HICKS WITH STICKS PARTY
 Having learned little from all the time and money lost producing shows; Hicks with Sticks has found new excuses to produce more of them.
First up is a genuine HWS party at The Knockout with 77 el Deora, the Shut-Ins and Tom Armstrong, plus a few surprises just to make sure its a real event. True, the flier might be lacking
something is taste, but at least give this guy credit for a 100% original, one-of-a-kind tattoo. Click on the picture for the full effect.
Next up, the SF Bay Area has more twangin' bands
than clubs so a lot of them are having trouble finding stage time. Hicks with Sticks hopes to provide a remedy by booking the Parkside's twang Sunday shows on the last
Sunday of every month, beginning on July 29 with Misisipi Rider, Starlene and Michael Koppy. Starlene has been on an extended break more since the '90s, but
the band has re-formed with some new members. It's good to have them back in action and have a place for them to play. In general, bands interested in playing the
Parkside should contact JoseSegue @ "you know where" dot com.
Cafe du Nord and HWS are also exploring shows starting in September where we'll
feature touring bands and more established local bands. The plan is fairly basic for now. We'll try a few show and see what works. Stay tuned.
NEW AXTON KINCAID CD
 Axton Kinkaid
manages to impress everybody with their live shows and their debut CD, Songs from the Pine Room, has all the potential to bring them the fan base they deserve.
Eleven of the CD's 12 songs are originals, but their cover of the Stone Roses "I Want to Be Adored" is a surprise standout. There are only a dozen or so words in the song, but tight,
understated music and near-Gregorian vocals provide enough light and longing to carry it for four minutes. It reflects a sense evocativeness
that pervades this CD; even on up-tempo numbers like "Who's Gonna Pour My Whiskey When You're Gone?" about losing a favorite bartender, and "Red Light," a
road song about a couple on a streak that they know will have to end.
Song after song evokes emotions that bind the listener as in "Pine Room" which is
about a 16-year-old girl coming of age. One of its verses starts with "You know I never liked my mother," a line that would surely lead a lesser lyricist than Kate Howser
into the goop, but it all works because the song is about moving on rather than getting stuck. The song writing, arrangement and vocals work throughout
these songs, and credit is due to the entire band for playing within itself. Live or on CD, this band plays as a team, each member holding his or her own without stepping
on the others, making it easy for the listener to approach their music, relax with it, bop with it, reflect upon it or be touched by it.
Look for their upcoming shows in July. If you're not already tuned in, you won't want too miss out much longer. Resistance, as they say, is futile. www.axtonkincaid.com |
VIRB.COM OFFERS BANDS ANOTHER WEB OPTION
MySpace
is beyond being a quickie web presence for up and coming bands. A web novice can create a MySpace page with band bios, songs, show announcements, photos and videos in an hour or two, and MySpace is friendly to search engines like
Google. Yet established bands too are finding it complements, rather than conflicts with their own sites.
But MySpace is not without its issues. It's ads are intrusive, its editing
and navigation are clunky, and there is a posting limit of four songs per band. MySpace is also full of lookers and self-promoters, not buyers. In MySpace's struggle to be everything to everybody it often
winds up being nothing to anybody. Most MySpacers build their collection of friends and not much else, though, for instance, Glen Earl Brown Jr. & the dICKENS like it for announcing their shows.
Cari-Lee Merritt
has a whoppin' three MySpace pages for three of her musical personalities. And of course some find homes for their thoughts and innermost secrets in their MySpace page blogosphere where nobody pays any attention to them there either. Hicks with Sticks has a page at
www.myspace.com/josesegue
as a "second site," mainly because there wasn't place on this site for the "Weiner vs Birdie" video.
 The question is whether a band can get noticed on MySpace
or whether it has fallen into a large and crwodd pit. Enter www.Virb.com, a band-friendly site with a clean interface, smarter search capabilities, and unlimited posting of songs. They've got
space for bios, pictures and blogs too. All it needs are more twanging bands. Hicks with Sticks did a music search within a 50-mile radius of SF and found
good cross-section of listings, but nobody from twang, or any other Americana styles, on Virb. We did find an interesting link to Insomnia Radio in SF which plays alt-rock that's not boring at http://www.virb.com/irsf. In all, the uncluttered simplicity of Virb makes it fun to explore, and getting lost in it for several hours wouldn't be that hard to do. Virb isn't going to upstage MySpace: it's yet another way for a band to increase it's exposure on the web.
ALL THE NEWS THAT PRINTS IN FITS
Get your steps up for twang, R&B, bop and boogie. Learn jive dancing at the Verdi Club where Rockin' Raul will be teaching classes all five Tuesday
nights in July. Www.TuesdayNightJump.com ... Bands working on, or about to release, CDs include
Red Meat, Royal Deuces, Dave Gleason's Wasted Days, Glen Earl Brown Jr. and the dICKENS and The Devil Makes Three. It's going to be a busy summer... The Devil Makes Three's show at
Great American Music Hall on June 8th drew a good Santa Cruz/KPIG crowd, but less of a SF/Hicks with Sticks crowd than expected. The SF/DM3
twang connection seems to be missing a beat. There are good reasons why DM3 is the best and biggest drawing twang band in the Bay Area.
Any one of their CDs has the Hicks with Sticks seal of approval.
Those who don't know them should catch up at http://www.thedevilmakesthree.com... Smelley Kelley and Dave Janusco from the Plain High Drifters have a side project recording a few cover tunes. Find Smelley-fied versions of
Creedence's "Run Through the Jungle," Iggy Pop's "The Passenger" and Sam the Sham's "Little Red Riding Hood" at http://thediamondgalaxy.com/AGDemo.html. |
