Boston, Massachusetts: A Sandman’s Guide to the Freedom Trail of Rock

In a city often overshadowed by its headliners and biggest stages—from Aerosmith and Donna Summer to the Garden and Fenway Park—you can find its heartbeat on the unlikely paths and byways cleared by the its poets and troubadors, from Jonathan Richman to Morphine’s Mark Sandman. On this episode, host Will Dailey returns to his hometown for an insider’s guide to the nation’s birthplace as it reinvents itself yet again. 

To hear the artists mentioned in this episode, check Will’s playlist at soundofourtownpod.com

Want to chat about the music in your city? Hit us up on: 

• Instagram: @DoubleElvis @WillDaileyOfficial

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Going to Boston calling this year, I had a lot
of listening prep work to do. Thankfully, I could bring
my room everywhere with me on the road to return
home ready for the fest, whether in a hotel room
or green room, with the room size defying sound, I
could listen to the New Ripe or Van Buren and
feel like I was already there, experienced the best sound anywhere,
everywhere with Sonos Rome, the ultra portable smart speaker for

(00:22):
all your listening adventures. Visit Sonos dot com to learn
more in shop Rome in three new exclusive colors, Double Elvis.
When you find out that James Brown prevented this city

(00:43):
from burning down in but that Van Morrison fled to
this town so that he might escape the New York Mafia,
and while they're in exile likely crafted his masterpiece, or
that this is the town, or a fast rising punk
rock band long before they were rock and roll Hall
of Famers turned to September outdoor concert into a full
blown riot in Well. Then the nickname Hub of the

(01:07):
Universe starts to make some sense. She got a mind
of her own, Yeah, and she used it mighty fine.
She drove a pickup truck painted green and blue. The
tires were wearing thin, and she's done a mile or two.
And when I asked her where she was headed for
back up to Boston. I'm singing in a bar memory
one sell the rolling stones. We're visiting where America began.

(01:33):
A resilient city on a hill that can produce sounds
as raw and romantic as the drama of its four seasons.
A climate that can create euphoria as much as it
can incite rage. A town called stiff and uptight as
often as it is called rebellious and rowdy. A city
that is the very cornerstone of a nation's foundation. Composed
of insane one way potholed streets tied together each square

(01:53):
inch of this higher learning metropolis. It's a city students,
world class hospitals, bio and tech startups, in a city
that can get away with toward the future with pragmatic optimism.
I think, and what are the sounds that come from Boston,
once the epicenter of Puritanism, but forever the origin of
a sprawling country. What is the music of a city where,
more often than not, the artist is drowned out by

(02:13):
the pummeling deciples of sports championships, and who are the
musicians in a city that make it worth visiting? Is
it worth living here and being an artist? See, I'm
from here, and I wondered myself all the time. Within
this legacy of revolution, Boston has a tough personality that
protects it's deep seated inferiority complex. It's technically a small town,

(02:34):
but with a big personality. Nonetheless, it operates as if
it's on par with any metropolis in America, even those
that are ten times its size. Greater Boston is the
union of Cambridge and Boston, beating with one giant Megatron heart,
backed up by Somerville often supplying the blood in oxygen
and Sure it gave us a revolution may outline for
a constitution, Big deal that also gave us Julianna hat

(02:56):
Errol Smelling, Kot the Cars, Ship of the Dresden Dogs,
so Jay Giles, Bassi, Jonathan Richmond, Letters, The Cleo, The
drop Kickmarthy Buffalo, Tom, Tracy Chapman, Darling, Upper Values, That Hawwy,
The Hill, Mighty Mighty Bostone, Mr Lake Street, Dive, New Editions, Converge,

(03:18):
Still God, Fuzzy Rights Lane and in Danda Martin Sexs
and Lizzie mcgouplay in Market Mark. There's a spirit strong
enough to entice the velvet underground to escape the absurdities
of our gargantua in New York City to seek their
home away from home. In nineteen sixty nine, at the
long gone Boston Tea Party concert Hall, in the vibe

(03:40):
and outsized personality of this modest sized town provided a
platform for the Great James Brown to amplify some much
needed sonic therapy to a grieving nation, direct the TV
across the state from the modest sized Boston Garden. On
April fifth, nineteen sixty eight, Brown mourned with Ann lifted
up at the heart of New England on the night
the world was on edge after Dr King was murdered.

(04:02):
In our fourth episode, we are taking a trip to
my beloved hometown, the city I can attest that only
a fool would operate a national career from but a
galactic sized gold mine. To sharpen your sonic wits, It is,
after all, the hub of the universe. This is Sound
of Our Town and we are visiting Boston, Massachusetts. Sound

(04:24):
of Our Town is a podcast about the music that
shape the city you are touching down in. It is
also about finding, hearing, and experiencing its best music happening
right now. What sounds and places of shape the city's culture,
and what new sounds continue to define it. It's about
getting together in a room to listen, and why that
matters so much right now, whether you're quickly dropping in

(04:45):
or landing for a long stay. In each episode, I'll
introduce you to the real places and sonic stories echoing
in a particular town, so that your adventure is enriched
with music. My name is Will Daily, I'm an artist
and I've been slugging it out in towns from many years.
We're here because we've all been at that live show
where the music takes over. It moves us, whether we're

(05:05):
the audience or the band, taking us somewhere together. And
before we walk the sonic freedom Trail, I want to
switch things up here and first transport ourselves three thousand,
four hundred and forty six miles away to a festival
stage in Palestrina, Italy for the nell Gnome del Rock Festival,
where songwriting legend Mark Samman, Son of Boston and indie

(05:27):
Titans to music fans, takes the stage for the last
time on July three, with his band Morphine. In the
apex of nineties alternative music, a low rock sound could
be heard bellowing from the corner of Massachusetts Avenue and Cambridge,
just outside of Central Square. A trio composed of baritone

(05:49):
sacks or maybe two played by the same dude at
the same time, a two string super low based guitar
sometimes played with a slide, and a confidence supremely smooth
drum group that made up the Majestic and Mighty Morphine.
Their success was not your typical American success. It was
first regional and then national, with fans such as p. J. Harvey,

(06:10):
Less Claypool and Mike Watt all extolling their admiration. It
was and is passionate Dana Cauley on Sachs drome du
pre originally on drums and later the late Great Billy
Conway on the tubs, and the lead singer, the lead
singer whose deep vocal baritone flirted constantly with his self
built bass guitar of his own invention, Mr Mark Samman,

(06:32):
a deep mood of dream like timbers and a beat
nick nostalgia mixed joyously with the all mighty hooks that
a great song needs. The trio climbed the ranks of
Boston clubs, then the Northeast region, to other US markets,
and onto venues and clubs across the Atlantic, where they
are much beloved. It was during a tour in Europe,
hammered by the sweltering, heated July, that Morphin was slated

(06:53):
to play the idyllic town of Palestrina, Italy. I mentioned
it was hot. It was a hundred degrees hot. The
band had been enjoying their tour. Sam Man, a tall gentleman,
was exhausted from the summer's pummeling, but eager to play
at the Italian Rock Festival, the three thousand miles from
their home in Boston, where just nine years earlier they
created their organic trance rock. This unprecedented sound, this timeless groove,

(07:18):
the irreplaceable mark. Samman standing in front of a microphone
just before the second song of their set collapsed to
the stage. The crowd fell silent. He was rushed to
the hospital where he was pronounced dead age heart attack,
no history of heart trouble, just gone. As a Boston artist,

(07:42):
especially when coming up, I wanted people, when they heard
my music to feel the way I felt when I
heard Morphine. Their musical trajectory was organic and desirable. It
made me, in scores of other musicians, want to carve
our own sonic path, tell my own story outside the
confines of anamorphous and taxing industry tree. Morphine's gravitas, conviction,
and sublime singularity made them as elemental to Boston music

(08:06):
as well. Fenway is the baseball and there's possibly only
one room in Boston that could have serviced the correct sonic, social,
and geographical box for Morphine to take hold as a
band in that little bar makes it the perfect spot
for your first stop after you land at Logan or
pull off the mass Pike. It's a summer night in Cambridge.

(08:29):
As a neon bottled liquor sign sputters to life against
an inky black sky. You and your band haul your
gear past the humid storefronts in depression air laundrymatt to
the threshold at the corner of mass avon Hancock. The
door opens, faces turn through the greeny blur of the
bar room. Glasses are raised and greeting. There's Bonnie Ray
and Tommy Ramone at the corner table at the end

(08:50):
of the bar and ethereal. Jeff Buckley passes a frothy
guinness to poet Sheamus Heeney. As the bar keep balances
a leaning tower of fresh pine glasses. A woman pushes
past towards the local player. It's usual table. Is that
Kim deal? Is that Kim deal kicking some? David ma'am
at ass, a lazy ceiling fan barely cuts the smoky
haze where Van Morris and hunches over a notebook, scratching

(09:11):
out lyrics. What do you think of astra weeks? You
know as a title? Fur Lengetti floats in, nods and vaporizes.
Philip Roth sweats it out in the corner. Sex, regret, fascism,
you name it and vanishes. The mist clears, the beer
flows and voices raise. You go to the bar, have
a seat. Woman asks you nicely, Can I buy you
a drink? Yeah? I think she likes you, That's what

(09:32):
I think. And yes, you're gonna play tonight. You and
your band set up in a small patch of warm
pine floors designated as a stage. A Honckey talk harmonica
sets the mood. You get right up close to the mic.
For you, singing is as easy as breathing. Welcome to
the Plow and Stars, a room established in nineteen six

(09:54):
nine with a capacity to hold one hundred of your
favorite artists, writers, musicians, and neighbors. To be a music town,
you need to have a healthy number of small, cozy
places that hold big influence. The Plow is one of
those places. The room has a call to the artist.
I was playing there one night when in walks Sherry
Jones and Zachary Quinto ready to chill after rehearsing The
Glass Menagerie at a theater just down the street. It

(10:16):
makes sense that the actors are drawn to The Plow
and Stars, a bar named after the play by Sean O'Casey.
And I'm guessing that after several grouling hours with Tennessee Williams,
you really want some music in a beer. The Plow
has been a quintessential Irish bar long before Irish bar
was something marketed, sold in a box and stationed at
every few blocks in every city around the world. These
wood floors have some magic in them when they're combined

(10:38):
with tube amps and vintage drums, tempered via decades of
all night sets by the city's best songwriters and luminaries
like the Handyman Rick Berlin and Johnny Trauma and the
B Three Kings. Given the guitar pick size of the stage,
you brushed by the band, usually the bass player. On
your way to the bathroom, there's an if these walls
could talk flair, Sometimes there's room to dance as the

(10:59):
city's s players catch the vibe of morphine dripping off
the walls. In Boston and Cambridge are chalk full of
intimate venues of various DESKBA limits spots like Atwood's hosting
Beautiful Nights where an artist like Cliff Notes can bring
his music and his infinite curations, or the lily Pad
where Lady Pills just had their album release after a
feature on MPR. Places where the music is not an

(11:20):
add on, but the reason for being there, and we'll
visit some right after this. At home, I have to
play music in almost every room, the living room, in
the kitchen, front steps, even the bathroom for those cold
summer showers. That's why I love my Sono's Room. With

(11:43):
my Sono's Room like a place or wherever I want
in my house, and it'll automatically tune itself based on
the space so it sounds great no matter what, no
matter where. And if I want to expand my sound system,
I can quickly and easily connect the room to other
Sono speakers over WiFi. And since the rooms Ultra Dura
boll And weighs less than a pound, I can even
put it in the basket on my bike for a
ride down the Esplanade in Boston. I just connect via

(12:06):
Bluetooth and I'm listening to the Blue Ribbons and Lightfoot
all over town. And yeah, I have a basket on
my bike. I like the finer things. So get Rome
and get ready for your next adventure. Learn more in
Shop three new exclusive colors at Sonos dot com. I

(12:27):
swoon for a good listening room, and one of my
favorites in America is in Davis Square, Somerville, the Burn
Back Room. This might be Boston's best and maybe the
only true showcase room, a place where you can hold
the room to a whisper solo or rock out full band,
all thanks to the curation of booker Tom Bianchie. Titans
of song like Juliana Hatfield and Tanya Donneley frequent this

(12:47):
room for these qualities, and the Burn is a true
to the Bone Irish pub upfront, featuring authentic Celtic and
acoustic jams around a microphone chandelier right when you walk
in the front door. However, the nerve center of epic
impromptu funk jams and clinics for the hungry pupil is
Wally's Cafe, just a few blocks away from Boston Symphony
Hall and national landmark in its own right, Wally's claim

(13:10):
of being the oldest jazz club in the United States
maybe its least important attribute. In n seven, Joseph L.
Walcott opened Wally's Paradise across the street from its current location,
and there and then Walcott, nicknamed Wally, became the first
African American to own a nightclub. In New England, sixty
five days a year there is music, jazz, funking jam

(13:31):
sessions in close proximity to the Berkeley School of Music
in the New England Conservatory. Wallis has stood at the
proving ground for the grates of both timeless jams and
impromptu clinics. Roy Hargrove, Brantford, Marsalis and d Nino Perez
have all been found at Wally's in the past, and
today's successful jazz artists like Kendrick Scott, Warren Wolf and
Jeremy Pelt developed their touch in its modest size bar.

(13:53):
If there's magic in Boston's dirty water, you can hear
it at Wally's and on the other side of town
and Harvard Square. I'm not gonna say Harvard without the
r and watch any movie about Boston for that if
you get off on that kind of thing. But in
Harvard Square there is an American folk music mecca, introducing
Club Passing. To get to this club, tucked in between

(14:14):
Church and Brattle Streets, you have to once again brave
those slick New England bricks sidewalks before you squeeze down
an alley staircase and there you are in a candle
lit room that holds a hundred and twenty people in
the palm of its hand. In an era of sprawl,
rebuilding and expansion in Boston, this club has survived because
it is an institution. Originally called Club forty seven when

(14:35):
it opened in nineteen fifty eight. It changed its name
in nineteen sixty nine. A lot happened in nineteen sixty nine.
Club forty seven hosted the likes of Joan Bays, Bob
Dylan and Joni Mitchell back in the day when there
wasn't even a back in the day, and now it
hosts Lori McKenna, Lyle Brewer, and Olisa Almador, to name
a few. But there is one room where you don't
need a ticket. In this cozy spot receives the coveted

(14:58):
NOK cover Sound of our Town feature I got. I'll
come up with a better name for that. If you're
of the lucky sixty two people max in this Porter Square,
Cambridge spot, then you've made it through the door at Toad,
home to the town's songwriters who just want to stay fresh,
bands that have residencies that last decades, and the best

(15:19):
players backing songwriters trying out new material. The intimacy of
Toad is what spares you the show and holds you
only within the music. This is the same place where
Bill jenobits singer and guitarists the beloved indie band Buffalo
Tom was playing in two thousand and six with his
side project Crowned Victoria, when one of rock and roll's
biggest voices, who had just finished playing to seventeen thousand

(15:40):
at Boston Garden, snuck in to hear Jenomits. On that
same night, Pearl Jam played for two and a half
hours at Boston Garden. At the end of the show
and the last whaling stratocast that notes of Yellow lad Better,
the lead singer by the name of let me check
my notes here Eddie Vetter left the stage and got
himself across to ount a snug hole in the wall

(16:01):
in Porter Square, all with the sole intention of seeing
an artist at Vetter had shared a bill with a
decade and a half earlier, Buffalo Tom and Pearl Jam
played together at the now defunct Avalon Club on Landsdown
Street in the shadow of Fenway Park in when they're
both just starting out. Fast forward fifteen years later, Vetter
punches out of his day job, makes his way across
town to Toad and stealthily finds one of the few

(16:24):
seats in the club, and Toad hosts some mighty beer
selection and a full bar, but on the back wall.
The stage itself can maybe fit for adults if they
decided to share nice and deal with being on top
of one another. It's tight. Sometimes a keyboard player or
slide guitarist sits at a bench closest to the stage.
The proximity, though feeds the vibe. Legend has it that
Vetter was only see it for a few songs that

(16:45):
night in two thousand and six before being found out
and asked to join in. It was one more encore
that echoed from Boston Garden to Porters Square. So wild,
so authentic, so free, and oops, I did it again.
I've been filling you up with sonic stuff. I forgot
to consider that you might be hungry. But being a

(17:08):
Toad reminds me that right across the street is one
of the most magical, joyous noodle spots. You may woke Qatar,
just wear a jacket because the waiting happens outside on
the street. But it's worth it if you get into
the fifteen seat diner style eat and dash and bring
your appetite to ensure that you get the staff congratulations
for an empty bowl before you go over to Toad
for the first set. And these rooms make up just

(17:30):
some of the soil of the town, the spaces where
Morphine's Dana Cauli frequents as a player and as a listener.
But it gets bigger. Boston, after all, is a small
city with a big personality. Now it's possible that you
are rolling in for one, maybe two nights to spare
and you want to get your face melted right off.

(17:52):
We can start by visiting a smaller spaces that honor
the legacy of the town, a place where the door
and drink do not require a bank. The standards that
indie acts like Morphine relied on to grow to legendary
status hold true at Midway Cafe, an independent stage where
every genre finds home, plus a long running open mic
in Thursday's Querioki welcomes all who did a friendly, fabulous,

(18:16):
laid back queer scene. This hundred capacity club, now thirty
five years in, maintains the ethics that keep a scene
alive when sprawl, high rents, and high cost of living
threatened the artistic integrity of a town. We love our
independence on paper, but without the Midway Cafes of Boston
and America, we can forget about getting our faces melted.

(18:36):
It's our souls that start dripping down the drain. And
maybe Harvard squares your absolute destination and you're not down
with a folk joint like club Pass scene, well, Sinclair
is practically right next door, and since two thousand thirteen,
Sinclair has been the premier high end award winning destination
for touring indie bands and big Boston lineups. Modern architecture,
smooth cement floors in an exceptionally tall stage, Sinclair and

(19:00):
three bars can hold you and five twenty four of
your closest friends. Not a bad seat in the house,
And if five people isn't enough for your needs, you
can now jump across town to the three thousand Persons
Sister Venue, the newly launched road Runner, tucked into a
corner of Brighton, which is part of us and I
don't want to get into geography. The venue opened in
spring of two thousand twenty two, and it has already

(19:20):
hosted Billy Strings, Olivia Rodrigo and Boston Legends drop Kick
Murphy's how it connects to the infrastructure and soil of
the Boston music scene, like the Midway Cafe does, remains
to be seen and heard, but the room is dropped dead,
gorgeous and designed to melt faces. And there's one more
room in town that carries the same intensity and opening

(19:43):
up our calendars might be the best ticket. If the
indispensable rock anointed room that makes a city complete, that
next level place that within its walls offers as many
delightful quirks and unsavory charms as it does historic and
legendary shows. The Paradise Rock Club has a brightly lit
marquis that illuminates and Wealth Avenue in the heart of
Boston University Territory. It is the place that local bands

(20:04):
like Morphine have vaulted to with the same faces and
ears at earlier packed the plowing stars among the hundreds
of new fans hearing them on the radio, and that
same trajectory is happening today with acts like Umpah and
Right and within the intoxication of my youthful rock and
wall dreams. The Paradise sat front and center the stage
to get to and I did so many times that

(20:25):
I may have taken my former dreams for granted. And
then one night in two thousand seventeen, one of my
lifetime sonic highlight moments was forged on its stage when
the limits of the Paradise fire code was severely tested
during the annual Hot Stove Cool Music charity concert. Yes,
the same charity concert that happened since Chicago at the

(20:45):
Metro every summer. The event actually started in Boston in
the early two thousands by Baseball Hall of Fame journalist
Peter Gammon's and theo Epstein Hot Stove features dozens of
Boston and Chicago artists every February on a face melting
Saturday Night. Two thousand seventeen. Event included k Hanley, that
Guy from Toad, Bill Janovits, Tanya Donley, myself, and a
gang of musical friends from both cities and special guest

(21:08):
Eddie Vetter, that same guy from Toad as well. Vetter,
the inclusive and generous icon donating his time to raise
funds for our charity for inner city youth programs, asked
me a nineties kid to play guitar and sing back
up on Pearl Jam, Classics, Squeeze covers and the Who.
Second song in the Vetter set in the building almost
didn't make it through the end of Corduroy. It was

(21:30):
raw energy that even the lifelong staff had not experienced
in this nine capacity club that in the past has
hosted Cold Play, YouTube, r e M and Morphine. My
naive past self, my floating present self, and even my
grateful future self collided in a way that is only
possible in the places where you first start dreaming. Now,

(21:53):
let's keep filling up your calendar in Boston in case
you are planning a head like someone who has their
ship together. The help of the universe is catching up
to cities a lot of festivals, and it's those independent
ones that echo the energy morphine cultivated in the corner
of Plowing Stars oh so long ago. My favorite is
bams Fest. It happens in early July and Franklin Park
Bands is a cultural movement led by Greater Boston black

(22:14):
and Brown artists. If Latrelle James and Still Gold are performing,
then this free fest is the best deal in America.
And then there's Nice Fest. It happens in the same
neighborhood as the Burn in Davis Square, and it highlights
the best indie bands and artists the city has to
offer over two days in late July. Boston also has
a lot of beer, and beer has a festival of
its own. Harpoon Fest, happens every May and features add

(22:36):
percent Boston artists and a ship ton of beer. Okay,
it's really a beer festive music and not a music
festive beer, and maybe that's what makes it a Boston fest.
It hosts many Boston music award winners and nominees to
highlight the award ceremonies thirty year history in town. The
fest takes place at Hartlin's Brewery down on the pier
close to where the tea was tossed in. And of

(22:57):
course there's the Mega festival Boston goes down every year
in May along Soldiers Field Road on Harvard property. It
features a healthy amount of local artists. It is your
megacy of people's censory overload situation that rules America for
better or worse, depending on your sonic needs. But Boston
Calling puts a city in a national light for music

(23:17):
in a way it's been trying to recapture since the nineties,
you know, since morphinos around. And if you're planning a
trip to Beantown for Boston Calling, then I'm here to
fill in your after party at any of the aforementioned venues.
If you're up to date on your tetnis shot, I
want to take you along everyone's favorite dirty river on

(23:40):
the Boston Side, where we will find the town's very
own Amphitheater, the Hatshell, built in on the Esplanade behind
Beacon Hill. It is the city's open air venue, well
known for its Fourth of July festivities. It is also
the infamous site of the Green Day Riot. The city's
alternative radio station w f n Xston Peace hosted a

(24:01):
free concert for returning students as the iconic punk band
was first climbing up the charts. Five thousand people were
expected and oops, what do you know? Close to a
hundred thousand showed up. The crowd tore up flower beds,
broke through barriers, hurled bottles and cans, and generally hailed
America soon to be new punk heroes, and there was
no containing the energy as the band barely made it through.

(24:23):
When I come around, the plug was pulled after twenty
minutes of music, A hundred people were injured, and looking back,
this was just Green Day getting started. After that hot mess,
the city's inner puritans quickly re established the hat Shell
as a family friendly venue used mainly by the Boston
Pops and okay, possibly an Earth Day fest here there

(24:43):
be all right now that the flower beds are back
and orders restored. A walk along Charles river Esplanade in
the spring or fall is a hundred percent Boston zen.
It's a reminder of the small town aspect of the city.
Of the beauty of nature within the town, even the
dirty rivers not that thirty anymore. Still, what a great
spot for an outdoor punk rock sholl. For a couple

(25:06):
of years after the Green Day Riot, Boston decided to
try it again in Okay w f n x's request
to do another Welcome Back to School concert, but this
time the music needed to be more chilled, so they
booked Morphine. On September six, Morphine played the Hat Shell,
just a couple of miles down the road from their

(25:27):
favorite local, The Plowing Stars, a few thousand more people
than the Paradise Onward and Upward. So far, I've taken
you to the Hole in the Wall, the Vintage Club,
the Large Venue, the Megafest. But I'd be remiss if
I did not take you to the Vatican of Boston,
maybe the Vatican of New England. Built in nineteen eleven,

(25:51):
Fenway Park is the oldest ballpark in the major leagues.
There's another podcast out there somewhere if you want to
hear about the heartbreak and the big stories within its
green walls. That's not our job here, and you don't
have time for that either. There's too many shows to
catch we're talking about the music, specifically Fenway Park Summer
concert series, launched in two thousand and one by the
Boss in the Street Band, it now hosts a dozen

(26:15):
or more concerts a year. While the Socks are away,
Jay Z Bad Bunny, Billy, Joel and Paul McCartney somehow
managed book shows there, and Fenway Park has a musical
secret agent built into every home game, and the masterful
fingers of Fenway organist Josh Kantor, whose in game set
list includes songs ranging from Lady Gaga to Pop, Phantom
of the Operative, Tears for Fears Hall and notes that

(26:36):
Selena Gomez all on the ballpark organ some sixty covers
per game, and in recent years, Fenway has hosted many
local luminaries like Super Smash Brothers, Jesse d Ally McGurk
in Session Americana on a rooftop garden stage before games,
and it is opening a five thousand seat theater attached
to the park in fall of two thousand twenty two.

(26:59):
See even sports can't survive without music. And while I
have you in Fenway, it is just a jump over
to my favorite gem. Now this has been a tough
call in my hometown. I could have easily have chosen
the spot that is my dream gig, the majestic three thousand,
six hundred seat Wang Theater. It's an outsized hidden gem,
for sure, but I always feel like I'm walking into

(27:21):
a Kubrick dream upon entering the Ornate Lobby. I'll play
there one day and I'll just put you all on
the guest list. It could also easily be wherever force
of nature J J. Gonsen is setting up Shock. Her
club once was one of hundreds shut down during the pandemic,
and from those ashes, she morphed it into a glorious
pop up at Poynton Yards in Cambridge. Her iconic images

(27:42):
of Elliott Smith and Kurt Cobain are hidden gems themselves,
but it's her curation of events like Summer Pride with
Walter sickertt in the Army of Broken Toys, Brandy Blaze
and d J. Y Sham that keep the independent side
of Boston thriving. But for the hidden gem, it's gonna
have to be my personal mental sanctuary je outside of
Fenway Park the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum. If someone tells

(28:05):
you that you don't go to Boston to visit the
magical realm of a Venetian style palazzo that is itself
a masterpiece filled with masterpieces, then weep for them because
they've never been to the courtyard of the Gardener Museum.
On free first Thursdays, you can drift through this realm
and listen to luscious songwriters, mariachi bands, and world music
trios as the music flows upwards from an otherworldly garden

(28:28):
portal to walk through three stories of elaborate stone balconies.
And yeah, the Gardener is missing a half billion worth
of stolen artwork. Just DM me if you have any
information on that. But you can't steal magic. Inexorably, nothing
stays the same. Some amazing establishments have their moments, then

(28:51):
fall victim to the march of time and high rents
to get reabsorbed into the city escape too often become
a Starbucks or worse, another bank, and I to these
couple of years. It's an awareness of the past that
can soothe our navigation of the present. To further understand
the lore of Boston, there are two books to take
in before you arrive. The first suggestion is a must

(29:11):
if you're listening to this show. The appropriately titled The
Sound of Our Town, A History of Boston Rock and
Roll by fame rock journalist Brett Milano, published in two
thousand and seven pages that will give you nostalgia even
if you are in a round for it, or even
if you weren't alive for it. And to unleash the
ju ju of the past, the sonic vibe, and that
musical chowder, you must read astral Weeks, A secret history

(29:34):
of nineteen sixty eight by Ryan Walsh, lead singer of
lauded rock band Hallelujah the Hills, published in two thousand
and eighteen. This book kind of tells the story of
the making of the greatest album of all time, but
it really tells you about some of the spirits that
linger in the Boston sound and scene. And there are
spirits echoes that a songwriter absorbs. It feels like Mark

(29:57):
Salmon was imbued with a little of that Boston vapor
that Romance Lou Reid and move Van Morrison's pan across paper.
I believe in the spirit when I listened to Morphine
low Lush and played on a d I Y base
and I'm not alone. Ten years after the loss of
Sam and Dana Carley and Jerome Dupre joined forces with
singer Jeremy Lyons to form Vapors of Morphine per the

(30:18):
request of the Nell known Del Rock Festival, and they
are still going strong today, keeping the spirit alive and
building upon it. That sound is Boston to me, uniquely enduring.
Like a lot of cities in America, Boston is without
a traditional music business. It doesn't have as many breakout
acts that become household names as say, does a city

(30:40):
like l A or New York. But then again, is
that even the model at all? Is there such a
thing as a breakout act that emerges from a city's
music scene, or do artists simply emerge from platforms like YouTube,
tik talk, and Instagram that are open to the world.
Everyone has a song now, and everyone's songs are available
to you right now. And what do we do with

(31:00):
all that choice? When we are so interconnected digitally? Where
do we find uniqueness originality? When the coffee in Atlanta
tastes the same as the coffee in Houston, When every
song from everyone around the world is on the same
platform pushing everything all the time like follow, stream, share, repeat,
ad NAZM, Where are your choices? Special. Where do your

(31:21):
choices make a difference. Well, it's in the next town
that you visit the venue, in the concert halls you
decide to step into, come alive. Not simply because of
the potential energy that aren't they're waiting, but because of
what you bring by being there. Boston has a richness
of character and a true grip built into its artists

(31:43):
and its music. It's the only way to survive there.
Armed is simply a two string base, a barretone sacks,
and an unrelenting groove. You make the tiny plowing stars
sing your headline of street fair in Central Square, Cambridge.
Then you sell out the Paradise ben you're asked the
headline the hat shehell, and then the world opens up

(32:05):
to your authenticity and uniqueness. When that happens, you begin
to open yourself up more and more as your voice
rises from the depths of your being. Maybe then you
find yourself a few years down the road, on a
summer's day in Italy. You're looking out upon and then
throw a crowd staring back, waiting to hear the deep

(32:25):
sound of your voice. You see the microphone you breathe in,
and one more thing. While you're in Boston. To really
feel it, make sure you stop on the corner of
Mass Ave in Brookline Street in Central Square there and

(32:46):
then just outside the door the Middle East Club, look
up at the street sign and read what it says.
You've arrived at Mark sam Man Square. Now all you
need to do is catch a show. We can't stay forever,
but we can share in the music that does. All right,

(33:14):
you've been listening to Sound of Our Town. We've got
twelve episodes for you this first season, and this one
makes four. Where are we going next? You will find
out next Thursday. If you want to chat about the
music scene in your city, hit us up on Instagram
at double Elvis and at Will Daily Official, or on
Twitter at Double Elvis FM and at Will Daily. Sound
of a Town is a production of Double Elvis and

(33:35):
I Heart Radio. The show is executive produced by Jake Brennan,
Brady Sadler, and Carl Karioli for Double Elvis, Production assistance
by Matt Bowden. The show is created, written, hosted, and
scored by me Will Daily. Additional writing on this episode
by Ellen tebow For sources to see the show notes.
Music for this episode was composed and performed by me
Will Daily. You can check out my music just by
spelling my name correctly. Anywhere you listen to music, just

(33:57):
spell Daily with all the vowels you can fit in it.
I'm on spot, pi, Apple, band Camp, and always at
will Daily dot com. And there's some additional music on
this episode by my friend Cliff Notes. And if you
are coming to Boston, you need to check out his
podcast Lust for Live. It's a weekly short form podcast
about what live music is happening on the week you
decide to come to town. We've got family here to

(34:17):
care for all your sonic needs. Also, on this episode
of Some Oregon, played by the one and only Josh
cantor dm me. The title of the song that he's
playing and I'm gonna send the first person to do so.
Some merch and all that drumming that you hear in
Sound of Our Town is played by Boston's own Dave Brophy. Okay,
I'm off to the next town and the next show.

(34:37):
DM me if you think I should come to your town,
And it's always thank you for your ears.