The arrival of the new Stan Rogers “Best of” collection got us started on a set of new music and and clever cover versions. We heard some classics from Lyle Lovett, and a great set of music requested by one of our most loyal listeners.
The arrival of the new Stan Rogers “Best of” collection got us started on a set of new music and and clever cover versions. We heard some classics from Lyle Lovett, and a great set of music requested by one of our most loyal listeners.
Artist – Song title – Album Title – CDN=Canadian – WPG=Winnipeg artist
2:00pm – 2:30pm
Willie P. Bennett – Willie’s Diamond Joe – Tryin’ to Start out Clean – CDN
Fred Eaglesmith & The Flying Squirrels – Rough Edges – Things Is Changin’ – CDN
Fred Eaglesmith – York Road – Official Bootleg Series Vol. 2 – CDN
Prairie Oyster – Long & Lonesome Old Freight Train – One Kiss – CDN
Stan Rogers – Forty-Five Years – The Very Best of – CDN
Stan Rogers – Barrett’s Privateers – The Very Best of – CDN
2:30 – 3:00 pm
Stephen Fearing – Early Morning Rain – unreleased outtake – CDN
Bruce Cockburn – Driving Away – Small Source of Comfort – CDN
The Wailin’ Jennys – Asleep at Last – Bright Morning Stars – CDN – WPG
The Good Lovelies – Crabbuckit – Let the Rain Fall – CDN
The Secret Sisters – Something Stupid – The Secret Sisters
Romi Mayes – Hand Me Down World – Guess Who’s Home – CDN – WPG
Brandi Carlile – Dreams – KGSR Broadcasts Vol. 18
Bob Schneider – The Bringdown – KGSR Broadcasts Vol. 18
3:00 – 3:30 pm
Lyle Lovett – Closing Time – Lyle Lovett
Lyle Lovett – Just the Morning – I Love Everybody
Lyle Lovett – Private Conversation – The Road to Ensenada
Matthew Ryan – Dam – May Day
Matthew Ryan – Me & My Lover – East Autumn Grin
3:30 – 4:00 pm
Jim Bryson – Fleetwood – The North Side Benches – CDN
The Cash Brothers – Nebraska – How Was Tomorrow – CDN
Shannon Lyon – Naive – Wandered – CDN
Leeroy Stagger & The Wildflowers – Sleep Alone – Live at the Red River Saloon – CDN
Steve Earle – You Belong to Me – Copperhead Road
Mike Plume Band – She’s Still Everything to Me – Fools for the Radio – CDN
Today, it’s our Blue & True Valentine’s Day special! We start off in Blue Valentines mode, as we celebrate the great musical legacy of the late, great Willie P. Bennett, who left this world on Feb. 15, 2008. We sure do miss him, but luckily he left behind some amazing music. Sadly, his music is not available for purchase or download ANYWHERE, which is absolutely criminal, so it’s more important than ever that we keep his music on the radio.
For our second hour, it’s some of what you might expect a sappy singer/songwriter show to do on Valentine’s Day Eve (as well as a few oddball selections, right Ron?). We delve into the huge category of Love Songs, and pull out some gems.
Today, it’s our Blue & True Valentine’s Day special! We start off in Blue Valentines mode, as we celebrate the great musical legacy of the late, great Willie P. Bennett, who left this world on Feb. 15, 2008. We sure do miss him, but luckily he left behind some amazing music. Sadly, his music is not available for purchase or download ANYWHERE, which is absolutely criminal, so it’s more important than ever that we keep his music on the radio.
Artist – Song title – Album Title – CDN=Canadian – WPG=Winnipeg artist
February 15 is the third anniversary of the death of one of our guiding lights on Tell the Band to Go Home, the great Willie P. Bennett. If I can do one good thing with this show, and in the world in general, it’s to share Willie’s music and let people know how amazing it is. Sadly, you still can’t buy it ANYWHERE (a heinous crime that the RCMP needs to relentlessly pursue), so hearing it on TTBTGH is one of your only avenues.
Today, we will do our duty and play you a bunch of songs by and about Willie.
We’ve posted a few things about Willie since he’s been gone. I thought it might be fun to provide links to them here:
One for Willie. I wish that I didn’t have to do this show, because man, do I miss the guy, but I think that given the fact that we all gotta go some time, I think we paid him a proper tribute. With some words from his friends and fans, and a bunch of great music, this may be my favourite episode of TTBTGH of all time. It’s certainly my most planned and passionate episode, and I hope that you might listen and enjoy it (again?).
My thoughts on hearing that Willie had died.
On that sad silence at the Fred Eaglesmith show
Our Willie tribute (and Valentine’s Day show), 2009
Our Willie tribute (and Valentine’s Day show), 2010
Our Willie tribute (and Valentine’s Day show), 2011
Fred Eaglesmith, performing Willie’s classic “Country Squall” live at the Park Theatre in Winnipeg
Just got in from a screening of the brilliant film “I, Curmudgeon,” by the equally brilliant Allan Zweig. It’s an examination of curmudgeonly people and their negativity, and the effects that it has on their lives, and all such things.
I’ve wanted to see the film for years. I wanted to see it because it was the follow up to Zweig’s breakout film, Vinyl, one that has inspired and moved me over the years, but also, because I knew that I would relate.
I always knew that I was negative, but I come by it honestly, I think. I suppose I have a predisposition to being difficult and angry. My closest male role model growing up was my grandfather, who was the very definition of a curmudgeon – think Archie Bunker, only angrier. I know that a lot of people found him a miserable SOB, and I suppose that at many times I did as well, but, somehow, I understood it in a way that others didn’t. I actually found him rather hilarious, most of the time, so I started picking up mannerisms at an early age. I was a precocious curmudgeon, you could say.
In later years, I’ve come to recognize how being negative and brutally honest and somewhat intolerance of the general idiocy of society and the world at large have set me apart. I see that somehow I’m the exception to the rule, and most people are uncomfortable with that. Most people don’t like it when someone constantly reminds them that the world is full of stupidity, and that it’s all annoying and unfair. There was a long time where I felt badly about that, as society tells me I should.
But society is totally messed up. I’m sorry, it just is. I mean, how do you explain the phenomenon that is the TV show Glee? How is it that, in a world that is so clearly, visibly, irreparably, honestly screwed up, Glee has become the norm? Seriously? The world is full of sadness and horror and injustice and flat out stupidity, and our society is swept up by the most nauseatingly happy phenomenon since the Monkees. It’s disgusting.
Are we that incapable of dealing with reality that we have to block it out with a heavy dose of Glee? Those annoying, perky, perfect kids with their perfect hair and their dorky clothes, singing peppy versions of songs that were annoying in the first place, only to be made infinitely more annoying by their saccharine sweet and technologically aided delivery?… yuck. But, too often, that’s our way of dealing with reality – go as far in the opposite direction as possible. I guess that’s why the world is, and shall remain, completely messed up.
So I suppose that people like me who stare the brutal, harsh, completely screwy reality in the face all the time, are doomed to be ostracized. Luckily, in the past few years, I’ve been able to embrace being a curmudgeon, instead of being shamed by it. If being brutally honest and pointing out how stupid people and situations are is so bad, then consider me guilty and hand me a life sentence.
It’s much better than a life of Glee.
We love starting our day off with great new music, and this week’s haul was exceptional. We threw in a few requests/dedications for our wonderful listeners, before heading off into “upcoming concert” territory. We finished with a dusty old pile of vinyl records, in honour of the upcoming screenings of Allan Zweig’s documentaries about obsessive collectors!
February is our least favourite month of the year, but we’re doing our best to compensate with some great music today. We’ve got great new music, classics, and a couple of exciting upcoming shows to discuss. One of the folks heading to town, Tom Wilson of Lee Harvey Osmond, joins us via the telephone to discuss LHO, Blackie, and all kinds of other things.