For the latest season of VH1 Stoytellers, the music network stayed away from legacy artists, instead focusing their attention of on a slew of contemporary acts. During Ray LaMontagne’s highly
Last year, Soulive helped to celebrate the month of March with a ten-show, guest-laden residency at Brooklyn Bowl that was cleverly dubbed Bowlive. For the second year in a row,
Back in 2002, the large-scale music festival landscape in the United States was virtually nonexistent. So when Superfly Presents and AC Entertainment announced plans for a multi-day, jam-friendly fest, named
Last night, the National Academy Of Recording Arts & Sciences hosted its 53rd annual Grammy Awards ceremony, handing out trophies in 31 categories ranging from Song Of The Year to Best Hawaiian Music Album to Best Album Notes. While we generally don’t take much stock in who they had hand out awards to, there were a handful of noteworthy performances from last night’s telecast – Cee-Lo dressed like Elton John circa 1973 with The Muppets, Mick Jagger honoring the late Solomon Burke and John Mayer, Norah Jones and Keith Urban paying tribute to Dolly Parton with a cover of Jolene.
HT’s most anticipated performance of the night though was the impressive trifecta of Mumford & Sons, The Avett Brothers and Bob Dylan. The two rising stars of the roots-Americana scene each got to show off just what makes them must see live acts, as Mumford & Sons tore through a raucous version of The Cave, while the Avetts delivered a powerful crescendo building take Head Full of Doubt, Road Full of Promises. The performance climaxed with both acts backing Dylan for a ramshackle, foot-stomping take on Maggie’s Farm, with Zimmy front and center…
We’d like to congratulate HT faves The Black Keys, Ray LaMontagne, Mavis Staples, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Jeff Beck, Paul McCartney and Them Crooked Vultures for taking home Grammys, as well as Arcade Fire, who were the big winners of the night, walking away with Album Of The Year honors.
READ ON for a full list of winners from last night’s ceremony…
For the second consecutive year at Hidden Track, we concocted our innovative little experiment for the year-end Best Albums list. Instead of picking the old fashioned way – subjectively – we opted for something a little different: a collaborative, collective list that incorporates the opinions of everybody here at HT.
To begin, we devised an all-encompassing list of well over 100 nominees, whereby most everything our contributors recommended made the list. Then we invited our crew of writers to independently and blindly vote on the whole list on a scale of 1 to 20 (20 = five stars). We ended up with varying degrees of familiarity with the nominees as some folks voted on just about everything, while some just a few. From there, we deployed our egghead algorithm for rating albums: (two times the average rating) + (the total number of votes). At that point, we took the top 25 highest scores and presto: the Hidden Track 25 Best Albums of 2010. No bullshit, no big opinions; just the results.
We’re on to day two of on our week long countdown, let’s check out albums number 16-20…
20) Marco Benevento – Between The Needles & Nightfall
Key Tracks: Greenpoint, Between the Needles, Numbers
Sounds Like: Brad Mehldau meets Tortoise
The Skinny: Marco Benevento’s latest solo record is the prolific keyboard player’s most impressive release yet. Bassist Reed Mathis’ sense of space and harmony along with drummer Andrew Barr’s subtly explosive poly-rhythmic playing lay the foundation for Benevento’s hook-laden melodies, shape-shifting piano, and circuit-bent sounds. While his first two studio releases were solid, Between the Needles and Nightfall has a cohesiveness not found on either that allows Marco’s songwriting to truly shine. The one-two punch of Greenpoint and Between the Needles at the front of the album set the overall tone for the album, while Marco’s solo at the end of Numbers highlights the whole thing.
READ ON for the next four albums in our countdown…
In the decade since the runaway success of the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack – which took home the Grammy for Album Of The Year in 2002, and has
In 2003 power-pop act Fountains Of Wayne became household names behind their seemingly ubiquitous hit Stacy’s Mom from their highly recommended album Welcome Interstate Managers. The New York-based quartet, whose
With three rather successful releases under his belt, Ray LaMontagne decided that he needed a change for his new studio album. The singer-songwriter, whose previous albums were all produced by
While "Trouble" celebrated being saved by a woman, Ray LaMontagne's God Willin' kicks that no good lyin' lady to the curb. But it doesn't take long for this pariah dog to beg her back, let her go again, then finally stroll on toward the sunset, head held high.
After a handful of high profile warm up shows, which included a number of SXSW appearances, James Mercer (The Shins) and Brian Burton (aka Danger Mouse) will take their new
