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Joe Algeri & The Sugarbrits – Merry Christmas (around the world)

The countdown for Christmas has officially begun, because Joe Algeri’s yearly Christmas song is out and available. The writer of the (should-be) legendary holiday tunes Chris Hillman Christmas and I Saw Santa With A Gun is back with a new song entitled Merry Christmas (around the world). This time the song has a Finnish ingredient as well, because Joe recruited The Sugarrush boys Andy, Coma and Paati to the task. The other guests on this international pop christmas are Lars Brusell (Sweden), Terry Munslow-Davies (Australia) and Joe’s Britannicas colleague Herb Eimerman (USA).

Merry Christmas (around the world) by JOE ALGERI & THE SUGARBRITS

Oh and there’s another international pop hit that should have gotten its own blog post a week or two ago, but I was too busy with the day job. Joe Algeri and Herb Eimerman are also behind this along with the power pop wizard Dom Mariani (DM3, Stems, Someloves) and Stefan Johansson. Their name is Green Beatles and The Basement is the name of this stunning pop song.

The Basement by GREEN BEETLES

Year 2011 Round-up Part 1: Small Houses, Hezekiah Jones, Chris Bathgate, Stranded Horse

I think it will go close to Christmas (or even after) until I have the albums and songs of the year lists ready, but I thought I post a couple of quick round-up posts before that. Maybe I should ask Suburban Home is that Micah Schnabel album coming out before the end of the year, before choosing the album of the year. At the moment it seems to be a contest between The Deep Dark Woods and Glossary with Dawes lurking on the 3rd spot and Mummypowder leading the local contest. But last minute changes are always possible.

I’ve become more and more addicted to folk singer-songwriters during the year and Jeremy Quentin (Small Houses), Raphael Cutrufello (Hezekiah Jones), Chris Bathgate and Yann Tambour (Stranded Horse) are new musical heroes of mine. I think I’ve found the first three from the wonderful Canadian blog Slowcoustic and if you like these videos below you should bookmark it (or just make it your home page).

Without further ado, I’ll bring you these great folk songs. Also known as the most beautiful songs of the year 2011 here at the onechord.net headquarters. I’ve listened these so many times that you need master’s degree in mathematics to be able to count that far. The albums are also fantastic. Well at least the first three. I don’t actually have the Stranded Horse album yet, which is criminal because I love that song. I have to do something with that if the rest of it is even half as good.

Small Houses: Late July (from the album North)

Small Houses – “Late July” from Spencer Wells on Vimeo.

Hezekiah Jones: Lift The Shadow From This Heart (from the album Have You Seen Our Fort?)

Chris Bathgate: Poor Eliza (from the album Salt Year)

Chris Bathgate : Bridgehouse Session Pt. 2 from Mostly Midwest on Vimeo.

Stranded Horse: And The Shoreline It Withdrew In Anger (from the album Humbling Tides)

Klifton Filente – Breaking the Clouds

It looks like I will be unemployed for the next three weeks. Not a perfect scenario, but the big plus side is that I finally have the time to write about the albums that I’ve fallen in love with during the last few weeks/months. Klifton Filente’s new album Breaking the Clouds is definitely one of them. This singer-songwriter from Gothenburg, Sweden is a big favourite of mine these days. He won my heart over with the previous album Common Ground and this new one is equally wonderful. I can’t understand why all indie pop blogs in the world aren’t writing about Jonas Lundvall’s Klifton Filente. I think he is pretty amazing and I’m totally into his sweet and beautiful pop songs. You can download these awesome releases for free from his bandcamp.

This is the opener Foremost of the Westerners:

Foremost of the Westerners by Klifton Filente

Klifton Filente at Bandcamp

Greg Pope – Monster Suit

Greg Pope is a multi-talented guy. The power pop circles know him as an excellent pop singer-songwriter, but apparently he is also a film director. This latest album Monster Suit is actually the official soundtrack for the short film Giant Monster Playset directed by Mr. Greg Pope, but it works beautifully also as an individual piece of pop art and contains several fabulous pop tunes. For example this song entitled Soulless Heart is a slice of melodic pop heaven.

 
Trailer for the movie Giant Monster Playset:

GIANT MONSTER PLAYSET, trailer from Greg Pope on Vimeo.

Greg Pope Website

Joe Pug Live at Lincoln Hall

I think another great songwriter Kasey Anderson first got me into Joe Pug. Either him or the blog ninebullets. Or Kasey writing for ninebullets. Either way this happened sometime last year, I later bought the album Messenger, fell in love with it and it was one of my top 20 albums last year. Now ninebullets alerted me about the new live album and I have to do my small part in spreading the gospel.

Chicago’s Joe Pug is one of the greatest folk troubadours at the moment. Everyone seems to think so, but of course that’s a bit of a perspective illusion. In the bigger picture he is still relatively unknown, but in the world I live in, he is extremely highly respected and about 90% of the blogs and webzines I read (and whose opinion I trust) are totally into him. The big news concerning Joe Pug is that he has a new live album out there in the digital world entitled Live at Lincoln Hall and you can buy it for $5. You know that generally I don’t really care for these kind of things, but this guy is something special and you can hardly get a better value for money than buy this thing of beauty for around 4€ or so. Live albums don’t get much better than this. Fantastic stuff.

To get you in the right mood. Here’s How Good You Are from the HearYa sessions:

Joe Pug Website
Joe Pug Store

Video of the Day #80: Matti Jasu & The Loose Train

Matti Jasu wrote a lot of amazing pop songs for Goodnight Monsters and I’ve been eagerly waiting his new material. Now the wait is almost over. Matti Jasu will perform at Flavour of the Month on friday 2nd of december with his new band and today this cool video of a song called Fingers Crossed appeared. Fingers crossed that the Matti Jasu & The Loose Train album will soon hit the stores and our hearts. I’m 100% sure that it’s going to be awesome.

Flavour of the Month – Mikael H & The Siberians, Matti Jasu and the Close Encounters

Flavour of the Month is once again around the corner and will take place at Pikku-Torre, Turku next friday 02.12.2011. Two wonderful bands Mikael H & The Siberians and Matti Jasu and the Close Encounters will share the stage. Really looking forward to this. More details in the finnish press release below:

LAULUNTEKIJÖITÄ YHTYEINEEN JOULUKUUN FLAVOUR OF THE MONTHISSA

Joulukuun Flavour Of The Month-klubilla perjantaina 2.12. on tarjolla helsinkiläistä ja turkulaista laulaja-lauluntekijäosaamista.

Folk-mestari Mikael Hakkarainen ja yhtyeensä The Siberians ovat juuri julkaisemassa kolmatta albumiaan The President of Venice Beach Helmi Levyjen kautta. Yhtyeen debyytti Sounds like Siberia julkaistiin vuonna 2004 ja kakkoslevy Back from Serbia vuonna 2006. Parin vuoden tauon aikana Hakkarainen on soittanut mm. John McGregorin kanssa Kasparissa sekä Astrid Swanin, etelä-afrikkalaisen Guy Collinsin sekä australialaisen Gosia Winterin yhtyeissä.

Turkulainen Matti Jasu puolestaan saatetaan muistaa kaksi albumia 22-Pistepirkon Bone Voyage-merkille levyttäneestä Goodnight Monstersista. Jasun uusia tekemisiä kuullaan nyt nimen Matti Jasu and the Close Encounters alla.

tiedot lyhyesti:
FLAVOUR OF THE MONTH ESITTÄÄ
Mikael H & The Siberians
Matti Jasu and the Close Encounters
+ FOTM DJ team
pe 2.12. 2011 klo 21-03
Pikku-Torre, Yliopistonkatu 30
liput 3€

Mikael H & The Siberians photo: by Alena Rebova

New songs from Carmen & The Devil

Carmen & The Devil, The finest Finnish country/folk duo has some new songs for you. You might have heard these new Carmen & The Devil originals on their stunningly beautiful live concerts during the recent months, but now they’ve added the songs to their Soundcloud as well (there’s also a limited edition cassette that contains these new tunes, but that might be a bit tricky to find). This wonderful band will be mostly investigating the Austrian old time country scene for the next couple of years, but let’s hope they manage to get that debut album done and dusted sometime during 2012. That’s going to be a thing of beauty. The new songs are Tell-Tale Heart and Row Row and you’ll find them below. Hit the soundcloud link, if you haven’t heard the older ones, because those are equally amazing.

Carmen & The Devil: Tell-Tale Heart:

 
Carmen & The Devil: Row Row:

 
Carmen & The Devil at Facebook
Carmen & The Devil at Reverbnation
Carmen & The Devil at Soundcloud

Marmalakes – Even Clothed

I wrote a couple of words about Chase Weinacht’s two great solo albums back in june. Now his band Marmalakes has released a new EP entitled Even Clothed and oh my.. this is even better. I’m becoming seriously addicted to the music these guys make. This young band from Austin, TX is capable of writing really amazing folk-pop songs that contain beautiful, delicate harmonies and colourful arrangements. I’m totally loving this. For example this last song of the EP Balmorhea is mindblowingly brilliant. Listen to it below and check out the whole EP on their bandcamp. If I still wrote reviews, I think this would get full five hearts.

Balmorhea by Marmalakes

Marmalakes at Bandcamp
Marmalakes at Facebook