James Velvet
Wide Awake In My Head
remakes,
retakes,
& other odd fish
1989-2003
Total Time: 50:53
Cost: $9.98 +s/h*
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Credit Cards and PayPal
Read Our Review
STYLE: Americana
Roots / Rock-n-Roll
HOME TOWN: New
Haven, CT.
New England, USA
Visit James Velvet's WEB
SITE
Get James Velvet GIG INFO
James Velvet
Frank Critelli puts James Velvet
"On The Sofa" for
an interview,
read it HERE.
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1. Wide Awake (#1)
2. Sittin' On A Fence
3. She Comes And Goes (#1)
4. Lazy Me
5. Gouty Arthritis
6. Dark Wind (#2)
7. Corrina Gets Away (#1)
8. Saint Cecelia (Beautiful Name) (#2)
9. Ordinary Time ...a young widow's lament...
10. I Miss You (#2)
11. The Kindness Of Friends (#2)
12. She Comes And Goes (#3)
13. Turned Around
14. Slow Down Time
15. What I Said (#1)
16. In My Head
Check out James Velvet's
NEW CD - Just Plain Jane and
Other Modest
Proposals
& also his CD - Bones
'n Clones
Check out James Velvet's band -
The
Mocking Birds
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Issue
#72
Mar. '05
How do you ramble?
People have many ways to ramble. Vocally,
physically, mentally they roam, they wander,
they stroll and they spread aimlessly – some in no particular
direction and others
with a somewhat cloaked idea, while vaguely feigning indifference.
While some will argue
that the last example is not compliant to rambling, I would disagree on
a personal level,
see, I ramble, and I ramble in many of the ways I just cited (and
possibly a few more at
that), but one of my most structured (if not oxymoronic) rambling is
the type I do through
music. I tend to, and love to, ramble through music, I allow it to take
me where it may, I
willingly follow as it roams and wanders in, out, and over life in the
unlimited ways it
can. But, you take a gamble when you ramble through music, for it has a
way of creating a
distinct destination which then defeats the purpose, for if your
goal/intent is a true
ramble then you must leave yourself open to wherever the music will
take you and if
you’ve cued up an album of a precise manifestation then
what’s the point? (note:
while not intending to dis the benefits of structured listening
experiences – because
we love those as well – I am offering up this synopsis as a
purely unique argument
for the innate need to ramble).
So, how do you ramble?
James Velvet
rambles through music, yet
while I ramble through music from the sole position of listening, James Velvet rambles through music by
creating it,
and he surely creates it from his vast experiences of listening to it,
of living it, and
of becoming part of it. James Velvet
has
rambled on the turntable of life and not only allowed the grooves to
take him where they
may, but also left a mark on those grooves so that when another needle
tracks on through
it can ramble along with him.
Wide Awake In My
Head is a musical ramble
that touches everywhere from Holly to Costello. While slightly
structured as a
chronological retrospective, it strolls through time with one of the
most proficient
singer/songwriters that New Haven, CT has been able to call
it’s own for over the
last decade and a half. Subtitled “remakes,
retakes, & other odd fish,” Wide
Awake
In My Head allows us to wander through the basement and attic
of the years 1989-2003:
years which yielded cassette EPs, cassette albums, cassingles, and CDs
- the majority with
Velvet’s long standing institution The
Mocking Birds, but also including solo
outings with guests that include many of the New Haven scene royalty.
And while rambling
through this basement and attic we find not just the diamonds in the
rough, but the
polished ones as well.
“Sometimes
after recording a song I feel
that it needs a second or even a third chance to find itself.”
So states Velvet
in the liner notes. In essence, James Velvet
believes that just like us human beings, sometimes a song needs to
ramble in order to
fully appreciate and understand its life – to find itself.
And as a human being, James Velvet
needed to ramble through all these
remakes, retakes, & other odd fish to not only find where the
music has led him, but
also to find that the music has led him to find himself as well.
Because here on display
is the James Velvet that loves to
ramble
through music, the inner creative Velvet that most may have not
actually noticed before.
While 10+ years of recording and releasing CDs combined with
uncountable live gigs
(including an unheard of 11 year run of monthly appearances at Café 9) made James one of the
best known
stalwarts of the New Haven music scene, this collection exposes more of
the man in 50
minutes than all those years combined. And it is all those years of
musical ramblings that
make this a document of profound proportion.
Firmly anchored in Americana roots rock, the
music Velvet creates and recreates on
these 16 (alternate/rare) tracks rambles through influences as varied
as any found
throughout the years. It’s a complete testament to the
wandering soul of a musician
who writes lyrics that center around the appreciation of love, the
beauty of nature, and
what some would term the left leaning politics of the anti-war,
peace-loving, sub-culture
of the 60s. Wide Awake In My Head
roams and
wanders in, out, and over life in the unlimited ways that James Velvet allows it to, and as such
created
an enlightening ramble through the historic influence of American music.
So, how do you ramble?
I put on Wide
Awake In My Head.
Ramble on James, ramble on.
Wide
Awake In My Head by James
Velvet.
Is available now for: $9.98 +s/h*
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