“All of a Sudden” swells between naturalistic chamber folk arrangements, operatic vocal performances, and sprawling instrumental expanses. O’Tierney’s collaborators fill the mix with meditative droning sax, echoing guitar harmonics, and cascading arpeggiated keys, letting each disparate part swirl together around O’Tierney’s crystalline vocals. The tide of instrumentation ebbs and flows with imperceptible ease, settling into a serene atmosphere midway through before steadily crescendoing to a gorgeous climax, guided by resolute guitar strums and dizzying jazz-tinged sax runs. O’Tierney gives the track subtle instrumental shades, but she leaves the emotions plain and direct, addressing an old love while offering a clear-eyed look a hopeful future ahead: “I still have the leaf you gave me / The autumn that you left / I still have the grief you gave me / But it’s not all I kept / On my own I know I’m home again.”
Under the Radar Magazine

The Claudettes: GARAGE GLAMOUR Red-hot dance cuts, ice-cold noir songs, rabid rock, passionate soul...the Claudettes reach a whole new level of sound and style with GARAGE GLAMOUR. The album's title points to the signature blend of glitz and grit that the Claudettes bring to the stage and studio. And the music? Fellini would nod and smile at this carnival ride of an album, which is bookended by two of the most nakedly sincere songs of the Claudettes' career.

Remastered 1985 debut release from Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper. The start of it all for the legendary late Mojo Nixon. August 2, 1957 — February 7, 2024 Mojo Nixon How you live is how you should die. Mojo Nixon was full-tilt, wide-open rock hard, root hog, corner on two wheels + on fire… Passing after a blazing show, a raging night, closing the bar, taking no prisoners + a good breakfast with bandmates and friends. A cardiac event on the Outlaw Country Cruise is about right… & that’s just how he did it. Mojo has left the building. Since Elvis is everywhere, we know he was waiting for him in the alley out back.

After more than a dozen years as an entity, Expo’76 rolls on — impossibly fresh in each performance, their reputation as the Chicago area’s most reliably potent and unpredictable cover band firmly established. Their secret all along has simply been remaining true to themselves, playing the music they want to play. Their set list is a far-flung assortment of hits, forgotten classics and deep cuts.

The Chris Greene Quartet - led by the Evanston saxophone colossus - played its first gig in 2005 and has since become one of the most highly visible, award-winning and critically lauded bands in the Chicago area. While honoring jazz's tradition, the band incorporates elements of funk, hip-hop, rock, Afro-Cuban, the blues and reggae, reflecting their diverse backgrounds. CGQ is celebrating the release of "Conversance," the first ever jazz release for Chicago's longest-running indie rock label, Pravda Records.

On Steve Dawson’s new album, Ghosts, his sixth as a solo artist, the Chicago-based musician and songwriter, well-known for the impassioned alternative country of the band Dolly Varden, crafts ten songs that find reasons to believe – in music, in human connections, in desert vistas – even as the ghosts move all around him, all around us. These ten songs combine intimate confessions and tightly constructed narratives. Their ghosts are often personal, but they intersect enigmatically with a broken world. “‘Is this really happening?’” he asks on “Walking Cane.” But there’s no clear answer to the violent changes. “Have we learned nothing? Here we go again.” But sometimes those ghosts leave gifts – of wisdom, of wonder – and sometimes living with them is also a kind of hope. “I am glad to be alive,” Dawson sings with his partner Diane Christiansen. Recorded live in-studio with a “dream band” of Chicago all-stars, the musicians suffuse these songs, some of the finest Dawson has ever written, with harmonies, rhythms, and textures that make them come alive and imbue them with hope. Dawson says, “Many of my favorite albums were recorded live in the studio. The arrangements on this new album were created on the spot, and rather than a collection of overdubs, the album is a performance.”

Brian Krumm, front man for Chicago’s tortured Americana artists The Great Crusades wrote the songs on his debut solo release, Just Fade Away (Pravda Records), during the 2020 shutdown. In an effort to stay sane during the first days of the pandemic, Krumm would drink a shot of whiskey each evening and try to write a song. Twenty-five days later, he had 25 songs. Krumm enlisted his bandmates to record the tunes, as well as a who’s who of Chicago music scene standouts. His influences, such as Robyn Hitchcock, the Jayhawks, Warren Zevon and Dylan, shine through on Just Fade Away and Krumm’s captivating, taleteller lyrics are again at the forefront. The record gives listeners a sonic snapshot of remembrances from Krumm and a life lived observing a perplexing yet utterly inspirational world.