Oceans - Allison Crowe and Band - Heirs + Grievances

“A Mari Usque Ad Mare”. Canada’s motto well frames the dominion of Allison Crowe – “from sea to shining sea”. From her birth in the harbour city of Nanaimo, BC on the Pacific coast to her creative years at home in Corner Brook, NL on Atlantic shores there’s a vast expanse of beauty.

Crowe’s approach to music-making, along with bandmates Céline Greb aka Lin Lin, Billie Woods, Sarah White and Dave Baird – on record and on-stage – is so true, as well, that in an industry of processed audio and calculated everything, the sound of Allison Crowe and Band is refreshingly real as that of the natural world.

Diving further into the just-released album, “Introducing / Heirs + Grievances”, take a swim now in “Oceans”:

Oceans - Allison Crowe and Band - Heirs + Grievances from Allison Crowe on Vimeo.

http://music.allisoncrowe.com/album/heirs-grievances

"Muruch.com Presents: Allison Crowe"

In 1999 a teen-aged Allison Crowe was already building her legend as a musician – radiating from her birthplace of Nanaimo, BC to perform in nightclubs and bars up and down Vancouver Island on Canada’s Pacific coast.

That same year, across the continent in the USA, a West Virginia-based poet and cultural commentator was launching one of the first, and now longest-running, legal-mp3 music websites. Under the banner of “Murúch”, the Irish word for “mermaid”, pioneering Editor/Head Writer Vic and her team of writers and photographers still plumb the currents of music, books, film and other arts.

“Murúch’s RSS feed is syndicated on Hype Machine, Elbo.ws, Livejournal, Facebook and Twitter… The site has been featured on VH1’s Best Week Ever Blog, The Woodstock Film Festival website, MSN’s Money Central Blog, Technorati’s Top 100 Music Blogs and The Guardian’s website.” Rolling Stone has reposted the site’s content, and its reviews are quoted “in countless press releases, Amazon and Wikipedia pages and even album liner notes”. Cited, as well, by the University of Maryland as an example of excellent critical writing – the fuller story of Murúch can be found @ http://www.muruch.com/about and http://www.muruch.com/2000/07/muruchhistory.html

Along their courses, sometime before Allison Crowe migrated to Canada’s Atlantic shores, making her home in Corner Brook, Newfoundland a decade ago, “Murúch” discovered Allison and has been a steadfast champion of her music ever since.

Mutual admiration and respect has grown through the years such that Allison’s honoured to be described these days as Murúch’s “musical mascot”.

“Muruch.com Presents: Allison Crowe” is a digital album, coming very soon, comprising the blog’s personal favourites from Allison’s recorded repertoire. Curated by Murúch, it’s a 21-song playlist that’s, both, passionately individual and universal.

Cover art is also by Muruch.com – pictured here on the album’s front is the entrance to Newgrange, the great national monument of Ireland that predates Stonehenge and the pyramids of Egypt. Photographed this Summer in County Meath, the triskele symbols on the giant stone carry forward from pre-Celtic and Celtic times to our age (even giving design to the centre-piece adapters for vinyl “45” RPM recordings).

It’s apt entry point for the intersection of 15+ years rocking and rolling by Allison Crowe and Muruch.com.

This Little Bird

Chiming from “Sylvan Hour”, Allison Crowe’s newest, classic, release is “This Little Bird”. Born on the Pacific, in the Harbour City of Nanaimo, BC, Canada – Crowe migrated to lovely Corner Brook, Newfoundland, on Atlantic shores right after recording this batch of songs. The bi-coastal musician’s creative flight shows she’s made good on her promise: “This little bird’s gonna see the good life has to offer / and how you can give your heart and still feel free”.


This Little Bird from Allison Crowe on Vimeo.

Accompanying Allison Crowe’s music on this video journey are scenes from “The Song of the Birds” – 1935 entry in the ‘Color Classics’ animation series of Fleischer Studios.

          

Summer side of life - new album hatching

For those of us living in the northern hemisphere, Summer is nearing its end - and Autumn/Fall starts to reveal itself.

For me, it's a season of musical revelation.

Allison has started to create her next album. She travels from Canada's Atlantic coast to the Pacific in about two weeks' time to record her fellow musicians - Billie Woods, on acoustic guitar; Dave Baird on electric and acoustic bass; and Laurent Boucher on percussion.

These are the band-members who've toured with Allison in 2009.

There'll be an electric guitarist, joining the group on about three songs. Right now Alley is working with a brilliant, and incredibly sympathetic, orchestrator. One of the big questions at the beginning of this process was - how would the strings and orchestral elements Allison was hearing on several songs be realized?

We've learned over the years, that it's like alchemy, the joining of art and science (in the form of technical engineering/production). It's a magic that calls for invention, serendipity, inspiration.

It's early on, two songs in to what promises to be a 12 song collection - but, I'm hearing it.



Sir George Martin talks about The Beatles' recording art - listen here

My Dad made buttons for my brothers, sister and myself that said "I am a Beatle" and I was happily wearing that more than forty years ago, before I'd learned to ride a bicycle.

At this moment, I feel the same excitement that stirred when George Martin (now Sir) got together with those four lads from Liverpool.

Much more to come ( :