Music Monday: Ernie Halter 90s R&B Acoustic Throwback

Katie July 27, 2015 0 Comments

Shoop
Poison
All My Love
Return of the Mack
I Wanna Know
Always Be My Baby
If I Ever Fall In Love
No Diggity
My Prerogative
Pony
You Make Me Wanna
Waterfalls
I’ll Make Love To You
Weak
This Is How We Do It
Love No Limit

Ernie Halter is one half of my favorite “hid yo kids” remixes… along with Tony Lucca. I think about 5 years ago Antoine Dodson became an internet sensation by telling the news to “hide yo kids, hide you wife” and in true internet fashion it became a song and then Tony Lucca and Ernie Halter did their own remix of the bed intruder song and it is something that I listened to regularly around that time. I love it.

There it is above, in case you want to see what the heck I’m going on about.  Anyway.  Recently Ernie Halter said that he was going to do an album of 90s R&B tracks in a way that only he could.  Knowing what he was capable of from bed intruder and from seeing him live several times, I knew that this was something that I didn’t want to miss out on.

If you love singer/songwriter/broken down acoustic remixes of songs that started out sounding nothing of the sort as much as I do, you’ll love this new album from Ernie! These are some of my favorite songs from my childhood too so it is great to relive that with a bit of a twist!

Music Monday: Josh Groban Stages

Katie July 20, 2015 0 Comments

Pure Imagination (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory)
What I Did For Love (A Chorus Line)
Bring Him Home (Les Miserables)
Le Temps Des Cathedrales (Notre-Dame de Paris)
All I Ask Of You (w/ Kelly Clarkson) (The Phantom of the Opera)
Try To Remember (The Fantasticks)
Over The Rainbow (The Wizard of Oz)
Children Will Listen / Not While I’m Around (Into the Woods / Sweeney Todd)
You’ll Never Walk Alone (Carousel)
Old Devil Moon (ft. Chris Botti) (Finian’s Rainbow)
Finishing the Hat (Sunday in the Park with George)
If I Loved You (w/ Audra McDonald) (Carousel)
Anthem (Chess)

Gold Can Turn To Sand (Kristina)
Empty Chairs at Empty Tables (Les Miserables)

Stages is the 7th studio album from Josh Groban and is made up of songs from Broadway musicals. It came out in April of this year. This is the first album of Josh’s I’ve actually owned, but have always been impressed with his voice. I think my favorite track is Pure Imagination – I loooove Charlie and the Chocolate factory and this is certainly my favorite song from it.  His rendition of Over the Rainbow is pretty great as well!  I’m not really familiar with most of the other musicals featured on this CD (though I did see Les Miserables and was not a fan) but I think that he does them all quite well!

Music Monday: Owl City Unbelievable

Katie July 13, 2015 0 Comments

Although Owl City’s album came out just a few days ago (July 10) today I am just focusing on the single “Unbelievable”.  I’m not really a fan of owl city’s style with the distortion of singing so I’m not sure I’ll bother to review the whole album, but since this track features Hanson I had to mention it.  Though only Isaac gets a songwriting credit on the song, all 3 Hanson’s have a couple lines in the song.

The whistling in the song reminds me a lot of Owl City’s song “Good Time” which he did with Carly Rae Jepsen (who opened for Hanson on their Canadian tour a while back… 6 degrees of Hanson!) I love all the 90s references since I am most definitely a 90s kid.  I think the song is cute.  They even made an animated video for the song – I love the sticker the VHS has at the end! 😉

Music Monday: You + Me rose ave.

Katie July 6, 2015 0 Comments

Capsized
From a Closet in Norway
Gently
Love Gone Wrong
You and Me
Unbeliever
Second Guess
Break the Cycle
Open Door
No Ordinary Love

rose ave is the debut album from You + Me which is made up of Dallas Green and Alecia Moore – most commonly known as P!nk.  I actually didn’t know anything about this CD, but my mom saw Pink on Ellen or some other show talking about it and so she asked for it for Mother’s Day.  It came out in October 2014.  If you’re used to Pink albums, this one is a lot more mellow than what you might be expecting, but her voice is beautiful and and it is a nice change of pace.  Dallas and Pinks voices really sound absolutely wonderful together which is what makes this CD so wonderful.  This CD was recorded almost entirely in one week. Dallas and Pink had thought about collaborating and decided to sit down and see what would happen – they had bits of the album written and booked a studio just in case. Next thing you know – they had an album!  It must have been meant to be.

Music Monday: Jammy Jams Little Headbangers 4: Sunset Strip Goes Lullaby

Katie June 29, 2015 0 Comments

Round and Round (Lullaby Rendition of RATT)
Dance the Night Away (Lullaby Rendition of Van Halen)
Kickstart my Heart (Lullaby Rendition of Motley Crue)
Sweet Child O’ Mine (Lullaby Rendition of Guns N Roses)
Wild Child (Lullaby Rendition of W.A.S.P)
I Won’t Forget You (Lullaby Rendition of Poison)
Cum On Feel The Noize (Lullaby Rendition of Quiet Riot)
Heaven (Lullaby Rendition of Warrant)
Too Young To Fall In Love (Lullaby Rendition of Motley Crue)
Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love (Lullaby Rendition of Van Halen)

I cannot get enough of these Jammy Jams. Maybe because I just enjoy a good nap.  If you have a little one or not, you’ll enjoy these lullaby renditions of some of your favorite headbanging songs!  These are instrumental only renditions of some of your favorite heavy metal, rock and 80s songs. Perfect to put the little one to sleep – or in my case, yourself as well! I have to say I think my favorite from this compilation is Sweet Child O’ Mine.  Appropriate too for a lullaby!

Purchase your copy at the following links

Buy CD, Download: http://tinyurl.com/k9tsvk5
iTunes: http://tinyurl.com/osnjgp7
Amazon: http://tinyurl.com/nw55gtw
Google Play: http://tinyurl.com/ncbuabd

Music Monday: Michael Tolcher Eleven

Katie June 22, 2015 0 Comments

Ride
Wild Animal
Live it Up
Piece of my Heart
Necessary
Los Angeles
Mother’s Garden
Fine
Give Me Your Hand
How Do I Love You
Stars

Eleven is the latest release from Michael Tolcher – named because it has been 11 years since his last CD was released and because it has 11 tracks on it.  Michael’s first CD was a big part of the soundtrack of my summer in 2004 (he was on tour with Hanson) so I was interested to see what he had come up with in the past 11 years. (Hard to believe it has been 11 years. Wow. I’m old.)  I have to say that the album was totally worth the wait and much better than I was expecting – although I guess when you have 11 years to perfect your tracks, they are going to come out quite great! The album is free on his website, but I’m not sure for how much longer so you’ll want to jump on that ASAP!

Music Monday: Blues Traveler Blow Up The Moon

Katie June 8, 2015 0 Comments

Hurricane (feat. 3OH!3)
Blow Up The Moon (feat 3OH!3 and JC Chasez)
Castaway (feat. The Dirty Heads and Rome Ramirez)
Vagabond Blues (feat The Dirty Heads and Rome Ramirez)
Top Of The World (feat Hanson)
Nikkia’s Prom (feat Plain White T’s)
Matador (feat Thompson Square)
I Can Still Feel You (feat Thompson Square)
Darkness We All Need (feat. Secondhand Serenade)
Jackie’s Baby (feat New Hollow)
Hearts Are Still Awake (feat Jewel)
I Know Right (feat Bowling for Soup)
Right Here Waiting For You (feat Bowling For Soup)
All The Way (feat Thomas Ian Nicholas)

Blow Up The Moon is the 12the studio album for the band Blues Traveler.  For this album, they decided to have a collaboration on every song featuring a couple of my favorites – Hanson and JC Chasez from NSYNC. I was also interested in hearing the collabs they did with Jewel and Thomas Ian Nicholas (the actor from American Pie & Rookie of the Year, among others).

Excluding the obvious favorite tracks (Blow Up The Moon and Top of the World) I think my favorite song on the album is Jackie’s Baby. Which probably means I should check out some New Hollow when I get a chance.

The album has that patent John Popper harmonica sound but since there are so many collaborations, not all the songs sound like the Blues Traveler you might expect. (And maybe some of their lesser known tracks do sound like some of this – but I admit I only know their singles)

This is a solid album and after listening I considered buying tickets to see them when they are in town. Of course, since I’m in my time machine this will be posted after that show passes so I guess you’ll know before you read this if I ended up going or not…

Edit… I did not end up going to see Blues Traveler here in CT when they came last month, I am however going to see them next month – with Hanson! It is sure to be an epic bucketlist trip so you won’t want to miss those blog posts 😉 

CD Review: Joy Williams Venus #JoyWilliams #O2O

Katie June 7, 2015 0 Comments

Before I Sleep
Sweet Love of Mine
Woman (Oh Mama)
One Day I Will
Not Good Enough
What a Good Woman Does
Until the Levee
You Loved Me
The Dying Kind
Till Forever
Welcome Home

Venus is the solo album from Joy Williams – previously one half of the four-time Grammy-winning folk-rock due The Civil Wars. Joy tells a more honest, human story of one woman’s journey out of darkness on the album. Over 11 unstintingly honest songs, she unabashedly recounts what occurred in her life over the past two and a half years. It shows how one woman has come to live her truth – the good, the bad, the petulant, the honorable – and in the end, shows all of us how to live our own.

The album will be released on June 29, but thanks to One2OneNetwork I had the chance to listen to it free and early in order to provide this review for you all.

I participated in the Joy Williams Venus album review program as a member of One2One Network. I was provided an album to review but all opinions are my own.