Mountain Jam organizers have announced the final additions to this year’s lineup and they include HT faves White Denim, Big Gigantic, The London Souls and Kung Fu. The ninth annual Mountain Jam Music Festival will take place at Hunter Mountain, New York from June 6th to June 9th.

Other additions to the Mountain Jam lineup will be Michael Franti & Spearhead, Swear & Shake, Bill Evans’ Soulgrass, Filligar, Roadkill Ghost Choir, The Gaslight Anthem, Michael Bernard Fitzgerald, Jay Collins and the Kings County Band, Todd Wolfe Band, Holy Ghost! (dj set), Futurebirds, 4onthefloor, Conspirator, The Christine Spero Group, The London Souls and the Alecia Chakour Band.

Here’s the full Mountain Jam 2013 lineup…

Phil Lesh & Friends (2 sets), Widespread Panic (2 sets), Gov’t Mule (2 sets), Primus, The Avett Brothers, The Lumineers, Dispatch, Michael Franti & Spearhead, Big Gigantic (late night Thursday), Gary Clark Jr., The Gaslight Anthem, Soulive w/ The Shady Horns (late night), Conspirator (late night), Deer Tick, Jackie Greene, ALO. White Denim (late night), Rubblebucket, The London Souls, Amy Helm, Holy Ghost! (DJ Set) (late night), Nicki Bluhm & The Gramblers, The Revivalists, Kung Fu, Futurebirds, David Wax Museum, Swear and Shake, Roadkill Ghost Choir, Bill Evans Soulgrass, Alecia Chakour Band, Michael Bernard Fitzgerald, SIMO, The 4onthefloor, Filligar, Todd Wolfe Band, Jay Collins and the Kings County Band, The Christine Spero Group

[via Jambands.com]

Tickets are currently available through the event’s website.

Michael Franti & Spearhead w/ Bobby Long @ Terminal 5, October 28

Say what you will about Terminal 5 and all of its quirks and issues, but there does come that rare time that the multi-level industrial venue affords fans an extraordinary experience that you can’t get anywhere else. This past Thursday night, with the unique pairing of Bobby Long and Michael Franti & Spearhead, anyone who spent their Franti set up on an upper level looking down on the stage saw what I saw: a bird’s eye view of Michael Franti’s gigantic bare feet.

[All photos by Rob Chapman]

At 6’6”, Michael always looms like a giant over the crowd from the stage, and even more so when he takes a seat on the stool for an acoustic ballad, but holy shit, those feet from above look like naval bases out to sea.

A fitting allegory perhaps, as with the release of his latest hit factory studio release, the Sound of Sunshine, Franti & Spearhead officially make the jump to larger than life. If All Rebel Rockers broke the seal to mainstream success, the Sound of Sunshine turned on the spigot. Many longtime fans take this as a negative, and cite the newer material of hope over strife as a sellout or even a losing of religion, but for fans who just want to go out, dance, and listen to some good festive music, Franti’s live still show offers plenty to enjoy. READ ON for more about last Thursday’s show…

Last night, the San Francisco Giants finished the job on the Texas Rangers and won their first World Series since 1954. Congratulations to all the Giants fans out there on a well-deserved victory. To celebrate, we’re throwing today’s video post over to Michael Franti & Spearhead for a re-worked version of Say Hey (I Love You) dedicated to the team…

Michael Franti & Spearhead – Say Hey (I Love You)

The last time Michael Franti & Spearhead visited the Ed Sullivan Theatre for a Letterman taping was just before 9/11. Franti and his longtime backing band returned to the Late Show last night to perform their super-catchy hit The Sound of Sunshine. Take a look at the end result…

Michael Franti & Spearhead – The Sound of Sunshine

Michael Franti & Spearhead bring their never-ending tour to New York City this evening for a performance at Terminal 5 on the West Side of Manhattan.

When Michael Franti followed up his ambitious, politically-charged 2006 release Yell Fire! with dancehall mass-appeal on All Rebel Rockers back in 2008, it wasn’t entirely clear if he took a palpable 180° away from his activism, or more likely, just got swept up in his Jamaican studio environs. Apparently, the former proves truer as his latest effort, The Sound of Sunshine, takes it a step further as he reunites with Sly & Robbie in Jamaica for a portion of the record, and leans heavily on the formula that produced his first big hit the last time around: catchy-as-hell reggae grooves, dancehall sit-ins, and a fat dose of the Edge’s delay-laden guitar tone.

[Photo by James Minchin]

In retrospect, Franti’s Yell Fire! project served a contradictory purpose in that what he expected to drive him toward an album of 15 angry songs, taught him about the importance of simply making people feel good with his music.

“I get scared, man,” Michael emphasizes in reminiscing about that period. “Being in Iraq especially, I mean, I hate to say it, but I couldn’t wait to leave. And I say that, because I met so many people there who were beautiful, kind, generous, and loving people, both Iraqis and Americans, who couldn’t leave. When I was just able to hop on a plane and get out of there, they were stuck in that situation. So, one of key things I learned there came from playing music on the streets for Iraqi families. A lot of times, I’d start by playing some quiet political songs and they would turn to me and say, ‘that’s really nice, but play something that makes us laugh and sing.’ It was a real lesson for me in making happy music.”

READ ON for more of Ryan’s chat with Michael Franti…

It’s been six months since I was able to browse through Phish tapes for Last Week’s Sauce. Even with the LivePhish SBD’s sounding better than ever thanks to a new engineer working on the recording, we still enjoy a good AUD tape. Brings me back to a time when SBD’s were rare, even non-existent, for entire tours at a time. Fans were thankful to grab a quality recording and it sure seems like this led to us being a lot less critical of everything related to the shows. But Phish is just one of five bands featured this week, we’ve got some tapes from Bonnaroo and some other goodies for you as well.

[Thanks to JBanyai97 for this week's photo]

And we continue to take all the selected tracks, normalize them, create some simple fades and put it into one easy to download MP3 for you.

Click here to download the Last Week’s Sauce Podcast

Artist & Title: Michael Franti & Spearhead – Yell Fire, Hey Hey Hey
Date & Venue: 2010-06-12 Minglewood Hall – Memphis, TN
Taper & Show Download: Tim DiScenza

This is a tape from Tennessee but surprisingly not from Bonnaroo. I guess Superfly allowed Franti to play a gig in Memphis in addition to Bonnaroo, who knew? I don’t have an official How You Feeling/I Wanna See You Jumping count, but I can tell you there are at least three just IN BETWEEN the two songs. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got a lot of love for Franti, I watched his webcast from Mountain Jam two weekends ago and was reminded just what command he has over a festival audience. Michael Franti & Spearhead play two shows on June 20th at Yoga Tree Casino in San Francisco.

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A video from Bonnaroo, Franti apparently really likes Alabama:

READ ON for tracks from Phish, Tortoise, and Umphrey’s McGee…

One week from tomorrow, Michael Franti and Spearhead head out for one of the biggest gigs in the band’s illustrious history – a nine week arena tour opening for John Mayer. Spearhead stands to win over a ton of fans on the jaunt, but I wondered if the group would change things up from the typical politically-charged sets we’ve come to expect from them.

Our pal Richard Gehr asked Franti that question along with a bunch of others for an interview that ran on the HeadCount blog. John Mayer and Spearhead find out how MSG is feelin’ on February 25 and 26.

Here’s a quick look at six other stories you need to read…

• Jesse Jarnow profiles NYCTaper & other “local audio hoarders”
• Eddie Vedder covers Springsteen’s My City in Ruins for Haiti
• Pitchfork lists Twenty Great The Simpsons Musical Moments
• Animal Collective’s What Would I Want? Sky = Song of the Day
• Send your questions for the Allmans to Jambands.com/Relix
• iClips will webcast Umphrey’s McGee from St. Louis on Feb. 4

Finally, Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune interviewed Jam Productions’ Jerry Mickleson about the Live Nation/Ticketmaster merger getting approved by the Department of Justice for the Turn It Up blog. Of all the concessions the DOJ attached to its approval, it appears none will really help Jam survive. We sure hope they beat the odds.

As usual, Superfly Productions will present a series of concerts at a number of New Orleans venues during Jazzfest. The cleverly titled 2009 Superfly during Jazzfest concert series has just been announced.

READ ON for more details and a full list of performances…