Shoot! I've been so busy trying to get ready for Ireland I forgot to promote the fact that my new CD is out on the June 6th. Yes, Irish Drinking Songs: The Cat Lovers Companion is officially available online in TWO DAYS!!!

I was hoping to try to get the word out so I could get everyone to go to CD Baby on June 6th and purchase a copy, thus, push the CD up their charts. And I forgot!

Because I forgot. Could you please help me get the word out. On June 6th, email your friends, blog about it, podcast about, tell everyone you can to go to http://cdbaby.com/cd/mgtdtc3/from/celtic/ (or at least I *think* that'll be the URL) and purchase a copy. The CD will even be on sale. Please help me push it up the charts!

And of course for those of you who've already reviewed the CD, get ready to post your reviews. You can read a bunch of reviews here.

Thank you all for your help!

Because June 6th is also the day I'll be flying to Ireland. Wouldn't that be a great day to top the CD Baby charts?!

My live performances on the Pub Songs Podcast have gone over very well. I've only released two from my home studio, but I get a lot of emails from people who enjoyed them and want to hear more. So I listened to the shows again and picked the recordings that were made in those shows. They will make up the first in a series of albums from the Pub Songs Podcast.

This first album is called Folk Music with Delusions of Grandeur. Why the name? I played rock music in my early music career. I play folk music, but I'm a bit of a rocker at heart. I mean my new sideburns are kinda testimony of that. But being the realist, I know that currently folk music lacks the power and ability for mass appeal like rock music. But never the less, I dream of rocking out in an arena... with my autoharp and Celtic folk songs.

This album will feature some of the songs I recorded for my Pub Songs Podcast. Plus, I decided to add a few songs that are just hanging around waiting to be added to a CD. Here are some of the songs you may hear on the new CD:

1. Black Velvet Band
2. Jock Stuart (A Man Who Wears A Kilt Every Day)
3. Star of the County Down
4. The Virgin Diet
5. Lish Young Buy-A-Broom
6. Lord of the Pounce
7. Loch Tay
8. The Pleasant Peasant Pheasant Plucking Song
9. Eleanor Plunkett
10. I Saved The Planet Earth (Dr. Who)
11. Monkeys Over Mongolia
12. A Rabbit For Halloween (Bugs Bunny & Witch Hazel)
13. Won't You Come With Me
14. Happy Birthday, Dear Hobbit & Friend
15. Advertisement: PlagueAway, the Pestilence Potion
16. The Faire Is Over

I hope to finish mixing the album after I return from Europe. And it may well be out in mid-July 2007.

What do you get when you cross a bawdy pirate with a Scots-Irish bard, a lot of beer and drinking songs? You get Irish Stout.

Irish Stout is a concept band featuring Captain Black Jack Murphy's gritty Irish vocals and Marc Gunn folkiness on autoharp. The band performs Irish pub songs and bawdy piratey humour. We're talking songs you really shouldn't sing about. Ask their friend Lazarus Long. Lazarus was kind enough to supply topics for some of the band's more original material.

But that's not here yet. Right now, the duo has just released their first album, A Collection of Irish Pub Songs. This fun and raucous collection of Celtic songs is just what every drinker and music lover wants to hear while dieting on their favorite Irish stout.

A Collection of Irish Pub Songs

If you're having a drink, join Murphy and Gunn for a night of pub song singing!