Undeniably different, invitingly familiar and as masterful as ever, guitarist Lawson Rollins heads “True North” on his tenth album, a collection that commemorates the Billboard chart-topper’s 20th anniversary as a recording artist. Jazziz magazine named the Infinita Records release that dropped last Friday one of the “10 Albums You Need to Know.” With the influential SiriusXM’s Watercolors leading the charge, radio programmers are welcoming the new release by adding the first single, “Bluewave Bossanova,” to playlists out of the box, favoring a radio edit featuring Mary Fettig’s soprano sax caress. 
 
“True North” is the first album that Rollins composed, produced and recorded all the guitar parts on his own. He relies upon his mesmerizing classical fingerstyle guitar play to forge a unique path incorporating contemporary jazz, world music, Latin and New Age, making records that convey exotic travel, exhilarating adventure and quixotic escape. “True North” continues the quest yet it’s easy to observe a variety of new dimensions spawned from a recent spate of assorted music and film projects.  
 
Named by Guitar Player magazine as one of the “50 Transcedent Acoustic Guitarists” of all-time, the San Francisco-based Rollins curated a collection of his best (“Airwaves: The Greatest Hits”), experimented on “Dark Matter: Music for Film”; scored his first film, “Stay Out Stay Alive,” a multiple award winner and consistent film festival favorite that opened last November (Rollins also served as the movie’s executive producer); and collaborated on a single (“And If You Will Come With Me”) with Israeli superstar singer Idan Raichel. Rollins couldn’t help but be impacted artistically from this diversely prolific period when it came to crafting “True North.” The works expanded his sonic palette with Rollins adding electric and slide guitars, steel string guitar and interesting synthesizer textures alongside his signature classical Spanish nylon string acoustic guitar rhythms and rich melodic expressions.     
      
Renowned for dispensing dazzling acoustic guitar arpeggios, scales and harmonies at astonishing speed (showcased in YouTube videos that have received over 10 million views), “True North” exhibits sharper focus, self-control and command as he “stays on course” instead of wandering off on prolonged improvisational excursions. The tone of the lead guitar emotes new warmth and purity. Even the album art, consisting of sundrenched images taken on the Outer Banks (North Carolina) where Rollins spends a lot of time each year, is filled with light and soft pastels unlike earlier images. 
 
Rollins’ “True North” traveling mates are drummer and percussionist Dave Bryant, bassist Dan Feiszli, violinist Mads Tolling and Stephen Duros who plays additional keyboards and electric guitar on the album’s “With the Wind,” an eclectic and extravagant track unlike any ever recorded by the artist.
 
Below is a sampling of some of the early album reviews:
 
“The 14 original tracks on this new album find his improvisational flair in top form and showcase a wide range of emotions as well as that cross-aesthetic that has come to characterize his music since he first rose to popularity in the early 2000s.” – Jazziz
 
“A lovely, skillful and engrossing album, Rollins is just plain a contemporary master of the art. An album acoustic guitar fans should not be without.” – Midwest Record
 
“He plays his instrument with a soulful intensity that combines the stimulating rhythmic drive of rumba, salsa, and samba with graceful melodic finesse and free-flowing improvisational flair... On ‘True North,’ Lawson is most definitely back to doing what he is most known and admired for: staying true to the direction of his artistic inner compass and delivering the kind of inimitable guitar playing, creative instrumentation, and memorable compositions his fans have come to love.” – Exclusive Magazine
 
“Lawson's crossover style will undoubtedly once again attract fans of all kinds. Putting him in a category is not necessary, as long as the music is beautiful!” – Keys & Chords
​

So here we go again to spoil you with 11 new bands we’ve added to the Sjock 45 line-up.

A quite conventional list of names, as you damn well know what Sjock stands for; call it a blend of good old-fashioned Rock’n’Roll, Rockabilly, Country, Cowpunk, Punkrock, Garage and the odd bunch of weirdos.

Or to be more specific:
Agnostic Front / Black Lips / The Jason Ringenberg Band / Death by Unga Bunga / Pat Todd and the Rankoutsiders / White Fang / Decent Criminal / The Same Old Shoes / Sean K. Preston / Belle Starr and the Boot Jacks / Hukkelfukkers

This being said, we have released 22 of 44 bands or just half of the entire hot enchilada!
So there’s a lot more to come in the next weeks! Stay tuned via this newsletter and on our website / Facebook / Instagram pages, as we’ll be opening ticket pre-sales very soon!

https://www.facebook.com/events/453216535531716/
www.sjock.com
https://www.facebook.com/sjockfestival/
https://www.instagram.com/sjockfestival/

​

Mic Gillette, first trumpet and founding member of Oakland funk outfit Tower of Power, died over the weekend after suffering a heart attack, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. He was 64.

“The Tower of Power family was stunned today by the news that Mic Gillette, our dear friend and bandmate going back to 1966, passed away,” Emilio Castillo, Tower of Power bandleader, said in a statement. “Mic was without a doubt the greatest brass player I’ve ever known. Our sincere condolences go out to his wife Julia, his daughter Megan and their entire family.”

Formed in the late-Sixties as the Haight-Ashbury scene flourished across the San Francisco Bay, Tower of Power cultivated a brass-heavy sound that would make them one of the most important funk groups of the Seventies — and their horn section one of the most coveted.

Revered promoter Bill Graham signed Tower of Power to San Francisco Records in 1970 after an audition at the Fillmore and released their debut LP, East Bay Grease, later that year. For their follow-up, Bump City, the group signed with Warner Bros. and scored a minor hit with “You’re Still a Young Man.” Their 1973 self-titled third LP spawned their highest charting track, “So Very Hard to Go,” as well as seminal cuts “This Time It’s Real” and opener “What is Hip?”

Kat Riggins brings her Blues Revival tent to Gulf Coast Records. Happy to join the team with Guy Hale and Mike Zito in their hurricane of a journey with the new label. Mike Zito will be at the helm as producer in an undisclosed Memphis studio this week.

Watch for Kat Riggins next week sitting in with several bands on Beale Street during IBC week. Also Kat will perform at The Big Blues Bender in Las Vegas this September with the Gulf Coast Showcase and several other performances.
​
Kat Riggins was born Katriva Riggins in Miami, Florida on February 7, 1980. She grew up in a household where there was always background music. Because of the wide range of genres in her parents collection, Kat developed a love for all types of music from gospel and soul to country and rock and everything in between. "I can remember being in the car with my mom and sister singing along to Tracy Chapman one minute and Chuck Berry the next", says Kat. However, even then, she was drawn to the smokey gritty sounds of artists like Bessie Smith,Sam Cooke, Nina Simone, Tina Turner, Denise LaSalle, Etta James, Ray Charles, Koko Taylor,Janis Joplin and the list goes on. She grew up singing in local programs, church events, and family gatherings with her sister and cousins. At age 23 Kat landed a gig singing jazz and blues standards in a small lounge in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida with the accompaniment of only a piano player. Since then she has performed throughout Florida, New Orleans, Vietnam, Thailand, China, South Korea, Curacao, Belgium and The Netherlands so far.


Kat's own musical style is a blend of the blues with hip hop, pop, rock,gospel and even country music. "It's all related anyway", she exclaims. She is inspired by young artists such as Janelle Monae, Karreim Riggins, SyncOpera and ZZ Ward and Andra Day who share in her passion to revive music from the vinyl days. "It's about the raw emotion in every note", Kat says. " If I can move someone to feel what I feel when I sing a song, then it's all worth it". With her own band, Blues Revival, she travels the world with the intent to "wake up the blues one song at a time"!

With her first two works, an EP called "Seoul Music" and an original album called "Lily Rose" Kat penned each song with subtle hints of her love of the blues. Her latest album, aptly named after her band "Blues Revival" is a loud and proud declaration of that love! "Blues Revival" is a clever mashup of gospel-blues, blues-rock, funky blues, contemporary and traditional blues, with BLUES being the operative word! With this and albums to come, Kat Riggins's focus is to be a part of this musical revolution that aims to awaken the masses and introduce them to the sincerity behind blues music.

"I thank God that my passion is my purpose... That is to help preserve this endangered species called The Blues." - Kat Riggins

​With more than a million records sold worldwide, Sass Jordan delivers the eight-song album spotlighting her signature vox in a wholly-dedicated blues endeavor across seven diligently selected covers — plus one knockout original, “The Key.” 
 
“The Blues has been there through my entire career. People have always said, 'You're so bluesy.' And it's true. My singing is blues-inflected. My songs use blues-type licks. I didn't do any of that on purpose. It isn't contrived. It's just me.”
 
Co-produced by Sass and D#, Rebel Moon Blues serves as a watershed that charts a new course in Jordan's musical voyage while tracing her love of the blues back to its source. All killer and no filler, the album features the inimitably raspy rock goddess jubilantly celebrating the songs, sounds and styles of everyone from old masters like Willie Dixon, Elmore James and Freddie King to younger, louder guns like Gary Moore and Rory Gallagher. 
 
Nailing down the crate-digging setlist was both a labor of love and a trip down the rabbit hole. "I wasn't following any formula. I knew they had to be songs I loved and could really sink my teeth into,” she says. 
 
Cut off the cuff and on the fly in just three fast-paced days, Jordan and the Champagne Hookers — her touring band of guitarists Chris Caddell and Jimmy Reid, bassist Derrick Brady and drummer Cassius Pereira, augmented by blues harp master Steve Marriner and keyboardist Jesse O’Brien — played live in the same room at the same time. "The energy is so different when you're playing it live," Jordan says. "It's a different frequency, a different vibe. It's very joyous. You can hear a lot of us laughing on there. I love that kind of thing. 

“It's like you're right there with us. We're there, we're live, and we’re having a blast, baby!"  
 
And no changing the lyrics either. "To me, what makes these songs fresh, besides our energy, is that it's a female doing traditionally male stuff. And I sing the lyrics the way it was written...  If the singer’s singing about, 'My girl,' I sing, 'My girl.' That's what puts the icing on the cake. I like approaching the songs the way they were written. I find that not messing with the original gender is particularly relevant in today's climate. It's great that we can get away with doing that now." 

A pioneer of powerful, gritty female-fronted rock, Jordan has worked alongside fellow greats like Aerosmith, the Rolling Stones, AC/DC, and Van Halen, among many more. She is currently on an International 30-date tour — including Tel Aviv, San Francisco, New York, Atlanta, and Canadian stops in Vancouver, Calgary, Winnipeg and Toronto — with A Bowie Celebration, the critically acclaimed, one-of-a-kind roving tribute to the late legend, featuring a distinct alumni of former bandmates. 
​
Born in Birmingham, U.K and raised in Montreal, she launched her solo career with the single “Tell Somebody” from her 1988 debut of the same name, garnering national acclaim and a JUNO Award for Most Promising Female Vocalist. Throughout her career, she’s earned three more nominations for Best Female Vocalist thanks to albums like Racine (1992), Rats (1994), Present (1997), Hot Gossip (2000), Get What You Give (2006), From Dusk Til Dawn (2009) and her side project S.U.N.'s album, Something Unto Nothing (2011) — along with singles like “Make You A Believer,” “You Don't Have to Remind Me,” “Sun's Gonna Rise” and 1992's “Trust in Me,” a duet with Joe Cocker from the record-selling Bodyguard soundtrack. 

Jordan starred in the off-Broadway Janis Joplin show, Love Janis, performed The Vagina Monologues in Winnipeg and Toronto, guest starred on NBC's Sisters, and of course, weighed in as the only female judge on Canadian Idol for all six seasons beginning in 2003. 
 
In 2017, she released Racine Revisited, recreating her sophomore album with an all-star cast for its 25th anniversary. This year, Rats celebrated the same milestone with a colored-vinyl reissue. 

"It's surreal," she acknowledges. "When you hear ‘25th anniversary,’ you're like, 'WTF?' I don't really remember the person that wrote them. I'm not that person now. But then it passes. Because it's another day! It's now! And I have more fun now than I’ve ever had. 

“My voice is better now than it's ever been. I can hit notes that I never could before. I feel the exact opposite of a lot of people. I feel the voice gets better with age. Hell, everything gets better with age!" 
 
Not surprisingly, she's less concerned with what she's done than what's coming next. That includes a new brand, Rebel Moon Whisky, along with her Kick Ass Sass wine. "Whisky is my spirit animal," she laughs. "There aren’t any female singers doing a whisky line yet, that I know of. It's a whole new thing! Besides, what goes better with blues than whisky or wine?" 
And rest assured, there's plenty more blues to come from Jordan. "I definitely want to do some more recording in this style. I loved every second of it. It all happened so easily and it just made so much sense. 

“I'm not reinventing the wheel. Never have, never will... But this opens up a whole new world for me, and it’s one that I belong in and feel at home in already!”

Rebel Moon Blues is available March 13, 2020. 
 
Hi-res CD cover: http://www.markpuccimedia.com/SassJordan-RebelMoonBlues-Hi-Res-Cover.jpg
 
Track Listing:
Leaving Trunk (J. Estes)
My Babe (Willie Dixon)
Am I Wrong (Kevin Moore)
One Way Out (M. E. Sehorn /E. James / S. B. Williamson)
Palace of the King (Leon Russell / Don Nix/Duck Dunn)
The Key (S. Jordan / D. Sharp) 
Too Much Alcohol (Joseph Benjamin Hutto)
Still Got The Blues (Gary Moore) 

Claudio Roditi, whose lyrical poise and burnished warmth on trumpet and flugelhorn helped make him one of the most accomplished jazz musicians from Brazil, died on Jan. 17 at his home in South Orange, N.J. He was 73.
His wife, Kristen Park, acknowledged his death yesterday on a GoFundMe page established to help support his treatment for prostate cancer. “He didn’t like the concept of ‘battling’ or ‘fighting’ cancer,” she wrote. “He accepted it and felt it was more like something that he was just trying to live with.”
For the musicians in his inner circle — like Cuban-born clarinetist and saxophonist Paquito D’Rivera, in whose band he played for years — Roditi was singular. “To say that he was very special is redundant, because everybody loved him so much,” D’Rivera tells WBGO, speaking by phone. “He was an original without even trying.”
Roditi was celebrated for his fluent musical synthesis of bebop and Brazilian music, as exemplified by the title of his 1994 album Jazz Turns Samba. But he was adept in an expansive range of settings, from post-bop to Afro-Cuban mambo to symphonic music. His playing combined a mastery of the modern-jazz trumpet vocabulary — the dialects of Clifford Brown and Lee Morgan, among others — with the essence of saudade, a distinctly Brazilian expression of melancholic longing.
That mingling of traits can be heard throughout Roditi’s discography as a leader, spanning more than 35 years. Here is a perfect example, from the 2009 Resonance release Brazilliance X4, featuring Roditi’s longtime compatriots Helio Alves on piano, Leonardo Cioglia on bass and Duduka Da Fonseca on drums. (The song is “E Nada Mais,” a Brazilian standard, which the band plays as a bossa nova.)

​Brazilliance X4 earned Roditi a Grammy nomination — his second, including an earlier nod for Symphonic Bossa Nova, featuring Ettore Stratta and the Royal Philharmonic. He was also part of a Grammy-winning ensemble led by one of his trumpet forbears, Dizzy Gillespie: the United Nation Orchestra, which scored Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album for Live at the Royal Festival Hall.
That recording, from a 1989 concert, was also released on video. Roditi makes a strong impression on D’Rivera’s “Samba For Carmen,” which begins at 3:25 in the clip below. (Roditi picks up the solo baton from trombonist Slide Hampton at 4:52.)

Claudio Roditi was born on May 28, 1946 in Rio de Janeiro. Because his father worked in Brazil’s coffee industry, their family moved around the country — spending significant time in places like Santos, a coastal town near São Paolo, and Varginha, in his mother’s home state of Minas Gerais.
“The first instrument I played was the table at our house,” Roditi recalled in a 1996 episode of Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz. “Then I asked my father to get me a set of bongos, so that was the first instrument I owned.” By age 6 he was taking piano lessons from his mother’s cousin; a few years later he spotted a trumpet in a band room in Varginha, and “it was love at first sight.”
Roditi began exploring jazz in his early teenage years, inspired by trumpet heroes like Gillespie and Miles Davis. After his father’s death, he moved with his family back to Rio, where he received more formal training from noted saxophonist Aurino Ferreira.
By the mid-1960s, just as bossa nova was becoming a worldwide phenomenon, Roditi began to feel restless in Rio. He entered a jazz competition in Vienna, Austria, in ’66, receiving positive feedback from its distinguished jury, which included alto saxophonist Cannonball Adderley, trombonist J.J. Johnson, and a trumpet hero, Art Farmer. In short order, Farmer became a mentor, encouraging him to pursue a jazz career.
He began this pursuit in 1970 at the Berklee School of Music in Boston, after which he moved to New York City. He racked up prominent sideman affiliations: with Herbie Mann, Tito Puente, McCoy Tyner, saxophonist Charlie Rouse, and the German pianist Klauz Ignatzek, among others.
In D’Rivera’s band, he was originally called upon to play valve trombone — which he did for a number of years, until he declared that it was interfering with his trumpet embouchure. “I never believed him,” D’Rivera says, laughing. “I think he was just too lazy to carry around the two instruments! But I loved the way that he played any instrument.”
In fact, Roditi was known for favoring a rotary-valve trumpet, which is more commonly associated with orchestral settings than jazz. Played with key-controlled rotors rather than pistons, it’s a less flexible instrument that can produce a rich, full tone. “He found pleasure in playing the rotary valve, which for jazz music is a little more limited,” D’Rivera says. “You cannot play half-valve with a rotary, so it’s one effect less that you have with that instrument. But he didn’t seem to care. He liked the sound of the rotary valve.”
In recent years, Roditi had put renewed focus on his own compositions, featuring them exclusively on a 2010 Resonance album called Simpatico. Among those tunes is “Alfitude,” dedicated to the iconic Brazilian composer known as Johnny Alf, and “A Dream for Kristen,” for his wife, whom he met in Boston during his Berklee years.
News of Roditi’s death circulated on Sunday, just as the music world was absorbing the loss of saxophonist, composer and NEA Jazz Master Jimmy Heath. On social media, artists like trumpeter Arturo Sandoval and bassist Christian McBride observed these losses as a one-two punch, and a sad day for jazz.

​Among the many times Roditi and Heath had crossed paths was a record date in 1992, for the latter’s Little Man Big Band.
On New Year’s Day, Roditi had posted a note to his GoFundMe page that reflected on his health struggles. “I always try to see a glimmer of hope in any situation,” he wrote. “It means the focus is on the present moment and all the beauty (and music!) that exists in that very moment.”

Alicia Keys is terug. En hoe! Het muziekicoon met 15 GRAMMY-prijzen op haar naam kondigt vandaag haar nieuwe album ‘ALICIA’ aan met release voorzien op 20 maart bij Sony Music, en haar langverwachte terugkeer naar de podia met haar ‘ALICIA – THE WORLD TOUR’. Op vrijdag 12 juni staat Alicia Keys voor het eerst sinds 2013 opnieuw in het Sportpaleis. De ticketverkoop start maandag 27 januari om 10u via livenation.be.
 
De ‘ALICIA – THE WORLD TOUR’ belooft iedere avond een bijzondere multimediale en artistieke beleving te worden. Keys zal haar nieuwe muziek brengen, maar ook haar klassiekers – van “No One” tot “If I Ain’t Got You” en “Girl on Fire” – zullen zeker niet ontbreken. Het wordt een meditatie over de liefde en het leven, één groot feest, barstend van de aanstekelijke energie dat enkel live muziek kan teweegbrengen.
 
American Express® Card-leden genieten van een exclusieve presale voor de ticketverkoop van start gaat voor het grote publiek. AMEX-leden kunnen vanaf morgen woensdag 22 januari om 10u tot zondag 26 januari om 17u alvast tickets in voorverkoop aanschaffen.
 
Meer over Alicia Keys, het nieuwe album, de volledige tourdata in Europa en US vind je in het internationale persbericht hier.
 



START TICKETVERKOOP
MAANDAG 27 JANUARI, 10:00

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​
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Hot Ticket: € 174,10
(incl. servicekosten en mobiliteitsbijdrage)

​NAKED releast de single “Into the Night” om het toetreden tot de band te vieren van pianist en Hammond wizard Patrick Cuyvers (The Scabs). 
 
Het “Wired Up” album staat in verschillende jaaroverzichten 2019 en airplay charts in de UK en de US genoteerd. Na concerten in Benelux, Duitsland en Frankrijk in 2019, inclusief het memorabel optreden op het Blues Peer-festival, staat TBK dit jaar op Moulin Blues, het grootste blues & roots festival van Nederland.

Already a bona fide star in her native Denmark, jazz singer Sinne Eeg has in recent years been weaving her spell in performances throughout Europe and the United States, where audiences and critics alike have responded enthusiastically to her dark, alluring voice, rich timbre, impeccable intonation, inherent sense of swing and remarkably natural scatting ability that recalls her own vocal jazz heroes, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan and Anita O’Day. On We’ve Just Begun, her winning collaboration with the 19-piece Danish Radio Big Band and 9th album overall, Eeg sings with signature soulfulness, sassy spirit and jazzy abandon on a program of three well-chosen standards, a swinging adaptation of a tune from a vintage Danish film, and five affecting originals with Eeg as composer and/or lyricist. Eeg released her self-titled debut in 2003 and gained international attention with her critically acclaimed 2007 album, Waiting for Dawn, and Remembering You in 2008. Her latest, We’ve Just Begun, is her most impressive outing to date.

He was known by millions for a single song, but what a song it was. Robert Parker, the musician and singer who shot to the top of the charts with his 1966 smash, “Barefootin’,” has died at age 89.
The New Orleans born Parker was a saxophonist with eclectic performer Professor Longhair, and became a fixture on the NOLA scene, working with such stars as Irma Thomas and Fats Domino.
Parker moved to the front of the stage in the late 50s, charting with “All Night Long,” but remained under the radar (and continued to hold a “day job”) for nearly a decade before “Barefootin’” made him a household name. The song allowed Parker to tour the world, often performing barefoot while sharing the stage with many of R&B’s most popular performers.
Robert Parker never again achieved the level of success he had with his biggest hit, but he remained active, playing local clubs well into his 80s, and was inducted into the Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in 2007.
Parker is survived by his wife Carolyn, and by millions of fans who found joy in taking their shoes off for his classic hit. 

Revered songwriter David Olney died Saturday, January 18, 2020, after suffering an apparent heart attack during a performance in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida. He was 71.
 
A key member of Nashville’s music community since his move to Music City in 1973, the Lincoln, Rhode Island native was a compelling and enigmatic presence. He wrote sonnets and starred at the Nashville Shakespeare Festival, and his live concerts blended tenderness and ferocity, theatre and sincerity, agitation, and embrace.
 
Country Music Hall of Fame member Emmylou Harris said: “David Olney tells marvelous stories, with characters who cling to the hope of enduring love, all the while crossing the deep divide into that long, dark night of the soul.” Troubadour Steve Earle called Olney, “One of the best songwriters working in the world today,” and the late Townes Van Zandt once said, “Anytime anyone asks me who my favorite music writers are, I say, ‘Mozart, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Bob Dylan and Dave Olney.’”
 
Olney’s songs have been recorded by Harris, Del McCourty, Linda Ronstadt, Steve Young, and many others. His lyrics are products of a remarkable inquisitiveness that allowed him to explore subjects that few songwriters would consider: He wrote of a Nashville train disaster, of baseball shortstop Phil Rizzuto, and of actor John Barrymore. He wrote about Jesus Christ from the narrative perspective of the donkey that carried him into Jerusalem, and about the Titanic from the perspective of the iceberg that sank the ship.
 
His friend and songwriting great Guy Clark said that Olney’s art “transcends craftsmanship. It’s inspired, for sure.”
 
Olney moved to Nashville after briefly studying English at the University of North Carolina. He quickly fell in with a group of like-minded songwriters that included Clark, Van Zandt, Rodney Crowell, and Richard Dobson. In the early 1980s, he formed The X-Rays, a jagged rock band that secured a contract with Rounder Records. In 1986, he embarked on a solo recording career that produced more than 20 albums and allowed him to travel the world making music.
 
He is survived by wife, Regine, daughter, Lillian, and son, Redding, and by a devastated music community. Memorial details are not yet available. 

13.07.2020
Paleis 12, Brussel
Tickets te koop vanaf vrijdag 24 januari om 10u.

TICKETS

Volgende zomer zal Diana Ross niet enkel het 'Sunday Legends Slot’ op het Glastonbury Festival invullen, maar ook haar fans in Ierland, UK, Spanje en België trakteren op een wervelende show vol tijdloze muziek, schittering en glamour. Op 13 juli 2020 komt ze naar Paleis 12 in Brussel.

Diana Ross is een icoon. Ze wordt beschouwd als één van de succesvolste zangeressen en entertainers aller tijden. Vanaf haar debuut als frontvrouw van The Supremes en tijdens haar onnavolgbare solocarrière hertekende Ross het muzieklandschap en maakte ze de weg vrij voor hedendaagse sterren.

Als erkenning voor haar internationale verwezenlijkingen op cultureel en humanitair vlak kreeg Ross in 2007 de prestigieuze Kennedy Center Honors in Washington DC. In 2012 kreeg ze de hoogst mogelijke erkenning van de National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences: een GRAMMY® Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2016 mocht Ross dan weer de Presidential Medal of Freedom in ontvangst nemen, de meest prestigieuze erkenning die een Amerikaans staatsburger kan krijgen. President Obama sprak bij de uitreiking de gevleugelde woorden: "ze straalt gratie uit, haar invloed is onontkoombaar”.
​
Maar het liefst van al staat ze onder de gloed van de spots en vertolkt ze de songs die in ons collectief geheugen gegrift staan: "I’m Coming out”, "More Today Than Yesterday”, "Stop! In The Name Of Love”, "You can’t hurry love”, "Love Child”, "The Boss”, "Upside Down”, "Love Hangover”, "Why Do Fools Fall in Love”, "Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”, "I Will Survive” en "Reach Out and Touch (Somebody’s Hand)”.
Op 13 juli krijg je de unieke kans om een diamanten -75 jaar jong- Diana live aan het werk te zien. Tickets te koop vanaf vrijdag 24 januari om 10u via greenhousetalent.be.

 

THE INSPECTOR CLUZO
BROTHERS IN IDEALS 
We the People of the Soil UNPLUGGED 
Out Jan. 17th, 2020, available on CD / LP / Digital 
(F.thebassplayer Records/Caroline International) 
Engineered, mixed and produced by Vance Powell (Jack White, Clutch, The Raconteurs, Stapleton)

Live with 5 piece acoustic band @Botanique 4 Februari ​

​Het verhaal van The Inspector Cluzo is tegelijk ongelooflijk, atypisch, buitengewoon.

De 'Rockfarmers' combineren hun carrière als muzikanten met het runnen van een Bio boerderij in Gascogne (met hun families). In de beide disciplines staan indie / onafhankelijk zijn voorop, dus hebben ze een eigen label (en nu Caroline als distributeur), eigen management, eigen booking, eigen financiën … . Bovendien is hun motto ‘act locally to think global’, zo verdelen ze de producten van hun boerderij via lokale netwerken (coop's).

Ze vierden een jaar geleden hun 10e verjaardag als duo met een album "We the people of the soil" - waarmee ze bijna letterlijk over de hele wereld opgetreden hebben (in Be op Bsf, in de AB en Bota). Geproduceerd door Vance Powell (rechterhand van Jack White), ging het album (tot nu toe) al meer dan 25.000 keer fysiek over de toonbank). Clutch (US), nam het duo mee op hun Europese én Amerikaanse tournees, waarna ook Eels overstag ging en E zich deze lente als fan van de band outte en hen meenam op een aantal US data. 

Het album "We People Of The Soil" werd danig goed ontvangen dat de Cluzo's besloten een volgende stap te zetten: "Brothers In Ideals". Een akoestische versie van "We the People of the Soil" werd afgelopen Mei in Nashville, TN live (analoog) opgenomen op amper 4 dagen tijd, opnieuw geproduced en gemixt door de 6x Grammy Awards Vance Powell (The Raconteurs, Jack White, Stapleton). De bezetting omvatte naast de 2 Cluzo's ook een paar gastmuzikanten uit Nashville: een viool, een cello en een piano/Wurlitzer breiden het soulvolle klankpalet uit. Het album verschijnt op 17 januari, gevolgd door een een exclusieve tourné....met dus een uitzonderlijk concert, op 4 februari in de Botanique te Brussel.

TIC over het nieuwe album: 
It was the proper time to record our 1st acoustic record... to share what we felt in that Middle West with Clutch & Eels, a kind of a testimony. After the EELS tour we stopped and recorded in Vance Powell's studio. All was recorde live live during 4 days, mixed in 2 days. Just like this, simple..We invited some friends, Charles Treadway (piano, Wurlitzer), Eleonore Denig (Violin), Austin Hoke(Cello) and Marianne Dissard(Vocal on "The Best") (Cfr Calexico) we played all together in the studio...that's it. We were not planning to release it, but being our own Label and doing what we want we decided to release it - never having a specific career plan, just following our artistic feelings. ​

Jimmy Heath, a prolific saxophonist, composer and bandleader who played alongside some of the biggest names of jazz, including Miles Davis and John Coltrane, has died.

Heath died Sunday morning in Loganville, Georgia of natural causes, his grandson told NPR. He was 93 years old. His family was at his side, including his wife of 60 years, Mona Heath, his children Mtume and Rozie, his grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and his brother, drummer Albert "Tootie" Heath.

In a career that spanned seven decades, Heath brought the bebop he loved to big bands — and into the 21st century.
Heath is best known as a saxophonist, but he wrote and arranged music throughout his life. In 2013, when he was 87 years old, he told NPR it was important to be a complete musician. "Not just to stand up and improvise," he stressed. "You know, you got to compose. I want to be a person who can compose, and leave something here for posterity."

Heath left hundreds of compositions that were performed by his own bands, and others.
Phil Schaap is a curator of Jazz at Lincoln Center. He says that one of Jimmy Heath's most important contributions was bringing the bebop revolution of the 1940s to succeeding generations.

"Moses is dead. The tablets are still here," Schaap declares. "Well, Jimmy Heath read the commandments of jazz, and he got the tablets from the great prophets. And he used it his way to great benefit, and he even fed it back towards the prophets. You know, Miles Davis used his stuff. Charlie Parker used his stuff. And John Coltrane was nurtured by Jimmy Heath."

James Edward Heath was born October 25, 1926, in Philadelphia. His sister Elizabeth played piano; his older brother Percy played violin and bass; and his younger brother Tootie played the drums.

"My father played the clarinet," recalled Jimmy Heath. "He was an auto mechanic for a living, but he played the clarinet on the weekends. He'd get it out of the pawn shop and play in a marching band in Philadelphia. But my mother sang in a church choir. But we were privy to have all these great recordings in our home at that time. We heard all the bands. The big bands were prominent at that time."

​Jimmy Heath developed a big sound on his saxophone. But he was a little man — 5'3". For most of his life, his colleagues on the bandstand called him "Shorty" and "Little Bird" (a reference to saxophonist Charlie Parker, who was nicknamed "Bird").

"My father told me about that. He was a small guy," Heath said. "He says, 'Jimmy, you just got to work harder as a little person. Because the big guys get all of the girls, and all of the gigs. They get everything. But if you pursue your profession, and music, like I do, every day, just like before you came in here, I was practicing. And things like that, you can overcome these myths.'"
​
Jimmy Heath had to overcome more than myths. He beat a very real heroin habit, and went on to perform and record for more than half a century. He also taught for 20 years at Queens College in New York. Heath said the reason he was able to do all that was simple.

"I'm going to do this until I leave. This is all I love. It's a matter of love. If you love what you do, and you can make a living at it, What's better?"

And Jimmy Heath was one of the best.

Sharing All He’s Learned Lately About Love,
The Multi-Talented Indie Singer/Songwriter and Producer Gets
The Seduction Off to A Vibey, Up-tempo Start With The
Upcoming Drop of The Lead Single “Virginia Is for Lovers”
Adopted by the Virginia State Travel Service 50 years ago, “Virginia is For Lovers” has become one of the most beloved and iconic slogans in the world. While it’s meant a lot of different things to many people over time, the one constant has been spreading love. With the release of his fresh new single with that title, Richmond-based multi-talented singer/songwriter and producer Lydell Williams spreads that love while continuing to fulfill his mission of getting us back to the roots of R&B and Neo-soul with substance. 
Driven by an uptempo, vibey and ultra-seductive flow, “Virginia is for Lovers” is, for Williams, “a great representation of what love is, and my recent experiences with love, Richmond being considered by many the city of love, period.” It’s also the perfect intro to the singer’s highly anticipated upcoming full-length album Without You, whose tracks groove together to create a powerful and emotional, moment by moment chronicle of a profound recent relationship in his life, which played out very much like the plotline of the classic 1997 romantic drama film “Love Jones.”

​The great Chicago bluesman Luther Allison lived by a simple philosophy that he was happy to share (“Leave your ego, play the music, love the people”). Now, twenty-three years after Luther’s passing, the great man would surely be thrilled to hear Bernard Allison’s Songs From The Road, and proud to find that his ferociously talented son is sworn to the same mission, bringing soul-soaked, all-guns-blazing blues to audiences who need it more than ever.
Released in January 2020 as a CD/DVD set on Ruf Records, Songs From The Road is a live snapshot so raw and real that hearing it feels like hanging off the security barrier of Dortmund’s Musiktheater Piano club when Bernard and his crack-squad band hit town last October 23rd. With an A-list crew on-hand – and a dynamic mix from industry legend Jim Gaines – this immersive recording catches every last flash of virtuosity, bead of sweat and drop of atmosphere. “I actually prefer live performances,” says Bernard, “because you can communicate and interact with the audience. I basically feed off of that energy, combined with my group’s talent and personalities.”
Since he embarked on his acclaimed solo career with 1990’s The Next Generation, Bernard’s studio catalogue has been heavy with highlights, and that night in Germany, every fan in the house got something off their wish-list. This prolific songwriter reminded us that his recent output is his strongest to date, with cuts from last year’s acclaimed Let It Go album including Night Train, Cruisin For A Bluesin, Same Ole Feeling, Backdoor Man and the wound-licking slow-blues of You’re Gonna Need Me. “We showed more mature songwriting with that album,” he nods.
But Bernard is happy to embrace his past glories, too, on a setlist that digs up his studio catalogue for diamonds. From 1998’s Times Are Changing album, there’s The Way Love Was Meant To Be and the funky strut of I Can’t Get You Out Of My Head. From 2000’s Across The Water, there’s Meet Me Half Way and the powerhouse, fingertwist blues-rock of Feels Kinda Funny. After stopping off for the grooving title track from 2002’s Storms Of Life, Bernard pulls out Stay With Me Tonight from 2005’s Higher Power, and mines 2015’s In The Mix for fan-favourites Call Me Momma and Something’s Wrong.
Oldest of all – and a treat for long-standing fans – is Let’s Try It Again. Borrowed from his father’s classic 1984 album, Life Is A Bitch, it’s a moment that brings Allison Jr’s story full circle, reminding us of his own formative years, when he jammed with Luther as a kid, broke out in the band of Koko Taylor and frequently cut heads onstage with close friend Stevie Ray Vaughan.
You might know the songs – but you don’t know these interpretations. With Bernard leading the lineup on vocals and searing lead guitar, backed by Dylan Salfer (guitar), George Moye (bass), Mario Dawson (drums) and José James (sax/percussion), this is a live band whose chemistry lets them stretch out and shake up these classic songs. “Fans that know our choice of songs will notice the change in arrangements that highlight my current band members,” says Bernard. “As opposed to hearing the studio versions, which normally feature my vocals and guitar. We’re the Bernard Allison Group and we show our unity night after night across the world. It’s ‘the Allison way’…”
On Songs From The Road, the result is a glorious exchange of energy between band and crowd – and evidence that Luther’s old philosophy is burning brighter than ever. “Our shows aren’t like going to the movies and staring at the big screen,” Bernard considers. “We’re there for the people to enjoy each other’s stories for the evening.”

Romano Nervoso, de zelfverklaarde ‘Godfather van de Spaghettirock’, omschrijft zijn muziek als wilde rock-'n-roll gespeeld door Italianen (en een Griek).

Nadat hij Danko Jones in 2005 aan het werk zag in zijn thuisstad Toronto, groeide er een wederzijds respect voor elkaar als muzikanten. Het begin van een nieuwe vriendschap, die eind 2019 resulteerde in de release van ‘Wild Boy feat. Danko Jones’, de eerste single van Romano Nervoso's vierde album ‘The Return of the Rocking Dead’.(11 April 2020 via Mottow Soundz) 
 
Check Romano Nervoso als support van Danko Jones tijdens zijn tournee in België:
In januari kan je Romano Nervoso op volgende locaties live aan het werk zien in het voorprogramma van Danko Jones: 
22 January – Het Depot, Leuven 
24 January – De Kreun, Kortrijk 
26 January – De Casino, Sint-Niklaas 
​

Na vijf jaar stilte is Roosbeef terug. Terug uit Kentucky én met een nieuw studio-album dat ons wachten rijkelijk beloont: 'Lucky'.

'Lucky' is komende week album van de week op Radio 1. Op zaterdag is frontvrouw Roos Rebergen te gast bij Belpop (Radio 1) en op zondag hoor/zie je Roosbeef voor het eerst in de nieuwe bezetting live op De Zevende Dag (Eén). 
​
OVER 'LUCKY'Met ‘Lucky’ — het vierde studioalbum van Roosbeef — is terugkomen voor Roos Rebergen ook thuiskomen. Het hiaat sinds de vorige plaat is niet onbewogen geweest. Ze heeft haar muzikale bron opgezocht en twee jaar tussen de bluegrass geleefd. Ze vond daar meer dan muziek. Ze zag natuur zo groot als de wereld en mensen die alleen zijn en elkaar nodig hebben. Achter de Appalachen leerde ze het Amerikaanse lied beter begrijpen, en hoorde verhalen die nu op ‘Lucky’ een weerklank vinden.

Intussen belandde Roos terug in Antwerpen. Ze raapte haar band terug bijeen, met als nieuwe aanwinst Pascal Deweze (Sukilove, Metal Molly), maar nog altijd met Tim van Oosten (Het Zesde Metaal) op drums  en Tom Pintens (Zita Swoon, Het Zesde Metaal) op gitaar en keys. Met het ongelofelijke vakmanschap van de band is het resultaat niet mals. ‘Lucky’ snijdt diagonaal door de ziel en heeft vele facetten.

Met ‘Lucky’ verkent Rebergen nieuwe oorden. Het is een testament van haar muzikaal en tekstueel wasdom, wat onderschreven wordt door de ijzersterke band, die een groot deel van de arrangement voor deze plaat op zich nam. Pascal Deweze nam de productie en mixing voor zijn rekening. Ook Tom Pintens speelde een bijzondere rol in de productie en arrangementen. Roosbeef is terug!

Roosbeef staat sinds 2005 garant voor Nederlandstalige, humoristische pop, dwarse melodieën en spannende live-shows. 
Vandaag is Roosbeef niet alleen meer de band van Roos Rebergen, maar net zo goed die van Tim Van Oosten, Pascal Deweze (producer van ‘Lucky’) en Tom Pintens.

Eerder loste Roosbeef twee singles als voorlopers van het album: 'Menselijke Mensen' en 'In Mijnen Tijd'. 

​After making her first appearance on the ballot, the late superstar has been honored with induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as part of its class of 2020.
Joining Houston as inductees this year will be another late icon, rapper The Notorious B.I.G., as well as The Doobie Brothers, '80s synth-pop pioneers Depeche Mode, alt-rock veterans Nine Inch Nails and British glam rockers T. Rex.
Houston sold 200 million records worldwide was the first artist to have seven consecutive No. 1 hits.
She was also the first female artist to have an album debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. Her awards are so numerous that she's in the Guinness Book of World Records.
In 2019, Houston returned to the charts with a remix of "Higher Love" produced by KYGO, and with a posthumous duet of "Do You Hear What I Hear?" with Pentatonix. Next month, a hologram tour sanctioned by her estate gets underway in England.
While some may dismiss her as simply a pop singer, Rock Hall President and CEO Greg Harris says Houston is more along the lines of some of the legendary singers who are already in the Rock Hall.
He told ABC Audio, "[She] ... follows in the footsteps of those great diverse singers before her, like Marvin Gaye and Smokey Robinson and Aretha Franklin. They could deliver soulful ballads and hard-hitting dance numbers, rock and roll, soul, funk all rolled together."
The 2020 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony will be held Saturday, May 2 in Cleveland, Ohio, and will air live for the first time starting at 8 p.m. ET on HBO.
Tickets to the ceremony go on sale Feb. 27 at 10 a.m. ET via www.RockHall.com.

De affiche van Gent Jazz krijgt verder vorm met vier, enfin, vijf topacts! Novastar en Stef Kamil Carlens zullen, net als vorige zomer, openen voor Sting op dinsdag 14 juli. Het exotische jazzcollectief Compro Oro sluit op zondag 12 juli de Garden Stage af. En ook de Amerikaanse singer-songwriter Marc Cohn strijkt op zondag 12 juli op de Bijlokesite neer, in het gezelschap van de legendarische gospelband The Blind Boys of Alabama. Ze spelen er net voor Van Morrison.
De festivaldag van Sting is intussen volledig uitverkocht, maar voor de dag van Van Morrison zijn nog standaardtickets te koop via gentjazz.com.
Hieronder vindt u meer informatie over de nieuwe namen van Gent Jazz, dat dit jaar plaatsvindt van 8 tot 18 juli.
​

Het is eindelijk bijna zo ver: de voorverkoop gaat starten. Morgen, woensdag 15 januari, zal om 12.00 uur de voorverkoop van start gaan. Daarnaast hebben we weer nieuwe namen toegevoegd aan het affiche voor Moulin Blues 2020. Tevens introduceren we je in deze nieuwsbrief iets nieuws: de Festipi op Moulin Blues!

Voorverkoop
Zoals al eerder aangegeven is het voor de vroege vogels weer mogelijk om early bird combitickets, tegen gereduceerd tarief, te bemachtigen. Let wel: er zijn maar een beperkt aantal early bird tickets verkrijgbaar en er geldt: maximaal 4 early bird tickets p.p. Natuurlijk zijn er ook reguliere dag- en weekendtickets verkrijgbaar! Vanaf morgen op www.moulinblues.nl.

Let op: vanaf deze editie is het helaas niet meer mogelijk om tickets in de voorverkoop bij Primera vestigingen aan te schaffen.
 

 
Nieuwe namen Moulin Blues 2020:

Texas Blues Guitar Summit ft. Anson Funderburgh, Mike Morgan & Shawn Pittman (USA)

Nikki Hill (USA)

Dany Franchi (ITA)

Travellin' Blue Kings (NL/BE)

Richville (NL)

Festipi op Moulin Blues 2020

Vanaf deze 35e editie is het mogelijk om op de Moulin Blues Camping te overnachten in een ware Festipi. Comfortabel overnachten met alle positieve elementen van een tipi-tent. Je kunt een Festipi huren incl. inrichting (bed, slaapzak etc.). De Festipi is een Tipi tent met een doorsnede van 3 meter. Ideaal voor 1, 2 of 3 personen.

 
Meer info over Festipi
​

Pearl Jam komt voor het eerst in zeven jaar met een nieuw album. De Amerikaanse rockband van zanger en gitarist Eddie Vedder presenteert op 27 maart ‘Gigaton’, hun elfde studioplaat. Dat heeft de groep op zijn website bekendgemaakt.

Het laatste album was ‘Lightning Bolt’ uit 2013, waarvoor de groep een Grammy won. “Het maken van deze plaat was een lange weg”, zegt gitarist Mike McCready in een korte verklaring op de website. “Het was emotioneel duister en soms zeer verwarrend. Maar het proces was ook opwindend en gaf ons een experimentele plattegrond naar muzikale verlossing.”
McCready had in november al laten weten dat de groep recent weer de studio in was gedoken. De groep had dit weekend op sociale media al gehint op een spannende mededeling, met twee mysterieuze foto's.

Pearl Jam geldt als een van de grootste bands die de Amerikaanse stad Seattle in de jaren negentig heeft voortgebracht. Hun debuutalbum ‘Ten’ sloeg in 1991 in als een bom, dankzij hits als ‘Jeremy’, ‘Alive’ en ‘Black’.

Deze zomer, op 2 juli 2020, staat Pearl Jam als headliner op het podium van Rock Werchter. Diezelfde maand treedt de groep ook twee keer op in de Ziggo Dome in Amsterdam. Die concerten zijn uitverkocht.
​

The popular and award-winning orchestra, Thorbjørn Risager & The Black Tornado, brings forth a new album via Ruf Records on January 31, 2020. The intensity is intact, but there is also room for new streaks of melancholy. Through more than 1,000 concerts in 21 different countries, the hard-swinging, critically acclaimed ensemble makes people smile and dance. For that is what the blues is capable of, grooving away life’s problems. On this, his 10th album, frontman Thorbjørn Risager knows this better than most, tackling complex topics  from own age to political reality.

In this way, the title Come on In, symbolizes everything that Thorbjørn Risager & The Black Tornado stand for. Thorbjørn explains: “Some people think the blues is sad because it’s named after the color of the melancholy and has its roots in music played by the slaves in the United States. But you have to remember that this was music that people gathered around when they were trying to relax from their hardships. It emerged in festive situations and was meant to be danced to. I would like to help lift that tradition:  To try to ease your problems through music, and then go home with a smile on your lips.”
Presently, the band still work in the same way as when they began. Thorbjørn Risager sits at home with his acoustic guitar and creates the core of the song before they enter the studio, where everyone offers beats, bass lines, horn parts, backup vocals and fills. All that provides the Black Tornado with a sound that evokes a feeling of the elements raging around Risager’s voice.
Their open-minded and innovative approach to the blues adds elements to the songs from genres like funk, gospel, soul and rock ‘n’ roll. It all depends on the feeling and the direction of the song. One of the significant nuances of the new album is its axis of melancholic songs with acoustic guitar. It has instinctively arisen because the blues now reflects where Risager stands in life.
“The blues is my outlet. And this time, I’ve written some songs about having doubts about whether I’m the right place in my life. However, there is something fundamental in my songwriting that seeks the light. Which is about clenching your teeth together, saying, ‘I’ll just keep moving on’.”
Some orchestras break through and fade out. Others give up if the breakthrough doesn’t immediately show up. And then there are those for whom it is a matter of life and death to play music, steadily gaining popularity by keeping the standards high year after year. Thorbjørn Risager & The Black Tornado belong to the latter category. Quietly, both in Denmark and abroad, there is a growing awareness of their explosive concerts, in which guitar, bass, drums, organ and horns surround Risager’s powerful vocals – reviewers have drawn parallels to both Ray Charles and Joe Cocker.
The Blues has been in Risager’s bloodstream ever since he, at the age of 10, heard something absolutely magical. In his home in Jyllinge, his two music teacher parents primarily put classical records on the turntable, but at the neighbor’s house another world opened up. Thorbjørn was too young to understand the depth of the roots, the amount of dust and gravel, the size of the pain, and not least the redeeming euphoria of singing it all out. He just knew that he had to take it home with him. So he got cassette tapes with the exotic music and for years he was falling asleep to the sounds of Fats Domino and Muddy Waters.