Donald Gibson: Do it again!

Blogcritics“He sings! He swings! ‘Til the money runs out, he’ll tango ’til you pour…”

Another Top 10 arrived: Donald Gibson, Music critic and editor for the Blogcritics Magazine compiled his ranking of the 10 best covers of the year 2008. Southside Johnny’s “Temptation” of GRAPEFURIT MOON made it on place 8, which is just great, given the Gazillion covers released again last year! So here’s what Donald had to say:

8) “Temptation” – Southside Johnny & The LaBamba Big Band Album: Grapefruit Moon: The Songs of Tom Waits Soaked in the faded glitz of late-night burlesque and the blue-collar grime of a Jersey shore bar, Southside Johnny bejewels this Tom Waits gem with a big brass band (or is it a brass big band?) and swagger to spare. It’s a nocturnal lament, ladies and gentlemen, rife with carnal delights and callings. It’s Southside Johnny for one night only, every night of the week: He sings! He swings! ‘Til the money runs out, he’ll tango ’til you pour.

http://donaldgibson.blogspot.com/2009/01/do-it-again-top-10-covers-of-2008.html

Groovevolt's Albums of the Year 2008

logo_groovevoltOk, now, here’s the question: What do artists like Will.I.Am, Beyonce, N.E.R.D., The Hold Steady or Ryan Adams have in common? They all share the list of “Best Albums of 2008″ of the blog-magazine GROOVEVOLT.

SOUTHSIDE JOHNNY, GRAPEFRUIT MOON: THE SONGS OF TOM WAITS: It’s all about the horns. Southside Johnny Lyons’ interpretations of classic Tom Waits tracks benefits from LaBamba and the Hubcaps rich horn section. The disc crackles with an energy nearly unmatched by any band recording this year.

Says GROOVEVOLT on their blog.

The interesting statement comes at the end – about how an album qualifies for the selection and what the consequences that selection process puts on the team:

This is not a countdown. These are the albums that filled our offices all year. Non-Stop, continuous play and sometimes feelings of hatred towards the employee who kept pressing repeat.

Now, me thinks, that the GROOVEVOLT office might be a place I would like to work at. Then I’d spend the whole day at the water cooler together with the person who kept pushing GRAPEFRUIT MOON… Thanks GROOVE-people!

A Deeper Shade of Soul's Top 40

The “Best Songs of the Year” list-mania continues:

BEN LAZAR in his blog A DEEPER SHADE OF SOUL (you’ve gotta love that title!) knows how to get it down to his personal Top 40 of the year 2008! And he also has been thinking and writing about that exercise as such.

Compiling this list the top 40 songs of the year was an energizing experience – there was a lot of great music released this year. I’m not sure it was a great year for albums, but who listens to those anymore, anyway? Technology has, for all practical purposes, turned everyone into their own DJ and jukebox, and it’s all about find the great songs amidst the torrents of music waiting to get into our hard drives, iPods and broadband connections. Attaching “good” or “bad” to such developments is pointless. It just is, and is getting more so.

I’m born in the middle of the sixties, so I will forever be an “album” connoisseur. I do not even own any MP3 device (but my girlfriend does). So what I do the most to enjoy music is to put a CD in my car-sereo, turn up the volume and let the music do to me whatever it does… The internet as such is something which I really dig a lot, web radios let me escape from the commercial airwaves, and web-sites, well, you probably see that this is fascinating stuff to me. But if it would come to my personal Top 40… it would have to be about albums, not “tracks”…

I’ll save you Ben’s full Top 40, but I really recommend you go over to A DEEPER SHADE OF SOUL to get to see it. Southside Johnny and La Bamba ended up on the honorable 4th place and Ben’s comments show that this has been a well thoroughly thought selection.

Southside Johnny and La Bamba’s Big Band (w/Tom Waits) – “Walk Away”

The most playful track I heard all year. Two cult artists – one a tiny one, the other a big one, remind the few who are listening how much they have in common, and that life is a hell of a lot easier with a sense of humor.

A great list Ben… a lot of songs which I never heared about – thanks to German Radio – and where I will probably have to dig deeper into – the albums… so, thanks for the inspiration!

The AMG Favourite Americana Albums

logo_amg_blogAnother list (this must be that time of the year, where people are sitting at their desks and think about nothing else than lists for the better part of their days…) made a strange selection when it comes to Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes… they picked the -Australian- compilation of songs where the most actual track has been released not later than 1991 – “FEVER! The Anthology” for their list of the best “Americana” albums of 2008.

Now guys, have you been sitting on your ears the last 17 years? Your category “Americana” for sure collects some great music, and it’s for sure also always a good thing to list Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. But it’s for sure not a good promotion, neither for you OR the Jukes, if you do that with another anthology of their classic stuff, ignoring Southside’s fabulous GRAPEFRUIT MOON!

Well, if you would at least have listed that in the JAZZ category, you’d be forgiven…

LINK: THE ALL MUSIC BLOG: FAVOURITE AMERICANA ALBUMS OF 2008

The 40 Best Albums of 2008

This is short and sweet: The “500 WORDS” blog nominated the best 40 albums of 2008. And Southside Johnny & La Bamba’s GRAPEFRUIT MOON finished 3rd on the list. You have to see the full album ranking to realize in what exceptional good company GRAPEFRUIT MOON has been competing.

3. Southside Johnny. Grapefruit Moon: The Songs of Tom Waits: It’s all about the horns. Southside Johnny Lyons’ interpretations of classic Tom Waits tracks benefits from LaBamba and the Hubcaps rich horn section. The disc crackles with an energy nearly unmatched by any band recording this year.

This is another very, very nice compliment to the great tribute to Tom Waits and the Big-Band sound of 2008.

And, just by the way: Guns N’ Roses, “Chinese Democracy” finished 40th! I’m sure there’d be some people to argue that! ;-)

LINK: 500 WORDS: THE BEST ALBUMS OF 2008