Blogcritics Author: Jon Sobel

Music Review: Indie Round-Up - Anya Singleton, Emory Joseph, Parlour Steps, Kalliopi

Jon Sobel — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 02:14:19 EDT

Anya Singleton rocks with soul, while Emory Joseph applies a youthful bounce to the Garcia-Hunter canon.
Anya Singleton, The Other SideAnya Singleton's first full-length album goes a long way towards fulfilling the promise of her earlier EP, Not Easy To Forget. The jazzy sound of that disc has evolved here into a more up-front soul sound with a bigger beat, epitomized by the insistent opening track, "Don't Tell Me." When I first...

Theater Review (NYC): Bouffon Glass Menajoree

Jon Sobel — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 14:22:48 EDT

This parody of the Tennessee Williams classic is grotesque in the original and best sense of the word.
Just as there are all sorts of dramatic traditions, from Elizabethan to operatic to Noh, so are there multiple styles of clowning. One that we hear relatively little about, despite its continued presence in popular culture (from the early films of John Waters, for example, and Cirque du Soleil), is the French bouffon tradition. This began, so it is...

Music Review: Indie Round-Up - Grascals, V-Project, Roots of Creation, Amelia White, Smiling Strangers

Jon Sobel — Wed, 9 Jul 2008 17:52:19 EDT

From bluegrass and reggae jams to alt-country and "three-minute" pop, this week's round-up has something for nearly everyone.
The Grascals, Keep On Walkin'The third disc from the award-winning Grascals has a slightly more traditional sound than some of their earlier arrangements, partly because of the addition of Aaron McDarris's banjo to the regular lineup. Precision playing is expected from a top bluegrass band, but having toured together for years now, the...

Book Review: In the Woods by Tana French

Jon Sobel — Tue, 1 Jul 2008 09:42:07 EDT

This multilayered story combines the gritty worldliness of a police procedural with the eerie chills of a psychological thriller.
This highly regarded mystery, now released as a trade paperback, marks a strong beginning for first-time novelist Tana French. Set in the suburbs of Dublin, In the Woods is a multilayered story that combines the gritty worldliness of a police procedural with the eerie chills of a psychological thriller.Detective Rob Ryan and his partner, Cassie...

Charlie Black and the Politics of Fear

Jon Sobel — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:26:27 EDT

All Charlie Black did was acknowledge some uncomfortable facts.
What does it say about us, as a society, when a truthful statement - or one that reflects, at least, some commonly accepted wisdom - is so politically unacceptable that it causes a minor firestorm in the campaign of a major party candidate?Charlie Black, a top adviser to John McCain, told Fortune Magazine the other day that a terrorist attack on...

Music Review: Indie Round-Up - J.J. Appleton, Gandalf Murphy, Gary Morgan and PanAmericana!

Jon Sobel — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:25:25 EDT

Womblike melodies and lush yet elemental arrangements trick out Gandalf Murphy's excellent new disc.
J.J. Appleton, Black & White MatineeEvery so often a little jewel of a CD comes along. J.J. Appleton's new six-song disc falls short of full-length, but merits more than the foreshortened "EP" badge. At 24 golden minutes, it seems the perfect length.It opens with its "single," an old-fashioned term that still means...

Theater/Burlesque Review (NYC): Revealed

Jon Sobel — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 12:46:31 EDT

Bawdy fun in the East Village.
One of the great things about being a writer is getting invited to all sorts of interesting events, including some that fall outside the categories you're used to. Like, say, an evening of lovely women taking off their clothes."Burlesque" originally meant a comedic, parodic style of variety show, of which striptease was only one...

Music Review: Chuck Leavell, Live in Germany: Green Leaves & Blue Notes Tour 2007

Jon Sobel — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 16:44:17 EDT

The Rolling Stones' keyboardist may be a "musicians' musician," but there's something for almost everyone on his new two-CD live set.
A joyous noise erupts from this new two-CD release from keyboardist extraordinaire Chuck Leavell (Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Allman Brothers). The set opens appropriately with a Professor Longhair chestnut and motors on through Stones covers, standards, Leavell originals, and a lot more. The pianist has stepped out in front before, notably...

Theater Review (NYC): All Kinds of Shifty Villains: A Carnival Noir

Jon Sobel — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 15:44:57 EDT

A hallucinating gumshoe, a sinister clown, and a femme fatale collide in this shifty new play.
With their new theater piece, writer Robert Attenweiler and director Rachel Klein set out to combine the noirish flavor and tropes of the gangster genre with the circus/clown tradition. They've succeeded: All Kinds of Shifty Villains is an oddball play, but an entertaining one.Fair warning: at the beginning, I hated the play. It began...

Concert Review: Strawbs and Judith Owen at BB Kings, NYC

Jon Sobel — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 16:00:21 EDT

Strawbs is on tour with their classic early 1970s lineup.
Strawbs got their start way back in 1964, as the Strawberry Hill Boys bluegrass band. They had success in the UK during the 1960s, undergoing several lineup changes but always led by singer-guitarist and main songwriter Dave Cousins. (Early on they worked with both Rick Wakeman and Sandy Denny). In the 70s the band moved away from its folk...