The Buttshakers - Wicked Woman

I love to hear great Soul music, delivered with real passion and errr.....soul and The Buttshakers certainly do that and they deliver it with power too, singer Ciara, from St Louis makes sure of that!

Ciara is more than supported by 5 guys from Lyon who play like their lives depend on it, this really is top quality soul that is played by a band that are so aptly named, shake your butt, because this band are going to kick it anyway!

A rhythm n’ blues vibe, dose of garage, and a high part of sex-appeal make their songs a blast of powerful hits, turning their shows into furious dance action. Formed in early 2007, and quickly joined by Ciara, gospel diva from St. Louis (Missouri), The Buttshakers immediately imposed their soul energy well beyond the local scene. As early as first concerts, the group distilled soul music to the four corners of France and beyond: Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Spain, with over an hundred dates behind on the last two years.

Within this vibes they recorded their first two vinyl singles for copaseDisques in 2008 & 2009 followed by the album "Headaches and Heartaches" in early 2010 for a french label. Unfortunately the label called it a day shortly after the album release.
Coming back to Germany in 2012 for a short live-tour the band ended up in a recording studio in Hamburg to lay down some brandnew songs for our tiny copaseDisques label.
These songs gonna see their release on a 6-track 10” sized piece of vinyl!! (plus digital download via ITunes, Amazon, Musicload, Finetunes and many more....)

You know you gonna need this to bring back the Soul to your heart! 

Contact, befriend, follow, listen to some songs, like and love The Buttshakers here: Facebook

Pre order the vinyl here: Copasetic

Downloads will be available at itunes Amazon etc.

Attention - Tattered Youth (Name Your Price)

Attention from Minneapolis MN deliver a great album with some great Power Pop/Rock, once again, I am not able to tell you too much about this band but I can encourage you to check out the music which talks in volumes.  You can find the bands official website here: http://attentionrock.tumblr.com

Download the album for a "Name Your Price" fee, could be a billion quid or it could be nothing, but the band want you to have the music any which way, please try to make some donation though however small.

Get it here: Bandcamp

Contact, follow, like and love Attention here: Facebook

The Sharks, 7 EP's for FREE DOWNLOAD.

Let's see if we can't make Monday a little more palatable with seven EP's from The Sharks for Free Download.   I don't know an awful lot about the band other than that they come from Brixton, London and have some pretty up beat melodic, punky, power pop which ticks all the right boxes, oh and their interests include, breaking strings, Scrumpy Jack (cider), Puppetry and beards!

The more I have played through these tracks whilst putting this short feature of the band together, the more I love them and I was pretty smitten on the first listen already.  Each and every track here has its own picture cover with some excellent imagery on them, ranging from a traffic warden for the track "Sixty Five Quid" to some Pop Art for the track "On and On."   Why this band are giving their music away for free when so much time and effort obviously goes into the package, offering both excellent audible and visual experiences, is beyond me, but thanks guys......thanks very much!

The Sharks are:

DAVEY CANE - Vocals, Guitar, Puppetry

PAUL HARVEY - Vocals, Guitar, String Breaking

ROBBIE BUTCHER - Bass, Beards, Scrumpy Jack

WILL UDALL - Drums, Vocals, Beards

The band are embarking on a monthly gig from January next year, LIKE their facebook page to keep up with all the information regarding this.

Download all 7 EP's FREE here: Bandcamp

(Navigate your way through the EP's in the column on the right hand side.)

Contact, befriend, follow, like and love The Sharks here: Facebook

Press Contact: info@thesharks.co

The Mergers - Monkey See, Monkey Do. OUT DECEMBER 16th

The Mergers play "Beat!" Beat with a capital "B" and they do an excellent job of it too!

The band from Nuremburg are just about to release their fantastic debut album, "Monkey See, Monkey Do," upon the world.  Listening to the album, you will almost definately get a sense of time travel and find yourself back in 1966, bobbing your head, tapping your feet and discover a fear and loathing to go back to the present with its dirge of faux RnB singers from "Some shit holes got talent" type programme.  

This is real music as it was meant to be, abundant in melodies, harmonies and jangly guitars and even a bit of rocking piano.  There are several moments on the album that bring to mind The Beatles stint in Hamburg when they were raw, ready and exciting, maybe this is where the title of the bands album derives from?  

From album opener "All I Can Do" to the twelth track "We'll All Be Stars" the listener is treated to gem after gem, if you love your 60's beat music, like myself, then this album is definately for you.

THE MERGERS suddenly emerged on a disgustingly rainy day in Germany in 2011. 

Actually country-bred from an ancient beat community that was founded in 1966 in consequence of musical taste’s negative development.

THE MERGERS luckily were kept away from all upcoming musical influences. 

Aspiring music manager Annie Goldfinger discovered this kind of a new world (that surprisingly looked very similar to an old one) by accident and brought this incredible new band for their first time in life to the continent. Unfortunately they had no entry permit so they were forced to leave subsequently, but only a few months later they were finally ready and allowed to hit the stage.
But what’s the catch? Immigration department insisted on taking up residence in Nuremberg (once voted Germany’s most boring metropolis), for lightening up the dull & bored people’s lifes.
But these 4 young men are well known for meeting tough issues head-on.

The Mergers are:

Jerry Coma (Vocals, Guitars)                                           Henry Florence Jr.(Vocals,Bass)                                              Jay Le Saux (Vocals, Guitars)                                                 Winston McCloud (Drums)

The album is due for release on the 16th of December and will be avaialble from itunes, Amazon, at the bands shows and at soundflat.de.

Catch the band live here: Live Dates Dec 2012/Jan 2013

Contact, befriend, follow, like and love The Mergers here:  Facebook

Grand Prix- Lejos & Hogar albums. NAME YOUR PRICE

This band from Buenos Aires, as their name suggests, owe a little debt to Teenage Fanclub with their sound, these albums contain some cracking songs, I have had both albums for many years now and still love them.  Some track are recorded in English and some in the band native Spanish.

I can't find out too much about them, so if you know anything, please enlighten us in the comments section.  Thanks.

Download both albums, "Name Your Price" here: Bandcamp

Nick Capaldi - A Shade Of Orange.

A few weeks ago I reviewed the brilliant "Stanley Arms Brigade" single by Nick Capladi on the blog and the album is due out just before Christmas and Nick very kindly sent me a copy of the album to feature on the blog.

I first heard about Nick Capaldi via one of the musicians in his band, Gareth Owen. Gareth used to lodge with me about 10 years ago and is one of those people that no matter what instrument you presented him with, he could just play it, I had all sorts of instrument around my home, keyboards, drums, guitars, Turkish instruments like Curnas and Zurnas, all of which he could play, so when he got in touch with me and told me that he was playing with Nick, I knew it would be something special and that he would be playing with an equal, if not greater talent, for the sake of my friend Gaz, we will say equal in this instance. Of course, I was correct in my assumption that it would be great.  We should not forget, of course, the two other, very talented, members of Nick's set up, Luke Watson (Drums) and Thomas Hughes (Organ)  who provide a very solid backbone to the band.

There is a healthy variety of styles on the album that are amalgamated to blend perfectly throughout the playing experience, a touch of soul on "Read Into Me," featuring the lovely vocals of Lynne Jackaman, a more rocking feel on "You Aint No Woman To Me," Jangly guitars on the slightly country feeling "We Fall,"and a nice bit of Power Pop on "My Car Was Born To Ride" which is possibly my favourite track on the album, if I had to pick one, which is very difficult to do on this 10 track album.

I would be hard pressed to catergorise this album into one genre, but even with the crossovers within, it flows really nicely from start to finish, it doesn't have one awkward track like some albums, that leaves you wondering what the artist was thinking when they included that one!

Gareth Owen (Left) Nick Capaldi (Right) Photo by Nadia.

Overall this is a very solid debut album which finishes up with the rocky "Eyes On The Road" a stomper of a track and maybe a reference to a band that are looking forward to where they are going, which, should be somewhere pretty cool, if the world is a just place.

Listen to and download the album here: iTunes

Official website here: http://www.nickcapaldi.com

Contact, follow, befriend, like and love Nick Capaldi here: Facebook

Live Dates:

AIR Raiser - The Corn Exchange Dorchester
Dorset
3rd December 2012
Various Artists gather for a great night of live music
Tickets £5 on the doorDoors open at 8pm


Camden HeadCamden
London
8pm
3rd January 201312 Bar
Denmark Street
London
31st January 2013

Mother Live
333 Old Street
London
EC1V 9LE
8.30pm
13th Febuary 2013

The Jac - I See Things Differently. FREE FESTIVE DOWNLOAD

The Jac kindly bestow a Christmas gift upon us to help us get into the spirit of the season.  These 15 tracks of seasonal joy don't follow your usual stylings of Christmas songs (as the title suggests) and may not be suitable for your Granny, who likes to sway away to Cliff's "Mistletoe and Wine" or some other piece of dirge that gets rammed down our throats at this time of year, this is a refreshing take on seasonal songs that won't drive you mad.  Light the fire, throw on a yule log, stoke it up with all those old Christmas best of's albums and play The Jac loud!

Surely you can’t expect a Christmas album from the southern hemisphere to be normal?

It always seems to confuse Westerners in the northern hemisphere that the festive season in Australia falls in summer where it’s not uncommon to spend Boxing Day at the beach because it’s so hot. The idea of a white Christmas belongs in a postcard or a movie here.

I make no apology for this compilation of songs I’ve been recording since 2001 being so dis-jointed and occasionally odd; I just wrote whatever came into my head that particular year. The more unorthodox and eccentric elements set the blueprint of this year’s debut JAC album, Faux Pas.

“I See Things Differently” features everything from a sincere and whole-hearted look at the themes of distance and longing (Sweet Baby Jesus, Stockholm Christmas, If Santa Makes It Down), to being generally fucked up (Yuletide Heroine Blues, All I Want For Xmas Is Cindy Brady, Psychotic Psummer, Going Down) and even a little something for the kids (Surfin’ Santa & I Saw Santa With A Gun). If there is no track to tickle or amuse you then you just don’t believe in Santa.

More than anything to do with religious beliefs or traditional festive messages, this compilation simply chronicles my beginnings in home recording; none of these tracks have been recorded or mixed in professional studios. In fact the idea of the Brtiannicas, a band the where the members lived, wrote and recorded their parts in separate countries, was born out these early recordings.

I feel honoured that there have been so many friends that have contributed to the recording of these songs; some one off and others continue to appear more often than not. In particular, I’d like to thank Herb Eimerman and Magnus Karlsson from the Brits, Stefan Johansson and Lars Brusell.

As of 1 December, all the 15 tracks can be downloaded for free online: www.thejac.com.au Lyrics and information on each track are also available there.

Whatever you do or don’t believe in, I wish you happy holidays and all the best for 2013. Thanks for your support in 2012.

Warm regards,
Joe Algeri (the JAC)

Download "I See Things Differently" FREE here: Bandcamp

Contact, befriend, follow, like and love The Jac here: Facebook