This is the kind of stuff that makes working in a record store fun.
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“The River”
There’s an old saying that you can take the girl out of the country but you can’t take the country out of the girl, and it’s something you can hear listening to Barbara Jean’s debut disc, the Great Escape. The title track might well refer to Jean’s move from Grand Marais to the Twin Cities. Her own description of the home she left, in a recent interview with the City Pages‘ Natalie Gallagher, certainly captures a sense of the sweet sorrow:
“I lived in the country, about ten miles out of town, on a farm, in a house that I built. It was very rural, very serene, very beautiful. I had wolves in my yard, deer… you could see the lake [Superior], a little sliver of it, from the porch at my house. It’s hard to explain,” says Barbara Jean of her home near Grand Marais. “I think the environment up there, anyone who’s been up there to the North Shore, you see how breathtakingly beautiful it is, and when you live there, I think it really becomes part of your consciousness — all that open space and the wildness of it just sort of gets imprinted on you in your psyche in a way that you don’t totally realize until you’re not around it.” (the whole interview is here)
There’s another familiar saying – this one best phrased by a cold weather songstress a generation removed – that you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone. The Great Escapes‘ greatest charm is it’s Minnesotan-ness. It’s Minnesooootan-ness. After a couple listens to this disc we didn’t even notice Tyler’s accent.
And being Minesooootan isn’t such a bad thing these days. Jean could do worse than to ride the Trampled by Retribution Near Sandstone tide. There’s been a well spring of roots-country bubbling up north for years, and here’s one of the best discs to rise to the surface this year, ranging from the barn dance stomper “Keep it Rockin’” to that heartbreaking title track. “The Fog” could have been a Stars and Satellites outtake and “Not What You Thought” has a nice Erik Koskinen feeling (who’s an adopted Minnesotan, of course, but we sure are glad to have him!). There is, in fact, so much good roots-country music from our fine state these days that Barbara Jean is in good company whether she settles down here or up there. She has just finished a short tour with southern transplant Chastity Brown and the City Pages‘ songwriter of the year Actual Wolf, and has a few gigs in May with the earlier-mentioned Mr. Koskinen.
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“Snowfalls”
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“Great Escape”
We were introduced to Barbara Jean by another north shore songwriter, Caitlin Robertson, at the Turf Club, and her disc has been spinning in the shop since (Caitlin two albums are featured in a post here). Barbara Jean probably disappointed a lotta folks up in the arrowhead in the interview we quoted above when she said, “the North Shore is great, but you can’t really go anywhere from there — it’s so remote and removed … I wanted to be in a place where there’s more venues, more people to work with and collaborate with.” Folks have said the same thing about the Twin Cities, however, so we suppose the grass is always greener, as they say.
On the Great Escape Jean alternates between the banjo and the fiddle or viola. Her banjo playing is clean and light, often providing as much movement as the album’s sparse percussion. Our only complaint about her fiddlin’ on the album is that it only appears a couple times. The driven, down-home “Keep it Rockin’” has a slow, cajun feeling, and on the honky tonk heartbreaker “Basket of Flowers” Jean sets the stage for her woe-is-me departure perfectly with a lovely melody. The album’s other distinct instrumentation is the pedal steel played by Andy Dee, which lends a soaring grandeur to several tracks much in the way the same instrument added to the Ericksons‘ latest disc, The Wild. Multi-instrumentalist producer Bernie Larsen provides the heartbeat to most tracks with a variety of keyboards, guitars and percussion.
There’s a bittersweet feeling to the disc suggested by its dark-skied cover art by Noah Prinsen. The light, airy arrangement for “Snowfalls” for instance is driven by Jean’s soft banjo rolls, but build around a sad story of a struggling relationship and the temptation to leave. “To make us both happy’s gonna take some real, real hard work,” Jean laments. The title track pulls together all these conflicting feelings – “There was hurt and heartache, but there was joy in there too” – and is the album’s most memorable moment. Jean switches to her fiddle for the closing track, a boozy lament along the lines of Woody Guthrie’s “So Long its Been Good to Know Ya” or “Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad.” In the end, Jean’s Great Escape is a little sad, but not so heartbreaking.
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“Basket of Flowers”
Barbara Jean will perform songs from The Great Escape here at Hymie’s Records on Sunday April 27th at 3pm.
There’s a notebook and pen sitting next to one of the listening stations…
We found a bunch of newspaper clippings inside a Tom Rush album.
What do they mean? Have we configured them correctly?
And now that we’re looking at the best Tom Rush album, let’s add a few more questions: Why is it so hard to find a clean copy of this record? Did people just play the hell out of it? Every copy “pops” during “These Days.”
Why don’t we sell more Tom Rush records (especially this one)? Why is Nico’s recording of “These Days” so much more famous? Because it was in that depressing movie? Did you know Jackson Browne wrote that song? There are 100 demo albums out there which include his original version – it was called “I Went out Walking” in those days. People pay as much as $1200 for it. We’d sure like to play a copy, if you happen to be one of those hundred lucky people.
Did you know Jackson Browne was born in Germany? His mother was from Minnesota.
Tom Rush was from New Hampshire. He has a degree in English literature from Harvard.
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“These Days” by Tom Rush
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“Built for Comfort” by Howlin’ Wolf (written by Willie Dixon)
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“Fat Man” by Jethro Tull
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“Fat Lady” by the Spidels
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“Big Fat Woman” by Bobby Freeman
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“Put Some Meat on them Bones” by Jimmy Murphy
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“I Don’t Want no Skinny Woman” by Blind Boy Fuller
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“Happy Being Fat” by Big Dee Irwin
Record Store Day was a blast! Fourteen awesome bands played sets, and we think every one of them found new fans!
More, and hopefully some pictures, coming up. We need a day to clean up & recover!
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“Jumpin at the Record Shop” by the Slim Gaillard Quintette
4/20 RECORD STORE DAY
Since a lot of you might be clicking on our website for the first time today, we’d like to introduce ourselves. We are a mom & pop record shop (literally) with a small staff. We are not a chain (we have only one location). We have a huge selection of just about every kind of record you can imagine, and we really hope you’ll come by to experience some of the awesome live music we have planned for the day, even if you’re not looking to buy any records.
This day is our live-action mix tape for the world – these are our favorite bands. These are the people whose music we sing along to & they’re all amazing people, dedicated to the music they’re making. The only thing we know for sure going into our biggest day of the year as an independent record shop is that nobody is going to be disappointed by the music, because these people are all really, really awesome.
39th Avenue Stage:
11:00 Brian Laidlaw and the Family Trade
12:15 The White Whales
1:45 The Prissy Clerks
3:00 Audio Perm
4:45 Big Quarters
6:00 Southside Desire
Hymie’s Stage:
11:00 Jake Manders
12:30 The Ericksons
2:00 Ben Weaver
3:15 Pennyroyal
5:00 Martin Devaney
7:15 Chastity Brown
8:30 Wizards Are Real
In addition to all this awesome live music, our friends from Merlins Rest Pub will be pourin’ suds (21+ within the beer garden) and DJ Truckstash will be spinning his secret blend of country rock and rockin’ country. All for the amazing price of $0 (beer not included).
Our contingency plan for poor weather is to have an awesome time in the rain and snow instead of an awesome time in the sunshine. Either way, we’re planning on having an awesome time, so don’t worry about the weather.
Yes, we will have special Record Store Day releases, and yes we will have the second installment of Noiseland‘s American Buffalo compilation of gems that they have produced for local artists. One copy was autographed by the artists who appear on the collection. All of them will be given away free with any purchase of a new, local LP. The autographed copy will be given away at RANDOM to someone buying a local album.
Local roots-revival trio Corpse Reviver (Adam Kiesling, Mikkel Beckmen & Jillian Rae) have given us ONE COPY of their yet-to-be-released first album to give to the first fan of the Harry Smith Anthology of American Folk Music to claim it. The trio performs songs from the legendary compilation, and the disc is really, really good.
We will also have free 45s from Red House Records of Dale Watson singing killer honky tonk songs from his latest album, El Rancho Azul. You can bet DJ Truckstash will be spinning that one!
Our favorite screen-printin’ poster artist Dwitt will be here, along with ceramic artist Ben Krikava and the Hymie’s artist-in-residence from Vinyl Afterlife.
It was a little tough to look out at the snow, pretty as it was falling over Lake Street, with our block party just a short 48 hours away. Tomorrow’s forecast is looking pretty good, and we’ve had worse weather in the past. A little rain n’ snow ain’t gonna spoil an epic day of awesome music like this.
We’re starting things a little early, of course, with a special performance by Charlie Parr this afternoon. Charlie’s one of our favorite fellas in the entire world, in addition to being an extraordinary performer and songwriter. He released his latest album, Barnswallow, in February with a couple shows at the Cedar Cultural Center and we spun some records between the set, mostly blues and old time country. In a lot of ways Barnswallow is the best record he’s ever made, being both firmly rooted in the past (with classic Dave Ray and John Koerner songs) and in the present, with original songs that capture Charlie’s own unique way of telling a story. If anyone we know is living proof that doing what you love and treating folks well along the way will lead you to success, it’s Charlie Parr.
Record Store Day is the anniversary of the day we took over Hymie’s Records, and also the anniversary of the day we closed the old shop and set out to move it (all seventy-five tons) five blocks east to the new location. It seems like every April we accomplish the unimaginable, and each year friends from all around lend a hand to make it happen. Just last year Papa John made a huge investment in the building and replaced the furnaces, giving us the opportunity to knock out the walls around the listening station and change the entire layout of the shop – overnight we took out the walls, rerouting gas lines and venting and electrical conduit, cleaning everything up so the next day it was like nothing had happened.
We’ve had a shoplifter around the record store the past couple weeks. He’s been taking the records he wants and putting them inside 50¢ers. Last week he stole a copy of Imagine, which is so ironic we were left speechless. Guess he must have really needed that one. It happens from time to time that people figure out a scam like that and run with it until they’re caught, and in the end those little losses are completely outweighed by the good folks: the guys who bring their friends to the shop, or call a buddy when they see an album he’s been looking for. And then there’s the folks that lend a hand when help is needed, whether its for a big project like tearing out walls or a little project like tidying up the shop for Record Store Day. Just this week somebody brought in a cassette deck because he’d heard us mention ours was broken – turns out we’d fixed it for him a couple years ago free of charge and now he didn’t have a use for it anymore. What goes around comes around.
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“True Friends” by Charlie Parr
So anyways, we want everyone to know that nothing’s going to be cancelled on account of the weather, but the nice folks up at Chaperone Records in Duluth let us know this week that they’re not going to have the double-10″ reissue of Rooster in time for Charlie’s performance here this afternoon, or for Record Store Day tomorrow. Printing and pressing were delayed. We’re a little disappointed, having scuffed up our copy of the disc not long after it first came out in 2006 or so. But you can’t dwell on those little disappointments, and you can’t let ‘em get you down. Especially when the big picture’s lookin’ pretty good. If Charlie Parr’s coming to your shop to sing a few songs you must be doing something right.
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“Never Felt Better” by Big Quarters
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We’re all so excited for the Record Store Day block party this weekend. In addition to the great bill of bands playing on the stage in the shop as well as the stage on 39th Avenue – scroll down to see for yourself – we’ve invited back some of our favorite local artists. Screen artists Dwitt, who created a new poster for this year’s block party, will have a huge selection of posters, and Ben Krikava will be selling pottery. You probably remember these guys from the last couple block parties. Vinyl Afterlife will also have an expanded selection of the record label coasters and notebooks they make and sell here in the shop. The good folks from Gardens of Eagan will have seedlings for your garden, and Mother Earth Gardens has given us some “seed bombs” to give away – don’t worry, they aren’t dangerous and they don’t explode! It’s a little packet of soil and native wildflower seeds, and you can toss ‘em anywhere in your garden.
Another annual tradition of our Record Store Day block party is to have the awesome artists’ collective Rogue Citizen will be here to create art before your astonished eyes. We absolutely love these guys. Yesterday we took pictures of the art they left us with last April – you have probably seen these around the record shop.
These painters, illustrators, muralists and graphic designers can also, in their own words, be called upon to “assume the roles of promoter, printmaker, writer, agitator, or pub crawler.” Stop by and help them do these things. But don’t take them to the pub, take them to the Merlins Rest Pub beer garden, which will be set up on 39th Avenue and pouring local brews – from Harriet Brewing and Northgate Brewing – and cracking cans of Pabst from 1 to 7pm.
And earlier in the day, from 10:30-1, the Open Eye Figure Theater will bring it’s pedal-powered “Driveway tour” puppet theater by the block party to entertain the kids and adults alike. We’ll also have thousands of LPs and 45s outside for 10¢ apiece, so crate diggers are sure to have fun. DJ Truckstashe will be spinning records outside all day, so be sure and stop by and request a Roger Miller song or two.
And here, folks, is the bill for this year’s live music. We really couldn’t love all these folks any more than we already do, and we’re excited to have them all part of the party! The sound system is provided by our sponsors, Twin Cities Sound.
39th Avenue Stage:
11:00 Brian Laidlaw and the Family Trade
12:15 The White Whales
1:45 The Prissy Clerks
3:00 Audio Perm
4:45 Big Quarters
6:00 Southside Desire
Hymie’s Stage:
11:00 Jake Manders
12:30 The Ericksons
2:00 Ben Weaver
3:15 Pennyroyal
5:00 Martin Devaney
7:15 Chastity Brown
8:30 Wizards Are Real
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“After Taxes” by Cab Calloway
