Brad Barrish

I’m excited for all of this music to come out. Some of it is already available, but you’re just gonna have to wait for the others. It’s the perfect mix to listen to while I’m driving home in the dark. It just makes things a little lighter and a little brighter. Hell, that’s kind of the purpose of these things. I’m not posting MP3s anymore. It’s a hassle and in most cases, you can put it together on your own. It costs me too much for hosting, and while I appreciate the people that have donated some money in the past, there’s just not enough to pay for the bandwidth. And besides, it’s a bit of a conflict of interest for me and getting in trouble at work because I post MP3s just ain’t worth it.

01 Apocalypse Please - Muse Taken from Absolution

02 Eye For An Eye - U.N.K.L.E. Taken from Never Never Land

03 Paths (FSOL Cosmic Jukebox Mix) - Robert Miles Taken from Organik Remixes

04 Shining - Kristian Leontiou

05 They - Jem Taken from Finally Woken

06 N.Y. (Chris Coco Remix) - Doves Taken from Lost Sides

07 Cherry Blossom Girl - Air Taken from Talkie Walkie

08 Bruxellisation - The Electric Soft Parade Taken from The American Adventure

09 Elevator Love Letter - Stars Taken from Heart

10 Surrender (Demo) - Tim Booth

11 Bad Day - R.E.M. Taken from In Time: The Best Of R.E.M. 1988-2003

12 Reptilia - The Strokes Taken from Room On Fire

13 Darling Nikki - Foo Fighters Taken from Have It All (UK Single)

14 Luminol - Ryan Adams Taken from Rock N Roll

15 The Sound Of Settling - Death Cab For Cutie Taken from Transatlanticism

16 Woman Like A Man - Damien Rice

17 Trouble - Ray Lamontagne Taken from Ray Lamontagne

18 Gentle Moon - Sun Kil Moon Taken from Ghosts Of The Great Highway

19 Esta Noche - The Twilight Singers Taken from Blackberry Belle

I had some time this evening to finally get to work on this month’s mix, but it’s just not going very well. It’s not flowing at all and the music is all over the map. I think I’m going back to the drawing board. Did I mention the new Jay-Z record? I can’t really say I’ve been much of a fan, but I really like this album. I’ve been listening to a lot more hip-hop because of work and it’s always fun to discover something new which I probably never would have been exposed. Also of major note is the new Basement Jaxx album. Certainly one of the best albums I’ve heard all year.

Friday night Joel and I went to check out Paul’s new bar in the valley. It’s called NoBar. Here’s all the info:

10622 Magnolia (one block west of Cahuenga) North Hollywood, CA 91401 818.753.0545 Monday-Friday: 6pm-2am Saturday & Sunday: 8pm-2am

The Leona Naess and Josh Rouse show was pretty mediocre. Leona’s a great songwriter, but her performance left me pretty bored. The highlight was seeing Ethan Johns playing guitar with her. I had to pull him aside after her performance to tell him how much I love the new Ray Lamontagne album. I told him the story about how I just happened to take it home one night, listened to it a few times and was nearly moved to tears. He said he cries every time he listens to it and said it was one of the most amazing experiences he’s had as a producer. Josh was off. I don’t know how else to explain it. Of course I only have one other show from which to compare, but it just didn’t feel like he was super into it. The crowd was good to him and sang along wit a lot of his songs. We ended up leaving as the band came on for an encore. Thanks to Nili at Ryko for the tickets.

Time to catch up on TiVo and eat dinner. Have a great week.

I didn’t change my link color to green for the holidays.

I’m sitting in my office (at home, for once), listening to Ryan Adams’ Love Is Hell, Pt. 1 (purchased from the iTunes Music Store) and for the first time in quite a while I feel like sitting down to write about things.

I haven’t been much of a home body recently, and what time I have been at home has not been in front of my computer. It’s a bit unusual for me, but other priorities, some chosen and others…well, not chosen are taking up the time. [Note: If your not interested in the geeky stuff, skip down to the next paragraph]. And speaking of my computer, I picked up one of the new 15" PowerBooks a day after they were released. I don’t really remember when that was, but I’ve been struggling with display problems that seem to be plaguing quite a few people that own them as well. So I decided to send my brand new computer back to Apple for repair, only to have it sit in their repair facility while they tested a permanent fix. Needless to say, I wasn’t happy being without computer for nearly two weeks, so I had them send it back unrepaired. To their credit, Apple has a great customer relations department that took my case and made sure I was updated every step of the way. They have recently called and said they have a fix and as soon as I send my machine back, they will make sure it is given priority and turned around quickly. We’ll see…

No matter how good my intentions are, I can’t keep the updates coming as frequently as I would like. Ever since I got my job, nearly a year ago, I haven’t been going to many shows and I haven’t been updating as much. As you’ve probably noticed (or not), I decided to lose the concert calendar. It just took too much time to comb the newsletters, LA Weekly and web sites to keep everyone posted on what shows were coming up. The trade off is that hopefully I can give some more substantial updates in place of that section. It wasn’t anything you couldn’t find somewhere else anyway.

Wow, Ryan covering Oasis…It sounds gorgeous.

I’m going to see Josh Rouse and Leona Naess at The Troubadour this weekend, which should be a damn good show. If Josh puts on a show that was anything like the last one I saw at Largo, it will be a treat. I’ve never seen Leona play a show, but I’ve been a fan of her music for quite a while. If I have time I’ll post a little review.

To answer your question about my monthly mixes, no I have not had time to compile for the last month or so. I hope to get back to that this month at some point. There’s so much great music that I want to share, but it all takes time to compile, to say nothing of posting it on my site.

‘Tis damn near the season of year-end lists, but since I’m still working on those, here’s a list of random stuff for you:

Best denim: Paper Denim

Best star sighting since I’ve lived in LA: Elton John eating at Barneys Greengrass - in a head-to-toe sweat suit, with big glasses and lots of rings on his fingers.

Best place to see a film in LA: ArcLight Hollywood

Last good movie I saw: Love Actually

Worst movie I’ve seen in a long time: Matrix Revolutions

Best movie I can’t wait for you to see: Win A Date With Tad Hamilton

Last good book I read: Silk by Alessandro Baricco

Best album of 2003: Wouldn’t you like to know?

Best album I’ve recently heard: Ryan Adams - Rock ‘N’ Roll

Another really great album I recently heard: Jay-Z - The Black Album

Best album I can’t wait for you to hear: Ray Lamontagne - Ray Lamontagne

A band that will be missed in a big way: Wild Gift

I haven’t had a computer at home for over a week (!!) and now I do. I’ll explain more later, but the comments are back on (soon to be spammed again, I’m sure) and I will be updating the calendar section, etc. very shortly. Thanks to those who decided to email me. I’ll be emailing back soon. Amazing how shit piles up without a computer at home.

On Tuesday afternoon my grandmother had a heart attack while she was trimming the bushes. Less than a day later, with my mother, father, sister and her rabbi by her side, she passed away. On Thursday morning my brother and I got on a plane bound for our home in Kansas.

While it’s been rough at times, I find a certain amount of joy in knowing that she went the way she wanted to go, doing yard work, and with very little struggle or discomfort. She knew it was her time and she was ready. We should all be so fortunate.

Before I left Los Angeles, I wrote a eulogy for her. It started off with a quote by Daisaku Ikeda which says, “You mustn’t allow yourselves to grow old before your time. Please live with youthful spirit. That is what Buddhism teaches us to do, and how life ought to be lived.” I went on to explain that while my grandmother was not necessarily conscious of it, she embodied the spirit of a Bodhisattva. She had such a young spirit, which was absolutely infectious. She was always willing to listen or discuss whatever was on your mind, she helped make the world a better place in so many ways.

Kansas is so beautiful this time of year. Leaves are starting to change and you can feel a change in the air. It’s something that I miss, living in Los Angeles. While I’d never want to move back here, I do love visiting a certain times of the year. It doesn’t feel like home the way it used to. I still feel like it’s the place in which I grew up, but that’s about the extent of it. I have amazing memories of this house (and my grandmother’s house as well), but that’s kind of all that remains, aside from the fact that my parents and sister still live here. When I get homesick, it’s for my home in Los Angeles.

It’s getting late here. I’ve got another day and some change left in Kansas. I don’t know if I’ll post anything else about it while I’m here, but I’ve been thinking quite a bit about what home is and how important family is, so there you have it. I’m going to get some sleep now.

I was one of the lucky ones to experience Damien Rice last night at The Henry Fonda Theatre. Despite some diffuclties with the sound, which left Damien singing without a microphone on a couple of songs, the show was nothing short of honest and beautiful. It was one of those occasions when I felt so very lucky to be in love with music.

When I first heard O nearly a year ago, I was pretty blown away. I don’t know if it’s something about Ireland that makes for good songwriters, but I noticed a lot of similarities between Damien and Fran Healy (from Travis). Both songwriters have an immense gift for truly connecting with their audience. They aren’t afraid to talk about what inspired their songs, which can be intense at times. Enough comparisons though, Damien is certainly his own man. Having read quite a bit about him, I know that he travelled around Europe for some time, no doubt rounding up inspiration and reflecting, only to return to Dublin to make a record. You can hear the wandering, not only in his voice, but also in the music itself.

His music is not just terribly romantic and lovely, but so smart and simple. Vocal harmonies by Lisa Hannigan and Vyvienne Long add impressively to Damien’s near perfect voice and guitar workings. O will certainly be one of my picks for best album of the year, and the show was one of the best I have seen all year.

Best of luck to him tonight at The Shortlist Music Prize award show. He’s certainly deserving of the honor.

It’s not often that I sit down to write about music and feel like I just can’t do it justice. This is one of those times. When I took Ray Lamontagne’s CD home from work last night, it was because I thought I had heard or read about him somewhere. If for no other reason, I saw it was produced by Ethan Johns and that was good enough for me. When I got around to playing the album, it was pretty late and I was exhausted. The minute I heard Ray’s voice my jaw dropped slightly and I was transfixed. By the end of the first song, I felt like sobbing.

As the rest of the album played, I was shocked by the soulful purity of his music. And when I say soulful, I’m talking Otis Redding soulful. No, I’m not kidding. It’s been years since I’ve felt so moved by an album, or even a song. I listened to the album two more times in its entirety. I couldn’t concentrate on anything else and was on the verge of tears nearly the entire time.

It’s the kind of music that’s untouchable, precious - like it’s not even possible for something to sound so beautiful. The stark production and instrumentation only work to compliment Ray’s mesmerizing voice. There’s just enough of this and not too much of that. You’ll be reading about Ray very soon and I’d lay down a pile of money that a lot of people are going to be saying the same thing. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go listen to the album again.

As much as I hate the state (no pun) of things in California, the recall is just ridiculous. Frankly, I don’t care, which doesn’t mean I’m not going to vote, but I’m voting against the recall when I go to the polls next week. Schwarzenegger is an ass and has no business being the Governor of this state. I’d link to a bunch of no-recall sites, but frankly they are no better than the pro-recall sites. Educate yourself about the real candidates and make an informed decision. Don’t be a sheep, think for yourself, fight the power, blah blah blah.

Today’s New York Times Op-Ed piece was a good one (free registration required). David Brooks shines a spotlight on the fact that we are getting so caught up in the drama of the candidates, fighting like little children for that coveted space in The White House, that we are forgetting about the issues. Yeah, it’s early in the presidential race, but can someone tell me what all of these candidates stand for or where they stand on the issues that matter to you? Was anyone else totally disgusted as they watched ten candidates attack one another’s character instead of talking about the issues that matter? It seems to me, and I think Mr. Brooks would agree, that we get what we ask for and while we sit around on our collective apathetic asses all we’ll get is the drama.

And while I’m on a bit of a political rant, I’ll say this: we need to finish what we started in Iraq. I was as opposed to going into Iraq as anyone, but if we pull out now, we’ll be doing far more harm than good. Who’s to say that we won’t benefit in establishing democracy in Iraq? Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t like the fact that there are kids over there dying for our country. I don’t like war and I don’t support our reasons for being there, but we’re there and facts are facts. I don’t have a good exit strategy and neither do the people who are running this country. My only suggestion is to read. Read about both sides and take it upon yourself to find out about what’s going on. Stop waiting for CNN to serve you the answers. Take a few minutes out of your day to learn a little something and then think for yourself.