Today’s Random Weekend selection is a live bonus track from whatever reissue of The Grateful Dead’s American Beauty I have in my iTunes library.
I tried to find the exact one on YouTube and encountered several official releases of live performances of ‘Candyman,’ plus dozens of unofficial clips. The sheer volume of live Grateful Dead content is overwhelming.
This track is from Brad Paisley’s fifth studio album (not including a Christmas release), appropriately titled 5th Gear. The 2007 release kept up Paisley’s pattern of good-humored romps blended with more thoughtful tracks.
For my money, this album represents a bit of a lull between Paisley’s three best records — Mud On the Tires and Time Well Wasted on the early end, and American Saturday Night as the follow-up.
My appreciation and affection for Mandy Moore makes me loathe to spend blog time on Ryan Adams, the man who badly mistreated her during their 6-year marriage, even though he released some truly great music before his career was derailed by numerous accusations of misconduct.
So, while presenting a lovely track from Adams’ excellent 2000 album Heartbreaker, I will use this space to advocate for an Emmy nomination for Moore honoring her amazing work in the ABC show This is Us.
When a Foo Fighters song came up as today’s random iTunes selection, I just assumed it would be loud. I’m a big fan of Dave Grohl, but only an occasional fan of his band because of the heaviness of their sound.
But ‘Home,’ the final track on the band’s 2007 album Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, turned out to be something very different, a delicate piano ballad about the longing for a place to be at peace.
When today’s random song popped up, I had a hard time remembering that English indie rock band Keane ever released an album called Strangeland.
A quick search of the blog revealed my lone post on the 2012 recording, written the year of its release, in which I trashed it as the band’s first misstep after a string of very good albums.
This is the first time I’ve heard a moment of the album in the decade since.
Meet Me In Montauk 