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Holiday 2014: A Cantus Christmas
by C. Michael Bailey
Elbowing their way into the male chorus arena from none other than the land of the Norwegian Bachelor Farmers—Minnesota—the nine-voice Cantus squarely challenges San Francisco's Chanticleer for the prize of best traditional Christmas choral release. A frequent performer and favorite of A Prairie Home Companion, Cantus has carved out their rightful place among choral groups. Considered ...
Steven Schoenberg: Christmas Reimagined
by C. Michael Bailey
Categorization is an anti-entropic effort to describe similar, but not equal, things for comparative reasons. So was my thinking when I began my review of pianist Steven Schoenberg's recording Steven Schoenberg Live: An Improvisational Journey (Quabbin Records, 2009) with: “Like the face of Helen launching a thousand ships, for better or worse, Keith ...
The Led Zeppelin Papers: Led Zeppelin IV, Deluxe Edition
by C. Michael Bailey
Led Zeppelin Led Zepplin IV, Deluxe Edition (Atlantic Records) 1971/2014 “It might seem a bit incongruous to say that Led Zeppelin--a band never particularly known for its tendency to understate matters--has produced an album which is remarkable for its low-keyed and tasteful subtlety, but that's just the case here. The ...
The Led Zeppelin Papers: Houses of the Holy, Deluxe Edition
by C. Michael Bailey
Led Zeppelin Houses of the Holy, Deluxe Edition (Atlantic Records) 1973/2014 “For me, Led Zeppelin began as the epitome of everything good about rock: solid guitar work, forceful vocals and rhythmic backing, devotion to primal blues forms, and most of all, thunderous excitement on stage and vinyl. But as superstardom came ...
Low Society: You Can’t Keep a Good Woman Down
by C. Michael Bailey
Let's not insult Low Society lead vocalist Mandy Lemons by noting she was influenced by Janis Joplin. That is the lazy critic's out. Better we describe her as the love child of a serious Amy Winehouse and Big Mama Thornton, irradiated by beta particles that had once passed by an AM radio, late at night, playing ...
George Taylor: TroubleTown
by C. Michael Bailey
On George Taylor's second recording, Rain or Shine (Self Produced, 2014), the guitarist looked oddly like a square accountant. On his first recording, TroubleTown he looks like Texas surfer cleaned up in a blue blazer. On both recordings, Taylor plays some of the freshest throw-back Americana being played. Touted as a “Blues musician," and, while he ...
Rory Gallagher - Irish Tour ’74, the 40th Anniversary Deluxe Box Set
by C. Michael Bailey
In the end, music is a personal soundtrack to one's life. It is tied to a specific time and place, circumstances and memories that are so tightly integrated in one's experience that having memory with no music cannot even be imagined, much less considered. In the summer of 1974, I went from Little Rock to Chicago ...
Nancy Kelly: B That Way
by C. Michael Bailey
Vocalist Nancy Kelly is one of those artists one can always count on for producing muscular and assertive jazz. On B That Way, Kelly is supported by an organ-guitar trio featuring tenor saxophone. Such a format affords an expanse of sound from the intimacy of a piano trio to the full-throated roar of a big band. ...
Jon Mayer: The Art of the Ballad
by C. Michael Bailey
Jon Mayer not John Mayer. This particular Mayer is a jazz pianist currently living on the West Coast who has been plying his Jazz trade in one form or another since the mid-1950s. Early on, Mayer played on two notable sessions: alto saxophonist Jackie McLean's Strange Blues (Prestige, 1957) and on the John Coltrane sessions recorded ...
Linda Cole and Joshua Bowlus: What a Wonderful World
by C. Michael Bailey
Yes...that Cole Family. The same talent pool that gave us Nat King Cole and Freddy Cole has also given us Linda Cole (a daughter of the brothers Cole's cousin). Linda Cole teams with pianist/arranger Joshua Bowlus and his quartet for a breezy stroll through 13 pieces from the Cole Family songbook and beyond. Globally, Bowlus supplies ...
