Listening Lyrics

Community radio in Davis is in its annual drive to keep your radio station on the air. Jeanne and I discuss the programs on KDRT while we play the music of the following fine local artists: Katgruvs, Bootjuice, Midnight Dip, Bad Mother Nature, Miss Lonely Hearts, Philharmonik, Jessica Malone, Nickel Slots, The Big Poppies, Element Brass Band, Big Sticky Mess, and Roger Kunkel. There are so many many more, but we only have an hour -- keep listening to our weekly show and I'm sure we will please you. 

Thank you.

Nick Zhilin - Look who I found.

On my photo Instagram account (pastoorpics), I have followed a fellow photographer (emptynous_photo ). I noticed that he is also a musician. That's when the roots for this interview were planted.

Nick Zhilin (Николай Жилин) was born, raised and lives in St. Petersburg, Russia. He grew up in a family with three brothers; his mother encouraged his musical studies. Nick plays the piano, guitar, and loves to perform on his Balalaika. He writes his own songs, and experiences what many young musicians do, mainly perfecting their music in their spare time.

Nick is also involved with his university in the study of world religions and philosophy.

Sylvie Simmons writes about music, and plays music. She's an award-winning rock journalist - one of the very few women included among the predominantly male rock writing elite - and a best-selling author whose books have been translated into more than 30 languages.

Her most recent books are last year's Face It: Debbie Harry and, in 2012, the definitive Leonard Cohen biography. She has also written books on Johnny Cash, Serge Gainsbourg and Neil Young.

After four decades of writing about music and musicians, Sylvie did the near-impossible and crossed over to being a singer-songwriter herself, accompanying her original songs on a ukulele. Signing a record deal in 2014, she released her debut, Sylvie, which the UK Guardian called "one of the most beautiful albums of the year."

Alex Jordan was born to music, playing first trumpet, then bass, then guitar—and always singing.  His musical influences ranged from jazz to musical theatre.  He studied his father’s extensive CD collection, in particular the Grateful Dead section, which considerably expanded his perception of what was music.  Listening to a live album, he had a revelation when he heard a passage in which silence was clearly part of the music. “It was quantifiably, certifiably, distinctly music, and it was dead silence. I’d never heard anything like that.  I don’t know that I became a Deadhead at that moment, but I sure got it.”