Last year’s Seeger Sessions saw the Boss unexpectedly twist toward traditional Americana. This Live in Dublin double disc and companion DVD finds him employing his seventeen-piece Sessions Band to expand that musical palette with exhilarating results. Where Springsteen’s earlier folk forays — the bare-bones Nebraska and more recent Devil &…
Joss Stone is all about the love. Obsessed with it actually. Over the course of a phone call from Vancouver, the last in a series of whirlwind press interviews to promote her new album, Introducing Joss Stone, she uses the word to describe much of what motivates her. “I don’t…
With the term “jam band” incorporating everything from blues to bluegrass these days, it’s an overused handle that barely describes all the disparate bands lumped within its parameters. Still, Assembly of Dust has found its fit there, mostly due to its freewheeling dexterity, a sense of retro revival, and a…
Wilco may set the standard for eclectic indulgence. Shedding its Americana visage with Yankee Hotel Foxtrot in 2002, the band successfully redefined itself as an experimental outfit dealing in atmospheric soundscapes and sonic contradiction. This daring was rewarded with a pair of Grammy nods for the followup, A Ghost Is…
Forget the Foo Fighters — the true champ when it comes to blending melody and mayhem is a tumultuous trio known as Dinosaur Jr. These art-rock heroes were making heads bop and torsos flail back when Dave Grohl was still taking his cues from Kurt Cobain. The group’s bassist, Lou…
Kings of Leon are commanding quite a racket these days. Made up of three brothers — sons of a Pentecostal preacher — and their cousin, the band has been hailed by some as the savior of Southern rock. Their third album, Because of the Times, is an ironic little mixture…
Following the critical acclaim garnered by the 2005 simultaneous release of I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning and Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, Bright Eyes seems eager to confirm its status as indie overachievers. With anticipation building for a followup, the band’s mainstays — boy-genius Conner Oberst, joined by Mike…
Norah Jones is still searching for her perpetual groove. Since garnering instant acclaim at the top of the jazz and pop charts with her multiplatinum debut album, Come Away With Me, Jones’s forward momentum hasn’t been all that successful. Though undeniably sensual and seductive, her second album, Feels Like Home,…
Despite putting out nine albums and having a knack for writing songs that would make Paul McCartney and Brian Wilson wince with envy, Ron Sexsmith has somehow managed to fly below the radar with the music-buying masses. Just exactly why remains an unfathomable mystery. Yet to his credit, this baby-faced…
After four albums of exceptional, introspective folk-pop musings, it’s something of a shock to find Erin McKeown turning her attention to jazz gems of the Thirties, Forties, and Fifties. Still, she does a credible job of capturing the spirit of those songs with a wink and a nudge of irreverence…
Forget for a moment the obligatory roll call of hits — we’ll get to that in due time. Focus instead on the fact that few artists have established an image as durable as Stevie Nicks has. True, she can come off as a bit precious — spinning like a dervish,…
Every year a wide swath of the nation’s rock critics singles out one up-and-coming band as the greatest thing since reverb. Last year that distinction fell to a Montreal troupe coyly named the Dears. As the new year dawns, the superlatives have yet to subside. Fortunately the Dears’ ironically titled…
Despite the fact that his latest album, the optimistically dubbed Face the Promise, represents his first new set of songs in nearly a dozen years, Bob Seger is, to borrow the title of one of his most resilient oldies, still the same when it comes to his blue-collar brand of…
To the casual observer, this comment might seem self-effacing: “I was smiling during that last song because I saw such a big crowd in here. But then I realized maybe it was because this is the only tent with air conditioning.” Yet there is no denying that the speaker, Matthew…
Scotty’s Landing is laid-back, even by South Florida standards. Flanked by Miami City Hall and the infinitely more expensive Chart House, it’s tucked behind one of several marinas that line the water along Coconut Grove’s South Bayshore Drive. Unadorned and nondescript, Scotty’s is little more than a canvas-covered wood deck…
There’s something to be said for straight-ahead, unpretentious, wholly exhilarating rock and roll without the woes or hand-wringing that seems to underscore the petulance afflicting so much of today’s music. The Format provides the antithesis to that approach, as evidenced by its latest outing, the ironically dubbed Dog Problems. An…
By his own admission, John Taylor lives a charmed existence. Deliriously wealthy, strikingly good-looking, happily married to a successful entrepreneur, and a founding member of Duran Duran, one of the most successful British groups of the past two decades, he can claim the quintessential rock star existence. After reuniting with…
In an era when political correctness is pursued to unyielding extremes, singer-songwriter Randy Newman is an astute observer, immune to any notion that social commentary should refrain from satire and stereotypes. Eight years after Three Dog Night earned him his first chart success by covering his song “Mama Told Me…
Either Andy Partridge has way too much time on his hands or he’s simply too prolific to be reined in by the confines of XTC, the proto-punk band-turned-Beatles/Beach Boys disciples he founded nearly three decades ago. It’s likely a bit of both; after all, it has been practically 25 years…
After Lloyd Cole’s twentysomething years of making music, first with his band the Commotions and then solo, his career had become somewhat rote — an album every couple of years, but nothing that seemed especially inspired. His latest disc changes that perception; it’s a stirring set of songs. The title…
The best live albums bring something new to songs that have been heard only in a studio incarnation, new performances that transcend the recorded versions and connect with striking immediacy. By that standard, Okonokos, My Morning Jacket’s first concert set, is a stunning success. An able followup to last year’s…
Hail the Sails, Great Britain’s latest buzz band. Essentially a guise for a one-man musical operation — multi-instrumentalist and overachiever Michael Gagliano — the self-titled debut runs rampant with psychedelic sensibilities and flower-power precepts. Though accessible and engaging, the material maintains an integrity and intelligence that elevates it far beyond…
