Liner Notes

  by Pete Mazzaccaro To the impressive list of fantastic records by women in 2019, please add “The Discredited Language of Angels,” the debut album by Gabi Garbutt and the Illuminations. I’m a little late to this one – it came out in mid-November – but it hasn’t garnered nearly the attention it deserves. Garbutt, […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro There’s a pretty good case to be made that R.E.M. is the most important band of the post punk era. From its remarkable 1983 debut “Murmur” through 1992’s “Automatic for the People,” which made it The Biggest Band in the World at the time, it was the most significant influence on the […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro The argument that pop music has gotten worse over time is a case every generation has made of the one to come after it. We hear new music and don’t hear the same range of melody, complexity of song arrangement. In today’s pop, there’s often not even enough structure to talk about […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro Twenty-five years and one month ago, Oasis roared onto the musical landscape with its debut album, “Definitely Maybe,” a rock record that wore the sheen of Beatles grandeur but seethed with blue collar grit and emotion. It etched in stone the Brit Pop ethos of the mid ‘90s and accomplished a very […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro One of the things I’d like to do with this column is highlight records by bands or solo artists that might get lost in the weekly churn of big pop music releases. To that end let me introduce you to Frankie Cosmos, an indie rock band based in New York City that […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro I won’t pretend to be an expert on country music. I am a fan of the genre’s most rootsy practitioners. Among my favorites: Willie Nelson’s “Red Head Stranger,” the ballads of Townes Van Zandt and “newer” work by Gillian Welch, Jason Isbell and others. My taste would best be described as classical […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro In the past few years, the most interesting music I’ve heard is by women: Courtney Barnett, Speedy Ortiz, Lucy Dacus, Stella Donnelly and Bleached (which I reviewed here a month ago). These women are building on influences that range from The Runaways and Debbie Harry to The Breeders and Liz Phair. And […]

by Pete Mazzaccaro There’s really no band like The Flaming Lips. A noisy, artsy punk rock group when it was formed in Oklahoma 1983, it scored a hit in 1993 with “She Don’t Use Jelly,” a track that was just Nirvana enough to earn it regular radio rotation. Hundreds of bands with a similar sound […]