Hey folks – hope your week is going well – I’ve spent quite a bit of time in the studio these past few days, putting the finishing touches on a couple of the tunes and taking them over to Jeff Saltzman’s place for some mixing. He’s doing some mixing on a song called “Susan Be” (which is up on the blog as well), and one of our favorites of the new songs called “Celia’s Garden“.

The lyrics are based on the paintings of Childe Hassam, a 19th Century impressionist painter from Boston,  who spent his summers in Maine at Celia Thaxter’s Garden…(in fact, the song opens with a playful reference to the “poppies on the Isle of Shoals“). I had such a great experience writing the “Ballad of Winslow Homer“, based on Homer’s paintings, that I wanted to try it again with a song based on Hassam’s work. There’s so much imagery and texture, even in the titles of the paintings – it was a ton of fun to write and even more fun to play, and I hope it comes through in the song – it’s definitely one of our favorites. Click below to listen (or download) and let us know if you like it -

The Dimes – Celias Garden (DEMO)

Have a great rest of the week and we’ll see you guys soon -

Johnny

Hey y’all – hope you’ve had a good week. It’s been a pretty mellow one here in P-town.  We had another solid recording session last night, and slowly but surely we’re starting to see the new record take shape. And speaking of the new record, here’s another song making it’s way towards the album. This is one of my personal favorites – I had a lot of fun with the lyrics and the imagery on this tune, and it’s full of strange bits of history. It’s a story set around the Great Boston Fire of 1872, which some say might have destroyed the entire city had it not been for Boston fire chief John Damrell. Check it out and let us know what you think…

The song is posted for you to listen to and/or download with the other demos, over towards the right…

Lithograph of Boston and the Great Fire of 1872 (Courtesy of the Boston Public Library)

-Johnny