From a CUNY student project page on Brooklyn Heights: “Montague Street was also a place for musicians where live music made Brooklyn Heights a destination for those seeking lively nightlife. Bob Dylan in his song “Tangled up in Blue” sings of the street’s lively cafes and air of revolution:”

“I lived with them on Montague Street
In a basement down the stairs
There was music in the cafes at night
And revolution in the air”

- “Tangled Up In Blue” - Blood On The Tracks (1975)

Check out the interesting discussion on Brownstoner…

LINK: Did Bob Dylan Really Live in Brooklyn Heights? [Brownstoner]

“Love, American Style” is a great song by The Cowsills, a band much better known for recording the song “Hair.”

The “Love, American Style” song was the theme for a TV show of the same name name. According to TV.com, the hour-long show debuted on ABC in the fall of 1969 with “stories about common people finding love in all walks of life. Each hour-long show would give us either one, two, three, or four stories of love.”

THE PROBLEM: The full lyrics to this song do not seem to exist online, even on the Cowsills’ own website. At best, you can find a transcription of the ~30 seconds used as the intro to the TV show. So as a public service, Daily Heights presents the only page on the Internet where you can find the full lyrics to “Love, American Style.” Including chords. After the break.

Love, American Style

La-hove, love, … (clap) la-ha-hooove …
Love, American style, truer than the red, white and blue
Love, American style, that’s me and you
And on a star-spangled night my love, (My love come to me)…
(more…)

Here’s my new favorite acoustic streetcorner Hank Williams cover band, caught live this past Saturday afternoon at Grand Army Plaza:

The band is called The Merles, and they’ve played small Park Slope clubs and bars, including Cafe Steinhof. They told me they have no upcoming gigs. If anyone knows how to get in touch with The Merles, please send the contact info our way, K?
The Merles - Long Gone Lonesome Blues (Hank Williams) [.AVI VIDEO, 0:43 sec, 11MB]

MAC PEOPLE: Is there seriously no way to watch an .AVI video on a Mac?

Louise Crawford writes on OtBKB about her son’s band: “They’ve been practicing for months but he’d made it clear that he’d tell us when he was ready for us to come to a rehearsal … Cool and Unusual Punishment is the name … they rehearse every Friday night in the drummer’s apartment. The drummer’s parents are extremely good natured about the noise. They actually keep the drum set in the living room.”

“The people in their apartment building are good natured too. Apparently last week they called while the group was rehearsing a song called ‘Where is My Mind?’ by the Pixies. the drummer’s mother came into the living room holding the telephone: ‘The woman downstairs would like to speak with you,’ she said ominously. The kids got nervous, of course, sure that she was calling to complain about the noise. But it turned out that she loves the song … and just wanted the band to play it again.”

“It would be virtually impossible for the band to rehearse in our building what with Mr. Persnickity downstairs … “

Link: Cool and Unusual [Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn]

“Legal Eagles. Fly or Die!”

Taken on Washington Ave. near Lincoln, next to the liquor store. I can barely make out the e-mail–I think it’s ElsieLawMusic@hotmail.com? I sent out a request for a review copy last week but got no reply.

Now is the time that DAILY HEIGHTS engages in the time-honored tradition of pandering to advertisers and pretending it’s unbiased editorial content:

In my opinion, the proper response to the phrase “Open Mic Night” is to run in the opposite direction, screaming. So it was with great trepidation that I accepted an ad from Muk, a ProHo resident and self-described quasi-alt-country- insurgent-folk-americana artist who was once in a band that shared the stage with both the Dead Milkmen and Phish (different shows).

Imagine my surprise, then, to discover that Muk is actually a talented musician and songwriter–in fact, I can honestly recommend a visit Muk’s elegantly simple, no-nonsense website (see ad links, to your right) to download some absolutely free MP3s from a man who has “carefully honed his craft of marrying folk and Americana melodies to evocative lyrics.”

It didn’t hurt that Muk said some very flattering things about our non-blog: “I am true to the site’s name, reading it on a daily basis, usually a few times a day, actually … I have never bought ads anywhere, and thought why not give it a shot where the money at least goes to something that I want to support.”

APPROVED.

Finally, it was surprising to discover that this was the same Muk we met about 2 months ago at Soda Bar when we crashed his baby’s 1-year birthday party.

Small world. But that’s the point of Daily Heights, right?

On St. Johns Place there is always plenty of activity during Outdoor Loudness Season (OLS). There is a girl in the next building over that plays guitar on her roof while singing at the top of her lungs. A neighbor a few floors up plays saxophone or some such wind instrument. And let us not leave out the piano man coming from who knows where and hosting speakeasies where people sing what appears to be the Fame soundtrack well into the wee hours of the morning. Last spring I thought I would participate in OLS by filming a music video on my roof with Cuban surf rock band The Cuban Cowboys. No sooner did the George Bush piñata get strung up then did a woman in a house coat come up to the roof and tell us to shut the hell up. Perhaps she had employed a beta version of Google Satellite Maps and saw what we were up to. Just enter 11238 into the search and click the “Satellite” link on the upper right to see who the heck it is up there making all that racket. By the way, 3 days after my failed Outdoor Loudness, this lock appeared on the door to the roof.

Nichelle sent us this: “A night of live music and the best burlesque acts from the five boroughs starring pin-up cutie Peekaboo Pointe and hosted by the hula-hooping Miss Saturn. Wasabassco Burlesque Review 2 features more than 15 performers, including a snake charmer, tarot card reader, belly dancer, comic, The Wasabassco-a-gogo Dancers, a mermaid, a magician, and more with: Aimee Leigh, Albert Cadabra, Anais Sin, Anita Cookie, the reigning Miss Rivington: Darlinda Just Darlinda, Gothic belly dance by Maiiah, Mama Caliento, Mama Lou, Molly Crabapple, Little Brooklyn, Nasty Canasta, and Scott Rayow. $15.”

Southpaw | 125 5th Ave. in Park Slope, Brooklyn (between Sterling Place and St. John’s Place). 718-230-0236.

In what will certainly be the coolest wine tasting in all of Brooklyn this weekend, Andy Shernoff of ex-Dictators fame will be pouring Argentinian and Chilean wines over at Fermented Grapes. The Argentinians are "of exceptional quality while not being overly pricey," according to Debbie, Jan and Kilolo. Brace yourself for Chardonnay with "notes of beautiful pear, fig and honeysuckle," and Malbec that "has
very dark fruit with lots of mineral undertones."

FRIDAY, Feb. 25 from 6-8 PM at FERMENTED GRAPES WINES & SPIRITS | 651 Vanderbilt Avenue - Brooklyn, NY 11238 ~ phone: 718.230.3216 ~ fax: 718.230.3237 ~ www.fermentedgrapes.net

[PHOTO: arg0t.tripod.com]

Lava is
a six-woman dance/acrobatics troupe that now teaches dance/acrobatics at Lava Studio in Prospect Heights. The crew appear in a recent music video from Le Tigre. The song is TKO, and you can watch it in streaming Windows Media or Real Player format. [PICTURED: Le Tigre.]

LAVA |
524 Bergen St.,
Brooklyn, NY 11217; 718-399-3161; email: LAVA

Check out this profile of Bob Law, 65, the former music director of WWRL and host of the "Night Talk" radio show, who owns both the Namaskar health food store Bob Law’s Seafood Cafe: "Both establishments are on the same block of Vanderbilt Ave. near Prospect Place in Brooklyn’s Prospect Heights neighborhood. Namaskar has been there for almost 14 years, the Seafood Cafe for three … (Law) doesn’t see his move from radio to retail as such a stretch. ‘I’ve been preaching entrepreneurship to African-Americans for years…’"

"…he and his wife, Muntu, opened the Seafood Cafe … ‘I wanted it to be in between a fish-and-chips place and a sit-down restaurant … The idea was to create another city dining experience by offering people a little something different.’"

Go read the rest of Clem Richardson’s profile in the Daily News.

DJs from Brooklyn’s own Black Underground will "spin the disco and funk sounds
of the 1970s" at the First Saturday Dance Party, Brooklyn Museum, 9 to 11 p.m., Sat. March 5.

Full schedule:

5–7 p.m. Film: See award-winning short films by Brooklyn College students.

6–8 p.m. Music: Listen to cabaret music performed by musicians from the Brooklyn Philharmonic.

6:30– 8:30 p.m. Hands-On Art: Bead and decorate your own ancient Egyptian menat necklace.

7–8 p.m. Film: Short films from the archives of the Brooklyn International Film Festival.

7–8 p.m. Curator Talk: Visit the Luce Center for American Art with Linda Ferber.

8 p.m. Modern Voices: Museum Educator Leslie Klinger on Women’s History Month

9 p.m. Performance: Enjoy the Beautiful Hills of Brooklyn, a one-act play starring Joanna Merlin.

9–11 p.m. Dance Party: Dance to 1970s disco and funk spun by DJs from Brooklyn’s own Black Underground.

This guy needs more publicity. He needs a manager, actually. He just finished his 4th album and is about to record his 5th. Check out this 40-second video clip (8.4MB). That is all.

This guy needs more publicity. He needs a manager, actually. He just finished his 4th album and is about to record his 5th. Check out this 40-second video clip (8.4MB). That is all.

This guy needs more publicity. He needs a manager, actually. He just finished his 4th album and is about to record his 5th. Check out this 40-second video clip (8.4MB). That is all.

This guy needs more publicity. He needs a manager, actually. He just finished his 4th album and is about to record his 5th. Check out this 40-second video clip (8.4MB). That is all.

From AllHipHop.com: "Jay-Z’s involvement with a group of investors that purchased the New Jersey Nets won him accolades as a business man, but  some residents in the Prospect Heights section of Brooklyn are singing a different tune.

Yesterday (March 28) almost 400 people turned
  out to protest a planned 19,000 seat arena that developer Bruce Ratner, who led the purchase of the Nets, has on the drawing board …

Almost 500 residents and businesses stand to be displaced under the "eminent-domain" law, which is the right of a government to appropriate private property for public use.

Patti Hagan, spokesperson for the Prospect Heights Action Coalition … Read complete article.

AllHipHop.com reports on the $300 million the new Jersey Nets owners accepted from the investment group including
Bruce Ratner and Jay-Z: "The acceptance means
that group is one step closer to realizing their goal of moving the
team to Jay-Z’s hometown of Brooklyn, New York."

"The sale has sparked criticism from a variety of people … New York Knicks owner James Dolan is reportedly lobbying hard against
bringing the team to New York, while residents in the area expressed
their own concerns about the a proposed $600 million dollar sports
complex…"

"The acceptance of the
$300 million dollar bid ends a bidding war between Jay-Z’s group and a
group led by Charles Kushner and Senator Jon Corzine." … Read full article.