career retrospective

EM88 – Mutlu

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2019-10-17
Posted in: career retrospective, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, hall and oates, includes music, mutlu, mutlu onaral. Leave a comment

MutluMutlu joins Eric in conversation to discuss the beginnings of his musical career, coming up in the Philly singer-songwriter and soul scene, how he connected with the likes of Daryl Hall and John Oates, T-Bone Wolk, Amos Lee, and The Hooters, life on the road, his arc of being signed to a major label, getting lost in one of those all-too-familiar major label shuffles, and most importantly some of the origins and meanings behind the songs on his new independently released EP, Good Trouble.

Mutlu is at heart a soul singer and songwriter, but his work ranges from super sexy songs complete with a wink and nod to 70s and 90s R&B, fun songs, songs with important social commentary, tips of the cap to styles like reggae and rap, songs about emotions we all feel like depression and loss, and even mixing in some traditional and pop influences from his Turkish heritage.

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Six-Pack of Daniel Johnston, Volume One

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2019-09-16
Posted in: A Six-Pack Of, bj kahuna, bj kramp, career retrospective, daniel johnston, eric's episodes, includes music. Leave a comment

Six-Pack of Daniel Johnston, Volume OneSix-Pack of Daniel Johnston, Volume One

On this Six-Pack episode, Reid Messerschmidt from The Irrationally Exuberant Podcast and BJ Kramp of the Rock And/Or Roll podcast join Eric Miller of Pods & Sods to celebrate the life and work of Daniel Johnston. Daniel is considered by some to be one of the greatest songwriters of all time. His work is extremely lo-fi, literally recorded at home directly onto a tape recorder, but it is also incredibly unguarded and human. He struggled with mental illness and compulsively created music and art throughout his troubled life, topics he regularly covered brilliantly in his work. Some chance high-profile fans, a very welcoming music scene in Austin in the late 1980s, and an undeniable talent has led to Daniel’s legacy as a songwriter, cult-like status, and very loyal fanbase. His life’s story wonderfully captured in a 2006 documentary, The Devil and Daniel Johnston… if you haven’t seen it, go check it out.

Daniel passed away this week at the age of 58, and so we wanted to pay tribute.

So sit back, kick your mom out of your basement, and join us as we honor the brilliantly unique Daniel Johnston.

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Songs of The Knight – Hear & Now

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2019-02-12
Posted in: billy squier, bj kahuna, bj kramp, career retrospective, eric's episodes, includes music, jon lamoreaux, songs of the knight. Leave a comment

Songs of The KnightConsidered by many to be Billy Squier’s return to form record, Hear & Now is unquestionably a fan favorite. After a few years of Rock Me Tonight video fallout and a slightly less than stellar commercial performance with 1986’s Enough Is Enough, Billy returned in full force with an incredible collection of riff-laden, rock-pop hits, sweeping ballads, and a few deep cuts that continued his unique style of “articulate rock.” But did it hit?  Why or why not?

And while we’re asking questions – what is the connection between this record and the film Deliverance? Between this record at The Waitresses’ Christmas Wrapping?!?  Listen to find out as we continue our Songs of The Knight: A Billy Squier Retrospective series.

Joined by podcast friends Jon Lamoreaux of The Hustle Podcast and BJ Kramp of the Rock And/Or Roll Podcast, Eric and his co-hosts go in-depth and track by track with Billy’s sixth album.  Warning: we do go off the rails a bit in the episode following a story Jon shares about his early discovery of, well, this record among other things.  But we also continue our thoughtful deep analysis of this record, which is one of our collective favorites. Finally we wrap this episode with Eric’s personal ranking of Billy Squier’s entire discography.

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Songs of The Knight – Enough Is Enough

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-12-06
Posted in: billy squier, bj kahuna, bj kramp, career retrospective, eric's episodes, includes music, jon lamoreaux, songs of the knight. Leave a comment

Songs of The KnightWhat do you do to follow up a disastrous video that, although charted quite successfully, negatively impacted your career trajectory? How about when you’re stuck between label pressure in a changing landscape of hair metal and keyboard oriented rock?  Well, if you’re Billy Squier you toil away on an album until you come up with Enough Is Enough. In this episode of the sidecast series, Songs of The Knight: A Billy Squier Retrospective, we take a detailed look at 1986’s Enough Is Enough. Joined by podcast friends Jon Lamoreaux of The Hustle Podcast and BJ Kramp of the Rock And/Or Roll Podcast, Eric and his co-hosts go in-depth and track by track with Billy’s fifth album.  We get into the featured duet with Freddie Mercury, Love Is The Hero, the co-write he did with Freddie Lady With A Tenor Sax, our thoughts on the album cover, the fine art of singing Whoo-hooo, what challenges did Billy face at this time in his career, his guitar playing, his singing, his adventurous songwriting, and much more. Finally we wrap this episode in the series with Jon’s personal ranking of Billy Squier’s discography.

Calley Oh!!

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EM85 – Danny Vaughn of Tyketto

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-11-30
Posted in: career retrospective, danny vaughn, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, includes music, interview, tyketto. Leave a comment

Danny Vaughn of TykettoDanny Vaughn of Tyketto joins Eric in conversation to take a track by track look back at the band’s 1994 sophomore release, Strength In Numbers.  Produced by legendary producer Kevin Elson, their follow-up to Don’t Come Easy had a difficult journey making it’s way onto shelves following the whole wave of grunge that displaced many bands of the time.  Danny shares his personal memories and all the details behind the album’s creation and journey.

A solid fan favorite, Strength In Numbers features some songs that were should-have-been monstrous AOR hits of the day – Rescue Me, Catch My Fall, Standing Alone.  But the album also demonstrated the band was interested in growing and branching out.  They were writing deeper, smarter, and more varied songs at the time.  There are some healthy and authentic dashes of blues, Springsteen-esque singer-songwriter, mandolins, harmonicas, Bo Diddly beats, sweeping almost-progressive rockers and so much more.

For the 25th anniversary of the album, Tyketto will be doing some touring where they’ll perform the full album in its entirety – get those details here.  They also have a new live CD and DVD that captures and ambitious performance featuring horns and strings. On the solo front, Danny has a new super-interesting solo album of “odd songs” in the works and well as his duet project with Dan Reed of Dan Reed Network.

If you’re familiar with Tyketto, you’ll enjoy this in-depth discussion of this classic album.  If you’re new to the band, hopefully you’ll listen and discover a truly solid rock album from 1994 that you may have missed the first time around.

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EM83 – Dave Meniketti of Y&T

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-10-30
Posted in: career retrospective, dave meniketti, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, includes music, interview, y and t, Y&T. 1 Comment

Dave Meniketti of Y&TDave Meniketti of Y&T joins Eric in conversation to discuss the beginnings of his career, the early formation of Y&T, how he went from his dad’s record collection to discovering blues guitarists, early days songwriting, finding his confidence as a vocalist, the legendary Winterland 1974 show, memories of the original members that have since passed away, some anecdotes of touring with the enthusiastic partier that was Bon Scott, business struggles with A&M and Geffen in the 80s and 90s, bringing in Steve Smith on their Ten record, how Y&T kind of side stepped the grunge era and kept it together through the 90s, his solo career, discovering some classic tunes hidden in their vault, what led to their newest release, Acoustic Classix Volume 1, how he got involved in his other business, Meniketti Wines, will there be another proper Y&T album, what’s next for him and the band, and much more!

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EM82 – Liv Warfield

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-10-16
Posted in: ann wilson, career retrospective, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, heart, includes music, interview, liv warfield, nancy wilson, prince, roadcase royale. Leave a comment

Liv WarfieldLiv Warfield of Roadcase Royale joins Eric in conversation to discuss the beginnings of her career, moving to Portland Oregon from Peoria Illinois to find her voice in a steady karaoke scene, becoming an independent artist with a charting single, how she connected with Prince, the funny story in waiting for the announced “Prince will call you” call that changed her life, how Prince influenced her confidence and songwriting on her next solo album, how the couple of songs they wrote together came about, is there anything she worked on with Prince in his legendary vault, what she wishes the world knew more about Prince, how she connected with Nancy Wilson to form Roadcase Royale, origins of their anthemic Get Loud, what it means to raise your voice as an artist, how have “Heart” audiences accepted her, what’s next for the band in terms of touring and recording, what’s next for her personally, and much more!

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EM81 – Jimmy Carter of Blind Boys of Alabama

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-08-07
Posted in: blind boys of alabama, career retrospective, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, includes music, interview, jimmy carter, sam cooke. Leave a comment

Tom BaileyJimmy Carter of The Blind Boys of Alabama joins Eric in conversation to discuss his early life connecting with his classmates to form The Blind Boys of Alabama, early memories of touring and recording, memories of contemporaries like Sam Cooke and Sister Rosetta Tharpe, experiencing the Civil Rights movement and the diversification of the Blind Boys’ audiences in the 80s, their appeal in the secular world, touring with Peter Gabriel, what it was like performing at The White House for Obama, memories of his final performance with longtime friend and partner Clarence Fountain, learning that their recording of Way Down In The Hole was used for the TV show The Wire, what his plans are for a new recording spanning the group’s 80 year career, what he plans to do in the second half of his life and much more!

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EM80 – Tom Bailey of Thompson Twins

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-07-10
Posted in: career retrospective, eric's episodes, eric's interviews, includes music, interview, thompson twins, tom bailey. Leave a comment

Tom BaileyTom Bailey of The Thompson Twins joins Eric in conversation to discuss his early life discovering music and growing up with a musical family, how he got into discovering the keyboards via The Beatles, what the working structure was within The Thompson Twins in terms of creativity, are there any songs hidden in their vault, what it’s been like returning to the stage after 20+ years, was he nervous that the audience would still be there, the journey back to pop music in recent years, inspiration behind his song Come So Far, his first self-title debut solo album Science Fiction, will it be another 20 years before his next album, and much more!

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Songs of The Knight – Early Days, Piper, & Tale of The Tape

Posted by Pods & Sods on 2018-07-05
Posted in: billy squier, bj kahuna, bj kramp, career retrospective, eric's episodes, includes music, jon lamoreaux, piper, songs of the knight. Leave a comment

Songs of The KnightKicking off our Billy Squier sidecast series, Songs of The Knight: A Billy Squier Retrospective, we’re taking a look at Billy’s early life in music, his two A&M albums with Piper and his solo debut from 1979, Tale of The Tape.  Joined by podcast friends Jon Lamoreaux of The Hustle Podcast and BJ Kramp of the Rock And/Or Roll Podcast, Eric and his co-hosts go in-depth on the details of these early records in Billy’s career, we share personal stories about getting into Billy’s music, what it means to us, we go off on more than one tangent (as three podcast guys are wont to do) involving Bill Aucoin, KISS, Escape Club, Queen, and even The Greenberry Woods, we share thoughts on particular tracks and how these first three albums are a harbinger for things to come in Billy’s discography.  Finally we wrap this debut episode in the series with Jon’s personal top ten list of Billy Squier songs.  We hope you’ll follow us as we work through Billy’s entire discography!

Calley Oh!!

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