and the King…

band that'd be at home in Scarborough (image via jambands.com)

I came across The Duke and The King last year thanks to Dax and fell in love with their music almost immediately (yeah, I know: oxymoron). My favourite song from Long Live Duke and The King (their 2010 self produced album), You and I begins by proclaiming “love is a coke-dealer’s daughter, love is a slave ship at sea…” You can see why I like them.

The 2009 Nothing Gold Can Stay is also a winner (Daily Telegraph‘s album of the year) and If You Ever Get Famous came free when I purchased my cute little netbook – sweet! Thank you Toshiba…

So who are they, you ask. Best described as a hippie-soul-folk band of outlaws, the quartet is composed of four ridiculously talented (and humble) human beings: Simone Felice (who is due a post all this own), Bobbie Bird Burke, Simi Stone and Nowell Haskins. From New York nog al. Taking their name from two travelling hustlers in Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn they aim to create music “you put your whole heart into. You have to believe in it, no matter what.” The band formed when Simone, after leaving The Felice Brothers (again, entire post required) to get married, his wife subsequently suffered a miscarriage and holed himself up in a cabin with friend/drummer/songwriter, Robert ‘Chicken’ Burke (uhuh, that’s Bobbie Bird Burke – a man, his own words, with as many names as the devil). Nothing Gold Can Stay was the result. A beautiful, productive way of dealing with grief (when you consider most people just lose the plot when their heart breaks). Respekt.

... keep an eye on the driver cause as the highway unwinds,

boy, the way home fades and can be so hard to find...