Coming Down For You : Joan Shelley - track of the day (thus far!)

Joan Shelley, “Coming Down For You,” Like the River Loves the Sea LP (No Quarter Records, 2019)

Oh we do like Joan don’t we . . . . . . . . . ?

thanks to . . . . . 

O My Soul

AMBERLIT MORNING :: Joan Shelley

So I Will Bid You 'Good-night' with this 

a morning song that works equally as well as a lullaby

 Lullaby from

Joan Shelley

Amberlit Morning (+ Bill Callahan) 

From the new album 

"The Spur" out June 24th, 2022

Directed by Cyrus Moussavi & Brittany Nugent

Camera & Edit by Cyrus Moussavi

Art Direction by Theo Shure

Phoebe Moon Goddess

Sharleen Chidiac

Moon and Star

Bene & Lila Coopersmith

Astronomer

Tatum Talaee

Backdrop and Borders by Laura Tiffin

Satellite Sculptures by Ryan Foerster

Special Thanks to:

Coffey Street Studio (Andromache & Michael)

Nevena Dzamonja

Luis Vera Martinez

Mae Colburn

Filmed in Red Hook, Brooklyn 2022

Raw Music International

THE AQUARIUM DRUNKARD INTERVIEW with ::

 More 

JOAN SHELLEY

Joan Shelly Aquarium Drunkard Interview here . . . .

From the album "The Spur" out June 24th, 2022 Pre-order: smarturl.it/dxxogb

PLAYLIST: What are we Listening to? :: JOAN SHELLEY | The Spur

 https://joanshelley.bandcamp.com/album/the-spur

I want to explain these songs / I want to leave them unexplained. 

We’ve all been working with a lot of silence. 

I was tired from touring, remembering the long drives across the midwestern plains at dusk, against the pale yellow sky seeing the black outline of the horizon with the occasional silhouette of a little farmstead, a corn crib or windmill, beyond, a breaking society, beyond, the aches of a world in pain. 

A powerful tugging between apparently opposite things, hopelessness and resilience, isolation and togetherness, all at once. 

A deep connection to our homeplace, to staying, a complex reckoning with family, with the past, with the rubble, with the wind taken out of everyone’s sails, with new life and constant death. 

We returned to the feral tree farm. 

Raising goats, chickens, listening to birds, watching the river, growing a child. 

A deep clean spring. 

So I started reaching out. Bringing in. 

I wanted these people I admire to be close to me in the game, in the tangle of my emotions, in my unaddressed fears, I wanted them woven into my tapestries, which are songs, because I am...  more

credits

released June 24, 2022 

Produced by James Ekington. Recorded and mixed by Zak Riles at Earthwave Studio, Shelbyville, Kentucky. 

All songs by Joan Shelley with additional lyric contributions from Bill Callahan ("Amberlit Morning"), Katie Peabody ("The Spur"), Max Porter ("Breath For The Boy") 

Joan Shelley - vocals, acoustic and resonator guitars, piano 
Nathan Salsburg - acoustic and electric guitars 
James Elkington - drums, keyboards, dobro, mandola, bass, recorder, percussions 
Meg Baird - vocals (1, 11) 
Bill Callahan - vocals (4) 
Anna Jacobson - brass (5, 6, 10) 
Sean Johnson - drums (12) 
Lia Kohl - cello (1, 6) 
Nick Macri - upright bass (1, 7, 12) 
Spencer Tweedy - drums (5, 10)

license

all rights reserved

Transmissions :: Joan Shelley

Posted on July 6, 2022

On Joan Shelley’s fantastic new album The Spur, the singer/songwriter reaches out from a place of solitude, seeking connection. Rooted in Britfolk aesthetics, it’s an album that feels intimate but spacious too, all finger picked acoustic guitars, Richard Thompson inspired electrics, and sparse percussion.

I love it when Aquarium Drunkard get's all newsletter(ish) . . . . . and today's is no exception. We have mentioned Joan Shelley before thanks to the Aquarium but this is another stellar talent linked to her . . .Mr Nathan Salsburg

Diversions :: Nathan Salsburg / Beyond ‘Third’

Diversions, a recurring feature on Aquarium Drunkard, catches up with our favorite artists as they wax on subjects other than recording and performing.

The first time I heard “Impossible Air,” the third track from Kentucky guitarist Nathan Salsburg’s third lp Third, I was overwhelmed. Though like the other nine songs that accompany it, “Impossible Air” features nothing more than the sound of Salsburg’s unaccompanied acoustic guitar, each low string buzz and striking string bend captured simply and cleanly. Like the best guitar soli, Salsburg’s songs offer a gift to the listener: the gift of space. His songs, formed from elements of ancient American traditons and elegant Celtic ballads, create room to feel, articulating that weird middle ground between melancholy and sweetness. Like Salsburg’s previous works, it’s wonderful, but there’s something new at work here, on his finest album yet, a new sense of lightness and grace.

“The songs that came out — and the songs that are still coming out — there’s an ease,” Salsburg says over the phone from his home in Kentucky, nursing his first cup of morning coffee following a string of West Coast shows with his musical partner Joan Shelley. The years between Third and his last solo record, 2013’s Hard For To Win And Can’t Be Won have found Salsburg on the road and collaborating in the studio with Shelley, James Elkington, Wooden Wand, Bonnie Prince Billy, and others. Working with friends has opened his approach up, and made “the joy of playing more acute and more readily available.”

“My first two records, I felt like they needed to be representatives of some inchoate yearning or the need to express myself in some big way,” Salsburg says. “I say this with some sarcasm, because everyone who plays an instrument wants to do that. But [I was inspired by] the fun of playing with Jim and Joan, and when I came back to doing solo guitar music, I didn’t ask it to do so much, or really anything for me. The fun of playing with those two extended itself into playing solo.”

if you listen to one thing today make it this

then check out the whole article here . . . . . AQD

a worthy post from the wondrous  . . . . . 

Joan Shelley :: Time Has Told Me (Nick Drake)

Covering Nick Drake can be tricky, but Joan Shelley manages just fine with her gorgeous, heartfelt rendition of Five Leaves Left’s lead off track (part of Mojo Magazine’s new tribute to Drake, available gratiswith the March issue). She doesn’t do anything radical with the song — she just lets it breathe, wearing its wistful melancholy like a favorite winter coat. Shelley is back on the road this year, supporting her recent self-titled LP. In fact, for a few dates, she’ll be supporting the guy who played lead guitar on the original “Time Has Told Me” — the mighty Richard Thompson himself, who has been known to cover the tune from time to time. Maybe Joan can coax him onstage for a duet …  words / t wilcox download it here . . . . 

Aquarium Drunkard - Joan Shelley Nick Drake cover here

We like Joan Shelley. We like Nick Drake (a lot). We like Richard Thompson (he's on it - the original that is). We like Aquarium Drunkard

Aquarium Drunkard this morning has posted more about the wonderful Joan Shelley who they introduced me to the other day . . . . . . today they feature a song covering Frank Sinatra rarity 'I Would Be In Love (Anyway)' and the classic Leonard Cohen song 'Night Comes On' (with Will Oldham)  and you should really check it out . . . . . go on you won't regret it

Aquarium Drunkard - Joan Shelly lagniappe sessions

Joan Shelley web

JOAN SHELLEY

One of the reasons I love stalking around the t'interweb is coming across new music, new artists and things I didn't know before. So you can imagine I can spend a heck of a time wandering wondering as there is such a lot to find! This wonderful singer songwriter Joan Shelley I found over at the wonderful Aquarium Drunkard blog

Joan Shelley was recorded with Jeff Tweedy at the Loft in Chicago. Shelley plays guitar, Dobro, baritone ukulele and sings, backed by her longtime guitarist Nathan Salsburg, James Elkington on piano, Dobro, and organ, Tweedy on bass and guitar, and his son, Spencer Tweedy, on drums and percussion. Together, they play sparse and deliberately. Even when things veer toward rocking — like on the Fairport Convention and Pentangle recalling “If the Storms Never Came” or the foreboding “I Got What I Wanted” — the band focuses on accentuating the richness of Shelley’s words and song-craft. They share a vocabulary of Appalachian and English folk elements, interweaving careful but engaging accompaniment into the nooks and corners of Shelley’s songs.

Check her out more. . . . .here