Welcome to the first show of 2019! Happy New Year to all our listeners. We have some fantastic music and review for you this week. Tremendous Taste Dave from Preston, UK sends us his Listener Recommendation – The Decemberists with Carolina Low. Listen on to hear what we think of this.
We also have another Listener Suggestion from Jamie – the quite unique one man band Shakey Graves with the track Roll the Bones. Unknown Mortal Orchestra from New Zealand give us quite a diverse bookend for the show. In addition, we have a Record Box Classic from Art of Noise and more from the truly wonderful Jenny Lewis (of Rilo Kiley fame). Let’s bring in 2019 together.
Track Listing
- Major League Chemicals Unknown Mortal Orchestra
- Try to Change Mother Mother
- Carolina Low The Decemberists
- Roll the Bones (Audiotree Live Version) Shakey Graves
- Close (to the Edit) Art of Noise
- Acid Tongue Jenny Lewis
- Hunnybee Unknown Mortal Orchestra
More about Shakey Graves…
Shakey Graves (Alejandro Rose-Garcia) is a very interesting character and musician hailing from Austin, Texas. We discussed in the show how Shakey Graves came about his performing name. In 2007 at the Old Settlers Music Festival in Texas, he and friends gave each other Indian guide names whilst sat around a campfire. As a result of a memorable evening performing music he decided to keep his. Unfortunately, we don’t know what any of the other names were.
He became increasingly known for his one man band set up, and played mainly solo on his self-released debut album (Roll the Bones). He was becoming increasingly frustrated at having to borrow high hats and kick drums to perform. Consequently, a close friend devised the solution of a modified suitcase that acts as a kick drum and tambourine stand.
Shakey Graves Day
He won Best Emerging Artist award at the 2105 Americana Music Awards. However, previous to this Mayor of Austin, Lee Leffingwell proclaimed Shakey Graves Day. Every year on September 9th through 11th Shakey offers his recordings, including unreleased albums, for pay-what-you-want prices on Bandcamp.
Remembering Manchester’s most famous busking son
After listening to Shakey Graves we had a flashback of listening to Little Big Band in Manchester in the 1980’s. Because of this, we decided to look up Little Big Band (Rob Gray) and were delighted to find he is still knocking out his amazing music. Firstly, Rob performs in more towns than just Manchester now. Secondly, his music is still as fresh and driven sounding as I remember it. I used to travel into Manchester as a 13 year old boy just to stare up at Rob on the steps of the Royal Exchange theatre in Manchester. Consequently, I learnt to play harmonica. Thanks for being such an inspiration Rob. Here are a couple of my favourite performances from you.
Happy New Year to our listeners around the globe
Yes! A Happy New Year to you all. Thank you for staying with us throughout the year. We really appreciate you being there. Remember – keep those listener suggestions coming in.
So where are your listeners based?
It’s a question we get asked a lot. At the time of January 2019, here’s a list of countries that are listeners to From the Bottom of the Record Box.
| Australia |
| Belgium |
| Brazil |
| Canada |
| Colombia |
| Costa Rica |
| Czech Republic |
| France |
| Georgia |
| Germany |
| Greece |
| Honduras |
| Hong Kong |
| India |
| Ireland |
| Italy |
| Japan |
| Korea, Republic of |
| Lebanon |
| Mexico |
| Netherlands |
| New Zealand |
| Norway |
| Poland |
| Russian Federation |
| Sierra Leone |
| Singapore |
| Spain |
| Sweden |
| Switzerland |
| Tunisia |
| Turkey |
| Ukraine |
| United Arab Emirates |
| United Kingdom |
| United States |
The Decemberists’ Colin Meloy
