Rock videos
The videos section of Allison Crowe's website was launched, naturally, when the first of Allison's music went online. For a few years, it was possible to keep up with releases - from Allison, and other folks incorporating her music into their own vids.
These days, Allison's own music videos number more than 150 and there's thousands of videos that feature her recordings as the soundtrack to other peoples' visual art and remembrances, as well as other musicians covering Allison's songs.
You'll find here, then, the first collection of music videos - and you can visit YouTube and other online sources for the full, up-to-date, experience.
^ Complete - Allison Crowe video uploads (chronological) on YouTube ^
Going Home Tonight ~ Allison Crowe (pre-album version)
On the road to creating a new album, musician/singer-songwriter Allison Crowe teams up with a longtime friend in orchestrator, arranger and producer Kayla Schmah.
Crowe, at home in, both, Nanaimo, British Columbia and Corner Brook, Newfoundland, (on Canada's Pacific and Atlantic coasts), and L.A.-based film composer Schmah first met, a decade ago, on Salt Spring Island, BC (where, it happens, this video was shot).
The pair are making art together today. "Oh, do not ask, 'What is it?' Let us go and make our visit." Here be a pre-album version of "Going Home Tonight", a song on Crowe's upcoming CD, "Spiral".
Fab arts and entertainment blog Muruch kindly debuts the mp3/audio
Hold Back
From: Adrian22
From Allison Crowe's newest album, "Little Light",
comes this song - "Hold Back".
"I would chew my arm off to sing like Allison," says
West Virginia, Mountain Stage-loving music blogger Muruch.
"Though I guess that would make it difficult to shred a piano
like she does, which seems to be half the fun" - referencing,
respectively, "Hold Back"
and "the fervent, mesmeric, piano-hammering extended version of
'Disease'
" ~
both songs on Crowe's newest CD.
"She is reminiscent of some of the great women vocalists who
shaped rock music in the late '60s and early '70s. Allison's
emotional delivery is unique in today's music," is how music
industry veteran, and manager to Bif Naked, Peter Karroll's
earlier framed it.
Images accompanying this vid are almost all shot by Canadian
photographer and musician Billie Woods.
The image of Allison onstage in New York City (at the piano on
darkened stage) is by Ben Strothmann.
Pics of Allison as a child are courtesy the Crowe family photo
album.
"Ever wonder what it would have been like to listen to a
gifted singer/songwriter from Saskatchewan in a small, intimate
hall before she became Joni Mitchell? Don't fret. There's no need
to turn back the clock. Check out Allison Crowe." ~ Robert
Reid, The Record (Canada)
Northern Lights ~ w. images by David Cartier
The images
come from Yukon-based
David Cartier, Sr. - who shares his beautiful images of the Aurora
Borealis on this flickr
page
Here's what David says about this source of inspiration:
" When Men lack a sense of awe, There will be disaster "
- - - - Lao Tzu --- The Tao Teh Ching
Awe is what THIS is all about!!
The Aurora is an experience of breathtaking beauty... the viewing
makes you feel like you are connected integrally with an amazing
cosmic force ..... Aurora watching is as addictive as any drug and
a whole lot more satisfying. Once you become addicted, you stay
out all night, lose sleep, forget about social commitments, nearly
get wind burned and frostbit and it's all, deeply, worth it !!
Every human being who can manage it should make a pilgrimage to
the subarctic auroral zone in order to see and feel this at least
once in their life.
Many of these were taken with an amazing old Russian Kiev-19 35mm
SLR. This camera , which I still use for night sky photos, NEVER
freezes up or has any shutter problems in the cold, even at minus
60!! The more expensive Japanese and German cameras which I own
always, or at least often, stop functioning in the deep cold.
Imagine (John Lennon)
In
January 2004, in concert, Allison led the assembled musicians in a
group-closer ~ John Lennon's "Imagine". In April 2004, she
headined a concert to cap Earth Week activities in Victoria, the
capital city of British Columbia, Canada. The "Goolden
Gala" (in a gorgeous, old, converted 800-seat church) was to
"Celebrate Peace, Earth and Justice". Also to that end,
Allison made this recording. Peace signs are from TopPun.com
- the groovy site of Dan Ruff.
In September 2007, Allison Crowe will join musicians, poets,
painters, dramatists and all who come together to celebrate the
"John Lennon Northern Lights Festival" in Durness,
Scotland.
Freda people now!
+
Imagine - John and Yoko's Bed-In for Peace - Gerry Deiter photos of 1969 - Allison Crowe live
More than forty years ago today, John Lennon and Yoko Ono staged a Bed In for Peace at Montreal's Queen Elizabeth Hotel. The couple held the eight-day event - from May 25 to June 1, 1969 - to protest civil unrest and the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam war.
"We're going to sell peace the way other people sell soap", Lennon told a young photo-journalist Gerry Deiter. Assigned by Life Magazine to document the happening in the hotel suite, Deiter was the only photographer there the entire 8 days. He captured hundreds of images of the couple singing, composing, visiting with friends and talking to the media. Lennon and Ono spoke to some 150 journalists during the press conferences they held daily from their bed. June 1 was the culmination - the recording of Give Peace A Chance.
Now these images come together in the book "Give Peace a Chance: John & Yoko's Bed-In for Peace". Photography by Gerry Deiter. Compiled by Joan Athey. Edited by Paul McGrath.
Joan Athey has graciously allowed these images to accompany a live performance of "Imagine" by Canadian musician Allison Crowe.
Give Peace A Chance
War is over if you want it
Imagine peace
http://www.peaceworksnow.com
I Dreamed A Dream (Les Misérables) - live
Time After Time (Cyndi Lauper) - live
Allison Crowe, a child of the '80s, performs one of her favourites
of that era in concert - a cover of Cyndi Lauper's "Time After
Time".
This recording (thanks Scott LJ for the audio!) comes from the same
pre-Christmas '06 concert as does the version of "I Never
Loved a Man". With this song, there is no concert footage
available, and, so, inspired by the example of Cylune, one of the
great artistic Web 2.0 vidders, I've made my own, very simple
(primitive?!), vid to accompany the music. Thanks muchly to Steve
for capturing the images of Allison images of Allison's hometown
glory - in Canada's Winter time!
I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You) - (Ronnie
Shannon)
This funkily lo-fi recording is from a concert just before Christmas
2006 (more hometown glory - Winter). Allison Crowe performs "I Never Loved a Man (The Way I
Love You)" - a song written in the '60s by Ronnie Shannon,
and which was a break-through hit for Aretha Franklin.
Bob Muller, the Grand Poobah of Covers at JoniMitchell.com says:
"it takes a lot of self-confidence to tackle Aretha's version
of "I Never Loved a Man..." but Allison does and
nails it just as good as the Queen of Soul herself. Her piano
playing is equally exquisite. Treat yourself to one of the mightiest
talents on the singer-songwriter scene today."
Cheers to Del and Scott for capturing this happening. Warmest thanks
to web creator extraordinaire Cylune for enabling this video to be
enjoyed as it is ( :
Angels (Allison Crowe)
From the same concert at which she performed "I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)" and "Time After Time", here is an original song, not yet recorded on an album - "Angels". This song is heard on the "Little Lights" album.
The video footage is, again, of a Canadian Winter.
(Thanks Scott LJ for the audio, and Steve C for the camera-work!)
Me and Bobby McGee ~ Allison Crowe live
Canadian musician Allison Crowe performs live in concert "Me and Bobby McGee", the Fred Foster, Kris Kristofferson song recorded famously by Janis Joplin.
Images are from Billie Woods, the terrifically talented photographer who regularly tours Europe with Crowe. These pics are from such locations as Frankfurt and Siegen, Germany and Durness, Scotland where Allison Crowe headlined the 'Northern Lights Festival', a benefit for the John Lennon Memorial Garden.
As with her other interpretations, Allison Crowe doesn't mimic the sound or style of another artist. Instead, she covers songs in her own voice.
"Allison Crowe is the best thing to happen to 'Me And Bobby McGee' since Janis Joplin changed Kristofferson's lyrics" says Allan Showalter. Showalter's entertainingly erudite "pastiche of a blog",1 Heck of a Guy notes:
"Of course, the credentials that matter most are her performances. If you haven't heard her powerful yet not strident version of 'Hallelujah'... I urge you to do so now. Then, for something completely different, listen to her take on Ronnie Shannon's 'I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)', which is (forgive me, Aretha) the best I've heard.
" 'Me and Bobby McGee,' the song authored by Kris Kristofferson and popularized by Janis Joplin (although Roger Miller's version was the first to rank as a hit), is not one of my favorites, but it is useful as an example of Allison Crowe's skills, in part because most readers of this blog have, I suspect, heard it sung by at least a couple of performers.
"Also noteworthy, however, is the choice of this song itself. If Allison had asked me to select 100 possible covers for her to play in a concert, a real concert with a fancy piano set in the converted church chapel of the Conservatory of Music in Victoria, British Columbia, a concert that would become the album, Allison Crowe Live At Wood Hall (with album art... radiating dangerous levels of wholesomeness), 'Me and Bobby McGee would not have been on my list. Nor would it have been on my Possible Allison Crowe Covers #101-200″ list, nor the #201 to 300″ list. Me and Bobby McGee is a Kristofferson-Joplin-Miller kind of song. Kenny Rogers, when he was still the Kenny Rogers in Kenny Rogers & The First Edition, sang it, as did Gordon Lightfoot, Bill Haley & His Comets, Sam The Sham, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash. Waylon sang it. So did The Grateful Dead and Dolly Parton. It is definitely not an Allison Crowe kind of song.
"Until she sings it.
"Although Allison introduces over a dozen significant adaptations to 'Me and Bobby McGee,' I'll point out only one nuance. Listen to her inflected pronunciation of 'Baton Rouge' in the first line, 'Busted flat in Baton Rouge, waitin' for a train.' It makes this version of the song her own from that point, giving the song a richer, more complex flavor than those rendered in flat Midwestern intonations. Yet, performed the same way by almost anyone else, the same tactic would come off as too precious by half."
Interview on Vicki Gabereau show (Allison Crowe)
A word-of-mouth sensation in western Canada since her teens, the independent-minded Allison Crowe made her first national television appearance on the Vicki Gabereau show in January, 2002. (TV talk-show host Gabereau - dubbed "The Queen of Chat" - is the Canadian counterpart to such American hosts as Ellen DeGeneres and Oprah Winfrey.) Here Allison talks a bit about her hometown of Nanaimo, British Columbia, Canada - which has produced such jazz musicians as Diana Krall, and sisters Ingrid and Christine Jensen. And, she identifies some early inspirations - The Little Mermaid, Pearl Jam, Janis Joplin and Joan Osborne.
This interview segment is intro to a performance of Allison's song "Crayon and Ink".
Crayon and Ink - live on TV (Allison Crowe)
This is the first national television performance by Canuck singer-songwriter Allison Crowe. Broadcast across Canada on January 28, 2002, this live segment introduced a country to the singer-songwriter from Nanaimo, B.C. Show host is Vicki Gabereau ~ Canada's "Queen of Chat". Allison Crowe is accompanied on her song "Crayon and Ink" by bassist Dave Baird and drummer Kevin Clevette. The song appears on Crowe's debut EP, "Six Songs".
Lisa's Song (live)
A
few months after the disappearance of Lisa Marie Young from Nanaimo,
Canada, Allison Crowe and band recorded this song for Lisa - live
"Inside Pandora's Box". Pandora's Box is a television
studio in Victoria, B.C. - home to the New VI now A-Channel
television.
Lisa is still missing. You can learn more @ Lisa's
Page
Scared (Allison Crowe)
This video accompanies the song "Scared" ~ recorded live-off-the-floor in 2001 by Allison Crowe and her trio for Crowe's debut disc, "6 Songs". It's filmed in the downtown streets and dock area of Nanaimo, British Columbia - chasing pavements in Canada's "Harbour City". When it premiered as part of an Urban Industrial show presented by Crimson Coast Dance Society, Allison said: "This song is about not being afraid to stand up for yourself and what you believe in, to speak out even in the most adverse of circumstances. It was a wonderful gift from Angela Kendall and Brian Dutkewich (of transmission 2 video)." Allison Crowe plays piano and sings, Dave Baird plays bass, and Kevin Clevette is on the drums.
Release (Pearl Jam)
Release (512) - click ~ Release (128) - click
Like a scene from Cameron Crowe's movie, "Almost Famous", an entire floor was rented in a funky downtown hotel, The Commodore, and, with doors wide open, and a communal room for watching PJ videos, the Jammers experienced music and friendship in the Emerald City.
Allison (vocals, keyboard) with Dave Baird (bass) and Kevin Clevette (drums) performed a welcoming concert ~ in a small, very warm, theater in back of Second Avenue Pizza. Here, after the band's set and encores, Allison remembers a Pearl Jam song she wants to play - "Release".
Pam Abramowicz captured the intensity in all Jammin' beauty. WJC host Sandi Heinrich takes the mic after Allison's performance to say a few kind words, and, then, it's all amongst friends - Melanie, Shaley, Shannon, Reena and more!! :)
The stuff that dreams are made of...
Indifference (Pearl Jam)
Another live performance from the Worldwide Jammer Convergence that took place in Seattle, Washington, USA in the Summer of 2001. Allison Crowe and her trio perform Pearl Jam's "Indifference". Greatly inspired by Eddie Vedder and PJ, Crowe was delighted by the invitation to Seattle for a concert before Jammers from all over the continent+. The audio/video is lo-fi, still it captures a hot night that's magic in the memories of Jammers. Thanks to Pam Abramowicz for capturing this and other events at the Convergence on vid.
Jeremy - Coda to Philosophy
When she led a trio, with Dave Baird on bass, and Kevin Clevette on drums, Allison would, when the spirit moved her, include some of PJ's Jeremy as a coda to her own song, Philosophy. Due to the thin-ness of the sound on this video-cam recording, Allison's thunderous roar is not so audible, but the vibe is there ( :
So, crank up the bass and the volume, And keep on rockin' in the free world.
Deep thanks to Sandi Heinrich, organizer of the "Worldwide Jammer Convergence", and to all the Jammers who came together for this magic weekend.
Release Lyrics as Performed by Allison Crowe
Skeletons and Spirits (Allison Crowe)
From "This Little Bird", Allison's next album, comes this jaunty take on relationships ( :
Recorded live, in June 2006, in Canada's most easterly province, Newfoundland, for the über-popular Rogers tv program, Out of the Fog. Hosts Krysta Rudofsky and Paddy Daly ~ marking his first week not on hockey programming ~ along with Producer Mike Fisher and his team are ace!
When I'm Gone (Phil Ochs) - Allison Crowe
Ani DiFranco recorded this song for the soundtrack of "Steal This Movie" - a film based on the life and adventures of a '60s radical, Yippie Abbie Hoffman. Crowe, inspired by DiFranco, has recorded "When I'm Gone" for her newest album/CD "Little Light".
The images of Allison Crowe on-stage are captured by photographer Billie Woods, (herself also a musician), in concert at the Edmonds Center for the Arts, Edmonds, Washington, USA - January 31, 2009.
Creep (Radiohead) - Allison Crowe (live)
As a teenager in the '90s, living in Canada's Pacific Northwest, Allison Crowe gravitated toward the Seattle bands Nirvana, Pearl Jam - along with such other favourite North American musicians as Ani DiFranco, Tori Amos and Counting Crows. Across the pond, from the UK came the sounds of Radiohead.
Crowe and her bandmates, performing in Nanaimo, BC venues such as Katz and The Queens, included, alongside their originals, a pair of Thom Yorke-penned songs in their live repertoire - "Fake Plastic Trees" and "Creep".
This live recording dates to the start of this millenium, by which time Allison, on vocals and piano, was performing in a trio - joined by Dave Baird on bass, and Kevin Clevette on drums. (Thanks to audio archivists Condor and John MacMillan for preserving a rare track.)
"Creep" is a song that Radiohead stopped performing entirely for a few years, and brought back into the band's regular live sets in 2009. In recent times, it has been covered by a wide range of acts - Prince, Amanda Palmer, Brandi Carlile, Damien Rice, Moby, and Macy Gray among others.
Allison Crowe's music in digital + physical formats ~ click here
Studio A (released tracks) ~ Studio B (rarities, boots+)
Rock videos ~ Tidings videos
Web 2.0 Vids #1 ~ Web 2.0 Vids #2 ~ Web 2.0 Vids #3
