The Dead South - In Hell I'll Be In Good Company [Official Music Video]

 This is  the viral video smash by the Canadian "bluegrass" group-The Dead South.  They have been described as Mumford and Sons' Evil Twins.   Yeah- the same idea- roots music sort of updated for modern sensibilities.  The first thing you notice about the group is the pioneer style clothes-but quickly you are also quite enthralled  by  the musicianship  and lead singer's scratchy voice.

The fellow in the beginning of the video is Danny Kenyon. Kenyon fingers his cello to achieve something like the sound of a bass-he occasionally sings as well.  The second fellow over (with the thick beard)  is Scott Pringle, he typically plays mandolin and is the group's main backing singer-and secondary lead vocalist.  The lead singer is Nate Hilts-this  guy looks the part of some old western character. He also plays guitar.  The fellow on the banjo is  Colton "Crawdaddy"  Crawford.  He had to leave the band for a couple of years-but is back in the band.  He was replaced during that  time by the  excellent Canadian banjo player-Eliza Maria Doyle. Also on occasion, Eric Mehlson filled in for Danny Kenyon, who sometimes took time to work his day job in Regina  as a engineer. In August 2020, Kenyon left the band for a time, due to accusations of sexual misconduct while he was in high school. However, he has been reinstated.  The group is very popular in Europe as well as Canada and the USA.

Dead South with the two fill in members, cellist Eric Melhson (on left), and  banjo player, Eliza Mary Doyle.

The video for "In Hell I'll Be In Good Company" was , directed by Zach Wilson of Two Brothers Films  and was   filmed in numerous locations many  around Regina,  Saskatchewan and other parts of Canada. Among the over thirty  locations were the Trafalgar Fountain in Regina, Vintage Vinyl & Hemp in Regina, near the  CN Tower in Toronto, and  the Great Western Brewery in Saskatoon.  There  are  about 400 different shots in the video.    The  group was   actually  physically there in all these places. There are-no green screens  used.  What a continuity nightmare for whomever had them stay in their marks.

 The farm country   around  Regina  is quite beautiful. It always seemed strange to me that this  part of the world in the middle of Canada is one of the world's bread baskets-considering how up far north it is. Anyway, "In Hell I'll Be in Company"  is from the album,  Good Company  which  was recorded with the help of Orion Paradis, a producer  at SoulSound Studios in Regina.  The album was released in April 2014.

As much as the song sounds like it was written long ago-it is in fact an original song  by the group, written  mostly by Nate Hilts. The group has also shot  other  videos with  Two Brothers. One was the  story video for "Boots", a song from their 2016 album, Illusion and Doubt.  That video  was filmed mostly around Wadena, Saskatchewan.   I believe  that the women  portraying the siren in the video is actually Nate Hilts' real life significant other. The video for "Boots" follows.

The  group put out their most recent  album Sugar and Joy in 2019. A new EP came in 2021.

The fan video for "In Hell" that came in 2020.
Originally published January 2019

A short personal history of Upper Chevy Chase in Washington, D.C.

In the early part of my life  I lived in  Chevy Chase,  a neighborhood in the northern part of  Washington, D.C. ( There are also villages  on the other side of D.C. border in the Maryland suburbs that  are referred to collectively as  Chevy Chase, MD). Technically, the part I lived in is now called Upper Chevy Chase-a  name assigned by the city to differentiate  this  neighborhood from the parts of Chevy Chase closer to Connecticut Avenue. 

In the mid-1800's much of  the northern parts of Washington D.C. were still  forest and farmlands. It took many decades  for the city to develop beyond it's  beginnings as L'Enfant's downtown original grid.  It was the  development of the street car  around the turn of century that  made it much easier for people to live further away from downtown D.C yet still work there. In the mid-1800's the urban street  grid had not been filled in parts of Northwest DC and the major  avenues named after various states such as Wisconsin Ave., Connecticut  Ave.and Utah Ave.  either did not exist or went under different names.  Dirty old country roads such Rock Creek  Ford Road , and Milkhouse Ford Road were the main roads.

Chevy Chase D.C before it was developed.  The Rock Creek Ford Road was eaten by the grid-but the Broad Branch road survived. 

Much of the development of Chevy Chase both in D.C. and in Maryland  was facilitated by the Chevy Chase Land Company which had been founded in 1890.  As  developers built new blocks  they were asked by the city to try maintain Washington D.C grid system.  This meant mostly straight line roads. The east- west roads ascended the alphabet and the north south roads were numbered.   Diagonal avenues were named after  the states. Some of the old country roads retained their old names-however, some of these old roads were wiped off the map -since they no longer fit the grid. Upper Chase was mostly farms in 1890  was slowly developed over the next 50 years.

Above: Upper Chevy Chase before it was fully developed about 1909.

29th street in 1919

In the early 1900's  -the Chevy Chase Sanitarium still existed in the neighborhood -and it would be  soon be replaced by houses.  Two  large estates-  Knollwood and Bonnie Brae bordered Rock Creek Park.  They would replaced by the Army Distaff House in 1962  and the Unicorn Lane developments in the 1970's.

Bonnie Brae

I lived on 29th Street, NW adajacent to the Army Distaff House which  is now the Knollwood Military Retirement Community. The western section of the street was built first, because  it all been owned originally by one property owner (Alexander Matthews). The  eastern section of the street was owned by multiple parties. After the street was filled in one of the older houses from the old owners  on 29th Street remained.  Years later at the end of the century,  this older house was replaced by a much larger house that it worth almost two million dollars today.  The house I lived was built in 1935   in the final section of the development of 29th street.   The  twelve houses in this  tract were packed in a unbuilt triangle that was so small that there was not enough backyard for each house-so the houses were restricted by covenant from building fences to allow some semblance of a common area to make up for the small yards. A further projected continuance of 29th street wasn't built and so 29th street  stopped right at Tennyson St.

The wedge between 29th Street and Tennyson Street. 

It was a wonderful neighborhood to live in. Most of the houses had  sunny front yards with   large trees in  the backyard.  The houses were all different.  Rock Creek Park was nearby, as were the Maryland suburbs, and the commercial district of Connecticut Avenue.  The people who lived there were often professionals sometimes of a slightly nerdy bent.  We lived next to a congressman, and nearby lived Frank Wilson, the treasury agent who nailed Al Capone on tax evasion.  We went  to Lafayette Elementary School and attended church at Blessed Sacrament.  People who lived there at  time often talked about Chico the tennis coach, or Curly the grocery deliveryman at the Broad Branch market.  They  would speak fondly of   the Lafayette Annual School Fair.  At the Blessed Sacrament church there  was Father Jennings who was "hip to the young people".  TOn Connecticut avenue there was a  People's Drug Store and the Avalon movie theater. In the early 1970's  they had just built  a  new  library and community center.

Eventually, for a variety reasons my parents decided in the early 1970's to move to  a newly built house in Rockville, MD.    Surprisingly, the  Upper Chevy Chase neighborhood really hasn't changed too much in the almost 50 years since I lived there. It's a little more multi-cultural and the property values have skyrocketed but the actual changes to the neighborhood are mostly cosmetic -the stores have different names, the trees even taller.  Lafayette is bigger -it's once  black top playfields  are  now covered with school room additions even as the original brick structure of old school  remains.  One thing that  did change was the playground in  the Lafayette Park.  At the time I lived  there - there were large concrete pipes to play on and big wooden storage boxes that you could  climb on top of. Those  have all been  demolished, but typically the small summer camp building next to the tennis courts still remain as does the ballfield  oval on the  Lafayette school  grounds.  I still think of this area fondly.

Summer Camp Building at Laftayette

Related links:
Historic Chevy Chase DC
Baist's DC real estate atlas, 1919
Hidden clues reveal Old Roads in Chevy Chase D.C. An article by Eric Fielder
History of Rockshire Development 

Originally written/published January 2019 by J.C.Bernhardt

Nasa's Winter Curse

NASA's winter curse in the sign of Aquarius!

Ever heard of the "NASA's Winter Curse"? All of the major fatal accidents in the US Space Program have occurred in the Winter and within 27 to the 32nd days of the calendar year.

The crew of Apollo 1 Virgil Grissom, Edward White and Roger Chaffee died in a training pad accident on 27 January 1967.


 The Challenger crew of Francis "Dick" Scobee, Michael J. Smith, Ronald McNair, Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnik, Ellison Onizuka, and Christa McAuliffe died after liftoff on 28 January, 1986.

The Columbia crew of Rick D. Husband, William C. McCool, David M. Brown, Kalpana Chawla, Michael P. Anderson, Laurel Clark and Ilan Ramon died on their re-entry into the atmosphere on 1 February 2003.

In all three accidents the   spacecraft was also destroyed...

Of course, that these accidents have occurred at the same time of the year is  partly just a coincidence, and there have been many successful launches and flights under the Aquarius sign. The famous (non-fatal) Apollo 13 accident occurred in April.  I should also note that there were a few other fatal accidents involving American  astronauts that have occurred outside this window of time, but none of these occurred in space or in  spacecraft.




Article about the winter curse

First Aid Kit covers list

The video above is a  video of First Aid Kit  performing a song originally done by Fleet Foxes, it was taped outside their home  in 2008. The song was their breakthrough video.

The  Swedish sister vocal duo, First Aid Kit has made quite a  reputation from performing covers as well as from singing original self written numbers.  Below you will find  list of the covers that they have done usually as live performances, Radio&TV appearances, or the occasional self produced video.
 At least nine songs, "Tiger Mountain Peasant Song", "Walk Unafraid", "Universal Soldier", "America", "Gloomy Sunday" , "On the Road Again" , "Come Give Me Love" and "When I Grow Up' have been formally released by the group as recordings but most of the songs have not been formally released as recordings. Among their most praised performances are their  three appearances at Polar Music Prize ceremonies  performing songs written by Emmylou Harris, Paul Simon and Patti Smith. In 2021, the group added a whole album of Leonard Cohen songs to their list of released cover songs.

Some of their covers are straight forward attempts at duplicating the original song such as "Crazy for You"- their Heart cover.   Many of their covers are different from the originals simply because they are women  performing songs originally performed by men.   However, many of their most potent covers change the song in fundamental ways such as the "Tiger Mountain Pleasant Song". Sometimes, First Aid Kit manages to  mutate itself into something different  such as in their trance-like version  of  "Dancing Barefoot".

All they do cover  current  songs on occasion, a surprisingly large number of their songs come from country rock and folk performers of the 1960's and 1970's.  First Aid Kit seem to prefer covering acts that are genuine and who lack artifice.

It is quite rare to hear vocal harmony today-especially by singers who match so well together..  The other refreshing  aspect of this act is their willingness to perform acoustically pretty much  alone, and live.  More than once I  have been blown away by their songs-and performances and  I can tell you that a rare thing nowadays.

Note: The act listed in parenthesis is the most famous person to record the song.  A few of  First Aid  Kit's covers were  performed   in collaboration with other acts. A few of the covers are only snippets of songs.   I have listed   72 songs here, though I believe there are a few more. In 2019, The group performed a whole Christmas concert with covers many of which they hadn't done before, but many of those songs haven't been shared on the internet.   I haven't included the dozen or so recordings by artists that First Aid Kit  perform backing vocals on. 

America (Simon and Garfunkel)
Angel From Montgomery (John Prine) 2020
Awake My Soul (Mumford and Suns)

Blue Christmas (Elvis)

Blues Run the Game (Jackson Frank)
Chandelier (Sia) 

Chelsea Hotel no 2 (Leonard Cohen)
Christmas TV (Slow Club)

Chiquitita (ABBA )

Colorado Girl  (Townes Van Zandt)

Come Me Give Me Love" (Ted Gardestad)

Complainte pour Ste. Catherine (McGarrigles)

Crazy On You (Heart)
Dancing Barefoot  (Patti Smith )

Devil in Disguise (Flying Burrito Brothers)

Diamonds and Rust (Joan Baez )

Enter the Ninja (Die Antwoord)
Fairytale of New York (Pogues)

Gloomy Sunday (Billie Holiday)

Hallelujah (Leonard Cohen)

Harvest (Neil Young)
Happy X-Mas (War is Over) John Lennon
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (Judy Garland)

Heart Like a Wheel (McGarrigle’s)

I Could Be The One (Avicii)

If It Be Your Will (Leonard Cohen)

It Ain't Me Babe (Bob Dylan )

It Hurts Me Too (Elmore James)
It Must Have Been Love (Roxette)
I Walk the Line (Johnny Cash)

Kathy's Song ( Simon & Garfunkel ) 

Love Interruption (Jack White)

Moving Up (Primal Scream)  
No Tears Left To Cry (Ariana Grande)

On The Road Again (Willie Nelson)

One More Cup Of Coffee (Bob Dylan)

Over the Rainbow (Judy Garland)

Perfect Places (Lorde)
Play With Fire (Rolling Stones)
Random Rules (Silver Jews)

Red dirt girl (Emmylou Harris)
River (Joni Mitchell)
Running Up That Hill (Kate Bush)
Runs in the Family  (The Roches)

Sån’t är livet (Anita Lindblom, Roy Hamilton)

Seven Nation Army (Redstripes)

Side of the road (Lucinda Williams)

Simple Man (Graham Nash)

Song for Zula ( Phosphorescent) 

Stand by your man (Tammy Wynette)

Still Feeling Blue (Gram Parsons)

Subterranean Homesick Blues (Bob Dylan)

Talk to Me Of Mendocino  (McGarrigles)

The Gambler (Kenny Rogers )

The Partisan   (Leonard Cohen)

The Rose (Bette Midler)
There's A Light (Beth Nielson Chapman)

The Swallow  Song (Richard & Mimi Farina)

Thinking Out Loud (Ed Sheeran )

This Land is Your Land (Woody Guthrie)

Those Memories of you (Trio)

Tiger Mountain Peasant Song (Fleet Foxes)

Universal Soldier (Buffy-Sainte Marie)

Visa vid midsommartid  (Anita Lindblom)

Waiter at the Station (Willy Mason)

Waiting Around to Die (Townes Van Zandt) 

Walk Unafraid (R.E.M)

War Pigs (Black Sabbath )

Waterloo Sunset (The Kinks) 

Went to War (Amason cover)

We're Going To Be Friends (White Stripes)

What's The Point (Johnossi)

When I Grow Up (Fever Ray)
White Winter Hymnal (Fleet Foxes)

Who By Fire (Leonard Cohen)

Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone? (Carter family)

With God on Our Side (Bob Dylan)

"Dancing Barefoot", First Aid Kit's Patti Smith cover played at the Polar Music Prize ceremony.

(This post was originally published July 2, 2017 and has been updated regularly since then as the group covers new songs). Written by J.C.Bernhardt

A short history of the American guitarist, Jen Turner (updated)

Jen Turner playing  bass at the Coachella Festival.

She appears to have come out of New Jersey. She was born about 1971, Her first instrument was the piano, but at some point she was also a ardent drummer playing in drum circles.  As a teenager, she hitched around the country for four months to learn to play guitar. 

   

Jen Turner performing at the Meadowlands in 1995 with Natalie Merchant.

Somehow in early twenties, she  ended up being picked to play lead guitar on Natalie Merchant’s debut solo album, Tigerlily. That is where her  biggest  commercial success occurs with her playing some just  amazing guitar on the album's  songs, most notably on "Carnival" and "Wonder".   Turner  was so good that she was almost upstaging  Merchant. After two years she ended up leaving the Merchant backing band and formed her own group, Furslide  in 1997.

Furslide, which she fronted as lead singer and guitarist  also  included  Jason Lader and Adam MacDougall. They  released their debut album titled Adventure in fall 1998 and played a few shows subsequently in the US, the UK and all across Europe ( opening for Lenny Kravitz on October 8, 1998 in Detroit, they also where the support act for Kula Shaker, Alanis Morissette and Ben Folds). In 1999 they dissolved, not having been commercially successful. 

In 2001 and 2002 she made two excellent albums as lead singer with a new group, called Inner, the  group also included Erica Quitzow, Samuel Omeechevaria and Fabien Waltmann. These two records  were released on her own independent record label, Caboose Music.

Inner's first release was  an EP called Dog Demos in 2001.The demos  were supposedly all recorded in one take.  They released a full length album,  Lovetheonlyway in 2002. This may be her best work up to now-vocally she sounds like Jane Siberry here. The songs here   are  very introspective, raw, confessional and original sounding. What struck me is how the  lyrics kept going in unexpected places. 

Jen Turner  appears to have kept  a lower profile for a few years in the middle 2000’s. Since 2007 she has mostly worked in bands where she is not the front person. Perhaps, an understandable approach since she is a better instrumentalist than vocalist, but a little more frustrating for those trying to pick her "musical voice" out of the competing voices of the band she is working in. She  worked on two albums playing guitar  with Joseph Arthur and the Lonely Astronauts.  Those albums are called Let’s Just Be (2007) and Temporary People (2008).

 

In 2009 she was  documented doing  some live work in the style of Inner at a gig at the Living Room in New York City.

Around 2009 or 2010  she joined Here We Go Magic and was with them for their second and third albums. This was her blond period.  With this group she played bass and keyboards. She   produced their 2010 album, Pigeons (released June 2010) and was also with for them for  their album,   Different Ship in 2012.   She left that band abruptly in a airport in a misunderstanding over sausages.

In 2012  she engineered (and played drums on!) the album,  In Limbo, by the group Teen. I can't think of too many people who went from guitar to bass/keyboards to engineer/drums over the space of a few albums. Yes, multi-instumentalists have done all these at once on albums, but to go from specific role to another role-that's unusual.

For a time  in  the 2010's  she  worked in a side project  called Thrillionaire which features another female singer, Henrietta Tiefenthaler, they sang lush psychedelic melodies over German Krautrock beats. She also did  some concerts recently as part of a group called Alamar. 

 

Thrillionaire 

In 2013/she was  in a duo  called  Exclamation Pony with  Brit Ryan Jarman (who’s regular band is the Cribs) in  late 2013,they released a single   called "Pseudo Individual".

In 2015, she joined up with the group High Desert Fires. Bun-headed Chris Traynor fronts the band, sings and plays guitar. Jen  plays  guitar and sings. Gabriella Da Silva  sings, Taylor McLam plays drums and  sings, Drew Broadrick plays piano and sings,   Sibyl Buck plays the bass and sings and  Naren Rauch is a multi instrumentalist.  Jen worked with Sibyl Buck before in the Lonely Astronauts. Chris Traynor is similar to Jen in that he has a long experience in various bands (most notably Bush), and plays more than one instrument.

 Jen makes a short appearance in a new documentary about the Tigerlily album that was released as part of a new Natalie Merchant release called, Paradise Is There. See link below...

http://www.nonesuch.com/journal/nonesuch-natalie-merchant-paradise-is-there-new-tigerlily-recordings-dvd-2015-08-13

Recently, she  produced a new album by NYC trio, American Anyman.

What little I have read about  Jen Turner as a person suggests that she is a humble and kind person with a free spirit.  Her  music career has been a unique mix of  continuing reinvention and great mystery.

 There are rumors that Jen  is working on solo material-here's hoping!

 Chest Rockwell's video upload of "Carnival"-
 https://vimeo.com/218876480

Also at Felpin's Pond: Fanny-the first all women rock band to hit the Top 40

Natalie Merchant - Carnival (1995) E. Rutherford, NJ

Romina Power -A short bio in English!

I first saw Romina Power  in the  movie Justine, and was enchanted with her
youthful good looks.  It turns out she is daughter of  the late American
actor, Tyrone Power.  Her mother was an Mexico actress. Although Romina
has lived throughout the world, most of her singing and acting career
has been conducted in Italian. Usually she sings with Al Bano,who was for
long time was her husband.  He was also  father to her children. He's
the better singer, but she looks more dazzling.   I was  intrigued that I
have never heard of her. (Her singing career was not successful outside of Europe).  In her spare time she writes novels.

This  is is her in the movie, Justine