CD-Charts Position 161
Average Rating:

Juvenilia

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Liz Phair

Release Date August 08, 1995
This is the Liz Phair I love. Raw, sexy, funny, gritty, real. Nothing like her recent work, which is made for the masses. This album is great. I love it and it should be re-released.

CD-Charts Position 162
Average Rating:

Puddle Dive

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Ani DiFranco

Release Date July 26, 1994
This is one of my absolute favorite Ani albums. The lyrics and melodies are catchy and the album is short (only about 30 minutes) so it's perfect for driving in the car or while tooling around the house. Her lyrics and poetry are as personally and politically relevant as always but there's also a really playful side (Blood in the Boardroom, Pick Yer Nose) that Ani doesn't showcase too often in her later albums. A more "human" Ani is appparent in this album than in any she's produced since. Definitely buy Puddle Dive.

CD-Charts Position 163
Average Rating:

Never Home

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Freedy Johnston

Release Date February 25, 1997
Freedy Johnston fills Never Home, his follow-up to the flawless This Perfect World, with a host of intelligent, detailed stories about memorable characters.

Johnston kicks off the album with "On The Way Out," a driving slice of rock. The song tells the story of a shoplifter whose cleverness appears to be wasted on a store clerk who couldn't care less. A version of this song appeared the year before on the soundtrack to the movie Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead. I liked the rougher production of the earlier version, but the version on Never Home features stronger drumming.

Johnston's gift is painting pictures with his lyrics, and he doesn't disappoint on this album. "Western Sky" is a beautiful, rather offbeat ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 164
Average Rating:

The Alternative to Love

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Brendan Benson

Release Date March 22, 2005
Brendan Benson's "Alternative to Love" can simply be summed up as brilliant. I am, admittedly, fairly new to Benson's work, but had a surprisingly lovely introduction to it the first time that I listened to The Raconteur's "Consolers of the Lonely." As a recently converted member of the International Church for the Reverence of the White Stripes, but nevertheless, hopelessly devoted to the great Jack White, I had bought COL looking to satisfy my ever-growing thirst for more White material. However, I emerged from the experience more intrigued by the other leading man, Benson, than solidified in my love for Jack White. Benson's music has been called "power pop" and has most often been compared to that of the Beatles. The mood of Benson's music is ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 165
Average Rating:

For the Stars

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Anne Sofie von Otter, Elvis Costello

Release Date April 10, 2001
I like Von Otter so much. I have so many of her albums I decided to buy this one when I saw it at Academy Records in nYc where people trade their things they don't want for things they do want. I guess there is a reason this ended up there. This album is terrible.

CD-Charts Position 166
Average Rating:

So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Ani Difranco

Release Date September 10, 2002
is the funk. Ani 70's. Doin it with Horns. Talkin to the audience in a way that would enrAgE some. Dig important right on crusAder songs lliKe "Letter tO a John" aNd the first song..

CD-Charts Position 167
Average Rating:

Artist's Choice: Elvis Costello

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Elvis Costello

Release Date January 01, 2005
is the funk. Ani 70's. Doin it with Horns. Talkin to the audience in a way that would enrAgE some. Dig important right on crusAder songs lliKe "Letter tO a John" aNd the first song..

CD-Charts Position 168
Average Rating:

Can You Fly

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Freedy Johnston

Release Date September 25, 1992
I can't believe this record is 15 years old! A lost classic...one of the finest American pop records of the last twenty years...original, dark, and lovely lyrics which vascillate between themes like death and love with effortless elegance...

CD-Charts Position 169
Average Rating:

Live at L'Olympia

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Jeff Buckley

Release Date August 14, 2001
It may be coincidental that my favourite Jeff Buckley songs were written by others...'Lilac Wine' and 'Hallelujah'. But in the usual banter we have when comparing him to his father, it's Tim trumping the prodigal with his lyric skills, which is by no means an attempt to diminish Jeff's gifts. 'Grace' is unquestionably a more listenable, intimate and coherent album than any of his fathers'. And if you wanted added proof of his virtuosity then this concert, held in July 1995,is a fabulous testament. The warmth of his voice is astonishing. But my prompt to get the album is the incomparable, final track, with my idol, Alim Qasimov, not from the concert at L'Olympia. It's tacked on, fairly seamlessly, from a concert of Sacred Music, held two weeks later, in the ... Read More:

CD-Charts Position 170
Average Rating:

North

CD-Charts > Music > Singer-Songwriters
by: Elvis Costello

Release Date September 23, 2003
While Elvis reigns near the top of my "Fave Songwriters" list and North certainly contains some sleek writing...I just can't (as another reviewer also noted) get past the constant vibrato ol' MacManus surrounds his voice with on...gasp...EVERY song. With each new album, his use of vibrato has risen from mildly amsuing to quite annoying to brain-numbing. Elvis, it's great that you want to stretch your wings. You're a five-star talent. But please, oh please, oh please - can you hold a note now and then without that bloody vibrato?! Aaaaaaaahhhhhh...