Released partly to celebrate International Women’s Day, a holiday recognized by the United Nations, these eleven unplugged tunes from as many female singers make wonderfully varied and pleasurable listening. And the performers’ backgrounds are equally fascinating. Some are comparatively well-known; Sandrine Kiberlain is a French movie star while The Wailin’ Jennys, from Canada, have […]
Save the Music, the VH1 foundation dedicated to promoting music education in the nation’s public schools, is celebrating its 10th anniversary with a concert featuring
John Mayer — and 50 of the students the organization has helped over the past decade.
The concert, scheduled for Sept. 20 at Lincoln Center, will also include Project Runway’s Tim Gunn […]
Romancing is Musiq Soulchild’s game, so it’s refreshing that a label shift (Def Jam to Atlantic) hasn’t changed his ways. Instead, the soul singer’s fourth effort, “Luvanmusiq,” offers more gentlemanly tunes, served sunny side up. Sampling the ’80s dance hit “Heartbeat,” the trumpet-blaring lead single “B.U.D.D.Y.” endorses platonic friendship over romance. The remaining tracks […]
Manic yet charming, relentless yet affable, this Glasgow, Scotland, trio creates its own little universe on “Costello Music,” released last fall in the United Kingdom. Jon, Mince and Barry Fratelli are brothers like the Ramones were — in other words, not really. Jon delivers their entertaining inside jokes in the free-flowing narrative style of […]
Sarcasm is the calling card of James Murphy’s music as LCD Soundsystem, even when his disco beats are speaking for themselves. The rhythms work on the level of pure dance music but also carry air quotes, looking backward to their first meetings with buzzing guitars and art-school attitude in the ’70s and ’80s. The […]
Seven years after the five-sibling McClurkin Project’s self-titled debut became a springboard to solo stardom for Donnie McClurkin, the now-famous brother reunites with his four gifted sisters for a project of genuinely classic proportions. Brother Donnie’s influence is still pronounced and profound — as co-producer, writer of seven of the 13 songs and lead […]
Historically the piano has been shut out of a bluegrass setting, dominated by stringed instrumentation as befitting its Appalachian mountain roots. But that hasn’t stopped Hornsby from collaborating with country wiz Skaggs on a delightful self-titled CD. Highlights include a toe-tapping jaunt through “Across the Rocky Mountains” and even a rippling cover of Rick […]
This is the third album from this Tamashek group and, in terms of production values, its strongest disc. Producer Justin Adams, who produced Tinariwen’s 2006 album, “Amassakoul,” returned to helm this project. The sound remains as sparse as the desert that fostered these musicians, but there’s a weight and clarity to the mix that […]
If Stone was a whiz-kid prodigy on her first two albums, “Introducing” brings us the 19-year-old Brit as a confident vocalist demanding some R-E-S-P-E-C-T. She makes that reference directly on “Headturner,” a sassy, muscular head of steam with a big beat and a Prince-style swagger. Elsewhere, Stone channels the Supremes (”Girl They Won’t Believe […]
As if these three luminaries joining forces for the first time to record a two-disc set of classic songs weren’t enough, producer Fred Foster is also onboard. Legendary musicians Buddy Emmons, Boots Randolph, Johnny Gimble and the Jordanaires also add their exceptional talents. Likewise, Vince Gill — with Price on “Heartaches by the Number” […]
The first half of “Living With the Living” offers well more of everything that’s made Leo and his Pharmacists such post-punk studs: melody-kissed stomp (the hand-clappy, torrential “The Sons of Cain”), unabashed melody (”La Costa Brava”), more Clash (”Who Do You Love?”) and especially more cynical rage (the satisfyingly unsubtle “Bomb. Repeat. Bomb.”). The […]
For all his earned stripes (roughly 15 years in the music biz), ex-boy band heartthrob Marques Houston has yet to advance beyond the R&B Everyman archetype to become a real trendsetter. With no narrative thread, his third solo work, “Veteran,” gets muddled in sentimentalism. On the Bryan-Michael Cox production “Circle,” the love-as-karma theme is […]
