03.24.24 Medeski•Russo•Ribot at Big Ears Festival, featuriing guitarist Marc Ribot, organist John Medeski and drummer Joey Russo.

The Guitarists of Tom Waits. From Closing Time to Bad As Me.

This video traces the contributions of every guitarist who played with Tom throughout his recording - and touring - years.

Francesco Chiacchio

Midnight Lilacs + Marc Ribot - Tannen Records, 2013

MARC RIBOT GUITAR The most famous records Ribot has played on are a series of classic releases by Tom Waits. Ribot was a guitarist for Waits on Franks Wild Years (1987), Big Time (1988), and Mule Variations (1999). Ribot provides the lyrical lead guitar for Waits's retro-soul exploration on "House Where Nobody Lives," the fuzz electric blues backing on "Cold Water," and the broken abstractions on "Eyeball Kid." On "Black Market Baby," Ribot's distorted notes slide on the edge of lounge, threatening to tip over into Webern before heading to extremely drunk classic rock. The guitarist's ability to straddle nostalgic styles and art music helped define Waits's cerebrally boozy approach to roots music-noisy, dissonant, and cool.

Marc Ribot // The Jazz-Bins

Unreal. Keyed in from note #1 and didn't drop the energy for one millisecond of the set. Featuring Greg Lewis on the B3 and Joe Dyson on percussion.

Maria Elena Silva - Dulce - I did not expect to hear Marc Ribot playing guitar in a dream pop setting!

Pushing past the submissive qualities of her debut, Silva captures a deep and deliberate pop-forward poignancy in her sophomore “Dulce”. Written in the wake of her relocation to Chicago, Silva contemplates new love, a listless fate, sobriety, and maternity all the while retaining the patience of her previous release, “Eros”. Temperate motifs aside, a freer, wilder intensity permeates “Dulce”. Longtime collaborator Scott Dean Taylor has developed a singular vocabulary when playing with Silva and dispenses all manner of obligatory drummer-isms. A sonic ascetic, he plays only what her songs require. Listen to his booming kick drum mimic the sound of a thunderclap three minutes into "Jasper." Hammond organ whiz Carey Frank fills in blanks throughout the spectrum as he trades off with Maria's down-tuned electric guitar for command of the bass frequencies and longtime Lou Reed and kd lang drummer Danny Frankel alternates with Hodges for percussion duties. Silva’s “Dulce” is unapologetic. She brings forth higher than ever before highs, powerful whispers, and a noteworthy knack for teetering between the classical and the senseless. One minute you're hanging on every syllable of Silva's vocals and the next minute you're flying into the clouds on Ribot's guitar and the group’s rhythmic interplay.  Maria Elena Silva - acoustic and electric guitars, vocals Carey Frank - Hammond organ Danny Frankel - percussion Stephen Hodges - percussion on “Jasper”, “Love”, “Narrowed” Marc Ribot - acoustic and electric guitars, ukelele, electric sitar Chris Schlarb - acoustic guitars on "Love, If It Is So" Scott Dean Taylor - acoustic drums Produced and Mixed by Chris Schlarb

It was 15 years ago today: Allen Toussaint's Nonesuch debut album, The Bright Mississippi, was released. Toussaint explores the work of his New Orleans forebears on a soulful, live-in-the-studio jazz set, produced by Joe Henry, performing with Don Byron, Nicholas Payton, Marc Ribot, David Piltch, Jay Bellerose, and special guests Brad Mehldau and Joshua Redman.

"Exquisite" —Washington Post

John Zorn Marc Ribot Live in Jazz in Marciac 2010

pic 1 source: jazzinmarciac 📸: Francis Vernhet

pic 2 + 3 youtube

John Medeski, Marc Ribot, & Joe Russo perform "Hey Joe" on 9/12/23 at the Sultan Room in Brooklyn, NY. Heady af.

Robert Plant ı Alison Krauss Raising Sand 2007 Rounder ————————————————— Tracks: 01. Rich Woman 02. Killing the Blues 03. Sister Rosetta Goes before Us 04. Polly Come Home 05. Gone Gone Gone (Done Moved On) 06. Through the Morning, through the Night 07. Please Read the Letter 08. Trampled Rose 09. Fortune Teller 10. Stick with Me Baby 11. Nothin’ 12. Let Your Loss Be Your Lesson 13. Your Long Journey —————————————————

Riley Baugus

Jay Bellerose 

Norman Blake

T Bone Burnett 

Dennis Crouch 

Greg Leisz 

Alison Krauss

Robert Plant

Marc Ribot 

Patrick Warren 

* Long Live Rock Archive

Here's a striking deep cut on the latest album from Marc Ribot's Ceramic Dog. There's a wonderful thick guitar tone and furious chug to the rhythm section going on here. Love it! Don't let the jazz tag on the Bandcamp page fool you - these old dudes can still rock out.

Natalia Lafourcade — De Todas las Flores. 2022 : Sony.

! acquire the album ★ attach a coffee !

Last fall I really started to go down a rabbit hole listening to live Bill Orcutt solo gigs on YouTube. I was tweeting abt it on QueenCityJamz and stumbling into a handful of fans of his music.

Not sure where exactly a link was made to Marc Ribot but I became pretty obsessed with him too. Ribot's career since 1979 is full of all kinds of fascinating bands and genres that he's played in. I wanted to mainline all of his music at once.

Another guitar player I'd gotten into was a younger fella than those two - David Nance. He's got a Neil Young vibe to his playing which I can't get enough of. This led me to making a Wish Board tweet last December:

Well, long story short I realized living out in the Rocky Mountains where these cats don't come very often that I finally needed to attend the Big Ears Festival in 2023 where Orcutt & Ribot were playing over multiple days.

We'll get to that amazing four-days later, just wanted to use this first post to sorta give an idea of how this Amplified Wires blog idea sprang from.

MISSION STATEMENT FOR AMPLIFIED WIRES:

Find the most interesting guitar players in all genres who are striving to find new ideas and new ways of playing the guitar, which after all is just some amplified wires bolted to wood as I Ribot wrote to that effect in his entertaining autobiography UNSTRUNG (2021).

I want to use this blog as a repository of all of the albums, live shows, articles, etc that I find that are related to guitarists I wanna explore with Amplified Wires.