James Hunter
James Hunter has written for the New York Times Arts & Leisure section; New York Times Sunday Business; LA Style; LA Weekly; Boston Globe; Boston Phoenix; Village Voice; New York Observer; New York Times Magazine; Louisville Courier-Journal; GQ; Details; Rolling Stone; Mademoiselle; Vibe; US magazine; Mens Journal; TV Guide; The New Yorker and The Atlantic (both purchased pieces not published); The Believer; Request; Record; Mix; Music & Sound Output; Creem (updated, not the original, storied in some quarters publication); Blender; Spin.
102 articles
List of articles in the library
Carly Simon: Come Upstairs (Warner Bros.)
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 1 October 1980
Carly Simon Yells and Screams ...
Al Green: In God He Trusts: Al Green reaches higher
Comment by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 12 January 1982
IN THE '70s, in Memphis, Al Green and producer Willie Mitchell made quietly unstoppable soul music the world still hasn't gotten over. If at first ...
Heaven 17: The Luxury Gap (Arista)
Review by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 9 August 1983
DISCRIMINATING rock-and-roll fans in this country can finally tone down their horrified wails about white British dance bands' ubiquitous, maddening, mosquito-whine electroboogie. Pride in shallowness ...
Profile by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 20 September 1983
No longer one of the girls ...
Al Green: "There are riders approaching"
Interview by James Hunter, Record, December 1983
THE CONTINUING TRANSFORMATION OF AL GREEN, MAN OF GOD ...
Spandau Ballet: True (Chrysalis)
Review by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 13 December 1983
THE MADDENINGLY obscure, communications-obsessed songs on True, Spandau Ballet's new album, could have been written by Mary Hartman after years of living abroad. ...
Interview by James Hunter, Music & Sound Output, January 1984
CARLY SIMON talks a relaxed, slyly attentive kind of talk, zeroing in on a particular point as instinctively as she watches evasive moods and emotions ...
Luther Vandross, Dionne Warwick: Dionne Warwick: How Many Times Can We Say Goodbye (Arista)
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 3 January 1984
Dionne's Hot Date ...
Review by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 10 January 1984
THERE HAS NEVER been a record quite like ABC's slick 1982 debut The Lexicon of Love. Of course, you'd heard a jaded singer as enslaved ...
Randy Crawford: Nightline (Warner Bros.)
Review by James Hunter, Record, February 1984
SINGER RANDY Crawford — as rightfully celebrated and well-known in Europe as she is not in her native United States — sounds like Gladys Knight, ...
Womack and Womack: Womack & Womack: Love Wars (Elektra)
Review by James Hunter, Record, March 1984
WITH A sassy authority too gritty to be bitchy, too determined to be shrill, Linda Womack lithely barks out the phrase "I can't understand that" ...
David Lasley: Raindance (EMI America)
Review by James Hunter, Record, August 1984
MICHIGAN-BORN David Lasley sings like Robin Gibb baptized in the grace-giving waters of soul. As a songwriter his compositions often rank with the best of ...
The Jones Girls: Keep It Comin' (Philadelphia International)
Review by James Hunter, Record, August 1984
KEEP IT Comin', the Jones Girls' latest album, is black pop in the year 2 A.T. (After Thriller), which means craft and consistency are givens. ...
Davitt Sigerson: Falling in Love Again (Island/ZE)
Review by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 7 August 1984
WITH OPEN EYES Davitt Sigerson drives into the wreck ol romance on Falling in Love Again (Island/Ze), his American début. ...
Prince & the Revolution: Purple Rain (Warner Bros.)
Review by James Hunter, Musician, September 1984
Stylistic Seizures from the Love Laboratory: Prince Lets His Latest Out of the Bottle ...
Get Right With God: Gospel Truth
Review by James Hunter, The Boston Phoenix, 18 September 1984
A SMOKY, finger-snapping cavalcade of bold quartets, plainspoken guitarists/vocalists, and feverish singing preachers. Get Right with God: Hot Gospel 1947–1953 (Krazy Kat, UK import) is ...
Philip Bailey, Phil Collins: Philip Bailey: Chinese Walls (Columbia)
Review by James Hunter, Record, January 1985
WHAT WAS Phil Collins supposed to give Philip Bailey that George Duke — who sound-photographed Continuation, Bailey's vivid 1983 solo debut — couldn't? Bumpy rhythms ...
Overview by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 30 April 1985
RIGHT NOW a hit record carries more mass-audience clout than at any moment in the history of show business. Maybe not coincidentally, there are more ...
Dwight Yoakam: Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. (Reprise)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 5 June 1986
KENTUCKY-BRED singer and songwriter Dwight Yoakam makes his Los Angeles country music get up and go. As he boasts on the Johnny Horton cover that ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 28 August 1986
FORGET GEORGE Strait as the White-Stetsoned sheriff of country's current "new traditionalism" Think of him instead as Elvis Presley balladeering out of the Lone Star ...
Rodney Crowell: Street Language (Columbia)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 6 November 1986
RODNEY CROWELL'S credentials as a first-rate country-pop producer (for his wife, Rosanne Cash, on Seven Year Ache and Rhythm and Romance) and songwriter ('Till I ...
George Jones: Wine Colored Roses (Epic)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 21 May 1987
THIS IS the finest George Jones record in more than five years. Still working with producer-arranger Billy Sherrill, Jones commands a mix of ten songs ...
Aerosmith, The Cult, Def Leppard, Mötley Crüe, Whitesnake: Heavy Metal: The Sound Too Dense to Die
Comment by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, 16 October 1987
TWENTY SUMMERS ago, it was love. In 1987 it was metal, pop-metal, ushered in by Bon Jovi's much less musicianly 7-mil play on Van Halen's ...
Was (Not Was): What Up, Dog? (Chrysalis)
Review by James Hunter, Musician, November 1988
DURING THE early '80s, Detroit-based songwriters and producers Don Ferguson and David Weiss competed with New York City art-funksters under the name Was (Not Was). ...
Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Traveling Wilburys: Jeff Lynne's Guitar Craze
Interview by James Hunter, Musician, August 1989
A Wilbury explains why Tom Petty's solo album sounds the way it does ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 8 February 1990
STARS OF the Gospel Highway traces the exuberant rise of black gospel in America. The third in a series coordinated by Anthony Heilbut, a chronicler ...
Anita Baker: Compositions (Elektra Entertainment)
Review by James Hunter, Musician, August 1990
FOUR YEARS ago, Anita Baker quietly stormed the pop music charts with Rapture, a reclamation of jazz-soul balladry driven by acoustic resonances and Baker's forthright ...
Marion Williams: Surely God Is Able (SpiritFeel/Shanachie)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 20 September 1990
COMMENTATORS OFTEN place the Olympian gospel singer Marion Williams, a thriving veteran who got her start singing with the Ward Sisters during the late Forties, ...
Whitney Houston: I'm Your Baby Tonight (Arista)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 10 January 1991
Whitney Gets Warmer ...
Alexander O'Neal: All True Man (Tabu/Epic)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 4 April 1991
SINGER ALEXANDER O'Neal has been an adult-soul champ since he and his producers, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, released Alexander O'Neal in 1985. That debut ...
Bryan Adams: Waking Up the Neighbours (A&M)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 17 October 1991
WAKING UP the Neighbours will, with no sweat, reestablish Bryan Adams as the radio's hoarse purveyor of energy and fun. A scrupulously careful yet adamantly ...
Review by James Hunter, Musician, March 1992
SINCE 1987, Keith Sweat has exhibited the grip and attitude of a classic soul singer, rather than a conventionally powerful voice. He and frequent collaborator ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 14 May 1992
Healing for a Cult of Millions ...
Interview by James Hunter, L.A. Style, January 1993
On Love Deluxe, Sade eschews formula to arrive at the right fusion ...
Utah Saints: Utah Saints (London/PLG) ; Various Artists: Techno Mancer (Antler Subway/Caroline)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 21 January 1993
TECHNO IS music that gets on people's nerves. Whether pounding like metal or watercoloring like New Age, it strikes many as repetitive and cold, about ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 4 February 1993
RATHER THAN preaching or hectoring, the Five Blind Boys of Alabama featuring the great Clarence Fountain just demonstrate their beliefs through the medium of music. ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 15 April 1993
The Bliss Album: A New Dawn ...
Sting: Gentleman's Agreement: Sting dreams a world without junk...
Comment by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 2 December 1994
"IN THE POLICE he was a pop star, the best we've had, a potent force delivering blistering reggae-tinged chart-friendly hits apparently to order." ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 15 June 1995
TWENTY-SEVEN-year-old English rapper, writer and producer Adrian Thaws has been known as Tricky since he roughed up bits of Massive Attack's milestone 1991 LP Blue ...
Review by James Hunter, Vibe, August 1995
THIS RISKY debut is puzzling. D'Angelo, a 21-year-old Virginia native, is determined to give pre-hip hop forms like blues, soul, gospel, and jazz a mid-'90s ...
Michael Jackson: HIStory: Past, Present And Future, Book I (Epic) ***½
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 10 August 1995
A DECADE after 'Thriller' and MTV transformed pop, Michael Jackson releases a collection that combines a classic greatest-hits anthology with a jarring and uneven new ...
Take That: 'Back For Good' (Arista)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 2 November 1995
BEAUTIFUL LOSER ...
Profile and Interview by James Hunter, Entertainment Weekly, 10 November 1995
The country star's number one album proves he's here to stay ...
Everything But the Girl: Missing – the Full Remix EP (Atlantic)
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 27 February 1996
ALMOST TWO years ago, still relying on the fierce understatement they premiered back in 1984, the English duo Everything But The Girl released Amplified Heart. ...
Afghan Whigs: Black Love (Elektra Entertainment)
Review by James Hunter, Spin, April 1996
THIS CINCINNATI band was several Sub Pop records and many more feverish live dates into a career when its soulful experiments cohered into Gentlemen. By ...
Review by James Hunter, Spin, April 1997
WITH BRITISH soul sage Howie B. dispensing '90s groove advice and a thousand rhythm tracks bulldogging throughout this exhilaratingly complex album, Pop could get slotted as U2's ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 3 April 1997
ASIDE FROM a minor hit three years ago, with the perfect pop single 'Girls and Boys', England's beloved Blur have never quite killed alternative-era America. ...
Elliott Smith: Something Happened: Elliott Smith's real-life blur
Interview by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, May 1997
BORED BY stories, interested in the unruliness of things. Portland's Elliott Smith is a singer-songwriter suspicious of singer-songwriter certainties. Angles, hypotheses, probabilities, lucid emotions arising ...
Review by James Hunter, Spin, October 1997
THE SINGER throws up lyrics about pursuit and desertion. A snare drum lightly skips across a series of bass pinpoints, an organic foundation unthinkable before ...
Busta Rhymes: When Disaster Strikes... (Elektra)
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 16 October 1997
BUSTA RHYMES' follow-up to The Coming, his 1996 solo debut, is a complicated suite about the end of the century from hip hop's high-volume major-domo. ...
Scott Weiland: Lone Temple Pilot
Interview by James Hunter, Details, January 1998
"TODAY, I am not suffering," Scott Weiland says. "I am not dope sick." The frontman for Stone Temple Pilots claims his fuckup days are behind ...
David Arnold, John Barry, Sheryl Crow: More Fun With Martinis, Girls and Guns on 007 Albums
Report and Interview by James Hunter, New York Observer, 12 January 1998
PUSHING HER voice to surge and sparkle in ways it just doesn't want to, Sheryl Crow tries and tries to manage the choruses of 'Tomorrow ...
Marilyn Manson: The Long Road Out of Hell (ReganBooks)
Book Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 19 March 1998
MANSON'S LITTLE BLACK BOOK: MARILYN MANSON UNLEASHES THE ULTIMATE TELL-ALL ...
Garbage, Superdrag, Van Halen: Albums from Van Halen, Superdrag and Garbage
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 18 May 1998
Is Rock Dead? No, It's Just Morphing ...
Lucinda Williams Is Ready for Her Close-Up Now
Profile by James Hunter, New York Observer, 29 June 1998
THE COGNOSCENTI are wigging. "How did a 45-year-old 'neurotic diva' with one foot in Faulkner's South and one foot in Garth's make the year's best ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 3 September 1998
PERFECT CHEMISTRY ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 17 September 1998
Courtney Love and Hole make a fiery, flowery return ...
Burt Bacharach: The Look of Love – The Burt Bacharach Collection
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 23 November 1998
Kitschy-Kitschy-Koo: Look of Love Gets Too Cute ...
Book Excerpt by James Hunter, Encyclopædia Britannica, 1999
COUNTRY ROCK, the incorporation of musical elements and songwriting idioms from traditional country music into late 1960s and '70s rock, usually pursued in Los Angeles. ...
Interview by James Hunter, Vibe, February 1999
YOUNG, GIFTED, AND MACK, BALTIMORE SOUL SLINGERS DRU HILL SING SONGS THAT MAKE MEN MOODY, BUT MAKE THE LADIES SCREAM. ...
Massive Attack: Singles 90/98 (Virgin)
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 15 February 1999
What Big Ears They Have! Massive Attack's Remix Art ...
Blur, William Orbit: Blur: 13 (Virgin)
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 5 April 1999
Blur's Tender Mercies Shine Through Sheen of 13 ...
Underworld: Warhol Without the Wackos: Underworld's Beaucoup Fish
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 19 April 1999
THERE'S ALWAYS BEEN something different about Underworld, the three cunning Englishmen who in the '90s have had their way with U.K. beat culture, recasting it ...
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 24 May 1999
Backstreet Boys Play Coy, Robbie Williams Is a Joy ...
Faith Hill, Tim McGraw: Tim McGraw and Faith Hill: Love and Industry
Profile by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 25 May 1999
COUNTRY MUSIC Nashville is a town of handlers, of purportedly insightful managers and publicists and producers and record company presidents. In 1993, when Tim McGraw ...
Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Tom Ze: David Byrne Has Got His Ears Wide Open
Interview by James Hunter, New York Observer, 28 June 1999
FOR THE last 10 years, David Byrne has run Luaka Bop, the Manhattan-based record label that specializes in international pop, with Yale Evelev, formerly of ...
Interview by James Hunter, Vibe, August 1999
More than just a Stevie Wonder enthusiast, Jamiroquai's wonder frontman, Jay Kay, knows a little something about fly birds, fast cars, and the bass-booming beats ...
Chet Baker, John Barry: Playing by Heart: John Barry in All His Glory
Review by James Hunter, New York Observer, 17 January 2000
A SUPERNATURAL-LOOKING CD entitled Playing by Heart is billed to John Barry, Chris Botti and, weirdly enough, Chet Baker. On the black-and-white CD cover, in ...
Third Eye Blind's 'Never Let You Go'
Comment by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 4 April 2000
THE KIND OF emotional and formal fire Third Eye Blind build on 'Never Let You Go', their current hit, has rocked producers, radio programmers, and ...
Travis: Luv Hurts: Travis' The Man Who
Review by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, 17 May 2000
POP RECORDS can come with some pretty heavy reps. Travis' The Man Who appears in the U.S. after moving two and a half million copies ...
Chain Store Hairdos: Totally Hits 2
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 25 July 2000
THERE'S SOMETHING strange about the idea of Totally Hits 2, the compilation of recent pop smashes by various names, a follow-up to 1999's equally incongruous ...
U2: All That You Can't Leave Behind
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 26 October 2000
U2'S TENTH STUDIO album and third masterpiece, All That You Can't Leave Behind, is all about the simple melding of craft and song. Their first ...
Comment by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 30 January 2001
DJ Music Builds Its Way Out of the Velvet-Rope Underground ...
Dido: Boots and Beats Beneath the Bed: Dido's No Angel
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 6 March 2001
WHEN HIP-HOPPERS go anywhere from Spandau Ballet to Annie to Diana Ross and David Bowie to Kenny Rogers for music – as Prince Be, Jay-Z, ...
Elvis Presley: From Elvis In Memphis
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 10 July 2001
IN THE Elvis Presley mythology, 1968 marks the year of the TV Renaissance, when Presley delivered a mesmerizing, passionate performance on NBC, which regenerated his ...
Billy Joel: Fantasies and Delusions
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 8 November 2001
Piano Man lives his classical-music fantasy ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 13 November 2001
STING WAS IN Tuscany when he gave this concert in a courtyard there, beginning at nine in the evening, Italian time, September 11th. ...
Reba McEntire: Greatest Hits Vol. III – I'm A Survivor
Review by James Hunter, Country Music, February 2002
SOMEONE I KNOW once worked long-distance, from laid-back Denver offices, with an old guy popularly known as Boston's crankiest attorney. ...
Shania Twain: O Sister, Where Art Thou?
Comment by James Hunter, Country Music, February 2002
We're sorry, Shania. Come back, we need you. ...
Gary Allan: Scumbag in the Dark: Gary Allan's Alright Guy
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 19 February 2002
"THIS ALBUM," the booklet inside Gary Allan's current Alright Guy reads, "is dedicated to Willie, Waylon, Johnny, George, Buck & Merle," which is a way ...
George Strait: A Conversation With George Strait
Interview by James Hunter, Entertainment Weekly, 19 April 2002
Press-shy trad-country giant goes On The Record for a no-bull Q&A ...
The Chemical Brothers, Matthew Herbert, Stephane Pompougnac, Rinôçérôse: Lifestyles of the Rhythm
Overview by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 2 July 2002
Dance music accesses an unseparatist pop sensibility ...
Jackson Browne: The Naked Ride Home
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 17 October 2002
FROM THE COOL romanticism of 1993's I'm Alive to the textured ruminations of 1996's Looking East, Jackson Browne has explored, with a sense of flash ...
Faith Hill: Redrawing Country's Borders
Interview by James Hunter, The New York Times, 24 November 2002
IN 1999, THE Mississippi-born country singer Faith Hill released 'Breathe', and it sold more than eight million copies. Country music purists were put off by ...
Heather Headley: This Is Who I Am
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 28 November 2002
Broadway player becomes lively R&B diva ...
Kenny Lattimore and Chanté Moore: Things that Lovers Do
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 8 April 2003
Their project may cause pregnancy. ...
Burt Bacharach: Little Big Things: Burt Bacharach's What the World Needs Now
Review by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, 28 April 2003
IN THE LATE '80s, I sat with the great Japanese pop artist and composer Ryuichi Sakamoto on a hotel rooftop in L.A. talking about Burt ...
Robbie Williams: Fly Like an Ego: Robbie Williams' Escapology
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 13 May 2003
WHEN LONDON'S Robbie Williams released his 1999 U.S. debut, he warned Americans. The Ego Has Landed, he called the thing, a shrewd compilation of even ...
Tim McGraw: The Gambler: Tim McGraw
Interview by James Hunter, Country Music, December 2003
TIM MCGRAW IS PUMPED. ...
N.E.R.D., Pharrell Williams: N.E.R.D.: Recombinators
Profile and Interview by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, 22 April 2004
PHARRELL WILLIAMS doesn't shout. Today, the co-producer of Jay-Z and Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake and No Doubt (and others) is sort of urgently whispering ...
Review by James Hunter, L.A. Weekly, 20 May 2004
VAN LEAR ROSE is an album of 13 songs explosively written and sung by Loretta Lynn. Jack White, of the White Stripes, produced it. Eric ...
The Cure: Join the Dots: B-Sides & Rarities – 1978–2001: The Fiction Years
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 25 May 2004
THE CURE'S Join the Dots: B-Sides & Rarities: 1978–2001: The Fiction Years is titled with the exhaustiveness that can, in every sense, characterize box sets. ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 19 August 2004
The new Brandy: beats by Timbaland and Kanye West, inspiration by Coldplay ...
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 21 December 2004
THIRTY-EIGHT YEARS ago on a huge #1, Nancy Sinatra made her suede-toned warning that 'These Boots Are Made for Walkin'.' For the piano finale of ...
Susie Suh: Anti-Diva: Susie Suh
Profile by James Hunter, The Believer, 1 June 2005
SUSIE SUH'S eponymous collection is the debut of a twenty-five-year-old who grew up performing Korean folk songs on local TV with a children's choir in ...
Donald Fagen: Morph the Cat (Reprise) — Catdown to Ecstasy
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 16 March 2006
Steely Dan's unfashionable co-founder catches a New York where things changed forever ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 5 October 2006
The Son Rises Again: Lennon goes through the wringer and comes out with a great album. ...
Tracey Thorn: Sublimely nonchalant electro-pop majesty: Tracey Thorn's Out of the Woods
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 20 March 2007
TRACEY THORN, of the now-on-hiatus duo Everything But the Girl, sings with the transparency of country air and the significance of Louis XIV furniture. Alone ...
Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 25 September 2007
ON HER RECENT Out of the Woods, Tracey Thorn, singing about artists who awed her early on, mentions "Bobby D in '63". But she also ...
Kylie Minogue, Robyn: Robyn: Robyn/Kylie Minogue: X
Live Review by James Hunter, The Village Voice, 29 April 2008
MOST OF Robyn recasts the teenage hitmaker of a decade ago as a formidable 26-year-old Stockholm chick. ...
Jackson Browne: Time The Conqueror
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 2 October 2008
AFTER SPENDING the late part of last year stumping for John Edwards, Jackson Browne continues to address the frustration, outrage and heartbreak over the Bush ...
Review by James Hunter, Rolling Stone, 22 September 2012
IN THE 1970s, ZZ Top broke through with a regional sound – simmering Texas blues – and then, in the next decade, reimagined their sound ...
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