Album Reviews

Sarah Shook’s latest effort Cruel Liars, billed under the moniker Mightmare, sounds unlike anything they have released before.

Jeremy Rose is a Sydney, Australia-based woodwind specialist, bandleader, label, and festival director whose music involves the intersection of genres and cultures. His label, Earshift Music has released over 60 albums and his Earshift Orchestra is a global performing unit. The concept for this project, Disruption! The Voice of Drums” is to feature the drums […]

Originally released in 2012, Craft Recordings is issuing the first-ever vinyl release of ‘Holidays Rule’ on translucent red vinyl for its 10th anniversary.

Molly Rankin and Alvvays started off as a bright and shimmering, slightly twee indie pop outfit almost ten years ago. The group’s debut soon followed and although breezy and charming, it lent us two mammoth singles, “Adult Diversion” and “Archie, Marry Me”, the latter of which would essentially become the group’s signature song. On Antisocialites, […]

Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms And Lava makes good on its title with one of King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s most elemental experiments yet; seven tracks, each built on improvisatory jams in one of the seven modes of Western music with just a tempo and a title to guide them. What they’ve ended up […]

On their latest, Lines In The Levee, Ashville, North Carolina’s Town Mountain manage to sidestep the impulse to soften their sound with a pop sheen that would certainly blunt their authenticity but could bring them a more mainstream audience. Rather, much like their labelmates 49 Winchester, they deliver 11 tracks of faithful traditional country and […]

In the latest Wannabe, artist Chris Prunckle offers his illustrated commentary on the Homeless Gospel Choir’s new album Fourth Dimension Intervention, in his signature six-panel comic strip form. Click on the image for full resolution (best viewed on desktop):

It has been just over a decade since the world was introduced to the colorful creations of Broken Bells. The combination of super producer Danger Mouse and The Shins’ frontman James Mercer, together they help each other explore new sonics and tempos that culminate in their critically acclaimed albums. Their unique take on indie-rock was […]

The parallels between comedy and music are evident. You need clever wordplay, proper delivery, and perfect timing and no one connects those dots quite like Chicago emcee Open Mike Eagle. The veteran, multi-faceted artist has been combining the two art forms effortlessly for roughly two decades, stringing them together through witty punchlines and meticulous concept […]

This backup vocal role in Chicago is a rather intriguing one. Former mainstays of the now defunct Bloodshot label, Nora O’Connor, Kelly Hogan, and to some extent Neko Case are interchangeably lead singers on their own projects and background vocalists on so many others. Take for example The Flat Five, Chicago’s pop vocal super-group — Kelly […]

Consider the names. Charlie Parker, Count Basie, Joe Turner, Bernie Moten, Pete Johnson, Jay McShann, Andy Kirk, Mary Lou Williams, and the subject at hand, Bobby Watson, all hail from Kansas City.  Surely the Kansas City sound may not be as identifiable as that of New Orleans or even the West Coast, but Watson does […]

Bonny Light Horseman’s strong self-titled debut pulled from ancient folk songs, resulting in an indie-folk winner. Now on the group’s follow-up Rolling Golden Holy, the band has tightened up and crafted ten original outings that meld past with the present in a sweet-sounding fashion.  The trio of Anais Mitchell, Eric D Johnson, and Josh Kaufman […]

The pandemic years unleashed waves of musical discovery for many artists, and a look back at past work; and in some cases, material that an artist long wanted to record but did not. The latter is the case for acoustic blues singer and guitarist Rory Block. Through her terrific Mentor Series, six tribute recordings dedicated […]

On their third album Forevermore, LA-based Grand Canyon manages to mine everything from early Springsteen and E Street band albums to Tom Petty for a remarkably satisfying listen that somehow manages to be both familiar and strikingly original at times. From the opening track, “Heart of Gold,” you can almost hear the crowd cheering on […]

Many ears might find difficulty adjusting to the bright, blissful sound of Courtney Marie Andrews on her newest effort, Loose Future. It’s the fourth album for the Grammy-nominated and highly acclaimed singer-songwriter who had floored us with her achingly vulnerable, soaring gospel-soul vocals on her previous two albums. Rarely had anyone sung about pain and […]

Little Feat’s live album Waiting For Columbus (Warner Bros., 1978) became very popular immediately upon its original release in 1978. Yet in its first configuration as a double-LP of vinyl, the title didn’t actually appear in the form first envisioned by the group: the band recorded and mixed enough material for a triple set, but for marketing […]

Two years on from her impressive debut, Old Time Feeling, S.G. Goodman has finally embarked on her first headlining tour, and after building up her fanbase with opening spots for the likes of Jason Isbell and Shakey Graves and appearances at the Newport Folk Festival and SXSW – along with the June release of her […]

Two years ago, following the breaking story in The New York Times that pianist Keith Jarrett had suffered two strokes in 2018 and may never perform in public again, his label ECM released Budapest Concert, the second complete show issued from Keith Jarrett’s 2016 European tour, recorded two weeks earlier than the widely acclaimed concert released as Munich 2016. Now, […]

Loyal followers of jazz activist, visionary, poet, and multi-instrumentalist William Parker are doubtlessly already aware of the book, his biography Universal Tonality: The Life and Music of William Parker, by Cisco Bradley. Now we have a 2CD archival recording under the same title, that delivers this musical concept, a performance that took place at Roulette […]

Doggerel marks the Pixies’ fourth studio album since reconveying in 2004, this equals the same number of albums they released in their original incarnation. To say that levels of expectations have dropped significantly would be an understatement, but the band has delivered serviceable if unremarkable, rock in recent years and that workmen-like feeling continues throughout […]