Saturday Matinee – Samantha Martin & Delta Sugar, Larkin Poe, Selwyn Birchwood, and Boogie Beasts

Samantha Martin & Delta Sugar are a soul / gospel / R&B / blues group from Toronto, whose musical influences come from way past the Canadian border. The full band consists of 10 members plus singer / songwriter / guitarist Samantha Martin.

Multi-instrumental blues / roots rockers Rebecca & Megan Lovell, aka Larkin Poe, are amazing. Multiple Grammy Award winners from Georgia, the sisters named their group after their great-great-great-great-grandfather, a cousin of that other Poe guy.

Selwyn Birchwood is an American blues guitarist, vocalist and songwriter from Tampa, Florida. He was the winner of the Blues Foundation’s 2013 International Blues Challenge (band category), as well the winner of the Albert King Guitarist of the Year award. [Wiki]

From Boogie Beasts‘ website:
“Dirty beats, hypnotizing slide, screaming harmonica riffs and plenty of fuzz: all of these will be served by this four man band from Liège-Limburg-Namur, Belgium. […] The drive is infectious, the noise is pure filth, yet highly irresistible.”

Stuff happened this week – some good, some bad, most of it just plain absurd. It’s also the time of year where we ignore resetting the clock in the dashboard and set our sprinklers and calendars ahead instead. As always, the change doesn’t affect porch time. Be there or be somewhere else.

Saturday Matinee – Christone “Kingfish” Ingram, Albert Castiglia w/ John Ginty, and Larkin Poe

Christone “Kingfish” Ingram is nominated for a 2024 Grammy for his album Live In London. Pretty good for a guy only halfway into his 20s, and I hope someone helps him shed some kgs so he can stay around a while.

Albert Castiglia is vicious, sort of a Negan Smith of blues rock, and there’s the proof. That’s John Ginty on the Hammond B-3 organism.

Larkin Poe pulls off some fine surf rock blues. They are also nominated for a 2024 Grammy for their album Blood Harmony.

Used to be only the days, but now the weeks are flying by.  The accelerator’s stuck, the brakes are shot and we’re about to slam right into the holidays. Maybe I’ll pretend it’s not happening, at least for now, and I’ll see you back here tomorrow.

Saturday Matinee – Genya Ravan, Pat Benatar & Larkin Poe

Proto punk soul singer and producer Genya Ravan blew me away when I heard Stay With Me (1970), and check out her 1977 interview here.

Pat Benatar‘s 1991 cover of Denzil Laing & the Wrigglers‘ 1958 cover of
Wynonie Harris‘ 1951 cover of Hank Penny‘s song from 1949.

Larkin Poe gets all nasty and swampy.

You know the drill. Have a great weekend.

[Update: Fixed link to Stay With Me.]

Saturday Matinee – The Password, Larkin Poe, Grace Slick & Ernie Andrews

The Password [via].
Seen that scene many times, but it wasn’t until recently that I connected it to something I read years ago.

The Code Breakers” by David Kahn is a classic book on the history of cryptology. In Chapter 2 he described the simple alphabet letter-shift that every schoolboy knows, but then he double-encrypts the shift with a password. Kahn used SWORDFISH as an example.

Using a simple alphabet shift from A to B:
TACKYRACCOONS reads SZBIXQZBBNNMR. Lot of repeated letters, but if you add a key like SWORDFISH to the shift, you get LWQBVGIUJGKJ, and it’s tougher to crack. That’s kind of how the WWII German Enigma machine worked.


Leadbelly cover found here.

Grace Slick’s vocals (sans backup music) on White Rabbit creeps me right out [via]. “Remember what the door mouse said.” Oh shut up. Go feed your cats or something.

I need an aural palate cleanser after that one, so let’s roll with this:

Yeah, Ernie Andrews, one of the greatest big band soul singers of all time, and “Do I Worry” is one of my all-time favorites.

Have a great weekend or two, folks. We’ll keep the porch light on.