The following ten records were my favorites during the “aughts” or “O”s or “aughties” or whatever we’re referring to them as now that it’s the “tens” or “teens” or “tweens” or what have you.

[Read more →]

During one song I did not recognize, Hitchcock took a wild fuzztone solo while still singing the lead melody, which is not a thing people can just do. Rieflin delivered a brief studious lecture about how to make a proper studio recording as human hands grew from spectators’ eyeballs and undid the Gordian knot that binds commerce and music in our post-industrial society.

[Read more →]

Willy Porter, alone on stage for a few numbers, discussed with the audience everything from guzzling beers with Paul Simon and his enjoyment of naked women, to cleaning the gutters of a very tall house. It was as if we were all sitting and listening at the local bar, over sizey sips of brown liquor. He talked and sang of the profane, the mundane, and his fingers moved so fast on his strings, building a truly impressive layered illusion of multiple people performing.

[Read more →]