WFHB ADD POOL REVIEWS 9/20 and 9/27
ATE: 9.20.05ARTIST:Dar Williams
TITLE: My Better Self (Razor and Tie)
GENRE: FOLK/SS
GRADE: A
REVIEW:As the folk singer-songwriter continues to incorporate more pop elements, Dar Williams conjures a whole coming-of-age era in an album that suggests a 1970s soundtrack suffused with 1960s idealism. My Better Self's opening track, "Teen for God," evokes the bouncy innocence of Bible camp and the bittersweet ironies of innocence lost. "Echoes" sounds like it could have inspired a singalong around that campfire, a secular hymn for the global village about the big impact of small actions. On Williams's revival of Neil Young's "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere," Marshall Crenshaw provides vocal counterpoint and stinging guitar, while she teams with Ani DiFranco for a disembodied duet on Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb." With its intimations of immortality, "Blue Light of the Flame" features a shimmering keyboard generating space-age atmospherics reminiscent of early David Bowie. "So Close to My Heart" and "The Hudson" (with harmonies from Patty Larkin) return Williams's music to its folk base, but much of the rest suggests rites of passage, at a time when all sorts of "better selves" seem open to possibility, with the radio always on.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: 1,3,4,5,7,8,9,13
REVIEWER: Don McCleese amazon.com
DATE: 9.20.05
ARTIST: Death Cab for Cutie
TITLE: Plans (Barsuk/Atlantic)
GENRE: ROCK/ALT
GRADE: A
REVIEW: This is an amazing little pop record of amazing little pop songs. This record isn't a musical revolution, but more of a musical lullaby, a sweet collection of sad and hopeful stories.In fact, save for the fact that Gibbard has a soft focus sort of upper register voice, these songs, and most of Death Cab's for that matter, are less whiney emo rants as they are beautiful indie-pop songs. "I Will Follow You Into the Dark" is an excellent example. It's Gibbard and an acoustic guitar and he bares his heart in a tender and mature manner. The song is one of hope and not typical emo despair. The seventh song, "Someday You Will Be Loved", is a sort of Decemberists sounding song with the typical Gibbard twinge. "What Sarah Said" is definitely the most haunting song on the album. The rest of the album follows suit: solid Gibbard lyrics and song writing. It's a strong and generally hopeful album, not as sorrowful as some of his other songs.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: 2,3,5,7,8,9,11
REVIEWER: excerpted from popmatters.com
DATE: 9.20.05
ARTIST:Bonnie Raitt
TITLE: Souls Alike (Capitol)
GENRE: ROCK/MAINSTREAM
GRADE: A+
REVIEW: There is something reassuring about hearing such a solid Bonnie Raitt album after so many others. I mean, she's been in the game for about 35 years now and still sounds fresh – amazing guitarist, soulfully connective singer, picker of great songs, musicians and producers.
This is solid, classic Bonnie Raitt and worthy to file next to her best from the past.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS:1,2,4,6,7,9,11
REVIEWER: Jim Manion/WFHB
DATE: 9.20.05
ARTIST: Johnny "Guitar" Watson
TITLE: The Funk Anthology (Shout Factory)
GENRE: FUNK
GRADE: A++
REVIEW: Johnny “Guitar” Watson should have gotten the Funk Beyond the Call of Duty Lifetime Achievement Award before he passed away in 1996. Shout Factory has done us a great favor by compiling this awesome collection of JGW's tight, clean, creative, funny, and well-played funk. This music will never die and continues to inspire. When I was in Amsterdam awhile back, I bet I heard “A Real Mother For Ya” at least six times on the radio, in coffeeshops and in DJ clubs.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: all of them. Pick a title that you like and play it!
REVIEWER: Jim Manion/WFHB
DATE: 9.20.05
ARTIST: Josh Lederman
TITLE: Let's Waste Another Evening (Nine Mile)
GENRE: COUNTRY/ALT
GRADE: A-
REVIEW:Josh Lederman, leader of Los Diablos, writes old-fashioned songs. The kind you get drunk to, get married to, get divorced to and request to have played at your funeral. They're tales of down-'n-outers. They offer the minute details that often tell you more about a character than the grand, sweeping gestures. Perhaps most importantly, they have the good sense to enter the room briskly, make their point and then get the heck out of the way, leaving you enough time to go to the bar for another beer before they launch into another one.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: 2,4,6,8,9,12
REVIEWER:Jeff Miers - The Buffalo News
DATE: 9.20.05
ARTIST:Soulive
TITLE: Break Out (Concord)
GENRE: FUNK/JAZZ
GRADE: A+
REVIEW:Soulive is nothing if not a young jazz band of the people, playing on the road constantly, interacting with audiences graciously and regularly hosting musicians on stage and on tour. Yet this trio adamantly refuses to release albums that merely reflect its live act, which is a generously funky mix of pure improvisation over deep grooves seasoned with old-school soul, RandB, and contemporary beats. A pumping turn on “Crosstown Traffic” makes it sound like Jimi wrote the tune for a horn section. A fusion of such contemporary source material with old-school RandB and soul comes in the form of “Reverb,” where the band floats melodic textures over a groove as deep as it gets. “Got Soul” illustrates how handily Soulive maneuvers through syncopation. The incorporation of flamenco strains on “Cachacha” sounds perfectly natural, an enhancement of the group's style, not an experimentation with someone else’s (though it’d be hard to believe the members of Soulive don’t love Miles Davis’ Sketches of Spain). Guitarist Eric Krasno may be the most gifted instrumentalist in Soulive: his dexterity is always in proportion to his imagination. But his gifts would not stand out in such sharp relief were it not for the bottomless drumming of Alan Evans or the spice of contrast supplied by Neal Evans. “Breakout” sounds as tantalizing with the brassy horns as it so often has in stripped-down form parlayed by the core trio. It’s just one of the most obvious reminders that the name of this recording, Breakout, is a verb, not a noun.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: 2,3,6,811,13
REVIEWER: excerpted from allaboutjazz.com
DATE: 9.27.05
ARTIST:Big Star
TITLE: In Space (Rykodisc)
GENRE: ROCK/MAINSTREAM
GRADE: A+++
REVIEW: What a surprise to open the mail and find this, the first Big Star studio album in over 30 years. While not comprised of all the original members (no Chris Bell, but Alex Chilton and Jody Peterson are here), the overall aura of the set is the classic Brit-Invasion fueled Big Star Sound, blended with the Memphis roots music they embraced in their solo careers. The ghost of Chris Bell's mellow sensitive side hovers over a few songs, but as a piece this disc is a big fun Big Star party I thought we would never hear. Especially poignant due to Alex Chilton missing for awhile in New Orleans after Katrina hit!
RECOMMENDED TRACKS:1,2,3,6,8,10
REVIEWER: Jim Manion/WFHB
DATE: 9.27.05
ARTIST:Susan Tedeschi
TITLE: Hope and Desire (Verve)
GENRE: BLUES
GRADE: A
REVIEW:Tedeschi is gearing up for the October release of her fifth album, Hope and Desire (Verve Forecast), a collection of covers. "It was a blast to make," Tedeschi says. "We did it in 10 days. The chemistry was absolutely great." Produced by Joe Henry, the CD features ax heroes like Doyle Bramhall II and her hubby, Derek Trucks. Two of the musicians for the sessions — bassist Paul Bryan and drummer Jay Bellerose — were pals of Tedeschi's from her days at Boston's Berklee College of Music.The songs picked for Hope and Desire run the gamut from country (Iris DeMent's "Sweet Forgiveness") to rock (the Stones' "You Got the Silver") to gospel (Donny Hathaway's "Magnificent Sanctuary Band" — which features the vocal firepower of the Blind Boys of Alabama). Diverse, yes, but they have one thing in common, Tedeschi says: "great storytelling."
RECOMMENDED TRACKS: 1,2,5,7,8,10,12
REVIEWER: excerpts from citypaper.net (philadelphia)
DATE: 9.27.05
ARTIST:Rosie Thomas
TITLE: If Songs Could Be Held (Sub Pop)
GENRE: FOLK/SS
GRADE: A
REVIEW:It’s understandable that so many compare Rosie Thomas to Sarah McLachlan. Both write confessional piano ballads, have a knack for crafting beautiful melodies and sing like nobody's business. But while McLachlan appeals to the corporate everywoman who buys three CDs a year, Thomas’ target audience is the indie chick who keeps her hundreds of records arranged alphabetically and by genre. The big difference? Thomas’s heart breaks cerebrally, not just emotionally. She sees life and love through stark, gritty eyes that examine harsh realities McLachlan simply glosses over. In fact, Thomas’s songs - check out “Guess It May” and “Death Came and Got Me” - are so bleak she often incorporates a comedy act in her live shows to temporarily lighten the mood. That said, probably the best track on If Songs Could Be Held is a cover of the eternally sweet “Let It Be Me.” Thomas’s duet version is more saccharine than the Everly Brothers’, but no matter. It‘s damn fine music. So good, really, that it more than excuses some of the tracks - most notably, “Say What You Want” and “Time Goes By” - that blend together anonymously. In all though, Thomas's fans will be pleased to add this to their collection.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS:1,2,4,5,8,10
REVIEWER: excerpts from glidemagazine.com
DATE: 9.27.05
ARTIST:Burning Spear
TITLE: Our Music (Burning Music)
GENRE: REGGAE
GRADE: A
REVIEW:"Our music/they think that we lose it," sings Burning Spear on the opening title track to his 25th-or-so album in a 35-year career. The idea of "losing the music" could be a reference to the actual ownership of the music; Spear formed his own Burning Spear label beginning with 2003's "Freeman" to ensure control over his product. It also could be a reference to the fact that reggae has progressed from a humble style used for spiritual purposes to a global phenomenon, morphing along the way into heavily produced dancehall, the pop stylings of Maxi Priest, fodder for Eric Clapton and Willie Nelson, and, in its latest form, reggaeton, a Hispanicized reggae-dance hybrid coming out of Puerto Rico. Or, it could be a defiant reminder that Burning Spear - born Winston Rodney 57 years ago, in St. Ann's Bay, the same Jamaican village that produced Bob Marley - is, more than any other reggae singer, making the same music, for the same ends, as he was at reggae's birth. Spear has been remarkably consistent in his art, making roots reggae that stands as a statement against slick, commercial music. And yet, in his insistence on simplicity, and making the music very much about the message - freedom, community, persistence, Afrocentrism - Spear keeps making tuneful CDs. "Our Music" rolls along on Spear's repeated lyrical phrases, bouncing rhythms, and tightly arranged horns, guitars and backing female vocals. Spear hasn't lost anything, most especially his music.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS:
REVIEWER: aspentimes.com
DATE: 9.27.05
ARTIST:Angela Strehli
TITLE: Blue Highway (M.C.)
GENRE: BLUES
GRADE: A
REVIEW:Recording in Marin County has done well for this so-called "Queen of Texas Blues." No matter where she is, Strehli looks back toward Austin, but this time with a cast of Northern Californians spearheaded by "Mighty" Mike Shermer, who have created a collection of near-perfect songs, with a variety of shadings. Her first new recording in seven years is a four star marvel, the kind of work that recalls Bonnie Raitt's national breakout in the 1980s. The bouncy title track, "Blue Highway," with Strehli's voice joined in harmony with Maria Muldaur and Marcia Ball, sounds like somethng that would have been on Texas radio in the 1940s along with Hank Williams. "Heading South" should be a radio hit. It's a humorous take on a gringa's escape to Mexico, her luggage filled only with shoes. "SRV" is a gospel tribute to Stevie Ray Vaughan, with whom she plays on the 1985-bonus track, "C.O.D." recorded at Carnegie Hall."Hello My Lover" is a campy, fun duet with Paul Thorn. Through it all, Shermer's guitar boosts everything into overdrive, keeping it modern, but never losing the rich authenticity of soulful, deep-fried Texas blues. Let's hope she doesn't wait another seven years.
RECOMMENDED TRACKS:
REVIEWER: excerpted from mercurynews.com
OTHER RECENT WFHB ADDS:
9/20
Richard Swift Volume One Secretly Canadian
Carlos Guitarlos Hell Can Wait Nomad
Chris Mills The Wall to Wall Sessions Ernest Jennings
Devendra Banhart Cripple Crow XL/Beggars
9/27
Friends of Dean Martinez Lost Horizon AERO
Ladysmith Black Mambazo The Chillout Sessions Rasa
The Scotland Yard Gospel Choir I Bet You Say That To All The Boys SYGC
Maceo Parker School's In BHM
Tracy Chapman Where You Live Electra
posted by WFHB Music @ 12:35:00 PM
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