“THE BLACK TONGUED BELLS from Los Angeles, CA. reach the Top 30 in the Americana music genre (2013-14)”
– REVERBNATION

“Nasty, deep-in-the-pocket grooves, some of the fiercest feral vocals this side of Captain Beefheart and the sweet, sweet stink of raw roots energy makes for a brawny set that grabs hold and doesn’t let go so easily. Lead vocalist / guitarist / songwriter D. Miner is a no-nonsense presence who serves up lyrics as tough as his primal pipes. Check out ‘Comin Back For More’, ‘Down In The Hood’ and percussionist Louis Cox’s vocal feature ‘The Midnight Porter’. Great stuff. “
– Duane Verh – RootsMusicReport.com

“There are very few CDs that I can say, I like every song on the album… The Black Tongued Bells CD: Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell is in that select group.”
– Rick Keyes, On Air Personality, Host/DJ – KCR College Radio & The Music Caravan Show

“The Black Tongued Bells brilliant CD; Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell has been on my iPod since I received it!”
– Les Young DJ Host – Wall To Wall Blues Show, Penistone FM 95.7, Sheffield, UK

“Really looking forward to playing this amazing sound. The Black Tongued Bells CD – Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell is stunning!”
– DJ Yorkie – AiiRadio Net, UK

“Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell is a swampy, bluesy blast! Interesting riffs abound, Inventive musical style, raw slide work, but it’s definitely the vocal style and storytelling that makes this stuff hot! It will really hit home for people who love the raw bluesy sound and are not just looking for a carbon copy of everything else they have heard.”
– EVERY TONGUE HAS A TALE TO TELL is being considered for Bman’s Blues Top CDs in 2013! Click here to read full review…

“The group who meld Muscle Shoals and Memphis grooves with swamp blues and gospel overtones. Hypnotic richly textured wall of sound that feels like it were produced in a Mississippi juke joint.”

TO READ THE FULL REVIEW and find out more about The Black Tongued Bells new release CLICK LINK BELOW & Scroll down until you see the CD title – Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell. http://www.thebluesblast.com/bbnow.htm
– Blues Blast Magazine

“The Black Tongued Bells …WOW! Swamp rock is right!! Awesome, organic sounding stuff that people need to hear.”
– Tory Gates, Radio Host, WITF 89.5 FM, Clear Channel Communications, Inc. – York, PA

“Sweet Revival on the radio… At this point our choir THE BLACK TONGUED BELLS sing like angels and pass through the faithful with a heady message of inclusion off their new cd; EVERY TONGUED HAS A TALE TO TELL”
– Blue Monday Monthly Entertainment Magazine

“The Black Tongued Bells 2013 CD, Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell is one of the very best CDs I have listened to in 2013… And I have listened to over 200 CDs!!”
– Luc Brunot – Radio Host & Reviewer, France – Collectif Des Radios Blues / Dixie Rock Radio

“New and cutting edge… Love the Black Tongued Bells sound. The more I listen to the Black Tongued Bells, the more I like what I hear. The song, Gimme that Rise is a contender for one of the best songs of the year. Pretty sure Gimme will make it…but I got my ear on Jukin’ Joint, too.”
– Downtown Deb Blues Show, Gold Radio Blues Show, United Kingdom & Pennsylvania

“Love the album… Play it on my Blues Show BISHOP 105.9 FM”
– Gary Grainger – Producer & Host, United Kingdom

“The Black Tongued Bells are blues with a STAX influence, with the echoes of Creedence Clearwater Revival, Howlin’ Wolf and Little Feat. What is indisputable is that this CD, Every Tongue Has A Tale To Tell, is with such depth, touching and addictive.”
– Henry Chinaski – Reviewer & Musician, Central America

“I enjoyed the quality of musicianship and the imagination in the songwriting… The album held my attention for a long time. Nice slinky groove and solid rhythm section.”
– Bruce Iglauer, President and Founder, Alligator Records Label

“These musicians have an untamed, daring and completely unique sound. The group moves between Louisiana swamp black music, black rock n’ roll and the most genuine ‘roots music’, because The Black Tongued Bells work to get a very personal sound to play blues. Sometimes they also include other styles in their music, such as cajun or Motown sound. The cool easygoing air you will find in their music becomes a wrapping subtle atmosphere very difficult to escape. This peculiar sound will hook you from the first notes of the opening song “Comin’ Back For More” to the last cut of the fourteen songs included, the illustrative zealous “Hello Misery”. An album to enjoy on a sunny spring morning. VERY GOOD.”
– LA HORA DEL BLUES, Spain

“These guys are great — I LOVE their sound!”
– Geno Michellini, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame DJ, “Turntable Hits” Flying Eye Radio Network

“One of the best bands around. The Bells make swampy, bluesy rock and roll, as if they were bogged down in the Mississippi bayous.”
– Alyson Camus, Rock NYC

“With guitars as thick as molasses, The Bells drag their blues on the ground picking up soulful grit—then smooth it out with inviting grooves and vocal harmonies.”
– Nick Faigin, Harvelle’s Blogspot.com

“The Black Tongued Bells clomped onto the stage…the effect was like hearing a herd of mastodons pissing in a swamp.”
– Ron Garmon, Los Angeles City Beat

“The ambiance created by the Bells is powerful. There quite simply is nothing like The Black Tongued Bells. Their mix of stories and beats from the swamp is the coolest evolution in L.A. in a long time.”
– David Knight, Chief Producer, Nemo Media Group

“The Grand Ole Echo, a regular happening featuring Americana music performed by hot local acts…Roots-Rock legends The Black Tongued Bells round out the bill in their own inventive style.”
– John Sollenberger, Pasadena Weekly

“With twangy, dissonant licks, equally raw vocals and gritty narratives, this is the type of music that will be warmly welcomed by the airwaves.”
– Ryan Hoffer, A & R, Shut Eye Records, Inc.

“Exile on Sunset Blvd. as these unlikely Angelinos use a faded Creedence map to connect the tar pit to the swamp.”
– Catamount Collective, Hot Unsigned Americana Compilation, Nashville, TN

“One of my favorite bookings…I’ve featured their gritty ‘swamp opera’ several times. This is real entertainment blended with thought and insight.”
– Bob Stane, Owner/Artistic Director, Coffee Gallery Backstage, Altadena, CA

“Set in depression-era Louisiana, the Bells’ Swamp Opera, ‘That Great and Dreadful Day’, is a juke-joint style amalgam of song, hootin’ and hollerin’.”
– Los Angeles Times

“Get an earful of what’s called “American Swamp Music”…They’ve performed to rave reviews at venues all around the LA area. See what the buzz is about.”
– John Sollenberger, Pasadena Weekly

“A brilliant group of talented performers. There is nothing like them anywhere. This is a class act all the way…”
– Jana Pendragon, KXLU — 88.9 FM, Los Angeles, CA

“THE BLACK TONGUED BELLS NEW CD, EVERY TONGUE HAS A TALE TO TELL, SELECTED AS ONE OF THE TOP 5 ROOTS MUSIC ALBUMS YOU SHOULD OWN. According to their bio, The Black Tongued Bells took their name from this line in a Dylan Thomas poem. This statement couldn’t be truer. Every performance is a solid delivery of a tale, which is intimately conveyed with their audience. The sudden harmonic background vocals and “oh oh oh oh” lyrics with niche swamp sound are packed with California’s own “mojo”. The same deep rooted emotions that a musician might get from hearing a B-Side Rolling Stone record will probably flood your psyche. The imperfections and rawness of the Black Tongued Bells vocals and edgy guitar chops sway they album into the deep woods. Ya don’t need a mosquito invested porch to get genuine swamp music, ya just need this album.”
– San Gabriel Valley Music Magazine, California

“Hearing that a band took their name from a line in a poem by revered Welsh writer Dylan Thomas might raise expectations for literate, Richard Thompson-style wordplay, or perhaps some Celtic-flavored fretwork. But the Black Tongued Bells, who lifted their moniker from Thomas’ “I See the Boys of Summer,” are more attuned to the Rolling Stones and Creedence Clearwater Revival. They bring their self-described “American swamp” music to the South Pasadena Arts Council’s Third Annual “End of Summer Concert” next Thursday.

You can’t escape that word “swamp” when experiencing, or attempting to describe, the Black Tongued Bells’ music. Their newest album, “Every Tongue Has a Tale to Tell,” makes thoughtful stabs at topicality, most notably with “Long Way to Go” (“We’ve got a long road ahead before we can wave the freedom flag/ You put a new man in Washington, DC/ Somebody tell me, does that really change a thing/ It don’t matter if they’re red or if they’re blue/ ‘Cause in the end it’s all the same”). But ultimately what reels listeners in is that swampy vibe undulating through all of their music — a rhythmic river of Delta blues, Stonesy rock ‘n’ roll, Motown, Cajun and gospel.

When they first started playing shows around LA in 2001, they were primarily performing “That Great and Dreadful Day … Tall Tales From the American Swamp,” an entertaining “swamp opera” of storytelling and song — mostly song, backwoods jug-band-blues style. Since returning from a self-imposed hiatus several years ago, the current Bells — guitarist D. Miner, drummer Ray Herron, bassist Anthony Cook, percussionist Louis Cox and vocalist Mary Stuart — have plugged in and electrified their sound. Intentionally or not, it has made their shows more accessible to a wider audience. Miner growls like Tom Waits on a bender (a very good thing), while Cox’s percussion and Stuart’s soulful harmonies juice up Cook and Herron’s earthy grooves, whether they’re offering a slow-rolling take on Merle Travis’ classic “Sixteen Tons” or wheeling around “Down in the Hood” or jumping at the “Kingbee Jam.”

It’s an ear-pleasing, and fun, mix that appeals to the kind of all-ages crowd they’re likely to find before them next Thursday. Concertgoers are encouraged to take blankets and lawn chairs — and dancing shoes.”
– Pasadena Weekly

“This is the most rock n’ roll record since the first Georgia Satellites LP. In many respects it is so much more than that, but rock n’ roll is the foundational brilliance for this wonderful album. The BTB’s have in D.Miner a genuine guy and committed artist, who writes these vignettes of an art-based life that no matter how smart, never forgets its first & primary mission is to rock the house.

This is one wonderful hot, sweaty rock n’ roll record. The Black Tongued Bells are one funky, funky, funky rock n’ roll organization. I mean, c’mon, just look at what record label they’re on; the band starts outsider and ends up groovin’ on one wheel on an angle, not even sure if “fallin’ into the mud ain’t necessarily righteous” pathway. This is a godsend for folks searching for just something gen-u-wine that can remind you why ya love the rock n’ roll voodoo in the first damn place. I could bend your ear about the “je ne sais quoi, but I’m here nonetheless” utter cool hand D gospel of D. Miner, but suffice it to say, if the shit wasn’t this holy, he never could have gathered such an amazing band around his ass-kickin’ self. And as for his alternate universe tunings, yikes does it make for a fresh sound on the hot and warm and soft bread pudding that is being served up? Why yes, the answer is “YES!” The hot buns warmed by the steamin’ locomotive of Anthony Cook and Ray Herron keep the proceedings on a steady but slightly laid back groove that keeps the whole damn shooting match tethered (albeit only slightly) to reality. Ya gots the beautiful vocal-ese from a saucy Ms. Mary Stuart and the grits and gravy hit from the Venerable Reverend Sir Louis Cox. Well Mr. Miner is one lucky fella, that’s all we gotta say. Who he’s sleepin’ with to get this godly/ungodly support…

If ya must, and I concede humbly, then I ain’t heard such rock n’ roll consistency since the halcyon days of “Green River” or “Bayou Country”. I’m telling ya, stop readin’ my slop and go to www.theblacktonguedbells.com and check out the best band you ain’t ever heard of yet. This is the manna from heaven for the starving faithful of the Church of the Living Rock n’ Roll Swampy-YEAH division.”
– Innocent Words Magazine & Records

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