by Andrew Frisicano

DOWNLOAD: Benjy Ferree - Fear (MP3)

Brightest Young Things: I wanted to ask about your new record...where did all the reviews get the idea that it's a concept record?

Benjy Ferree: Man I have no idea; I never said that it was a concept record.

BYT: The name is from an Altman movie right? I remember loving it as a kid but I don't if it has any bearing on the story of Bobby Dee...

BF: I don't know, I just stole the title, you know?

...I guess Benjy hasn't read his own press release, which basically tells the entire story of Bobby Driscoll and how it relates to his new album. One sentence: "Come Back To The Five And Dime, Bobby Dee Bobby Dee, the second full-length album from D.C. musician Benjy Ferree, gives Bobby Driscoll a recognition that is long overdue: a musical eulogy to a forgotten child star who was chewed up and spit out by the unforgiving Hollywood meat market."

"Fear," off that record and posted above, may not actually be about a doomed child star, but it's still pretty good white-guy-soul song.

Benjy Ferree's tour with The Black Hollies kicked off September 3rd in Benjy's homebase of DC. Tomorrow (Sat, Sept.5th) both bands play Mercury Lounge (tix available at the door), and tonight (9/4) they play Maxwell's with The Nouvellas. Tickets are still on sale.

Ferree on NPR's Tiny Desk Concert and all tour dates are below...

Continue reading "Benjy Ferree & The Black Hollies - 2009 Tour Dates (tonight)"

After celebrating Halloween with two free digital albums, 2007's Its Only Ketchup and 2008's ding dong Ditch, Tim Fite is adding Valentine¹s Day to the short list of holidays that warrant free LPs with the February 14th release of Change of Heart. The record will be available on Fite's website

Fite writes: "Change of Heart is a group of songs that I wrote over the past year alongside Fair Ain't Fair in an effort to come to terms with a broken-heart. The songs on this album are about longing and pain. They are about sorrow and loss. They are about heartache and tenderness. But, most of all they are songs about love. There is a rich history of recordings made in the name of love, and a beautiful tradition of exchanging hearts in the form of music. Change of Heart is my small contribution to that exchange, and if you can excuse its broken state, my heart is yours."

While the rest of us are home, crying into our boxes of chocolate listening to Change of Heart, Fite will be setting out for his first ever headlining tour supported by fellow genre-defiers Benjy Ferree and DeLeon which kicks off February 19th in Cambridge MA.

Valentine's tomorrow, but no need to wait... you can get the free EP right now right HERE.

Tim, Benjy & DeLeon play the Bell House in BK on Feb 20. Tix are on sale.

Tim Fite & band

Continue reading "Benjy Ferree & Tim Fite - 2009 Tour Dates"

DOWNLOAD: Benjy Ferree - Fear (MP3)

Come Back To The Five And Dime, Bobby Dee Bobby Dee, the second full-length album from Ferree, is a musical eulogy to the forgotten child star, Bobby Driscoll. After "portraying" Peter Pan in the 1953 Disney feature, Driscoll faced the reality of growing up in a world without Neverland and was fired from Disney after the making of Peter Pan for the unforgivable crime of hitting puberty and developing acne. No longer cute and profitable, he struggled to find work and fell into a life-long battle with drugs until ultimately dying homeless and broke in a Manhattan tenement in 1968 at the age of 31. With police unable to identify his body, the Academy Award winner ended up in an unmarked pauper's grave on New York's Hart Island.

Ferree's eventual discovery of Driscoll's sad fate led to this album - an allegorical ode not just to his childhood hero, but to anyone who's gotten the short end of the stick in life . Musically, Ferree lets his distinctive blend of rock and roll and Americana across new borders and genres. Drawing as much from the country meandering of Jimmie Rodgers and the passionate blues pounding of Son House as he does from the vocal hysterics of Freddie Mercury and the balladry of Nick Cave, Ferree crafts a sound that is difficult to fit into any one category, but upon listening is as gratifying as it is unique.

Benjy Ferree plays Union Hall in Brooklyn tonight/Thursday (12/4).The track above is from the new album, coming out February 3, 2009 on Domino.

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Tickets are on sale for Cursive's upcoming show at Union Hall (1/18). Tickets for their Mercury Lounge show (1/19) are now on Am Ex presale (regular sale starts Friday). Cursive also added a January 17th show at Grog Shop in Cleveland which is also on sale.

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Benjy Ferree's new album tracklist and all (two) dates, below...

Continue reading "Benjy Ferree tonight, new album ++ Cursive tickets on sale "

Are you going to see Mirah & band @ Bowery Ballroom tonight? Benjy Ferree is playing there too.

Updated tour dates below....

Continue reading "Mirah - updated 2007 Tour Dates"