From: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org (jinglejangle-digest) To: jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Subject: jinglejangle-digest V2 #141 Reply-To: jinglejangle@smoe.org Sender: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-jinglejangle-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk jinglejangle-digest Sunday, September 26 1999 Volume 02 : Number 141 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [MLL] in northampton [Superjen21@aol.com] [MLL] Somerville show [rachel kramer bussel ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 25 Sep 1999 16:25:55 EDT From: Superjen21@aol.com Subject: Re: [MLL] in northampton did anyone go to this show at the iron horse on thursday? ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 25 Sep 1999 19:14:54 -0400 (EDT) From: rachel kramer bussel Subject: [MLL] Somerville show - ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sat, 25 Sep 1999 02:15:53 -0400 (EDT) From: Michael Zwirn To: Rachel Kramer Bussel , Rachel Kramer Bussel Subject: Hi Rachel Hi, I was at the RESPOND woman's shelter benefit in Somerville tonight (and have a CD which I have yet to remove from the wrapper) .... it was pretty good but also somewhat sterile - big formal venue, master of ceremonies and guest speakers (mayor of Somerville MA and Tim White, editor of Billboard Magazine). So the music lacked a bit of spontaneity. Jen Kimball was on first and did around four songs from her record, with a few of the local artists from the RESPOND disc singing along sometimes. A nice set albeit somewhat somber - "Gagna's Song" was the closer, and it's about her grandfather's death. Some of the locals did a few songs solo (nice, but unexceptional). Mary Lou Lord was the more unpolished of the singers, and actually asked for requests at one point, which was a bit out of place in that setting. No one responded. She did "Two Boats," which was on the benefit disc, "Western Union Desperate," "I Figured You Out," "I'm Talking to You" and I think one other. Have to glance at my CDs to remember which one. Oh, she did "Hey Antoinette" - now that is a cryptic song selection in that setting :) The original performer of that song was the band Courtney Love, right? Patty Larkin technically was headlining and I was least familiar with her songs ... her guitar playing is impressive when she's not singing and less so when she is. Some very nice flashy picking. All things considered, I liked her set but was not blown away. There are only so many women with acoustic guitars that I can take in one evening, and although some pieces were languid and stretch-out and others taut and direct, they tended to get lumped together too easily into those categories. Larkin's best songs were probably "The Book I'm Not Reading," "Angel's Wings" (which she wrote about domestic violence) and some piece about being in the folk venue adjacent to CBGB's when the Big Rock Star has to use her dressing town. I presume it was a real story. She also told stories about fellow folkie Cheryl Wheeler, made jokes about singing introspective folk songs and then sang them, and did one riff in the aforementioned story-song about Big Rock Stars in which I think she was trying to approximate Blur's "Song 2". The closing piece, which was nice, was a group rendition of Ben E. King's "Stand By Me," led by Larkin but with the two other headliners leading alternate voices. In this endeavour I learned one thing I already knew (Jennifer Kimball is an excellent harmony singer) and one thing I don't (Mary Lou Lord cannot sing harmony to save her adorable little head - she was fine on her lead, though). In between that music stuff we heard a very mediocre comedian (and apparently, the comic relief on 60 Minutes II), named Jimmy Tingle, who made some weird religion jokes that made people rather uncomfortable. Michael p.s. forward to the mll list, I don't think I'm subscribed from this address so it won't go through. - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Michael Zwirn mzwirn01@tufts.edu ICQ #12755821 Kibbutz Music Reviews: http://www.tufts.edu/~mzwirn01/kibbutz.html Current: No Boundaries, The Shanti Project Collection, Safe and Sound - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------ End of jinglejangle-digest V2 #141 **********************************