This new video from Minneapolis hip-hop artist Alex Frecon features a few scenes shot in Duluth.
This new video from Minneapolis hip-hop artist Alex Frecon features a few scenes shot in Duluth.
Minneapolis band the 4ontheFloor, featuring occasional Duluthian Gabriel Douglas, has a new music video out, a new album on the way and a Kickstarter campaign nearly wrapped up.
Alice Cooper drops a reference to Duluth on this song from his 1982 album Zipper Catches Skin.
Perhaps the least-known Duluth song is by the Champaign, Ill.-based band Abort Scene. “Born Pinned to the Duluth Wheel” was released on the album Seeds of the Real Alternative (Waterloo Records, June 3, 2008). The track also appeared on the band’s 2013 compilation Rational Hardcore.
Rena Vivian Smith as Madam Butterfly, Cosmopolitan Magazine, February 1907
The latest “Forgotten Duluthian” posting by David Ouse at the Duluth Public Library’s Vintage Duluth blog is about Duluth’s Madame Butterfly, Rena Vivian Smith.
Consider this the third post in the “Ruth Trilogy.”
Part One: Shuggy Ray Smith – “Ruth from Duluth”
Part Two: Ruth Hart: “Baby Ruth from Duluth”
One century ago, as “The War to End All Wars” raged on, Mary Scott Bywater of Duluth wrote and published a forgotten anthem.
This little tune, purportedly released in December of 1965, is about a “little pretty girl” from Duluth who “eats corn on the cob through a picket fence.” Enjoy.
From the album Yust Try to Sing-a-long in Swedish with Doug Setterberg & Stan Boreson, Golden Crest Records, undated (circa 1962).
Local music fans will recognize this tune as the inspiration for the Hoot Owls song “Scandinavian Hot Rod.”
Circa 2007, Fred Tyson performs “I’m a Free Man” at the Red Lion Lounge … and forgets most of the words.
Former Duluthian Gus Watkins has released this new video under his band name, Bijou Noir. He’s returning to Duluth Aug. 10 for an album release show at Blush.
The video was shot this summer in pre-World Cup Croatia, where Watkins has been living off and on since 2017. Joseph Hyrkas is the director.
The Head of the Lakes Fair is an annual tradition in Superior. The weekend event usually features bands performing on a stage in the center of the Superior Speedway. Often the headliner is a major touring act that is a bit past its prime. Below is a scattered list of bands that have played the festival. Because … nostalgia.
Matt Farley of Danvers, Mass. has been producing slapped-together novelty songs under clumsy pseudonyms since roughly 2004. The emphasis is clearly on quantity over quality; his website notes he has released 19,000 songs. He purportedly made $23,000 off his music in 2013.
We need to unearth some Duluth-based songwriter history. The current reference librarians at the Duluth Public Library are unable to track down the lyrics to a song about Duluth by Biz White, a female librarian during the 1980s and ’90s.
Here’s the conversation:
I was visiting with friends yesterday and one of them said he had been trying to find the lyrics to a song written about Duluth. It was written by Biz White, who used to work at DPL, and he thought it may have been for a Playhouse production. Some of the lyrics he remembered were, “Oh Duluth, your granite hills rise,” and “Oh Duluth, your heartless hills.” I was hoping you had some ideas.
Thanks,
Kim
Help! Does anyone have these lyrics recorded?
