Paste
Paste magazine, published in Avondale Estates, Georgia, was founded as a quarterly music and entertainment magazine in July 2002, moving to a monthly magazine with its August 2006 issue. It ceased publication in August 2010. A digital edition, pastemagazine.com, continues.
181 articles
Solomon Burke: Don't Give Up On Me
Review by j. poet, Paste, 7 January 2003
WHEN CRITICS began raving about Burke's comeback album, more than a few fools in the crowd asked "Solomon who?" ...
Report and Interview by j. poet, Paste, 15 June 2003
"I'M NOT A militant female songwriter, and I wouldn't want to be considered some kind of new age uber-feminist," Rosanne Cash says. "But having said that, ...
The Libertines: Libertines Rock The Cotton Club, Atlanta
Live Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 19 August 2003
AMIDST RUMORS of drug addiction and rehab, Libertines' singer-guitarist Pete Doherty has been out of commission for the past few weeks, skipping the band's European ...
Review by j. poet, Paste, 1 October 2003
JOAN BAEZ hasn't written a song in 10 years, but she maintains an unerring instinct for choosing good material. ...
Howlin' Wolf: The Howlin' Wolf Story
Film/DVD/TV Review by j. poet, Paste, 23 January 2004
THE DEBATE ABOUT precisely when the blues became rock'n'roll will go on forever, but the footage of The Howlin' Wolf Story makes a good case ...
Alicia Keys: The Diary of Alicia Keys
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 February 2004
AT THE TOP OF THE POP WORLD these days, it’s hard enough to find an artist who can sing well without the aid of ProTools. ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 February 2004
BEFORE HER AMICABLE SPLIT with Belle & Sebastian in 2002, cellist-vocalist Isobel Campbell recorded two albums with her side project, The Gentle Waves. Amorino, her ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 June 2004
SO HOW DO YOU follow the dense, experimental, critically worshipped Yankee Hotel Foxtrot? The latest version of Wilco answers with an overwhelming, at times postmodern ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 2 July 2004
THIS LATEST PHISHING TRIP begins as you'd expect a Tchad Blake-produced record would — in a fog of creepy, bone rattling Waits-ian gothic rambling, pinging ...
Drive-By Truckers: The Rise, Fall and Redemption of the Redneck Warrior Poets of Rock 'n' Roll
Profile and Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 August 2004
TEN, NINE... This is a story about rock 'n' roll. ...
The Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, Van Dyke Parks: Brian Wilson Remembers How to Smile
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, October 2004
WHAT would have happened if, as planned, The Beach Boys had released the Smile album in the summer of 1967? For starters, people would have ...
Michael Franti: Various Artists: Reggae on the River
Film/DVD/TV Review by j. poet, Paste, October 2004
TWENTY YEARS AGO, the residents of Piercy, Calif., held a benefit concert to rebuild a community centre torched by a local arsonist. ...
Report and Interview by j. poet, Paste, 1 December 2004
AT THE BEGINNING of every autumn, the local music community in Martha's Vineyard comes alive. That's when the vacationers leave and the working-class folks who ...
Review by j. poet, Paste, 18 January 2005
CERTAIN TRACKS on Beat Cafe sound like they could be outtakes from Donovan's 1967 album Mellow Yellow, but I'll let you decide if that's a ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 February 2005
DARK, WITTY, LONELY, BRILLIANT, TRAGIC — Mark Sandman was all these things. Fronting legendary Boston band Morphine, he realized his unique vision, creating a style ...
Interview by Barney Hoskyns, Paste, April 2005
JIMI GOODWIN, the affable and bearded bassist-singer with Mancunian trio Doves, leans forward in his seat for an endearing moment of honesty. ...
Solomon Burke: Make Do With What You Got
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 April 2005
WHEN LEGENDARY ARTISTS like B.B. King or James Brown grow old and start resting on their laurels, it's easy to forgive them. After all, they've ...
Mofro: The Pageant, St. Louis, Mo.
Live Review by Kandia Crazy Horse, Paste, 18 June 2005
PERHAPS THE RED, white and blue spotlights at St. Louis's Pageant should've served as trickster clues. Or the snide remark of a toasted, aging frat ...
Me'Shell Ndegeocello: The Spirit Music Jamia: Dance of the Infidel
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 1 August 2005
WITH THE EXCEPTION OF BECK, no popular artist since Prince has jumped so freely from one genre to the next on each successive album. What ...
Shakira: Fijación Oral, Vol. 1 (Epic)
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 23 August 2005
Beyond the Belly: Colombian songstress trumps lazy stereotypes with raw talent ...
Solomon Burke, Joe Henry, Bettye LaVette, Allen Toussaint: Joe Henry
Interview by Bud Scoppa, Paste, 10 January 2006
BEFORE PRODUCING Solomon Burke's modern-day soul landmark, Don't Give Up On Me, in 2002, Joe Henry was a modest-selling "critic's darling" with a reputation for ...
Drive-By Truckers: A Blessing and a Curse
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 12 April 2006
PATTERSON HOOD SUMS UP Drive-By Truckers' new album, A Blessing and a Curse, in one line of the closing track: "To love is to feel ...
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 12 December 2006
SOPHOMORE SLUMP? What sophomore slump? On the follow-up to Get Lifted, the Grammy-winning multi-platinum debut from John Legend, the one-time session man chucks the simple ...
Lucinda Williams: Car Wheels on a Gravel Road (Deluxe Edition)
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 1 February 2007
The story of Car Wheels on a Gravel Road is long and winding. ...
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 8 May 2007
ONE DAY in the late 1990s, not long after his sublime performance of 'Miss Misery' in between the bombast of Celine Dion and bravado of ...
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 3 July 2007
WHEN MADONNA OR DAVID BOWIE enlists the latest production gurus to spice up their music, the results frequently come off sounding desperate, as if the ...
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 11 September 2007
FOUR SONGS into La Radiolina, an onslaught of beefy, staccato guitar chords chop like butcher knives into a mix of vertigo-inducing electronics and air-raid sirens. ...
Retrospective by Mark Kemp, Paste, October 2007
ONE OF THE MORE telling songs in John Lennon's solo catalog is the tender 'Look at Me.' Not the well-scrubbed version on his first album, ...
Retrospective by Mark Kemp, Paste, 8 November 2007
Original debut and outtakes cast Boston rockers as America's lost Stones ...
The Breeders: Mountain Battles
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 31 March 2008
The Deal sisters stumble back into the sunshine for another winning set of delicate heartbreakers. Four songs into Mountain Battles, Breeders singer/guitarist Kim Deal announces ...
Review by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 10 June 2008
SINCE 1984, when Jeff Lynne, Paul McCartney and Dave Edmunds helped The Everly Brothers launch their comeback with the album EB '84, a certain kind ...
Johnny Cash: Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison (Legacy Edition)
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, October 2008
IN THE DOCUMENTARY included with this new edition of Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, daughter Rosanne shatters the mythology surrounding her dad, gently bringing him ...
Ryan Adams & The Cardinals: Cardinology
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 28 October 2008
I'VE NEVER UNDERSTOOD the fuss over Ryan Adams' prolificacy. Each of his nine previous albums has its own distinct identity, from his 2000 solo debut ...
Radiohead: Pablo Honey, The Bends, OK Computer (reissues)
Retrospective by Mark Kemp, Paste, 27 March 2009
WHILE THE BRITISH PRESS argued over whether Oasis' Definitely Maybe or Blur's Parklife would be the savior of mid-'90s U.K. rock, Radiohead sneaked a spanner ...
The Dap-Kings, Sharon Jones: Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings: I Learned the Hard Way
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 6 April 2010
SHARON JONES WAS BRIMMING with promise as a kid in church choirs in the 1960s, as she bounced back and forth between her birth city ...
Bright Eyes, Conor Oberst: Conor Oberst — Catching Up With... Bright Eyes
Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 23 February 2011
AFTER A LENGTHY FOUR-YEAR HIATUS from the band that launched his career, Conor Oberst has reunited with his longtime Bright Eyes collaborators Mike Mogis and ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 1 March 2011
DEVOTCHKA'S FIFTH STUDIO LP, 100 Lovers, begins with a gorgeously moody and cinematic wash of synths, strings and piano seeping forth as if water through ...
J Mascis: Several Shades of Why
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 21 March 2011
IT'S HARD TO BELIEVE THAT — after 25 years of squalling guitar rock with Dinosaur Jr and a slew of other bands (from The Fog ...
Those Darlins: Screws Get Loose
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 29 March 2011
WHETHER YOU THOUGHT they were a quirky-obnoxious novelty act or a gang of infinitely charming, boots-are-made-for-rockin' Americana party girls, forget your initial impression of Those ...
Jill Scott: The Light of the Sun
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 27 June 2011
JILL SCOTT REPRESENTS the modern thinking woman's evolved boho grit and dreams. Not one to buy into the fairy tales, she refuses to surrender the ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 28 June 2011
"GRINDSTONES AND RHINESTONES, that made up my life," Dolly Parton writes on the driving 'The Sacrifice', a dobro-laced song about work ethic and commitment, "but ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 25 July 2011
SOUL CHILD JOSS STONE grew up going toe-to-toe and holding her own with some of classic R&B's finest, and that old soul presence made for ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 16 August 2011
GUY CLARK'S ALWAYS BEEN CHARMING, and that easy graciousness can obscure the exacting quality of his writing. Few can split a moment open with such ...
Retrospective by Steven R Rosen, Paste, 22 August 2011
WHEN DON MCLEAN'S "American Pie" was released in late 1971, everyone tried to analyze what he meant by "the day the music died." McLean was ...
Robert Earl Keen: Ready For Confetti
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 30 August 2011
SOMEWHERE IN THE GULF between Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Rodney Crowell and Lyle Lovett and next wave Lone Stars Pat Green, Jack Ingram, Stoney ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 14 September 2011
WHEN NEW WAVE ERUPTED on the back-end of punk, there was Blondie, all crisp beats, silent screen star peroxide beauty and a sense of '50s ...
The Decemberists: Long Live The King
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 31 October 2011
WITH THE DECEMBERISTS, it's a safe bet that somewhere between the post-Brit-folk of Fairport Convention and Morrissey's darkness, leader Colin Meloy will emerge with a ...
Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 23 November 2011
"FIONA MADE ME CLEAN OUT THE GARAGE," John Prine confesses with a chuckle that's equal parts warm breeze, cold beer and fried chicken. "I cursed ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 10 January 2012
WHEN THEIR FIRST HOMEMADE CASSETTE came out in Japan in 1982, who woulda thought that Shonen Knife would still be around, making records and touring ...
Chuck Prophet: Temple Beautiful
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 8 February 2012
NOT SINCE LOU REED paid homage to the city and era that forged him with New York has there been a song cycle dedicated to ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 29 February 2012
SOMEWHERE BETWEEN Leonard Cohen and Bob Wills lies the Promised Land inhabited by Lyle Lovett, who balances elegantly broken romanticism with loose-jointed swing that shuffles ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 4 April 2012
TO LIVE AND BREATHE in the sketchiest part of the Quarter...to hustle and flow, to let go... to get saved and find a funky kind ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 April 2012
IT'S BEEN SEVEN YEARS since Bonnie Raitt released Souls Alike, and a lot of life has happened. Losing her parents, brother and a best friend ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 April 2012
"I'M STILL GONE and it's all the same/ I'm taking notes and naming names…" snarls Nanci Griffith on the churlish, Pogues-evoking-the-Everlys 'Hell No, I'm Not ...
Rufus Wainwright: Out of the Game
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 May 2012
FEW PEOPLE TWIST the opposing aesthetics of lush and stark with the dexterity of Rufus Wainwright, the chanteuse with the steady aim on broken hearts ...
Alejandro Escovedo: Big Station
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 June 2012
WITH A BRAZEN SWAGGER drawn from Alejandro Escovedo's punk roots, the 61-year-old songwriter/yowler declares, "I can take a punch, I can take a swing…" on ...
Kelly Hogan: I Like to Keep Myself in Pain
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 6 June 2012
WHEN KELLY HOGAN'S last solo record was released, Ground Zero was still smoldering in Manhattan. More than a decade has slipped by since then, but ...
Crazy Horse, Neil Young: Neil Young and Crazy Horse: Americana
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 June 2012
ONLY NEIL YOUNG could take the campfire chestnut 'Oh, Susannah' and turn it into something that demands The Frug. But Young opens Americana, his folk'n'protest ...
Report and Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 11 June 2012
On the cusp of their 30th anniversary, the Godfathers of Grunge are too busy for nostalgia trips. Inside Atlanta's The Loft — a barely lit, industrial ...
Grace Potter & the Nocturnals: The Lion The Beast The Beat
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 19 June 2012
IT MUST BE FRUSTRATING to be Grace Potter. So much talent, such a fierce band, the kind of charisma that can't be taught, exuding sex ...
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 9 July 2012
IN 2009, Old Crow Medicine Show's Ketch Secor was half-listening to a National Public Radio story on Levi Barnard, an American soldier who had died ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 18 July 2012
THE MEMBERS OF BARONESS have always mixed in a little indie rock with their occasionally sludgy brand of prog metal. And they've always peppered their ...
Ariel Pink's Haunted Graffiti: Mature Themes
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 21 August 2012
WITH ALL THE BUZZ that's been building for him and his Haunted Graffiti bandmates over the last several years, this new record could have been ...
Rickie Lee Jones: So Many Roads
Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 27 August 2012
OVER UNDERSTATED, PERCUSSIVE ACOUSTIC GUITAR and the barely-there, spectral drone of an ancient organ, the voice of Rickie Lee Jones seeps like water from a ...
Alanis Morissette: Havoc & Bright Lights
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 28 August 2012
WHEN BARELY POST-ADOLESCENT Alanis Morissette exploded spewing vitrol and bodily fluids with her raging accusation of the spurned, 'You Oughta Know' from the mega-hit Jagged ...
Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 12 September 2012
THE RAVEONETTES' LATEST, Observator, was supposed to be an L.A. record. Gearing up to write for it, frontman Sune Rose Wagner blasted The Doors on ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 18 September 2012
A CASCADING BASS LINE that evokes the work of Motown's James Jamerson, all fat, swollen and narcotically melodic, opens 3 Pears, Dwight Yoakam's return to ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 19 September 2012
THIS ALBUM is full of horrible, heartbreaking things. Things that happen not just to bad people but good people, too. Of course, by the time ...
Bettye LaVette: Thankful N' Thoughtful
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 25 September 2012
BETTYE LAVETTE'S VOICE, sanded raw and consumed by emotion, is a powerful witness: strong, down and above all, real. Those attributes infuse Thankful N' Thoughtful ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 25 September 2012
OVER THE SPAN of 10 years and four albums, The Whigs have simmered their energetic, overdriven, no-frills rock sound to its potent essence. It's been ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 2 October 2012
ALL THE WAY BACK to Y Kan't Tori Read, Tori Amos has always been the feral Kate Bush — slightly more muscular, possibly more grounded ...
Wanda Jackson: Unfinished Business
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 9 October 2012
WITH A VOICE LIKE A CHAINSAW swallowed by a little girl, Wanda Jackson's brand of "shake 'em up, baby" is as kitten-with-a-whip as ever. The ...
Bob Dylan: The Curmudgeon: Interpreting Lyrics
Column by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 13 November 2012
A QUICK SURFING run through the blogosphere confirms that the Dylanologists are already poring over Bob Dylan's lyrics from Tempest as if the bloggers were ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 4 December 2012
WITH A FEW CAREFULLY CONSIDERED piano notes, 'De Novo Adagio' reminds fans of soul diva Alicia Keys' classical roots and sets the stage for an ...
Camper Van Beethoven, Cracker: Camper Van Beethoven: California Dreamin'
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 22 January 2013
DAVID LOWERY is the lead singer and chief lyricist for two well-known rock bands: Camper Van Beethoven, which he co-founded in 1983, and Cracker, which ...
Adele, Whitney Houston, Taylor Swift: Divas and Anti-Divas
Overview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 22 January 2013
ACCORDING TO the Nielsen SoundScan, the bestselling album of 2012 was Adele's 21, which sold 4.4 million copies, followed by Taylor Swift's Red, which sold ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 February 2013
HOLLY WILLIAMS HAS WRASSLED all kinds of mainstream Nashville fringe: hippie country, postmodern country, even "kinda sorta" country. But all those records from the Nordic ...
Kris Kristofferson: Feeling Mortal
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 February 2013
AT 76, KRIS KRISTOFFERSON is one of Americana's true icons. A witness to old-school hillbilly music, rock's excess, punk's rebellion and modern country, the Rhodes ...
Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris: Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell: Friendship Aged Like Bluebird Wine
Profile and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 19 February 2013
WHEN GEORGE JONES asked Emmylou Harris to sing a duet with him on his 1979 album My Very Special Guests, she suggested a song by ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 19 February 2013
THE CONCEPT BEHIND Mark Kozelek's new record — take metal songs, punk songs, classic-rock and pop songs and deliver 'em slow and soft, accompanied only ...
Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris: Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell: Old Yellow Moon
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 27 February 2013
ON 'HANGING UP MY HEART' and Roger Miller's vintage 'Invitation To The Blues', Old Yellow Moon's opening tracks, Rodney Crowell and Emmylou Harris seem to ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 27 February 2013
NASHVILLE HAD NEVER quite heard the likes of The Mavericks, a Miami five-piece with a retro countrypolitan lean and a Cuban-American lead singer with a ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 March 2013
TO LOOK AT THE PRETTY GIRL in the sundress under the parasol, Ashley Monroe could be one more Southern belle looking for her place in ...
Kacey Musgraves: Same Trailer, Different Park
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 26 March 2013
KACEY MUSGRAVES, 23, sings unvarnished truths about being hooked on "Mary Kay, Mary Jane and Mary down the block," but she's maintained the sunniness that ...
Paul Williams and the Birth of Rock Criticism
Retrospective by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 16 April 2013
PAUL WILLIAMS, who died March 27, was the first music critic who ever made me think, "I want to do that." In some ways, Williams ...
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 3 May 2013
PATTY GRIFFIN was standing in a former South Austin church, now a private residence not far from her own home, and the rough-hewn roof beams, ...
Frank Ocean: New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, New Orleans
Live Review by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 5 May 2013
FRANK OCEAN has not only created a new kind of R&B album for the hip-hop era, but he's also creating a new kind of R&B ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 7 May 2013
WITH A BIT OF JUKE-JOINT loose blues strumming rising from a National guitar, Patty Griffin leans into 'Don't Let Me Die In Florida' with a ...
John Fogerty: Wrote A Song for Everyone
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 28 May 2013
JOHN FOGERTY'S GUESTS on Wrote A Song for Everyone may provide a pupu platter of genres, but the country/rock/progressive duet partners more often serve as ...
T Bone Burnett, John Mellencamp: T-Bone Burnett on Ghost Brothers of Darkland County
Review and Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 31 May 2013
"I DON'T HAVE ANY HOPES FOR IT," T Bone Burnett confesses about Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, the Stephen King/John Mellencamp collaborative play/performance experience he ...
Jason Isbell: The Highway Loves The Sin
Review and Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 June 2013
"I REMEMBER THAT PLACE being this mythical hellhole," Jason Isbell says quietly. He's not speaking of the addiction he's recently kicked, but the place of ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 25 June 2013
"SOME HOLY GHOST KEEPS ME HANGING ON," Mavis Staples intones over and over a loosely strummed acoustic guitar, world-weary yet resolved on the opening track ...
Robert Randolph & The Family Band: Lickety Split
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 16 July 2013
SINCE BURSTING into public consciousness, sacred steel prodigy Robert Randolph has straddled the worlds of the holy and the profane. On the jam band circuit, ...
Guy Clark: My Favorite Picture Of You
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 23 July 2013
AS HE ENTERS HIS 70TH YEAR, Guy Clark consolidates his standing as the eminence grise of Texas singer/songwriters with My Favorite Picture of You. A ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 23 July 2013
WITH A NOD to his wonderfully eclectic 1968 debut Song Cycle, legendary arranger/songwriter/producer Van Dyke Parks returns with the postcards from everywhere, Songs Cycled. Whether ...
Civil Wars, the: The Civil Wars: The Civil Wars
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 August 2013
PRESSURE MAKES DIAMONDS — or coal dust. For The Civil Wars, the triple Grammy-winners whose stark acoustica shook pop music, it created both. Amongst their ...
Robbie Fulks: Gone Away Backward
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 27 August 2013
ALWAYS THE CONTENTIOUS KIND, Robbie Fulks flexes the old Tareyton Cigarettes mode of doing business: "I'd rather fight than switch." To that end, he's remained ...
Janelle Monae: The Electric Lady
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 September 2013
AN ENNIO MORRICONE SONIC VISTA opens The Electric Lady, the sequel to Janelle Monae's The ArchAndroid, making its ambition obvious. Overture burning off, a tugging ...
Janelle Monáe: Imagining Her Own Future
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 10 September 2013
CINDI MAYWEATHER is the central character in Janelle Monáe's last three recordings: the 2008 EP Metropolis, the 2010 album The ArchAndroid, and this month's album, ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 September 2013
CIRCULAR ACOUSTIC GUITAR NOTES shower down as Richard Buckner's voice, a tad quavering and common enough to seem to sing for us all, rises from ...
Justin Timberlake: The 20/20 Experience : 2 of 2
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 October 2013
AFTER SEVEN YEARS, Justin Timberlake knew: The 20/20 Experience could be too much of a good thing. Keeping the focus sleek, its pop/soul songs come ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 October 2013
"DON'T YOU THINK that it's boring how people talk," Lorde hypnotically intones as Pure Heroine, her wildly anticipated debut opens on the confessional 'Tennis Court'. ...
Albert Hammond Jr.: Albert Hammond, Jr.: Chasing Greatness
Interview by Steve LaBate, Paste, 20 January 2014
IT'S BEEN 13 lucky years — count 'em — since The Strokes' epic garage- and post-punk-channeling debut provided an indispensable shot in the arm to ...
Rosanne Cash: The River & The Thread
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 21 January 2014
LIKE A GOOD claret or damp moss, Rosanne Cash's singing is something to sink into. Surrender to the tones – mostly dark, but marked by ...
Uncle Tupelo: No Depression Legacy Edition
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 28 January 2014
IN THE SUMMER OF 1990, somewhere in the puzzling chasm between lipstick-smeared hair-metal excess and flannel-clad grunge irony, Uncle Tupelo arrived on the scene like ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 4 February 2014
IT'S FRIDAY NIGHT. You and your friends roll up on the club. It has no sign — no flashing marquee to beckon you inside. It ...
Robert Ellis: The Lights from the Chemical Plant
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 11 February 2014
LIKE SAM SHEPARD, Robert Ellis understands the tenderness beneath the untamed's leathery exterior. Born and raised in Lake Jackson, Texas, recently relocated to nouveau hipster ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 April 2014
LEON RUSSELL'S VOICE sounds like parched earth, cracked and its essence crawled out: raw, blistering, molten to the touch and savory in all the right ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 April 2014
FROM SEAN WATKINS' FIRST commanding acoustic guitar strokes on 'The Rest of My Life', it's obvious Nickel Creek has grown up. Sister Sara Watkins' fiddle ...
Retrospective by Holly Gleason, Paste, 8 April 2014
WHEN EMMYLOU HARRIS MADE Wrecking Ball, the atmospheric meditation on the unbearable lightness of being, it appeared the diaphanous vocalist had been gate-checked by the ...
Jesse Winchester: An Appreciation
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 14 April 2014
FOR 10 YEARS, from 1967 to 1977, Jesse Winchester couldn't set foot in the United States, the nation where he had lived until he was ...
Eels: The Cautionary Tales of Mark Oliver Everett
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 22 April 2014
THERE'S AN INHERENT SOFT-FOCUS to Mark Everett's worldview. His jagged details scrape your flesh to the bone, but his bitterness or rancor is tempered with ...
Review by Steve LaBate, Paste, 22 April 2014
FROM THE VERY FIRST 'Sweat Leaf'-channeling fuzz riff, there's no question what's being "dropped" on this latest dispatch from prolific San Francisco garage-psych veterans Thee ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 May 2014
IF LANA DEL RAY HAD PORES, bodily fluids or even the rare hair out of place, she might be Nikki Lane, the East Nashville firebrand ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 13 May 2014
BEFORE DOLLY PARTON was country music's Mae West, she was a crystal-voiced songwriter who captured Appalachia's tiniest moments like fireflies in a jar. On Blue ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 14 June 2014
FOR A WOMAN with a voice like an open (if rough-edged) straight razor, Chrissie Hynde chose a smooth retro-pop vein to slash into for her ...
Old Crow Medicine Show: Remedy
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 July 2014
WITH 'BRUSHY MOUNTAIN CONJUGAL TRAILER', Remedy's dobro-dripping opener, Old Crow Medicine Show offers a salty, bawdy bit of old-time music basted with tangy strummin' and ...
John Hiatt: Terms of My Surrender
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 15 July 2014
"SOMETIMES LOVE CAN BE SO WRONG/ Like a fat man in a thong/ It walks shamelessly away," John Hiatt intones over the sauntering acoustic blues ...
Robert Plant: lullaby and...The Ceaseless Roar
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 9 September 2014
CINEMATIC. ORGANIC. DERVISH. Delta. Industrial. Celtic. Tribal. Gypsy. Yearning. Thrilling. The words to describe lullaby and…The Ceaseless Roar, Robert Plant's 10th solo album, are endless. ...
Stevie Nicks: 24 Karat Gold: Songs from the Vault
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 15 October 2014
LISTENING TO 24 Karat Gold is like being caught in a time warp. Then is now, now is then, and the listener feels confronted by ...
Jackson Browne: Standing In The Breach
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 28 October 2014
"IT'S NEVER BEEN THAT HARD to buy a gun/Now they'll sell a Glock 19 to just about anyone," muses Jackson Browne midway through 'The Long ...
Ian McLagan: Remembering Ian McLagan
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 5 December 2014
IN JUNE, IAN McLagan told The Austin Chronicle, his hometown paper since 1994, that he would be going out on tour in 2015 with the ...
The Band, Bob Dylan: Bob Dylan: Basement Tapes and Free-Floating Stanzas
Retrospective by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 16 December 2014
BOB DYLAN HAS been much in the press lately thanks to the release of the six-CD box set, The Basement Tapes Complete and of The ...
D'Angelo and the Vanguard: Black Messiah
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 30 December 2014
AT MIDNIGHT ON DEC. 15, 14 years dissolved. One key-stroke, and the mythic follow-up to D'Angelo's Voodoo could be yours. Luxurious, raw, crashed-up, silky, a ...
Justin Townes Earle: Light at the End of the Tunnel
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 13 January 2015
JUSTIN TOWNES EARLE released Single Mothers, one of the best albums of 2014, just four months ago in September. This week he's back with another ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 February 2015
ON THE LAMENTING 'Pardon Me', Raul Malo's voice extends on the final word of a particularly lonesome "life I chose to lead", and it somehow ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 17 February 2015
ON THE RANDY, low-flying Stones-evoking 'Go Go Boots Are Back,' Steve Earle scrapes the same guttural rock 'n' roll that made 'Copperhead Road' so compelling. ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 3 March 2015
IF LENA DUNHAM is her generation's bullseye for narcissistic neurosis, then Lilly Hiatt is the Gen X/Y femme intellectuelle who uses hurt, doubt and self-knowledge ...
Sleater-Kinney: Punk Lyrics: Shortening The Line
Comment by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 4 March 2015
A LOT OF GOOD THINGS are happening on Sleater-Kinney's first album in ten years, but I want to talk about one aspect that often gets ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 11 May 2015
IF 2011'S SELF-PRODUCED, self-released Revelation Road was Shelby Lynne leveling and exorcising the ghosts of her past, I Can't Imagine harvests the remaining sweetness of ...
Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 11 May 2015
"AS I STAND HERE TALKING TO YOU," Shelby Lynne confesses, on the phone from her Palm Springs home, "I have no clothes on. I can ...
Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris: Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell: The Traveling Kind
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 26 May 2015
IF OLD YELLOW MOON, Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell's first-ever duet album, felt like old friends catching up and remembering old times, The Traveling Kind ...
Kopecky: Drug for the Modern Age
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 28 May 2015
FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE KOPECKY FAMILY BAND, this Nashville sextet brings an eyes-open approach to the world of hooking up, checking out, disappearing into technology ...
Kacey Musgraves: Pageant Material
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 23 June 2015
"I'VE HAD MY PICTURE MADE with Willie Nelson/Stayed in a hotel with a pool," Kacey Musgraves trills early on Pageant Material, "Slept in a room ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 30 June 2015
IF JOY WILLIAMS weren't the distaff half of the Grammy-winning Civil Wars, Venus might play like a late 20th century single-sex college's elite women's studies ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 7 July 2015
VERUCA SALT BURST ONTO THE SCENE a caterwauling ball of sonic combustion, clawing, sneering, scratching with American Thighs in 1994. Named for Roald Dahl's tantrum-throwing ...
Joss Stone: Water For Your Soul
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 14 July 2015
JOSS STONE, modern queen of the timeless old-school soul, has propelled herself into a project merging hip hop, reggae, world music and R&B. Her tenure ...
Watkins Family Hour: Watkins Family Hour
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 14 July 2015
OFTEN COLLABORATIONS of wildly talented people fall short of the pieces, or force an outcome that feels designed to an end. For the Watkins Family ...
Jason Isbell: Making the Ordinary Exceptional
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 21 July 2015
JASON ISBELL'S new album Something More Than Free had to be different from his last one. Southeastern, his 2013 release, was born out of the ...
Grace Potter: Anything But Nocturnal
Review and Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 11 August 2015
GRACE POTTER SQUEALS midway through her last interview of the day. The mention of Donna Summer's street opera Bad Girls hits a nerve, and the ...
Ashley Monroe, Kacey Musgraves: The Ladies Used to Love Outlaws, Now The Ladies Are Outlaws
Report by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 1 September 2015
"LADIES LOVE OUTLAWS," Waylon Jennings sang in 1972, "like babies love stray dogs." Jennings was boasting. He presented himself as a desperado and would soon ...
Keith Richards: Crosseyed Heart
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 15 September 2015
AS ROCK'S ENDURING PIRATE, Keith Richards embodies swagger, sangfroid and a certain delicious naughtiness. More than the Stones themselves, the guitarist exudes a dirt 'n' ...
Bikini Kill: Revolution Girl Style Now
Retrospective by Holly Gleason, Paste, 1 October 2015
BEFORE THE INTERNET'S UBIQUITY, the 140-character Twitterverse and more, DIY punk meant hanging your own flyers and hand-stapled fanzines. In 1991, Bikini Kill — a ...
Patty Griffin: Servant of Love
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 4 October 2015
"AMBULANCE DRIVERS and grave diggers/Mislaid fortunes grown bigger and bigger/Polar ice caps below and above/Conquered and claimed and ruined for love," Patty Griffin's porous, earthy ...
Allen Toussaint: He Played Something Sweet, Something Funky
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 11 November 2015
ALLEN TOUSSAINT, who died Monday in Madrid of an apparent heart attack, was arguably the greatest songwriter/producer to ever come out of New Orleans. He ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 20 November 2015
ANTICIPATION'S A BITCH. For Adele, whose bajillion-selling 21 (okay, not a bajillion, but 30 million worldwide) proved emotional exorcism is its own commercial reward, how ...
Lucinda Williams: The Ghosts of Highway 20
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 5 February 2016
IN THE LATE '80S, Lucinda Williams emerged as the patron saint of busted love and broken dreams. Lucinda Williams and Sweet Old World established her ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 February 2016
LISSIE, IN MANY WAYS, is emblematic of the millennial/post-millennial generation's golden promise: follow your dream, work social media, find believers, win! Moving to California, her ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 4 March 2016
BONNIE RAITT HAS ALWAYS BEEN a pilot light, powering hard love, broken love, lost love and yes, unrequited love. In the valley of the unfulfilled ...
Guy Clark: Remembering Guy Clark, The Craftsman
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 18 May 2016
GUY CLARK'S favorite place was the basement of his West Nashville home, where he painstakingly hand-built flamenco guitars and hand-built songs with the same exacting ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 19 May 2016
BEFORE STURGILL SIMPSON or Chris Stapleton, there was Robbie Fulks: a hardcore alt-country sensation, writing subversive songs like his Nashville anti-Valentine 'Fuck This Town', 'She ...
Percy Mayfield: The Poet of the Blues
Retrospective by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 3 June 2016
WHO IS THE most underrated songwriter of the rock 'n' roll era? Percy Mayfield. ...
Bonnie Bishop: Ain't Who I Was
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 June 2016
HOLLOW BASS CASCADING over a sunken groove, slinky guitar etching the melody and a palpable humidity establish 'Show A Little Mercy' as a satiny ribbon ...
Live Review by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 8 August 2016
"I WILL NOT commit nor will I submit to musical genocide," Gregory Porter sang Saturday afternoon at the 11th annual Summer Spirit Festival. ...
Drive-By Truckers Walk the Bloody Streets
Review and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 27 September 2016
With the election just over a month away, the band puts out its most political album yet. ...
Leon Russell: Remembering Leon Russell
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 15 November 2016
RIGHT AFTER LEON RUSSELL graduated from Will Rogers High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1959, the young musician had to make a decision. Should the ...
Sharon Jones: Remembering the Transformative Sharon Jones
Obituary by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 22 November 2016
WHEN SHARON JONES sang at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in April, the blue-and-white fringe on her sequined dress never stopped swaying. The ...
NRBQ: The Disappearing Art of Bar Band Music
Retrospective by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 20 February 2017
THE 1978 ALBUM NRBQ at Yankee Stadium boasts a delightful visual joke. ...
Rhiannon Giddens: Freedom Highway
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 20 February 2017
ALWAYS AMBITIOUS, Americana/traditional folk artist Rhiannon Giddens uses Freedom Highway, her second solo album, for a contemporary end: tracing the roots of the BlackLivesMatter movement ...
Valerie June Wants to Be Set Free
Profile and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 17 March 2017
'GOT SOUL' is the final track on The Order of Time, Valerie June's long-awaited follow-up to her 2013 breakthrough album, Pushin' Against a Stone. The ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 21 March 2017
GROWING UP IS HARD TO DO. Growing up a wunderkind in public — your youth commodified as a talisman of sensitive youth — creates an ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 27 March 2017
FOR A SONG CYCLE that turns around death and mortality, Rodney Crowell's Close Ties is a decidedly jubilant affair. Co-produced by Kim Buie and Jordan ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 6 April 2017
IN THE SEVEN YEARS since Karen Elson's The Ghost Who Walks, there have been glimpses of the woman who was to emerge on Double Roses. ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 19 May 2017
LIKE A FAVORITE CHAIR, it's easy to take Ani DiFranco for granted. Always there, always as expected, always comfortable/satisfying in her execution, it's easy to ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 22 May 2017
STRIP AWAY THE SOPRANOS, the Underground Garage, the bandana-clad Springsteen sidekick role, the hyper-political Sun City all-star single and what you get is a true ...
Justin Townes Earle: Kids In The Street
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 23 May 2017
OTHER THAN THE CLASSIC Western shuffle 'What's She Crying For', with its piano sprinkles and steel guitar swerves, Kids In The Street marks the emancipation ...
Review and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 9 June 2017
CHUCK BERRY WAS one of our nation's great writers. In fact, it's puzzling that the Library of America hasn't yet turned his collected lyrics, poetry ...
Shelby Lynne, Allison Moorer: Shelby Lynne & Allison Moorer: Not Dark Yet
Review by Jon Young, Paste, 16 August 2017
IT'S BEEN A LONG TIME COMING. Though Shelby Lynne and her younger sister, Allison Moorer, have released a slew of solo records between them since ...
Comment by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 15 November 2017
Even as the tools of popular music evolve further from the analog to the digital, the spirit of the rock 'n' roll is as dangerous ...
Retrospective by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 21 November 2017
WHEN THE FOLLOWERS of Charles Manson murdered Sharon Tate, the pregnant movie-actress wife of movie director Roman Polanski, on Aug. 9, 1969, it was Plan ...
The Decemberists: I'll Be Your Girl
Review and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 13 March 2018
They could have gone into hyperdrive after the success of 2011's The King Is Dead. Instead, they receded from view for years and came back ...
Bettye LaVette Takes Bob Dylan Where He's Never Been Before
Profile and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 27 March 2018
On her new album, Things Have Changed, the great American soul singer reminds us just how fruitful reinvented songs can be in the right hands. ...
Profile and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 9 April 2018
A career spent blending sunny pop and punk aggression finds its ideal source material in Hatfield's childhood music heroine. ...
David Bromberg: A City Helps Out a Musician, and Vice Versa
Report and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 15 June 2018
Big Noise Festival is a public celebration of David Bromberg's contributions to the city of Wilmington, Del. ...
J.J. Cale, Leon Russell: Tulsa, Oklahoma, and the Legacy of Leon Russell and J.J. Cale
Retrospective and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 16 April 2019
THREE OF THE most prominent shapers of the Tulsa Sound have died over the past six years: J.J. Cale in 2013, Leon Russell in 2016 and the ...
Fontaines DC: The Sons of Lou Are Playing a Velvet Guitar
Profile by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 11 September 2019
IN THE 1960s, when groundbreaking songwriters such as Bob Dylan, John Lennon and Paul Simon were all working within the romantic tradition, Lou Reed stood out ...
Chrissie Hynde, The Pretenders: Chrissie Hynde Plumbs the Difference Between Alone and Lonely
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 11 August 2020
CHRISSIE HYNDE doesn't want to talk about songwriting. The Pretenders' lead singer and rhythm guitarist for the for 42 years has written some remarkable songs: ...
Memoir by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 29 October 2020
Wacko from Waco and Poet Laureate of the Honky Tonks ...
The Hold Steady: Craig Finn's Characters Are Growing Up
Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 19 February 2021
THIS MONTH WILL SEE THE RELEASE of two Hold Steady-related albums. The band's eighth studio album, Open Door Policy, will be released in all formats ...
Valerie June: The Curmudgeon: Valerie June Multiplies Her Voice
Profile and Interview by Geoffrey Himes, Paste, 20 April 2021
VALERIE JUNE's terrific new album, The Moon and Stars: Prescriptions for Dreamers, opens with echoing, broken acoustic-piano chords – the sound of a small, wooden, ...
Ryan Adams & The Cardinals: Jacksonville City Nights
Review by Mark Kemp, Paste, 2022
RYAN ADAMS got his PhD in bad behavior from decrepit old Rock 'n' Roll University, where he studied all the greats: Keith Richards, Bob Dylan, ...
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