COAL MINOR CANARY: DAVID HAGE GOES BEYOND ACOUSTIC FOLK GENRE ON DEBUT EP
It sounds like an apocryphal legend, but it’s true. In the heyday of the coal mining industry, workers would bring caged canaries into the mines. More sensitive to poisonous gases than humans, the bir...
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TONY HALCHAK TRACES HIS NEPA ROOTS ON ‘HARVEST SONGS’
When Tony Halchak began putting together his new EP, “Harvest Songs,” he had a theme in mind: a family displaced from its longtime hometown, maybe living in the Rust Belt, maybe a casualty of of the f...
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PHILADELPHIA FOLK FESTIVAL: ‘IT COULD BE 1975’
Philadelphia Folk Fest weekend is upon us, as thousands of fans have descended on the bucolic Upper Salford grounds outside the city for the venerable event’s 56th edition. As usual, this year’s Fe...
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KING JAMES & THE SPECIAL MEN BRING THEIR NEW ORLEANS VIBE TO DEBUT ALBUM
For most bands, recording a debut album is a bit of a rookie exercise. A group of musicians still finding their sound, feeling out their chemistry together, learning what works and what doesn’t. But w...
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KIM RANCOURT TALKS SOLO DEBUT, LOU REED ARCHIVE AND NEW YORK ALBUMS
Coming of age in Michigan in the early ’70s as Iggy and the Stooges pumped out the primal soundtrack, relocating to New York City in time to take in that city’s own brand of weirdness, and eventually ...
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NICOLE ATKINS GOES TO NEPTUNE AND BACK ON ‘GOODNIGHT RHONDA LEE’
The sound of the Jersey Shore doesn’t begin and end with Bruce Springsteen. Just ask singer/songwriter Nicole Atkins. Like the Boss, she takes ‘60s influences and makes them sound epic. Atkins’ 2007 d...
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NEW MASTERSOUNDS BRING THE FUNK TO PEACH FROM ACROSS THE POND
Jazz-funk guitarist and New Mastersounds founder and frontman Eddie Roberts is 46 years old. And the native of Wales had never really listened to the Allman Brothers’ music until a few years ago, h...
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IF YOU GO TO SEE VANESSA COLLIER, ‘BE PREPARED TO FEEL SOMETHING’
For Vanessa Collier, a live show is more than a set delivered by a performer to an audience. No, for the Maryland-based singer and saxophone player, it’s much more intimate and interactive than that. ...
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AKINA ADDERLEY CONTINUES FAMILY LEGACY, REMEMBERS LUTHER VANDROSS
Originally from New York, r&b chanteuse Akina Adderley relocated to Austin, Texas, where she now fronts the Vintage Playboys. Though steeped in soul, the band draws on other styles as well, includ...
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SLIM CESSNA’S AUTO CLUB LOOKS BACK ON ‘CIPHER,’ ‘MORE RELEVANT NOW THAN EVER’
Deeply literary in the Southern tradition and walking the line between wildly unhinged and coolly calculated, Slim Cessna's Auto Club has been making eerie and compelling music since its namesake, the...
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