CD Review: Ultraviolet Eye - Wake Up & Dream

Wake Up & Dream is Ultraviolet Eye’s first CD since the 2007 release Platform Song Cycle and a more polished effort that its bratty but fun 2000 debut Heroin Geek The Movie. Founding members Jeff Charreaux and Roy Appleman, who have created soundtrack music for a number of independent films, devote all of Wake Up to the genre of coming of age movies. The theme might not be readily apparent to the average listener, but it doesn’t matter. Charreaux and Appleman, along with musician/engineer Jett Farley have created an impressive collection of dreamy pop tunes that for the most part, exude a sense of excitement about what the future might bring.

“Don’t let the past get you down, be a star,” Charreaux advises on “Great Expectations,” an energetic song with inventive harmonies and a steady beat. The title track also sets an optimistic view to a fetching power pop arrangement, while “Before Sunrise” entices with an irresistible melody and layered vocals. The lighter than air “Floundering” offers lilting keyboards and lines like, “a perfect day to last forever.” “Gattaca” sports the most obvious celluloid reference, as Ultraviolet Eye taps into vintage new wave to honor the 1997 sci-fi flick’s cautionary tale of using genetic manipulation to build perfect people. Farley picked four of the ten tracks for synth-based bonus remixes that add a festive spin to the original material.

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Let It Go, Sweetheart. The Bangles have released more info regarding the vinyl 45 record they’re putting out as a sneak preview of their upcoming CD. It will feature the new song, “Sweetheart Of The Sun,” along with acoustic takes on “Hazy Shade Of Winter” and “Let It Go,” as well as a cover of Matthew Sweet’s “Anna Lee.” Sweet has been working with the band on their new disc, and he recorded two CDs worth of cover tunes with Susanna Hoffs. The Bangles official website says the 45 will be available at all Maurice’s, but hopefully, there will be other purchasing options for those of us who don’t have one of the trendy clothing store’s locations in our vicinity.

Pete Says Hello And We Hit The Ceiling. There’s also good news concerning the return of another power pop band that started in the 1980s. Peter Holsapple recently tweeted that the long-awaited dBs album is almost finished. He added, “Thank you for your patience. It will be rewarded, I think, exponentially.” It’s a safe bet he’s right.

Feel Lucky, Punk? Elvis Costello is coming back to Chicago, and he’s bringing his spinning wheel with him. Tickets go on sale tomorrow for the May 15th date of Costello’s “The Revolving Tour,” AKA The Return Of Spectacular Spinning Songbook at the Chicago Theater. He’ll be backed by The Imposters as he plays tunes randomly selected by audience members who play a sort of mammoth roulette game. Costello has used the device in the past, and I believe it resulted in him covering songs by other artists as well, such as “King Midas In Reverse” by The Hollies.

We Know Something About Tomorrow. The Bad Examples have just released an impressive new CD in Smash Record. Meanwhile, the band’s guitarist Steve Gerlach will be performing with his sci-fi rock side project Tomorrow The Moon at Beat Kitchen on February 24th as part of the Lou-Aid benefit. It’s the band’s first show in almost half a year.

Two For Lou. Actually, several bands will be coming together for Lou-Aid on a pair of Thursday nights later this month. Proceeds will go to help musician Lou Hallwas (Penthouse Sweets, The Differents) with bills from a recent hospital stay. The showcase on the 10th at Quenchers features Suzy Brack And The New Jack Lords, Phil Angotti, The Webstirs, John’s People, and Hallwas himself. The showcase on the 24th at Beat Kitchen will see performances from The Handcuffs, the previously mentioned Tomorrow The Moon, Penthouse Sweets, Organ Wolf, and We Repel Each Other. Suggested donation is $10 or more.

Rocking In Palatine. Yellow Matter Custard, a band comprised of veteran musicians Mike Portnoy, Neal Morse, Paul Gilbert, and Kasim Sulton, will be performing A Tribute To The Beatles at Durty Nellie’s in my humble hometown on Sunday, February 27th, at 7:30 PM. The $30 tickets are available exclusively at The Drum Pad, which is located at 48 W. Palatine Road, a short walk from Durty Nellie's.

FIF Goes On Without Me. My old comedy group Famous In The Future will air its latest TV special this Monday night at 9:00PM on Channel 19 Cable Access in Chicago. The show will include skits like the children’s tale/political movement mashup “Alice And The Tea Party” from Famous In The Future’s appearances at the past two annual Abbie Fests at the Mary-Arrchie Theatre. It can also be seen on Channel 19 on Tuesday, February 8th at 4:00PM, and Saturday February 26th at 10PM.

Be Sure To Bring Them Something Silver. Speaking of Mary-Arrchie, the theatre will be staging a 25th Anniversary Benefit on June 13th at the Mayne Stage venue on Chicago’s north side. Tickets go on sale tomorrow. Hats off to Rich Cotovsky and the crew for all those years of in-your-face theatrical productions, and for creating the annual Abbie Hoffman Died For Our Sins festival.

A New LSD Blows In. WXRT morning DJ Lin Brehmer and WBBM Newsradio morning traffic anchor Bart Shore both played an updated version of the vintage folk rock hit “Lake Shore Drive” by Aliotta, Haynes, & Jeremiah this morning. It’s a very topical parody created by Skip Haynes that describes hazardous conditions that stranded several motorists on the title street this past Tuesday night.

I Am The Eggman, I Am The Clay Man. Sarah Louise Klose contributed a short item to the File column of this month’s Illinois Entertainer about an artist named Taylor Zitman, who creates hand-designed polymer clay figures of rock and roll stars. The photo showed The Beatles in their Sgt. Pepper gear, and Zitman has also molded likenesses of Lady GaGa and Amy Winehouse. She sells her creations for $50 to $70, depending how much work is involved. Special orders can be made through her website.

CD Review: Saturday Looks Good To Me - Every Night

Note: This review appeared in the Illinois Entertainer in 2004.

Every Night marks the third time singer-guitarist Fred Thomas has gathered a multitude of musical friends under the moniker Saturday Looks Good To Me to record an album’s worth of freewheeling 1960s influenced rock. Thomas wrote all of the material for this latest release, but assigned at least half of the lead vocal chores to a revolving cast of female singers that includes Betty Sue Barnes, Kelly Jean Calwell, Ericka Hoffman, and Ko Melina. The credits don’t specify who sings what, but all of the above do a fine job of conveying Thomas’s quirky sentiments.

The melodic “Since You Stole My Heart” could have come from Lesley Gore if Gore had gone in for offbeat poetry like, “I walked through the graveyard/And sang to the cold stars.” “Lift Me Up" taps into classic Motown while maintaining Thomas’s flair for acerbic observations, and the guitar solo on “All Over Town” echoes Revolver era Beatles. The wistful “Until The World Stops Spinning,” with its cosmopolitan horn arrangement, reinvents the original girl band sound. Saturday Looks Good To Me sounds a bit more modern whenever Thomas takes over on lead vocals, particularly on “When The Party Ends.” His astute choices for this ever-evolving band make Every Night another enjoyable effort.

Happy Birthday, Graham!

Today’s post is a celebration of Graham Nash’s birthday involving some of the items from my rock and roll memorabilia collection.

The Graham Nash figure is a soft sculpture I had custom made by an artist I met at The Wells Street Art Fair a few years back. It appeared in three episodes of Manchester Gallery, the comedy series my wife Pam and I created for the Sunday Morning Coffee With Jeff Internet show.

The framed autographed photo of The Hollies in their very early days was a gift from a fellow Hollies fan for my 50th birthday.

The third item is a book of rare photographs called Through The Ages - Volume 1, which was put together by Hollies drummer Bobby Elliott from his archives. It's available from the band's official website. I recently e-mailed Mr. Elliott to tell him I had reviewed his book on my blog (see Archives, December 2010) and he was kind enough to write back and thank me. He added that he hopes to create a Through The Ages - Volume 2 soon.

A few years ago, I had the honor of interviewing Graham Nash (see December, 2009) for the Illinois Entertainer and he mentioned a new CD of 1960s cover tunes that he was going to be recording with Stephen Stills and David Crosby. That CD hasn’t been released yet, but reportedly, it’s moving closer toward completion.

So here’s a birthday wish to Graham Nash, a true star of the original British Invasion, and architect of the California rock sound. May we always enjoy his music.

CD Review: Jane Lui - Goodnight Company

Note: This review originally appeared in the Illinois Entertainer.

Finding a reverent version of “Edelweiss” from The Sound Of Music on Jane Lui’s latest CD, Goodnight Company is a good indication that this is an indie rock artist who follows her own path. Lui’s compositions are set to slow, spare arrangements that she occasionally embellishes with horns and string arrangements. Her poetic lyrics, which take an offbeat view of romantic relationships, are exquisitely rendered in a vocal style similar to Joni Mitchell’s.

Lui captures the fun and adventure of a new love on the fetching “Jailcard” by declaring, “Tonight I got a ticket to a man.” On the more bitter “Perished,” she dismisses a lover with lines like, “Off you go with a foolish mouth” and “So take a bow and say goodbye.” The acoustic “Illusionist Boy” is particularly reminiscent of Mitchell, while “Take Me For Now,” with its ornate instrumentation, has more of a musical theater feel. “New Jersey” has Lui dabbling in R&B, and the CD closes with the stark but beautiful spoken word piece, “Last Rose Of Summer.”

45 RPM Memories: The Pink Parker - “Hold Back The Night”

Sometimes it’s as much of a nostalgia trip to look back to where I bought a record as it is listening to the record itself. As those of us in Chicago brace for what the weather reports claim could be up to a foot of snow, I can still recall the great blizzard of 1967, and the tiny record/electronics store where I bought The Hollies’ Stop Stop Stop album with money I earned shoveling our neighbor’s walk.

I can also still remember where I bought The Pink Parker “Hold Back The Night” 45 EP back in 1977. It was called Yardbird Records, and had human manikins with bird heads in the front window. There weren’t too many places on Chicago’s staid southwest side where you could find a wide selection of punk and new wave releases, but this was one of them. Kroozin Music’s stores might have been the only other options, although I vaguely remember Triangle Records.

I had heard “Hold Back The Night” on the radio, but to be honest, the real selling point for me was that the record was pressed on pink vinyl. Not that Graham Parker & The Rumour don’t do a great job of covering this earlier hit by The Trammps. Parker’s raw vocals and the horn section create a classic soul feel in this tale of a heartbroken guy who dreads every evening because he knows he’ll be haunted by dreams of his former lover. Side A also features the romantic “(Let Me Get) Sweet On You,” which is pretty similar to “Hold Back The Night.” Both songs were produced by the highly successful Robert John “Mutt” Lange, and feature Brian Robertson of Thin Lizzy on guitar.

The B-Side of EP, produced by Nick Lowe, gives a clear indication of why Graham Parker & The Rumour were considered a top notch concert act, as the band burns through live versions of “White Honey” and “Soul Shoes.” Unfortunately, I never saw Graham Parker & The Rumour back in those days, but I did catch an entertaining solo performance by Parker at a Chicago street festival in 2009. You can read my review of that show in the Archives of this blog, under August, 2009.

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Happy Days Is Here Again. The Soda Jerks, a side project for some of the members of the power pop band The Romeros, will be bringing the sounds of the 50s and 60s to the smaller room at The Abbey Pub tomorrow night, January 29th. The six-piece-band out of Blue Island, IL has been together for almost a decade and cites Otis Redding, Sam Cooke, Buddy Holly, and The Rolling Stones among its influences. Recently adding tenor sax/keyboards player Alex Francois no doubt helps in covering those old Motown hits, and he can harmonize with guitarist-vocalist Gus Fuller and bassist-vocalist Tom Gerez. Guitarist Michael Vanderbilt and drummer Brian Fee round out the band. The Soda Jerks’ motto is “Bringin’ that sweet soul music,” but it looks like they also play The Beach Boys, The Dave Clark Five, and The Who. The show starts at 9:00PM, and it's free.

On A Sad Note. Gladys Horton, the lead singer for 1960s Motown girl group The Marvelettes, has passed away. The trio was best known for “Please Mr. Postmans,” which would later be covered by those avid American R&B fans, The Beatles. Terri Hemmert, host of WXRT’s weekly Breakfast With The Beatles show, offered a touching blog on the station’s website.

Cool People At A Nice Place. Singer-guitarist Phil Angotti has chosen the posh Park West as the venue for his CD release bash next Thursday, February 3rd. An impressive lineup of special guests, including Mike Zelenko, Carolyn Engelmann, Tommi Zender, Ellis Clark, Steve Dawson, and Eric Howell, will be on hand as Angotti unleashes the songs from People and Places. A new video, which also features some notable local musicians, will be shown before the performance. Doors open at 7:30PM.

Holy Anti-Nuclear Benefit! Rolling Stone is reporting that Prayer Cycle 2: Back To Zero, a new charity CD that benefits the no nukes organization Global Zero, will includes tracks by Sting, Sinead O’Connor, and Robert Downey Jr. A previously unreleased recording of Jim Morrison reciting his poem “Moonshine Night” will be among the “world prayers” included on the album. The first Prayer Cycle was released in 1999.

Overthrow Chicago. Power pop fans in the Windy City will want to set aside a chunk of time this coming April for the return of International Pop Overthrow. This year’s fest will run from the 14th through the 23rd at various venues in town. The schedule hasn’t been released yet, and there’s no indication that founder David Bash will be doing anything special to celebrate his tenth annual visit here. But this guy has such a knack for picking power pop acts, there’s no doubt IPO Chicago 2011 will be another smash.

The Bird Book. Yellow Bird Project, a Montreal-based organization that has been devising unique ways to help indie rock acts connect with charitable causes since 2006, will soon release the Indie Rock Poster Book. A follow-up to YBP’s popular Indie Rock Coloring Book, this new effort features thirty 11 x 14-inch reproductions of posters that can be removed from the book and framed as art. The price of $25 will go to selected charities. Yellow Bird Project also sells customized t shirts designed by the likes of Andrew Bird, Tegan & Sara, Bon Iver, Rilo Kiley, Ra Ra Riot, and Metric.

From Grace To Gwen. The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame’s new photography exhibit, Girls On Film: 40 Years of Women In Rock features shots taken by Anastasia Pantsios from 1969 to the present day. Grace Slick, Patti Smith, Joan Jett, Tina Turner, and Gwen Stefani are among the female performers being honored. The exhibit opens February 14th at the museum in Cleveland.

Music From A Mailman. Prop Thtr is presenting Prine: A Tribute Concert at Viaduct Theater on January 30th, and February 4th-6th. February 6th. The show features Megon McDonough, Tim Grimm, Jan Lucas-Grimm, Bobbie Lancaster, and Michael Shelton performing 32 songs by the critically acclaimed folk singer.