Free Download Friday #70: Amazon MP3s

I used to see Tweets and links on a semi-regular basis promising free downloads from Amazon. Unfortunately, when I followed the links, they took me to Amazon USA and the downloads were unavailable in the UK.

However, Amazon UK are now giving away a number of free MP3 downloads and have a dedicated page listing the currently available crop. Huzzah!

Tom Jones
Originally uploaded by itzpapalotl

The stand-out track for me (and I never thought I'd hear myself say this) is from Tom Jones! Now if you are thinking Delilah - forget that. Or if you are thinking of the more modern covers like Kiss - forget that too! The track on offer is called Burning Hell and is from his new album Praise & Blame. I have heard rumours that the record company was worried by this album when he delivered it to them because it was such a departure from what he had done before. If this is true, it is further proof that record company executives are idiots!

The album comprises largely of gospel covers and reminds me more of Johnny Cash than of Tom Jones. Burning Hell is an outstanding track. I have never bought a Tom Jones album (although over the years I've acquired some of his classic tracks) but on the strength of this track, I am very tempted to get Praise & Blame. Burning Hell has a stripped down production with raw bluesy guitar and drums with Sir Tom Jones groaning the lyrics with passion and power. Take it away Tom: "I'm goin' down to the church house, get down on bended knee..."

Other tracks on the Amazon free download page that I think are worth listening to include:

• Faster (Live From Hammersmith Working Men's Club) - Manic Street Preachers
• Wake Up Call - Maroon 5

And five tracks from Bush:

• Glycerine (Acoustic)
• Swallowed [Goldie/Toasted Both Sides Please Mix]
• A Tendency To Start Fires
• Testosterone
• Warm Machine

But the standout track is Burning Hell. Download it, and download it now!

Band iPhone Apps #2: Spınal Tap

This is the second post in a sequence leading up to a review of the Rush iPhone App. The first post, Band iPhone Apps #1: Peter Gabriel, was some weeks ago but hopefully I'll manage to find time to do the rest without such a large gap between posts. (Famous last words!)

Stonehenge!
Originally uploaded by Der Ohlsen

This review is of the Spınal Tap App. If you've never hear of Spınal Tap, I would strongly recommending that you beg, borrow or buy a copy of This Is Spınal Tap, a mockumentary about a fictional heavy metal band... Well, I say "fictional" but they have released a number of albums and have toured and played bigger venues than some real bands.

Recently, they released an album called Back From The Dead which is supposed to be a reunion album to mark the 25th anniversary of the making of the film. It is described as "unwigged and unplugged". Brilliant! This app is connected with the Back From The Dead album and tour. It has seven (full) tracks from the band and you can comment on the tracks and share the fact that your listening to them on the iPhone App by text, Twitter, facebook, etc. As well as the music there is a fan wall (where you can leave messages and photos), and a news section (although the most recent "news" is a year old). Finally, there is a More... section with Photos, Videos, a discography, biography and more.

It's not without its problems, for example, the outdated news section and the fact that most of the links to the videos are broken. However, for the price (free) it is still well worth checking out. And if you really want to see the videos (and more beside) they seem to be available on the Tap's YouTube channel.

Free Download Friday #69: From last.fm

I am a long time user of last.fm (although I've not been particularly active of late - other than Scrobbling what I listen to on my iPod) and although I have posted about last.fm before, I've not passed on any of their free downloads for a while. This post fixes that!

Miss The Occupier
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

First up is Miss the Occupier - the band with my wife's friend in it. Last.fm is offering Dead Pirates as a free download. Not as strong as The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, in my humble opinion, but jolly good nonetheless. Jangly guitars and vocals with attitude.

Nine Inch Nails are another band I've featured here before and they have, Me, I'm Not (grimmless mix), available on last.fm. It is a very sparse arrangement which really only features Trent's vocals and a muted piano track. Despite the lack of noisy guitars and industrial noise - I like this mix.

And while you are checking out the remixed track, you could also try In This Twilight (Collapse) another remix of a Nine Inch Nails track and also available as a free download. This one has a much bigger sound - lots of ambient keyboards under the vocals. Two contrasting views of NIN - both available for free.

Free Download Friday #68: I'll get my cape...

Warning: It's going to get a bit prog this week!

Do you remember AOL? We used to call it Internet Lite and you could have built a small mansion from the free AOL CDs that seemed to fall out of every magazine you picked up. I assumed that it had just withered in the face of the rise of broadband and "proper" Internet providers.

Well, it seems they are still about in some form because this week I found my way to the AOL Radio Blog and in particular, the Free MP3 Downloads they offer. Loads of stuff here and they seem to have started a Free Music Tuesday feature that I'll have to keep an eye on.

Here are some of the downloads that caught my eye:

Hawkwind

Dave Brock Hawkwind 1982 Cornwall
Originally uploaded by Watt_Dabney

Hawkwind were the first band I saw live in concert (see Concert Memories #01: Hawkwind - I must get on with writing more of these concert memories!). AOL are offering Inner Visions from a new album called Blood Of The Earth. Look for the Download Free MP3 link on the AOL site underneath the brief paragraph describing the band. It is a direct link to the mp3 file. And talking about the "brief paragraph", I love their description of the track:

"This song features trippy keyboards and what sounds like an attack from video game spaceships."

If you have never heard Hawkwind, this is a great introduction. They more or less invented Space Rock, and the Inner Visions track is an excellent example of that genre. My copy of Quark, Strangeness and Charm will definitely feature in today's playlist!


Steve Hackett

I make no secret of my love for Gabriel era Genesis and Steve Hackett is from the same vintage - a key player in defining that early Genesis sound. The track on offer from AOL is Fire On The Moon. (From Space-rock to Fire On The Moon...Do you see what I did there?) This is an outstandingly good track. Quiet, contemplative start and then the chorus kicks in! Big drums, atmospheric keyboards, bombastic bass line, vox humana, kitchen sink... and about halfway through a great guitar solo from Mr Hackett (with the promise of another to come at the end).

My only problem is the vocals are slightly weak but otherwise this is a great track. Well worth the price of a free download!


Asia

An artist of a similar vintage is Asia.

I really like Yes and therefore have always felt that I ought to like Asia more than I do... But somehow they never grab me. This track, Finger On The Trigger, is good but I'm not sure it inspires me enough to go and look for songs I'd have to pay for.


And finally...

Now for something completely different.

I'm not sure why I had a listen to Kings X. The name sounded familiar but when I looked at my iTunes collection I didn't have anything of their songs. (Perhaps I got confused with Symphony X?) However, this track, from Kings X, Alright, I really like! Much more of a straight-forward rock track although according to Wikipedia, the band have prog metal leanings. I'm very tempted to go and find the album this came from and see what the rest of the tracks are like.


Any other suggestions?

That's my pick from the current crop of AOL free downloads. What tracks catch your eye?

Free Download Friday #67: Peter Gabriel

Following on from the review of the Full Moon Club iPhone app, it seemed appropriate to link to a free download from Mr Gabriel.

152/365: I am... Peter Gabriel
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

You can Download 'Here Comes The Flood' from Peter Gabriel's Guitar Center Session. Here Comes The Flood is a song from his first solo album: Peter Gabriel Vol.1 and was always one of my favourites. Recently he has been doing a stripped back version of it that, like much of Gabriel's work, has grown on me with repeated listens.

If you are a fan of Mr Gabriel, you might also be interested in The Voice Project that one of his daughters is involved with. The project is working with women in and around Northern Uganda. There are opportunities to make a donation and support the work they are doing but they see the project as doing more than just charity work.

One of the most prominent aspects of the website is the cover chains. One artist records a cover song and the artist covered has to record another cover to pass on the challenge. For example, the Gulu Women's Choir in Northern Uganda were videoed singing a Joe Purdy song, he recorded something by REM, Mike Mills (from REM) then recorded a Billy Brag song and Billy recorded something from Joanna Newsom.

Peter Gabriel is currently featuring at the end of a chain with his cover of a Tom Waits song:

Peter Gabriel » Tom Waits from The Voice Project on Vimeo.

I hope Mr Waits picks up the challenge!

What are your favourites from the chains on display so far?

Band iPhone Apps #1: Peter Gabriel

When I started this post, I intended to write a review of the Rush iPhone App. However, I thought I'd start by describing a couple of other band Apps first to set the scene and show what other artists are doing with their music Apps. Unfortunately, my brief reviews got longer and longer... so I decided to split this post over a few days and build up to the Rush review!

I'll start with Peter Gabriel's iPhone App. I am a huge fan of Gabriel era Genesis and have loved pretty much everything he has done since he went solo. I have also been lucky enough to see him live a couple of times and his most recent gig in Glasgow is one of my favourite concert experiences ever.

One of his latest ideas is the Scratch My Back project, where he has recorded covers of other artist's songs. A fairly standard idea except that he has invited these artists to cover one of his songs in return. Of course, being the type of musician he is, he had to make it more difficult for himself, so his recordings are arranged without drums or guitar! The resultant recordings are fascinating: some grabbed me straight away; some have grown on me; a few I'm still working on. But all of them are interesting.

What has that got do do with iPhone Apps though? Well having released his album of covers, he is now releasing the covers of his songs that others have done and has produced an App that gives details of each pair of songs; a video of Peter talking about the track and artist he covered; and a short snippet of the other artist's cover. His fan/website is called the Full Moon Club, so the App is also called Full Moon Club. A new cover is released every month, on the night of the full moon, and when it is released, information, videos and a short sample of each track appears in the App.

It is a straightforward App that doesn't do anything particularly fancy but does what it does, very well. The video introductions are fascinating and give a real insight into the process of producing the covers. You can probably find most of the information on Gabriel's website, but having it collected together in an App makes it much easier to navigate on your phone. Very useful!

The App is not without its problems. For instance, you can't access David Byrne's cover of I Can't Remember from June because of a problem with scrolling (although you can hear it in full on Peter's site or preview it on iTunes). Also, there hasn't been an update since June... but perhaps he's too busy with the tour because there hasn't been an ...And I'll Scratch Yours release since June either.

Despite these two niggles, I would not hesitate to recommend this free App to fans and non fans alike. Gabriel is never less than interesting and this App lets you glimpse some of the creative processes behind his work. He has always pushed at musical and technological boundaries and it is great to see the use of new technology from an established artist.

Picture credit: Screendump from iPhone App.

Free Download Friday #66: Back after a long holiday...

It's been a long time since Free Download Friday #65 so I'll through in a few from Classic Rock Tracks of the Day that I didn't pick up because I was on holiday, and then one from Planet Rock... just because I like it! So without further ado:

Seraphina from GUN. I've featured GUN before (Free Download... er... Tuesday?) when they were showcasing their new singer, Toby Jepson. Well they have another new singer (to lose one singer is unfortunate but to lose two...) and another free download to let people hear what he's like. I would say that the new vocalist, Dante Gizzi (previously the bass player - so is that promotion?), acquits himself admirably. The track is let down a bit by poor lyrics, especially the oft repeated chorus, but otherwise it sounds great and rewards repeated listens.

Portrait Of Red by The Virginmarys. This caught my eye initially because I saw the name and got confused. I thought it was Electric Mary, a band that I had heard a bit and liked. However, I discovered I liked this track from The Virginmarys and I will need to see what else I can find by them. (Note to self: are their other bands with "Mary" in there name that are worth checking out? See Paint it Black for similar phenomenon with "Black".) The band are a relatively new three-piece and all three of them seem to be going flat out. The is a snarl in the vocals and power and energy in the music. Well worth checking out if you like your rock raw and raucous! Final note: in a bizarre bit of synchronicity, the track offered for download is produced by Toby Jepson!

One Last Soul by Black Country Communion. If you've not been paying attention to the recent rash of supergroups, the name Black Country Communion might not mean much to you, but if I say Glenn Hughes, Jason Bonham, Derek Sherinian, and Joe Bonamassa, maybe I can change your "Who?" to a "Whoo!". I've been wanting to here this group since I heard Joe Bonamassa was involved. As I've mentioned before (see other Joe Bonamassa posts) I am a huge fan of Mr Bonamassa, so I was pleased to see some output from this group available as a free download. On first listen, I was disappointed that Joe's guitar didn't feature more strongly, however, on reflection, that's probably right for a group setting - it's not a solo project. And as a group project, it works. Perhaps the keyboards could feature more strongly but otherwise, everyone gets a chance to show what they can do (including a great solo, or two, from Joe). On the strength of this track, I'd say we have a group worthy of the adjective "super".

Cheat The Gallows by Bigelf. Bigelf have featured here before (Free Download Friday #49: Metal!). I was so impressed with the few bits of Bigelf I'd hear, so I got their album (Cheat The Gallows is available on eMusic). I detect hints of Pink Floyd in this track but heavier and meatier than Floyd.

Last but by no means least, Planet Rock featured The Union (see Free Download Friday #54: Two old hands). Planet Rock were offering a chance to win a concert in your living room from The Union (which you are probably too late to enter) and a free download of Watch The River Flow (which is hopefully still available).

{Sorry. first Friday after the holidays, and I'm a day late. I'd say I'd do better in future but past experience suggests that Free Download Saturdays will still feature on a semi-regular basis!}