Old 97's - Kitchen Listening

Spent some time today listening to some albums from Old 97's while sitting in the kitchen working at my laptop. Always enjoyed their music which was some of the early alt-country movement of the mid-1990's. I played through a few of their albums in alphabetical order from my iTunes. Blame It On Gravity, Drag It Up and Fight Songs. There's a lot more great albums especially the early ones that I should listen to soon too although I seem to like their later little more refined sound better than some of their early raw country influenced songs with a punk feel.

I did see them perform downtown at a Thursday in the Square concert sometime in the mid 1990.

Old 97's in my collection:

• Hitchhike to Rhome, 1994
• Wreck Your Life, 1995
• Too Far To Care, 1997
• Fight Songs, 1999
• Satellites Rides, 2001
• Drag It Up, 2004
• Hit By A Train: The Best of Old 97's, 2006
• Blame It On Gravity, 2008
• The Grand Theater Vol. 1, 2010
• The Grand Theater Vol. 2, 2011
• They Made a Monster: Too Far To Care Demos, 2012
• Most Messed Up, 2014
• Graveyard Whistling, 2017

I Believe In Love - Evening Mist FV

This mix is another in my Evening Mist Final Version series. This one focuses a little more on the New Age and film soundtrack pieces in my album collection along with some traditional classical music.

I Believe In Love - Evening Mist FV

1. I Believe In Love – Suzanne Ciani
2. Keep Walking – Kelly Lee Owens
3. Libertango – Maggie O’Connor
4. To Love – Eighth Blackbird
5. Sea of Tranquillity – Colleen
6. The Esctasy of Gold – Ennio Morricone
7. Amarcord – Nino Rota
8. Helter Skelter – Matt Haimovitz
9. Palestrina: Super Flumina Babylonis – ORA
10. Haydn: Piano Sonata #33 in C Minor 1. Moderato – Emmaual x
11. Bach: Partitas for Harpsichord, 2 Andante – James Weaver
12. Reminiscence – Olafur Arnalds
13. Bach: Aria (Soprano) – St. John Passion – J. S. Bach Society Orch. & Choir
14. We Keep This Flame – Christopher Tignor
15. The Academy in Peril – John Cale
16. Crystal Silence – Chick Corea & Gary Burton
17. Quiet City – Wynton Marsalis and Eastman Wind Ensemble
18. Healah Dancing – Keaton Henson

Sinfonia - Evening Mist FV

Here is another mix in the Evening Mist Final Version series. This one is a set of classical music running an hour and a half as usual and makes for a very satisfying listen.

Sinfonia - Evening Mist FV

1. Rossi: Sinfonia settimadecima & Galliarda detta la Zambalina – Apollo’s Fire
2. Chopin: Waltz #3 in A Minor – Vladimir Horowitz
3. Rachmaninov: Vespers Op. 37 – Irina Arkhipova & USSR Ministry of Culture Chamber Choir
4. Mozart: Clarinet Concerto in A Major, II. Adagio – Joyce DiDonato
5. Handel: Partenope, Act II: Qual Farfalletta – Amanda Forsythe
6. Bach: Suite III in C Major, BWV 1009 – Matt Haimovitz
7. Scarlatti: Non so qual piu m’ingombra: Aria – Elizabeth Watts and The English Concert
8. Dvorak: Symphony No. 8 in G. Op. 88 2. Adagio – Wiener Philharmonika
9. Chopin: 19 Nocturnes: No. 17 in B Major Op. 62 No. 1 – Artur Rubinstein
10. Haydn: Concerto for Trumpet and Orchestra in E-flat Major – Raymond Leppard
11. Handel: Fireworks Music Suite in D Major: IV La Rejouissance – Bohdan Warchal
12. Bach: Prelude and Fugue in C Sharp Minor – Walter Gieseking
13. Monteverdi: Vespers of the Blessed Virgin – Canadian Brass
14. Mozart: Clarinet and String Quartet in A Major, 1. Allegro – Emerson String Quartet
15. Bach: St. John Passion, Chorus – J.S. Bach Society Orchestra & Choir

Dinner @ Shango

Tonight we went out for our first dinner of the New Year after a brief discussion as to where to go. We went to one of our favorite nearby restaurants... Shango New Orleans Bistro and we had some of our favorite menu items. Becky had a Shrimp Po' Boy and I had a Blackened Catfish Po' Boy. They both included some wonderful honey covered sweet potato fries and their fabulous cole slaw. I also had a cup of gumbo. I washed it down with a pint of Flower Power IPA from Ithaca Brewery. 

We had no leftover boxes tonight. Ate it all.

The restaurant was busy and there were plenty of people. The other two restaurants next door were very busy too with lots of students from across the street.

Flowers of Romance - Evening Mist FV

The second mix in the Evening Mist series. A selection of new age and classical music from my album collection. This makes for a very interesting listen.

This mix is part of my Final Version series of mixes and runs about an hour and a half.

Flowers of Romance - Evening Mist FV

1. Flowers of Romance – Ottmar Liebert
2. Artifacts of Longing, Pt. 1 – Christopher Tignor
3. Promise of the Morning – Jon Mark
4. An Accidental Memory in the Case of Death – Eluvium
5. Upheld By Stillness – ORA
6. Meeting Mozart – Suzanne Ciani
7. Mozart: Violin Sonata #30 in C, Allegro Moderato – Jean-Pierre Rampal
8. Scarlatti: Endimione e Cintia: Aria “Se geloso e il mio core” – Elizabeth Watts & The English Concert
9. Schoenberg: Drei Volksliedsatzwe - Schein Uns, du Liebe Sonne – Laurence Equilbey
10. Handel: Serse – Ombra Mai Fu (Largo) – Reginald Kilbey & His Strings
11. Vivaldi: Oboe Concerto in A Minor – 2. Largo – Douglas Boyd
12. Vivaldi: Concerto in G Minor for Two Cellos – 1. Allegro – Apollo’s Fire
13. Dvorak: “Eia mater, fons amoris” – Jiri Belohlavek
14. Bach: Violin Concerto No. 1 in A Minor – ii. Andante – Anne Akidi Meyers
15. Field: Nocturne No. 2 in C Minor  - Elizabeth Joy Roe
16. Du Fay: Missa “Ecce ancilla Domini / Beata es Maria”: Sanctus – Cut Circle
17. Philip Glass: Music in Similar Motion – Eighth Blackbird
18. Thought Not - Kneebody & Daedelus

Adagio - Evening Mist FV

This is the first of my Evening Mist Final Version series of reworked classical/new age Evening mixes that I put together several years ago as 8 hour mega mixes. Now they are recreated as hour and a half collections of music with a certain feel that includes strings, horns, choral and a new age vibe with a hint of jazz. I throw in a few film soundtrack pieces too. However, this one to start with consist mostly of classic sounding classical music.

So this first one starts off with a well known and one of my favorite pieces from from the Italian Baroque composer Tomaso Giovanni Albinoni. His Adagio in G Minor from the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. This is also the title track for the mix. It keeps going from there with many of my favorite classical pieces from Bach, Mozart, Handel, Vivaldi, etc.

Adagio - Evening Mist FV

• Albinoni: Adagio in G Minor – Charles Groves: Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra
• Bach: Brandenburg Concerto #2 in F, BWV 1047 – 2. Andante – Herbert Von Karajan: Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
• Mozart: Clarinet Concerto in A Major, KV 622 – I. Allegro – Sinfonia Concertante
• Vivaldi: Concerto in D Minor for Two Violas de Gamba – “Tango” – I. Allegro ostinato – Apollo’s Fire
• Mozart: Concerto in D for Horn and Orchestra – Allegro – Michael Thompson & Richard Watkins
• Handel: Messiah, Part One – Andrew Davis
• Vivaldi: Four Seasons op. 8 Spring: Allegro – Itzhak Perlman
• Chopin Waltz #7 in C Sharp Minor, Op. 64/2 – Vladimir Horowitz
• Orbit – Matt Haimovitz
• Mozart: 3. Andante catabile – String Quartet K.387 – Emerson String Quartet
• Bach: Air from Orchestral Suite No. 3 in D Major, BWV 1068 – Anne Akiko Meyers
• Gabrieli: Canzon in Double Echo – Canadian Brass
• Bach: Chorale – St John Passion – J. S. Bach Society Orch. & Choir
• Puccini: Tosca – E Lucevan Le Stelle – Luciano Pavarotti
• Bach: Concerto No. 1 in F Major, BMV 1046, IV Menueto – Oliver Dohnany
• Vivaldi: 1. Allegro – Oboe Concerto in D, R.453 – 1. Allegro – Douglas Boyd

First Chili of the New Year

Today was a cold and snowy day so Becky made her first chili of the new year and it was delicious and wonderful as usual. Very tasty. We had some nice Co-Op bread to go with it too.

New Year Carnage

I was planning to write something nice and positive for my first post of the new year but when I came downstairs and turned on the TV I was inundated with the breaking story of a 3 AM mass murder incident on Bourbon Street in New Orleans where someone killed ten people and injured thirty or more running through a crowded street with a pick-up truck. Then he started shooting at responding police officers. The news is also saying he had explosive devices.

As the day went on there were more people reported dead and injured and the media and the authorities announced that this was an act of terrorism and there may be other people involved. There was also an ISIS flag in the truck used in the attack. 

Trump immediately started ranting that this was done by an immigrant recently crossing the border to kill Americans. He had no information and was just making shit up again.

Later it would turn out that the killer was a Black Muslim American citizen from Texas, born in the USA and an Army veteran who may have been recently radicalized by online ISIS propaganda.

Then later in the day a car bomb went off in a Musk Tesla car outside the front door of a Trump Hotel in Las Vegas injuring several people and killing one.

I guess 2025 is going to be a same old same old year of America tearing itself apart.