Today in History October 16, 1937 – Barry McGuire is born!!

Barry McGuire Eve of DestructionAmong today’s  birthdays is singer-songwriter Barry McGuire. From Wikipedia – Barry McGuire

…..an American singer-songwriter best known for the hit song “Eve of Destruction”, and later as a pioneering singer and songwriter of Contemporary Christian music.   In 1963, McGuire along with Randy Sparks (the founder of The New Christy Minstrels) co-wrote, and sang lead vocal on, the Christys’ first and biggest hit single: “Green, Green.” He left the Christys in January 1965, after recording the album,Cowboys and Indians; however, on the 1965 album Chim Chim Cher-ee, he sang only on the title cut…..   As a folk rock solo singer in the 1960s, he was best known for his hits “Eve of Destruction” and “Sins of the Family”, both written by P.F. Sloan. His other chart successes were “Child of Our Times” and “Cloudy Summer Afternoon (Raindrops)” (penned by Travis Edmonson of the 1960s folk-duo, Bud & Travis). “Eve of Destruction” sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc.[1]   McGuire’s LP, The Eve of Destruction, reached its peak of number 37 on the Billboard 200 chart during the week ending 25 September 1965. That same day the single of that name went to number one on both charts. McGuire was never again to break into the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. According to McGuire, “Eve of Destruction” was recorded in one take on a Thursday morning (from words scrawled on a crumpled piece of paper) and then he got a call from the record company at 7:00 the next Monday morning, telling him to turn on the radio—his song was playing. The recording includes an “ahhh” where McGuire could not read the words.[2] The Temptationsreferenced McGuire’s song “Eve of Destruction” in their song “Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World Is Today)”. For other references and covers of “Eve of Destruction” see the article: “Eve of Destruction”. Read More

Today in Music and History – 1879 – Joe Hill was born!!

                                              Joe HillAs I was closing tabs on my Opera browser tonight I caught a glimpse of Today’s Birthdays in Music from MusicOrb. The page was all the way to the top and birth years ranging from 1698 to 1880 were visible. There in 1879 was a name familiar to most folk music fans, Joe Hill. While I knew the name and the song “Joe Hill”, which has been covered by many artists, I realized that I didn’t know much about the man beyond the fact that he was a labor activist. That meant I needed to go to Wikipedia to find out more about Joe. From Wikipedia: Read More

Lunchtime Music – John Gorka – “People My Age” Oh My!

John GorkaOk so on Wednesday, my wife moved closer to that magical life milepost the big 60! I won’t say how close she is because if I did she’d say “Well, I’ll still never be older than you!” And she’s right because as you may know, I passed that mile post a couple of years ago! Anyway over the last couple of weeks I keep flashing back to the folksingers that I have loved over the years. This morning I remembered the said passing of Steve Goodman and on this date but in 1973, Jim Croce died in that tragic plane crash. Read More

Life’s Soundtrack – Part 1 – Cal Scott – Carved Wood Box

Carved Wood BoxSo last night as I worked burning, washing and sieving asphalt and its component parts, I listened to two fine folk albums. The first was the latest release from Cal Scott Carved Wood Box and the second was Walk Along John from  Canadian mandolin virtuoso John Reischman. Currently, Cal Scott’s album is number 29 on the Folk DJ Chart and Reischman is number 4! Read More

New Folk – Next Time Around from Darryl Purpose

Next Time AroundMy musical day today started with a mix of folk music from the iPod, first there was a song from Jesse Winchester’s Gentleman of Leisure album and then a Mark Erelli song, a track from Les Sampou, I haven’t heard her voice in a while!  As my thoughts rambled through the list of musicians whose music could come on next, they landed on Darryl Purpose, whose music I’ve loved since around 2000. I thought about his latest album, his first album of new material since 2003. In 2005 he set down his guitar shut down his music making and according to his website he… Read More

New Folk – Scrimshaw from Nels Andrews

So the other day I put several albums on the IPod to listen to, one I’ve already written about Tiger Maple String Band’s Coming Home and last night on the way to Target and back home I had a chance to listen to part of Nels Andrews latest Scrimshaw.The thing about listening to an album like this in the car is that you need to pay attention more to the road than to the music, when in fact the music demands more attention!! From the not real great listen that I gave the album, I could tell that it’s special. So special, that Jim Blum at NPR’s Folk Alley picked ‘Scrimshaw‘ in his top records of 2012 and Dutch popmagazine Heaven put Scrimshaw in its top 10 for 2012. writer Pieter Wijnstekers places it in fine company, with Iris DeMent, Phantom Limb, Rose Cousins, Glen Hansard, Husky, Gretchen Peters, Anais Mitchell and Kathy Mattea. Read More

Into the Night – What We Lost – Ben Bedford

So to enjoy most singer-songwriters you don’t need to be all that Culturally Literate, not so with Ben Bedford. With Bedford it’s always a good idea to have Google or Wikipedia  fired up so that you can find out more about the subject of many of his songs. Take the song “Cahokia”  from his latest album What We Lost , when Ben sings… Read More