Holly Gleason
Holly Gleason is a Nashville-based writer who has written for Rolling Stone, Spin, Musician, Paste, Tower Pulse, Request, Rockbill, Bam, The Illinois Entertainer, Interview, Rock & Soul and Graffiti (Canada). She specializes in songwriters, roots music, country, some r&b and very early rap.
159 articles
List of articles in the library
Review by Holly Gleason, Musician, April 1988
LYLE LOVETT represents a new voice in Nashville: the quirky country songwriter who believes that even cowboys get the blues. Consequently, this Texan's viewpoint can ...
k.d. lang: Shadowland: The Owen Bradley Sessions (Sire)
Review by Holly Gleason, Musician, July 1988
LISTENING TO Shadowland, k.d. lang's second album, you can't help thinking you've fallen into a time warp, back to when Patsy Cline ruled the radio. ...
Report and Interview by Holly Gleason, Billboard, 16 July 1988
LOS ANGELES — With the success of Dwight Yoakam's gold albums (Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. and Hillbilly Deluxe), producer Pete Anderson has found a beachhead ...
Interview by Holly Gleason, Spin, August 1988
IT'S A SLOW night at the Redwood Room, a shot-and-beer North Hollywood hole in the wall where blue collar types, in heavy work boots and ...
Merle Haggard: Long Gone Train
Interview by Holly Gleason, Spin, September 1988
Merle Haggard's gone from hopping freights and serving time to being country music's strongest and truest voice. He's never looked back. But he's never forgotten ...
Dwight Yoakam: Buenos Noches From A Lonely Room
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 20 October 1988
SINCE FOCUSING the public eye on his archival brand of country music with Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. two years ago, Dwight Yoakam has been good ...
Michelle Shocked: Short, Sharp, Talented
Profile and Interview by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 3 November 1988
Is country-folk singer Michelle Shocked ready for stardom? ...
Steve Earle: A Bad Boy Settles Down
Report and Interview by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 26 January 1989
STEVE EARLE recently released his third album, Copperhead Road, and married his fifth wife, Teresa. Considering that last New Year's Day found him in a ...
Lyle Lovett: Lyle Lovett and His Large Band (MCA/Curb) ****
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 9 February 1989
LYLE LOVETT has always been a little bit schizophrenic. A Nashville musician with big-band leanings, Lovett has somehow managed to gracefully walk the line between ...
Cowboy Junkies Shoot For Success
Interview by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 9 March 1989
NASHVILLE'S BLUEBIRD CAFE is packed for the local debut of the Cowboy Junkies. The Canadian bands lethargic cover of 'Sweet Jane' has been talked up ...
Guy Clark: Old Friends (Sugar Hill) ***½
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 9 March 1989
THIS IS THE first album in five years by Guy dark, one of the deans of Texas songwriting. Like his previous work, Old Friends evokes ...
Tanita Tikaram: Ancient Heart (Reprise)
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 23 March 1989
AS HER album title suggests, Tanita Tikaram possesses an old soul. There's a worldliness to her work that belies her nineteen years, as she writes ...
Randy Newman: Coach House, San Juan Capistrano, CA
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 18 May 1989
Old Four Eyes Is Back ...
The Bangles: Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, Los Angeles CA
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 15 June 1989
Heroines Take a Fall ...
Cindy Lee Berryhill: Naked Movie Star (Rhino)
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 29 June 1989
CINDY LEE Berryhill comes across as a mixture of beat poet, street waif and social gadfly — a dangerous combination that threatens to slide into ...
k.d. lang: k.d.lang: Absolute Torch and Twang
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 13 July 1989
Absolute Torch and Twang – the third major-label LP by Canadian chanteuse K.D. Lang and the second with her band the Reclines – splits the ...
Clint Black: Killin' Time (MCA) ***½
Review by Holly Gleason, Rolling Stone, 24 August 1989
IN TODAY'S brave new Nashville, artists fall into neat categories: the docile crooners, like Randy Travis and George Strait, who sing pretty and pretty much ...
Linda Ronstadt: Ronstadt's Rainstorm Of Emotion
Interview by Holly Gleason, CD Review, March 1990
LINDA RONSTADT enters the press room at a trade magazine's office in Los Angeles with her five-person entourage, and immediately manages to find familiar territory ...
Interview by Holly Gleason, Hits, 9 July 1990
AN EXCLUSIVE HITS INTERVIEW WITH TRAVIS TRITT BY HOLLY GLEASON ...
Garth Brooks: In Pieces (Liberty 80857; CD and cassette)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 26 September 1993
A Megastar for Everyman ...
Billy Joe Shaver: Tramp on Your Street (Zoo/Praxis 72445-11063; CD and cassette)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 3 October 1993
AT A TIME when country music has been reduced to an arena-ready formula, Billy Joe Shaver is a blotch on the horizon. Unapologetically raw, the ...
Reba McEntire: Read My Mind (MCA 10994; CD and cassette)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 12 June 1994
NOBODY TRICK ropes vocally like Reba McEntire. With stunning control, she can twirl, curl and throw a loop around a melody better than anyone. ...
Shawn Colvin: Cover Girl (Columbia 57875; CD and cassette.)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 20 November 1994
COVER GIRL, the singer-songwriter Shawn Colvin's third album, seems like a cop-out. The silvery-voiced troubadour has earned critical praise for her emotionally incisive lyrics. Yet ...
Veruca Salt: American Thighs (Minty Fresh/DGC; CD and cassette)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 19 February 1995
THE ONLY buzz louder than the feedback-laden guitars on Veruca Salt's American Thighs is the hype surrounding the Chicago-based foursome. This alternative rock group is ...
Linda Ronstadt: Feels Like Home (Elektra; CD and cassette)
Review by Holly Gleason, The New York Times, 9 April 1995
Linda Ronstadt Comes Full Circle ...
Buddy and Julie Miller: Buddy & Julie Miller: Buddy & Julie Miller
Review by Holly Gleason, Cleveland Free Times, 2001
WHAT IS THE sound of marriage hardfought, hardscrabble, hardwon? Is it Yoko Ono's dissonant shrieking? Trent Reznor's most post-ndustrial cacophony? Or the ruminations on various ...
Jimmy Webb, Paul Williams: Jimmy Webb/Paul Williams: Feinstein's at the Regency, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Joe's Garage, 17 November 2001
WHEN YOU PUT Paul Williams and Jimmy Webb in a room, you basically have the collective soundtrack of the late '60s and '70s in pop ...
Ooooh Las Vegas! 37 Stories, and It's All Out There…
Essay by Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, 24 November 2001
Country music publicist Holly Gleason spends a night in Sin City – and comes to terms with the celebrity frenzy that is pop's new American ...
Essay by Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, 16 September 2002
THERE IT WAS ONE DAY – propped against my doorway in West Hollywood – a plain brown cardboard box like so many others. Anonymous. Almost ...
Aerosmith: Starwood Amphitheatre, Tennessee
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, October 2002
"EVERY DAY, I LOOK in the mirror/ All these lines in my face gettin' clearer/ The past is gone..." It is a benediction, an acceptance, ...
Warren Zevon: The French Inhaler Hastens Down The Wind: Warren Zevon Learns To Let Go
Essay by Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, October 2002
THERE'S THAT THING called friend-of-a-friend, where you're "in" even before you know about the other person. And so it was with Warren Zevon, produced by ...
Obituary by Phast Phreddie Patterson, Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, December 2002
PHAST PHREDDIE PATTERSON and HOLLY GLEASON pay tribute ...
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 30 April 2007
YOU HAVE TO start at the end – where they paid respects to Townes Van Zandt, the songwriter/compadre who captured the essence of life after ...
Steve Forbert: Strange Names & New Sensations
Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 31 May 2007
WHEN 'ROMEO'S TUNE' bubbled out of late '70s car radios, it was a wide-eyed kid from the small-town south trying to get the girl with ...
Lori McKenna: Dreams of an Everyday Housewife
Profile and Interview by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 31 August 2007
LORI MCKENNA has always loved the same boy. She first laid eyes on him in third grade. They started dating in their junior year, married ...
Kathy Mattea: Station Inn, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Harp, March 2008
IT'S AMAZING how expansive Kathy Mattea's old leaves and fall rainwater alto can be. With just a few acoustic guitar notes cascading around her on ...
k.d. lang: kd lang: Kravis Center, West Palm Beach, FL
Live Review by Holly Gleason, Harp, March 2008
KD LANG WALKED onstage, guitar on her back and glided effortlessly into 'Upstream', a song about the nature of life, the struggle of human nature ...
Interview by Holly Gleason, American Songwriter, 2 January 2009
HE IS sitting right there on the sidewalk, eating red snapper, heavy-lidded eyes taking in the world around him and engaging with the various people ...
Nashville Cats: David Briggs Reflects at the Country Music Hall of Fame
Report by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 26 March 2011
Nashville Cats: David Briggs at Ford Theatre, Country Music Hall of Fame, Nashville, TN ...
Bobby Keys: The Bobby Keys Band: Mercy Lounge, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 3 May 2011
THERE ARE FEW musicians synonymous with an oeuvre or a sound, yet Bobby Keys pretty much defines rock & roll saxophone, especially of the Rolling ...
Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 13 May 2011
I SHOULDN'T be writing this. It's not right. ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 17 May 2011
WITH A DESCENDING CIRCULAR FLOURISH of acoustic guitar notes, the bluegrass influence on Follow Me Down is evident, but the almost weightlessness suggests something else, ...
Jimmie Dale Gilmore and the Wronglers: Beachland Ballroom, Cleveland
Live Review by Holly Gleason, nodepression.com, 21 June 2011
THEY CALL IT Heirloom Music, going so far as to make it the title of their first collaborative recording; but for Jimmie Dale Gilmore and ...
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, 30 June 2011
WHEN YOU'RE BEYONCÉ KNOWLES, machining the sheets of throbbing summer singles — muscular anthems that merge thick modern R&B, hip-hop-inflected beats and enough female-empowerment lyric ...
The World's Oldest Teenager: Remembering Jane Scott
Obituary by Holly Gleason, Los Angeles Times blogs, 4 July 2011
SHE WAS LIKE Andy Warhol: iconic blond hair set in a most determined pageboy that never moved. That, and red oversized glasses. You couldn't miss ...
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 ...
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 ...
Profile and Interview by Holly Gleason, Relix, 9 September 2011
TWO JUBILANT kids are dancing amid a gaggle of homegrown hippie girls in the wings of the Savannah Civic Center in Georgia. The Civic has ...
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 ...
Betty Wright and the Roots: Betty Wright: The Movie
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 17 November 2011
"SOME PEOPLE think it's an untouchable subject, but I like to touch the untouchable," says Betty Wright as her organic roots funk Betty Wright: The ...
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 Holly Gleason, Paste, 2 February 2012
WHEN YOU CALL Grammy-winning producer John Chelew, the man behind John Hiatt's career-resurrecting Bring The Family, you've got to want to be real. Thankfully, Ruthie ...
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 ...
Earl Scruggs Passes On: Three Fingers, Hippie Kids + A Grace That's Felt 'Round The World
Memoir by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 28 March 2012
I'LL NEVER LOOK at the Waffle House the same way. The one out by the Assault & Battery Lane exit, 65 South out of Nashville, ...
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 ...
Donna Summer: Last Dance... and Gone
Memoir by Holly Gleason, Rock's Backpages, 17 May 2012
IN THAT FLOOD of ebony hair, there was always that one gardenia. Floating on top of the satiny waves of almost-porn star mane, it spoke ...
Alan Jackson: 30 Miles West, and Movin'
Profile and Interview by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 30 May 2012
"So here I am on my stool tonight Yeah, I'm practicing for the afterlife, Cause when I'm nothing but a pile of bones I'm gonna ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 26 June 2012
MINDY SMITH'S MUSIC — at its best — is like a papercut: painful to the point of making you wince, yet somehow so compellingly bracing, ...
Jackson Browne: Cain Park, Cleveland
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 20 August 2012
FOR JACKSON BROWNE, like James Taylor, a summer stop in Cleveland, Ohio is like the swallows returning to Capistrano. Throughout the '70s, the socially conscious ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 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 ...
Connie Smith: Honoring Connie Smith: 45 RPM at Douglas Corner, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 7 November 2012
FOR THOSE WHO believe real country music has fled Nashville, the recent CMA Awards would do little to ease your notion. Bombast, smoke, lasers and ...
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 ...
Ben Bullington, Rodney Crowell: Rodney Crowell, Ben Bullington and More: Station Inn, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 7 December 2012
BEN BULLINGTON had never played Nashville. The Montana doctor who'd lovingly crafted three albums thick with simple details and a voice that has a warm ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 15 January 2013
WITH A LOUCHE SAUNTER and a thick, descending ripple of horn punctuations, Erin McKeown opens her first self-released album with a high-ironic colonic that skewers ...
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: 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 ...
Jim Lauderdale, Buddy Miller: Buddy Miller and Jim Lauderdale: Mercy Lounge, Nashville
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 7 March 2013
BUDDY MILLER and Jim Lauderdale have been friends so long, making a record seemed almost beside the point. They've played in each other's band, recorded ...
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 ...
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 ...
Live Review by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 3 June 2013
AMERICANA – as the big tent pitched by the Americana Music Association – is its own conundrum. Drawing an audience that's decidedly 30+, it embraces ...
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 Monáe: The Electric Lady
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 10 September 2013
AN ENNIO MORRICONE sonic vista opens The Electric Lady, the sequel to Janelle Monáe's The ArchAndroid, making its ambition obvious. Overture burning off, a tugging ...
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'. ...
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 ...
Matraca Berg: The Daughter of Music Row
Retrospective and Interview by Holly Gleason, Oxford American, 22 January 2014
A SLIGHT, YOUNG brunette stood alone in a navy Richard Tyler slip on the Opry House stage, backed by a pianist and a string quartet, ...
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 ...
Charlie Pickett: My Friend Charlie: Real Life, Raw Rock & the Impossible Gulf In Between
Retrospective by Holly Gleason, hollygleason.com, 14 February 2014
MY FRIEND CHARLIE used to be a rock star, only I didn't know him then. Maybe I interviewed him once, at WVUM — "the Voice of ...
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 ...
Nickel Creek: Celebrating the Now
Profile and Interview by Holly Gleason, Paste, 15 April 2014
NEVER MIND THE GRAMMY AWARDS, the accolades and being young, gifted and at her creative peak. There was a moment during the recording of 2005's ...
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 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 ...
Book Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 May 2014
EVERY SO OFTEN, a music bio arrives that becomes "the book to read." Think of Last Train To Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley and ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 18 December 2015
FROM THE OPENING NOTES of Prince's HITnRun Phase 2, it seems like a return to the days of the Purple One's midcareer classics like 'Cream', ...
Guy Clark: Randall Knives, Desperados & Homegrown Tomatoes
Memoir by Holly Gleason, The Bitter Southerner, 2016
IT'S 6:42 in the morning, and traffic ain't moving. There's no notion of how far this snake of pick-ups, sedans, mini vans twists and lays ...
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 ...
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 ...
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 ...
John Prine: Songs from the Gut: A Conversation with John Prine
Interview by Holly Gleason, No Depression, Fall 2016
JOHN PRINE, the original "new Dylan", has always written songs with a deep heart and a strong empathy for the people who go unseen. ...
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 ...
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 ...
Retrospective and Interview by Holly Gleason, No Depression, 23 May 2017
IT WAS EARLY 2003. The Dixie Chicks were easily the biggest girl group in history — and also the biggest act in country music post–Garth ...
Steve Earle & The Dukes: So You Wannabe An Outlaw
Review by Holly Gleason, Paste, 12 June 2017
SOMEWHERE IN THE SWAGGER STAGGER opening chorus of the cautionary title track of Steve Earle's return to the majors, the multi-Grammy winner half bellers/half brays ...
The Amazing Rhythm Aces: Russell Smith: An Ace, An Old Friend + An Echo of a Moment
Essay by Holly Gleason, hollygleason.com, 15 July 2019
THIRTY THOUSAND OR so feet above everything, late and tired. With the ear buds in, the demos – all top shelf kind of awesome – ...
Memoir by Holly Gleason, hollygleason.com, September 2019
IT WAS COLD, steely but not metal. It swirled and encircled you like a cartoon vine, only it was staccato – and the beat was so evident. ...
Eddie Money: Take Me Home Tonight: Eddie Money Passes, Regular Guy Rock Hits Heaven Between The Eyes
Memoir by Holly Gleason, hollygleason.com, 23 September 2019
"UHN... hold on... UHN, hold on ta me tighter Never gonna leave you Now (gasping for air) Can't you please believe me now..." ...
Grace Potter: With Daylight Grace Potter Returns (from a Messy Midnight)
Interview by Holly Gleason, American Songwriter, 27 November 2019
GRACE POTTER IS BACK, and you can blame it on Gwen Stefani. ...
Tina Turner: Regal, Fierce & Divine: Tina Turner Roars into the Rock Hall on her own terms
Retrospective and Interview by Holly Gleason, Pollstar, October 2021
TINA TURNER in a chain mail dress… Tina Turner in a black leather mini skirt, denim jacket, seam up the back of those legs… Tina Turner in ...
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