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The Animal Years
''The Animal Years'' is the fourth studio album by American singer-songwriter Josh Ritter. The album was originally released in the UK on March 20, 2006, and in the United States on April 11, 2006. It was Ritter's first album released on V2 Records. A double-disc deluxe edition was released in Ireland on January 17, 2010, and in the US on February 15, 2011. In 2010, Ritter's band was given the name "The Royal City Band" (a reference to the song "Thin Blue Flame" from ''The Animal Years''). Background Before performing "Girl in the War" at the 2006 annual dinner of the Center for American Progress in Washington D.C., Ritter stated that he intended to "write about he United States of America but nsteadit all came out sounding like a love song." Ritter has said that the life and work of Mark Twain were a great influence on ''The Animal Years'', in particular Twain's books ''Life on the Mississippi'' and ''Letters from the Earth''. When analyzed alongside Twain's biography, lyrics ...
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Josh Ritter
Joshua B. Ritter (born October 21, 1976) is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and author who performs and records with the Royal City Band. Ritter is known for his distinctive Americana (music), Americana style and narrative lyrics. In 2006, he was named one of the "100 Greatest Living Songwriters" by ''Paste (magazine), Paste'' magazine. Early life Ritter was born on October 21, 1976, in Moscow, Idaho, Moscow, Idaho, to Robert and Sue Ritter. His fascination with music began when he first heard Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan's "Girl from the North Country" on his parents' copy of ''Nashville Skyline'', and he purchased his first guitar at a local Kmart (United States), K-Mart. After graduating from Moscow High School in 1995, Ritter attended Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, Oberlin, Ohio. He initially enrolled in Oberlin's neuroscience program, as his parents were both neuroscientists, but he later created the independent major "American History Through Narrative Folk Musi ...
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Slant Magazine
''Slant Magazine'' is an American online publication that features reviews of movies, music, TV, DVDs, theater, and video games, as well as interviews with actors, directors, and musicians. The site covers various film festivals like the New York Film Festival. History ''Slant Magazine'' was launched in 2001. On January 21, 2010, it was relaunched and absorbed the entertainment blog ''The House Next Door'', founded by Matt Zoller Seitz, a former ''New York Times'' and '' New York Press'' writer, and maintained by Keith Uhlich, former '' Time Out New York'' film critic, who was the blog's editor until 2012. In the media ''Slant''s reviews, which A. O. Scott of ''The New York Times'' has described as "passionate and often prickly", have occasionally been the source of debate and discourse online and in the media. Ed Gonzalez's review of Kevin Gage's 2005 film '' Chaos'' sparked some controversy when Roger Ebert quoted it in his review of the film for the '' Chicago Sun-Time ...
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Modest Mouse
Modest Mouse is an American rock music, rock band formed in 1993 in Issaquah, Washington, and currently based in Portland, Oregon. The founding members were lead singer/guitarist Isaac Brock (musician), Isaac Brock, drummer Jeremiah Green and bassist Eric Judy. They achieved critical acclaim for their albums ''The Lonesome Crowded West'' (1997) and ''The Moon & Antarctica'' (2000) and found mainstream success with the release of ''Good News for People Who Love Bad News'' (2004) and its singles "Float On (Modest Mouse song), Float On" and "Ocean Breathes Salty". From their 1996 debut album ''This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About'' onwards, the band's lineup mostly centered on Brock and Green, undergoing multiple changes. As of 2024, Brock is the only original member of the band, Green having died in December 2022. Judy performed on every Modest Mouse album until his departure in 2012. Guitarist Johnny Marr (formerly of the Smiths) joined the band in 2006, sh ...
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Thomas E
Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (other) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the Apostle * Thomas (bishop of the East Angles) (fl. 640s–650s), medieval Bishop of the East Angles * Thomas (Archdeacon of Barnstaple) (fl. 1203), Archdeacon of Barnstaple * Thomas, Count of Perche (1195–1217), Count of Perche * Thomas (bishop of Finland) (1248), first known Bishop of Finland * Thomas, Earl of Mar (1330–1377), 14th-century Earl, Aberdeen, Scotland Geography Places in the United States * Thomas, Idaho * Thomas, Illinois * Thomas, Oklahoma * Thomas, Oregon * Thomas, South Dakota * Thomas, Virginia * Thomas, Washington * Thomas, West Virginia * Thomas County (other) * Thomas Township (other) Elsewhere * Thomas Glacier (Greenland) Arts and entertainment *Thomas (Burton novel), ''Thomas'' (Burton novel) ...
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A-side And B-side
The A-side and B-side are the two sides of vinyl records and cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a single usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or record company intends to be the initial focus of promotional efforts and radio airplay, with the aim of it becoming a hit record. The B-side (or "flip-side") is a secondary recording that typically receives less attention, although some B-sides have been as successful as, or more so than, their A-sides. Use of this language has largely declined in the 21st century as the music industry has transitioned away from analog recordings towards digital formats without physical sides, such as downloads and streaming. Nevertheless, some artists and labels continue to employ the terms ''A-side'' and ''B-side'' metaphorically to describe the type of content a particular release features, with ''B-side'' sometimes representing a "bonus" track or ...
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Nashville
Nashville, often known as Music City, is the capital and List of municipalities in Tennessee, most populous city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County in Middle Tennessee, located on the Cumberland River. Nashville had a population of 689,447 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of United States cities by population, 21st-most populous city in the United States and the fourth-most populous city in Southeastern United States, the Southeast. The city is the center of the Nashville metropolitan area, home to 2.1 million people, and is among the fastest growing cities in the nation. Named for Francis Nash, a general of the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War, the city was founded in 1779 when this territory was still considered part of North Carolina. The city grew quickly due to its strategic location as a port on the Cumberland River and, in the 19th century, a railr ...
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Accordion
Accordions (from 19th-century German language, German ', from '—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a Reed (mouthpiece), reed in a frame). The essential characteristic of the accordion is to combine in one instrument a melody section, also called the descant, diskant, usually on the right-hand keyboard, with an accompaniment or Basso continuo functionality on the left-hand. The musician normally plays the melody on buttons or keys on the right-hand side (referred to as the Musical keyboard, keyboard or sometimes the manual (music), ''manual''), and the accompaniment on Bass (sound), bass or pre-set Chord (music), chord buttons on the left-hand side. A person who plays the accordion is called an accordionist. The accordion belongs to the free-reed aerophone family. Other instruments in this family include the concertina, harmonica, and bandoneon. Th ...
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Wurlitzer
The Rudolph Wurlitzer Company, usually referred to as simply Wurlitzer, is an American company started in Cincinnati in 1853 by German immigrant (Franz) Rudolph Wurlitzer. The company initially imported stringed, woodwind and brass instruments from Germany for resale in the United States. Wurlitzer enjoyed initial success, largely due to defense contracts to provide musical instruments to the U.S. military. In 1880, the company began manufacturing pianos and eventually relocated to North Tonawanda, New York. It quickly expanded to make fairground organ, band organs, orchestrions, player pianos and pipe organs, pipe or theatre organs popular in theatres during the days of silent movies. Wurlitzer also operated a chain of retail stores where the company's products were sold. As technology evolved, Wurlitzer began producing Wurlitzer electric piano, electric pianos, electronic organs and jukeboxes, and it eventually became known more for jukeboxes and vending machines, which are s ...
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Hammond Organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert, first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding #Drawbars, drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, sound was created from rotating a metal tonewheel near an electromagnetic pickup, and Power amplifier, amplifying the electric signal into a speaker enclosure, speaker cabinet. The organ is commonly used with the Leslie speaker. Around two million Hammond organs have been manufactured. The organ was originally marketed by the Hammond Organ Company to Church (building), churches as a lower-cost alternative to the wind-driven pipe organ, or instead of a piano. It quickly became popular with professional jazz musicians in organ trios—small groups centered on the Hammond organ. Jazz club owners found that organ trios were cheaper than hiring a big band. Jimmy Smith (musician), Jimmy Smith's use of the Hammond B-3, with its additional harmonic percussion featu ...
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Ukulele
The ukulele ( ; ); also called a uke (informally), is a member of the lute (ancient guitar) family of instruments. The ukulele is of Portuguese origin and was popularized in Hawaii. The tone and volume of the instrument vary with size and construction. Ukuleles commonly come in four sizes: soprano, concert, tenor, and baritone. Ukuleles generally have four nylon strings tuned to GCEA. They have 16–22 frets depending on the size. History Developed in the 1880s, the ukulele is based on several small, guitar-like instruments of Portuguese origin, the , and , introduced to the Hawaiian Islands by Portuguese immigrants from Madeira, the Azores, and Cape Verde. Three immigrants in particular, Madeiran cabinet makers Manuel Nunes, José do Espírito Santo, and Augusto Dias, are generally credited as the first ukulele makers. Two weeks after they disembarked from the SS ''Ravenscrag'' in late August 1879, the '' Hawaiian Gazette'' reported that "Madeira Islanders recently arriv ...
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Lap Steel Guitar
The lap steel guitar, also known as a Hawaiian guitar or lap slide guitar, is a type of steel guitar without pedals that is typically played with the instrument in a horizontal position across the performer's lap. Unlike the usual manner of playing a traditional acoustic guitar, in which the performer's fingertips press the strings against frets, the pitch of a steel guitar is changed by pressing a polished steel bar against strings while plucking them with the opposite hand. The steel guitar's name is derived from this steel bar. Though the instrument does not have frets, it displays markers that resemble them. Lap steels may differ markedly from one another in external appearance, depending on whether they are acoustic or electric, but in either case, do not have pedals, distinguishing them from pedal steel guitars. The steel guitar was the first foreign musical instrument to gain a foothold in American pop music. It originated in the Hawaiian Kingdom about 1885, popularize ...
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Mandolin
A mandolin (, ; literally "small mandola") is a Chordophone, stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally Plucked string instrument, plucked with a plectrum, pick. It most commonly has four Course (music), courses of doubled Strings (music), strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of eight strings. A variety of string types are used, with steel strings being the most common and usually the least expensive. The courses are typically tuned in an interval of perfect fifths, with the same tuning as a violin (G3, D4, A4, E5). Also, like the violin, it is the soprano member of a Family (musical instruments), family that includes the mandola, octave mandolin, mandocello and mandobass. There are many styles of mandolin, but the three most common types are the ''Neapolitan'' or ''round-backed'' mandolin, the ''archtop'' mandolin and the ''flat-backed'' mandolin. The round-backed version has a deep bottom, constructed of strips of wood, glued together into a bowl. Th ...
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