It is not hard to imagine the atmosphere in a room, a conversation, in “A Light Left On.” I find myself asking whether artists invest significant warmth in music as it is often lacking, when it matters, in the world.
Tag: music
Life was Bent, and I was Twisted: The King of In Between by Garland Jeffreys
It is very liberating to hear someone say something that sounds tough and wise; and in “Til John Lee Hooker Calls Me,” a blues-rock rave-up with intense singing, Jeffrey celebrates the musical heroes who have come and gone, such as James Brown, Fats Domino, Bo Diddley, Sinatra, Nat Cole, and John Lee Hooker.
Of Necessity, The Human Claim: John Legend and The Roots, Wake Up!
John Legend is asking music to be real; asking music to be a bridge to reality; asking music to interrogate reality. I respect that. I admire work that expresses, preserves, and celebrates experience; and work that articulates values and virtues: work that embodies complete thoughts and uses poetic resources, whether the work is domestic or international. I know something about country and city life, of how children recreate the cruelty and ignorance they see in their parents, and the difficulty of professors and employers seeing themselves in a young African-American man.
Social Awareness and Spiritual Consciousness, Precious and Proud: The Essential Earth, Wind and Fire
By Daniel Garrett Earth, Wind and Fire, The Essential Earth, Wind and Fire Compilation produced by Leo Sacks and Maurice White Sony, 2002 “Don’t hesitate ’cause the world seems cold. Stay young at heart…” —Earth, Wind and Fire, “That’s the…
Citizens of the World: Rihanna’s Loud with The Definitive Collection by Diana Ross
Yet, it is usually interesting, if not illuminating, to hear new sounds, something I began to contemplate once more when considering the work of Robyn Rihanna Fenty, whose popular work seems to draw from different genres—hip-hop, rock, dance, and Caribbean music—to create a sound that is, at once, personal and impersonal, familiar and fresh.
A Great Voice Evokes, Inspires Feeling: My Soul by Leela James
The slow, intimately blues-tinged song “So Cold,” a response to a quirky lover, is a quick reminder of the gifts of Leela James, in which it is easy to identify with her voice and to feel empathy for her. Leela James has a great voice, the kind of voice one hears and then feels like crying or making love.
Glamour, Grace, and Grit: the anthology Breathe Again: The Best of Toni Braxton
Toni Braxton is both a song stylist and a popular entertainer; and she has touched places in an audience that used to be reserved for the obscure divas requiring special introductions and interpretations. It says much that her toughness is direct but not frightening, and that her sensuality is easy to see but does not diminish respect for her.
Let Us Now Praise Sensitive Men: Bob Baldwin, Never Can Say Goodbye: A Tribute to Michael Jackson
In tribute to a man lost much too soon, the jazz pianist Bob Baldwin has produced an album that executes with delicacy the established and known rhythm patterns of Michael Jackson’s songs, and, sometimes, even adds intensity, but, for the most part, Bob Baldwin does not extend the songs into new territory, new invention.
Freedom and Discipline: Turtle Island Quartet, Have You Ever Been…?
In the interpretation of the Turtle Island Quartet, I hear something fine and sensuous. Just as the native rhythms that might have sounded one way when played on an African landscape with African instruments sounded differently when played on European instruments on American soil as part of the improvisations on composed music that is jazz, the sound of Jimi Hendrix’s songs are different with classical instrumentation and technique.
A Gentleman, a Model: Brian McKnight, Evolution of a Man
Brian McKnight does not sing of ghetto life in run-down tenements, violent hustles and narcotic sales, of whores and pimps, or rats and roaches; nor does he sing of temporary jobs and unemployment checks, of bad bosses and landlords, of sudden evictions and midnights spent deciding whether to beg, borrow, steal—or die. He sings of love as game, luxury, and spiritual fulfillment.