Cheri Knight: American Rituals by Steve Peters

Aug. 18, 2022 – There’s a new release of old recordings by Cheri Knight, my dear friend/collaborator/housemate back in college days in Olympia, released on the Freedom to Spend label. Cheri’s had a long and varied career in music, but this material had been largely forgotten and has finally resurfaced forty years later.

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Listening in 2021 by Steve Peters

Dec. 24, 2021 – As I said last year, I am not good at making Top 10 lists, or even Top 50 lists. But here, in no particular order, are fourteen releases that made an impression on me in 2021 and that I expect to spend more time with in 2022.

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Thrift Store Surprises by Steve Peters

Dec. 15, 2021 – It’s a good time for digging in the bargain bins as people ditch their CDs in favor of digital-only or succumb to the Great Vinyl Boondoggle. So here’s a list of this year’s gleanings – mostly from thrift stores, a few from used record shops or Discogs, and the occasional gift from an artist friend.

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Remembering J.A. Deane aka Dino by Steve Peters

July 31, 2021 – Among the many interesting musical characters who landed in New Mexico when I lived there, Dino was one of the most remarkable. He wasn’t a household name to most listeners, but he had been a vital member of several intersecting music scenes in both the Bay Area and NYC before coming to northern NM, and he quickly impressed all who encountered him.

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Why meditate? by Steve Peters

Feb. 13, 2021 – A friend of mine recently posted about quitting her long-term meditation practice. After twenty-plus years she was feeling frustrated by her apparent lack of noticeable progress and finally decided to give up on it. I get it. I've practiced meditation for over twenty years now. And like my friend, I sometimes feel like a failure. So why do I keep doing it?

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Very Old Songs by Steve Peters

Jan. 14, 2021 – Songs are one of the most persistent forms of human virus, implanting themselves deep within our gray matter and constantly mutating in search of new hosts, spinning off endless versions and variants as they travel across space and time and surviving through their ability to adapt to all kinds of unlikely hosts through the centuries.

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Top Ten List: A Failure by Steve Peters

Dec. 31, 2020 – I am not one of those people who makes Top Ten lists, annually or otherwise. But last year my friend Kat told me about a series on our neighborhood micro-FM station called My Ten Songs, and she innocently asked what I might play if I were invited. Now here I am over a year later, still thinking about it.

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One Song: Patti Smith by Steve Peters

Dec. 18, 2020 – Patti Smith’s Horses was released forty-five years ago this week. It was one of those albums that came along exactly when I needed to hear it, and probably changed my life. It remains as important to me now as it did then.

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One Song: John Lennon by Steve Peters

Dec. 8, 2020 – On this night 40 years ago, I was huddled in the kitchen of a freezing house in Olympia with the local college radio station on. I don’t remember who was on the air or what they were playing. I just remember that suddenly it all stopped and the DJ announced that John Lennon had been murdered. And there was now an unexpectedly large, gaping hole in the world.

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One Song: Jimi Hendrix by Steve Peters

Nov. 28, 2020 – Yesterday was the 78th birthday of Jimi Hendrix. I had intended to post this on the blessed day itself, just to prove that I don’t only commemorate artists on the anniversary of their death. But the truth is, I was having a really hard time narrowing it down to one essential song.

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One Song: Nick Drake by Steve Peters

Nov. 25, 2020British singer-songwriter Nick Drake died forty-six years ago today, age 26, from an accidental overdose of anti-depressants. He only recorded three albums while he was alive. Each has its charms, but if I have to choose just one song from his entire catalog…

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