2019 has been all about breakthroughs for established artists, but few that I’ve examined have evolved as much as Leo Harmonay has in his new record Naked Rivers. In songs like “Contour,” Harmonay focuses our attention towards the relationship between his smoky vocal and the tense melodic backdrop created by a fleeting guitar part’s yearning. Other […]
Numbers, letters, some carefree dancing and a few sock puppets are thrown into a singular melting pot of melody and marvelous grooves in the music video for Jeremy Rice’s new song “Arriianne,” but for as eclectic a collection of imagery as it is, this is one video that appeals more to conventional pop standards than […]
Paul Jacks first emerged in the music world as a front man and songwriter for Alaska’s Smile Ease in 2004 following a low profile solo single released the previous year. The song “Cowboys and Indians” attracted the attention of like-minded songwriter friends in the Anchorage, Alaska area and led to the band’s first incarnation. They […]
Nocturnal Blonde dispense a colorful, albeit confessional, opus in their debut album Still Gushing, a record that is both a twelve-song tribute to the life of Dave Williams and a chilling look into addiction that is unlike any other that I’ve heard in recent memory. Produced with a divinely evenhanded approach to melodicism, Still Gushing’s most formidable […]
A studded groove adorned with a rich vocal melody strikes Allocai’s “Be My Main” to life with a subtle chill-factor that goes unmatched this summer in both the underground and the mainstream. We follow the searing serenade through a whirlpool of harmonies that surge passionately beneath an atmospheric instrumentation strong enough to snuff out even […]
Progressive music is having one heck of a year because of the incredible work of artists like alternative pop/rockers the Sharon Lia Band, whose new single “Why Can’t We Pretend?” is being hailed as a watershed moment for the group ahead of their release of a brand new album in Beyond Wonderland. In “Why Can’t We […]
Mutlu’s musical journey has included a long standing collaboration with singer/songwriter Amos Lee and sharing the same stages as marquee performers like Joe Jackson, Shuggie Otis, Katy Perry, Todd Rundgren, and the Blind Boys of Alabama among many others. It’s the seven songs on his new album Good Trouble bringing us here today, however, and the first […]
The Merrymaker’s Orchestrina fire off some decadent rhythm in “Have Mercy on Me,” a throttling wallop of riffage in “Anarchy (Reloaded)” and some supple swing in “Imaginary Friend.” They experiment with the depth of their acoustic/electric skillset in the freeform “Thinking About You,” spellbind us with their exotic influences in “Space Robot” and throw a […]
With a burly, blues-driven swing, Michael A. Coker’s Story Book Road lays into “It Don’t Mean Nothin,” one of the cornerstone tracks of their 2018 extended play, The Window of Your Soul, and while the countrified vocal harmonies are quite spellbinding in this rough-edged jam, they’re not nearly as dominant a force as the lightly overdriven […]
There’s a palpable melancholic atmosphere pervading the first minute plus of Rob Alexander’s “When I’m Gone (For George Michael)” and a spartan musical vision eschewing frills in favor of establishing an unshakable connection with listeners. The initial bare bones musical approach, relying on nothing but simple and straight forward piano coupled with Alexander’s rough hewn […]