guilty pleasure monday: trouble (ray lamontagne)

…and it all started because of a little dog.

ray lamontagne is a singer-songwriter from new england whose raspy voice has graced grammy-winning music. i had no idea of any of this until i saw the travelers insurance commercial featuring an adorably-scruffy but neurotic benji dog who feared for the safety of his favorite bone. i know radio in DC is limited, but i can only wonder how many other artists i have been missing since we lost any station that plays anything new.

but enough of that rant. what i have since learned about the reclusive mr. ray: he apparently grew up in a less-than-stellar situation and initially rejected music because it is something his father did (and apparently, his relationship with his father was, you guessed it, troubled.) but, as legend has it, he was working in a shoe factory when he heard a song. this song:

and suddenly, his life changed.

what little i can read about him makes it sound like he lives a pretty private life with his family. it doesn’t sound like he likes to tour much. pity. what truly brought him to my attention was a song from his latest album, g-d willin’ & the creek don’t rise.

one of those random internet radio stations played it, and i had to find out who was singing that song. (yeah, i know — it’s a little countrified, but i like it. it has a bit of that neil young harvest vibe to it, methinks.) and then, i heard that voice and thought, hmm, isn’t that the voice from the commercial with the cute dog that has that song i like?

so yeah, it’s a little bit country AND it’s a little bit rock. and if you’ve never listened to this guy’s stuff, you really ought to give it a try.

wish he toured more. maybe touring is more trouble than he can handle, though.

4 thoughts on “guilty pleasure monday: trouble (ray lamontagne)

  1. thanks as always, murph. i will give them a listen. i feel like i am in a time warp here. of course, thanks to local radio, i *am* up on moves like jagger and i’m sexy and i know it. (now if you’ll excuse me, i am going to go and smack myself in the head to make both songs go away.

  2. The local sorta-AAA station isn’t perfect by a long shot, but it’s better than I’ve found in many other, larger cities. If you want to take a listen, it’s http://929dave.radio.com/

    There’s way too much Coldplay, Jack Johnson, and the like, but they make up for it by occasionally throwing on “Alex Chilton” or “Madman Across the Water” (which they played just yesterday).

  3. thank you kindly. you wouldn’t believe how we literally have no rock stations anymore except for BIG 100.3. and that’s really a “lite” classic rock sort of deal. oh how i miss WHFS!

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