Angela Autumn hails from the small borough of Zelienople, Pennsylvania, which is a bit west of the Allegheny ridge, but you wouldn’t be wrong to think that she’s been baptized in Appalachian streams. You need but hear a few bars of “Old Time Lovers” to imagine bluegrass stains on the back of her guitar. There is that plaintive voice, the small catches, and the woo-hoos coming at you like a muddy creek. The foot-stompin’ and fiddle-supplemented good ‘ole girl vibe of “Sowin’ Seeds,” the two-step pacing of “God’s Green Earth,” the plucked banjo and lonesome tones of “Western Skies,” and rolling melody of “Back in Line” all owe more to hardscrabble mount than the lights of Nashville, where she now lives. Her idea of a change of pace is to mix a tiny Dylan vibe into “Shooter” or sing about “Texas Blue Jeans.” To be sure, she’s a young singer who could use a tad more variety in her repertoire and depth to her vocals, but you surely can’t go wrong by giving a serious listen to her new LP Frontiers Woman.
Listening to Annabelle Chvostek is like discovering a retro gypsy musician melded with a carefree, bilingual, quirky chanteuse. Sporting a steampunk-inspired album cover, the album title is a throwback: String of Pearls. (For you young’uns, that was the name of a massive 1944 hit for the Glenn Miller Orchestra.) Chovstek is a vet of the Canadian folk- and folk-rock scenes. Though she’s a Toronto native, she attended Concordia University in Montreal and is comfortable enough in French that a quarter of her 12-track recording are sung en français. Chvostek has always been a bit on the cheeky side of things and her cover of the title track is a jumpy little number evocative of how Django Reinhardt might have approached it. Chovstek goes into a jazzy Edith Piaf mode on “Je T’ai Vue HeirSoir,” complete with plinky keys and guitar, and maniacal fiddling. She’s a few shades more serious on “Walls,” a song about who we are and what we leave behind. She gives it an orchestral treatment and ices it with lyrics such as: I'm a holy fool/And a killer too/And I leave it all with you/The light's an open palm/And the branches keep us calm/We don't leave today/But when we do/We won't be gone…. But don’t worry, Chvostek mostly keeps the mood lighter. Check out her live take on “The Fool,” which is like being at a carnival from the comfort of your office chair.
Some recordings review themselves. In 1994, Brian Amador and his Puerto Rican/Argentine wife Rosi formed the Cambridge, MA-based Sol y canto, which is a spinoff of an ensemble they created a decade earlier, Flor de caña. They have been making pan-Latin music since the days when it was niche music that was yet to live up to Sol y canto’s mission: to make music accessible to both Spanish- and non-Spanish-speaking audiences. These days their daughter Alicia often joins them on stage to create glorious three-part harmonies. She’s on the band’s fifth release, En vivo, en familia (Live, as a family). “Amaras” is typical of what Sol y canto does. It’s mostly just Spanish guitar, bongos, and three voices. They sing with sunny joy, even on songs such as “Epidemia de soledad (Epidemic of Loneliness)”. By keeping things simple, our minds can travel to the marketplace to take in “Olor de chiles (Smell of Chilis),” though it’s a rare song in which other things (flute, bass) are as close as the trio gets to being slick. There are even touches for gringos, as in “En vivo (Home Again),” which is in English. As legions already know, Sol y canto’s power comes from being true the music, their hearts, and spirits.
I’ve previously railed against the “Civil Wars Syndrome,” the tendency to compare every energetic country/folk duo to the long-disbanded Grammy Award-winning partnership of Joy Williams and John Paul White. Don’t do that with Surrender Hill, the husband/wife collaboration between Robin Dean Salmon and Afton Seekins Salmon. First of all, Robin was born in South Africa before he surrendered to wanderlust and made numerous ports of call, played in a punk rock band, and eventually drifted to Arizona. For her part, Afton is an Alaskan who studied dance in New York City before landing in the Grand Canyon State. Their latest project, A Whole Lot of Freedom, opens with the title track, a quick nod to Robin’s punk rock days before turning country: Got a little country in my soul/little bit of rock and roll/got a lot of whiskey in my blood. Robin handles most of the lead vocals, but Ashton provides tight harmonies that are really evident in quieter acoustic-led pieces such as “Healing Song” and “Beautiful Wren,” the latter which is about their daughter. They draw on a lot of inspirations, including outlaw country, family tales, life experiences, and their “road-dog status.” You’ll hear echoes of Guy Clark on “Turn This Train Around,” but don’t be deceived by the title “Badge of a Punk Rock Band;” if you can believe it, it was inspired by a bad trade of a saddle, an electric guitar, and car restoration! I’d like to hear more Afton leads on an 18-track album that sometimes feels like Robin is trying too hard to sound like the boy from Texas he isn’t, but this is a very solid country album that takes interesting turns.
Jazz lovers will appreciate Refuges Mouvant by rising Québéçeois star Mireille Boily. Her new project is a collection of cool jazz song, poetry, and spoken word that pays homage to signs of heaven and earth. It is combo jazz in which she’s accompanied by saxophone, piano, standup bass, and percussion. She is a gifted songstress though, to be honest, this genre of music simply doesn’t move me. This, of course, is a personal statement and not a critique of Boily’s obvious gifts. Try tracks such as “Crépuscule” or “Nouvelle Lune,” as she might be your cup of tea.
If I could give young singers one piece of advice, it would be: We want don’t want to hear anything else until we’ve heard you. I think that Sarah Cicero has a nice voice, but her EP Cold Immaculate Opposite doesn’t let me know for certain. PR material describes her voice as “incandescent,” but the thing about light-emitting rays is that they are encased in a shell. There are so many layers and drifting departures that Cicero only emerges as refracted light. The overproduction is such that a rough video of her singing “Atticus” while sitting on stairs warbling against street noise is better than the studio version. The same issues turn her single “Letter to the Editor” into something approaching aural wallpaper. Cicero should simplify and add where needed, not just because she can.
Rob Weir
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