Trombone Shorty’s For True has followed Backatown to the top of Billboard‘s Contemporary Jazz chart. It debuted at No. 1 after its September 13 release; now Shorty has two albums on the Contemporary Jazz chart since Backatown is at No. 4. It has been on the chart for 74 weeks. For True is also at [...]
Tag Archives: Reviews
Critics Not Sold on Tha Carter IV, But Buyers Are
September 7, 2011 – 4:47 pm
Reviews have been tepid for Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter IV, but in its first week, it sold 964,000 digital and physical albums combined. Those numbers are just shy of opening week sales for Tha Carter III, and the 300,000 digital units sold in the first four days was a record for iTunes. That record was [...]
Treme Down Under
August 2, 2011 – 11:45 am
One of the questions we’ve always asked about Treme is how it plays outside New Orleans. Season two is just starting in Australia: how does it play out of the country? Treme has some of the same difficulties and delights. The plots are satisfyingly complex and stretch over many hours, only sometimes tangling with each [...]
While We Were Working: Bootsy Collins, Rob Riggle and Rush
June 22, 2011 – 5:02 pm
[UPDATED]Last night, we put the July issue to bed, and with it went the immediate demands that kept me from writing about recent shows. Here’s the quick wrap-up in reverse order: Sunday night, Rob Riggle was at House of Blues in a show set up because he’s in town shooting the remake of 21 Jump [...]
Reviews of the First Episode of Treme Season Two
April 26, 2011 – 4:16 pm
On Sunday, HBO premiered season two of Treme with an episode called “Accentuate the Positive.” It is a fitting title as it has been getting positive reviews. Season two picks up seven months after season one left off. According to screenrant.com, “the myriad plotlines that drove the first season will still be present, but [writer [...]
Jazz Fest News: Arcade Fire, Mumford & Sons Reviews
April 18, 2011 – 10:51 am
Saturday night, the Arcade Fire (Friday, May 6, 5:35 p.m.) headlined Coachella. It was the band’s first time headlining a major festival, and by all accounts, it was a major success. According to William Goldman at Spin.com: On the sexy-tropical jam “Haiti,” Chassagne waltzed and twirled in her gold-sequined dress. The song holds special meaning [...]
A Seasonal Desk-Clearing
December 23, 2010 – 1:36 pm
This may continue into next week, but I’ve got CDs here that I had the best intentions of writing about but never made it to somehow, starting with: Bob Dylan: The Witmark Demos: 1962-1964 (Columbia/Legacy): If you want to hear this two disc set as Bob becoming Bob, go for it, but it’s not that [...]
Americana and Canadiana
June 28, 2010 – 10:55 am
Some recent Americana releases and one Canadiana album: Like the equally understated and private Tony Joe White, Otis Taylor‘s quiet authority draws listeners in. He keeps his blues tight, using as few words and chords as possible, and creates a musical whirlpool without ever seeming to try. He’s slightly more expansive on Clovis People Vol. [...]
Dance and Coo
June 9, 2010 – 10:45 am
Right now, I have a lot of cool dance music on my desk, a lot of it world incarnations. Lagos Disco Inferno (Academy LPs) collects tracks from the late 1970s recorded in Lagos when the disco craze was worldwide. The weakest tracks find Nigerians parroting the disco beat and language – songs include “Boogie Trip,” [...]
