Tag: jim ruiz

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the chickfactor best of 2025 lists: round two

Bridget St. John playing at chickfactor’s Mon Gala Papillons at London’s Bush Hall, 2004. Photo: Gail O’Hara

Bridget St. John: many things I adore 2025

• my three cats – ever loving ever grateful

• the 30+ sparrows who gather beneath my window every morning for black sunflower seeds – ever thankful

• recording and then performing with Wilie Aron, Emily Wittbrodt & David Nagler at The Bitter End

• the FolkEast Festival – such a generous vibe…meeting Sandy Denny’s daughter, Georgia…playing with Jon Wilks… hanging with Diana Matheou… and in the company of my daughter and niece

• attending a Brooklyn Cyclones baseball game

• playing The Chapel, SF, and McCabes, Santa Monica, during the April tour with Evie Sands and her stellar band

Jim + cat

Jim Ruiz

The 7 foster kittens and their mother who tore up both our house, and our hearts, last summer. 

Bunty – mother (née Lee Wiley)

Louis Armstrong (pictured)

Frank Sinatra

Gladys (née Blossom Dearie)

Chet Baker

Billie Holiday

Hoagy Carmichael

Bing Crosby

John Jervis – WIAIWYA

Sarah Cronin – Sarah’s death cast a large shadow over an already shadowy year, terrible and unfair and a huge loss… I suspect this won’t be the only time she is mentioned in this year’s lists, as is only right and proper.

Poker Face – Columbo meets the Littlest Hobo starring a live action version of the girl from Brave, and who could ask for anything more. It’s great!

Italian exploitation soundtracks- Still banging on about these, especially those that live in the creepy house between disco and krautrock, with Edda Dell’Orso preempting Liz Fraser in the flat upstairs – there’s a massive (it’s about 8 hours at the moment) playlist here for anyone interested (sorry for big green music machine link)

New music from old bands – Pulp! Stereolab! Allo Darlin! All still wonderful and so much easier than hunting down new bands that sound a bit like them… and new Heavenly next year too!

True Grit Texture Supply – essential and ubiquitous brushes, tools and effects for your graphics package – have spent a LOT of fun hours playing in that sandpit this year

Plumbers- this year I found a good, reliable, affordable plumber and heating engineer- cannot be overstated.

Sade – I love Sade.

Biscuits – yes, biscuits – they are brilliant, especially the cheap own brand ones – what are your favourites? Drop a couple of packs into your basket next time you go for a big shop, and treat yourself when you get home – you deserve it (unless you are a fascist, a billionaire, or a POS PUSA – then you don’t)

Mike Slumberland: Here’s my top ten listens of 2025

Dead Famous People – Wild Young Ways (Tiny Global Productions)

Galore – Dirt (Speakeasy Studios)

Makaya McCraven – Off The Record (International Anthem)

Mitch Murder X Pizza Hotline – Anti Gravity Tournament (WRWTFWW)

Natural Information Society – Perseverance Flow (Eremite)

Paper Jam – This And That (self-released)

Saint Etienne – International (Heavenly)

Sault – 10 (Forever Living Originals)

Satoshi Tomiie & Tuccillo – Delta Dubs (20:20 Vision)

Viola Klein – New Chapter (Meakusma)

Brian Nelson (Black Tambourine, Velocity Girl) 

Graphic Novels, Comics, & Books of 2025 (with no particular order or emphasis)

Gilmore Tamny (Weather Weapon, The Mystery, The Yips) 
These are things that interested and engaged me this year, which I’d recommendo. Some of them came out in 2025, some of them I just discovered this year. No particular order.

TV

  • Who Hired the Hitman
  • The Lowdown
  • Hacks
  • The Diplomat
  • Unknown Number: The High School Catfish
  • Heated Rivalry
  • An Update on Our Family
  • Pokerface
  • Mo
  • The Task
  • The Righteous Gemstones
  • Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke
  • The Pitt

MOVIES/SPECIALS

  • The Perfect Neighbor
  • Deaf President Now!
  • Taurasi
  • Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery
  • Fairyland
  • The Wedding Banquet
  • Come See Me in the Good Light
  • The Baltimorons
  • PostMortem, Sarah Silverman
  • Why Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show Is America, Josh Johnson
  • Happy Gilmore II
  • Sorry Baby
  • The Secret Agent

MUSIC/LIVE PERFORMANCE
oof I need to listen to more music, BUT songs I found and liked very much this year and a few live shows:

  • Manchild, Sabrina Carpenter
  • Hold On, Ngozi Family
  • Denial is a River, Doechii
  • Chappell Roan generally
  • Ben Hersey, Non-Event show
  • Major Stars release show for More Colors of Sound
  • Ravon Chacon performance, ICA

SOCIALS

TIKTOK

·      abbey.joselyn

·      doggystylinguk

·      kobimcnutt

·      nicoleolived

·      noodyxbums

·      ship_spotting_

·      journeyofjackson

·      yoleendadong

·      dpeezy2099

·      oceanscary4K

·      notoriouscree

INSTA

  • koreydior_
  • olya_with_squirrel
  • african_brutalism

PATREON

  • Christine Mcconells
  • The Cottage Fairy

YOUTUBIO

  • Broadway Barbara
  • That Practical Mom
  • Red Squirrel Studios (for cat enrichment–top notch)

BOOKS (all audiobooks FWIW)

  • The Unfinished Harauld Hughes, Richard Ayoade
  • Spent a Comic Novel, Alison Bechdel
  • The Dead of Winter: Beware the Krampus and Other Wicked Christmas Creatures, Sarah Clegg
  • Birnam Wood, A Novel, Eleanor Catton
  • History Lessons, Zoe B. Wallbrook
  • We Solve Murders, Richard Osman
  • Heartwood, Amity Gage
  • Vera Wong’s Guide to Snooping (on a Dead Man), Jesse Q. Sutanto
  • Generation Darkness, Elizabeth Hand
  • King of Ashes, S.A. Cosby
  • Margo’s Got Money Troubles, Rufi Thorpe
  • Sociopath, Patric Gagne
  • Rental House, Weike Wang
  • Havoc, Christpoher Bollen
  • Creation Lake, Rachel Kushner
  • Perfume and Pain, Anna Dorn
  • Glory Daze, Danielle Arceneaux

PODCAST

  • The Rest is Entertainment (I listened to nearly every single episode)
  • The White Pube
  • Crissle’s Couch
  • The Art Angle
  • Waldy and Bendy
  • Grits and Eggs Podcast (have not kept up but love what I heard)
  • Darknet Diary (selective listening but some NUTS stories)
  • Wisecrack
  • Scamanda
  • The Read
  • I need to listen to AudioFlux
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the jazz butcher: live review by jim ruiz

ultimate jazz butcher fan jim ruiz happened to be in new york city when the jazz butcher played at spike hill, brooklyn, on sunday, june 15, 2013! here is his review of the show.

it was a beautiful, still night in brooklyn when this fledgling music critic and his wife made their way to spike hill in williamsburg. after a car journey of about 1200 miles, from minnesota, the last 5 were covered on bicycles thanks to the new bike share citi bikes, which were located near our departure and destination points.

spike hill is a smallish venue with brick walls and a full bar and restaurant next door. while waiting for the show to begin in side bar, I was introduced, for the first time, to JBC sideman max eider, coincidentally my favorite living guitar player. luckily, I didn’t stutter and max graciously excused himself as the duo, dressed in suits which could loosely be described as “english,” was about to take the stage. I made my way to the front of the room and the show began.

it began with an oldie, “holiday,” as in english speaking gentleman on…. although odd to hear without the typewriter rhythm behind it, obviously a good one to warm up with, I remember thinking while watching max, “hey, I could play that!” that thought was a fleeting one as the set began in earnest.

this is as good a point as any to give my impression of pat fish, a.k.a. the butcher or just butchie to his friends. clearly enjoying himself, he was seated on a low chair playing a borrowed ovation acoustic guitar. a better frontman they simply do not make as he put the crowd, and just as importantly max, at ease with his pithy and hilarious banter. for instance, coming to max’s rescue later in the set when max sang the wrong first verse to his own composition “who loves you now?” with a comment to the effect that he (pat) was always the one to mess up. on another occasion telling the crowd if they wanted to sing along with a chorus – “please don’t.”

the set was front-loaded with songs off the new album, the last of the gentleman adventurers, kicking off with the title track. these new songs too benefited from brief intros from pat as when he revealed later in the set that the song “shame about you” was inspired by involuntarily uttering the phrase after seeing himself in the mirror one day, and when the identity of “black raoul” was definitively revealed to be his cat. the crowd, less familiar with these new songs, waited patiently, but with rapt attention, for the fun to really begin, and they weren’t disappointed.

the set then moved into what could be described as the glass era, the peak years of pat and max’s collaboration together. the first one, “southern mark smith” caused me to sing, a little too loudly, along with the line “I’ve found out already what makes my heart sing!” much to the irritation of nearby revelers.

then came max’s own tour de force, the aforementioned “who loves you now?” before the song began, max made reference onstage to an interview I conducted with him where it was revealed to the world, and remembered by himself, that wes montgomery’s version of  “polka dots and moonbeams” was his inspiration for the song.

I asked myself, “how can my life get any better than this?”

after a rousing “girlfriend” came the sublime “betty page,” with max’s virtuosity, now in fifth gear, on display for all to hear. after a brief return to the new album for “shame about you,” max lent his hand to “shirley macLaine,” a post collaboration song from the 1991 album condition blue. the favor was soon to be returned.

the set had seemed to last for about 15 minutes when eider walked, a little mysteriously, off the front of the stage, as there was no backstage option. fish, looking perhaps for the first time a little unsure what to do, just stayed on stage as the crowd, almost better described as an unruly mob, demanded more.

the butcher graciously put max back in the spotlight for the closing two numbers, “partytime” with its genre-defining major 7 chords and the best guitar solo of the ’80s and “drink”—max’s own song, effectively giving the sideman the last word.

like love, perhaps musical collaborations are lovelier the second time around. If that is the case, and it appears to be, the future looks bright for jazz butcher fans such as myself. I only wish you could have been there.

postscript – for guitar players (nerds) only after the show I asked max way too many questions the first one being, naturally, what kind of guitar were you playing?  “a gretsch” was his answer. when pressed for a little more information he told me it was a “double” anniversary. favored more by country players than jazzbos. the “double” anniversary features hi-lo-tron single coil pickups.

as I was standing near the stage I can attest to the fact that max plugged directly into a fender deville 4 x 10 amp. fiddling with a couple of the knobs during the show. the chorus effect made no appearance, apparently banished to a bygone era.