The Decemberists – The King is Dead – “January Hymn” The Decemberists chose their name because of their fondness for the eerie aesthetic that goes with the last month of the year. Their latest single captures the solemn, quiet beauty of the season with minimal guitar strumming, and reverb from the keys echoing beneath the [...]

“The Party’s Over” is the title track to a 1967 album Willie Nelson recorded in Nashville for RCA. The song comes from the interim period after Nelson had found success as a songwriter in Nashville with hits like “Crazy” and “Funny How Time Slips Away” but before the songwriter decamped to Austin to reestablish his [...]

Country artist Katie Armiger is, at 19 years old, already a music industry vet. She’s been releasing her own music, which has earned her comparisons to Shania Twain and Martina McBride, since she was 15. Armiger, who helped pen the hit songs “Kiss Me Now” and “Trail Of Lies,” take us through her journey so [...]

Neil Diamond is back with his first album of original material in four years, a TV special, and a world tour.

Born of jam sessions around a wood-burning stove and the notion that he always wanted his own bluegrass band, Peter Rowan (a bluegrass veteran who got his start with Bill Monroe) and his band are just a little “tickled” to find themselves with a Grammy nomination for best bluegrass album. Legacy, which came out in [...]

The Bowmans Live At Powerplay Studios Self-Released Rating: The Bowmans, sisters Sarah and Claire, describe their music as indie Americana. I can see why they would do that, and they certainly are a local legends among those musicians in New York’s musical underground who embrace what is called Americana. But really the Bowmans’ songs are [...]

Full disclosure: I’m from New York City. Garth Brooks was never particularly popular in my (old) neck of the woods. I do remember the whole Chris Gaines SNL fiasco, and I also remember being shocked when I saw the man in the black cowboy hat on the cover of the Rolling Stone back in 1993. [...]

A new set of rules to regulate Internet traffic was passed this week by the Federal Commmunications Committee. The rules will give the federal government the power to regulate the Internet, in theory giving equal weight to all websites and services. On either side of the debate are broadband and wireless companies (Comcast, AT&T, and [...]

Fran Healy “If you write a good enough melody, then it’s almost like a magnet that attracts certain phrases, or certain words, towards it. And then the next stage is the easy part, which is like doing a medium-difficulty crossword from The Guardian. You’ve just got to fill in blanks and it writes itself.” Sean [...]

2010 has been a busy year for Vampire Weekend, starting with the release of sophomore effort Contra (XL Recordings) in January. Over the summer, the former model pictured on the album’s cover filed a lawsuit against the band for misappropriation of image. More recently, Contra was nominated for a Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album. [...]

Poor Kings of Leon! They can’t catch a break. After suffering through pigeon-gate earlier in the year, our recent cover subjects had to postpone tonight’s triumphant return show at the 02 Arena, London’s premiere venue, due to two of their tour buses catching fire. According to the AP: Sixty firefighters have tackled a blaze that [...]