Sade, “Soldier of Love” – Like a long-ago lover not quite forgotten, Sade has returned to steal our hearts with more beautiful, uncategorizable music.
It’s been 10 years since her last album, a fatal hiatus for almost any other artist, but just another hibernation for a woman whose disdain for fame only deepens our fascination. Sade’s voice sounds unchanged, a unique emotional instrument that conjures visions of rain-streaked
On January 27, I had the pleasure of attending the taping of Norah Jones’ performance for an upcoming installment of the PBS music series, “Soundstage.” Even on a bitter cold and blustery New York evening, it was well worth my trip from Harlem to DUMBO’s St. Ann’s Warehouse, not only for the entertainment, but also for what would probably be my last chance (for a while, at least) to experience one of the most beautiful sights in the city - the view of the Brooklyn Bridge and lower Manhattan (more…)
The Clipse, “Til the Casket Drops” (Columbia)
The rap duo that brought you the 2002 trunk-thump anthem “Grindin’” has been doing a bit of that themselves since then, toiling in record label delays until finally getting around to their third album “Til the Casket Drops.”
So is The Clipse back in full swing? Yes, and no.
There are a couple of radio-ready songs here worth putting on repeat. “I’m Good,” the first
“Gentlemen Broncos” is a comedy so weird, so off, so simply wrong that even freakish hero Napoleon Dynamite would have a hard time lending it his catch word, “Sweet.”
That it comes from the makers of “Napoleon Dynamite” is just sad. Not that “Napoleon Dynamite” is anything more than a sturdy cult favorite, but when that little ode to outsiders became an indie hit in 2004, it did seem a signal of fresh talent with an agreeably askew outlook to challenge the mainstream.
Rod Stewart, “Soulbook” (J Records)
Rod Stewart reinvented himself in the new millennium by exercising his distinctly soulful pipes on classic standards with his “Great American Songbook” collection. Now he returns to his soul roots on “Soulbook,” a thirteen-song collection that represents the soul sounds of Philadelphia, Memphis, and Motown.
Stewart kicks things off with a dramatic rendition of the Four Tops classic, “It’s
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The “reinvention” of the 1980 high school musical “Fame” — please, people, don’t call it a remake — stays faithful to the spirit and structure of Alan Parker’s original while sucking out all the raciness.
There’s no nudity in this PG-rated version, no one gets an abortion. No one even lights a single cigarette. So no, it’s not exactly the most realistic depiction of modern high-school life.
But at the same time, dancer and choreographer (more…)
Like Britney Spears before her, Demi Lovato pretty much admits in the title of her sophomore album that she’s serving up more of the same the second time around, but unlike Britney, that may not have been Demi’s intention.
For Here We Go Again, Lovato makes a relatively clean break from the Jonas Brothers, who penned much of her debut, Don’t Forget, drafting sensitive AAA singer/songwriters Jon McLaughlin and John Mayer presumably to give Lovato a bit of mature veneer, a subtle (more…)
The collaboration between Method Man and Redman on the 1999 album “Blackout!” was so enjoyable that it raised the bar for any future projects between the humorous pair.
But ten years later, the duo fails to live up to expectations on “Blackout! 2.”
The new CD mainly falls short because of its length - it’s overloaded with 17 tracks. The CD just seems to run too long, boring listeners with redundant lyrics and weak skits.
Where it does stir excitement are
The curse of Bob Dylan’s bootleg series is that you might start thinking of his official releases as first drafts.
Dylan has been on a roll this past decade, staring mortality in the face and wringing memorable music from it. The “Tell Tale Signs” disc of outtakes and reimaginings proved just how sturdy the work is. It also contributes to making “Together Through Life” a letdown.
This is a batch of mostly pedestrian compositions in a bluesy style, with Los Lobos’
On the title track of U2’s latest album, “No Line On The Horizon,” frontman Bono sings “Every night I have the same dream/I’m hatching some plot, scheming some scheme.”
The Irish rockers’ 12th studio album reflects some heavy scheming on the part of the band, and its longtime producers, to mine wider sonic territory that the band has explored since the 1990s. The result is an album that feels more compelling in sound and less strident in message than U2’s previous two efforts
