“Dave Miller has a penchant for melodies that stick with you, in a good way. His latest album provides the joy and the lift we all need right now– through his bad ass guitar playing, a myriad of unexpected shifts reveal a brilliant sonic universe.” – Mary Halvorson

BANDCAMP

Guitarist and composer Dave Miller (Greg Ward’s Rogue Parade, Dustin Laurenzi’s Snaketime, Joe Policastro Trio, Algernon, Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls), has been a prominent fixture in the Chicago music scene for nearly two decades. His last record, Old Door Phantoms (ears&eyes Records), hailed by Audiophile Audition as “the multi-genre instrumental album of the year”, as well as “a complex and beautiful piece of work” by New City, explored themes of nature, spirituality, and the human condition through the lens of an instrumental psychedelic garage rock band.

Echoes of Neil Young’s Crazy Horse and guitarist ‪Marc Ribot‬ continue into Miller’s new album, Dave Miller, though he has expanded his focus to now include detailed arrangements and more refined production techniques. With the opening of Miller’s new recording studio, Whiskey Point Recording (co-run with ace pianist/engineer, Dan Pierson (V.V. Lightbody)), Miller’s music has become even more alive and exploratory. Beautiful mellotrons collide with fuzzed out guitars over swampy drums and non-ironic bongos, as if ‪Brian Wilson‬ got into a bar fight with The Meters and ‪Link Wray‬ before realizing they were kindred spirits, with Miller composing the score. Miller’s music, above all, aims to create its own utopic universe where all the cool music coexists.

Dave Miller – guitars
Matt Ulery – fender bass (Wild Belle, Greenleaf Music)
Dan Pierson – keyboards (V.V. Lightbody)
Devin Drobka – drums (Field Report)
Juan Pastor – percussion (Howard Levy, Fareed Haque, Miguel Zenón)
Mikel Patrick Avery – tambourine (Joshua Abrams Natural Information Society, Theaster Gates)
Mike Harmon – fender bass (track 4)(V.V. Lightbody)

Dave Miller appears on Ryley Walker Presents Imaginational Anthem vol 9

Guitarist Wall Matthews is surviving member of experimental 70’s collective, Entourage. Sampled by Four Tet, their name whispered in reverence through the decades, Entourage forged bold musical ideas on their two rare ’70s Folkways LPs. Tompkins Square released ‘Ceremony of Dreams : Studio Sessions and Outtakes, 1972-1977′, in 2018 to wide acclaim. ‘Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981′ is a collection of unreleased or obscure music by the master guitarist. This volume will be released as a limited edition LP, along with five other digital volumes of Wall’s music, chronologically mapping his career.

A sampler is exclusively available on bandcamp. All six volumes can be heard in their entirety on every digital platform worldwide by searching ‘The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews.’

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Wall Matthews – Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981

Guitarist Wall Matthews is surviving member of experimental 70’s collective, Entourage. Sampled by Four Tet, their name whispered in reverence through the decades, Entourage forged bold musical ideas on their two rare ’70s Folkways LPs. Tompkins Square released Ceremony of Dreams : Studio Sessions and Outtakes, 1972-1977, in 2018 to wide acclaim. ‘Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981′ is a collection of unreleased or obscure music by the master guitarist. This volume will be released as a limited edition LP, along with four other digital volumes of Wall’s music, mapping his entire career, all out April 10th.

Praise for Entourage :

“A three-hour stream of instrumental riches, whether you’re looking to find samples or get lost in a trance….These 30 tracks alternately conjure the ecstatic minimalism of John Cale and La Monte Young, the billowing clouds of Arvo Part, the aleatory intrigue of Derek Bailey, and the strange guitar beauty of Sandy Bull” – Pitchfork

“As seriously as they clearly took their playing, the music never lost its sense of playfulness and joy” – PASTE (8.7/10)

“This is essential and irresistible vintage American weirdness.” – All Music Guide (4.5)

“…it’s transporting stuff.” – Rolling Stone

“Erring between Alice Coltrane-esque spiritual jazz, Steve Reich’s minimalism and stunning instrumental folk, Ceremony of Dreams highlights 30 tracks from a fiercely creative period between 1972 and 1977 that did not appear on the two Folkways albums released at the time.” – Vinyl Factory

“New age gongs, drones, sax, pastoral guitar, scraped violas … Think Third Ear Band’s druid rock meets early Popol Vuh with the obvious chops of a less slick Weather Report”
- Record Collector (4 stars)

Sam Burton is from Salt Lake City, now based in Los Angeles. After several years circulating homemade cassettes on labels like Chthonic and embraced by blogs like Cassette Gods, Sam has recorded his first proper debut album with producer Jarvis Taveniere (Purple Mountains, Allah Las, Real Estate). Due in mid-2020, the LP will be preceded by two limited edition 45s. The second will be available on coloured vinyl exclusively for Record Store Day in the UK. The first 7″ includes “I Can Go With You” b/w “I Am No Moon.”

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This collection of rare black gospel from the Midwest-featuring church congregations, basement recordings sessions, family bands and children’s choirs-is drawn together by two threads. The first-hope-which holds fast and unchanging, even in the most trying of circumstances. The second-circumstance-the way these recordings fell into the hands of producer, Ramona Stout, in Chicago at the dawn of the Obama era, when she had just about lost hope in her American Dream.

Over the course of five years (2006-2011) of vinyl hustling in Chicago’s South and West Sides, these 45s came into Ramona’s hands, mixed up in milk-crates stacked with Northern Soul, water-damaged jazz and Hall and Oates LPs. After much travel and time, Ramona has articulated the spirit that drove this music forward. In this collection, she writes of this music and its relationship to the struggling communities where the records were found.

Sourced from exceedingly rare 45s-many of which were vanity pressings of less than 100 copies-all of the tracks found on this collection appear for the first time since their original release. Remastered by Grammy-winning producer Christopher King, these recordings have been resurrected for a new generation of listeners. With art direction by Grammy-winning graphic designer Susan Archie, this collection is a tangible, immersive experience in the struggles-the victories, the failures and the lingering hope-that defined Chicago in the post-Civil Rights era.

No Other Love is a singular, impressionistic journey into music that expresses faith, despair and exuberance. It is also a profound exploration of the very meaning of hope.

All tracks used by permission.

Will Beeley – Highways & Heart Attacks – His first album in 40 years !

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No Depression Review

** Q&A and live performance at Grimey’s, Nashville on Sept 12th, 2pm. FREE ! Will in conversation with Edd Hurt, Nashville Scene. **

Texas singer-songwriter Will Beeley came up in the Austin scene of the 70’s with Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt and Steve Earle. His two 70’s LPs were reissued by Tompkins Square in 2017. The new album was recorded by 5-time Grammy winner Joe Trevino (Flaco, Los Lobos), produced by Jerry DeCicca (Larry Jon Wilson), features Michael Guerra (The Mavericks), and was mixed by Stuart Sikes (Loretta Lynn’s ‘Van Lear Rose’).

HIGHWAYS & HEART ATTACKS is a remarkable return from a singer-songwriter whose work might well have been lost to dusty record crates and the secret annals of Americana musical history. But with Tompkins Square’s 2017 reissues of Beeley’s two stunning albums, 1971’s Gallivantin’ and 1979’s Passing Dream, the Texas-based troubadour finally earned the applause his distinctive songcraft long deserved, with Noisey praising his “deeply felt, little heard, folk music” and Paste noting, “With the re-release of these fine LPs, we can spend some time more fully appreciating them before (Beeley’s) very welcome return to the music world.”

“The music business is one of those things where you expect it to happen now,” Beeley says. “When it takes 40 years to happen, it kind of makes you sit back and go, I’m surprised it ever happened.”

Born at Southern California’s March Field Air Force Base, Beeley traveled the world with his family before they finally settled down in San Antonio, TX. His natural love of music was further fueled watching Townes Van Zandt performing regularly at local bars and honky tonks, inspiring him to try his own hand at singing and playing songs for a living. Though only 200 copies were printed and sold from the stage and back of Beeley’s car, 1971’s stark Gallivantin’ was undeniably marked by Beeley’s emerging lyrical voice, comparable to such contemporary Lone Star State peers as Van Zandt and Michael Martin Murphey. Beeley signed an artist contract with the Mississippi-based soul label, Malaco Records, recording sessions in 1971 and 1973, with a single released in 1974.

Beeley was then given a release to concentrate on his songwriting but in 1977, he reunited with Malaco and backed by the label’s house band – which by a stroke of good fortune included such young Texas studio musicians as guitarist Larry Campbell (Bob Dylan, Levon Helm), keyboardist Carson Whitsett (Paul Simon, Z.Z. Hill), and drummer James Stroud (Mickey Newbury, Eddie Rabbit) – recorded Passing Dream. The LP saw Beeley taking a far more ambitious approach than his debut, imbuing his deeply personal songcraft with an edgy psychedelic outlaw energy. Most strikingly, Beeley’s singing voice had evolved, colored by experience and struggle.

“But nothing ever happened,” he says. “It just kind of dissolved. I was pretty discouraged.”

Beeley withdrew from his own musical career and went about the business of real life, raising a family in New Mexico whilst working as an over the road truck driver. His guitar and pen sat untouched for years, his dreams of being a working musician long relegated to his personal back pages. But when Tompkins Square reached out about reissuing Gallivantin’ and Passing Dream, Beeley was inspired once again. He reached out to Tompkins Square founder Josh Rosenthal, wondering if the label might be interested in new material. The answer was of course an enthusiastic ‘Yes!’ and plans were made for Beeley to hit the studio for the first time in nearly four decades.

Recorded at San Antonio’s Blue Cat Studios with producer Jerry David DeCicca (Chris Gantry, Ed Askew, Larry Jon Wilson), GRAMMY® Award-winning engineer Joe Trevino (Flaco Jimenez, Los Lobos, Los Texmaniacs), and GRAMMY® Award-winning mix engineer Stuart Sikes (Loretta Lynn, Cat Power, Phosphorescent), HIGHWAYS & HEART ATTACKS sees Beeley backed by a combo of Americana all-stars that includes accordionist Michael Guerra (The Mavericks), guitarist Don Cento (Sarah Jaffee), bassist Canaan Faulkner (The Black Swans, Ed Askew), drummer Armando Aussenac (Neon Indian), organist Richard Martin, and GRAMMY® Award-winning violinist Bobby Flores (Freddy Fender, Doug Sahm, Willie Nelson). Songs like “Been A Drifter” and “Don’t Rain On My Parade” are both wistful and warm-hearted, Beeley’s rough-hewn vocals the ideal vehicle for his one-of-a-kind tales of a road well traveled and a surprise ending hard earned.

“I feel this is really the best stuff I’ve written,” Beeley says. “I recorded Passing Dream more than 40 years ago. I’m just thankful I got another chance to go in the studio and lay down some more of my tunes.”