// Category Archive for: Music Reviews

Music Review: The Edge of Daybreak, Eyes of Love

By Tyler Hodg

The apocryphal story of The Edge of Daybreak’s 1979 album, Eyes of Love, is one worth telling. Recorded in a Virginia penitentiary, the band was comprised of inmates—who committed crimes ranging from assault to armed robbery—all with a common love for soul music. The tapes were shipped out to a local record company who released the music to those on the outside. Eyes of Love wasn’t a massive success by any means, but its mythological presence is intriguing nonetheless. Thanks to a re-release, The Edge of Daybreak’s music lives on.

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Music Review: The Warden, The Warden

By Melissa Bratcher

You know those nights? The kind where someone ends up in jail, someone goes to the ER, and maybe you wake up the next morning with a whole bunch of bruises and a suspicious tattoo and why are your shoes so muddy and exactly what is that smell? The self-titled debut album from The Warden is the aural equivalent of that.

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Music Review: Raging Fire, Everything Is Roses 1985-1989

By Melissa Bratcher

There’s a line in Bruce McDonald’s Hard Core Logo in which Pipefitter, drummer savant says, (and I’m paraphrasing wildly here) “No one ever writes checks to the bands who influenced them.” Upon listening to Everything Is Roses 1985-1989, an anthology of Nashville’s Raging Fire, it seems like a whole lot of bands should have written some checks. The music of Raging Fire sounds familiar (though I’d not heard them) because so many bands aped their style. Strong front women with their own eclectic voices owe a debt to Melora Zaner. She doesn’t have a bombastic voice, but she makes you listen because of her nuance and passion. Without Raging Fire, a whole slew of bands wouldn’t exist.

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New Music for Halloween Parties

By Jeffery X Martin

Are you a discerning celebrator of Samhain, looking for some different music to terrify and delight your friends with at your next public ritual? Or perhaps, you’re just a happy Halloweener, looking for some bombtracks for the next party. No worries, Fellow Traveler… we’ve got you sussed.

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Music Review: The Chapin Sisters, Today’s Not Yesterday

By Tyler Hodg

The Chapin Sisters harness the sounds and feelings of folk music of the past, all while staying current with their latest release, Today’s Not Yesterday. It’s the follow-up to the duo’s 2013 Everly Brothers cover album (review), and their first album of original material in five years. While their style has remained fairly intact as the years have passed, the production now sounds more crisp than ever before.

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Music Review: Various Artists, All About The Girls

By Melissa Bratcher

Croydon Municipal, as I have mentioned frequently, is an amazing boutique label. An offshoot of Cherry Red Records, Croydon Municipal is run by Saint Etienne’s Bob Stanley, who culls his gargantuan record collection to curate brilliantly themed, thoughtful compilations (like his Popcorn Girls collections, or the current Songs For Swinging Ghosts). On All About The Girls, the theme is lost girl group gems, and it is a delight through and through.

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Music Review: Various Artists, Songs For Swinging Ghosts

By Melissa Bratcher

Attention humans: be prepared for your record collection to become marginally spookier, but a whole lot weirder with the delightful new release from Croydon Municipal/Cherry Red Records (and just in time for Halloween), Songs For Swinging Ghosts.

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Music Review: Blitzen Trapper, All Across This Land

By Melissa Bratcher

There’s something enormously comforting about a new Blitzen Trapper album. They’ve got a certain sonic texture, that coupled with lead singer Eric Earley’s distinctive, weatherbeaten rasp and slice-of-America lyrics, make them easily recognizable and inimitable. While they have experimented with looser, sparse sounds, their latest, All Across This Land, has that classic Blitzen Trapper feel. It rocks, sometimes gently, and the songs are immersive and evocative, conjuring up dusty back roads that stretch for miles, blue collar desperation, and youthful yearning.

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Music Review: Patty Griffin, Servant of Love

By Tyler Hodg

Patty Griffin is a musical treasure. There is no modern poet that can come close to the brilliance that she puts out, and her music stands high above almost everything else. But all that is great has to fall at some point, right? In the case of Patty Griffin, that theory has yet to be proven. Her latest album, Servant of Love, is yet another entry in her fantastic catalogue.

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Music Review: Wand, 1000 Days

By Less Lee Moore

And the paintings are now dead
And they looked into your eyes
And the patterns that they set
They will live inside your mind.
—Wand, “Paintings Are Dead”

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