Just left Albuquerque en route to Sacramento where we start a two week tour of the West Coast. Looking forward to a lot of great shows and catching up with friends and family. I’ve been staying busy in Austin the last few weeks, playing shows with the Heathens, Zapata!, Deadeye, and King Corduroy. Also did some recording sessions with TBird & The Breaks and Noble Dog, both killer bands. Had a chance to sit in with Wisebird and The Beckham Brothers last Saturday at Momo’s. It was pretty fun.
This week’s recommendation is Warren Haynes’ new album, Man In Motion. This is the soulful side of Warren Haynes. The songs are all fantastic and I like how there are no fade-outs on the record, the band just kicks it into high gear and they let the tape roll! Ron Holloway on sax, Ruthie Foster on harmony vocals, Ray Weber on drums, and Ron Johnson on bass. Also prominently featured are two legendary keyboardists, Ivan Neville (clavinet, organ) and Ian McLagan (Wurlitzer, Piano). Warren, as always, is top-notch. His performances on this record remind me of Freddie King, both singing and playing. He is a living legend and a personal hero.
On a personal note, I was saddened to learn that Motorcyle Mike died yesterday. He was a real-life cosmic bandito. Always on the go, driving back and forth between Guatemala, Austin, and NorCal. He had a larger than life personality and a big heart. He was extremely generous and always had a twinkle in his eye. He’ll be missed by many.
“Pleasure blocks, but pain clears the way of inspiration. Tagore says: ‘When the string of the violin was being tuned it felt the pain of being stretched, but once it was tuned then it knew why it was stretched’. So it is with the human soul. While the soul goes through pain, torture and trouble it thinks that it would have been much better if it had gone through life without it. But once it reaches the culmination of it then, when it looks back, it begins to realize why all this was meant: it was only meant to tune the soul to a certain pitch.” -Hazrat Inayat Khan
TN