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Soulful tribute to Southern California roots legend
5 months ago
  • Artist:
  • Album:
    The Man of Somebody’s Dreams: A Tribute to the Songs of Chris Gaffney
  • Track:
    1968

Chris Gaffney, who passed away from liver cancer in 2008, was a consummate musical insider. Though he recorded six solo albums, and co-led the Hacienda Brothers with Dave Gonzalez, his reputation remained strongest with among his fellow musicians and songwriters. His contributions as a member of Dave Alvin's Guilty Men were sufficiently important to lead Alvin to temporarily derail the latter's...

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Alvin kicks up new sparks with guilty women
5 months ago
  • Artist:
    Dave Alvin and the Guilty Women
  • Album:
    Dave Alvin and the Guilty Women
  • Track:
    Nana and Jimi

Having debuted this all-female backing lineup at San Francisco's Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival in 2008, Dave Alvin and his estrogen-packing band have waxed a gem. Christy McWilson and Amy Farris' harmonies and duets prove compelling partners to Alvin's baritone on an album of blues, rock, folk and a few surprises. Chief among the surprises is the Cajun fiddle and pedal steel arrangement of...

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Focused and accessible album of love and anger
5 months ago

After the artistic bonanza of 2005's CD triple-shot (the eclectic Don't Ask Don't Tell, the Disney covers Got No Strings and the Latin-influenced Mexican Standoff), Michelle Shocked returns with a passionate album of rock, folk and a touch of soul. Aside from her theme albums, the mood here is among the most focused of her catalog, nicely summed by the quote in her album's press: "I think the m...

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Endearing legacy of overlooked mid-60s pop hit maker
5 months ago

Despite major commercial success in 1965 and 1966, including a chart-topping debut, five top-five and ten top-twenty singles, Gary Lewis' music career was all but over two years after it began. His 1967 induction into the army left his label to release stockpiled tracks and record Lewis on occasional leaves; by the time of his discharge a phalanx of bubblegum bands had taken his place in the he...

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Tasty southern mash of Cajun, country, jazz and swing
6 months ago

The Ramblers fifth album, their second for Sugar Hill, continues to masterfully mix fiddle-led country and blues, Hot Club-styled jazz and galloping western swing. As the band's evolved from imitation to influence, so too have they moved from albums stocked with covers to nearly all original material. [...]Original Story

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Cowpunk revival: punk rock meets country waltz
6 months ago

This San Francisco trio travels the same circles as lo-fi minimalists Two Gallants, but the Riders country leanings take them closer to 1980s bands like Blood on the Saddle, Rank and File, the Meat Puppets, and Replacements. [...]Original Story

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Audacious pop concept by former bluegrass wunderkind
6 months ago

If you caught King Wilkie's bluegrass debut Broke, and somehow managed to miss their break with orthodoxy on 2007's Low Country Suite, you're in for a really big surprise. With the original group disbanded, and founding member Reid Burgess relocated to New York City, the band's name has been redeployed as the front for this stylistically zig-zagging concept album. The Wilkie Family Singers are ...

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Terrific throwback to mid-80s West Coast country
6 months ago

Though he grew up in Illinois with adoptive parents, Serby's a bona fide throwback to the throwback sounds of mid-80s Los Angeles. Ironically, he was born in Los Angeles to a biological father, only recently discovered, who was also a country musician. Serby's honky-tonk swells from the same roots as the Blasters, but with a deeper helping of the country twang and two-step rhythms Dwight Yoakam...

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Blue country cool meets hot rock twang
6 months ago

Jewell's third album retains the 30s jazz phrasings of her vocals, but the folk and country sounds of 2007's Letters From Sinners & Saints give way to electric guitars that twang like slow-motion rockabilly. [...]Original Story

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The soul behind the samples
6 months ago

The usual exercise one enjoys with hip-hop and other sample-based music is to work backward from the collage to its sources. Sample-crazy DJs such as Girl Talk's Greg Gillis are often the subject of lengthy crowd-sourced lists that deconstruct the construction, and the releases themselves sometimes include an official list. Some samples, such as Clyde Stubblefield's performance on "Funky Drumme...

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‘90s hitmaker adds indie heart and soul to the spit and polish
6 months ago

Raye came out blazing in 1991, reeling off four straight million selling albums and a string of hit country singles. He waxed a compelling catalog that mixed standard Nashville topics with more daring message songs, but his commercial success tailed at decade's end. Freed from his contract with Epic, Raye's gone the indie route with a live disc and a series of studio albums that rekindle the me...

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Expanded edition of Landreth’s blues-rocker
7 months ago
  • Artist:
  • Album:
    Levee Town (Expanded Edition)
  • Track:
    For Who We Are (The Night Bird Sings)

Originally released in 2000 by Sugar Hill, Landreth's album is augmented on this reissue with five tracks from the same era. As on last year's From the Reach, Landreth proves himself a guitar hero whose music runs deeper than his incomparable slide work. [...]Original Story

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Devastating album of anguished folk, rock and country
7 months ago

Austin singer-songwriter Slaid Cleaves returns with an album of Americana whose quiet beauty belies lyrics of deep resignation. Just as Springsteen's anthems can obscure his bite, Cleaves presents his songs with an offhandedness that, on the surface, offsets the despondency of his words. [...]Original Story

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Cathartic, hard-charging indie guitar rock
7 months ago

This Portland band was originally a one-man project of singer-songwriter-guitarist Tommy Harrington. His debut, 2004's Let Go Afterglow led to extended solo touring, but unexpected fatherhood and a regression into drugs shelved the project until Harrington was able to get clean and refocus. [...]Original Story: http://www.hyperbolium.com/2009/04/19/the-wanteds...

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Song That Are Easily Covered
7 months ago

I'm sure there are other examples, but I was surprised to find so many good covers of Tim Hardin's "Don't Make Promises" were out there.The original by Tim Hardin. Covers by Gary Puckett, Three Dog Night, Helen Reddy, Paul Weller, Chris Smither. There are many more, including a fine rendition by Bobby Darin, all worth hearing.Oh, and what made me think of it in the first place: there's a new ve...

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