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In This Section
Stage Notes: Broadway star to perform cabaret at Akron fundraiser
Letterman plot suspect asks New York court to drop case
Aerosmith's Joe Perry: Band not breaking up
Bon Jovi return to blue-collar roots with a new CD
Maya Angelou, Rihanna among Glamour mag's honorees
Answer the call of 'For Better'
Most Read Stories
Suitcase causes bomb scare at Akron bus terminal
Akron City Council OKs higher speed on I-77
Chapel Hill isn't rolling right along
Motorcyclist killed, wife injured in Stark County crash
Man says he was punched, robbed by 3 people in parking lot
Unusual sports bar to be sold at auction
Family found dead in Ohio home
Louisville athlete commits to play for Boston College
New eateries expand menu of options
Blogs:
Pets:
More dancing dogs, the Salsa edition
The Heldenfiles:
Tuesday Notebook
Patrick McManamon:
First and 10: Some ideas for a better second half
Akron Zips:
MAC Roundtable
Tribe Matters:
Indians announce spring dates
Cleveland Browns:
Mangini doesn't name a quarterback
Kent State Sports:
Bye week coming at good time for Flashes
Cleveland Cavaliers:
Shaq: It’s All About Winning Championships
Buckeye Blogging:
Buckeyes Roll 100-60 / Season Outlook
Varsity Letters:
Report: Walsh baseball player commits
All Da King's Men:
More On The Fort Hood Jihadist
Blog of Mass Destruction:
Simply Incapable of Telling The Truth
Akron Law Café:
Health Care Financing Reform: (63) Commonwealth Fund Report on Primary Care
See Jane Style:
Muffle Your Muffler
Car Chase:
Clock Tender- Extending the Life of Collector Car Clocks
Let's Talk Real Estate:
Rumors: Akron Starbucks Closing
Ohio Travels with Betty:
Jack is looking for a trip to Southern Ohio the week of November 16.
Sound Check:
Aeromsith looking for new singer as Steven Tyler contemplates solo career
HRLite House:
Personal Rant – Why People Do Not Live in Northeast Ohio
Akron Gamer:
Video: 'Modern Warfare 2' hits the streets
POSTED: 01:11 p.m. EDT, Jul 14, 2008
LIFE DEATH LOVE AND FREEDOM
John Mellencamp
John Mellencamp, 56, is feeling his age and then some on Life Death Love and Freedom. It's an album presented like a deathbed testament: bleak, solitary, bluesy and unbowed. In Don't Need This Body, Mellencamp sings, ''All I got left is a headful of memories/And a thought of my upcoming death,'' and that just about sums up the album.
Everywhere he looks, he sees shattered expectations and looming sorrow, both in his own future and in the wider world. And where, in decades past, he would shrug off any odds against him and come up grinning, now he strives for simple perseverance. It's a brave album in the way it sets aside all his old consolations.
His voice is gruff and weary, with a craggy matter-of-factness replacing his old swagger. The album was produced by T Bone Burnett, and it shares the rootsy, spooked tone of Burnett's 2007 production Raising Sand by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. This album's most upbeat track, My Sweet Love, is rockabilly heard from afar, a love song with a queasy undertow: ''It sure would feel good to feel good again,'' Mellencamp sings.
In the new songs, he trades his familiar brawny rock for sparser settings, like the bluesy riff and echoes of If I Die Sudden and the Celtic-Appalachian modality of Young Without Lovers. Burnett disassembles Mellencamp's usual sound, placing his own down-home guitar within the band and, for nearly half the album, devising arrangements without drums.
Mellencamp can still come up with blunt, righteous choruses — like those in Jena, a song about racial confrontation in a Louisiana town — but on this CD, he underplays them, as if he's all too aware of every limitation.
— Jon Pareles
New York Times
TWO MEN WITH THE BLUES
Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis
There's a newcomer to the jazz scene by the name of Willie Nelson.
Prediction: He's going to be big.
Two Men With the Blues features Wynton Marsalis and his quartet with Nelson and his harmonica player, Mickey Raphael, during a two-night stand recorded in January 2007 at Jazz at Lincoln Center. The site is New York City, but the music is New Orleans jazz and R&B, with only occasional nods to Nashville and Austin.
The question is not why Nelson chose to record this sort of album, but why he waited so long. His distinctive phrasing and easy delivery make him a natural jazz vocalist, as he has long showed when covering pop standards, and the gravity-defying intervals he sings are perfect for the genre.
Nelson's unorthodox style might lead a lesser band over the cliff, but Marsalis and company mesh with their vocalist beautifully. Marsalis is in top form as a soloist and in tandem with saxophonist Walter Blanding, and Raphael turns out to be a darned good Dixieland harpist.
Less successful is guitarist Nelson. Although there's a certain rustic charm to his rudimentary solos, his picking sounds out of place here. But when he sings, all is forgiven.
Nelson has been singing Stardust for more than 30 years, and he can still wring every ounce of emotion out of the Hoagy Carmichael tune. If his performance doesn't raise goose bumps, Marsalis' solo will.
<p> Steven Wine
Associated Press
JEANIUS
Jean Grae
Underground hip-hop heads have long sung the praises of Jean Grae, but the rapper's full potential has always been hampered by subpar production.
Four years after her last record, she returns with a fierce showing helmed by the 9th Wonder, who's worked with Jay-Z and Mary J. Blige.
The beats are better, if a bit familiar, but the real draw is Grae's taut, bitter flow. Like many rappers, she spends too much time cutting down perceived rivals, but when she shines the light on herself, it's with an uncommon honesty and depth that reward repeated listens.
Jeanius is out on Talib Kweli's Blacksmith label, and Grae proves Kweli's equal at articulating deep disillusionment. If rumors of her retirement are true, she's left a rock-solid legacy.
Doug Wallen
Philadelphia Inquirer
MESS OF BLUES
Jeff Healey
Before he died of cancer in March at 41, Jeff Healey made this return to the blues after several years exploring another passion, jazz of the '20s and '30s. Mess of Blues makes for a fine epitaph.
The blues-rock that brought Healey fame in the late '80s was often too florid for our taste, despite his six-string prowess (the blind singer played with the instrument flat on his lap). This time, however, Healey focuses on an eclectic set of mostly familiar numbers, from B.B. King, the Band and Hank Williams to the Elvis-covered Doc Pomus-Mort Shuman title song.
Healey and his band display a good feel for all the material, freshening it up with roadhouse verve. (That's not to be confused with Road House, the Patrick Swayze screen stinker in which Healey appeared.)
Four of the 10 performances are live, which enhances the set's vitality.
Nick Cristiano
Philadelphia Inquirer
LIFE DEATH LOVE AND FREEDOM
John Mellencamp
John Mellencamp, 56, is feeling his age and then some on Life Death Love and Freedom. It's an album presented like a deathbed testament: bleak, solitary, bluesy and unbowed. In Don't Need This Body, Mellencamp sings, ''All I got left is a headful of memories/And a thought of my upcoming death,'' and that just about sums up the album.
Everywhere he looks, he sees shattered expectations and looming sorrow, both in his own future and in the wider world. And where, in decades past, he would shrug off any odds against him and come up grinning, now he strives for simple perseverance. It's a brave album in the way it sets aside all his old consolations.
His voice is gruff and weary, with a craggy matter-of-factness replacing his old swagger. The album was produced by T Bone Burnett, and it shares the rootsy, spooked tone of Burnett's 2007 production Raising Sand by Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. This album's most upbeat track, My Sweet Love, is rockabilly heard from afar, a love song with a queasy undertow: ''It sure would feel good to feel good again,'' Mellencamp sings.
In the new songs, he trades his familiar brawny rock for sparser settings, like the bluesy riff and echoes of If I Die Sudden and the Celtic-Appalachian modality of Young Without Lovers. Burnett disassembles Mellencamp's usual sound, placing his own down-home guitar within the band and, for nearly half the album, devising arrangements without drums.
Mellencamp can still come up with blunt, righteous choruses — like those in Jena, a song about racial confrontation in a Louisiana town — but on this CD, he underplays them, as if he's all too aware of every limitation.
— Jon Pareles
New York Times
TWO MEN WITH THE BLUES
Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis
There's a newcomer to the jazz scene by the name of Willie Nelson.
Prediction: He's going to be big.
Two Men With the Blues features Wynton Marsalis and his quartet with Nelson and his harmonica player, Mickey Raphael, during a two-night stand recorded in January 2007 at Jazz at Lincoln Center. The site is New York City, but the music is New Orleans jazz and R&B, with only occasional nods to Nashville and Austin.
The question is not why Nelson chose to record this sort of album, but why he waited so long. His distinctive phrasing and easy delivery make him a natural jazz vocalist, as he has long showed when covering pop standards, and the gravity-defying intervals he sings are perfect for the genre.
Nelson's unorthodox style might lead a lesser band over the cliff, but Marsalis and company mesh with their vocalist beautifully. Marsalis is in top form as a soloist and in tandem with saxophonist Walter Blanding, and Raphael turns out to be a darned good Dixieland harpist.
Less successful is guitarist Nelson. Although there's a certain rustic charm to his rudimentary solos, his picking sounds out of place here. But when he sings, all is forgiven.
Nelson has been singing Stardust for more than 30 years, and he can still wring every ounce of emotion out of the Hoagy Carmichael tune. If his performance doesn't raise goose bumps, Marsalis' solo will.
<p> Steven Wine
Associated Press
JEANIUS
Jean Grae
Underground hip-hop heads have long sung the praises of Jean Grae, but the rapper's full potential has always been hampered by subpar production.
Four years after her last record, she returns with a fierce showing helmed by the 9th Wonder, who's worked with Jay-Z and Mary J. Blige.
The beats are better, if a bit familiar, but the real draw is Grae's taut, bitter flow. Like many rappers, she spends too much time cutting down perceived rivals, but when she shines the light on herself, it's with an uncommon honesty and depth that reward repeated listens.
Jeanius is out on Talib Kweli's Blacksmith label, and Grae proves Kweli's equal at articulating deep disillusionment. If rumors of her retirement are true, she's left a rock-solid legacy.
Doug Wallen
Philadelphia Inquirer
MESS OF BLUES
Jeff Healey
Before he died of cancer in March at 41, Jeff Healey made this return to the blues after several years exploring another passion, jazz of the '20s and '30s. Mess of Blues makes for a fine epitaph.
The blues-rock that brought Healey fame in the late '80s was often too florid for our taste, despite his six-string prowess (the blind singer played with the instrument flat on his lap). This time, however, Healey focuses on an eclectic set of mostly familiar numbers, from B.B. King, the Band and Hank Williams to the Elvis-covered Doc Pomus-Mort Shuman title song.
Healey and his band display a good feel for all the material, freshening it up with roadhouse verve. (That's not to be confused with Road House, the Patrick Swayze screen stinker in which Healey appeared.)
Four of the 10 performances are live, which enhances the set's vitality.
Nick Cristiano
Philadelphia Inquirer
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