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Basement Dreams
This review is part of a series in which I review Neal’s solo records one by one chronologically, and chat with various friends and bandmates who were part of the making of each record. A collection of recordings made between 1996-1998 at Neal’s home studio in New Jersey, 1998’s Glitterhouse release Basement Dreams was named Americana Album of the Year by Mojo Magazine. As always, paired with Ginty’s glittering keys and Angie McKenna’s angelic harmonies, this album is a lot to digest – 23 tracks Neal recorded and engineered himself on an 8-track recorder, and 10 live tracks on the…
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The Sun Rises Here
The Sun Rises Here is Neal’s true, honest-to-god, soft-country-rock record. He flirted with it on Fade Away Diamond Time, but this album solidified his place in the “alt-country” registry. This album has all of the necessary elements – mandolin, pedal steel, lots of acoustic guitar, a sometimes twang-y vocal- to give it a true New Jersey-meets-John Denver/Bernie Leadon/Poco flavor, with lyrics in the vein of Townes Van Zandt or Jackson Browne. The album was recorded in one week at Master Control in Burbank with many of the same players from the Fade Away session. The record kicks off with “Today…
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Field Recordings
To use Neal Casal’s own words to describe his 1997 release, it “…really isn’t a record at all… it’s a sadly broken but strangely contented family of demos, dirges, out-takes, take-outs, songs proper and song fragments.” Containing outtakes from Fade Away Diamond Time, electrified versions of songs from Basement Dreams, and preliminary singles, each song was recorded and mixed in studios from coast to coast between 1994-1996. Only 1000 copies were initially pressed. The album’s liner notes alone make a physical copy worth scoring – credits include a “guitarred and feathered” Casal, “organ donor” John Ginty, and Greg Leisz on…
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Rain, Wind and Speed
UPDATE 8.18.22 – The Neal Casal Music Foundation is reissuing special edition vinyls of Rain, Wind and Speed- get yours here. This is part two of Petal Motel’s series where we go through each Neal Casal solo album one by one and chat with friends and fellow musicians who participated in their making. Neal Casal’s second release, the tender, raw Rain, Wind and Speed, was recorded in just five days in a neighborhood studio. After some personnel changes at Zoo Records, the label that had released Fade Away Diamond Time, cut Neal from their roster. He got back in a…
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Fade Away Diamond Time
This is part one of Petal Motel’s series where we go through each Neal Casal solo album one by one and chat with friends and fellow musicians who participated in their making. In 1994, Neal Casal and several other musicians set up shop in a mansion in Santa Ynez, California, and spent a few weeks living there, recording the younger singer-songwriter’s debut album. Fade Away Diamond Time was an instant classic, critically lauded as one of Neal Casal’s strongest albums. With twelve finely crafted, classic-singer-songwriter sounding songs; and a lineup of seasoned personnel like Greg Liesz, Bob Glaub, and Don…
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Trummors – Dropout City
Dropout City is the fourth album by Trummors. The band consists of Anne Cunningham and David Lerner, who share songwriting duties, and call on an assortment of musical friends that vary from album to album to make the true desert music they’ve become known for. Blending the best sounds from psychedelic music, country-rock, and folk rock, Trummors’ Dropout City is a tour of all the best parts of Americana, with songs that clearly nod to their homes both past and present. The band formed in Brooklyn before making their way to Woodstock, finally adopting the hometown of Taos, New Mexico,…
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Kenny Roby – The Reservoir
The Reservoir is Kenny Roby’s first studio album in seven years, and he certainly had a well of inspiration to draw from. Made on the heels of great loss, The Reservoir is less punchy honky-tonk than the bulk of Roby’s previous work. It’s a more sophisticated, polished, folk-rock album, perhaps a musical metaphor for Roby’s transition from Raleigh to Woodstock. The spirits of fellow residents like Bobby Charles and Jackson C. Frank may be lingering about, exerting their influence on songs like “For the First Time” and “Only Clown in Town”. The Reservoir is extremely personal, dealing with divorce, addiction,…
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Greg Loiacono – Mystic Traces
Whatever project Greg Loiacono’s involved with sounds quintessentially Californian. Mystic Traces is no different. Loungey and open with a laid-back sound, the album cruises and coasts like a drive down the 1. It’s easy listening in the best and truest sense of the phrase. Between his work with the Mother Hips, the Green Leaf Rustlers, and collaborating with countless other Bay Area musicians, it’s no wonder this album sounds so effortlessly cool. Mystic Traces nods to various genres, from bossa nova to country rock. Recorded in Ojai at Scott Hirsch’s (Hiss Golden Messenger) studio with friends like Kyle Field, Bary…
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The Hanging Stars – I Woke Up in July [EP] : Review
Simultaneously retro and innovative, the Hanging Stars are the best Americana band in the UK since Matthews’ Southern Comfort with their perfect blend of British dream pop and Californian country-rock, like the Stone Roses met Buffalo Springfield. The three-track EP gets its name from the opener “I Woke Up in July,” one of the strongest, most beautiful songs from their early 2020 release A New Kind of Sky. Lush production, the otherworldly quality of Richard Olson’s vocals, sweetness without twee- it’s the kind of song that has such quiet yet big, breathtaking presence that it could cause every person in…
