wash not to be seen again until next spring. After much resistance, I resolve to switch the thermostat to “heat” as if it was the last defense of the impending colder weather.
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Album Reviews: Love Over Gold – Fall to Rise
Love Over Gold is the name of a new collaboration between Pieta Brown and Australian singer-songwriter Lucie Thorne, who met during a tour of the land down under a couple of years ago. The two became fast friends, and, after some correspondence and planning, they formed the group named after a Dire Straits song.
