Greg Kot – Page 36 –

Julien Baker transforms despair into anthems on ‘Turn Out the Lights’

December 18, 2018 at 12:51 a.m.

That deep hole that Memphis singer-songwriter Julien Baker started to dig when she was still a teenager on her 2015 solo debut, “Sprained Ankle”? It gets wider and deeper on...

Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile perform Oct. 26, 2017, in the Rockefeller Memorial Chapel at the University of Chicago.

Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile click when they keep things small

December 18, 2018 at 12:51 a.m.

The setting was solemn, even breathtaking — the high ceiling and stained glass windows of Rockefeller Memorial Chapel on the University of Chicago campus. But the performers couldn’t have been...

Alvvays puts its faith in songs rather than window dressing

December 18, 2018 at 12:38 a.m.

Alvvays isn’t necessarily known as a band with a hard edge, particularly after the success of the sweetly anthemic single “Archie, Marry Me” lifted the Toronto quartet out of obscurity...

Nick Cave has been singing about mortality for decades, and he's really good at it. Whether the narratives are biblical or pulpy, the victims innocents or death row convicts, the circumstances comprehensible or cruelly random, Cave's songs are on intimate terms with the infinite ways a life can be extinguished. And yet, "Skeleton Tree", his latest album with his estimable band, the Bad Seeds, is a relatively concise song cycle shadowed by death that feels different than all the rest. <a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/music/kot/sc-music-nick-cave-skeleton-tree-ent-0916-20160916-column.html" target="_blank">Read the full review.</a>

Beck revisits past on ‘Colors’

December 18, 2018 at 12:00 a.m.

Beck was supposed to be a one-hit wonder, but more than two decades after "Loser," he remains an artist to be reckoned with. His previous release, "Morning Phase," even earned...

Randy Newman mixes mirth, empathy at City Winery

June 2, 2018 at 12:08 a.m.

"Marie" is one of the lesser-known songs that Randy Newman chose to play Wednesday in the first of two sold-out concerts at City Winery, but it left a bruise all...

How Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile made their electric campfire album

June 1, 2018 at 10:11 p.m.

The Kurt Vile-Courtney Barnett collaboration — which has produced a fine album, "Lotta Sea Lice" (Matador), and now a national tour —was meant to be, long before the two indie-rock...

St. Vincent gets personal on ‘Masseduction’

June 1, 2018 at 11:01 p.m.

If there's a rap against St. Vincent, aka Annie Clark, it's that she can be an arty, icy singer who keeps listeners at arm's length. Her inventive songs prompt distant...

Randy Newman talks about God, Putin and bad movies that make him cry

June 2, 2018 at 1:10 a.m.

Randy Newman has made a nice living while piling up two Oscars, three Emmys and six Grammys for soundtracking movies and TV shows. The "Toy Story" franchise wouldn't be the...

Torres’ sonic shift on ‘Three Futures’ falls short

June 2, 2018 at 2:06 a.m.

Torres, aka Mackenzie Scott, has a marvelous touch as a songwriter. She splits the difference between the mundane and the cathartic, the startling and the philosophical. Her 2015 release, "Sprinter,"...

Melkbelly mixes melody, mayhem and ‘family’ vibe

December 17, 2018 at 10:30 a.m.

The 24-hour-plus drive to Austin, Texas, to play the South by Southwest Music Conference is a pilgrimage many Chicago bands know all too well in recent decades. Each year, bands...

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