NSN with Audrey Spillman & Mike Farris 8-24-08

It was a night of return visits to NSN for both these Nashville-based artists. Audrey Spillman opened, celebrating the release of her first EP "Fade." At long last, fans can get some songs by Audrey on a CD. You can hear some of it and see the fabulous cover photo on her myspace page. Audrey was stunning as always, and her set this night went like this:

Fallin'
Tomorrow
What You've Been Doin' To Me
Comfort You
Fade
What Are You Waiting For (solo)
The Ride

Then it was time to "go to church" on this Sunday night! Mike Farris and his incredible Roseland Rhythym Revue brought back their unique blend of Memphis-soul styled gospel-rock. Here's the set:

Precious Lord
Streets
Oh Mary
Can't No Grave Hold My Body
Sit Down Servant
Devil Don't Sleep
Change Is Gonna Come
Selah
I'm Gonna Get There

NSN with Perrin Lamb & Ernie Halter 8-17-08

Before we went on the air at 8, Nashville singer/songwriter Trey Lockerbie played a set and he was on stage when I walked in. I caught the last 2 1/2 songs and for the last two, he called up Beau Stapleton, formerly of Blue Merle to play some mandolin. Beau didn't have to play anything as firey as his work on "Burning In The Sun,' but it was good to see him in action again, anyway. Perrin Lamb, also from Nashville, kicked off our broadcast at 8, playing some old and new songs, including "Be This Way" which has been featured on the TV shows "Army Wives" and "Kyle XY," and a song which is literally brand-new, "Nothing Left To Say," which Perrin said is so new, he's not even sure if it's finished, but I thought it was quite good.
Perrin Lamb's setlist was

Newborn Child
The Picture
Feels Like Home
Stolen Car (Springsteen cover)
Nothing Left To Say
Cling To Me
Love You More
Shiver
Be This Way

Ernie Halter, from Los Angeles, took the stage at 9, totally solo. Ernie was entertaining between songs as well as during them. He took requests from the audience as he switched back and forth between guitar and keyboards and so the supposed setlist was quickly abandoned. I can't report to you every song he played, but I do know he included these...

Different Lives
Love In L.A.
Lisa
Lighthouse
Pretty Girl
Cyclone
My Heart Is With You
Whisper

NSN with Plex Plex & The Duke Spirit 8-10-08

This was my first chance to ever see or hear Nashville's own Plex Plex and...wow! They were impressive. Singer Amanda X is kinda like watching Chrissie Hynde of The Pretenders if she were fronting an electronic group. Even though their music falls into the electronic-influenced category, there's no keyboard here, just guitar-bass-drums. Amanda told me the core of the band has been together since high school and have been playing together for years. It shows. They have it together and their CD release, hopefully coming this fall, will be one to watch for.
The Plex Plex set list was:

Flash
Nadia
Come & Go
Atomic
She Loves City
Teardrops
Tokyo Arcade

London's The Duke Spirit are a much heavier, hard-rocking group than I would have guessed, just from listening to their single "The Step & The Walk" from their album Neptune. They're great at what they do, but on this night - chalk it up to hometown pride or whatever - I enjoyed Plex Plex more. Frontwoman Liela Moss certainly has the rock charisma and she gets brownie points for dedicating a song to the late, great Isaac Hays. The Duke Spirit's setlist:

Send A Little Love Token
Lassoo
Dog Roses
My Sunken Treasure
The Step & The Walk
Into The Fold
Wooden Heart
This Ship Was Built To Last
You Really Wake Up The Love
Red Weather
Love Is An Unfamiliar Name

NSN with Patrice Pike, Tori Sparks, Danielia Cotton 8-3-08

There's nothing like being 3 minutes to live-on-the-air and discovering the studio equipment and the remote location equipment are not communicating with each other! Fortunately we got it resolved pretty quickly and got on with our special triple-bill of Patrice Pike, Tori Sparks and Danielia Cotton only 5 minutes late. Putting 3 acts in a time slot usually reserved for just 2, cuts down the available time for set changes to practically nothing, instead of our usual leisure of 20 minutes, so to lose 5 more of that really put the pressure on. Thankfully, everything went off without a hitch and we had a fantastic night with three women who rock!

Patrice Pike & I were reminiscing before the show that we really hadn't seen each other since her days in Sister Seven, her former Austin, Texas band that we played quite a bit on Lightning 100 back in their heyday. Patrice said she'd been to Lightning 100 once since then, but it just so happened I wasn't there at the time, so we missed each other. It was great to see her again, and my first time ever to see her perform totally solo - just her and her guitar. The all-too-brief set went like this:

1-Pressure and Heat. 2-Jack Knife Girl. 3-Rufus. 4-What's The Trouble. 5-The Coppertree.

Patrice is working on a new album for 2009, so hopefully we'll get her back then to play longer.
2nd on our triple-bill was Tori Sparks, from right here in Nashville. It was my first time to see her live and she was impressive. After I introduced her, she cracked me up by calling me "such a rock star!" Again, time constraints being what they were, it was a too-brief set from Tori.

1-Cold War. 2-Penny On A Rail. 3-Poison Well. 4-Providence R.I. 5-Out of the Void.
I noticed she'd skipped the planned 3rd song on her setlist, so I asked if they wanted to do one more before we broke away, (I must be out of my mind - we were running late already) and so we got a sixth song-Caged Bird. We'll have to have her back.

Then running just slightly late, a little past 9pm, it was time for our headliner - a return visit from Danielia Cotton. She just flat-out rocks! What a voice! And that band kicked! Danielia's setlist:

1-Bang My Drum. 2-Testify. 3-Devil. 4-Take My Heart. 5-Let It Ride. 6-Bound. 7-Righteous People. 8-Rare Child. 9-Make U Move. 10-Purple Rain. (yes, the Prince song, excellently covered!)

Although I'd told Danielia to just play what she was going to play anyway and not worry about the time, pro that she is - she rocked through her set and actually got us off the air at our regular time. Incredible!