The Warm Up with Lucero

05/06/2012 By
The Warm Up with Lucero [ 17:31 | 40.09 MB ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Lucero is known as a rowdy and raucous bar band, one that will play your requests and then close the bar down with you after the show.  They’re the hometown boys that made good and they spend most of their time on the road playing shows and “ambassadorizing” Memphis.

Their live performances are legendary and continue to be a huge part of their appeal to their fans. And we love a good, loud and drunk rock show just as much as the next person! But we’ve also had the pleasure of seeing  singer/songwriter Ben Nichols and pianist/organist Rick Steff play in more intimate settings over the last few years and that’s been a pretty special experience too. We set out to capture one of those performances this afternoon at Ardent Studios. We are pretty happy with the results.

Tonight is The Lucero Family Barbecue at The Hi-Tone. The band will be going on a 8PM, so be sure to get there early. We have a feeling that it will be jam-packed since this show will be subbing for a record release party for their latest album, Women & Work. We hear there are free hot dogs if you get there when the doors open at 5PM.


Women & Work is a love letter from Lucero to its hometown, Memphis, Tennessee. “Having a band in Memphis puts you in a tradition,” says Lucero frontman Ben Nichols. “We started at punk rock shows, not necessarily playing punk rock, but coming from the outside, from a bohemian place.”

The bohemian tradition is just as strong in Memphis as the city’s series of international hits. The popularity of Sun, Stax, Elvis, and Al Green doesn’t diminish the influence of the blues, Jim Dickinson, and Alex Chilton. The bridge between the shadows and the spotlight has become the heart of Lucero: Unafraid to mix pop with their anti-pop, they always charge into new territory.

As punks, Lucero were masters of restraint, with country music beer stains dribbled down the front of their shirts. As whiskey-soaked bohemians, they didn’t shy from sweeping Americana tableaus. And then they added an accordion. “When we started, we were building on a foundation we weren’t aware of,” says guitarist Brian Venable. “Listening back to our early stuff, we hear ourselves reference the old Sun Records. We didn’t hear it or feel it then, but we hear it and feel it now.”

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Pre-order Alex Chilton’s – Free Again: The “1970″ Sessions

11/29/2011 By

Available January 10, 2012 from Omnivore Recordings or where fine records are sold!

Chilton’s first post-Box Tops and pre-Big Star recordings.
Available on CD, Digital LP or Vinyl LP (first 1,500 pressed on clear vinyl).

OMNIVORE EXCLUSIVE: Available only from our web store and limited to 500 copies includes the clear vinyl LP + bonus 7″ single! see below for more info.

Click here for a first listen to the track “The EMI Song (Smile For Me)” (Original Mono Mix).

In the latter months of 1969, somewhere between the moon landing and the start of the Vietnam draft, the concerts at Woodstock and Altamont, Alex Chilton decided to take back his life. During that annus mirabilis, while the world experienced a generationally sparked social, political, and cultural upheaval, the 18-year-old Chilton was in the midst of a revolution of his own.

For the past year, Chilton had been strapped in a creative, professional, and personal straitjacket. He was the lead singer of a million-selling band, The Box Tops, but felt like little more than a puppet of the group’s producers. In the era of free love, he’d been pressured into a shotgun marriage and fatherhood. And he’d ultimately come to see himself as the pawn of an unscrupulous business machine, sent to grind it out on the road in a series of silly lip-synched TV performances and one-night stands while someone else cashed his checks. As he entered the studio that summer to make his first solo recordings, the man who would come to define the very spirit of musical independence was still bound in chains. At a time where liberation and self-expression were rallying cries, Alex Chilton was about to break free.

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Exclusive Trailer: BIG STAR: NOTHING CAN HURT ME

11/17/2011 By

BIG STAR: NOTHING CAN HURT ME is a feature-length documentary about the massive critical acclaim, dismal commercial failure, and enduring legacy of pop music’s greatest cult phenomenon, Big Star.

“Big Star served as a Rosetta Stone for a whole generation of musicians… We’ve yet to make a record as good as Big Star’s Third.” – Peter Buck, R.E.M.

“Big Star’s world-wide popularity is the epitome of ‘Memphis obscurity’.”–Robert Gordon, It Came From Memphis

Among many ardent music fans and critics the band, Big Star, is widely regarded as one of the greatest bands in rock history. Never experiencing popular success in their time; even today their greatest notoriety is from their song, “In the Street” the title theme for the Fox sitcom, That 70s Show. But despite their unique distinction of being famous for not being famous, today Big Star’s influence can be heard in the music of artists as diverse as R.E.M., Coldplay, Wilco, Beck, Jeff Buckley and Elliot Smith, just to name a few.

BIG STAR: NOTHING CAN HURT ME will trace the origins and history of the legendary band from the late sixties with lead singer Alex Chilton sky-rocketing to stardom at the age of sixteen with The Box Tops and their #1 hit, “The Letter” to the serendipitous meeting of Chilton and local Memphis singer-songwriter-guitarist, Chris Bell; through the tumultuous recording of the group’s three landmark albums, #1 Record, Radio City and Third/Sister Lovers (Ardent Records); culminating with their implosion due to failed record sales, personal breakdowns and the tragic death of Chris Bell in 1978.

This film is a unique portrait of an incredibly talented group of musicians who crafted three albums now considered pop masterpieces (all of which charted on Rolling Stone’s Top 500 albums of all time). The group strived for stardom but fell victim to the corporate stranglehold of the major record labels and radio stations who dominated the music business at that time. BIG STAR: NOTHING CAN HURT ME is seen as a cautionary tale of the growing corporatization in pop music in the 70’s as great American independent labels like Memphis-based STAX (Ardent’s distributor), were swallowed whole or marginalized by the music conglomerates. Artists whose musical vision and style were not deemed worthy of radio play were doomed to obscurity until many were discovered by a new breed of musical upstarts who arose from places like CBGB’s in New York and in college towns throughout America.

Eventually aligning under the term “Punk Rock,” the movement by the late 1970’s sought to topple corporate control over the music industry and remind the world what rock and roll is all about. It was the leaders of this movement—bands such as REM, The dB’s, The Replacements–and the passion of many frustrated music writers at such publications as Rolling Stone, Creem, and Musician Magazine who brought about Big Star’s resurrection and eventually defined the term “alternative music,” articulating a genre lying outside of the mainstream and brimming with the vitality and soul on which rock and roll was built.

For more info check out http://www.bigstarstory.com/ and the Facebook Page.

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Locals Only: Graham Burks Listens to Youniverse

04/08/2011 By

Upon first hearing Youniverse, it was clear to me that this is one of the best bands in Memphis.  (True, I recently declared the same thing about Good Luck Dark Star on this very blog, in my top 10 of 2010, but who’s keeping score?)  If you live here, you know that this city is full of untapped musical potential, but typically Memphis bands are happy to occupy their own unique corners of this musically unconventional town.  This is a tradition that began with Alex Chilton‘s post-Big Star snubbing of the music industry and continues to affect/infect our indie scene to this day (for better/worse.)

I first ran across Youniverse several times towards the end of 2010, culminating in an amazing New Year’s Eve show at the P&H in which the band played in the middle of the crowd, with no separation of band, stage, or audience.  The band grabbed my attention because they seemed to offer something different.  This is a Memphis band that embraces our irreverence for national tastes, but through sheer musical quality, transcends the limitations imposed by our quirkiness.

songs by YOUNIVERSE

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Song by Song Review: Little Tybee’s Humorous to Bees

03/23/2011 By

Do bees really laugh? If you were in Georgia … yes. It is  the home of  a tiny little swamp of an island that someone, somewhere decided to call Little Tybee. Well known for kayaking, surfing, … snakes too!

One thing the south has always done well is music. So it should make total sense that a band of musicians from Georgia would be worth a listen. Because music from the south seems to always give a listener a different slant on life. So with a name like Little Tybee, surely curiosity alone is enough to merit a listen. And this record deserves many of those.

WARNING: The vocal performance of writer-singer-pianist-guitarist Brock Scott along with brilliant musicianship may lead to temporary interruptions of positive cash flow.

The first cut, “Humorous to Bees” is actually a retro-ish intro that at first leaves one wondering where this is all going, but it serves as a perfect way to ease into the upcoming visions of “Strong Ears.” Visions that wash over you endlessly. Then, with perfect timing, a string quartet takes a turn, and we set out again on our journey of visions. Cap it off with all of these elements playing as good friends (and a few relatives), and the world suddenly looks different. Kind of like a Georgian Beach.

“Design” is officially the third cut and once again gives an aura of 40’s island sunsets in the chorus and the bigger picture starts to come into view, especially if you know of the legend of the undetonated atomic bomb that purportedly lives underwater off of Little Tybee island. A vision of, say, Pearl Harbor before the end of 1941. A bonus in this cut: Scott shares the spotlight with 8-string lead guitarist Josh Martin, who is one deadly man with a pick and an eight string guitar.

“Passion Seekers” starts with the magical sound of a … what is that? This cut is a sonic safari that brings Technicolor® to the picture with a piano and glockenspiel showing up in the first 20 seconds. Sunlight, moonlight, and a quirky guitar slide that becomes a theme … all that’s needed for another musical feather in their hat.

Little Tybee by Paper Garden Records

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Song by Song Review: Gomez’s Ben Ottewell’s Solo Album Shapes and Shadows

02/18/2011 By

So how do you go about getting someone to hear you above the glut? Not the cursory iTunes “audition” style listen; the “REAL” listen … you know, where you actually glimpse into the artist’s soul and hopefully get to spend a bit of time off from being you, and be the artist for awhile?

If you ask Gomez’s Ben Ottewell or listen to his latest solo record, Shapes and Shadows,  he gives many reasons to listen, because you will find many reasons to let the next one play. One of the main being that it’s fun guessing which direction he is going to go. And for each new direction, chalk up another reason. Starting with:

“Shadows” is a sonic journey that starts off way down there and ends up way up here! And all along the trip, it’s not easy to miss a beat of his message, due mostly to the uncluttered production that points to the pathway. But it’s really Ben who keeps your focus, with a voice quality that at times faintly echoes an early Neil Young. With no distractions pulling your ear off of his above-unique character, he moves confidently down the not so worn path, showing that he knows where this safari is leading; at least you think he does. Ottewell also has the gift of being able to paint some very complex musical scenery, containing a back-drop of unexpected color. End result: it’s a no brainer, given an engaging song, this artist clicks. As we move to other titles, his warm and oddly fetching voice provides a security for the listener, warming the soul while he may becomes daring and even a bit icy at times.

“Lightbulbs” As this piece wakes from a dream, it’s melody instantly demands an ear. The instrumental combination alone composes a denseness in the chorus which, when all stirred together, forms a big, rockin’ multi-colored wall. What? That was almost 5 minutes? It felt like 45 seconds, to me. An ethereal trip you will love. MUST play it again.

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