Album Reviews

It’s quite the distance from the Appalachians to Colorado, but for the duo of Fort Collins singer-songwriters Charlotte Formichella and Lynn Scharf – known as Driftwood Fire – they wouldn’t have it any other way

Unlike those lying Doobie Brothers, Sisters 3 is actually a band comprised of three sisters: Cassandra, Beatrice, and Anna Christie Sadler. The Philadelphia trio has a vintage style, but it would be a mistake to lump them in with the folk pop revival trend of recent years. Their second album, Coruscate at the Meadow Gate, has a sound too diverse to fit neatly in any genre.

For a band that has been gaining momentum over the past several releases, Blitzen Trapper’s latest, American Goldwing finds the Portland group pausing a bit to catch their breath. 

A large thematic portion of The Wandas debut album appears to be focused around the idea of chasing after love, or quite possibly the missing out on that existence.  Listening to the instrumentation of the majority of this album, it wouldn’t be as apparent to interpret the lyricism as depressing matters; it nearly is disguised.   That could be viewed as a success in terms of expressing, or changing, that idea within the sound that makes up this band.   

he effervescent enthusiasm that pervades Tommy Keene’s new album, Behind the Parade, belies the artist’s nearly thirty-year career as a cult figure. Sample the previous high points of his discography– Places that Are Gone or Based on Happy Times– and listen for a discernible difference in energy.

World Wide Rebel Songs at its core resembles the structure of The Nightwatchman’s previous two records, but the sound broadens somewhat with the addition of more production instrumentals.

Tripper has more of a narrative focus than previous Fruit Bats efforts. On his fifth album, Eric D. Johnson consciously shifts to story-based songs.

JEFF The Brotherhood is Jake and Jamin Orrall of Nashville, Tennessee, owners of Infinity Cat Recordings. The bare bones duo, just guitar and drums, played 230 shows last year and were hailed by Spin magazine as one of the “must see” acts at this year’s South by Southwest.  Their new album, We are the Champions, is eleven tracks and a short 35-minute. It’s packed with jagged scuzzed-out guitar riffs that hop between Weezer style chunky rhythms, sharp, classic rock swagger, and blasts of powerful punk power.

[rating=4.00] When Dave Stewart’s new album, The Blackbird Diaries, opens, the initial shock of finding a smoking, swinging roots-based rock jam is quickly assuaged by digging into the caliber of the musicians present. Stewart’s band, put together by John McBride, features many of Nashville’s best sessions players, such as Tom Bukovac, Chad Cromwell and Mike […]

Surprising, then, are the few rare times when language meets product, and an album breathes new life into a seemingly static journey. A great example of this is Catie Curtis’ new record, Stretch Limousine on Fire, which after a string of fairly nondescript and traditional Curtis folk/pop records thrusts her square back on top of her game.