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Henry Carrigan

THE READING ROOM: Rounder Records’ Music-First Recipe for Success

THE READING ROOM: Rounder Records’ Music-First Recipe for Success

Ken Irwin was born a ramblin’ man, searching out the music where its notes filled the air at old-time gatherings and festivals. In the early 1970s, he and his partner Marian Leighton staked out a claim on picnic tables at such locales, loaded them up with stacks of albums, and

THE READING ROOM: Dave Marsh Collection Offers Rock Writing With a Heart

THE READING ROOM: Dave Marsh Collection Offers Rock Writing With a Heart

According to at least one former music magazine editor’s recent collection of interviews and public conversations, rock and roll is the province of aging white men. Jann Wenner even titles his collection The Masters, as if the seven artists on which he focuses — Bob Dylan, John Lennon, Mick Jagger,

ALBUM REVIEW: Buddy & Julie Miller Share Pain and Hope on 'In The Throes'

ALBUM REVIEW: Buddy & Julie Miller Share Pain and Hope on 'In The Throes'

Four years after their acclaimed Breakdown on 20th Ave. South, Buddy and Julie Miller return with a gem of an album. To listen to this album is to be “in the throes” of a compelling attraction to intimately delivered songs about departure, courage, endurance and resolution, and love. Joining the

THE READING ROOM: ‘Prine on Prine’ Collects Decades of Interviews

THE READING ROOM: ‘Prine on Prine’ Collects Decades of Interviews

When John Prine died on April 7, 2020, he left behind a sumptuous banquet of lyrically ingenious songs that captured the vagaries of the lives of individuals whom society had consigned to its margins. Prine was better than any other songwriter at evoking the loneliness of these characters and the

ALBUM REVIEW: With ‘The Returner,’ Allison Russell Lifts Up Community

ALBUM REVIEW: With ‘The Returner,’ Allison Russell Lifts Up Community

Allison Russell’s jubilant follow-up to her award-winning solo debut dwells deep in the recesses of the soul. It’s imbued with a radiant spirituality that illumines the liminal spaces of human existence, and it exudes a joy that rides her transcendent vocals and the musical fabric created by her

ALBUM REVIEW: The Blind Boys of Alabama Put Power Into ‘Echoes of the South’

ALBUM REVIEW: The Blind Boys of Alabama Put Power Into ‘Echoes of the South’

The Blind Boys of Alabama are back in the house with their first new album since 2017’s Almost Home. From the opening track on Echoes of the South — which was recorded at the NuttHouse Recording Studio in Sheffield, Alabama — the group’s exuberant vocals transport us, carrying us through

THE READING ROOM: Memoirs and Music Books Coming This Fall

THE READING ROOM: Memoirs and Music Books Coming This Fall

Every fall brings another crop of big music memoirs and biographies, and I mean that both literally and metaphorically; Michael Azerrad’s "annotated" version of his 1993 Nirvana bio, The Amplified Come as You Are, totes up almost 700 pages, for example. While these books grow a little