ANA POPOVIC: BLUES GUITARIST/SINGER

Ana Popovic, the lady blues guitarist, and singer songwriter, released her 4th solo studio album August 16, 2011, UNCONDITIONAL, which includes 8 original songs, plus favorite cover songs.The blues rock album has slamming guitar riffs, and sultry vocals. The enticing album cover has stirred up a little controversy, but comes with the territory. Popovic is not just a pretty face/body, she is a serious musician.  A blues guitarist of Popovic’s caliber is typically male, and she is as talented as some of the best   male blues guitarist around today.

Unconditional, Ana explains, "Describes what I feel on stage. That place is simply unconditional. It is magical. It’s just me and my guitar, notes, sounds and drum grooves. I let the band lift me up, and I feed off of their energy. I hate to think when playing. I only feel. Unconditional is how I stand towards my music -it’s mine, it’s sacred, and it’s with no boundaries. Absolute, definite. I tend to put everything I have into it and don’t let anything or anyone get in between, except the people that truly inspire me."

Ana Popovic grew up in Belgrade, Yugoslavia (Serbia) where she became enamored with her father’s blues record collection, and the beginning interest in music. By the time she was 8 years old she was an opening act for likes of Jr. Wells, and other great blues performers. By the time she was 18 she had her own band HUSH, and they released their first album in 1998. Shortly after that she moved to the Netherlands to study Jazz Guitar, where she became well known on the Dutch blues scene, and later in Germany. She is currently touring in the USA.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WfKtdFiO2k&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nkz7-iAw-3E&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j23puGHD40M&feature=related


http://www.anapopovic.com/_index.php



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JOHNNIE BASSETT: BLUES SINGER/GUITARIST

The electric Bluesman, Johnnie Bassett released his last album, his 6th in 2009

THE GENTLEMAN IS BACK. The seasoned bluesman has worked for 5 decades perfecting his craft. The 75 year old Bassett, presents a fun blues filled album. His best release to date, with new material, some cover songs by music greats, and songs written with band members Chis Codish (keyboards) & Keith Kaminski (sax). Skeeto Valdez is the drummer for the group.
Bassett was primarily a session musician until 1990 when he went out on his own. He had previously backed notable artist like; Tina Turner, The Miracles, John Lee Hooker, Smokey Robinson & Jimi Hendrix, and many more in his career span as a session musician.

While he was a Rock n’ Roll musician, he grew up with the blues, and has done a bang-up job incorporating the Delta, and Jump blues into a R & B groove, with a sometimes jazzy feel in an album that comes together in a way the fits just right.

The easy going style of Basset may remind you of Albert King, or B.B. King. He feels the music he sings and plays, and says he is having fun, and will keep it up as long as he is having fun. Johnnie Basset is one of our National Treasures in the blues music sound of today and yesterday.
Bassett is not well known nationally, but he is a well known popular artist in the Detroit area. If ever in town, drop down to the 3rd Street Bar, for a weekly jam session with band members; Codish, Kaminski, and Valdez.

Blues enthusiast will enjoy this album. It’s the perfect album for sitting around a fire sipping a glass of wine, and tapping your toe for enjoyable listening. View the youtube video of Johnnie singing "A Women Got Ways",  from the album. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCpgl1Vz4Pk

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GOTYE: SINGER/SONGWRITER

Gotye (pronounced 'gore-ti-yeah') released their 3rd studio album in the US. August 19, 2011.


MAKING MIRRORS, The Alternative, Indie/Experimental Rock band comes to us from Australia.

Front man, Wally De Back, aka. Wouter (Walter) De Backer, was born in Belgium but moved to Australia at a young age. The multi-instrumentalist brings with him a fresh sound, blending his soothing vocals, spelling binding base, and haunting drums to create a sound appealing to a wide range audience. He is the modern day ‘Sting’, and sometimes a little 'George Michael'. See for yourself the innovative Gotye as you check out a couple of his videos that show his creativity and musical ability. His music is not the electronic dance craze, it is music electronically enhanced.

On YouTube from the album DRAWING BLOOD (2006) “Hearts A Mess”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GnXFJOXvL_A&feature=related

From the current album MAKING MIRRORS “Somebody I used to Know”, featuring Kimbra.(Tasteful partial nudity)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UVNT4wvIGY

In 2007 DeBacker won the ARIA award for best Male artist, and in 2006 he won the  AIR ‘Most Outstanding New Independent Artist’

DeBack is a talented young artist on a roll, who could easily become an international pop star, performing all over the world as his music has mass appeal. No doubt we will be hearing more of Gotye.

Be sure to go to his website to see how he recorded the current album in his barn on his parent’s property in Melbourne Australia.

http://gotye.com/

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CHRISTIAN FENNESZ: SONGWRITER/GUITARIST/COMPOSER

Fennesz, the Austrian born guitarist released his 6th EP SEVEN STARS out July 22, 2011. Fennesz has 6 studio albums to his credit and SEVEN STARS is the latest recorded effort, since he began recording as a solo artist in 1997.

The multi-layered compositions of guitar textures, notebook computer enhancements, include underlayments of pop melodies. Its new age spinning a bold new musical language. Some of his music could easily be referred to as 'Trance Music'. Fennesz, a laptop composer, singer/songwriter, and guitarist was originally with a free form rock group ‘Maische’ performing in the Viennese underground during the 80’s. They incorporated sound techniques not generally accepted in the rock world at that time.

Fennesz records his own music sound, but also collaborates with various other artists in many genres, and releases solo albums every 2-4 years. He is an acquired taste but has a following for his electronic zonal sounds, both soothing, and  invigorating.
The following excerpt below describes him in shimmering detail:

San Francisco Bay Guardian Music Blog (USA): Using his patented Mac patches to splay, splice, and caress a Stratocaster, Fennesz produces layer upon layer of compressed guitar feedback and processed glitches that spread out like a beach blanket on the windy sands of the Mediterranean. When a few chords suddenly appear from the whirring microtonal din, the noise musician-turned sculptor conveys with a Proustian flourish something truly magical: the distant memories of aquamarine sunsets and tawny sand dunes seem to emanate from the speakers.

Fennesz’s greatest strength has always been in his keen ability to formulate soundscapes that capture equally the coldest blasts of alien feedback and the most summery mosaic of acoustic guitar strums, chimes, and keyboard drones. Or rather, his compositions are at their most transfixing when they seem to play in music’s littoral zones, where the shallow grounds of textural play might suddenly give way to vast oceanic harmonics. [Erik Morse]

http://www.fennesz.com/

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BRANDON ONEAL BAILEY: HARPBOXER

Brandon Bailey is a young man with an extraordinary talent.

The Tennessee harp player has developed his skill as a “Harpboxer” which is an international phenomenon of sorts. His first CD “MEMPHIS GROOVES, out July 2011 is a 13 song album featuring his loop based harp playing infused with beat-boxing. His has that  harmonica singing with the combinination of the looping pedal and beat-box, and he sings too! 

Although he is not the inventor of the Harpbox sound, he has infused refined blues riffs with beat box and perfected it to call it his own. Check him out on YouTube to see what it is all about. You will find it unique if not mesmerizing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2u9lkpHVe6c

The pre-med student at the University of Memphis dedicates himself to school as much as he does to the harmonica. He is pursuing a musical career for now, but his ultimate goal is to become a Pediatric Neurologist.
In the mean-time "Brandon can do it all. On Memphis Grooves, he literally does it all... .Every single sound on this album is something Brandon produced with his mouth, harmonica, shaker, and thumping foot."

-from liner notes by Adam Gussow

"...astonishing skills…... . modern blues harp layered with groundbreaking ideas…... . an evolution of the blues by a teen musical master”."
-Yukari Shinagawa "Black Grooves


http://www.brandonobailey.com/

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JEFF GOLUB BAND

Jeff Golub (Goal-Ub, like club), Contemporary Jazz Guitarist, released his 14th studio album, THE THREE KINGS. The album is a jazzy blues album featuring piano man Henry Butler on keyboard and vocals, with special guest vocalist, Robben Ford and Sonny Landreth, and band member Josh Dion, drummer and vocalist.

Golub is probably best known for his association with Rod Stewart, whom he played with from 1988-1995, on 4 albums and 5 world tours, and that fabulous head of hair, now somewhat gray. He was also with Billy Squier, for several years and Dave Koz and the Kozman’s.

The Ohio native started out his career by imitating the best rock guitar men in the world like Clapton, Beck, and Jimi Hendrix, but later developed an interest in the blues, and was inspired by the work of Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy and Freddie King, BB King, and Albert King;  consequently his tribute to THE THREE KINGS.

Henry Butler, “The Pride of New Orleans”, adds the blues sound with energetic vocals, and accomplished key boards. Blind since birth from glaucoma, Butler is the consummate blues musician and a great addition to the Golub Band Album.

The 56 year old  Golub recently lost his vision. When he started making this album he began having issues with his right eye, and tried to ignore it, but persisted and it was eventually determined he had a collapse of the optic nerve, that has permanently impaired his vision in the right eye and most recently he began having the same problems in the left eye and has since been declared legally blind.

He has a great attitude about his misfortune, because he can still play the guitar, and his good friend Henry Butler, is helping him cope with the world as a blind man.

If you like jazzed up blues greats this is an easy listening album in more ways than one.

http://www.jeffgolub.com/

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IMELDA MAY, SINGER/MUSICIAN

Imelda May, vocalist from Dublin Ireland, released her 3rd Studio Album in the US, MAYHEM, out July 19, 2011. The rockabilly, jazzy, blues singer, brings a variety of tunes to us on this album. She is virtually all over the place when it comes to style. One moment she is rocking out, and shifts to jazzed-up tunes and show stopper performances, to almost cabaret. She is definitely entertaining and refreshingly different from the standard pop singer.


You may recall her performance at the 2010 Grammies along with Jeff beck as they paid tribute to Les Paul. Most recently she appeared on the Jay Leno Show on 7/18/2011.

She is quirky, fun, and not the usual jazz/blues, rockabilly singer, she is unique. Her artistry is a show in its own with pleasing and enjoyable vocals. She has kind of a 50’s flavor, and she can hoot and holler singing rockabilly as her “Proud & Humble” on the album. She can turn it around with her sultry “All For You”, or the jazzy “Bury My Troubles”, or the bluesy “Too Sad To Cry”.  Her version of the cover song "Tainted Love" is sure to get you off  your feet and dance!

No doubt, her show is fun and keeps you moving to the music. You will feel totally entertained when Imelda May hits the stage, she has something for everyone.

http://www.imeldamay.co.uk/

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