Regulars here include The Derailers, an upbeat country band guaranteed to crack a grin on the dourest face, and Don Walser, an icon of country yodelling (yes, yodelling).
Last week the band Cake's "Showroom of Compassion" (Upbeat) set a record for the fewest sales for a No. 1 album, with 44,000.
Lord Huron, the wonderful alt-country band from LA, played an incredibly upbeat set to kick off the Festival on Friday.
The band wants to make an even wider impact, and performances like the irresistibly upbeat set Bongo Maffin played at S.O.B.'s can only help fulfill this ambition.
On "The Shepherd's Dog," Sam Beam's new songs for his ever-changing project, Iron and Wine are still conundrums, but they arrive in upbeat full-band arrangements, steeped in the 1960s but with their own mysteries.
For the girls Malia and Sasha, I suggest CDs by lively, upbeat Scottish bands which I have rediscovered -- The Proclaimers, twin brothers from the environs of Edinburgh whose music is being used as the soundtrack for the filming of Sunshine on Leith, a kind of Scottish Mama Mia, and The Bay City Rollers, whose classic song "Bye Bye Baby" is featured in the film Love Actually, our holiday favorite.
Back at Draught Works, the mood was decidedly more upbeat as the band tuned up.
After creating its own label, Upbeat Records, the band released Showroom of Compassion in 2011, which became its first album to debut at the top of the Billboard charts, selling 44,000 copies in the first week after release.
Friends from Strathclyde University, Cook and Doherty wanted to work on something more upbeat than the bands they had played for in the past.
The second style, which is more contemporary, includes upbeat praise music, bands rather than an organ, and a much less formal set of readings and prayers centered on a video presentation.
