Freya Wolf

 

Freya was born in Aberdare in South Wales in 1978 She lived in Aberdare, Swansea, Carmarthenshire. She moved to Street in 2008 before travelling the UK for two years, with stays in London, Scotland, North and South Wales, Cornwall, Devon, before finally settling in Somerset.

As a classical pianist she was inspired early on by Nina Simone and Beverly Craven. She then found a love for female soul singers. She says "I have varied tastes from rock to reggae, classical piano to drum and bass. However, my all time favourite soul tracks are RESPECT by Aretha Franklin and My Baby Just Cares for Me by Nina Simone. My favourite track from other genres is Brighter Days by Hybrid Minds ft Charlotte Haining."

https://linktr.ee/freyfreywolf

Spudgun Assassins

 

UK Chichester based and formed by Tex Nash, Graham Hutchason, Steve Swatton and Graham Linn, the band have achieved their own style of melodic/mainstream rock.

Initially on forming, the intention was to concentrate on creating a live set of cover tracks in order to start playing live, however the band were immediately drawn into writing their own material which a few are now included in the live set. Although collectively their influences are varied, a natural writing chemistry was obvious from the start and the ‘Spudgun Assassins’ sound has formed naturally.

With an emphasis on strong melodies and hooks, all songs are written, recorded and produced by the band. The ‘Spudgun Assassins’ 6 track EP was the bands first release in 2018.

Plans were in place to start the process of releasing their second EP when tragically in 2021 the band lost their friend and guitarist Hutch to a heart attack. As part of a tribute to Hutch the band have collaborated with his daughter Phoebe Hutchason on keys and long time friend Ally Burnside on guitar to complete their new single release ‘All In My Mind’.

 https://www.spudgunassassins.co.uk

The Scaramanga Six

 

The Scaramanga Six is the brainchild of headstrong siblings Paul and Steven Morricone. Not in any way like your conventional mindless rock-star filth, The Morricone brothers appear more like a pair of polite and softly-spoken, yet viciously intense and sadistic nightclub bouncers. Raised in the Westcountry seaside resort of Weston-Super-Mare on an education of Stranglers records (by elder brothers) and Tony Bennett records (by their Mum), the young Morricone twins discovered there was much fun to be had in crooning and shouting in equal measures. The Scaramanga Six was finally realised in the dark & drizzly backdrop of Huddersfield, West Yorkshire where the band still lurk to this very day.

TyrannoPop? Luxury Rock Noir? Schitzophonic Splattercore? – whatever you want to call it, this suave and enigmatic unit have carved their own scenester-defying niche since the mid-90’s as the most unique and creative underground rock band in the UK. Every one of these individuals is hell-bent on assaulting the ears of the unsuspecting with intense and preposterous rock and roll music. Add ‘prolific’ to their wild claims – over the last decade & a half, the band have relentlessly embarked on a rampant recording spree. The average gestation period for a Scaramanga Six long-player is approximately 2 years – ‘The Terrifying Dream’ is the title of their current (and eighth) studio album, for which The Scaramanga Six decided to use the fantastic PledgeMusic platform to find and release with a hugely successful campaign. For their previous album, ‘Phantom Head’, The Six made an ambitious pilgrimage to Chicago Illinois to record with the best engineer in the world, Mr Steve Albini (Pixies, Nirvana, PJ Harvey, The Stooges, Shellac etc etc) in his own Electrical Audio studio. To get that authentic ‘Albini sound’, the recordings were all done completely live with minimal overdubs onto 2” tape using all analogue equipment and the bare minimum of post-production.

But hot on the heels of ‘The Terrifying Dream’, The Six are currently holed up in their secret underground base preparing a barrage of new material for their ninth studio album, which promises to be the most uncompromising, bloated and lavish offering to date. It seems The Six are entering a zenith of creativity, despite committing the music industry cardinal sins of mostly being over 40 and being around for over a decade.

The self-styled ‘evil pop group’ have been tearing a hole in the arse of the live circuit over recent years with their incendiary rock rituals including key slots at many UK festivals (headline set at Leeds 2007 on the Introducing stage). Their previous few albums have pulverised the minds of critics and also seen releases across Scandinavia, the Germanic countries and Japan, all through the band’s own infamous label – Wrath Records. Bookings at some of the big European festivals have also transpired (Hove Festival, Norway and Peace & Love, Sweden). All the while they have been building up and grooming a legion of die-hard crackpot fans ready to creep out from under logs or something and support the band wherever they play. 

 

 http://www.thescaramangasix.co.uk

Eddy Davis

 

Eddy Ray Davis was born on September 26, 1940. He was an American musician and bandleader of trad jazz, who was internationally known mainly through the decades of collaboration with the clarinetist and filmmaker Woody Allen.

Davis started playing banjo during his senior year in high school to play Dixieland with a college band called The Salty Dogs. The Purdue-based group played across the Midwestern United States and had pre-appearances of greats like The Four Freshmen and The Kingston Trio. He moved to Purdue for a year, then to Chicago. There, he became an integral part of the jazz scene at venues such as the "Gaslight Club" and Bourbon Street and often worked for variety or comedy acts, among others. with actor David Huddleston. He also appeared on a Dixieland revue in Disneyland and served as musical director for a tour resumption of the musical Whoopee! In 1966, he recorded his debut album "Live! At the Old Town Gate", with a group that from then on operated as "Eddy Davis Dixie Jazzmen". The next albums under the Davis name included "Whiz Bang" (1973), a satirical production with flute and tuba and "Plays and Sings Just For Fun".

Davis went to New York and received recognition from the jazz traditionalists there: he played drums in the earliest edition of Vince Giordano's "Nighthawks". In 1976, he performed in Germany with his European colleagues Herbert Christ, Jean-Pierre Mulot and René Franc in the "Hot Jazz Orchestra of Europe". In the American edition of this "Hot Jazz Orchestra" he played in 1979 with Max Kaminsky, Vince Giordano, Bobby Gordon and Dill Jones; In 1983, the clarinetist Jack Maheu and the pianist Don Ewell were part of "Eddy Davis and The Hot Jazz Orchestra". With "Stanley’s Washboard Kings" around Stan King, Davis went on a Japanese tour in the same year. He also orchestrated and conducted a musical by Terry Waldo, with whose "Waldo’s Gutbucket Syncopators", he recorded several albums.

When the conductor performed Maurice Peress Paul Whiteman's "Aeolian Hall Concert" from 1924 on its 60th anniversary, he hired Davis as a banjoist. At that time he performed regularly in the club Red Blazer Too in a trio with his banjo colleague Cynthia Sayer and the bassist Pete Compo. With Sayer, Davis also founded the "New York Banjo Ensemble", which recorded an album with compositions by George Gershwin in 1984 and an album with Rags in 2005.

Davis's connection with Woody Allen was established in Chicago in the 1960s when Davis was headlining a club on Rush Street and Allen was a comedian at that club, but also played in his band. Allen played in Eddy Davis's "New Orleans Jazz Band", with which Allen - otherwise known as a filmmaker - held the court as a clarinetist in New York for around 35 years. The band has played in the "Café Carlyle"' every Monday evening since 1997 (when it wasn't on an international tour); before that she had appeared in "Michael’s Pub" every week since 1985. Davis also appeared on the soundtrack for Allen's film "Radio Days" "(1987) and appeared on "Sweet and Lowdown" as a band member. For his contribution to the soundtrack for "Midnight in Paris" he received a Grammy Award. The documentary Wild Man Blues records Allen's first tour with Davis’s band. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Davis was also heard every week in the restaurant called "The Cajun" on Eighth Avenue in Chelsea. In the band he led there, Scott Robinson played on C melody saxophone. In addition, other recordings such as The Bunk Project (1993) or Just Sittin ’Here Strummin’ This Ole Banjo (2005) were created.

Davis was involved in 73 recording sessions between 1957 and 2012, including: with Leon Redbone, Turk Murphy, Doc Cheatham and Frank Vignola. Davis died in April 2020 of the SARS-CoV-2 infection at Mount Sinai West Hospital during the COVID-19 pandemic in New York City. He was 79 years old.

 https://theeddydavis.com/

The blog of JAM Radio in the list of the top 35 Blues Music Blogs

 

This blog JAM Radio has been selected as one of the Top 35 Blues Music Blogs on the web by the site feedspot.com. 

Many thanks to feedspot.com and to all the people who visit this site every day!

https://blog.feedspot.com/blues_music_blogs/

Celtas Cortos

 

Celtas Cortos is a Spanish Celtic rock band. They have sold over two million records during their career, making them one of the most commercially successful Spanish groups of all time.

They formed in Valladolid (Castilla y León) in 1986. Eight friends, four of whom played in the group Almenara, decided to participate in a music contest under the name "Colectivo Eurofolk". They won the first prize and continued to play together, changing their name to Celtas Cortos. Nacho Castro, the former drummer, suggested the name based on his favourite tobacco.

They won another contest in April 1987, where the prize was the production of an album. They shared the prize with two other winners, and contributed three songs to the album Así es como suena: Folk joven.

Executive producer Paco Martín helped them get out their first album, Salida de emergencia, with only instrumental songs. The next album, Gente Impresentable added the voice and the lyrics of Jesús H. Cifuentes (Cifu) to the powerful instruments. Their celtic rock style was combined with protest and other more melancholic lyrics. Through the years their music mixed with different styles such as Caribbean music, flamenco, electronic music or reggae. Their list of hits include 20 de Abril, La senda del tiempo and Tranquilo Majete.

In 2002 Cifu left the group, a definitive turning point after the departure of César Cuenca and Nacho Martín. At the beginning of 2006 Cifu came back to the group to prepare their next release, 20 years after their foundation. Their 2008 album 40 de Abril was very popular, landing in the top five of the Spanish albums chart. Between 2008 and 2016 they released another four albums.

Phil Vassar

 

 

Phillip George Vassar Jr. (born May 28, 1962) is an American country music artist. Vassar made his debut on the country music scene in the late 1990s, co-writing singles for several country artists, including Tim McGraw ("For a Little While", "My Next Thirty Years"), Jo Dee Messina ("Bye, Bye", "I'm Alright"), Collin Raye ("Little Red Rodeo"), and Alan Jackson ("Right on the Money"). In 1999, he was named by American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) as Country Songwriter of the Year.

Later that same year, Vassar was signed to Arista Nashville as a recording artist. His debut album, Phil Vassar, was released in early 2000, producing five hits on the U.S. Billboard country singles charts and earning a gold certification in the United States. He followed it in 2002 with American Child, Shaken Not Stirred in 2004, and finally Greatest Hits, Vol. 1 in 2006 before Vassar left the label for Universal South Records (now Show Dog-Universal Music). His first album for that label, Prayer of a Common Man, was released in early 2008. He has charted nineteen singles on Billboard's Hot Country Songs, including two which peaked at No. 1: 2000's "Just Another Day in Paradise" and 2004's "In a Real Love". 

https://www.philvassar.com/