Michael Burks brought his own smoke to the Double Door Inn Saturday night

Little did any of us know that Michael Burks' star would rise so far so fast when we witnessed his blue collar working grind on stage earlier last decade. This blues master gained national recognition in 2001 with the release of "Make It Rain" and showed it was not a fluke with his 2003 release of "I Smell Smoke".

And so with the release of his latest work "Iron Man", Michael is potentially positioning himself for legend status one day. Charlotte blues music fans had the opportunity to witness this legend in the making Saturday night at the Double Door Inn. From the size of the crowd, I'm guessing that almost all of them made it out to the show. The DDI was a sea of shuffling blues fans listening to a Blues Master put on a show.

A few photos of the show.

Read on for the rest of the story...

Cheers,

Monty

Red All Over smokes the Double Door Inn - Nov 25th '09

As reported on the 18th, RED ALL OVER was slated to perform at Charlotte’s Double Door Inn on Thanksgiving Eve. While many folks were resting at home after a day of Thankgiving preparations, there were a number of folks who got out for a night of friends, relaxation and dance. RED ALL OVER provided the motivating dance entertainment with their high energy rock performance, laser lightshow, not too overused smoke machine, synthesizers, percussions, guitar, bass and provacative vocals and dance.

Performance photos..

As discussed in the interview with Red All Over back on the 18th, the guitar player (Jorge Loor) is a stand-in for this show and did an admirable job along with Jarrett Bury coaching along the way. Of course Eliza Grey was a standout on vocals this evening. Rounding out the band tonight featured Brian Fetner on percussions.

Read on for the rest of the story......

Cheers,

Monty

Red All Over is set to rock Charlotte's iconic Double Door Inn

Over at the Double Door Inn, Micah Davidson first heard the Charlotte band Red All Over at a Crown Town Showdown event a few months ago. What he heard was so unique, fresh and upbeat he and Red All Over frontman Jarrett Bury set up a future date for the band to return and perform a show of their own. Well that future date is just around the corner – Wednesday the 25th of Nov '09, Red All Over will take the stage at the iconic Double Door Inn!

The band recently sat down for an interview with examiner.com over a cup of coffee – it wound up being a 2 hour conversation about everything from the origins of the band to global politics to photography to the impact of technology on digital marketing – but mostly we talked about their love of music and the emotions of being involved in the creative process.

If you’re not familiar with Red All Over hold on to your hat cause they don’t do your parents music. This trio of musicians brings an Amsterdam techno Euro-Pop sound with an 80’s style hint of British influence along with American storytelling lyrics resulting in a sound which garners global popularity. Might not be your Mom’s sound, but your girlfriends gonna dance and grind all night long!

Read on for the rest of the story and band snapshot...

Cheers,

Monty

Jim Weiders' Project Percolator

Project Percolator is the latest musical project undertaken by Jim Weider, former member of "The Band". Made up of acclaimed musicians, this project is unique in that it is guitar focused in a jazz, funk, rock, instrumental blend which will have you hearing and feeling the voiceless ballads. Prepare to get your groove on if you are one of the lucky ones around the world who are able to see this show live. Mesmerising is another adjective that describes the experience.

Project Percolator is made up of Jim Weider on lead and slide guitar, renowned NYC guitarist Mitch Stein on the other side of the lead guitar duo, internationally known Steve Lucas on Bass, and perhaps one of the best drummers playing today - Rodney Holmes (try keeping up with him with your ears, forget about it with your eyes - ain't happenin').

Project Percolator tours the East Coast through February and will tour Europe in the spring. I'd encourage you to hit-up the MySpace page or Jim's website to keep abreast of where this wonderful show will be in the coming months.

Here's a link to see a few photos from the show.

Cheers,

Monty

Contagious Blues Band

Contagious Blues Band

Charlotte Blues Society’s Blues Challenge Winners -- Triangle Blues Society’s Blues Challenge Winners -- 2008 “Blues Kings of Beale Street” Memphis, TN -- 2008 Charlotte Music Awards“ Best Blues Band”

These are a few of the accolades and awards bestowed upon this group of very hard working and talented musicians who are representing Charlotte - and of course themselves - in the 2009 International Blues Challenge in Memphis, Feb 5th through 7th (this week!!!).

This Saturday nights performance was a send off and fundraiser for the band and what a hot show it was. The DDI was jam-packed with blues fans appreciating the soulful art produced by this talented foursome. Junior Howell on drums is the heartbeat of Contagious and Jim Bolt is the soul on Bass. The lighting bolts that add the winning dimensions to this band are the two guitarists - Joey Recchio on slide and Hank Shell shredding the lead. These four guys come together producing the heart-pounding rhythm and soul-searching harmonies of a truly great southern rock blues band.

Being at the show was the only way to truly understand how much these guys love their trade and truly appreciate the people who support them in what they love to do. Best of luck to them this weekend, but no matter what they're number one in our hearts as Charlotte's pick for top blues band. Couldn't happen for a better group of guys!!

Some photos from the show can be seen here..

Cheers,

Monty

The Stellas & Lindy Dobbins

Saturday, Dec 6th Lindy Dobbins & The Red Velvet Manx held the CD release party for their first full length CD, entitled "A Year In Maine One Month" (perhaps Lindy can explain the title?).

The event was held just after breakfast Saturday - at 3 in the afternoon with The Stellas opening. An instant wake-up as the Stellas performed their electrifying brand of rock-n-roll. It may have been early, but Adam and the guys were in time, on key and highly energized! (Photos from The Stellas show)

With a nice crowd at the Double Door to show some love, Lindy and the band played a high octane, hour long, set featuring songs from the CD as well as a couple from the EP which are featured anew. "Power of One" stood out for me! (Photos from Lindy's show)

All in all a great Saturday afternoon of music at The Double Door.

If you were there, what did you think?

Cheers,

Monty

Reinvent The Wheel?

I've recently been confronted with some challenging questions from new acquaintenances. They have involved some really good people asking some really good questions of me to which I have really not had very good answers. The questions - very tactfully put - have revolved around when, if, or why, I haven't made it easier and more transparent for people to buy prints of my images if they want to. Or even to buy the image so they can make their own prints if they want to, under appropriate license of course.

My approach to this has been that I like to deal with the folks that buy a print to ensure they are satisfied with the result. Kind of the personal touch if you will. Turns out some folks don't see it that way. What I've been told is that the touchy feely stuff is really good during the time of taking the photos, but once taken, processed and posted, my new friends point out that selecting and printing is a commodity process that they feel more comfortable doing without needing to deal with anyone else.

I have to admit that I was uneasy, but I listened. What's more I think I understand and get it! So, what I've been researching is various ways to make the business end of purchasing as transparent as possible. That's where the title of this entry came from. I found that I could reinvent the wheel by setting up my own web-based store and merchant processing account - or - I could use some existing services. I'll be honest, I didn't like most of the 3rd party providers I looked into.

That's when I ran into a site called Smugmug. I know the name is corny, but the service is superior to anything I have seen to date. Not only do they support a professionally outsourced printing agency, but they support the online acquisition of the digital image along with personal and business use licensing, as well as a variety of gift products that go very well with photographic images.

So the short story is that I have bought into Smugmug and have begun loading images up to the site. It'll take some time to get my portfolios up there, but I wanted to let folks know that I've started this process and would love for people to visit the site and provide me with their feedback.

I hope that you find this a pleasing method to view my images as well as find it a viable option to acquire any prints or products you find desireable.

Here's the link! http://montychandler.smugmug.com/

Cheers,

Monty