“A heady and quirky mix of Regina Spektor, Leslie Feist, and Joni Mitchell, the second album from Nataly Dawn, the female half of heady and quirky indie pop duo Pomplamoose, is held together by the…multi-instrumentalist’s gift for gab, unique phrasing, and sophisticated musicality. Largely acoustic yet peppered with swampy slide guitar, brooding strings, and gospel-tinged [...]
Category Archive for 'Rock/Pop'
Lil Wayne: I Am Not a Human Being 2
Posted in Rap/Hip Hop on May 14th, 2013
“Compared to the albums he’s released under the name Tha Carter, Lil Wayne’s I Am Not a Human Being series is noticeably looser. The quality control is certainly above mixtape or street-release level, but stray tracks and Carter leftovers are given their homes here, while the overall album flow is allowed to be reckless…. [A]nyone [...]
Rodriguez: Searching for Sugar Man: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Posted in Folk Rock, Movies, Rock/Pop, Soundtracks on May 13th, 2013
“Whether moved by the documentary or simply interested in a one-disc anthology of Rodriguez’s work, the Searching for Sugar Man soundtrack is a thoughtfully curated celebration of this devastatingly underrated artist.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
“The Music is You: A Tribute to John Denver gathers up an oddball team of contemporary artists with a shared love for the late Muppets/Rocky Mountains loving singer/songwriter, and lets them strut and fret their hours upon the stage by paying homage to a rich assortment of Denver classics.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
Vows of Love
Posted in Rock/Pop on May 8th, 2013
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“Mala streamlines Banhart’s multifaceted muse, and the songs all fit together, if in a somewhat roundabout manner. Apart from the increased cohesion, the quality of the songwriting is far higher, reminding us of the astonishing promise and tossed-off ease of Banhart’s early material…” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
Shooter Jennings: The Other Life
Posted in Alt Rock, Country, Hard Rock, Indie, Rock/Pop, Roots Rock on May 4th, 2013
“Jennings truly came into his own on Family Man, but on The Other Life, he pushes the boundaries further, offering some of the finest songs he’s written to date. He fully realizes here what he’s been attempting all along. Box these sounds whichever way you want to, but they are all Shooter Jennings, and as [...]
Son Volt: Honky Tonk
Posted in Alt Rock, Alt-Country, Country, Indie, Rock/Pop on May 4th, 2013
“The whole album accumulates in a powerful, meditative way, and its themes are less about drinking and trying to forget the past than they are about making peace with the past and trying to remember it and use it as a spark and a springboard to the future. Honky Tonk is country facing forward informed [...]
“On Memphis, Boz Scaggs pays tribute to the city’s magnificent soul tradition, Al Green, and producer Willie Mitchell and his Royal Recordings studio, whose location and personnel were used to cut it in three days… This set is a stunner. Scaggs is in full possession of that iconic voice; he delivers songs with an endemic [...]
Josh Ritter: The Beast In Its Tracks
Posted in Alt Rock, Contemporary Folk, Folk, Indie, Rock/Pop on May 4th, 2013
“The resulting Beast in Its Tracks, written in the wake of his divorce, treats the situation with anger, warmth, despair, humor, honesty, and most importantly, empathy for both of its subjects, something that many records of a similar disposition fail to achieve.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
“[T]hey know how to turn a phrase, plant a seed, and build a bridge and tear it back down again without losing the audience in the process. Simply put, they can bend the relative simplicity of traditional folk music to their collective wills, which is exactly what they do on their sophomore outing, Babel.” –All [...]
“Sophistication is a given, but there’s a surprising undercurrent of sensuality that runs throughout the album, a sleekness that suggests a distillation of the stiff club-soul of Elle Goulding, a shimmer that blends quite seamlessly with Dido’s sculpted songs… Halfway through, Girl Who Got Away sucks you into its sway, its comforts as alluring as [...]
“Mika has flirted with dance music and electronic sounds since Life in Cartoon Motion, but on The Origin of Love he commits to it in a much bigger way…The album’s other highlights show that he’s still a keen and witty singer/songwriter, especially when it comes to love’s more confusing aspects.” –All Music Guide Check Our [...]
The Mavericks: In Time
Posted in Contemporary Country, Country, Rock/Pop on May 4th, 2013
“This album, In Time, is…a further step away from anything resembling a mainstream country release, incorporating not only the Tex-Mex and Cuban influences the band was known for, but also the rhythms of polkas, tangos, and all manner of approaches, making them closer to a band like Los Lobos than to Tim McGraw or Jason [...]
“Along with co-producer Jerome ‘J-Roc’ Harmon and fellow songwriter James Fauntleroy, the Tims have made a refined and distended follow-up to FutureSex/LoveSounds… [A] pleasant and grown release from a charismatic entertainer.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
David Bowie: The Next Day
Posted in Rock/Pop on May 4th, 2013
“The Next Day is designed to remind us all of why we’ve missed him, containing hints of the Thin White Duke and Ziggy Stardust… [T]he album has been systematically stripped of eeriness, trading discomfort for pleasure at every turn. And pleasure it does deliver, as nobody knows how to do classic Bowie like Bowie and [...]
Jimi Hendrix: People, Hell and Angels
Posted in Rock/Pop on May 4th, 2013
“The surprising thing about this set is not the sound quality (which is exceptional) or that these all sound like finished tracks, but the fact that even avid Hendrix bootleg collectors are unlikely to have heard most of this material… People, Hell and Angels certainly isn’t the place to start your Hendrix collection, but collectors [...]
“A virtual unknown in his English homeland but a chart-topping star across the Channel, Cornwall singer/songwriter Charlie Winston followed up his number one sophomore album, Hobo, with an equally eclectic third effort inspired by the likes of Nick Cave, Steve Reich, and Jacques Brel.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
“The first solo outing from Frames leader and Swell Season co-conspirator Glenn Hansard doubles down on the prolific Irish singer/songwriter’s penchant for crafting soulful, slow burn ballads that ache like the sliced-open underbelly of a terminally swollen rain cloud.” –All Music Guide Check Our Catalog
“On his tenth album under the Eels moniker, Mark ‘E’ Everett continues to follow his musical muse wherever it’ll take him with Wonderful, Glorious. After so many records it seems like E would be well past the point of any new firsts, but this is the first album to be recorded in his expansive new [...]