Matt Baldwin European/Middle Eastern Tour

3/4 Jerusalem, IL @ Club Uganda
3/5 Jerusalem, IL @ Noon lecture on new music at Musrara Art School
3/5 Tel Aviv, IL @ Levontin
3/7 Geneva, CH @ Cave 12
3/9 Paris, FR @ La Chaise
3/10 Hasselt, BE @ Kunstencentrum Belgie
3/12 London, UK @ Birthday
3/13 Poole, UK @ Cellar Bar
3/15 London, UK @ 12 Bar
3/16 Dublin, IE @ The Joinery
3/17 Tremens, IE @ St. Patrick's Delirium
3/18 Cork, IE @ Plug'd Record

Blood Sausage & Garotas Suecas.

Marc Vidal, "Croquetas con Morcilla" from Eater NY on Vimeo.

This week Garotas Suecas are featured in Eater.com's weekly cooking show called Sound Bites. In this episode chef Marc Vidal prepares chicken croquettes with blood sausage while jamming to the sweet Garotas Suecas tune "Banho de Bucha".

Garotas Suecas Escaldante Banda Artwork!

If all goes according to plan Garotas Suecas' next full length Escaldante Banda CD/LP will be released on September 7th via the American Dust label. A shit load of stateside touring is scheduled around the album's release. Adquira-se funky!

Moore Bros Receive A Killer Dusted Review.

Dusted Reviews
Artist: The Moore Brothers
Album: Aptos
Label: American Dust
Review date: Mar. 3, 2009

The Moore Brothers have been making music since the late ’80s, but their fifth and latest, Aptos, arrives on the heels of a publicity boost courtesy of fellow Californian Joanna Newsom. The duo joined Newsom on 2007 her European tour, and she puts in a guest appearance here, contributing harp to “Good Heart, Money and Rain.” The wider exposure is certainly merited: Aptos is, while humble and unassuming, compelling from start to finish, and both brothers are first-rate singers and songwriters.

The Moore Brothers’ sound is consistent throughout, generally consisting of sparse arrangements of guitars, bass and drums, which leave ample room for the flawless harmonies that are nearly ubiquitous. Despite the acoustic guitars and harmonizing, the brothers deal less in folk than in light pop. While they aren’t strongly evocative of any particular group or period, they clearly owe a debt to mellow early ’70s fare (Simon and Garfunkel in the harmonies, CSN on the David Crosby-esque “Aptos”, and America on the radio-ready chorus of “Heard About You“). The duo split songwriting duties evenly, with Thom penning the odd-numbered tracks and Greg the even ones. Like their almost indistinguishably similar voices, however, their work blends seamlessly together. Thom’s tracks are built around quirky stop-and-start melodies, and are generally brief and tightly wound. Lyrically, they tend towards character sketches, which aren’t fully fleshed out short stories (like those of say, Ray Davies), but rather oblique and evocative portraits (the lonely drummer girl of “Iraq” and the titular recluse of “Henry Alexander,” to name two). Greg’s, on the other hand, are generally mellower and more unabashedly lyrical, at times suggesting nothing so much as a Californian version of the Clientele (both musically and vocally, especially on the title track and “Pet Sidewinder”), evoking their almost-otherworldly melancholic beauty and dreaminess. While not radically different enough to constitute two irreconcilable aesthetics, the two tonalities complement each other well and lay out a propulsive push-and-pull between a more upbeat and energetic approach (Thom) and a less urgent, leisurely one (Greg).

Both lyrically and musically, the songs on Aptos are a strong set. At once effortless and masterful, the album suffers from no missteps or low points. While it may not deliver the utterly unique sound of a Joanna Newsom, it easily fulfills the expectations to which her endorsement gives rise. By Michael Cramer

THE MOORE BROTHERS CELEBRATE THE RELEASE OF THEIR NEW ALBUM THIS FRIDAY (03/06) AT THE MAKE-OUT ROOM, SF. CA.

Matt Baldwin Shows and In-store Performance.

Oct. 25th In-store at Metamusic Santa Cruz CA. (4:00 PM)
Oct. 25th @ The Crepe Place, Santa Cruz CA.
Nov. 23rd opening for the legendary Rodriguez at the Great American Music Hall SF, CA.

Bye Bye Blackbirds Free Download EP

The kind folks at American Dust are offering a free downloadable EP by recent signing The Bye Bye Blackbirds. The Apology Accepted EP is a little sneak preview of the band's full length album due out in September. It can be downloaded here. The lead track is a cover of a Go-Betweens song.

Matt Baldwin In The East Bay Express.

Beyond Fahey
After paying homage to the influential steel-string player, Berkeley Guitarist Matt Baldwin tries psychedelia.
By Tom Chandler
May 21, 2008
Original post

On the 2006 compilation Berkeley Guitar, three very talented steel-string guitar players, all friends who migrated to Berkeley from in and around Monterey, displayed their love for John Fahey and his legacy on Takoma Records. Matt Baldwin was one of those guys (along with Sean Smith and Adam Snider), but when you approach his debut CD, you pretty much need to forget what Berkeley Guitar led you to believe.

That compilation, while a very fine set, was trying to spread the word about this revival of solo steel-string guitar playing, centered in Berkeley, the longtime home of Takoma. While that's all very fine, it turns out that Baldwin and company are all much more than just solo guitarists. Smith's latest release featured quite a few guest musicians, and Baldwin's Paths of Ignition is layered with overdubs, features vocals (on one tune), and is ripe with psychedelia — all in tremendously good way.

The disc opens in the solo vein, with an extended take on Krautrock legend Neu's "Weissensee," when suddenly an electric guitar sneaks in. Hey! What happened to John Fahey? Oh yeah, Fahey played electric too. "I've been working more on electric guitar lately," Baldwin said. "I grew up listening to Black Sabbath, Blue Cheer. I've always loved Priest." But he looks suspiciously like a '60s holdout, with long straight blond hair held down by a headband. He has an earnest demeanor, and clearly thinks a lot about music.

His playing can go from doubling the acoustic fingerpicking to a wailing, electric, metal-influenced lead. It's pretty stunning. "The thing is that when I play in standard tuning I have a pretty generic blues-rock sensibility," he said. "So I did all the solos in other tunings, which helps me develop a more original lead-guitar melodic sensibility."

While evoking some music of the past, what with the Fahey influence, as well as a certain Krautrock and prog kinship, Paths of Ignition is utterly original. There's a radical reinterpretation of a Judas Priest song called "Winter," with Baldwin singing as if in an echo chamber. Then there's the solo tour de force of "Rainbow." Throughout, Baldwin's guitar playing remains understated yet amazing.

Produced by Baldwin and local songwriting/recording madman Sam Flax Keener, Paths of Ignition is a project of love and inspiration. "What's fun about these songs is they capture that moment of when you create something," Baldwin said. "I just went in with really basic ideas and started messing around, and Sam would say, 'What if we did this?' I would try it out, and say, 'What if I do it like this?'" He laughs, then continues: "Then we would hit some wall, and we'd both be thinking, 'What are we going to do?' So we'd go get some beer and do another take and it would all jell!"

After touring for Berkeley Guitars and doing countless solo shows around the Bay Area and down in Big Sur (where the Folk Yeah! series is gaining increasing fame), Baldwin says his next step will be a full band. Spawned by Paths of Ignition's explorations into electric territory, the new project will consist of musician Kephera Moon playing a chopped B3 Hammond and piano bass, and Keener on drums and doing some delay effects in real time. When asked if the electric concept will open up more venues, where people talking won't interfere with the quiet acoustic guitar, he laughs. "That can be nightmarish! On this tour there were certain nights, like in Nevada City, it was a really hard-drinking night. During the entire set, I could hear people yelling 'Jaeger!'" But then he extols the virtues of playing in places like Big Sur, where a room of one hundred people can get dead silent and focus on the actual music.

So perhaps Baldwin isn't leaving the Fahey ghost behind entirely, but rather broadening to encompass more than the Berkeley Guitar idea. If the current indie scene has taught us anything, it's that there's still plenty of need for organic, tweaked-out folk-oriented music, and Baldwin has a voice that's original and distinct even within that parameter — more like a worldview than just a few guitar tunes. Iconoclast? Yes. 

The Copester Digs On Matt Baldwin

Head Heritage grand wizard, Julian Cope, gives a tasteful nod to Matt Baldwin's new album in the May Drudion 008.

Next, rising from the midst of the new crop of acoustic guitar virtuosos is California’s Matt Baldwin, an uber tall and blond longhair with an immaculate first release named PATHS OF IGNITION on American Dust Records (www.americandust.net). As though appearing out-of-nowhere with just five epic tracks on the whole album were not enough, by choosing to cover Judas Priest’s ‘Winter’ and daring to commence his debut with his cover of Neu’s classic Michael Rother epic ‘Weissensee’, Baldwin sets himself right apart from the pack both in hipness and as one confident motherfucker with an amazing range of guitar playing. Shit, this stuff reminds me of some of the mid-90s stuff Doggen was pulling on the first TC Lethbridge LP MOON EQUIPPED, as hefty distortion rises from behind the spangly acoustic guitars. Hell, he even quotes Funkadelic’s FREE YOUR MIND & YOUR ASS WILL FOLLOW with the track ‘Eulogy and Dark’. Better still, as I listened to this record at 5.20 am last week, Matt’s first vocals from ‘Winter’ (‘In the morning when I wake up’) greeted me exactly as the first light of the spring sun’s orb cut through my window. Now, how righteous is that, motherfuckers? If you want one acoustic guitar record to stick on heavy repeat, make this one your first choice and you’ll not go wrong.

Baldwin will be playing with an electric band on May 26 at the Historic Brookdale Lodge in Santa Cruz, CA.

Nice Matt Baldwin Review.

Posted on Naturalismo today....
The gents at American Dust records have just released the first album by Matt Baldwin. I gave it a spin last night while eating a plum and staring longingly at the ceiling. First and foremost, Baldwin is a guitarist. And yes, before I go any further: comparisons to John Fahey and Leo Kottke are often tossed around wayyyyy too liberally to acoustic composers. I’m guilty of it myself. But aside from the fact that Baldwin plays longform acoustic-based compositions, his approach is far more atmospheric, far more restrained than his fingerpicking forebears. This is a rare case where “atmosphere” is not a compensation for a lack of talent. His virtuosity simmers beneath the surface; his skill is an unspoken subtext in every song. That’s not to say that he doesn’t let the lions loose to ravage a gazelle once and a while. Sometimes water can only boil so long before it bubbles over the edge of the pot, scalding the hand and sending thoughts racing.

Mr. Baldwin will be playing amongst the redwoods on May 10th at the Henry Miller Library in Big Sur, CA.

DOE on La Blogotheque!

Two great o' naturale videos of Department of Eagles posted on the immensely cool and ever so creative La Blogotheque site today.

#71 - Deartment of Eagles - Part 1
Uploaded by lablogotheque

#71.2 - Department of Eagles - Part 2
Uploaded by lablogotheque

Port O'Brien 7.5 Review Posted On Pitchfork Today.

Port O'Brien
The Wind and the Swell
[American Dust; 2007]
Rating: 7.5
Online review

From the Decemberists' belly-of-the-whale epics to Modest Mouse's existential oceans, from Alela Diane's yo-ho-ho choruses to Oh No! Oh My!'s pirate anthem, nautical themes have become so prevalent in current indie mythology that it's enough to make you seasick. But Port O'Brien has earned the right to the salt-crusted imagery adorning its first full-length, The Wind and the Swell, as well as to the numerous mentions of seas and oceans and fishing boats and puffins in these jagged, intelligent indie-folk songs. Port O'Brien mainstay Van Pierszalowski, a California native and son of a commercial fisherman, spends his summers aboard an Alaskan salmon schooner, either fighting the seas or bored in port if the weather's bad. He named the band after an Alaskan port, uses photos of his father's crew as album art, and keeps a detailed ship's blog on the group's web site.

But The Wind and the Swell, which collects the group's first two out-of-print releases on one disc, sounds like a much better journal of days at sea. Like most tracks, opener "I Woke Up Today" could be a sea-legs lament: "Yes I understand I cannot live on this land," Pierszalowski sings, "but does that truly mean I have seen all that can be seen?" The song is all windworn surfaces: the guitars sound rough and creaky, the voices cracked but resolute. These same lyrics repeat on the sparse closer "Simple Way", which slows the tempo and pares down the music: instead of a stormy passage, the song fades gradually, like land disappearing on the horizon.

Port O'Brien's first LP, When the Rain Comes, from 2005, was a set of mostly acoustic songs featuring Pierszalowski on acoustic guitar, reflecting the outfit's more-or-less solo origins. The recording is blunt and primitive, perfect for Pierszalowski's then-unrefined songwriting. "Five and Dime", his wordiest composition, reckons with his own wanderlust: "It kills me to think that straight lines have taken over the life I've led," he sings as the song veers suddenly into a relentless road-trip strum. The band's 2006 EP Nowhere to Run keeps the rough aesthetic and unflinching self-examination in place, but elaborates on them in intriguing musical ways: adding new sounds and more instruments, honing the lyrics to be more teasingly indirect, and benefiting greatly from the presence of Cambria Goodwin, whose sharp vocals and percussive banjo color "I Woke Up Today" and her own "Tree Bones".

On The Wind and the Swell, instead of presenting each release in its original tracklist order, as if they're two sides of the same album, Pierszalowski resequences the songs to highlight the contrasts between the two sets. This tack, despite its minor limitations (gone are the scraps of stray song interspersed between the "real" tracks from Nowhere to Run), distracts from the weaknesses of early tracks and emphasizes the seaworthiness of later songs like "Tree Bones" and "A Bird Flies By". In the process, The Wind and the Swell builds and fades, suggesting a landlocked anomie that only the ocean can assuage: "And I just wanna be floating on the sea," Pierszalowski sings on "Anchor", "with my anchor tied to land." The product of days and days at sea, The Wind and the Swell retains the songs' original documentary impact, even as it shows that Pierszalowski's music is less about seafaring summers than simple remoteness, both geographical and emotional.

-Stephen M. Deusner, September 17, 2007

Check out these upcoming Port O'Brien live dates:

09/23 Eugene, OR @ McDonald Theatre (w/Bright Eyes)
09/24 Chico, CA @ Senator Theatre (w/Bright Eyes)
09/26 Los Angeles, CA @ The Roxy
10/10 San Diego, CA @ Casbah (w/Rogue Wave)
10/11 Los Angeles, CA @ El Rey (w/Rogue Wave)
10/12 San Francisco, CA @ Bimbos 365 (w/Rogue Wave)
10/15 Portland, OR @ Wonderland Ballroom (w/Rogue Wave)
10/16 Seattle, WA @ Nuemos (w/Rogue Wave)
10/19 Denver, CO @ Bluebird Theatre (w/Rogue Wave)
10/20 Lawrence, KS @ The Bottleneck (w/Rogue Wave)
10/21 Omaha, NE @ The Waiting Room (w/Rogue Wave)
10/23 Minneapolis, MN @ 400 Bar (w/Rogue Wave)
10/24 Chicago, IL @ Double Door (w/Rogue Wave)
10/26 Toronto, ON @ Mod Club (w/Rogue Wave)
10/27 Montreal, QC @ Cabaret Music Club (w/Rogue Wave)
10/29 Northampton, MA @ Iron Horse Music Hall (w/Rogue Wave)
10/30 Boston, MA @ The Paradise (w/Rogue Wave)

Sweet footage of 'My Eyes Won't Shut'