Glen Campbell brings his "Goodbye Tour" to Mohegan Sun Friday, Feb. 24
Even as Alzheimer’s disease darkens the edges of Glen Campbell’s mind, the veteran singer and songwriter holds fast to one unshakable certainty.
“I’m a blessed man, I know that,” Campbell, 75, says by phone from home in California, before continuing a tour that stops Friday, Feb. 24, at Mohegan Sun.
That notion is an anchor fastening him to the present, though his recollections of the past grow cloudier, blurring a lifetime’s worth of memories from one of country music’s all-time greats. In a career spanning 54 years, Campbell has released 52 studio albums, 17 of which reached the top 10 on Billboard’s country chart. He landed 23 top-10 singles, including seminal versions of the iconic songs “Wichita Lineman,” “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” and “Rhinestone Cowboy.”
Campbell was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s about a year ago, after years of short-term memory loss. Determined to retire on his own terms, he released a new album, last summer’s poignant “Ghost On the Canvas,” and embarked on what’s billed as a “goodbye tour.”
Bassist Mark Hoppus (left) and guitarist Tom DeLonge of pop-punk band Blink-182 perform Aug. 15, 2011, at Comcast Theatre in Hartford. (Nick Caito/ncaito@courant.com)
Pop-punk band Blink-182 performs with the All-American Rejects May 18 at Mohegan Sun; tickets go on sale Friday, Feb. 24, at 10 a.m. for $69.50 and $49.50, via www.ticketmaster.com. Looks like Ted Nugent, REO Speedwagon and Styx relive the glory days of champion-rock when they share the bill July 5 on their “Midwest Rock ’n’ Roll Express” tour; tickets go on sale March 30 for $40.
Cee Lo Green performs April 13 at MGM Grand at Foxwoods; tickets are $65, $55 and $45. Denver band the Fray is there April 14; tickets are $55, $45 and $35. A Counting Crows tour itinerary lists a show there April 27; no word on tickets. April 27 was supposed to have been reserved for Daughtry, but that show has moved to April 28 to avoid coinciding with Nickelback in Hartford. Daughtry tickets are $95, $85 and $75. Tickets are available via www.foxwoods.com.
The-Dream performs March 10 at Toad’s Place in New Haven; tickets are $22. Maino is there March 15; tickets are $20. Tickets are available via www.toadsplace.com.
"Put Your Back N 2 It," the second album from Perfume Genius, is at once bleak and beautiful. (Photo by Angel Ceballos)
It isn’t clear exactly what happened to Mike Hadreas, the singer and songwriter who records as Perfume Genius — press notes, interviews and the like usually make some oblique reference to addiction and “a period of trauma.” Whatever it was, Hadreas has channeled it into wrenching songs, first on his 2010 debut “Learning” and now on “Put Your Back N 2 It” (Matador), Perfume Genius’ latest.
He delivers searing lyrics in a high, hushed voice swathed in reverb and accompanied most often by piano on songs drawn from dark emotional places. The deeply sad opener, “AWOL Marine,” and the lush, soaring chamber-pop song “Take Me Home” are harrowing evocations of the lengths to which people will go to deaden their emotional pain, while “Floating Spit” drifts on nebulous synthesizers and a distant, clanking rhythm paired with lyrics imagining the spiritual aftermath of a fatal overdose.
Only five microphone stands were set up for New Edition Saturday night at Mohegan Sun, and only five members of the six-strong band took the stage when the lights came up.
Bobby Brown wasn’t among them.
Just when it seemed like Brown was sitting out the show — following an abbreviated appearance at the New Jersey funeral of ex-wife Whitney Houston — he sauntered on stage at the start of “Hit Me Off,” prompting huge cheers from the audience.
When it was his turn to introduce himself before “Jealous Girl,” Brown offered blessings to Houston, who died Feb. 11 in Los Angeles. She was 48
“I love you,” he said.
"Me and my big mouth," Dave Grohl, left, says in a statement clarifying his "human element" acceptance speech last Sunday at the Grammys. (Photo by Steve Gullick)
It proved a head-scratcher for a lot of people: Foo Fighters leader Dave Grohl extolled “the human element” of making music in an acceptance speech last Sunday at the Grammys, then promptly jammed with Deadmau5 and Skrillex, electronic musicians whose music is about as robotic as it gets.
Seems that Grohl was taken aback by the outpouring of bile directed at his speech, so he’s clarified his position in what comes off as a good-natured rejoinder to the haters. Read his statement (warning: salty language) after the jump:
Here are a couple shows by Connecticut acts worth checking out this weekend:
FRIDAY, Feb. 17
Frank Viele with Jamie Lynn Hart & the Folkadelics, the Outer Space, 295 Treadwell St., Hamden. 8 p.m. With his band, the Manhattan Project, Hamden resident Viele is known for a high-energy blend of rock, soul and classic pop. He’s on this own for this show, returning to his singer-songwriter roots and stripping his songs down to their solo-acoustic bones. Boston folk-pop singer Hart opens the show, presumably with songs from her new full-length debut, “Anticipate.” $10.
SATURDAY, Feb. 18
Hannah Cranna with the Manchurians and Age of Reason, Cafe Nine, 250 State St., New Haven. 9 p.m. After a long absence, New Haven power-pop band Hannah Cranna (named for the Monroe town witch) is back together with a new album, sort of. “A Real Nice Parade” (available via CDBaby and IndepenDisc) the band’s first release since 1997, is actually a mix of five new songs recorded last year, and seven songs the band liked best from its heyday. All of them are catchy alt-pop songs built around jangling guitars and vocal harmonies that draw on the influence of the Beatles, Big Star and Badfinger.
In fact, Badfinger singer and guitarist Joey Molland produced the group’s self-titled 1997 album, and is a featured guest on the closing track here, a cover of Badfinger’s”Money/Flying,” recorded live in New Haven in ’97 For longtime fans, it’s a promising return from old friends with a knack for melody. For the uninitiated, it’s a strong introduction to a band the Courant described as “one of Connecticut’s best” back in the day. $5 cover.
After moving from Wolcott to New York City, Slam Donahue found an audience and landed a record deal.
It’s understandable that Slam Donahue is often mistaken for a Wesleyan band: The musicians are friends with Wesleyan bands and signed to the same label that has released music by several acts with Wesleyan connections. Furthermore, Slam Donahue is from Connecticut. Fom the hip confines of Williamsburg, how different can Wesleyan and Wolcott really be?
Plenty, say Slam Donahue partners David Otto and Thomas Sommerville.
Although the pair moved to Brooklyn in the summer of 2010, they met more than a decade ago after Sommerville, now 28, moved with his family from New Milford to Wolcott in time for his senior year of high school.
“I met the four or five kids who make music, and four out of five of them were awful, and Dave was the other one,” Sommerville, the bassist, says by phone from Williamsburg, where he and Otto, 23, are on their way to their jobs as bike messengers.
What looked like another quick pass for Gabi Carrubba Thursday night turned into a trip home from “American Idol” when the North Haven teen fell victim to a last-minute winnowing.
“I’m embarrassed,” she said through tears on the show after she was cut. “I’m the only one out of my group.”
The judges didn’t give a reason beyond needing to reduce the contestant pool from 70-something to 42 before the next round.
It seemed like an open question: Would Bobby Brown attend Whitney Houston’s funeral Saturday in New Jersey, or perform with New Edition at Mohegan Sun?
Turns out he’ll do both.
CNN reports that Brown will attend funeral services Saturday afternoon for Houston, to whom he was married for 14 years, and then join New Edition that night at Mohegan Sun. A statement from Brown’s camp, forwarded by Mohegan, seems to confirm CNN’s report:
Bobby Brown will be re-joining his New Edition band mates as they continue the 30th Anniversary tour. He will be on stage tonight, Thursday Feb. 16, at Showplace arena in Upper Marlboro, Md., and continue with them as they perform at the Coliseum in Greensboro, N.C., on Friday, the Mohegan Sun Casino in Uncasville on Saturday and Newark, N.J., and the Newark PAC on Sunday.
Media reports have suggested that Houston’s family would prefer Brown not attend services for the singer, who died last Saturday at 48.
Shearwater's latest, "Animal Joy," is less a rebirth than a refinement. (Photo by Greg Szeto)
Although Shearwater’s latest, “Animal Joy” (Sub Pop), has already been labeled a “thrilling artistic rebirth” — in the press notes, no less — it’s more accurate to say that each new album from the Austin, Texas, band is more a refinement than a reinvention.
That’s not to say “Animal Joy” — mixed by Peter Katis at Tarquin Studios in Bridgeport — isn’t thrilling. Leader Jonathan Meiburg’s music has grown deeper over the years, even as it has become broader and, not coincidentally, more immediate. “Animal Joy” grabs hold right away, thanks to the glorious flight of soaring melody on opener “Animal Life,” and then, like a musical joy ride, steers into tight turns, maneuvers nimbly through bumpy patches and floors it on long straightaways.
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