Iceland’s reputation for sublime beauty and natural wonders is well established as is Reykjavik’s status as a cosmopolitan city with its own unique culture and flavor. The country, with a mere 360,000 people – which is about 20,000 fewer folks than live in Lower Manhattan, has also increasingly become known […]
Festival
70 posts
In their first visit to New York this month as part of Globalfest, Jupiter & Okwess, who hail from Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, stole the show with a frenetic, joyful performance that represented the catholic spirit of the annual event put on by its not for profit namesake organization. […]
Pharoah Sanders Recalls Homelessness At Winter Jazzfest – January 5, 2017 2017 Winter Jazzfest NYC got underway on Thursday with an appearance by Pharoah Sanders at Le Poisson Rouge in the West Village. The 6 day event is now in its 13th year of delivering a well-curated mix of heavy […]
Donovan & Brian Wilson Celebrate Fifty Year Anniversaries – Sunshine Superman and Pet Sounds were both released in 1966 and both the Glasgow born troubadour and American genius are marking the landmark releases with tours visiting New York City. Donovan played Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall on Thursday September 15th, […]
Thao & The Get Down Stay Down In Town Tonight – August 4, 2016 When I spoke with Thao on a lovely afternoon in Austin during SXSX in March, she said that the new record A Man Alive was a much more personal album than she and the band had […]
James Carter Organ Trio: Django Unchained – July 2, 2016 James Carter honked, squawked, squeaked, and whistled his way through an exciting and entertaining set on Saturday night as part of the 37th annual Montreal Jazzfest. He even did a bit where he produced sound from a sax without putting […]
Montreal Jazzfest ’16: Stacey Kent – July 3, 2016 Festival International de Jazz de Montreal is a honking good time! As for the talent, the ten day hootenanny draws an embarrassment of riches. For the fans, whether they be native Quebecois or the quarter of a million or so visitors […]
Wolf Parade Light Fuse On 2016 Northside Festival; June 9, 2016 After Wolf Parade’s sound check on a gorgeous afternoon at Brooklyn’s McCarren Park, Dan Boeckner clipped on a microphone and spoke about this band‘s wildly triumphant comeback. “I underestimated what this band meant to people while we were active.” […]
John Scofield is a guitar virtuoso. He can make his guitar, seemingly, do anything he wants short or having it buy a round of drinks. Brad Mehldau is a keyboard virtuoso. No appreciable space exists between sounds in his head (I imagine) and the sounds that emanate from his piano […]
Sunflower Bean at Flamingo Cantina in Austin for SXSW 3-16-16 & coming to House Of Vans as part of the annual Brooklyn hootenanny known as the Northside Festival on Thursday 6-9-16 Love the Bean! The Wednesday afternoon performance that you get a taste of in the accompanying video was a […]
Bloc Party at Bangers in Austin on 3-17-16 during SXSW & at Governors Ball this Friday, 6-3-16. Bloc Party is one of the more interesting rock bands in the world. They are nothing but flavorful and modern; unpredictable from minute to minute within songs, from tune to tune on albums, […]
PINS Set To Drop In On NYC As a fan of PINS, having been exposed to their first record Girls Like Us as well as the follow up Wild Nights released last summer, I was determined to seek them out in Austin. Even though it wasn’t especially convenient to hop […]
Basia Bulat, The Kills Impress At SXSW – On Way To NYC I’m a relative rookie when it comes to Basia Bulat but got turned on to her not so long ago by hearing her stuff on WFUV and began to fall under her spell. I saw BB when she […]
Peaches told me she had promised herself she’d never play the South by Southwest music festival again. She turned up in Austin for the shebang a decade ago and wasn’t sure she needed to do it twice. Fortunately the inimitable Canadian/Berliner/Los Angeleno decided to break that promise and put on […]
SXSW 2016: Iggy Pop To Loretta Lynn To ASAP Ferg To Infinity And Beyond 3-15 through 3-20-2016 I’ve never seen a more exciting performer on stage than Iggy Pop. Therefore, my top priority in Austin was connecting with Ig along with his recently minted group spearheaded by his new mainman […]
Globalfest 2016 At Webster Hall The curators should be congratulated. Globalfest kicks ass every year and Sunday night – January 17th, 2016 – was no exception. Webster Hall was sold out. I shot four bands out of the dozen that performed. Globalfest 2016 At Webster Hall offered a handful of […]
The first time I saw Chris Potter was in ’93 or possibly ’94 when he was blowing sax on stage with Steely Dan. The alto and tenor sax of this extraordinary musician can be heard on the Dan’s Two Against Nature that came out in 2000. One of the great things […]
Protomartyr, the Detroit quartet who just put out their outstanding third album The Agent Intellect, are in NYC for the 35th annual CMJ Music Marathon. Here’s a look at the performance at Santos Party House and a little backstage conversation about the festival.
The Modern Sky Festival NYC happened in Central Park last Sunday (10-4-15) headlined by Yoko Ono and The Plastic Ono Band. The 82 year old widow of John Lennon launched the group along with John in ’69 as a concept; a kind of umbrella that would encompass whoever got involved, even […]
Justin Townes Earle was part of AmericanaFest NYC at Lincoln Center earlier this month. The singer-songwriter has added significantly to his impressive body of work recently with Single Mothers followed closely by Absent Fathers that was recorded in the same sessions. Here’s a taste of the performance and our conversation which featured […]
Amazing night Outdoors At Lincoln Center on Saturday 8/8/2015 as an all-star band (Smokey Hormel, David Garza, Benmont Tench, Al Kooper, etc) played Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited for the second annual AmericanaFest NYC. Watkins Family Hour, the long running side band of Nickel Creek’s siblings Sean and Sara Watkins […]
Country star Luke Bryan delighted the crowd at FarmBorough Festival earlier this summer. Now the Georgia native is coming back to New York City, where he was asked for directions during his last visit, to celebrate the release of his new album Kill The Lights…
Four heavy jazz artists: Gary Bartz, Buster Williams, Larry Willis, and Al Foster have come together as Heads of State. The new album, Search for Peace, is out and they’ll be celebrating its release with shows this weekend at Manhattan’s Smoke Jazz Club. I spoke with Gary Bartz at the […]
Welsh rockers Super Furry Animals were a tasty take and Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks didn’t disappoint as the 5th annual Village Voice 4 Knots Festival made the transition to a ticketed event and enjoyed its new digs on Pier 84 on Hudson River Park after 4 years at South Street Seaport, […]
I’m mad about hanging out at the Jazzfest – this year’s Montreal Jazz Festival 2015 being no exception. I ran amok with my video camera and got a taste of groups as far afield as Novalima, The Barr Brothers and Cibo Matto. Catching the Wayne Shorter Quartet was a highlight […]