Newsday

Television, Talking Heads, Ramones, The: Punk Rock: Its Day Will Come

Report by Wayne Robins, Newsday, January 1976

IF YOU thought Jefferson Airplane was a weird name, let some of these drop off your tongue. Talking Heads. Tuff Darts. Ramones. Planets. Heartbreakers. Shirts. ...

Joni Mitchell: Jones Beach Theater, New York

Live Review by Wayne Robins, Newsday, July 1983

DURING THE COURSE of her unpredictable but resilient career, Joni Mitchell has been the dewy-eyed sophomore, the slit-eyed hipster, the clear-eyed visionary. Her songs of ...

John Travolta: Practice Makes Perfect

Interview by Wayne Robins, Newsday, June 1985

John Travolta has gone from the disco hunk of Saturday Night Fever to the Rolling Stone reporter of his new movie. In between, he says, ...

Bruce Springsteen: Into the Future

Live Review by Wayne Robins, Newsday, April 1988

THE "TUNNEL OF LOVE" tour is not rock-and-roll business as usual, or even Springsteen business as usual. This, after all, is a show that for ...

U2 Reborn in the USA

Report and Interview by Wayne Robins, Newsday, October 1988

FOR HOURS, the same shot repeats over and over on a massive screen in a high-ceilinged editing room in Studio City, just a traffic jam ...

David Bowie: Sound + Vision

Review by Deborah Frost, Newsday, November 1989

Golden Years ...

Caetano Veloso: Town Hall, New York City

Live Review by Richard Gehr, Newsday, August 1991

Brazil's most respected singer-songwriter is a velvet-voiced visionary with a surreal sense of humor. Richard Gehr at Town Hall, Saturday night. ...

Grateful Dead, Jerry Garcia: An Interview with Jerry Garcia

Interview by Richard Gehr, Newsday, September 1991

IT WAS THE first thing that happened to the Grateful Dead when they arrived in New York City on June 1, 1967, and Jerry Garcia ...

Grateful Dead: Nassau Coliseum, Long Island, NY

Live Review by Richard Gehr, Newsday, March 1992

ICY WINDS RIPPED ACROSS Long Island Wednesday night as the Grateful Dead launched the first of three sold-out Uniondale evenings with the meteorologically inspired 'Cold ...

Genesis: Giants Stadium, New Jersey

Live Review by Deborah Frost, Newsday, June 1992

"DRUMMER SENSITIVE to acoustic music" read the want ad Genesis once placed in an English music paper. Its ironieshave never been more apparent or more ...

Little Richard: AWOP-BOP-ALOO-MOP-ALOP-BAM-BOOM!

Profile by Wayne Robins, Newsday, June 1992

THERE'S NO QUESTION that some rock icons learned how to do what they do by watching and hearing Little Richard, from the cascading "whooo's!" on ...

Joan Armatrading: Square the Circle (A&M)

Review by Deborah Frost, Newsday, July 1992

WHEN BONO interrupted a recent arena performance to sing a few bars of Joan Armatrading's minor '70s hit, ‘Love & Affection’, he struck the one ...

Shabba Ranks: Dancehall Invasion

Report by Richard Gehr, Newsday, August 1992

CURRENTLY MAKING impressive inroads into the American market, dancehall reggae may be the most challenging--and, many would say, irritating--style of popular music since rap, which ...

Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Party: Town Hall, NYC

Live Review by Richard Gehr, Newsday, October 1992

SITTING CROSS-LEGGED on an Indian carpet, surrounded by his seven-man qawwali "party," rotund Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan may look like Jabba the Hut but he ...

Bob Dylan: 30th Anniversary Concert at Madison Square Gardens

Live Review by Wayne Robins, Newsday, October 1992

BOB DYLAN'S SONG catalogue is so varied and vital that Friday's four-hour concert at Madison Square Gardens barely got the key in the door of ...

Leonard Cohen: The Loneliness of the Long-Suffering Folkie: Leonard Cohen

Interview by Wayne Robins, Newsday, November 1992

ON HIS NEW ALBUM The Future (Columbia), Leonard Cohen views history's changing currents with more than a little bit of wariness. "Give me back the ...

Rod Stewart

Interview by Wayne Robins, Newsday, May 1993

THE PENINSULA Hotel's presidential suite is not your standard overnight business accommodation, even for Fifth Avenue. There are three bedrooms, a library, two living rooms, ...

Billy Joel Gets the Blues

Interview by Ira Robbins, Newsday, August 1993

John Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful was all of 22 when he sang, "I think I've come to see myself at last." ...

Elvis Costello’s Brutal Truth

Interview by Ira Robbins, Newsday, 1994

Like an old flame breezing back through the door with no more than an indolent shrug and a sly wink, Elvis Costello has returned from ...

Roberta Flack, Anita Baker: Anita Baker: Rhythm Of Love, Roberta Flack: Roberta

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, September 1994

In a long list of thank you’s on her first new album in four years, Anita Baker cites Roberta Flack "for loving me anyway." Now ...

Warren G: Regulate…G Funk Era

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

IN THE early to mid ‘80s, two of the most successful rap records concerned vigilantism. The Rake’s 'Street Justice' and Kool Moe Dee’s 'Wild Wild ...

Faith Evans: Faith

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

TWENTY-TWO-YEAR-OLD Faith Evans was already a successful songwriter before mini-mogul Sean "Puffy" Combs signed her as a solo act to his Bad Boy label. This ...

Freddie Jackson: Private Party/Christopher Williams: Not a Perfect Man

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

FREDDIE JACKSON and Christopher Williams are mature, polished performers with superb voices. Both were signed to their respective labels at a time when each record ...

Commodores, The: The Past Of Young America

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

The Commodores: Best Of The CommodoresVarious Artists: The Music, The Magic, The Memories of Motown: A Tribute to Berry Gordy JUST WHEN we were sure ...

Green Day: Nassau Coliseum, Long Island, NY

Live Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

BY MATCHING the cheeky insouciance of the early Beatles with the amphetamine hooks of the Ramones in the late ‘80s, Green Day graduated rock and ...

Funkmaster Flex

Profile and Interview by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1995

EASTER SUNDAY, 10:30 p.m. The police are manning barricades on West 27th Street to disperse an overflow crowd that has flocked to the Tunnel to ...

Tito Puente Live At SOB’s, New York: At The Top Of His Game

Live Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, June 1995

Raising his drumsticks like a doubled scepter over a gleaming set of timbales , Tito Puente announced to Monday night’s capacity crowd at S.O.B.’s, "Tonight ...

Bo Diddley: The Bo Diddley Beat Just Keeps Jangling Along

Live Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, December 1995

Bo Diddley: Chicago Blues, New York, NY ...

Braxtons, The: The Braxtons' Right Risks: So Many Ways

Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, 1996

THE STORY goes that The Braxtons originally were a quartet. Producers L.A. and Babyface pulled Toni Braxton out of the bunch, because, at the time, ...

Maria Muldaur: A Multifaceted Muldaur

Profile and Interview by Carol Cooper, Newsday, April 1996

"IF YOU THINK about it," Maria Muldaur remarked during a recent showcase for her new blues album, Fanning the Flames, "a tarantella is really just ...

Iggy Pop: Roseland, New York, NY

Live Review by Carol Cooper, Newsday, April 1996

In 1967, when The Doors released their first LP, a young ex-drummer named James Osterberg formed the Psychedelic Stooges to voice the primal urges of ...