Monday, November 30, 2015

Exclusive Kris Kristofferson announcement

This week we have an exclusive announcement regarding live dates for Kris Kristofferson in 2016. Tune in to find out where & when the great man is playing

As always Bonanza & Son showcases the best of all the new & upcoming Americana, Country & Roots releases including brand new tracks from Brent Best, Thisell, Frankie Lee, Donnie Fritts, Sunny Sweeney, Randy Weeks, Gospelbeach + more

And of course it wouldn't be Bonanza & Son without lots of old vinyl that we've picked up along the Americana highway that is the past week of Bonanza & Son's crate digging & record buying plus selections from our trusty record shelves at home

Bonanza & Son On Resonance 104.4FM
‘Tracing the roots and subsequent influence of the pioneers, innovators, outlaws, renegades and mavericks of Country Music and Americana’s past present and future'
Wednesdays at 4:30pm (repeated Thursdays at Midnight)

Tune in live to Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM on 104.4FM in London
or anywhere at resonancefm.com

Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM 18/11/15: Kris Kristofferson Mini Special by Bonanza & Son on Mixcloud

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Peter Bruntnell live with full band including Dave Boquist of Son Volt

Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM Proudly Presents:
Peter Bruntnell with full band plus Dave Boquist of Son Volt




On Friday 4th December Peter Bruntnell and his band will play one of only three UK dates with Dave Boquist, original guitarist of legendary and seminal Alt-Country Band Son Volt.

This intimate full band show at Aces and Eights Saloon Bar in Tufnell Park London will be Pete's only London show with Dave Boquist + full band and Pete's final live show of 2015. (click the link below for advance tickets).

Peter will showcase brand new songs from his upcoming album set for early 2016 release as well as favourites from his illustrious 20 year career... These live dates will be a chance to catch the new songs live and ahead of release.

Pete could correctly be described as one of the first truly Americana artists in the UK before the sub-genre even had a name with him perfectly counterpointing American Roots influenced music and Alt-Country with classic, clever songwriting, dreamy Psychedelia and a cosmic vibe.

The NME said in no uncertain terms 'Peter Bruntnell's records should be taught in schools'
whilst Rolling Stone Magazine described him as 'England's best kept musical secret'.



Dave Boquist was original guitarist and multi-instrumentalist with the legendary and seminal Alt-Country band Son Volt.



We are also very pleased to announce that support comes from Small town Jones who will be showcasing their brand new album 'Sky Down To The Ground' fresh from their recent live session on Dermot O'Leary's BBC Radio2 Saturday Session.



Bonanza & Son DJs will provide the records throughout the night.

£10 Advance tickets available from the link below + £1 booking fee.
Tickets on the door will be £15 but are very limited and tickets are already selling fast.

www.wegottickets.com/event/338562


Sunday, November 15, 2015

Eric Chenaux on Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM

This week's Bonanza & Son on Resonance 104.4fm available to listen on demand.

We broadcast a compelling live session from Eric Chenaux with his avant-Americana, progressive Folk sounds and a very illuminating interview with this Toronto sonic skull-splitter from Constellation Records...

Plus we have a special Bonanza and Son Cosmic-Country mix for your aural pleasure...


Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM 11/11/15: Eric Chenaux live session by Bonanza & Son on Mixcloud


Eric Chenaux has a mixtape of his own on the Cast The Dice blog here...

http://castthedice.org/?p=9995



Bonanza & Son On Resonance 104.4fm
‘Tracing the roots and subsequent influence of the pioneers, innovators, outlaws, renegades and mavericks of Country Music and Americana’s past present and future'

Wednesdays at 4:30pm (repeated Thursdays at Midnight)
Tune in to Bonanza & Son on Resonance 104.4fmFM
on 104.4FM in London
or anywhere at www.resonancefm.com

YOU CAN ALSO LISTEN ON DEMAND AT
www.mixcloud.com/bonanza-son/

Thursday, November 05, 2015

This week's broadcast on ResonanceFM

This week's Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM is now available to listen on demand with Wild Ponies live in session...


Bonanza & Son on ResonanceFM 4/11/15: Wild Ponies live session. by Bonanza & Son on Mixcloud


On the show we have Wild Ponies all the way from East Nashville, Tennessee live in the studio on the run up to their European tour.



As always Bonanza & Son showcases the best of all the new and upcoming Americana, Country & Roots releases including the much anticipated, upcoming solo LP from Slobberbone/Drams main man Brent Best... As well as new and upcoming records from Small town Jones, John Moreland, James McMurtry and many more...






... and of course it wouldn't be Bonanza & Son without lots of old vinyl that we've picked up along the Americana highway that is the past week of Bonanza & Son's crate digging and record buying plus selections from our trusty record shelves at home including Son Volt, Peter Bruntnell, Lawrence Hammond and many more...




Bonanza & Son On Resonance 104.4fm
‘Tracing the roots and subsequent influence of the pioneers, innovators, outlaws, renegades and mavericks of Country Music and Americana’s past present and future'

Bonanza & Son On Resonance 104.4fm
Wednesday 4th November 2015 4:30pm (UK Time)
(repeated Thursday 5th November at Midnight

Sunday, November 01, 2015

Touched by the hand of God: Bob Dylan at The Royal Albert Hall Thursday 22nd October 2015...

It’s been just over a week since Bonanza & Son had the great pleasure of seeing Bob Dylan & His Band at The Royal Albert Hall and I have to say I’m still reeling from the experience… I don’t quite feel like the same man who walked into that hallowed hall such was the experience and such is this bizarre, beautiful feeling that has continued to ‘accompany’ me since and for some ten days now!

The only way I can describe how I feel is that I’ve been 'touched by the hand of God' and to be able to see the gig with my Son, well, a man can't really ask for more than that and it just enhancing the overall experience.

Dylan played hardly any of his so-called classics and I really respect him for that. A true artist who continues to do it ‘his way’… I find it bizarre that people complain about a trailblazer not doing what they want to hear!.. 'If he’d spent his career doing just what his audience wanted or expected you wouldn’t have liked him in the first place ya dig?'

Instead the set comprised 20 songs over 90 minutes made up of tracks predominantly from his last two albums, 2012's Tempest and this year's 'Shadows In The Night’, an album of classic ’show tunes’ more famously known for being performed by Frank Sinatra which came out at the beginning of this year. There were a couple of Sinatra covers not from 'Shadows...' perhaps suggesting his next LP may be of a similar nature. The rest of the set was a fine smattering of songs from 1997's 'Time Out Of Mind', 2001's 'Love & Theft', 'Modern Times' from 2006 and 2009's 'Together Through Life' with only three other songs not from this century...

In fact the only real ‘old favourites’ from The Dylan Songbook, as it were,
were 'Blowing In The Wind' and 'Tangled Up In Blue' but they were the most exquisite, weird-ass versions you’re never likely to have heard, still oily-wet from the masters palette and brushes!






The whole show had an incredible vibe and sound almost impossible to describe in that it is an essence rather than something tangible or easily expressed verbally…

Just try to imagine that feeling when you begin to fall asleep, half-awake half dream state but suddenly being confronted with the best Country band you've NEVER heard, with a line-up comprising all the greats of the past each stepping up in turn to play like twisted angels resplendent in full Western-Swing garb…

It’s a little like a scene from a David Lynch movie; euphoric, orgasmic jouissance but with an ever so slightly, sinister darkness. All sounding like it’s being beamed out from the furthest reaches of the cosmos as you float weightless, listening in on the intergalactic radio of Stanley Kubrick’s spinning, space station...

At this point I turned to my son and said ‘If there is a band playing in heaven then this is it’… But there was also a little bit of hell too!..

It was so dark and menacing in places, sounding almost like Nick Cave and The Birthday Party but with far better musicians…

Charlie Sexton played lead guitar like a man who has sold his soul at the crossroads and Bob looked just like a little demon hopping from one foot to the other, blowing on his evil harmonica whilst hell burns, fiddlers fiddle, banjos bang eerily and pedal steel fills the Albert Hall with the most beautifully delicate of feathers falling from angels wings!

And then suddenly it occurred to me that perhaps heaven ‘is’ hell and ‘Hell is a place’, this place… and we all can make of it what we will?!


The highlight of the set for me was ‘Lovesick’, originally appearing on Dylan’s 1997 ’Time Out Of Mind’ LP but here now transformed into a far darker, sinister and rocking beast sounding more like a Trench Town, heavy dub Reggae, call-to-arms than its previous incarnation… This version could easily have been Nick Cave’s ‘grinder men’ performing all three of Dylan’s religious trilogy albums in their entirety, with all the breaks, just as Satan intended…





It was in this form and in this setting that the song made more sense to me than it EVER has …

'I'm walkin' through streets that are dead… walkin' with you in my head… the clouds are weepin’…
You destroyed me with a smile… I'm sick of love… This kind of love, I'm so sick of it….
Sometimes the silence can be like thunder-Sometimes I wanna take to the road and plunder…
Could you ever be true… I wish I'd never met you…I'm sick of love, I'm tryin' to forget you.'

As Charlie Sexton viciously scraped Lovesick’s final chord from his guitar I jumped to my feet ecstatically not realising this was the last song and the whole Albert Hall was doing precisely the same thing for a much deserved standing ovation.

Seriously, I am NOT the same man who walked into that hallowed hall Thursday before last and there is no doubt in my mind I have been truly touched by the hand of God… In fact I doubt I’ll EVER be quite the same again!..


Here’s the full setlist and an audio recording of the gig:

1)Things Have Changed
2)She Belongs to Me
3)Beyond Here Lies Nothin'
4)What'll I Do (Irving Berlin cover)
5)Duquesne Whistle
6)Melancholy Mood (Frank Sinatra cover)
7)Pay in Blood
8)I’m a Fool to Want You(Frank Sinatra cover)
9)Tangled Up in Blue

Set 2:
10)High Water (For Charley Patton)
11)Why Try to Change Me Now(Cy Coleman cover)
12)Early Roman Kings
13)The Night We Called It a Day(Frank Sinatra cover)
14)Spirit on the Water
15)Scarlet Town
16)All or Nothing at All(Frank Sinatra cover)
17)Long and Wasted Years
18)Autumn Leaves(Yves Montand cover)

Encore
19)Blowin' in the Wind
20)Love Sick