a plethora of strings and huge emotional crescendos. Underwood co-wrote four songs, mostly with the tried-and-true tunesmiths who made Some Hearts soar. On the torchy heartache ballad "I Know You Won’t," she gives a beautifully nuanced and controlled performance, but if that song would suit any number of lush female pop stars from Celine Dion on down, "Flat on the Floor" rocks hard while preserving co-writer Ashley Monroe’s Appalachian angst. Still, there are missteps: the easy tears of the unlikely war ballad "Just a Dream," a too-obvious attempt to repeat the sass of "Before He Cheats" ("The More Boys I Meet"), and the Shania-ish bad-girl-on-Cuervo stomp of "Last Name." The big payoff, then, is how much 24-year old Underwood has ...  (less)

The trick here is that Irglová and Hansard also play the leads; because their characters are shown busking, writing music, or rehearsing, the songs are smoothly integrated in the film. The overall acoustic mood won't surprise fans of the Frames--some tracks ("Say It to Me," "When Your Mind's Made Up") have even popped up on the band's albums, though the arrangements are more pared-down here, befitting the scruffy, street-musician setting. Being the lesser-known entity, Irglová feels like a revelation; she sounds a bit like a folkie Björk on "If You Want Me," and her song "The Hill" is downright heartbreaking. Irglová and Hansard had already made the 2006 album The Swell Season together, so their collaboration here feels really org...  (less)

is due in stores everywhere June 12th. Lead single Misery Business, in addition to other album tracks, deals with issues of shame and self-discovery as lead-singer Hayley Williams discusses. I've been ashamed, she says. I've felt hate, jealously, lust, fear, pride, self-consciousness... You hear a lot of this on the record. I feel like I need to talk about it. It is not uncommon for Paramore to expose their emotions and allow fans to have such an intimate look into their lives. While recording the track Born For This, the band invited a handful of fans into the studio to sing back-up vocals on the song. Fans have responded by voting Paramore as the #1 Best New Band in Kerrang! magazine, beating out Panic! at t...  (less)

princess...next big thing" - Spin. "Santi White is Santogold...the collaborators and players may change, the sounds may shift, but at the center is one woman's indelible vision" - The Fader. SXSW / Coachella shows, 2007 tours with Bjork, M.I.A., songs featured in Entourage, Grey's Anatomy, Grand Theft Auto.  (less)

throws caution to the wind and threads her pop needle with an ambitious ribbon of yet-to-be-conquered genres: reggae and ska on "Mary Jane Shoes," with Rita Marley; vintage soul on "Here I Come"; '80s hip-hop on "Fergalicious"; and sophisticated R&B on the John Legend-assisted "Finally." It's a tremendous and unpredictable expenditure of effort that mostly pays off--echoes of more talented vocalists like Pink, Beyoncé, and Christina Aguilera poke through in places. But while unbridled messing about can pay handsome artistic dividends (here, the guitar-propelled rock-like track "Big Girls Don't Cry" coughs them up), ultimately it's when Fergie's at her Peas-iest that she's most lovable; cases in point are the raunchily irresistible "London Bridge," which ea...  (less)

also making sure he has at least one foot firmly in the past. A natural step forward, to put it simply.  (less)

five originals — the lonely-at-Christmas "Washington Square," "Hey Santa!" and "Christmas On TV," the spiritual "Brightest Star" and the maybe-next-year "Gotta Be Good." Chris Isaak Christmas is this season's holiday surprise — a Christmas album that's actually cool.  (less)

Morning Sun 10. Without Jesus Here With Me 11. Birds  (less)

Jakob as a singer and songwriter. Jakob is best known as the lead singer and songwriter of the rock band The Wallflowers as well as being the youngest of four children born to singer-songwriter Bob Dylan and ex-wife Sara Dylan.  (less)

she was barely in her teens, displays formidable skill as a multi - instrumentalist, playing the guitar and ukelele as well as the fiddle, and is just as versatile, and breathtakingly mature, as a singer. Watkins incorporates folk, country, gospel, and pop into her 14-song set, produced by former Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones and recorded in Los Angeles and Nashville. She's joined by a wide range of old friends and longtime heroes, including alt-country duo Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers keyboardist Benmont Tench, and Elvis Costello drummer Pete Thomas; colleagues from the bluegrass world like Tim O' Brien, Punch Brothers Chris Eldridge, Ronnie McCoury, and Rayna Gellert;...  (less)

New, Say Anything and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. They have performed at festivals around the world including Coachella, Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Reading / Leeds (UK) and Laneway (Australia). While the debut was an attention-getting shot across the bow, Mean Everything To Nothing, produced by Joe Chicarelli (My Morning Jacket, The Raconteurs, The Shins), presents a substantial leap forward in sonic textures and song craft.  (less)