ARTICLES
Built to Spill’s ‘Keep It Like a Secret’ Still Surprises at 25 (April 2024)
Pearl Harbour Remembers: Rockin’ in San Francisco, London, and Beyond (interview, April 2024)
Miles Davis’ ‘Filles de Kilimanjaro’ Makes a Jazz Noise (March 2024)
Pop-Rock Not for the Masses: Nellie McKay’s ‘Get Away From Me’ at 20 (February 2024)
Buffy Sainte-Marie’s ‘It’s My Way!’ at 60: Maybe Not Entirely Her Way! (February 2024)
Huggins Pan-Demonium: A 1970s Steel-Drum Artifact (February 2024)
Public Image Ltd’s Debut Album Put the “Post” in Post-Punk (January 2024)
Mother’s Finest: Iron Age Is ’80s Metal—and “Black Music” (December 2023)
John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s ‘Two Virgins’ at 55: Still Telling Naked Truths (November 2023)
Morgana King’s I Know How It Feels to Be Lonely (1968): A Vintage Jazz-Folk-Pop LP with a Cool Beatles Twist (October 2023)
Is Lo Fidelity Allstars Style Big Beat Back after 25 Years? (September 2023)
Fados of Portugal: A Charming Vintage Folk LP You Can Download (August 2023)
A Portrait of Rufus Wainwright as a Gay Pop-Rock Prophet (July 2023)
Violent Femmes’ 40-Year-Old Debut Is a Work of Singular Vision (June 2023)
Asylum Choir: Late-’60s Pop-Rock Perfection from Leon Russell’s First Band (June 2023)
20th Century Harp: A Vintage LP as Window into a Better World (June 2023)
Calexico’s ‘Feast of Wire’ (2003): Mestizaje Was on the Menu as They Evolved (May 2023)
Chip Taylor: On His Latest Album, the Writer of “Wild Thing” Considers All Living Things (April 2023)
The Doors’ “Roadhouse Blues”: Versions of Versions (April 2023)
Tearing Down the Fence Between Lisa Germano and ‘Happiness’ (February 2023)
Matthew Sweet’s Kimi ga Suki * Raifu (2003): Power Pop Transcendence (February 2023)
Twentieth-Century Flute Music: A Vintage Album for the Adventurous (February 2023)
Harry Belafonte Is Essential (December 2022)
Meet Bishu Chattopadhyay: Jazz Bassist, Composer, Band Leader, Border Explorer (December 2022)
Pee Shy: Is It Time to Stop Holding Back This ’90s Alternarock Phenom? (October 2022)
The Kasenetz-Katz Singing Orchestral Circus: A Vintage Bubblegum LP as Schlock & Roll Oddity (October 2022)
The Rolling Stones in the Twilight Zone: In Praise of the Disco-y “Emotional Rescue” (September 2022)
Johnny Rivers’s Home Grown (1971): A Singer-Songwriter Album Even Better Than Its Cover . . . and Its Covers (August 2022)
John Lennon’s “Cold Turkey” on the Run: A Cold Case of a Defective 45 (June 2022)
Carpenters Gold: 35th Anniversary Edition: A New Fan’s Look, with Questions to Ponder (April 2022)
Elvis for Everyone!: Presley’s 1965 Hall of Mirrors (February 2022)
The East Coast 60’s Rock & Roll Experiment: A Vintage LP as Fringe Time Capsule (February 2022)
Bob Dylan’s Christmas in the Heart: Not as Bad as It Sounds! (December 2021)
Paul McMahon: Singer/Songwriter, Artist, Goddess Worshipper, Not Necessarily in That Order (December 2021)
Thrift-Shop Paydirt: When Used Records Become Learning Opportunities (November 2021)
Yoko Ono on Apple Records: 1970-73 (October 2021)
The Nields: Where to Start (October 2021)
Black Vinyl: Confessions of a Music Collector (August 2021, slightly revised reposting of a 2013 article)
Mary Hopkin—The Apple Records Years: 1968-1971 (August 2021)
Terry Radigan—Radigan: A Pop Singer and Songwriter’s Greatest Nonhits (August 2021)
Ralph Williams: A Jazz Saxophonist Scratching His Soul in Central Park (June 2021)
John Lennon Goes Pop: A Case for Mind Games and Walls and Bridges (June 2021)
McCoy Tyner Meets Burt Bacharach (Meets Marie McAuliffe!) (April 2021)
September 67’s Lucky Shoe: An Album to Remember (April 2021)
Syd Straw: An Introduction or Refresher Course in Nine Songs (February 2021)
The Assembled Multitude—Who or What Were They?: A Blast of Orchestral Pop-Rock from 1970 (February 2021)
For Leon Russell Fans Only? Jesse Frederick in 1971 (December 2020)
The Health and Happiness Show: ’90s Indie Alt-Country Power Pop (December 2020)
On the Vagaries of Aesthetic Appreciation (blogpost at The Avid Listener, November 2020)
Austin Gravelding—Worth Giving Time To: 1970-71 (October 2020)
Mary Lee’s Corvette on All Cylinders: True Lovers of Adventure (October 2020)
Lotion’s full Isaac: ’90s Indie Rock Revisited (August 2020)
Paul Siebel’s Jack-Knife Gypsy: Not Just Folk! (August 2020)
Lost and Found: Mary Catherine Lunsford in 1971 (June 2020)
Sin 34: Not Your Father’s Hardcore Punk (June 2020)
Wings Takes Off—McCartney Nears the Ditch: Wild Life and Red Rose Speedway (April 2020)
Carol Hall on Elektra Records (April 2020)
Rotten to the Core: Adventures of a Temporary Vinyl Wholesaler (June 2015)
Duplicates of Duplicates: Or How I Ended Up Collecting Counterfeit Vinyl (April 2015)
Views of Lou (Lou Reed tribute; December 2013)
Black Vinyl: Confessions of a Music Collector (November 2013)
Frank Zappa's "Watermelon in Easter Hay": Or, This Is My Frank Zappa, Show Me Yours (June 2013)
The Walkabouts: Backtracking through Their Past Decade (April 2012)
Kelly Hogan, You Extremely Talented Singer, Please Record Again (December 2011)
Doug Wieselman: Cool Musicians' Go-To Guy for Sax, Clarinet, and More (August 2011)
Seven Looks at Laura Veirs: Putting Her CDs on (Somewhat) Random Play (October 2010)
My Rufus Wainwright Story (January 2010)
Wreckless Eric, C'es Moi (October 2009)
Pearl Harbor? No. Pearl Harbour! (October 2006)
The Return of Heather Eatman: Checking into Doll Hospital (interview, September 2006)
Babe the Blue Ox: A Lament for Brooklyn's Late, Great BOX (February 2006)
Kuma and the Art of (Sometimes) Violent Devotion (October 2005)
Graham Parker Twists Again (interview, July 2005)
The Strange Case of Firewater (July 2004)
Professor and Maryann: Hopeless, Romantic (late 2003 or early 2004)
Amy Allison: From Maudlin to No Frills (late 2003 or early 2004)
Bill McGarvey (July 2003)
Victoria Williams Loves You (January 2003)
Heather Eatman: Real Life (interview, June 2002)
Mary Margaret O'Hara in Ecstasy (May 2002)
Robin Holcomb: On the American Rhine (April 2002)
K. McCarty Does Daniel Johnston (January 2002)
Dana and Karen Kletter: Dear Enemies? (November 2001)
The Walkabouts (July 2001)