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In: Aisle 5, BLOG POSTS, City Winery, GroundUP Music Festival, Lettuce, Smith's Olde Bar, Suwannee Hulaween, Terminal West, The New Mastersounds, Variety Playhouse, Whippersnap Music and Arts Festival

This year was epic for my live music journey having seen well over 200 sets of music and recorded over 80 live performances. The first half of the year had an incredible run of live shows starting with the recording sessions for Snarky Puppy’s album with the Metropole Orkest, “Somni” in Utrecht, Netherlands. That one was recorded professionally by a dozen or so cameras and the videos are being released one by one. After that, I had an mammoth string of music starting with the GroundUP Music Festival in Miami Beach, rolling right into my first Jam Cruise and thenContinue Reading

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In: Amp Jam, BANDS, BLOG POSTS, FESTIVALS, Lettuce, The New Mastersounds

Bear Creek 2010 was my initiation into the new era of music festivals. For anyone that doesn’t know, that annual November festival based at the gorgeous Spirit of Suwannee Music Park (SOSMP), was renowned for it’s smaller, family-feel and specialized in jam and funk music across 5 or 6 stages including inside at the music hall. Bear Creek had an eight year run from 2007-2014. The 2010 schedule caught my eye because I had been looking for places to see Maceo Parker (James Brown, Parliament/Funkadelic) and funk band, Lettuce, that I was a fan of but had never seen beforeContinue Reading

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In: Aisle 5, BLOG POSTS, City Winery, GroundUP Music Festival, Lettuce, Smith's Olde Bar, Suwannee Hulaween, Terminal West, The New Mastersounds, Variety Playhouse, Whippersnap Music and Arts Festival

Here’s my 1st ever annual video recap of 29 live sets that I recorded this year. This is a sampling of the more than 80 videos I posted on YouTube this year, which is a subset of the videos that I recorded (some are not public), which is yet a further subset of the sets that I’ve actually seen or heard this year (since I don’t record every set). The videos are notable in one way or another, perhaps based on the quality of the recording, the circumstances of the recording or the uniqueness of the set. I’ll give aContinue Reading

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In: ALBUMS, Lotus, The New Mastersounds

2024 was a great one for recorded funk, jazz, soul and world music. This article covers the wide range of albums I enjoyed during the year from some perennial favorites like The New Mastersounds, Ghost-Note, Kamasi Washington, Lotus and The Greyboy Allstars to new and new-to-me artists like Diggin’ Dirt, Tatiana Eva-Marie and Kinga Glyk. These are the albums that I listened to the most – I wish I could include all the great albums that were shared with me during the course of the year — hopefully my coverage will increase in 2025. If you like what you read,Continue Reading

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In: Amp Jam, BANDS, BLOG POSTS, FESTIVALS, Lettuce, The New Mastersounds

Bear Creek 2010 was my initiation into the new era of music festivals. For anyone that doesn’t know, that annual November festival based at the gorgeous Spirit of Suwannee Music Park (SOSMP), was renowned for it’s smaller, family-feel and specialized in jam and funk music across 5 or 6 stages including inside at the music hall. Bear Creek had an eight year run from 2007-2014. The 2010 schedule caught my eye because I had been looking for places to see Maceo Parker (James Brown, Parliament/Funkadelic) and funk band, Lettuce, that I was a fan of but had never seen beforeContinue Reading

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In: BANDS, BLOG POSTS, Lettuce, Suwannee Hulaween, The New Mastersounds

Suwannee Hulaween is fantastic annual jam and electronic festival at the beautiful Spirit of Suwannee Music Park in Live Oak, FL.  It’s held close to the Haloween weekend and this year it was threatened by the Hurricanes which hit the area just three weeks earlier. The organizers, park, local team and volunteers worked tirelessly (well probably very tired) to clean up the part and prepare it for this festival that gets about 20,000 attendees. This recap has to start with a huge amount of gratitude to the team for pulling this off and to the organizers Paul Levine and MichaelContinue Reading

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In: BLOG POSTS, FESTIVALS, The New Mastersounds, Whippersnap Music and Arts Festival

Whippersnap Music and Arts Festival is back in 2025 for its second year at Florida Sands Music Ranch (FSMR) and FunkCity.net will be there to celebrate. I didn’t really know what to expect at the 2024 edition since it was my first time and it turned out to be one of the best events of the year! You get big-time, world-class music, a fabulous location and a really cozy, intimate setting with some of the coolest people around! It’s set in a great ranch campground and has two stages of music at alternating times so you never have to missContinue Reading

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In: BANDS, BLOG POSTS, FESTIVALS, Lotus, Suwannee Hulaween, The New Mastersounds

String Cheese Incident + Umphrey’s McGee Relay Marathon is the headline for Saturday and maybe the entire festival. SCI is up for their traditional three-set Saturday with the third set being the ‘theme’ set which is always spectacular. I’ve been coming to Hula since 2017 and they’ve put on some amazing shows incluidng 70s, 80s, and 90s events and they always have monster sit-ins with special guests that are not elsewhere on the program. Sandwiched between the Cheese sets are two Umphrey’s McGee sets. UM is a jamband powerhouse, and a headliner and many festivals and major venues like RedContinue Reading

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In: ALBUMS, BLOG POSTS, The New Mastersounds

Galáctico is the second studio album from the Joe Tatton Trio and it’s top notch. Joe’s made his bones as the keyboard player for The New Mastersounds for 18 years teams up here with guitarist Lucas De Mulder who released his first album on Color Red last year. This album is an excellent mix of uptempo funk and jazz as well as more dramatic cinematic pieces. It also comes full circle back to some of NMS’ roots, bringing in the Haggis Horns who played on early NMS albums. I’ve seen Joe’s impact on the NMS sound increase over the years,Continue Reading

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In: ALBUMS, BANDS, BLOG POSTS, Lettuce, The New Mastersounds

The Bamboos just released their tenth studio album after more than than twenty years performing together.  This Australian group have refined their craft of finding the sweetest spot between soul and funk to the finest point yet.  Hard Up reinvigorate a classic sound, seamlessly  incorporating contemporary influences to create something altogether brand new. Much of the album was recorded communally over a week just prior to the pandemic at a sprawling country house just outside the (coincidentally named) town of Lancefield, north of Melbourne. The approach of making an album outside the recording studio, steeped in such legendary tales as theContinue Reading