Posts by Shawn Donohue

Massive Nights, The Hold Steady’s annual run of shows at their adopted home, the Brooklyn Bowl in Williamsburg, once again brought a sold-out crowd to multiple joyous peaks on Friday night, December 6th. The third show (of four scheduled) found the band clicking on all cylinders. 2024 has been a busy year for the band. […]

The unofficial Mayor of the East Village, Jesse Malin has not played a show in a few years as he has put all of his efforts into recovering from a spinal stroke he suffered back in May 2023. By his own account the days have been dark, the recovery long, and painful, however tonight was […]

Kim Deal’s first proper solo album was a long time in the making. She started recording Nobody Loves You More in 2011 when she was still with The Pixies and wrapped up in 2022 when she worked with close friend (the late) Steve Albini. The record feels lived in, with a wide sonic scope and a distribution of feelings, as […]

His last release Greatish Hits: I Followed My Dreams and My Dreams Said to Crawl was completely unnecessary. Father John Misty is one of the few artists who still revel in the full album format, immersing himself in sounds and themes over a record’s run time. His albums tell long stories, tie together disparate ideas, […]

On his previous solo release, 2023’s Cedar City Sweetheart, Andrew Gabbard focused on adding more country/Americana elements to his indie rock base. This time, he mostly returns to his core strengths, using vibrating guitar and his soulful voice to bring it on home with Ramble & Rave On! Playing all of the instruments himself (except […]

Jeremie Albino’s fourth album, Our Time In The Sun, is a step up. The Toronto-based singer-songwriter traveled to Nashville to write and record at Easy Eye Sound with Dan Auerbach. The resulting record is an engaging mix of classic rock and roll and southern deep-fried country soul. Working with some top-notch songwriters this time around (Pat McLaughlin, […]

The long-running garage rockers from Queens, NY, The Fleshtones, release their first new music in four years with It’s Getting Late (…and More Songs About Werewolves)’. The band uses tongue-in-cheek humor, retro rock, and a sense of the macabre throughout the record.    Since the early 1990s, the group has had a stable lineup of frontman […]

With the Pixies’ tenth album, The Night The Zombies Came, the band has now matched its pre-breakup output. Since reforming in 2004, the group has released five albums. The group has effortlessly morphed from alt-rock groundbreakers into relaxed middle-aged rockers.    The core band, Black Francis – lead vocals, rhythm and acoustic guitar, David Lovering – drums, percussion, […]

The second leg of the Drive-By Truckers Southern Rock Opera Revisited Tour is just getting underway as the group travels through a host of swing states prior to the upcoming election. Before they hit the Midwest, though, they made a sold-out stop in NYC to play Irving Plaza, updating their 2001 breakthrough album for the […]

With the surprise announcement of a new album, Fate & Alcohol, the Japandroids reinvigorated their fanbase. Then, they immediately deflated it by saying the group was over, and this would be the last musical statement from Brian King and David Prowse. Who knows if that holds true—forever is a long time—but if it does, the […]

The Hard Quartet’s debut self-titled double album is a gorgeous collection of fuzzy indie-rock earworms that ebb and flow with scruffy charm. The alt-rock legends (Emmett Kelly, Stephen Malkmus, Matt Sweeney, and Jim White) came together naturally to form this band, and the musical results speak to their joy in recording. The strongest songs arrive […]

The sophomore album from the SoCal-based Thee Sacred Souls speaks to their throwback style before the music even starts, as the trio of drummer Alex Garcia, bassist Sal Samano, and singer and songwriter Josh Lane pose for the 1967-inspired Daptone album cover. Once the music flows on Got A Story To Tell, the group’s retro soul […]

JD McPherson returns with his first collection of original songs in six years on Nite Owls. The ten tracks strip down his sound a touch but keep the retro rocking vibe alive by interestingly rounding up new genre influences that McPherson incorporates.  Gone are the boogie-woogie piano rolls and brass blasts, but in their place […]

Manu Chao’s first album in seventeen years, Viva Tu, continues his journey through laid-back sonic delights as he sings in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and English. Chao shoots for universal appeal without sacrificing honest connections and soul, succeeding most of the time.  The patented mix of roots-based acoustic guitar strums, digital bleeps, buzzes, and video game […]

A trifecta of 90’s alt-rockers took over Madison Square Garden on Wednesday, September 11th, 2024, as Weezer, Flaming Lips, and Dinosaur Jr. reminded the aging sold-out crowd of their youth while still playing with vim and vigor. Opening the affair was the trio Dinosaur Jr., whose no-frills set was a musical highlight for those fans who made it into the […]

Multi-instrumentalist Dale Crover has had a wide-ranging musical career. On his third solo album, Glossolalia, he offers a collection of rockers with various sonic oddities sprinkled in, and a host of friends offer help along the way.   Best known as the drummer for The Melvins, here Crover sings and plays guitar and bass as well as drums, […]

On a gorgeous late summer night in the nation’s capital, Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band arrived to deliver the classic rock and roll goods approximately a year after the initially scheduled show was to be held.  Last year, Bruce needed to cancel his fall and winter dates due to a peptic ulcer, but on […]

The debut album One Of A Kind from the UK-based rock outfit The Heavy Heavy is a blast of retro rocking fun. The band combines its love of 60s pop with 70s arena rock. Multi-instrumentalist William Turner and vocalist Georgie Fuller co-wrote the record, while Turner produced, engineered, and mixed One Of A Kind. Turner’s throwback, mainstream rock […]

Matt Johnson reassembles THE THE, returning with the project’s first studio album in twenty-five years. Johnson’s brainchild, the London-based post-punk/art-folk outfit, delivers Ensoulment, an album filled with poetic observations on modern society over shifting tempos and backings.  Playing cinematically and dramatically throughout, focusing on Johnson’s lyrics and deep-in-your-ear vocals, the album portrays Johnson as a […]

After a 13-year hiatus, Tab Benoit returns with the hard-rocking bayou blues of I Hear Thunder. The GRAMMY-nominated guitarist/singer turns up the volume and delivers the goods throughout the straightforward album.  Co-writing with friend and guitarist Anders Osborne, Benoit keeps things in basic rock formation as Terrance Higgins plays the drums and Corey Duplechin the […]