You’d think Hollywood was situated at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains from hearing Rose’s Pawn Shop’s finger-pickin’-good new album. “Gravity Well” races along to the steady heartbeat of American traditional music, a little less dress-up than much of the folk that’s been tailored for mainstream pop tastes but no less emotional and catchy. […]
Canadian folk singer-songwriter Basia Bulat returns to the States in support of yet another album that made the Polaris Music Prize shortlist. “Tall Tall Shadow” is the chanteuse’s third studio album and the second to be nominated as one of Canada’s top 10 albums of the year (with 2008’s debut “Oh, My Darling” being the […]
Sometimes you want clarity, but all you get is “Opaque.” Scott Fleishman’s new video for the song from the L.A. duo Smoke Season is dripping with mystery, all liquid and languid and smoke-and-mirrors as siren Gabrielle Wortman laments the lack of a real connection in the chorus of “You ain’t gettin’ me.” Smoke Season, Wortman’s […]
Brother-sister duo The Belle Brigade know how to rev things up at a live show, whether they are playing in touring bands for Jenny Lewis and Ray LaMontagne or showing their own chops together with songs from their sophomore album “Just Because.” Siblings Barbara and Ethan Gruska also know how to write a swooping ballad. […]
Western Scene always had a diverse sound palette. From heavy guitar rock to folk to pop, Tom Pritchard and band co-founder Jason Burkhart knew how to entertain and maintain a listener’s attention for at least three and a half minutes no matter what genre they chose. Following up last year’s single “Same As You,” Western […]
Noah Lit’s first outing fronting Noah and the MegaFauna was 2012’s “Anthems for Stateless Nation,” a gobsmacking collision of gypsy jazz, world music and fun-house orchestration that, between him and his nine bandmates, seemingly left no instrument untouched. It was as if the co-perpetrator of onetime indie-rock sophisticates Oliver Future had something to prove – […]
Toronto four-piece PUP is a welcome throwback to punk aggression, sing-along choruses and bands with a healthy dose of attitude. They played around their home city as Topanga, named for the character in “Boy Meets World” until Disney decided to reboot the franchise, making their use of the name dicey. No matter. “Disney has swallowed […]
Sullen Ray is not very downcast at all. In fact, it’s not even Ray. No, Sullen Ray is the musical vehicle for singer-songwriter-guitarist Seth Eubanks, now joined by singer-songwriter Dee Clement after previously working with a rotating cast of collaborators. Their new single “Without Out” offers a cinematic slice of atmospheric guitar pop – imagine, here, […]
Exactly as its title suggests, “10,000 Emerald Pools” is a pretty song, really pretty. And it’s the rare pretty pop song these days that doesn’t assault your senses with synthesizers; instead, this one relies on a simple insistent bass line, simply perfect guitar chords and the vocals of Garrett Borns, whose gender-unspecific falsetto is pretty […]
Los Angeles’ Mia Doi Todd has built a vast catalog of art-folk characterized by poetic lyricism, a healthy disregard for genre boundaries, a refined vocal styling and, overall, an intimacy that can only be regarded as fearless. For her 10th album, she tackled the broad topic of nature in the balletic language of Portuguese, covering […]
