Brandi Carlile supporting Ray LaMontange in Chicago

Brandi Carlile is a Seattle singer/songwriter whom I discovered on reverbnation. She writes amazing songs and I just love her voice and style.
She has a new CD our and is touring right now.
Taken from her website:
"Brandi Carlile's third album, Give Up The Ghost, unveils her talents in their truest form. After two albums and non-stop touring, she has let her guard down and offers her most candid recording to date. If the phrase "give up the ghost" most often refers to death or dying, it can also be used to describe the passing of stages in life, of transformation."
Pre-sale tickets to Brandi's show supporting Ray LaMontange in Chicago on June 7th are available now!
Here is tour info for Brandi Carlile this year so far.
February 13, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 14, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 15, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 16, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 17, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 18, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 19, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
February 20, 2011 Miami, FL 2011 Cayamo Cruise SOLD OUT
June 7, 2011 Chicago, IL Millennium Park
August 7, 2011 Edmonton, Alberta The Edmonton Folk Festival
This is one of her older songs but the first one of hers I ever heard. I hope you enjoy it.

Kate Rusby Performs at BBC2 Folk Awards.

At 17 I moved to England from Canada, and we settled in Penistone, Yorkshire, as my Mother was from Barnsley and it was her homesickness that prompted our move to England. I went off to college in Scarborough and fell in love with traditional folk music, and thus began my own singing career.

Later, I hear of Kate Rusby, an English folk singer and songwriter, and was so thrilled to hear she was from Penistone, South Yorkshire. Personal connections are always a great thing in the music world.
Sometimes known as The Barnsley Nightingale, Kate has headlined various British national folk festivals, and is regarded as one of the most famous English folk singers of contemporary times. In 2001 The Guardian described her as "a superstar of the British acoustic scene." In 2007 the BBC website described her as "The first lady of young folkies". She is one of the few folk singers to have been nominated for the Mercury Prize.
Feb 7th she was on the BBC 2 Radio Folk Awards. Here is a song from the show, My Dreams Have Withered and Died.

Buffy Sainte-Marie - Starwalker

I got to see Buffy Sainte-Marie at the Vogue Theatre in Vancouver, and what an amazing show that was. My first memory of her is from my childhood, when my Dad woke me up and made me come into the living room to see her performing on the Ed Sullivan show, she was playing her bow harp and singing Cripple Creek. That is quite a memory, very vivid.
So here is one of my favourite songs of Buffy's

Meaghan Smith Up for New Artist of the Year JUNO

Meaghan Smith is a Canadian singer-songwriter and guitarist. Here is what they have to say on the JUNO site.
"Talking about her independently-recorded debut album, The Cricket’s Orchestra , Smith says: “Les (Cooper) and I put our heads together and decided to create my musical world by using a string quartet, an eight-piece horn section, guitars, keys, upright bass, a clarinet, some flutes, and even an Omnichord. We used Mellotron samples in place of a modern band because we loved the quirky, vintage vibe they brought to the songs, and topped it all off with some turntable scratches. The result is an ideal blend of old and new.” The Cricket’s Orchestra, was picked up by Sire Records/Warner Music Canada and released in early 2010. Smith also received a great deal of exposure by contributing a cover of alternative rock group Pixies’ “Here Comes Your Man” to the soundtrack of 2009′s (500) Days of Summer, featuring Smith playing an Omnichord."

Hannah Georgas nominated for a JUNO.

I first saw Hannah Georgas at the Biltmore in Vancouver. The venue was packed with appreciative fans. She has been nominated for a JUNO this year, another nominee for the New Artist of the Year.
The following is taken from the JUNO site.
"Hannah Georgas released her debut full-length album, This Is Good, in her native Canada this past April on Hidden Pony Records creating an instant splash, landing the May cover of Canada’s only national music monthly, Exclaim! The album, produced by Howard Redekopp (Tegan and Sara/New Pornographers) and Ryan Guldemond (Mother Mother), features infectious mix of pop-rock gems and folky tenderness that brings to mind elements of Feist and Basia Bulat. Georgas was named by CBC Radio 3 as Best New Artist in 2009, and her album was highly-buzzed about even before its release. It garnered glowing reviews in The Globe & Mail and The National Post along with almost every daily and weekly paper across Canada, and was named to the long-list for the Polaris Music Prize. Georgas performed in September at the Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg, at the Osheaga Music Festival in Montréal and took part in The Malahat Revue, cycling and performing across British Columbia with Jeremy Fisher, Aidan Knight and Said The Whale.

Best of Ladytron - Runaway [Official Music Video]

The Best of Ladytron: (2000-2010) will be released on March 29th in the US through Nettwerk Records (March 28th in UK). Here is some information taken from their website

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"In 2001, the first fruits of what would become the new electronic-rock movement began to fall. LADYTRON's debut, 604, was an integral part of that first strike. A pristine, analog adventure of sound and substance, the album would go on to influence the genre itself, while the group quietly made a global impact both visually and stylistically.

Hits like "Playgirl" and "Seventeen" (from their 2002 follow-up, Light & Magic) quietly rebelled against the bratty, disingenuous motifs of the time, instead invoking the sonic storytelling of groups like Air, Stereolab, and My Bloody Valentine. Ladytron's counterbalance of emotional vulnerability and psychological ingenuity personified by the opposing vocals of Helen Marnie and Mira Aroyo created their own world that had yet to be fully explored.

Their live performances immediately set them apart: "We wanted to play all those exotic instruments live," says Mira of the mountain of antique synths the group brandished on stage. Daniel Hunt adds, "Not many people ever performed that way, besides Emerson, Lake and Palmer or something. It felt like hanging around at Bell Labs in 1970."

A year's worth of touring and experimentation led to the creation of Witching Hour, Ladytron's most sonically complex production to date. It retained the unmistakable, mechanized warmth of their Korg MS20s, but Reuben Wu's dynamic programming coupled with Hunt's shoegazey guitar layers in tracks like the intoxicating single "Destroy Everything You Touch," "International Dateline" and "High Rise" flexed a more indie rock tenacity. While the album showed distinct creative growth, their resilience outside the studio provided a different kind of maturity; the group took to the road on the strength of their massive cult following, booking sold-out tours across North America and Europe, and playing for capacity crowds in China and Latin America. Ladytron toured exhaustively over the next two years, performing for over 4,000 people in Bogota, Columbia where their show was eventually shut down by local military.

Their most recent album, 2008's Velocifero continued this trend. "At no point have we ever responded to anything that's been going on outside," says Mira. "There are always going to be people who want you to remain in the same place forever, but that's not the way you make music, or anything else. It's obvious that you have to be allowed the benefit of the doubt to do whatever you want, because ultimately when you started out, there was no one there to tell you what to do. You just did it." Audiences will have ample opportunity to take in Ladytron's synthesis, and see for themselves how the group has redefined the genre they helped establish."

Basia Bulat Nominated for JUNO, New Artist of the Year

Basia Bulat is one of the nominees for a JUNO this year. In the category of New Artist of the Year, (Sponsored by FACTOR and Radio Starmaker Fund), she is up against other Canadian artists, including Hannah Georgas and Meaghan Smith.
I had the privilege to see Basia perform at the Vancouver Folk Festival a couple of years ago and her set was electric. So I am very happy to hear she is getting this recognition from the Canadian music business.
Taken from the JUNO site,
"In 2006, Basia went to live in Montréal and through friends she met Howard Bilerman, an engineer and co-owner of the famed Hotel 2 Tango studio. Initially the recordings were meant only as an “audible memory” of the time Basia spent with friends in London and Montréal. But Bilerman, smitten with Basia’s songs, began to write to friends at labels, friends with music-blogs, anyone who might pay attention. It’s this spark that sets Basia Bulat apart from the raft of typical singer-songwriters, and also what attracted the interest of Geoff Travis and Britain’s legendary Rough Trade label – who released Oh My Darling in Europe and Japan in the Spring of 2007. The album was released in North America shortly thereafter, and has since gone on to worldwide acclaim. It garnered a Polaris Prize nomination in 2008, and rave reviews from everyone from NPR and Q. Her new offering, Heart Of My Own, was born after over a year of touring that took Bulat across Europe, Australia, Canada and the U.S. several times over."