The Almighty Oracle

Follow this link and you’ll find 4 songs specially recorded for the Daytrotter session. Two are from the new album Red Letter Year while the other two are “oldies” : Subdivision (off Revelling/Reckoning – 2001) and Coming Up (off Imperfectly – 1992).

Ani live back in November 2007, Ancienne Belgique, Brussels, Belgium

Those live recordings remind me how much I love Ani DiFranco’s music. For the wonderfulness of her live work. Of course her studio albums are necessary and each has a different personality that will fit a certain mood. There have been some of these albums I couldn’t listen to entirely because they were too intense somehow but they grew on me as I grew up too and when I met these albums again down the path, I couldn’t believe I had missed out on them for so long.

Present/Infant [Daytrotter Session] : 

Right now I feel disappointed by Red Letter Year. Mostly because Knuckle Down and Reprieve were two simple albums of guitars, upright bass and drums accompanying Ani’s lyrics. But the 2008 release is known as Ani’s most collaborative to date and that doesn’t work too well for me. The sound on the more produced songs appears as muffled, with too many layers – and while I do like layers in songs, here they almost annihilate one another.

I guess it’ll grow on me like the rest. But the only thing I can’t really get is why have Allison Miller (who’s one of my favourite drummers) on drums and make it sounds like she was playing 400 miles away from where the songs were recorded? It takes away the whole point. All I want to do now is buy my ticket to see Ani, Allison, Todd and Mike live in Frankfurt, Germany on October 25th and get reconciliated with how music is at its best : live!

Allison Miller live back in November 2007, Ancienne Belgique, Brussels, Belgium

If you live on the Lille, France – Mons/Bergen, Belgium – Liège/Luik, Belgium – Aachen, Germany – Köln, Germany – Frankfurt, Germany imaginary line, I’ll be driving by so if you want to join, you’re welcome!

mel :: Sep.24.2008 :: Allison Miller, Ani DiFranco, DayTrotter Session, Mike Dillon, Todd Sickafoose :: 5 Comments »

Ani DiFranco is prolific. But her last album already dates back to early 2006 [yes, I know there's been Canon in 2007 but there wasn't any new songs on there - re-worked versions don't count] so it’s about time something brand new comes out.

Red Letter Year – the 20th! album – will come out on September 30th. It features 12 tracks, Todd Sickafoose, Mike Dillon and Allison Miller plus guests.

Here’s  Smiling Underneath, first song to appear on Ani’s myspace. I like the song but I’m waiting for the rest of the album to really see the whole picture.

mel :: Aug.05.2008 :: Allison Miller, Ani DiFranco, Song of the Day, Todd Sickafoose :: No Comments »

If you couldn’t/can’t make it to any of the shows of Ani DiFranco’s tour, here’s a video podcast of her session at the Interface in AOL’s Spinner.com.

She plays Both Hands, Present/Infant, You Had Time and Shameless. Of course her current partners in crime came along : Todd Sickafoose on bass and Allison Miller on drums. It’s a pretty good performance with a nice interview afterwards.

mel :: Oct.21.2007 :: Allison Miller, Ani DiFranco, Todd Sickafoose, Video :: 2 Comments »

Driving to and in Brussels is always a real adventure during which I almost inevitably end up losing myself. Last Thursday was no exception, only I knew it beforehand so I made it to the venue half an hour before the doors where scheduled to open. And only 3 people were there waiting in line. That was odd since last time there were many die-hard fans glued to the doors ready to rush in to grab the best seat available.

This time I calmly walked in the Ancienne Belgique, made myself comfortable in one of the back seats and I waited until 07:40pm to walk up to the very front row, that is exactly having your elbows on the stage. 08:00pm sharp, Hamell On Trial takes the stage with his overly political yet fun folk/rock. He checked on the connection with the audience bashing George W. Bush, to which everyone cheered. So he then knew we were all very receptive to what he had to say. Continue Reading »

mel :: Oct.13.2007 :: Allison Miller, Ani DiFranco, Concert Review, Hamell On Trial, Photos, Todd Sickafoose :: No Comments »