This weekend I had the pleasure of attending Stinkfest (hereon forward known as Kindiefest), a conference for the very cool if fairly small indie rock music for kids world. There was a running joke throughout the day about how many pitches we bloggers and writers all get with the line …and when I had kids last year, I realized there were no good family CDs…
Hm, then I wonder what kinds of kids’ music we’ve all been reviewing all this time.
In any case, there were so many bands I am incredibly excited for us to introduce you to in the coming weeks but I thought I’d toss out a couple whose live performances in the showcase simply blew me away — and who, for some absurd reason, we’ve never covered here before.
Brady Rymer had an entire room of jaded music industry pros off their butts and dancing, and that’s saying something. His catchy Grammy-nominated recent release, Here Comes Brady Rymer and The Little Band That Could is good old-fashioned American rock n roll and the fact that kids love it is almost incidental. It’s a little Springsteen, a little Dylan, a little bluegrass, and yet totally original. Of every CD in my overflowing press bag, this is the first one I ran home to listen to. Listen to Jump Up for starters, and you’ll know why right away.
Another standout for me was Stinkfest headliner Ralph Covert who is like that cute geeky music major you had a crush on in college (or is that just me). He fronts both the Chicago-based indie rock band The Bad Examples, and the family-friendly band, Ralph’s World which puts on quite the high energy show. Don’t be deceived by the fact that Disney is responsible for putting out his eighth album, The Rhyming Circus; even the NY Times referred to him as possibly this genre’s Elvis Costello. Oh, and if you’re looking for a little treat on the album, check out the Folson Daycare Blues. You can imagine, right?
Now let’s have a big collective hooray for great music the whole family can listen to together — not because it’s G rated, but because it’s actually that good. –Liz
Find Here Comes Brady Rymer and the rest of his CD collection on CD Baby, and find The Rhyming Circus; on the Ralph’s World website and on amazon.com. For still more, don’t miss our kids’ music archives right here.
