Shelley Carrol: "Inner Urge"

Catch Shelley Monday nights at the Amsterdam Bar!

Bernard Wright

Bernard Wright (born 1963) is an American funk and jazz keyboardist born in Miami, Florida.

Wright was offered a slot touring with Lenny White when he was 13, and he played with Tom Browne at age 16.^[1] GRP Records signed him in 1981 and released his debut LP, 'Nard, tracks from which have been prominently sampled by Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, and Skee-Lo among countless others. He followed with Funky Beat on Arista and Mr. Wright on EMI. The latter of these albums included his biggest R&B hit, "Who Do You Love" for which a video was made. Wright has also appeared on recordings by musicians such as Cameo, Bobby Brown, Pieces of a Dream, Charles Earland, Marcus Miller and Miles Davis.

This video is from Bernard's 1985 hit "Who Do You Love."

Bernard Wright frequently sits in with the jazz players during The Amsterdam Bar's Bad Ass Jazz, every Monday night.

Still Flyin', The Happy Bullets, and Fishboy!

Halloween night at The Amsterdam Bar!

About Still Flyin':

The San Francisco-based supergroup Still Flyin' was assembled in late 2004 by singer/songwriter Sean Rawls. By the time he arrived on the West Coast he was already a veteran of various Athens, GA bands, including Masters of the Hemisphere and Je Suis France. For the latter band, Rawls wrote a reggae song, "Never Gonna Touch the Ground." The song quickly became a live show staple and crowd favorite.

After relocating to San Francisco, the song seemed to have a life of its own and demanded to be jammed. Rawls decided he needed to form a band based on that song and the dream of Still Flyin' was born. He asked virtually everyone he knew in his new city to join the reggae-inspired project, and to everyone's surprise the first practice had fifteen people at it.

What might have begun as a lighthearted nod to good times soon became a juggernaut that no one in the band expected, and before long the group had become a San Francisco phenomenon. It didn’t hurt that this nascent supergroup counts members of bands such as Track Star, Aislers Set, Ladybug Transistor, Love Is All, Maserati, and Red Pony Clock amongst it’s rotating collective.

About The Happy Bullets:

Recording songs that combined a 1960's psychedelic nostalgia with ironic and literate lyrics, The Happy Bullets began when indie songwriters Jason Roberts and Tim Ruble met while working together at an art gallery in a suburb of Dallas. After a home recording demo was released and played on local radio, Roberts quickly recruited his wife, Andrea to learn bass guitar while lending vocal support to several of the bands more pop-oriented songs. Additional members were later added including Josh McKibben of The Sons of Sound, Rhett Jones, and Kris Youmans of The Paper Chase.

2004 saw the release of The Happy Bullets first record, Blue Skies and Umbrellas and was quickly followed up in 2005 with The Vice and Virtue Ministry, engineered by Stuart Sikes (Modest Mouse, Cat Power, the Promise Ring) and released on the upstart Dallas indie label Undeniable Records. The latter gained the band critical acclaim on the national college radio circuit and led to shared bills with Mates of State, Architecture in Helsinki, and Of Montreal.

In 2006, the Happy Bullets toured throughout the United States performing in Austin, Texas at the SXSW Music Festival, Athens, Georgia at the 2006 Athens Popfest, and at CMJ Music Festival in New York City.

About Fishboy:

Fishboy is a four-piece eccentric indie pop band from Denton, TX that began as the bedroom solo project of Eric Michener. He was given the nickname on a middle-school field trip after a dare to pluck and swallow a fish at the Dallas World Aquarium. Six years and several shoe boxes full of cassette tapes later, Michener moved from the suburbs to the Texas rock-and-roll Mecca of Denton with a handful of low-budget recordings released by the close-knit Austin music collective Business Deal Records.

Their third album, Little D, was acclaimed by the Austin Chronicle and Dallas Observer and voted Best Local Band of 2005 by the Dallas Morning News.

A brief message from our staff

Notable Performances Series

Does this drummer remind you of anyone you know?

Dallas Observer names The Amsterdam Bar Best Jazz Club for 2009!

The Dallas Observer's Best of Dallas Awards for 2009 are out and The Amsterdam Bar has been named Best Jazz Club for 2009!

This Exposition Park staple isn't really a jazz club, but step into this European-styled bar on a Monday night and, traditional jazz room settings be damned, you're gonna see yourself as good a night of jazz performance as offered by any other venue in town. Bad Ass Jazz, as the night is called, is pretty much just what the title implies—a night of the region's finest jazz talents rotating in and out of the playing area in the back of the room, sharing smiles, drinks and enough improvised jazz solos and group jams to keep the always-crowded room delighted. Even to the uneducated jazz listener, it's an impressive sight, not to mention an easy way to pretend you're more cultured than you probably are. Plus, it's free.

As this review notes, The Amsterdam Bar really isn't a jazz club at all. Our reputation as a jazz venue stems from our Monday night jazz, the notorious "Bad Ass Jazz" coordinated by local jazz great Shelly Carrol. We believe that Bass Ass Jazz is the single greatest night of jazz you are likely to find in Dallas, or in Texas, or quite possibly west of New Orleans or Chicago. It's that good.

We attribute this to Shelly's commitment to providing the very best in straight-ahead jazz and the talent of the diverse jazz ensembles he assembles to play every week. The lineup is never the same and there are always new faces sitting in to shake things up and keep the improvisation fresh.

Our thanks to the judges at the Dallas Observer and to Shelly and all the other talented musicians who have made Monday night at The Amsterdam Bar something extremely special!

Welcome to the neighborhood!

We were excited to read in the Dallas Observer's Unfair Park blog about a new business moving to the Expo Park area. Restaurant uniform designer Terra Watson has moved her business to a larger studio in our neck of the woods.

Welcome to the neighborhood Ms. Watson, stop in for a beer some time.

Avery's "The Kaiser" Imperial Oktoberfest

Lee at "I Love Beer" has a great review of Avery's "The Kaiser" Imperial Oktoberfest:

It was a bit more intense than what I sought in a simple dinnertime beer, but nothing else would do. It will surprise no one who has tried Avery's products that it is fantastic. It's like an Oktoberfest on steroids: 9.37% alcohol — and you can really taste it — with a generous dose of malt and a little more bitterness than I expect from this style. And yet, it was also really sweet, as well. I think that's because of the alcohol. If you're into really strong beers, this is a winner from the first moment it hits your tongue, through the entry into the mouth, and on into the sweet aftertaste. It really helped complete the fall experience brought on by the meal and the fading golden light of the first daylight savings time evening, which is about to dissolve into a crisp, cool night.

This isn't a beer that lends itself to mass drinking (if you were served one of these at your local oompah music festival, you'd be in for an early end to your party), but you really must have at least one of these to make your autumn complete.[1]

Thanks Lee, for a great review of a really interesting take on the Oktoberfest tradition!

Remember: Bad Ass Jazz, every Monday night!

One of my favorite things to do in Dallas is to stop into the Amsterdam Bar for the Bad Ass Jazz on Monday nights. There's no cover for this weekly event, but it draws a large crowd and features key players in the Dallas jazz scene. The band is slightly different every week, but is based around the members of The Shelley Carrol quartet. The lineup can be anything from a trio up to a quintet (and occasionally a sextet). Some of the musicians I've seen at the Amsterdam recently include:

Shelley Carrol - Tenor Saxophone
Brad Leali - Alto Saxophone
Gary Granger - Drums
Jonathan Fisher - Bass
Scott Bucklin - Piano
Jay Jennings - Trumpet
Andrew Griffith - Drums

The Amsterdam is also a great place to go for a cold beer.

Blue Petal and Don Cento, Saturday August 8th!

Blue Petal is a Dallas, Texas band with a powerful melodic folk rock sound. The band is fronted by Russian-born lead singer, Manya Repnikova, who plays as well as writes songs on the guitar. Though their music is quite energetic, it can quickly turn dark yet beautiful on songs like "Host" and "Turning it Around." Peter Anderson also plays guitar, keyboard, and writes songs for the band, while Bryan Butler taps into his native Texan roots for some authentically southern finger picking and harmonica playing. All mixed together you have a real recipe for music here.

Don Cento can play the guitar, and he does. Whether it’s a green solid body one, a yellow masonite one with lipstick pickups, a Bakelite one that sits in his lap while being slid on, a baritone one like Glen Campbell’s solo in “Galveston,” he has no natural enemies in the guitar family. Originally from Mark Twain country, where Missouri loves company, he came to study at UNT some seasons back; when the train pulled out after graduation, he missed it. Don is the first guitarist to join the LJM experience, and he brings an erudite versatility and unerring musical decency to the table.

Come early to ensure you get a good seat.