It’s Not Too Late...Vote for Kenny Chesney!
Current mood: excited
Category: Music
For the first time, the ACM (Academy of Country Music) is allowing fans to vote for their prestigious "Entertainer of the Year" award.
Among all the gifted people up for this accolade, there was one clear choice for me...Kenny Chesney.
Why???
Here's just a few of the reasons:
Last year's "Flip Flop Summer" tour was second in sales to the Police Reunion Tour. Many of those shows were sold out in a matter of hours.
His latest album "Poets and Pirates" has blown the doors off it's competition.
Seriously.
Within the first week of it's release every track charted in the Top 40! If memory (and numerous Googles) serve me correctly, this has never happened before.
On top of that, "Never Wanted Nothing More" has the distinction of being the longest running Number One song of the year. The second longest? "Don't Blink", also off of "Poets and Pirates". The third official single "Better As A Memory" hit the Top Ten in it's second week.
Add all that together and you can see what I think that Kenny Chesney deserves to be the ACM's 2008 Entertainer of the Year.
The 43rd Annual Academy of Country Music awards show can be viewed tonight, May 18th, on CBS starting at 8 PM ET/PT.
This is Round 3 in the series. The ultimate winner will take home cash ($2,500!!) as well as 10 hours recording time at Zen Seven Studios (Woodland Hills, CA) and admission to Loren Israel's Band BootCamp. There will be coverage by all the local rockers including Rock City News and Music Connection Magazine.
OK. It might seem a bit odd. A Battle of the Bands in an Italian restaurant?? Well, the Grill is much more than just a dining establishment. They are also an entertainment venue with jazz combos during their Sunday brunches, rock bands (like perennially favored locals Metal Skool) and comedy nights.
All in all, sounds like a pretty cool way to support your local musicians.
And if you thought that it just couldn't get any better than that, you're wrong.
This Sunday, tomorrow...errr, today, one of the esteemed members of the BotB judging panel will be no other than your favorite pixie, me. Yeppers. I rooted around in the mothballs and dusted off my A&R cap from the old days. I'll be donning it for the evening as part of my "dress to impress" attire as I join in the festivities.
I'm not telling you all of this to toot my own horn, doncha know. C'mon down to the South Bay and bring your appetites for good food and music with you. While you're there, stop by and say hello if you get the chance. I always love to chat with MyPals!!!
Sunday night, Redondo Beach. I'll be there...the Good Lord willin' and if'n the crick don't rise!!
YIPES...lest I forget. Have you checked out the brand spankin' new look of my profile yet? It was designed exclusively for me by the Three Pucci Musketeers, lads whose ages added all together is way less than mine and whose talents dwarf mine in equal (if not greater) measure. I really dig the Tink they used for the main graphic. She looks like she's saying "Have a seat, make yourself comfy and stick around for a while". As my niece put it "super cute (and totally you!)". And the music I have up right now (Rat Scabies, drummer extraordinaire doing "Sin, Sin, Sin") sounds like it was made just for the page.
ENJOY!!!
Currently
listening
:
Something/Anything?
By
Todd Rundgren
Release date: 25 October, 1990
Contrary to popular belief, The Serenity Prayer is not only for the friends of Bill W. It holds tenets that reach beyond the boundaries of circumstance, sexual orientation, money and/or ancestry.
Take my hand.
Say it with me:
"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."*
Furthermore:
"This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man."**
Blessings to all!!
*AA version. For the complete work as written as well as further information, follow the link embedded in my main text.
Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates
Current mood: determined
Category: Music
When I first wrote about Kenny Chesney a few months ago, it was in eager anticipation of the release of his new album Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates. It's been out for two weeks now and the response it has gotten across the board has been nothing if not tremendous. Double platinum sales figures are growing daily. It's all over the Billboard Magazine charts. After one week's street date, every (!!) song showed up on their Country Radio hit list...currently there are still three in the Top Ten. Sitting this week in Billboard's Top 200 number three slot proves that the showings on Adult Contemporary and Pop listings are indicative of the widespread appeal of Kenny Chesney's music.
Oh yeah. And don't be surprised if it makes it to the top of my "Best Albums Of 2007" tally this year. Because I'm here to tell you this is an awesome body of work, from opening note to closing.
Kenny's voice is warm and rich, the best I've heard from him to date. He makes it all sound effortless, so that each vocal is like a door, opening up and inviting you in to take your fill of the tale that every song has to tell. Don't get me wrong...the music performed behind the words are top-notch as well. I'm just sayin' that it's little wonder then that people have been responding to Just Who I Am they way that they have been because I can get lost just in the listening process.
As for the songs themselves? I think the best way to put is it that they have universal appeal. We all have "Demons" that we chase and that chase us back. Or have woken up the morning after and thought it "Got A Little Crazy" the night before. There's the life lesson in "Don't Blink", that "Life goes faster than you think". The sensibility to make it through the day as you " live and love and laugh a lot" as the opening song "Never Wanted Nothing More" states. Or that sooner or later, "we're gonna have to grow up, have to get real jobs and be adult some day, "Just Not Today"." Another wisdom is found in "Dancin' For The Groceries"; not to judge others by the job that they do, it doesn't always define who they are as a person.
The daily grind gets it's due elsewhere on Just Who I Am. "Shiftwork"...been there, done that, hated it. This song's rare duet appearance by the legendary George Strait and cool calypso beat has empathy for the working stiff in us all.
Joe Walsh, who's first claim to fame came in the late '60s with his stint in the James Gang, has built a career around his signature guitar sound as evident in songs like "Rocky Mountain Way" and "Life's Been Good". From the opening vocoder notes of "Wild Ride" (a Dwight Yoakam tune) he lends an extra bit of cachet to this rocker.
Then there's the many sides of love. "Wife And Kids" is a yearning for the future and someone to share it with while "Better As A Memory" is a lament to love not meant to be. A love that is so true and real that it can be frightening is the heart of the poignant ballad "Scare Me". I'd be hard-pressed to say which I like best in this song, the killer (but too short) guitar riff or the soulful vocal interpretation.
Geez...I'm gushing here, right? OK...in all fairness, there is a problem I have with Just Who I Am: Poets & Pirates. Even weighing in with eleven songs, it (as stated in "Don't Blink") goes by way too fast.
To hear more of Kenny Chesney's music online, visit his official website or check out his profile here on MySpace.
A Flame of Remembrance
Current mood: contemplative
Category: Life
I light my flame of remembrance.
For my family, nearby and global.
Friends close to my heart...always.
Those that lost their lives on what should have been just another day.
And the ones that made it through the terror only to deal every day with the horrors of the aftermath. Residents and workers, like my friend and mentor George Tabb...suffering now with chronic illnesses that will shorten their time here on earth.
I light my flame of remembrance, in honor of you all.
Kenny Chesney, A Poet and A Pirate
Current mood: accomplished
Category: Music
I'm pretty excited right now. I've been working on a project for a while and the finished piece, "Kenny Chesney, A Poet and A Pirate" finally went live this morning. It was a long haul to get this one to where I felt like it was the best it could be and I went thru more versions than I care to count to get to that place.
As usual, it's up on Blogcritics and you can check it out in full length, just click here.
A lot of times I'll use this blog to talk a bit about my process or share a part of my own personal RnR history. But this one's gonna be a bit different.
See...a couple of good friends of mine turned me onto Kenny Chesney a while back. I got a few of his CDs and really liked what I heard there. I decided that I wanted to write about him and started doing research...websites, videos, press releases. But I couldn't settle on my focus.
Then someone came over and was surprised to hear The Road And The Radio on our CD player. It showed them a side of me they hadn't expected...they'd always thought of me as just a hardcore rocker. As we sat and talked it came up that RnR and Country are not as far apart on a scale of musical genres as my guest had thought.
In that conversation I found my voice. It wasn't smooth sailing from that point on though. I had so much great information...where to draw the line as to what to include or delete? All of it was very impressive...but to put it all in there would have been an encyclopedic endeavor.
For example, I didn't mention any of his many awards, accolades from peers and fans. I mentioned a couple of his chart topping merits, but that was it...there's much more than that. It's quite a list, I'm tellin' ya.
Since 1997 when the Academy Of Country Music (ACM) voted him as the Top New Male Vocalist, he's had a solid standing in their yearly polls. In 2002 he was their Top Male Vocalist as well as the recipient of Single Of The Year for "The Good Stuff". He's taken their Top Entertainer Of The Year award twice, in 2004 and 2006.
The CMA's, a yearly awards ceremony for the Country Music Association, have heaped acclaim on his talents too. When The Sun Goes Down was 2004's Album Of The Year and he was named the Entertainer Of The Year. In 2005 he was their Triple Crown winner. In fact, Kenny Chesney has won the top slot of CMA's Entertainer Of The Year three (count 'em...3!!) times in a row.
Since 2002 Country Music Television (CMT) has been giving out annual awards for music videos...the only fan voted ones in Country. He has won several of them; Top Male Video as well as Video Of The Year.
Not to give any of Kenny's other well deserved honors short shrift...I know I'm forgetting a few.
But I also want to talk about something else that I couldn't fit into my BC article. Cable station GAC (Great American Country) has an exclusive two-part special Kenny Chesney: The Making Of The Flip Flop Summer Tour. It originally aired in April of this year and still gets a lot of air time (check the website for airdates).
Phase One is a behind-the-scenes look at the creative and technical sides of getting Kenny Chesney and his band out on the road, specifically this year's Flip-Flop Summer Tour. From stage and lighting designs, song sets and merchandise, Kenny starts planning months in advance of show dates being contracted. You get to see how each idea grows into reality and I really enjoyed the bird's eye view. There are also band rehearsals and the pre-tour college bar dates (a.k.a. The Keg In The Closet gigs).
Phase Two is the natural progression from the first. Here's where it all comes together and you are there for opening night. What was so cool about this? You see it all from the get-go; load-ins and more rehearsals included. There's a great section in fast forward when the buses start to unload, the equipment comes in and the stage and video screens are all put up...a microcosm of hours of hard work.
Separately both hours are entertaining and enlightening. Together they are much more than that...to me they're a reminder of the way-back days. Like in the old days when pigs flew (Pink Floyd--The Wall) and Mick Jagger and his pals looked like they were playing inside a giant mouth complete with those iconic lips and tongue. When Bruce Springsteen played for over 3 hours each show and Prince climbed a bathtub way up in the air...even earlier than that, Neil Young and his Rust Never Sleeps Tour replete with an acoustic and electric concert and "Road-eyes" that changed the set from one scene to the other. Back when going to a concert was an event...something to plan for and get excited about. Over the years I'd forgotten how much I'd missed that sort of concert tour. GREAT to see those old days are not completely forgotten. Seriously. Chalk up another reason why I've become a Kenny Chesney fan.
Now you know what I was talking about, the problem with having so much good material to work with. This stuff was too interesting for me to forget all together. Sometimes as a writer you have to make sacrifices...what to leave in and harder still, what to leave out.
This way, with this blog, I like to think that I got to do it all.
One more thing, while we're on the subject. You can check out more about Kenny Chesney without even leaving the comfort of MySpace. On his Official Profile you can check out tour dates, listen to some of Kenny's tunes (including a sample of his Number One single "Never Wanted Nothing More" and my personal fave "Summertime") and view some of his cool music vids.
Life Is Beautiful
Current mood: chipper
Category: Music
Sixx:A.M. "Life Is Beautiful", a track from the upcoming soundtrack to his long-awaited (and much talked about) auto-biographical book, Heroin Diaries.
Happy This Way
Current mood: exhausted
Category: Music
I'm a lucky pixie...there's no doubt about it. Especially when I have pals out and about that like to turn me on to artists that I haven't heard of before.
And that's the case with my latest review; Judith Owen's new cd Happy This Way. If you click this link, it will take you there. Where? Why Blogcritics, of course.
Judith has been around for quite a few years; her debut release came out in 1996 and one of the songs, "Hand On My Heart" was featured in the Jack Nicholson/Helen Hunt flick "As Good As It Gets" and her music has also found it's way into several tv shows as well. There's a reason for that...she's a very talented woman.
Ask me to define her style and be prepared for a long-winded answer...Ms. Owen is not easy to catagorize. The Welsh singer/songwriter/pianist has a beautiful voice and quite a way with words...her music is thought-provoking and introspective without making you want to head for your mother's little helpers.
Originally on a major label, in 2005 Judith, her hub Harry Shearer and manager Bambi Moe' started up their own venture, Courgette Records. Taking this step has given Ms. Owen more freedom and control of her musical destiny and that's a wonderful thang.
You can find out what I'm talking about for yourself. AND, you don't even have to leave the comfort of MySpace. There are four tracks from Happy This Way on Judith's Offical MySpace Profile. Two of my faves from her new disc are there, "My Father's Voice" and "Painting By Numbers" and that was a hard distinction to make about a cd that has, song for song, made it's way onto my own personal Top 100 all-time records.
Do me a favor??? I'd love to hear what you think of Judith, once you've checked her out.
Currently
listening
:
Happy This Way
By
Judith Owen
Release date: 22 May, 2007
excited
pensive
determined
contemplative
accomplished
chipper
exhausted
cold
