 |
DIRECTLY FROM US: CDs: $15 USD
|
(Use to preview album tracks)
|
|
Matt Novak's Middle River is so carefully crafted, a true work of art. Thirteen of fourteen songs written, performed, and sung by Matt, and backed by some of Northwest Washington's finest, including Mike Grigoni on pedal steel, lap steel, and dobro, Kati Claborn singing harmonies, Robert Goldtooth Ray and Andy Simmons on upright bass, Dave Maguire playing mandolin, Chris Glass on fiddle, Dylan Rieck on cello, some drumming and percussion by Julian Macdonough, and Allegra Ziffle on the accordion. The packaging is illustrated by local Bellingham artist Caitlin Ahern and designed and printed by Bison Bookbinding and Letterpress. This is a release you will love to fall in love with. |
|||
 |
DIRECTLY FROM US: CDs: $15 USD
|
(Use to preview album tracks)
|
|
Matt Novak's late 2004 debut Ten Valley firmly places him in the ranks of contemporary American singer/songwriters. The whole album is a profound and unassuming gem among the all-too-often hasty world of modern-day music releases. Ten Valley is an album that proves the careful attention paid to every aspect of each song, never really leaving the listener, but unraveling him/her to the very core of love found and lost, quests of the spirit, parental abuse, homelessness, homecomings, the listless, jailbound, and the broken-hearted. Matt's songs are aptly enriched by the harmonies of Kati Claborn, as well as supported by the stellar dobro playing of Seattle's Mike Grigoni, the bass of Robert "Goldtooth" Ray, one of the Northwest's finest fiddlers Howie Meltzer, Dave Maguire on mandolin, and Laura Smith on the clawhammer banjo. Each song is delicately arranged and enriched by sparse instrumental combinations just full enough to support Matt's emotive heartfelt voice. |
|||
 |
DIRECTLY FROM US: CDs: $15 USD
|
(Use to preview album tracks)
|
|
Pretty Little Feet's The Mountain Runners was written and recorded for use in the documentary film of the same name, which chronicles the incredible true story of America's first mountain endurance race. Pretty Little Feet's new release is a 45-minute historical musical narrative of the settling of Whatcom County. The album begins with the arrival of prospectors in the late 1850s at the foot of Whatcom Creek, seeking gold in the Fraser Valley, and takes the listener through the subsequent establishment of coal mines, lumber mills, townships, railroads, and industry leading up to and through the boom years, the bust, to and through the consolidation and establishment of Bellingham, and finally leading up to the 1911-13 Mount Baker Marathon, which is the focus of The Mountain Runners film. |
|||
 |
DIRECTLY FROM US: CDs: $15 USD
|
(Use to preview album tracks)
|
|
Pretty Little Feet's debut release, Through Oak and Ash, is a collection of eighteen tracks, recorded to tape at Actual Air Studios, in the picturesque Cascade foothills just west of Mount Baker. Through Oak and Ash is a lush and lively album of two-part vocal harmony, supported with melodic combinations of mandolin, driving fiddle and guitar, and a few songs highlighted with frailing banjo and resonating dobro. Like the band's name, the songs and tunes represented on this recording are an undeniably welcome nod to tradition. |
|||
 |
DIRECTLY FROM US: CDs: $15 USD
|
(Use to preview album tracks)
|
|
Quickdraw String Band's Blasting Caps is a welcome addition to the traditional music cannon, and makes for a fine addition to any acoustic music lover's library. August 2005 saw the release of Quickdraw's debut CD release, Blasting Caps. Their energetic approach and innovative interpretations, vocally and instrumentally, make it obvious to see how Quickdraw quickly became one of the most popular acts around Washington state. Very unique in their adaptions of various acoustic genres, Quickdraw is not old-timey or bluegrass, sometimes ragtime, country blues, folk, or celtic. Their style often defies categorization into any singular genre, but is definitely solidly grounded in acoustic tradition. This is exactly what makes them completely unique. Nobody else is doing what Quickdraw is doing musically in Whatcom County, and if they are, "they ain't doing it quite like us." |
|||
 |
Matt was included on the compilation "The United State of Americana: Volume Three." (Shut Eye Records) | ||
 |
Matt 's band Quickdraw M'Graw was included on the compilation, "Subdued Stringband Jamboree: The Last September Show." | ||
