Francophone Lands Licks, 2003

Post-script: Bertrand Cantant was eventually convicted of “murder with indirect intent,” and spent less than four years in prison. Three years after his 2007 release, his ex-wife committed suicide with him in the house. In 2012, he appeared on an Amadou and Miriam album. A solo set he released in 2017 charted at #13 in…

Country Lady Licks, 2004

Fun Fact: The next Elizabeth McQueen and the FireBrands album was an all-pub-rock-covers record, partially inspired by this review! ELIZABETH MCQUEEN & THE FIREBRANDS The Fresh Up Club No confirmation that the two songs addressed to a former love interest no longer in the band concern Asleep at the Wheeler David Sanger, who produced the…

1-girl:2-boy Amerindie Trio Licks, 2003

CORDELIA’S DAD “Jane”/”Promise”/“Closing Year” Last year, in “Camile’s Not Afraid of the Barn,” these indie-rock-moonlighting Massachusetts folk festival standbys set mysterious words about beached sharks, pellet guns, Chinatown firecrackers, and the smell of dirtbikes to a riff from “Jane Says” by Jane’s Addiction. Their new three-inch CD EP leads, coincidentally, with a traditional upstate-NY ballad…

Confusingly Named Background Gloom Licks, 2003

RAPTURE, Songs for the Withering The Rapture that Williamsburgers don’t know are a heavy-hearted quintet of Helsinki codeine-metal fops who quote Emily Brontë and Sophocles on their lyric sheet and gorgeously balance light croons with heavy grumbles about cold years and hangings and maggots (“our only friends”) and “bad dreams, hollow sleep of dark rooms,…

Country Dude Licks, 2003

Toby Keith tests the army’s latest super-secure landline technology. MERLE HAGGARD Like Never Before Merle has no doubt made more beautiful, more political, and jazzier albums, but maybe not all at once, and probably not in the past quarter-century. This one’s two pinnacles might be the best Gulf War II song and best Patriot Act…

Nashville Scene Country Critics Poll Ballots, 2003 – 2020

Decided to put these all in one place — One-stop shopping, doncha know. Not sure when the poll started or when I was first invited to vote, but my 2003 ballot is the earliest I’ve been able to find so far. Can’t say I still entirely agree with all of these, especially the further back…