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One of my favourite bluesmen, Edmonton’s Marshall Lawrence is getting pumped up with the Battle of the Blues with John Rutherford at the Slice on Jan. 25.
“I’m going to knock him out in the third song,” chuckled Lawrence over the phone from Edmonton, where he is putting the finishing touches on his fourth CD “House Call.”
His previous two, “Blues Intervention” and “The Morning After,” are acoustic CDs while his first CD, “Where’s The Party,” is with a full band.
They will each do a set then will finish each other off on stage together in a blues battle royale which will last until the wee hours of the morning.
“I’m going to knock him out and it won’t just be a TKO,” he continued, playing to the boxing theme of the tour which so far includes shows in Calgary, Medicine Hat and Lethbridge before going back north to Edmonton and Stoney Plain — with more dates being announced every day.
“There’s a lot of interest in this,” Lawrence continued.
“It’s going to be really interesting because we each approach the blues so differently.”
And while he is excited about the tour with Rutherford, he is even more excited about having not only harmonica player David Hoerl from the Twisters playing throughout the CD, but having gospel/blues legends the Holmes Brothers (Sherman Holmes, Wendell Holmes and Popsie Dixon) on his new CD as well.
He has recorded 21 tracks for the CD and will choose 13 of them to appear on the CD. One of the chosen will be “Factory Blues,” which features the Holmes Brothers.
“They were so professional. They sat in the control room for 45 minutes making sure everything was perfect. They’d play a track and I’d think it was awesome, but they’d want to do another,” he said.
While the original idea was to record the CD with numerous harp players, as soon as he heard David Hoerl, he changed his mind.
“He’s one of the best in Canada,” he said.
“As soon as I heard him, I said ‘That’s it, I didn’t need anyone else.’ He asked me what I wanted him to play, and I said just do what you do. I want it to sound like you. That’s why I hired you.”
The show begins at 8 p.m. There is a $10 cover for it.
Windup caps off ‘Knockdown Cancer’
And continuing with the boxing theme, there is also music for a good cause this weekend as Soup of Flies help “Knockdown Cancer” with a wind up gala evening at HB’S Lounge, Jan. 28.
It is the windup event for a month’s worth of fundraising presented by bowling centres across Canada throughout January. They have been putting pink bands around the bowing pins, provided a donation box and have donated 25 cents from each bowling-shoe rental throughout the month. In addition to music, there will be bowling, of course, both regular and cosmic bowling with local celebrities, a live and silent auction featuring a variety of items including golf, Bulls baseball, teeth whitening, hair-care products and restaurant gift certificates. There will be free pizza and a dance with all proceeds going to the Canadian Cancer Society. Tickets are $25 each.
Swollen Members return
The other big show will have hardcore rap fans out in force at the Stone on Jan. 27. Vancouver favourites the Swollen Members and special guests La Coka Nostra, who come to Lethbridge straight out of Boston, will be performing. La Coka Nostra includes Slaine, who is also getting known as an actor, as well as most of popular ’90s rap group House Of Pain including Everlast, Danny Boy, Ill Bill and DJ Eclipse. Special guests City Prophets, Indelible, F-Bomb and Sin-Sane are also performing. Tickets for the show, which begins at 9 p.m., cost $30 at the door
A couple other cool shows this week include Thom Swift and The Fairly Odd Folk, who play the Slice, Jan. 26. Marc Ross returns to the Owl Acoustic Lounge, Jan. 27.
And, last, but not least, this week the Lethbridge Symphony Orchestra presents Chamber Series III which features the University of Lethbridge Faculty Brass. It takes place at the Southminster United Church on Jan. 27 at 7:30 p.m.
Lots of laughs
If you want to laugh, check out the Snowed In Comedy Tour, which comes to Average Joe’s on Jan. 29.
Featured comedians include Dan Quinn, Craig Campbell, Glen Wool, Pete Johanson and Arj Barker, who plays Dave on Flight of the Conchords. Tickets are $20, but the first 50 pre-sales cost $10. The show begins at 8 p.m.
Duo eager for southern conference
Another one of my favourites, Jenny Allen and Leslie Alexander are looking forward to returning to Lethbridge to play the Slice on Jan. 27 before heading south for the Folk Alliance Conference in Memphis.
“It will the the third rinse of our dirty laundry tour,” shivered Allen who recently arrived back in chilly Calgary from Toronto where she was playing gigs.
The popular folk/country duo will play several gigs in late January and early February before escaping the cold to spend a week in Memphis for the Folk Alliance conference on Feb. 25
“It will be the first time for me going to Memphis and the first for Allen and Alexander,” she said, adding she has played Folk Alliance conferences before as a solo artist, but not since it moved to Memphis.
While Allen and Alexander have considered recording a CD together they may already have recorded a live CD at the Slice as they play together very well, adding a variety of different instruments and vocal harmonies to each others’ songs.
“We may release it. We have two shows recorded, so we’ll listen to them and see,” she said.
The duo have each released new CDs in the past year and help each other out on them.
The week that was . . .
The Naked Ear were back at the Slice on Wednesday, Jan. 18 to play some experimental jazz.
Gordon Leigh and the Naked Ear were interesting as always combining jazz with stream of consciousness poetry.
They added guitar, bass groove and lot of of percussion for a hypnotically groovy set of experimental jazz fusion.
An interesting one was “The roots begin in Africa.”
They were happy to play a request for “Cold is in the box.”
They also used a variety of weird instruments like a Sythn-axe and an exotic thumb piano for extra percussion.
Going to see Harry Manx is like having your brain massaged for a solid two hours including a break.
That’s what a full house at the Geomatic Attic, experienced Thursday, Jan. 19.
The Salt Spring Island bluesman played a really, really, really laid back show of original music as he played a variety of unusual instruments.
He began his show with a slow song to set the laid back tone for the night on his signature instrument— the two layered, 20 string east Indian instrument Mohan Veena, which had a hypnotic drone. He managed to make all of his other instruments drone in that East Indian style as well as he tapped out the rhythm on a couple electronic drum pads.
He alternated instruments almost every song incorporating a six string banjo, his cigar box guitar on which he had strung a couple bass strings and a couple of other guitars on which he was playing his unique over the fretboard slide. He didn’t say much in between songs other than to crack a few soft spoken jokes about banjos and the difficulty of tuning a Mohan Veena and to chuckle “here’s another cheerful song about death.”
He proved to be an affable host and was every bit the one man band as his fingers fleetly flew over the strings of his odd assortment of instruments.
His second set proved to be more of the same. One of the laid back highlights, Tijuana, not only blended the music of the east and west, but also the south. A lot of the second set included songs he wrote with Kevin Breit, with whom he has recorded three CDs. He switched to yet another guitar— a National Steel guitar, and quipped he always wanted a “shiny’ guitar when he was 13 and finally got one when he was 56. He wound down his night by playing and exotic version of Bruce Springsteen’s “I’m On Fire.”
It was indie rock night at the Slice, Jan. 20 with Michael Granzow, the Utilities, Medicine Hat trio The Daydream Junkies and Jesse Northey and the Dandelions.
Granzow, who most people know from the Record Holder, started off with a sedate set of originals indie-folk including most of the new Record Holders’ EP “To Sea.” He had a Weakerthans’ John K Samson thing going on throughout his set.
The Utilities were up next. This Lethbridge/ Ponoka band impressed me on my first exposure to them as I thought they were going to be another very similar sounding Said the Whale style ambient indie pop band. But they were so much more. The dual Stratocaster powered band brought together a blend of influences including a little funk, a touch of alt-country, a little Weakerthans alterna-rock, a smattering of Dave Matthews folk pop and a lot of indie folk pop. There was lots of jumping around in place, time tempo change, guitar exchanges and a variety of different styles being explored. At one point they segued into Beck’s “Devil’s Haircut” mid song, though they added a little more funk to it.
Medicine Hat’s Daydream Johnny added a much need burst of energy to a fairly mellow night. The energetic trio supplied a healthy dose of slapback echo filled, snarling late ’60s garage rock.
And while I wanted to stick around for Jesse and the Dandelions, I was not going to miss the return of Shred Kelly.
Shred Kelly packed the house and the Owl Acoustic Lounge Dance floor with a brand new sound and a trumpet, Jan. 20.
I caught the second half of their show, during which they showed they have moved away from their more traditional bluegrass/ upbeat folk roots to a more of a high octane indie-rock sound.
Keyboardist/ accordionist Sage McBride was singing as I stepped in. Coupled with some blasting ska tinged trumpet playing, McBride’s voice helped give the band a No Doubt with a banjo sound.
Their unstoppable beat and big bass kept the joint hopping. And they saved their crowd favourites from the end of their show. They had the audience singing along with “I Hate Work” and cheering during “Tornado,” as they whirled across the dance floor.
A lot of people were out to check out a new Calgary supergroup at the Slice, Jan. 21.
Gold, a supergroup of sorts including members of Shematoma, Women, the Yukas and Extra Happy Ghost,” played an upbeat set of dreamy, delay ridden, jangly indie pop-rock music to an enthusiastic audience.
The two girls harmonized beautifully and hauntingly as they traded delay heavy guitar riffs, giving them a neo Go-Gos or Bangles type of ’80s pop sound. But their songs had enough of a diverse sound to keep the show interesting. Their vocal harmonies were simply mesmerizing.
Redrum Triumph, aka Kelsey Jesperson and Steve Foord played a relaxed set of original folk/ pop combining an array of mandolin and guitar with Jesperson’s cello and violin. They also opened for Shred Kelly the night before.
I wanted to stick around for Reuben Bullock, but also wanted to catch a new local band The Junkman’s Choir at the Owl, Jan. 21
The trio were winding down their Robbie Burns celebration for a rapidly thinning crowd. The trio combined a couple guitars and some excellent violin and even a touch of sassy saxophone.
They played a touch of Celtic tinged traditional folk, but still ended up sounding like a more sedate Plaid Tongued Devils on a couple more exotic numbers.
Wednesday, Jan. 25
Slice — Marshall Lawrence with John Rutherford
Owl — L.A. Beat Open mic
Ric’s Grill — Ain’t Misbehavin with Bridgette Yarwood and Evan Schaaf
Black Tomato — Salem Abraha
Thursday, Jan. 26
Slice — Thom Swift with the Fairly Odd Folk
Good Earth Coffee House — Renee Werenka and Friends
Barn — open mic
Friday, Jan. 27
Owl Acoustic Lounge — Marc Ross
Casino Lethbridge — Chevelles
The Stone — Swollen Members with La Coka Nostra
Mocha Caban a— Herb Hicks Jazz Quartet
Southminster United Church — Lethbridge Symphony Chamber Series III :: University of Lethbridge Faculty Brass
Average Joe's — Dueling pianos
Jimmy’s Pub — open mic with Cory Oryniak and Dave Tillsley
Ric’s Grill — Davidson Porter Trio
Slice — Allen and Alexander
Mocha Cabana — Bridgette Yarwood
Saturday, January 28
HB’s Lounge — Soup Of Flies Knockdown Cancer
Casino Lethbridge— Chevelles
Ric’s Grill — Cal Toth
Owl Acoustic Lounge — Andrew and Julie Scott
Mocha Cabana — Riviera Paradise
Slice — Lustre Creame, Big Jim and the Twins
Sunday, Jan. 29
Average Joe's — Snowed In Comedy Tour with Dan Quinn, Craig Campbell, Glen Wool, Arj Barker, Pete Johansson
Lethbridge Legion — South Country Jamboree Society country and western jam 1p.m.
Monday, Jan. 30
Owl Acoustic Lounge — open mic
Tuesday, Jan. 31
Slice — open mic with New Weather Machine
Bo Didlys — open mic with Double Jack
Wednesday, Feb. 1
Owl — L.A. Beat Open mic
Ric’s Grill — Ain’t Misbehavin with Bridgette Yarwood and Evan Schaaf
Black Tomato Lounge — Chris Craig and Dano
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