The Mother Hips‘ve been around long enough and released a helluva ‘nough material that this collection of rarities and demo tapes, Chronicle Man, is gonna be for the band’s ready-converted disciples first and foremost. That being said, I still have my bones to pick with the set, as well as a few highlights of note.… Continue reading The Mother Hips | Chronicle Man | New Music Review
Master magician, Steve Martin performed a neat trick Friday night at Eugene’s Hult Center for the Performing Arts—he twisted a blazing-hot bluegrass band (Steep Canyon Rangers), a “notorious” singer/songwriter (Edie Brickell) and his own show-biz savoir-faire into an entertaining, vaudevillian blend of musicianship and comedy. Martin’s current act evokes a nostalgic, medicine show quality with… Continue reading Steep Canyon Rangers with Steve Martin & Edie Brickell | Review
“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” – Thomas Merton The first album from French Style Furs, “Is Exotic Bait,” is an existential collaboration. Nathan Willett and Matt Maust of Cold War Kids came together with lifelong friend and We Barbarians drummer Nathan Warkentin to document a spontaneous urgency… Continue reading French Style Furs | Is Exotic Bait | Review
There are many faces and aspects of love, and Tennessee singer/songwriter Joseph LeMay hits on many of them on his first full length album, Seventeen Acres. From past or potential love to new love to lasting and exciting love, his songs take you through the emotions of such experiences not only as they relate to… Continue reading Joseph LeMay Communicates Truth, Doubt, Love across Seventeen Acres
Not only is heavy metal rare to see in Boulder, but Sweden’s mysterious and anonymous Ghost is a rarity on the tour circuit in general. What a treat this was! For me, it started almost five years ago when my aptly named friend, Metal Steve from Long Island, NY told me how I have to… Continue reading Ghost in Boulder! Papa is Here…
Representing‘s titular track opens harmlessly enough with pan flutes that could’ve come right out of a fifth grade recorder songbook—off-beat, a few clinks on the cymbals, notes here and there… and then those reverb-laden drums start to build in the fourth bar, the trills become methodical… and we’ve arrived.From here on out, the album can… Continue reading Tribal Seeds | Representing | New Music Review
There’s one thing you can count on from a Gogol Bordello show; you’re going to leave it dripping, either from your sweat, everybody else’s sweat, or with some red wine that frontman Eugene Hutz uses to liberally douse the crowd. You’re also going to leave immensely satisfied at having seen one of the best live… Continue reading Gogol Bordello Punks Out the Boulder Theater
California based Jimmy Pinchak composes in an eclectic style borrowing from Rocking Blues music, combined with an Alt-Rock aesthetic. His lyrics share a black humor/self-deprecating sensibility. He writes of the mundane and the complex, and probably doesn’t understand everything but questions what he already knows. His latest debut CD entitled Make it Better captures the… Continue reading Jimmy Jax Pinchak | Make it Better | New Music Review
The venue’s Velvet Jones, a small-to-medium set in downtown Santa Barbara with Zion-I headlining—my first California show. Born and bred in New England, I had zero idea what I should be expecting from the Friday night gig out here on the western coast. I arrived early to a long line out the door. The crowd… Continue reading Zion-I | Velvet Jones | Santa Barbara, CA | 2/1/14 | Review
Roman is obviously vocalist is an accomplished singer/songwriter. Each style, each song on this CD expresses something a bit different than the other – a complete moment if you will. To me it’s comparable to looking into then suddenly experiencing what it is to be inside a snapshot of time. Some of the snapshots are… Continue reading Ed Roman | Letters From High Latitudes | New Music Review
