Blues-rock master Joe Bonamassa hits the Calvin on February 26th. All ticket buyers entered to win an Epiphone electric guitar from Joe!

Courtesy of Rev. Keith A. Gordon, About.com Blues Guide
(Thanks Rev.)
Blues-rock guitarist Joe Bonamassa drops his latest album, The Ballad of John Henry, on February 24th, 2009 and promptly hits the road for several months to sell it to the blues-loving masses. The first leg of Bonamassa's tour begins on Thursday, February 26th, 8PM at The Calvin Theatre and then heads overseas with several shows scheduled for the United Kingdom and Germany. The crown jewel of this 2009 tour is a coveted show to be held at the Royal Albert Hall in London, an honor reserved for precious few artists. Bonamassa and crew put on a hell of a show.

Bonamassa's new album is The Ballad of John Henry. Working once again with noted producer Kevin Shirley (Black Crowes, Aerosmith), Bonamassa is celebrating his 20th year as a professional musician with a set that the guitarist believes is his strongest effort to date.

Bonamassa is backed on The Ballad of John Henry by long time band members Blondie Chaplin on guitar, bassist Carmine Rojas, and keyboardist Rick Melick, as well as dual drummers in Anton Fig and Bogie Bowles. The follow-up to Bonamassa's acclaimed 2007 album Sloe Gin, and last year's scorching two-CD live set From Nowhere In Particular.

As for the contest, we'll announce details in a few days, but everyone who's already bought tickets will be included, don't you worry! Get tickets here.

New Wynton Marsalis album “He and She” to be released on March 24. Many songs premiered at Iron Horse last year.

On March 24, 2009, Wynton will release his fifth Blue Note recording, He and She . It’s an ambitious effort, combining spoken word and music, and Marsalis has given his quintet some formidable charts. The album is tempered with flashes of humor and plenty of swing. There’s ease and elegance and more than a little wisdom in these grooves…

He and She is about that eternally compelling and most elemental of subjects, the relationship between a man and a woman. Marsalis hasn’t merely crafted a love story, but a life story - a bittersweet rumination about the evanescence of life as well as the elusiveness of romance. Time is very much at the heart of He and She: the swift passage of time over the course of one’s life, the mood-altering shifts of time in the duration of a song.

He and She began with words, not music, though it was music that brought forth the words. Marsalis had been listening to Max Roach’s Jazz in ¾ Time, along with pieces by Duke Ellington, like “Lady Mac” from Such Sweet Thunder, work that explored waltz tempo in a jazz context. Roach’s classic album features “Valse Hot,” which, explains Marsalis is “a Sonny Rollins piece, a jazz waltz that I started to play when I was in high school.” That tune set off a spark: “I began to contemplate the shuffle rhythm, that the shuffle rhythm is the combination of a waltz feeling and a march feeling, and I thought it would be good for me to do an album of waltzes. I had written a couple before — one was for a ballet by Twyla Tharp, inspired by the Matisse painting, The Dance. I was thinking about waltzes and how in Vienna today younger people still dance the waltz, a waltz season is still a part of their social calendar. From there, I began to consider the ritual of courtship. The waltz is a courtship dance and at one time it was considered to be risqué. Now, of course, it’s genteel. Then I started to think about men and women, our relationships.”

Marsalis had ended his last Blue Note studio album, From the Plantation to the Penitentiary, with a stunning spoken word piece, a concentrated burst of righteous anger that addressed with preacher-like fervor the divisive, post-Katrina state of the nation. On He and She, Marsalis’s voice is more prominent throughout, prefacing just about every track with his words. Marsalis notes, “On He and She, it’s a man talking, but the person who delivers the universal truth of the matter is a woman.”

Before heading into the studio, the Wynton Marsalis Quintet traveled to the Iron Horse, in Northampton to perform this new material in front of an audience. On June 3 and 4, Wynton led a quartet at the Iron Horse for four packed shows Tuesday and Wednesday nights. He brought along pianist Eric Lewis, drummer Ali Jackson Jr., and bassist Carlos Enriquez, and the quartet performed a seven-tune set, followed by a single song encore.

Most of the compositions played at the first Tuesday show were so new that Wynton hadn’t named them yet, and they included a sprightly New Orleans shuffle, a playful swing largely built around a one-note melody, and even one speedy “out”. Marsalis has been coming up to the club for years to test-drive his work. The quintet subsequently cut the tracks live over a two-day period. The minimally edited result became He and She.

He and She draws its greatest power from telling a familiar story in such a compelling and richly entertaining manner, a unique variation on a theme that everyone, in some way, knows. One detects the sound of all our love stories in here. In other words, He and She is also Us.

More free music from artists playing in Northampton in the near future.

Thanks to all the musicians and singers who agreed to be on this new 13 track sampler. Everyone who's included will be at the Iron Horse, Pearl Street, or the Calvin Theater. Check 'em out and see if you want to check 'em out.
Click HERE or click image for the artwork. Click HERE for the free music download. The file is zipped FYI.

moe. at the Calvin Theatre Sunday, March 29th • 8:00 PM Tickets on sale this Friday 1/23

There is a reason that moe. is the preeminent progressive rock band on the music circuit today. In a remarkable career that's touched upon three decades and produced 17 albums and an incredible live legacy , the quintet of Al Schnier and Chuck Garvey on guitars and vocals, Rob Derhak on bass and vocals, Jim Loughlin on percussion and vibes, and Vinnie Amico on drums, continues to push the standard for performance art. Their discography marks a continuous progress and evolution in performance art. Each release is a step forward, refining a musical signature very much their own, yet very much a part of the tradition of rock and roll. Broadly speaking, that tradition may have its roots in the span of the American experience, rock and roll came to fruition in the 1960s and 1970s. The music from that period set the benchmark for the years that followed. This makes the many accolades and comparisons that moe. has received for their music — from Zeppelin to Zappa; from Steely Dan to the Dead — all the more meaningful and, let's be serious, pretty good company for moe. to be in. No mere revivalists, they're carrying forward and expanding on the best traditions of rock and roll.

Morgan Thomson talks about Melissa Ferrick who plays the Iron Horse on Friday, February 13th at 7PM

I stumbled upon Melissa Ferrick through an old school mix tape given to me from a friend this summer. Side 2, Track 3 was Melissa Ferrick's "I'm a Lesbian". This parody made me laugh with her sarcastic and witty lyrics ironically written to the music of "I'm the Only One" by Melissa Etheridge. (pictured at left)Intrigued by her voice and intelligent lyrics I looked into Melissa Ferrick more. Getting her big break from a freak circumstance as opener for Morrissey in 1991, almost 2 decades and 12 studio releases later, and still Melissa Ferrick is rockin'. "Ferrick manages to mediate between the rock'n'roll woman typified by Janis Joplin and the uncompromising, firecracker feminist Ani DiFranco." She writes from a rock' n' roll heart but sticks to the simplicity and intimacy of her refined acoustic "coffeehouse" sound with hints of rock added for flavor. She is the epitome of "just a girl and her guitar". That connection between the artist and their music plays a huge role in the connection between the artist and their fans. When you experience that type of intensity and raw emotion on stage, you begin to feel like you've gotten to look at the musicians childhood photographs and they're one of you're good friends who calls you in the middle of the night to talk about their significant other. With goosebumps running down your arms, your heart beating fast, and your mind hanging on every word of the musician, that connection becomes almost an endorphin-like high. For fans of Melissa Ferrick, this is common at her shows. Even with a rigourous touring schedule of over 150 shows a year, Melissa still astounds the crowd with her intrinsic passion and intensity onstage. Melissa seems to lose herself in the chords of her guitar and can't seem to hold back any one lyric that seem to be pouring straight from her heart. "I love, love, love playing live because I love the way my guitar sounds through my monitors. It's like a fight. I feel 'less than' the guitar. I will never, ever win that instrument, and it always wins me live. When I play live, I'm just a little misguided navigator...the show is in charge." -Morgan Thomson-IHEG Intern (pictured above in WARPAINT tie. Warpaint is her T-Shirt company)

Get Melissa Ferrick Tickets Here

It's a Cheryl Wheeler kinda weekend at the Iron Horse. Friday and Saturday 1/16 and 1/17 at 7PM.

Cheryl Wheeler has to be seen to be appreciated. Nothing you read and nothing you hear from her album prepares you for how good a performer she is.

From her albums you can tell that she is a gifted songwriter with a beautiful voice. From other people's comments about her you can learn that she is a natural story teller with a fantastic sense of humor. But until you see her in person, you never really believe what you've been told about her. Besides, almost half of the songs she does during her shows haven't been recorded!

Cheryl's concerts are more like what you would find at a comedy club than expect to find at a folk music concert. She will tell a story that has you rolling in the aisles, and then sing a song that leaves you wiping tears from your eyes. She will talk about some serious current event, and then sing a song that will have you howling with laughter. Her entire concert is a emotional roller coaster.

Her set list used to be a crumpled piece of paper with a bunch of song titles. She has improved on that. Now she has a picture of her border collie James in a plastic holder with the set list written on a piece of paper tucked behind the picture. After each song, she'll look at the list and decide what to do next. If somebody calls out a request, and her guitar is in the right key, she might try it, even if she hasn't done it in a while.

Has anyone ever seen Claire Higgins and Cheryl in the same room?

Northampton Mayor Claire Higgins (left) and Cheryl Wheeler (right)

With a new album due this Spring, the old “new Dylan” plays the Iron Horse on Sunday January 18th at 7PM

In his song about the late late ‘70s singer/songwriter boom called "Talking New Bob Dylan," Loudon Wainwright III sings: "I got a deal and so did John Prine, Steve Forbert and Springsteen all in a line/They were lookin’ for you, signing up others/We were ‘new Bob Dylans’…"

Forbert was coming out of Greenwich Village, playing harmonica on a rack and acoustic guitar, and his songs were personal but the Dylan comparison was lazy. Forbert has lived in Nashville since 1985. But nine years earlier, when he was just 21, he left his hometown of Meridian, Mississippi, and rode the train to New York City.

"I didn’t want to go to California," he said. "There was a lot happening in New York. It was very exciting at that time—all the CBGB stuff was happening and the Village folk scene was still happening. And if you found out that you couldn’t get into any of those places, you could sing in the street and see how things went.

"I wound up in the East Village pretty quickly. It was a lot of fun for me. In Meridian, you didn’t have a lot of people doing original music; it was just the typical bar scene with people playing Bad Company and Led Zeppelin. New York City was like a dream-come-true. There were kids from all over the country doing original material, listening to each other, learning what to do and what not to do, hopefully. I loved it."

His songs caught record company ears in fairly short order.

"It took a year and a half," he said. "Traditionally in rock-n-roll and pop music, you have your time between the ages of 20 and 25 where you get started or you don’t. There are exceptions, but that’s the general rule and it’s still true today, except it starts a little younger now."

His debut, Alive on Arrival, came out in 1978 but it was his second album, Jackrabbit Slim, that became his best seller, produced by the legendary John Simon and featuring Forbert’s one hit single, "Romeo’s Tune." He spent much of the ’80s without a recording contract. Since the early ’90s, however, he’s put out a series of fine albums, both studio and live.

His last CD, Strange Names and New Sensations, came out in 2007. Where his first album was a celebration of adolescence and the possibilities of adulthood, this one looked at life from the vantage point of a 50-year-old and included a striking new version of "Romeo’s Tune" and a blazing anti-war rocker called "The Baghdad Dream" that names names and points fingers. Nonetheless, there remains an upbeat sense of fun and good times in Steve Forbert’s music. As for the new stuff, we’ll leave it to Steve to tell you about that next Sunday.

Basement Comedy TONIGHT (Saturday 3/7) at...The Basement at 8PM sharp

Basement Comedy. Not a reference to the level of the comedy. Necessarily. That's just where it's happening. The Basement. Next to the Northampton Police Station, of course. TONIGHT Saturday March 7th, 8:00-10:00pm.

Louie Falcetti (pictured) is the host of this new monthly comedy show. THE ONLY ONE in Northampton.

This is no open mic, folks. No. These comics are licensed comedians with 10,000 hours of experience. Tonight it's Louie, Renata Tutko, and Sameer Naseem. Maybe more.

$5.00 Suggested Donation.

Bettye LaVette returns to Northampton’s Iron Horse on Wednesday January 7th at 7PM.

Last year it was fair to ask the question, “who is Bettye LaVette?” This year, not so much. After last year’s sold-out show at the Iron Horse and a triumphant year-long comeback Bettye’s return to Northampton is a fait accompli and a treat. The simple answer is Ms. LaVette is one of the greatest soul singers in American music history, possessed of an incredibly expressive voice that one moment will exude a formidable level of strength and intensity and the next will appear vulnerable, reflective, reeking of heartbreak. Unfortunately, it says much about the vagaries of the popular music industry that, although LaVette has been recording for over four decades, up until recent years she has remained criminally unknown. Last year’s comeback album, Scene of the Crime was recorded with the Drive-By Truckers.

Bettye stunned the audience with a standout performance of The Who's "Love Reign O'er Me" at The Kenedy Center Honors recently. According to Who guitarist Pete Townshend, "My favorite moment was when Bettye LaVette sang a very fine version of 'Love Reign O'er Me' at the Gala and Barbra Streisand turned to ask me if I really wrote it." Bettye herself was quite excited to be a part of the Honors: “The Kennedy Center Honors was the most exciting thing I have ever done in my life” says Bettye. “And this year has been the greatest year of my life. Who would have ever imagined both Barack and I going to the White House?”

Exile on Center St. - Rolling Stones Tribute Thursday Jan 8th 7PM at the Iron Horse. All the best locals do their favorite Stones songs.

It was a Springsteen-fest in 2007 and Tom Waits in 2006. This year the Valley's best musicians take on the music of the Rolling Stones. Each band does a Stones song and one of their own. This should be a blast. The line-up includes: Steve Sanderson (Drunk Stuntmen) and Thane Thomsen (The Figments) and National Carpet and Rusty Belle and The Amity Front and Dave Houghton (Fancy Trash) and Sitting Next to Brian and The Grownup Noise and Jose Ayerve (of Spouse) and The Novels and Henning Ohlenbusch and The Lonesome Brothers and Chris Pureka and The Fawns and Matthew Hebert.

Poster created by Hannah Ward who also runs the Monday Craft Night at The Basement called, coincidentally, STICKY FINGERS.'