Release Day Picks: September 30th New Album Highlights

Each week Release Day Picks profiles new LPs and EPs Team JamBase will be checking out on release day Friday. This week we highlight new albums by Bob Weir, Bon Iver, John Prine, Van Morrison, Drive-By Truckers and Reed Mathis and Electric Beethoven. Read on for more insight into the records we have all queued up to spin.

Bob Weir – Blue Mountain

The Scoop: Throughout his 30-year tenure with the Grateful Dead, Bob Weir never hid is affection for country music, from gunslinger ballads, to aching laments, to raucous drinking songs. Now some 50 years into his career, Weir has fulfilled a lifelong relationship with the genre with the release of Blue Mountain. The 12-track effort sees Weir collaborating with singer-songwriter Josh Ritter on the lyrics, while a who’s who of old and new friends from the indie-folk and jam world serve as backing musicians throughout. The album finds the 68-year-old Weir delivering an understated performance akin to Johnny Cash’s American Recordings albums, enveloping the listeners in a warm blanket as he spins his tales inspired by life in the American West. Stream the single “Lay My Lily Down” below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46cWp05Uaoo

Label: Columbia/Legacy Recordings/ROAR

Producer: Josh Kaufman, D. James Goodwin, Bob Weir

Number Of Tracks: 12

Running Time: 51:40

Guest Musicians: Bryce Dessner, Aaron Dessner, Scott Devendorf, Ray Rizzo, Joe Russo, Jon Shaw, Rob Burger, Sam Cohen, Nate Martinez, Jay Lane, Robin Sylvester, Steve Kimock, Annie Nero, Lauren Balthrop, Dawn Landes

Tracklist:

1. Only a River
2. Cottonwood Lullaby
3. Gonesville
4. Lay My Lily Down
5. Gallop On The Run
6. Ghost Towns
7. Darkest Hour
8. Ki-Yi Bossie
9. Storm Country
10. Hobo’s Lullaby
11. Blue Mountain
12. One More River to Cross

Stream / Download / CD/LP

Bon Iver – 22, A Million

The Scoop: Following-up 2011’s lauded Bon Iver, Bon Iver, frontman Justin Vernon returns with a collection of eccentrically titled songs on the band’s third album. The record was played live, in full at this year’s Eaux Claires festival in Wisconsin near Vernon’s April Base recording facility where the new album was tracked. The album – dedicated to musician Richard Buckner and vocalist and a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock founder Bernice Johnson Reagon – is more synth-based than previous efforts and has a lighter feel than the prior two albums. Watch the official lyric video for “30 “God”” below

Label: Jagjaguwar

Producer: Justin Vernon/April Base

Number Of Tracks: 10

Running Time: 34:10

Guest Musicians: Al Falaschi, Anthony Barba, Christopher Thomas, Clay Lyons, Clay Pufahl, David Laurenzi, Mark Henderson, Matt Douglas, Michael Lewis, Nelson Devereaux, Peterson Ross, Scott Fultz, Colin Stetson, Ryan Olsen, BJ Burton, Andy Fitzpatrick, Matt McCaughan, Sean Carey, Camilla Staveley Taylor, Elise Carey, Jessica Staveley Taylor, Rob Moose, James Buckley, Trever Hagen, Chris Rosenau, Jon “Squints” Westerlund

Tracklist:

1. 22 (OVER S∞∞N)
2. 10 d E A T h b R E a s T ⊠ ⊠
3. 715 – CRΣΣKS
4. 33 “GOD”
5. 29 #Strafford APTS
6. 666 ʇ
7. 21 M♢♢N WATER
8. 8 (circle)
9. 45_____
10. 00000 Million

Stream / Download / CD/LP

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John Prine – For Better, Or Worse

The Scoop: Renowned singer-songwriter John Prine returns to a similar format of his 1999 album In Spite Of Ourselves, once again employing an impressive group of female vocalists on 14 of the LP’s 15 songs. Prine duets with such talented performers as Susan Tedeschi, Alison Krauss, Amanda Shires, Iris DeMent, Lee Ann Womack, Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves, Holly Williams and others including his wife Fiona Prine. The album is made up of songs penned by such legendary country artists as George Jones, Ernest Tubb, Buck Owens and Hank Williams. Here’s the video for Tedeschi’s contribution to the George Jones tune “Color of the Blues”:

Label: Oh Boy Records

Producer: John Prine, Fiona Prine, Jim Rooney, Jody Whelan, Jason Wilber

Number Of Tracks: 15

Running Time: 42:28

Guest Musicians: Susan Tedeschi, Alison Krauss, Amanda Shires, Iris DeMent, Lee Ann Womack, Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves, Holly Williams

Tracklist:

1. Who’s Gonna Take the Garbage Out (Feat. Iris DeMent)
2. Storms Never Last (Feat. Lee Ann Womack
3. Falling in Love Again (Feat. Alison Krauss)
4. Color of the Blues (Feat. Susan Tedeschi)
5. I’m Telling You (Feat. Holly Williams)
6. Remember Me (Feat. Kathy Mattea)
7. Look At Us (Feat. Morgane Stapleton)
8. Dim Lights, Thick Smoke (Feat. Amanda Shires)
9. Fifteen Years Ago (Feat. Lee Ann Womack)
10. Cold Cold Heart (Feat. Miranda Lambert)
11. Dreaming My Dreams (Feat. Kathy Mattea)
12. Mental Cruelty (Feat. Kacey Musgraves)
13. Mr. and Mrs. Used To Be (Feat. Iris Dement)
14. My Happiness (Feat. Fiona Prine)
15. Just Waiting (John Prine Solo)

Stream / Download / CD/LP

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Van Morrison – Keep Me Singing

The Scoop: Legendary performer Van Morrison unveils his 36th studio album today, Keep Me Singing. The 13-track LP features 12 originals penned by Van as well as a cover of the blues standard “Share Your Love With Me.” While Van put out an album of re-worked classics last year, Keep Me Singing marks Morrison’s first album of all-new studio material since 2012’s Born To Sing. Morrison produced the album himself, which is his debut for Caroline Records. Listen to the track “Too Late” from the new Van Morrison album Keep Me Singing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mppwAMomTTg

Label: Caroline Records

Producer: Van Morrison

Number Of Tracks: 13

Running Time: 56:42

Tracklist:

1. Let It Rhyme
2. Every Time I See A River
3. Keep Me Singing
4. Out In The Cold Again
5. Memory Lane
6. The Pen Is Mightier Than The Sword
7. Holy Guardian Angel
8. Share Your Love With Me
9. In Tiburion
10. Look Behind The Hill
11. Going Down To Bangor
12. Too Late
13. Caledonia Swing

Download / CD/LP

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Drive-By Truckers – American Band

The Scoop: The 11th full length album by Drive-By Truckers once again finds the veteran rockers teaming with longtime producer Dave Barbe. Guitarist/vocalist Patterson Hood, guitarist Mike Cooley, multi-instrumentalist Jay Gonzalez, drummer Brad Morgan and bassist Matt Patton went to the famed Sound Emporium in Nashville to record American Band in late 2015. In a statement about the LP, Hood said “American Band is a rock and roll call to arms as well as a musical reset button for our band and the country we live in. Most of all, we look at it as the beginnings of some conversations that we, as a people very much need to begin having if we ever hope to break through the divisions that are threatening to tear us apart.” Listen to the politically charged single “Surrender Under Protest” below:

Label: ATO Records

Producer: Dave Barbe

Number Of Tracks: 11

Running Time: 46:41

Guest Musicians: 11

Tracklist:

1. Ramon Casiano
2. Darkened Flags on the Cusp of Dawn
3. Surrender Under Protest
4. Guns of Umpqua
5. Filthy and Fried
6. When the Sun Don’t Shine
7. Kinky Hypocrites
8. Ever South
9. What It Means
10. Once They Banned Imagine
11. Baggage

Stream / Download / CD/LP

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Reed Mathis & Electric Beethoven – Beathoven

The Scoop: Among the more clever new ideas to come out of the jam scene this year is the brainchild of former Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey and Tea Leaf Green bassist, Reed Mathis. Mathis and his Electric Beethoven project has taken Ludwig van Beethoven’s third and sixth symphonies and arranged them into jam vehicles for live “classical dance music” improvisation. On the album, Beathoven, he put together a new core of musicians for each movement of both symphonies, so it’s chock full of special guests. Mathis states that a recorded album was not the primary goal of the project, but rather the idea was really centered on live performances. That said, the album seems to have caught the spirit of improvisation, because the symphonies themselves sit second chair to the improvisational explorations even in the recorded setting. Have a listen to “Rebirth” from Symphony No. 3 below:

Label: Royal Potato Family

Producer: Reed Mathis

Number Of Tracks: 9

Running Time: 73:01

Guest Musicians: Brad Barr, Andrew Barr, Joe Russo, Luke Bolla, Steve Pryor, Stanton Moore, Jared Tyler, Matt Chamberlain, Mike Dillon, Page McConnell, Jason Smart, Mike Gordon, Marco Benevento, Robert Walter

Tracklist:

1. Awakening of Happiness
2. Scene By the River
3. Rain Dance
4. Thunderstorm
5. Shepherd’s Song
6. In Memory of a Great Man
7. Funeral March
8. Rebirth
9. Finale

Stream / Download / CD/LP

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Compiled by Ryan Dembinsky, Jeffrey Greenblatt, Andy Kahn and Scott Bernstein.