On New Year’s Day I downloaded 4 of the 10 “NPR Best CDs of 2006.” The first was Adem’s “Love and Other Planets,” a swooningly gorgeous concept album involving, well, love and other planets:
You and Moon:

Spirals:

Waves:

As usual, if you don’t like my music, choose your own with Pandora:
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The last post about the demon-burning and recent ruminations about my own human frailties brought to mind the Cowboy Junkies song “To Love Is to Bury” (which contains the lines “They say to love is to bury/Those demons from which we all hide”). It’s a sad but beautiful song of a widow lamenting the [...]

I heard “Je reviens” by the French alt-pop act Autour de Lucie for the first time fooling around with iTunes in an Apple Store, testing out speakers. It was one of the pre-loaded tracks on demo machines at the time. I was captivated by Valérie Leulliot’s voice. Went home and downloaded the entire album, Faux [...]

I featured one half (Maria Taylor, on right) of Azure Ray a while back. Here are four gorgeous songs by these two throaty southern women (Orenda Fink on left):
If You Fall (from Hold On Love):

Safe and Sound (from Azure Ray):

These White Lights Will Bend To Make Blue (from Hold On Love):

November (from November – EP):

As [...]

In another missed music opportunity, I didn’t know that Mojave 3 was playing at The Belcourt Theater in Nashville on October 28. I have only one of their several albums but plan to get more soon. Fans of Cowboy Junkies, Mazzy Star, and that aural constellation will likely approve. Here are there from Ask Me [...]

Going back to old favorites from grad school and immediate post-grad school days, I offer up three from Luna:
Slide (from Lunapark):

Time (from Lunapark):

Whispers (from Pup Tent):

As usual, if you don’t like my music, choose your own with Pandora:
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Hem, whose music one listener described aptly as “chamber folk,” simply makes darnright pretty songs. I had no idea they played Nashville on October 6! The photo is from that show. Here is one song from each of their three albums:
The Fire Thief (from Eveningland):

He Came To Meet Me (from Funnel Cloud):

Half Acre (from Rabbit [...]

Okay, so it’s actually Tuesday, so sue me. I thought I’d shift gears and speed things up, but still stick with female vocals (simply more interesting to me, usually). So, here are three of the less raucous cuts from the latest album (The Woods) by the Portland, OR riot grrrl legends Sleater-Kinney. They must have [...]