It took until 2003 for The Blind Boys Of Alabama to release a Christmas album, but the wait was worth it. Now, Omnivore is reissuing Go Tell It On The Mountain with bonus material (as they do and do so well) in time for your holiday playlist, and it is a welcome addition.
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Though it was made in 2006, New Orleans Music In Exile, is finally getting a Blu-ray release. The film, made by famed music documentarian Robert Mugge (Last Of The Mississippi Jukes, Gospel According To Al Green, The Kingdom Of Zydeco, among a great many), was shot in the rather immediate aftermath of Hurricane Katrina: two months later. Mugge and his crew had open access to a who’s who of New Orleans musicians and luminaries as they try to pick of the pieces of their lives and careers.
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Matt Tarka is a DC-based indie pop time warp. On his EP, Surely Late, he evokes the hazy, early days of college radio (remember that? What do they even call that now?) with powerful melodies, a bit of sugary sweetness, and a delightful propulsiveness that belies the heartache that provides the lyrical matter. It’s a four-song chunk of solid songwriting and catchiness, and an interesting introduction.
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What happens when you take sugary Teen Beat harmonies, marry them to chunky guitar tones, and then throw in grownup lyrics? You get a timeless power pop treasure that instantly feels like a classic. On their second album, Conrad, Detroit band The Legal Matters have crafted songs of love and loss and wrapped them in sunny sweet melodies with just the right amount of ache.
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We live in wondrous times. Tim Buckley has been gone since 1975, and yet, here we are in 2016, with never before released Tim Buckley material coming from Light In The Attic Records on October 21. How is it possible?
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Kadhja Bonet’s debut, The Visitor, is timeless and otherworldly; pulling the lucky listener into a spacey, jazzy world of poetic lyrics and Bonet’s stunner of a voice. It’s a bit psychedelic, it’s definitely jazz influenced, and it’s a cinematic type of soul that no one else is making.
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As the front man of Spandau Ballet, Tony Hadley was the purveyor of slick, soulful songs. His rich voice was perfect for their tracks of intrigue, drama, and yearning love. And, as Tony Hadley’s The Christmas Album shows, he’s still soulful and slick.
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The Flat Five’s debut album, It’s A World Of Love And Hope, is perfect antidote to the weird awfulness of 2016. Full of exquisite, goosebump-inducing harmonies and ear-worm melodies, it’s a vacation on vinyl (or digitally, as you do). The songs lull you with prettiness and then… you listen to the dryly hilarious lyrics. It’s the perfect marriage of those two factors and endlessly relistenable.
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The last time we checked in with Shovels & Rope, they had released Busted Jukebox Vol. 1, a collection of covers and collaborations. That was in 2015. Now, they have followed up with Little Seeds, an intimate, confessional return to form. It’s breathtaking in its honesty, chronicling some life-altering events in Cary Ann Hearst and Michael Trent’s lives.
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I’m going to admit this right off the bat: there were a few times in listening to Julia Jacklin’s fascinating debut, Don’t Let The Kids Win, that I couldn’t quite make out what she was saying. On the opening track, “Pool Party,” I was drawn to the languid retro feel, a slow dreamy sway of a song, and the unusual timbre to Jacklin’s voice. I just had no idea what the lyrics were (and to me, as a reviewer, lyrics are important). But it didn’t actually matter, because the feelings are evident; there is a heaviness, a sadness that runs through the Americana-esque song.
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