Archive Search Results
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Critic's Choice
Martin Sexton
Saturday, April 17, at the Beaumont Club.
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: April 15, 2004
There's folky, and then there's Martin Sexton, who, unlike most solo, acoustic-playing honkies, isn't hamstrung by notions of ascetic purity. Sure, he's plenty sensitive, but...
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Hear & Now
James McMurtry and the Heartless Bastards
Live in Aught-Three (Compadre)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: April 1, 2004
McMurtry's dispatches from the world where the Wal-Marts meet the meth labs have never gone down easy. He's a hell of a writer, but he sings the way Ashcroft probably hides the...
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Critic's Choice
Brant Bjork and the Brothers
Wednesday, March 24, at the Hurricane.
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: March 18, 2004
Former Kyuss drummer Brant Bjork is kind of a dilettante, but at least he's dedicated to it: He left Queens of the Stone Age to continue doing his own thing, which includes ax...
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Hear & Now
Flatlanders
Wheels of Fortune (New West Records)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: March 18, 2004
Early pressings of this album, the latest attempt to determine just what the hell the Flatlanders are, come packaged with bonus live tracks from 1972 -- right about the time...
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Hear & Now
The Casual Dots
The Casual Dots (Kill Rock Stars)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: March 11, 2004
It's early, but I'm nominating this album as 2004's feel-bad dorm-sex debut. The Dots come on hot and heavy, sounding just like what you'd expect from a no-bass garage trio...
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Hear & Now
Greg Trooper / Reckless Kelly
Floating/ Under the Table & Above the Sun (Sugar Hill)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: February 26, 2004
Your niche might be my rut, so when I report that neither of these discs clangs my bells, I don't mean to dissuade those inclined toward this strain of coffeehouse country....
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Hear & Now
Al Green
I Can't Stop (Blue Note)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: February 19, 2004
The title's a misnomer. The once-prolific hero trickles instead of floods these days, and his insistence that he is compelled toward the godless songcraft that made him a star...
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Hear & Now
The Down Trunks
Rock Unincorporated (Independent)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: February 12, 2004
Yeah, the name's a spoonerism of town drunks. But we can forgive that. The music hits a pleasant, boozy stumble now and then, but these KC boys aren't nearly as sloppy or as...
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Hear & Now
Dolly Parton
The Ultimate Dolly Parton (RCA Nashville)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: January 15, 2004
Here she comes again, that friend you love whom the world loves, too. But the world loves the her she became, not the her from way back when, and it's heartbreaking, in a way,...
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Hear & Now
J-Live
Always Has Been/Always Will Be (Fatbeats)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: January 8, 2004
Fourteen tracks split over two discs and sold separately at ten bucks a pop is a far cry from the overstuffed generosity of J-Live's The Best Part and All of the Above. But...
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Hear & Now
Avant
Private Room (Geffen)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: December 25, 2003
Avant's mission: to boldly plow ladies like nobody's plowed them before. His MO: 62 minutes of slow-burn come-on. At first spin, it's indistinguishable from any other...
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Interview
Secret Santanas
Holidazed and confused? Consider this your stairway to shopping heaven.
By Robert Bishop, Ray Cummings, Nathan Dinsdale, Geoff Harkness, Gina Kaufmann, Ali Ryan and Alan Scherstuhl
Published: December 18, 2003
OK, Nancy. It's less than a week until D day, and you still haven't twitched a butt muscle to find the perfect gift for Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanza or [INSERT YOUR HOLIDAY...
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Critic's Choice
Thank God for Astronauts
Thursday, December 18, at the Bottleneck.
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: December 18, 2003
Yeah, it's indie, it has a cute name and its guitars chime more than they crunch. And the group shares a hometown with Dressy Bessy and Apples in Stereo. But being pop --...
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Hear & Now
ZZ Top
Mescalero (RCA)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 27, 2003
ZZ Top fans have called Mescalero a return to form after 1999's dire XXX. But what else could it be, really, when form is all the Top has ever had? The same pounding...
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Critic's Choice
Ted Leo and the Pharmacists
Sunday, November 23, at the Bottleneck.
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 20, 2003
Lord, this boy's good. Ted Leo's quick, muscular guitar-pop is just the kind of rock-saving sound my younger self used to believe was bound to be huge any day now. It isn't, of...
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Hear & Now
Various Artists
Box of the Blues (Rounder)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 13, 2003
Unburdened by affiliation with PBS or Martin Scorsese or any fussy authoritativeness, this four-disc comp featuring a variety of Rounder artists is breezy fun and almost...
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Critic's Choice
Grand Champeen
Wednesday, November 12, at Davey's Uptown, and Friday, November 14 at Replay Lounge.
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 6, 2003
Kids today don't know it, but there was a time when Soul Asylum wasn't a synonym for Tom Petty. When Paul Westerberg plugged in and it mattered. When rock bashed out by...
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Hear & Now
Steve Earle
Just an American Boy: The Audio Documentary (Artemis)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 6, 2003
Songs you like played slower. And that's when you're lucky. For the first half-hour, it's songs you half-recall from Jerusalem, ground through with all the urgent fire your...
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Hear & Now
Jimmy Fortune
When One Door Closes (Audium)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: November 6, 2003
What has Jimmy Fortune, the former Statler Brother responsible for "Elizabeth" and "More Than a Name on a Wall," been up to since the Statlers retired in 1999? Why, rerecording...
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Hear & Now
Joss Stone
The Soul Sessions (S-Curve)
By Alan Scherstuhl
Published: October 23, 2003
The question isn't whether this works. It doesn't. There's promise, and the band is good, but the feel is NPR at the Apollo, and Stone's showy, half-trained vocals are pumped...
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