Tag Archives: Singer-Songwriter

The Hobart Brothers & Lil’ Sis Hobart: At Least We Have Each Other

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A musical family that grew up in separate homes

The Hobart Brothers & Lil’ Sis Hobart bring together three respected soloists from the Americana scene: Jon Dee Graham, Freedy Johnson and Susan Cowsill. The latter had a large helping of mainstream fame in the 1960s with her family’s group, The Cowsills, but since the 1980s she’s made a name for herself a backing vocalist, a charter member of the Continental Drifters and with a low-key solo career over the past decade. Graham’s first notoriety came with the Skunks and the True Believers, and after years collaborating with others (and briefly dropping out of the industry), he began a solo career with 1999’s exceptional Escape from Monster Island. Johnston began his career as a singer-songwriter in the early ‘90s, starting with rootsy sounds that quickly took in more country flavor.

What’s obvious from the album’s very first track, is that the three musicians’ individual paths led them to a place of tight collaboration. Johnston’s indie roots, Graham’s driving rock and bohemian growl, Cowsill’s hook-filled pop, and all three’s immersion in country, blues and folk, come together easily, as if they’d been a group for years. Those fictional years as a family are turned concrete by the shared experiences brought to their songwriting, populating their lyrics with images from blue roads and bluer hearts. Graham’s “All Things Being Equal” reaches outside his personal experience for a harrowing portrait of a failed cotton market, but his “Almost Dinnertime” and Cowsill’s “Sodapoptree” offer gentler notes of warm nostalgia.

The trio’s music is as diverse as their collected experience, including swampy Americana, Mexicali ballads, quirky power-pop and electric folk-rock. The album’s ten tracks are split between seven recorded as a full band (and funded by a Kickstarter campaign) and three demos recorded previously without a drummer; a separate digital download adds nine more demos. You can hear from the demo sessions that the principals’ mutual affinity was immediate, a gathering of like souls who’d been practicing to play together throughout their independent musical lives. [©2012 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Ballad of Sis (Didn’t I Love You)
The Hobart Brothers’ Home Page
The Hobart Corporation’s Home Page (Check out the HL662!)

John Amadon: Seven Stars

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Exquisitely crafted singer-songwriter power pop

Portland singer-songwriter John Amadon is something of a studio rat, holing up to write and record original compositions until they shine with craft. It’s not the airless sound of modern recording, but the earthy, sharp-in-just-the-right-places acoustics you’d associate with Big Star’s first two records at Ardent. The guitars have a pluckiness that brings listeners into the studio – like the acoustic picking that opens Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here.” The mood harkens back to the late ‘60s and early ‘70s era of power pop; you can hear strains of Badfinger’s melancholy, Alex Chilton’s falsetto (check out the first few notes of “All Patched Up”), CS&N’s harmonies, and the whole of Elliot Smith’s folk-pop.

Amadon has explained that several of the album’s songs are rooted in a one-sided obsession. Most directly he’s written “Let’s Walk Without Talking” about the object of his unfounded desire, and “Bitter Prayers” couches a not-wholly-convincing apology in a wistful melody and vocal whose protestations might be a stalker’s elocution to his prey. The songs are inner monologues itching to be spoken, uncertain self-appraisals whose outside awareness is askew. The album’s lone instrumental is appropriately entitled “Xanax,” as its mood perches between anxiety and medicated calm.

The album plays as an intense day-dream, filled with wanderings sparked by the barest of incidents. Amadon imagines a relationship with someone he’s never actually met, investing her with details that he seems to realize are false. Even without knowing the album’s premise, the affection in these songs is too claustrophobic to read as standard love song fare, and when Amadon sings “I won’t make light of the insight, you’re beyond knowing,” it’s more of an admission than an existential observation. This is a finely produced album whose sound would stop you in your tracks at a hi-fi shop; the lyrics will subsequently transfix you with their haunted imagination. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Let’s Walk Without Talking
MP3 | All Patched Up
Stream Seven Stars on Bandcamp

Apex Manor: The Year of Magical Drinking

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A power-pop singer/songwriter recovers from a not-so-magical year

There’s something exciting happening in Los Angeles; singer/songwriters like Bleu and Adam Marsland are breaking out once again, but instead of rolling down from the communal experience of the canyon, they’re holing up in homes and hobby studios. Such was the inspiration for former Broken West guitarist/vocalist Ross Flournoy, whose relocation to Pasadena after a band breakup severed his daily musical connection, and left him casting about for direction. Amid writer’s block and a daily beer habit, his lifesaver was an NPR song competition that afforded only a weekend to write, record and submit a song. The external pressure turned out to be just what he needed, documenting his denial, admission, inventory, acceptance and recovery as a songwriter in “Under the Gun.” With one under his belt, dozens more tumbled forth, some written alone, some with Adam Vine.

Apex Minor on record – Flournoy and former bandmate Brian Whelan, along with help from Andy Creighton, Derek Brown, Rob Douglass and Dan Iead – is reminiscent of Broken West, similarly propulsive and tuneful, but warmer and looser. The album begins at Flournoy’s nadir, looking up from the bottom of a half-drunk mason jar in “Southern Decline.” Producer Dan Long layers on buzzing rhythm guitars, demonstrating just how deeply Flournoy was buried in depression. His salvation as a songwriter leads to emotional re-emergence, self-awareness and on “I Know These Waters Well,” the twelfth-step desire to pass along new found wisdom. The album alternates rave-ups and soulful ballads, with Flournoy’s voice particularly expressive on the latter. Despite the detour, Apex Manor marks a terrific new phase, predicted by the Broken West, but ignited by a fresh start. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Under the Gun
Apex Manor’s Home Page
Apex Manor’s MySpace Page

Brian McKenzie: Resolution

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Country-rock singer-songwriter with a ‘70s vibe

One time metal guitarist (with the group Kilgore/Smudge) Brian McKenzie was drawn to singer/songwriter roots music as a mental escape from tours “packed like damned sardines in a cargo van.” He transitioned from electric guitar to acoustic relocated from Rhode Island to Nashville for a couple years, and honed his songwriting with the city’s pros. Now returned to the Ocean State, he’s cut this 7-song release. Judging by the retro country rock of the first two tracks McKenzie seems to have been listening to some classic B.J. Thomas sides, along with radio hits from one-time stars like Gallery, Lobo and the Stampeders. The productions are modern, but the melodies and harmonies sport a terrific ‘70s vibe. The remaining tracks are solid, hinting at Chris Isaak’s romantic croon and the thoughtful style of Gordon Lightfoot. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

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Marc Cohn: Listening Booth- 1970

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Singer-songwriter covers influential singer-songwriters’ songs

Contemporary singer-songwriter Marc Cohn offers up an interesting concept album constructed from a dozen covers. The theme is an exploration of a year in which singer-songwriters really took flight, and music first hooked Cohn’s soul. As he points out, it was also a year in which both singles and albums flourished commercially, with the latter creating space in which the former could play a bit longer and dig a bit deeper. His selections cover singer-songwriters Cat Stevens (“Wild World”) and Van Morrison (“Into the Mystic), singer-songwriters who used bands as their vehicle, including Pete Ham (“Baby Blue”), John Fogerty (“Long as I Can See the Light”),  and David Gates (“Make It With You”), and singer-songwriters who found solo voices after departing famous groups, including Paul McCartney (“Maybe I’m Amazed”), John Lennon (“Look at Me”) and Eric Clapton (“After Midnight”).

One of the joys of 1970 is how many different voices, sounds and styles were mixing it up on the charts, and how surprisingly well they meshed together; among the songs covered here are folk, rock, power-pop, soul and gospel. Routing them all through a single voice, in one set of contemporary sessions, has the advantage of pulling them more tightly together, but loses some of the colors that made the original tapestry so interesting. Cohn’s voice and the middle tempos create an album that’s more of an artist statement than a set of covers, but the continuity also rubs away some of the original differences that make this collection of songs interesting as a set. The sonic palette is similar from track to track, though there enough subtleties and surprises to keep things interesting.

The muffled percussion on “Maybe I’m Amazed,” the forceful tack on “Look at Me,” and the blue-jazz reworking of the Box Tops “The Letter,” each help draw the songs away from their iconic renditions. Similarly, the spare take on Badfinger’s “No Matter What” builds winningly into a moving country-soul duet with Aimee Mann, and the slow, Tom Waitsian reading of Simon & Garfunkel’s “The Only Living Boy in New York City” takes the song from Central Park to the Bowery. The closing guitar-and-voice take on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Long as I Can See the Light” best highlights the soulfulness that pulls this album together. This is a subtle spin that may seem too mellow and samey on first pass, but Cohn’s vocal interpretations will draw you in and bind you to these interpretations. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Marc Cohen’s Home Page

Andy Kim: Happen Again

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Welcome return of talented 60s/70s singer-songwriter

Singer-songwriter Andy Kim’s time in the spotlight of mass public acclaim was surprisingly short. In 1968 he co-wrote the song of the year (and national anthem of the bubblegum nation), “Sugar Sugar,” along with its follow-up, “Jingle Jangle” and other effervescent Archies’ album cuts. He edged onto the charts with his own “So Good Together” and “Rainbow Ride,” and cracked the Top 20 with covers of the Ronettes’ “Baby, I Love You” and “Be My Baby” in 1969 and 1970. Despite several fine albums for the Steed label [1 2], further commercial success eluded him until 1975’s chart-topping “Rock Me Gently.” Then, as the single’s run ended, so did Kim fade from public view. He resurfaced in the 1980s with a pair of albums under the name Baron Longfellow, but mostly stayed out of the spotlight.

In 1995 Kim connected with Ed Robertson of Barenaked Ladies, and in 2005 was coaxed from retirement to record an EP and give sporadic public performances. Another five years further on – twenty years since his last full album – Kim returns in superb voice with a disc full of terrific new songs. His writing craft translates smoothly to modern production sounds, and his voice, lowered both by age and choice (his earlier hits were often sped up to sound younger), is more studied and reflective than the unbridled optimism of the 1970s. “Judy Garland” offers a note of support to the troubled star with a rolling rhythm, CS&N-styled harmonies and a killer chorus hook. His thoughtful contemplation of mortality, “Someday,” reaches back to the Brill Building for a baion beat, but dresses it minimally in riveting percussion and a moody organ.

Kim and his studio crew have gathered together instrumental elements across several decades, marrying power-, sunshine- and synth-pop sounds into a truly compelling whole. Kim’s clearly continued listening to new music during his time away from the limelight, as he incorporates the emotional grandeur and orchestral touches of Verve and Coldplay, but without surrendering his ‘70s roots. He writes of love and relationships, but his lyrics ask questions rather than proclaim answers.  On the album’s title track he wonders, “Do you feel connected / to sentimental times,” and laments innocence lost. He’s optimistic, but the tone hasn’t the brash certainty of someone in their 20s or 30s.

The exhilaration that Kim does find, such as the schoolboy love of “I Forgot to Mention,” only really busts out in the chorus, and even then its insular focus is nagged by the outside world. Ironically, his realization that “Love Has Never Been My Friend” is sung to a bouncy melody that playfully undermines the song’s plea for Cupid to keep his distance. If one were to mentally extrapolate Kim’s music from the ‘70s to today, you’d get exactly this album: a thoughtful, finely honed collection of songs that refract youthful enthusiasms through the grounding of adult living, expressed in melodies that linger in your ears. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Someday
Andy Kim’s Home Page
Andy Kim’s MySpace Page
Download Happen Again

Joe Whyte: When the Day Breaks

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Singer-songwriter folk, country and Americana

East Coast Americana singer-songwriter Joe Whyte returns with an EP that strips down the band production of 2007’s Devil in the Details to acoustic folk-country. Whyte’s joined on a few tracks by Catherine Popper (bass and harmony vocals) and Dan Marcus (guitar, dobro and mandolin), and takes several with just his guitar and harmonica. The quieter arrangements allow Whyte to sing with more texture and nuance than with an electric band, leaving him to focus on his contemplative lyrics of leaving, hard living and uncertain futures. His protagonists are truckers and night owls whose problems are self-made, and soldiers and flood victims whose troubles are visited upon them. Whyte’s been playing out solo, and now brings that act to the studio with this latest EP, available for free download here. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Please Believe Me
Download When the Day Breaks for Free!
Joe Whyte’s Home Page
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Andrew Combs: Tennessee Time

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Fetching new singer-songwriter ala Clark, Van Zandt and Earle

Andrew Combs is a young Texan who’s developed a folksy, throwback singer-songwriter sound amid the crossover dreams and overproduction of Nashville. He cites Guy Clark and Townes Van Zandt as influences, and the edges of his voice bring to mind Chris Knight and Gram Parsons; Combs’ girlfriend Heidi Feek adds harmony on a few tracks, lending a Gram/Emmylou vibe. There’s a strong feel for Steve Earle in the album’s title track, particularly in the way the verses peak in the middle and trail off to find the song’s title sung as a contented exhalation. All fives tracks are taken at mid-tempo, but two are turned out as honky-tonkers and two as introspective country-rockers. Combs’ longing on the opening “Hummingbird” is shaded blue by Dustin Ransom’s barroom piano, echoing the mood Jack Ingram laid down on Live at Adair’s. Combs’ satisfaction with the Volunteer State is expressed in the comforts of “Tennessee Time” as Luke Herbert keeps time on the rim of his drum and Jeremy Fetzer adds a soulful baritone guitar solo. You can hear Hank Williams’ yearning in the confessional love song, “Wanderin’ Heart,” and the closing “Won’t Catch me” is sung with acoustic guitar and harmonica. All five tracks are thoughtfully sung and played, and a bonus cover of “Dark End of the Street,” available with EP purchase at Bandcamp, further exemplifies Combs’ affinity for Southern soul. Here’s hoping a full album is coming soon! [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Andrew Combs’ Home Page

John Denver: Live at Cedar Rapids 12/10/87

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Excellent John Denver live performance from the mid-80s

By the time John Denver performed this 1987 concert in Cedar Rapids, IA, he was a decade past his commercial peak of the mid-70s. He’d found continued success into the early ‘80s, but his most recent release, 1986’s One World, was both the last he’d recorded for RCA and the first album in fifteen years to miss the chart entirely. The album’s single, “Along for the Ride (’56 T-Bird),” had only middling success on the Adult Contemporary chart, and was left out of this set. Denver had forged a non-music public role as an activist, philanthropist, humanitarian, and social critic, but always remained an in-demand live performer. By this point in his career, his non-music activities flowed seamlessly into his stage performances.

This two-hour, twenty-eight track live set touches on fan favorites, social and political commentaries and well-selected covers. Denver’s voice hasn’t the youthful elasticity of his earlier years, but his investment in the songs, even those he’d been touring for fifteen years, is enthusiastic and resolute. He sings the hits at full length, rather than mashing them into medleys, and performs covers (Lennon & McCartney’s “Mother Nature’s Son” and Randy Sparks’ “Toledo”) that had been in his live set for nearly fifteen years. He was an endearing performer, as engaging with a story or a joke as with a song, and his invitations to the audience to sing-along are as warm as a summer campfire.

Denver performs most of the songs solo with his acoustic 12-string, adding a taped background for “Flying for Me” and welcoming a string quartet on stage for disc two. His material is drawn from throughout his career, going back as early as the title song of his debut album, Rhymes & Reason, and as current as “For You” (which was dedicated to his soon-to-be second wife) and the set-closing “Falling Leaves (The Refugees),” which he’d record the following year. His newer material is easily woven into the set, making evident that it wasn’t the quality or appeal of Denver’s music that had waned, only the interest of radio and the new generation of record buyers.

Disc two includes Denver’s statements on the arms race and world hunger and a segue into his then-current “Let Us Begin (What Are We Making Weapons For).” He reaches back to 1971 for the thoughtful “Poems, Prayers and Promises” and climaxes with a crowd-pleasing trio of hits. A dozen of these tracks appeared previously on a pair of PBS promotional releases [1 2], but having the entire concert start-to-finish gives fans an opportunity to relive the magic of Denver’s stagecraft. Collectors’ Choice delivers the discs in a double-digipack with a four page booklet (with liner notes by Gene Sculatti) tucked into a tight pocket beneath disc two’s tray. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Carole King: The Essential Carole King

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Two sides of Carole King

Brill Building legend Carole King has really had two full music careers. Starting in the late 1950s and flourishing in the 1960s, she was part of the legendary stable of New York City songwriters who took their name from the sister building to the one in which they wrote their effervescent gems for Don Kirshner’s Aldon Music. Together with Gerry Goffin, King wrote some of the most memorable songs of the 1960s, scribing landmark sides for the Shirelles, Everly Brothers, Drifters, Chiffons, Monkees, Aretha Franklin, and dozens more. King is generally regarded, based on the chart success of her songs, as the most commercially successful female pop songwriter of the twentieth century. Had this been her only contribution to pop music, she’d be heralded as a legend, but King also had it in mind to step into the spotlight and perform her songs.

Her early attempts at a singing career, represented here by the Top 40 hit “It Might As Well Rain Until September,” fit into the prevailing Brill Building sound. She sang demos (some of which can be sampled on Brill Building Legends) and had another minor hit with “He’s a Bad Boy,” but didn’t really develop her singer’s voice until nearly a decade later. Moving to the West Coast, King recorded an album with Danny Kortchmar as The City (Now That Everything’s Been Said), and released a solo debut (Writer) that gained notice but little sales. It wasn’t until the following year’s Tapestry that King found the fame as a singer that her songs had previously found for her as a songwriter. Her songs created a lyrical voice that was perfectly in sync with 1971, and even more poignantly, her tour de force remake of 1959’s “Will You Love Me Tomorrow” highlighted the emotional depth that had been part of her songwriting from the earliest days.

Legacy’s 2-CD set looks at both sides of King’s career. Disc one samples her early solo work, her 1970s stardom with tracks from  Writer, Tapestry, Music, Rhymes & Reason, Fantasy, Wrap Around Joy, Thoroughbred, her score for Maurice Sendak’s Really Rosie, and a couple of later tracks recorded with Babyface (“You Can Do Anything”) and Celine Dion. Missing are the albums she recorded for Capitol, Atlantic and EMI from the late-70s into the early-90s; they may not be essential to telling the story of her breakthrough years, but a sampling of tracks would have made a nice addition. Disc two samples fifteen King compositions recorded by (and mostly hits for) other artists. The breadth of acts that made brilliant music from King and Goffin’s compositions is staggering, particularly when you realize this is a fraction of the hits she wrote, and that is in turn a fraction of the thousands of cover versions these songs earned.

Disc one clocks in at over seventy-one minutes, disc two at forty-one – no doubt the cross-licensing of singles from so many original labels limited the second disc’s track count. Additional King-penned hits by the Drifters, Cookies and Monkees are missed, as are hits by the Animals, Tony Orlando, Earl-Jean and Steve Lawrence (not to mention Freddy Scott, who’s “Hey Girl” is represented by a Billy Joel cover), but what’s here is terrific. Disc one isn’t a substitute for King’s classic albums of the early 1970s, but provides a very listenable tour through her first seven years as a solo artist, and a great introduction to one of pop music’s brightest lights. Disc two is rich, but only hints at the wealth of King’s songwriting catalog. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Carole King’s Home Page