Jason Vivone & The Billy Bats - The Avenue

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 39:23
Size: 90.2 MB
Styles: Electric blues
Year: 2016
Art: Front

[4:03] 1. The Vivone Song (Pronounced Viv O Nee)
[4:00] 2. Kansas City Blues
[4:20] 3. The Avenue
[4:53] 4. Hello Mrs Radzinsky
[4:51] 5. Train Musta Jumped The Track
[6:55] 6. Calendar
[7:28] 7. My Heart Is In The Right Place
[2:50] 8. His House, The Mayor

Jason Vivone & The Billy Bats decided to bring it all back home for their new release. Back to Kansas City. Back to “The Avenue.” Singer, Songwriter and showman extraordinaire, Jason Vivone, who hosts Kansas City’s favorite blues radio show “The Boogie Bridge” on 90.1 FM KKFI, leads the six piece Billy Bats on an eight-song set paying homage to the city’s most notorious neighborhood “Independence Avenue.” The group delivers old school, shoot from the hip style ruffling traditional “blues” feathers perhaps.

“When my ex and I moved to Kansas City, in the late 1990’s, we found all these great old houses off Independence Avenue,” says Vivone. “We had no idea what we were in for. We found one-hundred-year-old Victorian homes for sale at a steal. Soon, we found out why. Old mafia families retired on our block. A serial killer stalked local prostitutes and killed them in the alleyways. These songs are about the people on “The Avenue” I met when I lived there.”

The Avenue mc
The Avenue zippy

---

Jason Vivone & The Billy Bats - Lather Rinse Repeat / Eddie Ate Dynamite

Album: Lather Rinse Repeat
Size: 87,5 MB
Time: 37:34
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 2012
Styles: Electric Blues, Slide Guitar Blues
Art: Front & Back

01. I Hear A Heartbeat (5:56)
02. Baby Fat (3:11)
03. The Nina, The Pinta, The Santa Maria (3:53)
04. The Black Lone Ranger (5:10)
05. One Hot Mother (4:01)
06. Photograph (4:15)
07. Do The Nod (1:53)
08. Liquid Diet (2:18)
09. Medusa Blues (6:53)

The line up is Vivone on vocal, guitar and harp; Matt Bustamante on drums, Jeremy Clark on bass; Paula Crawford on vocal and guitar; Imani Glasgow on vocal and percussion and Ben Hoppes on vocal and banjo. The release opens with a seductive I Hear A Heartbeat, a Texas Boogie style track with tempting lyrics and rippin' cigar box slide. Baby Fat using a tongue in cheek rhythm features Vivone on solo vocal and minimal band backing except a slide melody and drums. The Nina, The Pinta, The Santa Maria is a sped up Chicago blues with 50's style vocals and classic blues riffs but with a touch of humor and instrumentals. The Black Lone Ranger, loosely based on a Muddy Waters track and with a touch of George Thorogood, keeps the groove and again gives the slide king a chance to show his stuff. One Hot Mother, a prototypical 12 bar blues track allows Vivone the freedom to sing clever lyrics to anotherwise basic track. My favorite track on the release by far, Photograph, has the characteristics of a Tex/Mex blues along the lines of something Ryland Cooder would do. I like the melody and the slide work is controlled and interesting. Do The Nod has hints of Bo Diddley and further modern punk music. It breaks away form a lot of the balance of the recordings in that it is much more loosely recorded. Liquid Diet is a funky scratch track on the simplest basis. Medusa Blues wraps the recording with a more complex track... not in execution but in composition. This song has very simple components but is actually quite interesting with a quiet wailing harp. This is a party blues recording so get out your stuff and have a ball. ~Bman

Lather Rinse Repeat

---

Album: Eddie Ate Dynamite
Size: 97,6 MB
Time: 41:26
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 2013
Styles: Electric Blues, Slide Guitar Blues
Art: Front

01. Cut Those Apron Strings (4:24)
02. Placebo (4:48)
03. Mean (5:11)
04. Eddie Ate Dynamite (3:08)
05. Analog (4:45)
06. The Blues & The Greys (4:05)
07. Methinks The Lady Doth Protest Too Much (5:44)
08. Where Did The Day Go (4:44)
09. I Can Never Say Goodbye (4:34)

“The spirit of ‘Big’ Joe Turner is alive and well enjoying life in the shape and form of one Kansas born and bred Jason Vivone; his vim, verve and simple lust for life takes musical shape in the delicious merging of hill country and rockabilly, with a vigorous fifties rock’n’roll feel that is infused with a backbone of the blues, laced with a jaunty fusing of gospel and soul. The combination of banjo, cigar box slide and a sweetly enticing shuffling percussive sound make for spine-tingling music. When Jason’s voice isn’t hollering an invitation to you it is sweetly and personally canoodling your senses with an almost whispering seductiveness that is reminiscent of the fragile intonations of Harry Nilsson. ” ~Brian Harmon, Blues in the Northwest

Eddie Ate Dynamite

---