MusicViews

I could imagine Emmylou Harris recording any of their songs -- “Forgive Me,” “Hard Time”, “Night Falls”, “Pink Peonies”. Sheila’s songs are passionate and insightful and she conveys them with a voice full of power and emotion. I thought I knew where the melody of a song was headed and then it went somewhere else. more

Meteora is a gem of a folk trio, comprised of Will Brown, Jim Loney and Kat Logan. Right off the bat, their main asset is their excellent voices. From the first note of their first song, “Little Brown Bird”,... their three-part harmony moved me to tears. more

He delivered song after song in tight arrangements with an interesting relay going on between alternating drummers Seth Kearns and Charles C. Gagne, and alternating backup singers, Amanda Gervasi, Monique Barrett, Megan Jo Wilson and Sara Hallie Richardson. more

He piqued my interest when he said that during a period of writer’s block, he found an old book of poetry and decided to set some poems to music. more

She seemed at home on the stage, comfortable in her own skin, precise and practiced on the guitar and possessed a voice that can’t be pigeon-holed. more

The Caravan of Thieves blasted off with “I’m Gonna Eat Ya” (which they could have written for Deborah Harry) and “Love Made a Monster Out of Me”. Then we were swimming in the Talking Heads’, “Psycho Killer”. Adorable lead guy, Fuzz, flirted and cajoled the audience into hissing like snakes and snapping our fingers. Soon, we were all a-snakin’ and a-snappin’! more

The music was entrancing, particularly a piece named for the mountain for which it was written, Bai-Taiga. That composition was orchestral in depth and breadth, taking us beyond time and space and nearly inducing us into a shamanic journey. more

I was swept away from the first note and heard myself let out a big sigh after the first song. The tension was leaving me and I was all ears and heart, awaiting the onslaught of more beauty. more

Those low notes held me captive and fascinated. I wanted to lie down on them -- they made me think of a soft bed. I realized that as a singer, she catches my attention and helps me hear things on more than one level. more

An overview of the MusicViews column and a note about submissions. more

We decided to attend based on a few seconds we’d seen of a video in which they were joyously and rhythmically pounding on a wooden trunk, garbage cans and other objects on stage. more

Allison Russell and Awna Texiera are like enchanted panpipes -- the music flows through them like fiber optic cables. Their faces are beautiful and luminous when they sing... more

Mulvey’s musical teeth were cut while playing for years in the Boston subway. He seems totally at home on stage and has that sort of vital male energy that emanates like sunshine, the way fit muscles burn calories at rest. more

Folksingers express the plight of the common people. Jim McGrath absolutely comes from that tradition, working in the New England music scene for over four decades. He wrote nine of the twelve songs on this album. more

Halfway through the song, the time signature changes and takes off in a kind of “After Midnight” direction, ala Eric Clapton, (when he played with Delaney and Bonnie and Friends). This song has the potential to be lots of fun performed live, replete with improvisation and jamming. more

What really blows me away about musicians such as Glen Velez and Lori Cotler (and Inanna, which opened for them) is that they are tapping into fundamental places within human beings when they perform. The first drum rhythm we hear is the heartbeat of our mother. more

I was enthralled from the first moment. I was excited to see educated looking, mid-life white women, (my demigraphic!), playing complex drum rhythms, singing like angels and dancing like them too, all with generosity and joy. more

Charming head vocalist, Timmy Findlen, whose voice recalls Rudy Vallee or Al Jolson, hammed it up wearing a porkpie hat while strumming a ukulele and mini-banjo. He also inspired shock and awe in the audience as he coaxed out the haunting melody of “Shine on Harvest Moon”, from the singing saw. more

Lilianne is a tall slim, silver haired woman, with a relaxed and humorous air and a seemingly effortless ability with a melody. Her voice is in the class of Judy Collins, very full and powerful. Don had a very warm spirit and the guitar proficiency of Richard Thompson. more