Herb Alpert - Rise

Happy 73rd Birthday to the great Mr. Herb Alpert!

The Indie Rock 25

Entertainment Weekly loves them some lists :-) Pop culture lists are mostly meant to be conversation starters…”you thought THAT was good???” or “how in the heck could you leave (fill-in-the-blank) off???”…and their latest is a good example of that.

In a special insert in their latest issue, EW presents “The Indie Rock 25”, a sure argument sparker for indie rock fans. In order to impose some kind of order on the compilation of the list they imposed some very aribitrary rules: each of the past 25 years could only be represented by one album each, the albums selected had to be released on independent labels (disqualifying, for example, Nirvana’s Nevermind), and, for reasons unexplained, only bands could make the list (so bye-bye Cat Power, Sufjan Stevens, etc., etc.) Also, apparently each band was limited to one entry.

The resulting list was, almost as a matter of course, put together after a series of arguments, compromises, and reluctant omissions; it is, all of that taken into consideration, an interesting list just the same (certainly a good conversation starter anyway :-)

It goes back to 1984’s Let it Be by the Replacements and comes all the way up to 2008 with Radiohead’s In Rainbows (which was actually released for download in ’07 but I guess they gave it a pass because the physical CD was released on the first day of ’08.) Some of these I own and cherish, some I’ve never heard.

The rest of the list (samples and/or full tracks at the links [where available]):

1985: The Smiths’ Meat is Murder
1986: R.E.M.’s Lifes Rich Pageant
1987: Dinosaur Jr.’s You’re Living All Over Me
1988: Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation
1989: The Pixies’ Doolittle
1990: Fugazi’s Repeater
1991: My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless
1992: Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted
1993: Built to Spill’s Ultimate Alternative
1994: Guided by Voices’ Bee Thousand
1995: Archers of Loaf’s Vee Vee
1996: Belle & Sebastian’s If You’re Feeling Sinister
1997: Modest Mouse’s Lonesome Crowded West
1998: Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea
1999: Sleater-Kinney’s The Hot Rock
2000: Yo La Tengo’s And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out
2001: The Shins’ Oh, Inverted World
2002: Interpol’s Turn on the Bright Lights
2003: The White Stripes’ Elephant
2004: Arcade Fire’s Funeral
2005: Bright Eyes’ I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning
2006: The Hold Steady’s Boys and Girls in America
2007: Spoon’s Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga

Discuss :-)

(Video of Radiohead's "Jigsaw Falling into Place" below.)

The Orchard

There are always adjectives ready to try to capture the essence of anything…and there are adjectives aplenty to describe his sumptuous (see?) CD from the utterly remarkable Lizz Wright: luminous, sultry, soulful, beguiling, enchanting, utterly engaging. The Orchard is all of these things and yet the words don’t do Ms. Wright and the new addition to her splendid body of work proper justice.

But words are all I have here and thus they will have to suffice.

This wonderful collection is compromised of eight fine original tunes (all co-written by Wright) and four deftly chosen, surprising covers.

The originals include the cool, sprightly and irresistibly percussive “My Heart” and “This Is”, the quiet but stately “Speak Your Heart”, and the wistful, bittersweet “When I Fall”.

The covers include a bluesy stroll through Ike Turner’s “I Idolize You”, the righteous R&B of Sweet Honey in the Rock’s “Hey Mann”, a dreamy waltz with Patsy Cline’s “Strange”, and a compelling version of Led Zeppelin’s “Thank You”.

Wright is an incredibly expressive singer who brings honest passion to her music without ever feeling the need to give in to excessive vocal gymnastics (she got the chops to wail with the best of them but if it doesn’t stand in service to the song she has no space for it…and that’s so thrillingly refreshing that you wish this was a better world where she was a bigger star than she currently is.)

The music…given wing by acoustic guitars, bass, and keyboards…is able and powerful support to the wondrous vocals under the sure-handed direction of producer Craig Street.

The Orchard is a bountiful harvest of jazz, blues, pop, and R&B that gets more tasty…more delightful and fulfilling…with each listening.

Paul McCartney - Birthday

...you say it's your birthday, it's my birthday too, yeah!...

So come on and dance with Paul (and me) on my birthday...:-)

American Idol Top 12

This year’s American Idol top 12 have met the Lennon-McCartney songbook and they have, for the most part, lived to tell the tale (actually most of these songs are so well-written that any halfway decent singer would have to really go out of their way to screw them up…though, that said, Kristy Lee Cook, David Hernandez, and David Archuletta all managed to do exactly that.)

Let me once again state for the record that is not, as the host and the judges (and the producers) keep trying to convince us, the best group of AI finalists “ever”. They’re a talented enough bunch but, as a group, they’re certainly not head and shoulders over the standard set by the previous groups of finalists: season 1 (Kelly Clarkson, Tamyra Gray, Justin Guarini, Nikki McKibbin, Ryan Starr, Christina Christian), season 2 (Ruben Studdard, Clay Aiken, Kimberley Locke, Josh Gracin, Kimberly Caldwell, Trenyce), season 3 (Fantasia, Diana DeGarmo, Jennifer Hudson, LaToya London, Jasmine Trias, George Huff, John Stevens), season 4 (Carrie Underwood, Bo Bice, Vonzell Solomon, Nadia Turner, Anthony Federov, Constantine Maroulis), season 5 (Chris Daughtry, Taylor Hicks, Katherine McPhee, Elliott Yamin, Paris Bennett, Mandisa, Kellie Pickler, Ace Young), and season 6 (Jordin Sparks, Blake Lewis, Melinda Doolittle, LaKisha, Chris Richardson, Phil Stacey, Chris Sligh).

That said, the first performance night on the big stage (the new set is too busy and kind of ugly actually) showed some of the current cast stepping into contention while others kind of belly flopped.

Personally, I’ve got a fondness for the laid back Jason Castro (his take on “If I Fell” was charming)…I have no idea if he can go the distance but I like him.

Young front runner David Archuletta was a disaster on “We Can Work it Out” but he is still a strong contender with his lovely voice and his “aw shucks” demeanor. Kristy Lee Cook’s ghastly hyperactive country hoedown version of “Eight Days a Week” (I loved how Paula Abdul told her that the contestants shouldn’t take the judges’ suggestions so literally) and David Hernandez’s lounge-tastic stumble through “I Saw Her Standing There” dropped their long-term prospects while Syesha Mercado hit the triple whammy by having to go first, being off-key, and dropping a totally unmemorable version of Earth, Wind, & Fire’s arrangement of “Got to Get You into my Life”.

I think that Carly Smithson over-sings everything (she bludgeoned “Come Together” into submission last night) but she has a strong voice and good stage presence and she should go far in the competition.

I like the bluesy/growly rock chick thing that Amanda Overmyer does but I’m not sure if it will serve her well in some of the theme shows that AI throws at the singers (a disco night would be hell for her as will, I suspect, the week when Mariah Carey is the mentor.)

The judges seem to like David Cook but I don’t get it myself (like Smithson, he over-sings everything and doesn’t really connect with the lyrics he’s singing…”Eleanor Rigby” was a case in point) and Brooke White has a nice voice and an earnest charm….both of them seem likely to stick around for a while.

Who’s going to be the first of the finalists to be serenaded off by “Celebrate Me Home” (as sung by season 2 champ Ruben Studdard)? I don’t know…my guess would be Syesha but we shall see (and we shall update this entry after the results show.)

* * * * *

So it was David Hernandez...this year's "controversial" contestant...who got the boot. I was a bit surprised but I guess I shouldn't have been.

And next week, according to Seacrest, more Lennon-McCartney songs. I can't remember them using the same theme two weeks running but I guess that John and Paul's songs are more than worthy of that distinction.

Dexter

I don’t subscribe to Showtime so my previous exposure to Dexter…the macabre but surprisingly engaging crime drama starring Michael C. Hall…was from watching the pilot when it was posted on Showtime’s website just before the show debuted on the network. I enjoyed the pilot…featuring the titular character, a forensics expert for the Miami police department who is himself a serial killer who kills only other serial killers…and I looked forward to when the show was inevitably collected on DVD.

CBS is broadcasting an edited version of Dexter on Sunday nights (a happenstance created by the writer’s strike and the need to fill programming hours.) The edits were largely due to language (a couple of the supporting characters swear like sailors sometimes), for time, and for some of the more grisly bits (though, that said, the murders on the show are not always especially graphic…some of the stuff is no worse than what you might see on any given episode of CSI) but I was interested to see the difference.

Luckily I had received the season 1 DVD set of Dexter for Christmas and I took the occasion to finally sit down and watch all 12 episodes. Dexter is a stylish, black comic little gem of a series and Hall (late of the darkly comic Six Feet Under) is excellent as the titular character, a sociopath (though perhaps not as disconnected from his feelings as he so often claims to be) whose murderous impulses have been channeled into a “good” outlet by his late adoptive father, a policeman who recognized his son for what he was and taught Dexter a code that keeps him from killing the innocent.

Everyone in and around Dexter is damaged in their own ways…this includes his sister Deb (a police officer), his girlfriend (a skittish victim of spousal abuse), his nakedly ambitious boss, and an affable cop…and no one (save for one perpetually angry cop) seems to notice that there is something off about him. The series veers toward soap opera off and on but they pull back from that particular precipice almost every time.

Season 1’s overarching plot includes the hunt for Dexter’s opposite number, a macabre serial murdered who is dubbed the “Ice Truck Killer”, and while the identity of the killer is telegraphed fairly early on the eventual resolution of the conflict is ultimately satisfying. Dexter is probably not everyone’s cup of tea…the “hero” is a serial killer after all…but I found it oddly compelling and I look forward to season 2.

Thriller - 25th Anniversary Edition

25 years ago Michael Jackson’s Thriller became such a cultural phenomenon that people kind of skipped past the fact that it was a really good album but not a really great album.

We all remember the highpoints…the silky, ominous throb of the amazing “Billie Jean”, the propulsive energy of “Wanna Be Startin’ Something”, the smooth and pleasing pop sheen of “Human Nature”, the paradoxically goofy and funky title track (major props to the late, great Vincent Price for his “rap”), and the snarling rock and roll marriage of Jackson’s voice and Eddie Van Halen’s guitar on the still-potent “Beat It”…with abiding (and well-deserved) fondness.

A lot of what made those songs even more indelible is not only that they were great tracks but also that most of them had interesting videos that were in heavy rotation on MTV (back when MTV…you know…played videos during most of the day and night.)

The rest of Thriller is, truth to be told, mostly just okay. “The Girl is Mine”, the duet with Paul McCartney, was and is a harmless pop trifle, “Baby Be Mine” was and is a generic Quincy Jones pop/soul mid-tempo jam, “P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)” was and is silly and annoying (yeah, I know it was a hit…I don’t care…it’s still silly and annoying), and “The Lady in my Life” (yes another “hit”) was and is a limp, unconvincing love ballad.

For the 25^th anniversary edition CD, the original album is supplemented with two outtakes and four remixes. None of this stuff adds much to the record. The best of the lot is an amusing 24-second clip from Vincent Price’s voiceover track work for “Thriller”. The other outtake is “For All Time”, a pleasant enough (though ultimately forgettable) love song that might have been left out because the melody sounds more than a bit like “Human Nature”.

None of the remixes comes close to improving on the originals. “Billie Jean 2008” featuring Kanye West (whose vocal contributions consist mainly of throwing in the odd “yeah, yeah” here and there) slows the tempo down and buries the track’s strongest feature, that tight bass line, in the mix while Akon adds nothing interesting to “Wanna Be Startin’ Something 2008”. “P.Y.T. 2008” is only made even more silly and annoying with the addition of will.i.am and the idea of turning “Beat It” into a duet between Jackson and Fergie may have seemed like a good one on paper (though I find that hard to believe) but it was a bad idea when executed.

Thriller is, flaws and all, still a remarkable pop record even if this anniversary edition really doesn’t add anything good to its legacy.

The 80th Annual Academy Awards

A big night for the Coen brothers…three Oscars (Best Picture, Best Director(s), Best Adapted Screenplay)…and their movie, No Country for Old Men, on a sedate, kind of uninspired Academy Awards night.

The show itself was okay…Jon Stewart was pretty good (not great but he had a few nice moments) as the host…with decent enough musical numbers, relatively brief acceptance speeches, and perhaps a few too many montages (I’m guessing they put them together in case the writers’ strike was still going on and they needed to fill a lot of time and decided to go on and use them anyway.)

Everything about the 80^th Academy Awards show was…okay…nothing particularly memorable but nothing especially bad either. And hey they got it done in less than 3 ½ hours…gotta give ‘em credit for that :-)

American Idol 7: Semi-Final Round

Oh my. The shtick really has calcified hasn’t it? The principals on American Idol really are phoning it in and they’re not even bothering to pretend that they’re not.

Let’s see now: Ryan Seacrest as the preening ass who thinks he’s much wittier than he is? Check.

Randy Jackson as the goofy over-aged “hipster” who hasn’t a clue how far removed he is from being as cool as he imagines he is? Check.

Paula Abdul playing the role of the den mother desperately trying to organize her sunny comments into something coherent but failing at that more often than not? Check.

And Simon Cowell…so bored with the proceedings that he spends his time playing bratty brother to Abdul and then trotting out the same old tired put-downs? Check.

Add to that the fact that they made the singers do songs from the sixties (except for the one kid who did “Jailhouse Rock” which no one seemed to notice was a hit in 1957) and then had the judges (mostly Cowell) whine about the fact that the songs were not “relevant to today”.

They keep telling us that the top 24 talent this year is the best ever but none of the performances proved that out (they were mostly bland, inoffensive, and, yes Simon, forgettable...hopefully the women will show something more) and the rote interactions between the judges and the host have gone past annoying right into utterly predictable and completely boring.

Perhaps this season’s Idol will pick up steam as it moves along…maybe they’ll, as Randy would doubtlessly say, “work it out”… but at this point I wouldn’t bet the farm on it, dawg.

* * * * *

2/21 addendum:

The ladies were a little better as a group than the guys were the night before...but nobody thus far has jumped out as someone who would put out a CD that I would be rushing out to buy. We'll chalk it up to first week jitters and hope that the contestants will start living up to Seacrest's incessant claim that they are the best Idol semi-finalists ever. We shall see.

Just a Little Lovin'

Shelby Lynne is a soul survivor…an extremely talented singer and songwriter who won a “Best New Artist” Grammy years after she had started putting out records…a restless, creative spirit with a beautiful, sultry voice…and so the idea of her making a disc of covers of songs made famous by the amazing Dusty Springfield seems like a no-brainer. And, even more importantly, it made for one damn fine CD.

Springfield approached these songs like the big R&B/pop diva (that word used in the most affectionate and admiring way) she is…she inhabited songs with soul, passion, and verve. Lynne has those same qualities but she approaches the songs with a cooler, supper club vibe…subtle playing and, especially, nuanced singing…that breathes interesting, jazzy new life into some very familiar tunes (including sweet and smoky readings of “The Look of Love”, “I Only Want to Be with You” [see below], and “How Can I Be Sure”.)

The title track sets the mood with an evocative stroll and that is immediately followed by a beautifully yearning take on “Anyone Who Had a Heart” and a powerfully understated version of the often bombastic “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me” that seals the deal on this collection’s greatness. Lynne’s wistful, self-penned “Pretend” fits like a glove with the 9 covers here.

The music…a quartet of keyboards, guitar, bass, and drums on most cuts…is masterfully played but it’s Lynne’s rich, compelling voice that effortlessly…and rightfully…holds the center and righteously carries the day on all 10 tracks here; she once again proves that great singers and great songs are in no need of vocal gymnastics to make them soar and shine soulfully.

This is music for slow dancing…or snuggling…with someone you have a serious thing for…unabashedly passionate and romantic music that isn’t the slightest bit cloying…great music, a tribute from one great artist to another, that is achingly heartfelt and wonderfully entertaining from the first track to the last.

The 50th Annual Grammy Awards

The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences realized that when it comes to the Grammy awards…especially the 50^th anniversary awards…it’s the music that counts. There are only so many laundry lists of record executives and shout outs to God that the audience wants to sit through so, again, they kept the number of awards they handed out on the prime time broadcast to a minimum and concentrated on presenting an eclectic array of performances. For the most part it worked to make for an entertaining show.

As far as the awards went the Academy went against the prevailing wisdom that Amy Winehouse’s train wreck of a personal life would preclude them from honoring her by giving her 5 Grammys…including plum prizes for Best New Artist, Song of the Year, and Record of the Year (the latter two for the ironic but undeniably funky “Rehab”.) Winehouse (above with her Mom), originally denied a visa to come to the ceremonies, performed in a small venue in London before an enthusiastic audience. Her performances of “You Know I’m No Good” and “Rehab” were a bit ragged but potent nevertheless. She seems genuinely shocked by her Record of the Year win, which announced just after her performance.

Winehouse lost the coveted Album of the Year to a surprise winner: Herbie Hancock’s (below) lovely River: The Joni Letters (only the second jazz album to win the prize following the 1965 award to Getz/Gilberto by Stan Getz and Joao Gilberto.) Kanye West lost out on this one for the third time (both Vince Gill and Usher took playful jabs at West’s petulant behavior during previous awards shows.)

The show itself was a celebration of Grammy’s 50 years with lots of Grammy favorites among those presenting awards or introducing performances. Among the very familiar faces were Quincy Jones (27 Grammy wins), Stevie Wonder (25), Cher, Tony Bennett, Natalie Cole, and Ringo Starr.

Alicia Keys opened the show with a duet with the youthful ghost of Frank Sinatra on “Learning the Blues” (Keys would return later for a rousing version of “No One” with some help from John Mayer) followed by Carrie Underwood romping through “Before He Cheats” backed up by a phalanx of percussionists.

Some of the performances that followed were rousing: Herbie Hancock and Lang Lang’s soaring take of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue”, Beyonce and the immortal Tina Turner shimmying through “Proud Mary”, Aretha Franklin and BeBe Winans leading a gospel medley, young Timothy Mitchum and Carol Woods (from the movie Across the Universe) with an amazing gospel version of the Beatles’ “Let it Be”, Kanye West’s heartfelt “Hey Mama”, Andrea Bocelli and Josh Groban’s majestic “The Prayer”.

Others were fun…the reunited Time teaming up with Rhianna, Foo Fighters blazing through “The Pretender” with an orchestra conducted by Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones and a violin solo by this year’s “My Grammy Moment” winner, West and Daft Punk’s otherworldly performance of “Stronger”, John Fogerty teaming up with rock and roll fathers Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis, Feist’s understated version of “1234”.

(A couple were….um…a bit more problematic: will.i.am’s rap was lame and the duet on “That Old Black Magic” between veteran Keely Smith…still in fine voice…and Kid Rock…not exactly Louis Prima… was a bit awkward. And there was a bit too much Cirque du Soleil for my taste.)

All in all, Grammy didn’t embarrass itself during its golden anniversary show and that was all good.

Eli Stone

Eli Stone , ABC's new Thursday night "dramedy", tries hard to achieve a state of profound whimsy…there’s a definite Ally McBeal vibe (complete with random production numbers and quick cuts to exotic locales in dreams) to the proceedings…and sometimes it reaches that state.

But the word that too often encapsulates the show is cute. I haven’t decided if that’s a good thing.

The titular character is an ambitious shark of a corporate lawyer…he is successful and engaged to his boss’ daughter…who finds a new direction in life due to an inoperable brain aneurysm which causes him to have vivid (and, yes, whimsical) hallucinations which show him the way to do the right thing. There is some stuff about Eli perhaps being a “prophet” though one would hope that modern prophets aren’t seeing George Michael dancing and singing “Faith” :-)

The show is visually remarkable and the cast…led by Jonny Lee Miller as Stone and featuring the always wonderful Loretta Devine and Victor Garber…is solid but the pilot still wasn’t engaging enough to turn me into a fan. I’ll give it another viewing or two to see if it grabs my interest.

The Moment of Truth

The Moment of Truth, Fox’s new game show where people answer increasingly personal questions for a chance to make increasing amounts of money, is not the end of the world. It’s far too dull and far too shallow for that.

The lengths that people will go through to win money and/or be on television are well documented and this show is, sadly, no worse than many of the others where people are wiling to act the fool or reveal intimate details about themselves in front of millions of their fellow citizens.

After relentless hyping the show debuted Wednesday night after American Idol and it just sort of sat there without sparking any real interest (prurient or otherwise.) The game features answering up to 21 questions (culled from 50+ questions answered before the show while strapped to a lie detector) and moving forward as long as the answer given on the air is considered to match the veracity of the answer given while being examined by the lie detector.

It sounds more scandalous in theory than it turns out to be in reality. The show is filled with hokum…portentous music, supposedly “suspenseful” pauses before revealing if the answers are true, “candid” reaction shots from family members and friends onstage, oh-so-empathetic host (Mark L. Walberg...see above)…and while some of the questions are probing the contestants grin, grimace, and preen through the proceedings to the extent that you feel no connection to them. In the end, it all adds up to not much at all.

I will admit that morbid curiosity led me to watch the first episode but nothing I saw makes me all that interested in watching any others.

US 3 - Cantaloop

A cool blast from the past.

Heath Ledger

Heath Ledger, the 28-year-old Australian actor perhaps best known for his star-making turn in the 2005 film Brokeback Mountain, has died in Manhattan. He was found dead in his apartment (some reports cite possible drug causes.) Ledger is going to be seen as The Joker in the upcoming Batman film, The Dark Knight (see below).

Breaking Bad

When we first meet Walter White he’s driving a Winnebago through the desert like a bat out of hell. He’s wearing a gas mask. He’s not wearing pants. In the seat next to him is an unconscious man who is also wearing a gas mask. Behind him two other men flop around lifelessly. And in the distance, there are sirens. In his panic, Walter gets the mobile home stuck in a ravine and he hops out, throws off the mask, and uses a camcorder to send a message to his family. Leaving his ID by the camera Walter, in an apron and jockey shorts, stands in the road pointing a big gun in the direction of the approaching sirens.

And then we flash back three weeks to find out how he got to that fateful juncture in his life.

This then is the way that Breaking Bad, an intriguing new series from American Movie Classics (AMC), begins.

Bryan Cranston (perhaps best known as Hal, the amorous, hapless Dad on Malcolm in the Middle) stars as Walter, a sad sack High School Chemistry teacher who has to work a second job in a car wash to try to make ends meet for his family. Walter’s wife, Skyler (Anna Gunn) is loving (she celebrates his 50^th birthday morning by writing out the number 50 is veggie bacon on top of his scrambled eggs) but disappointed with where they are financially and his son Walter Jr. (RJ Mitte) has cerebral palsy and a sarcastic tongue.

A dire medical diagnosis causes Walter to “wake up” (his words) and take his life into darker realms in order to try to make a more stable financial future for his wife and son in the shadow of his impending demise. The path Walter chooses is to apply his knowledge of chemistry to cook up high grade crystal meth in partnership with a former student of his, drug dealer Jesse (Aaron Paul). They use the aforementioned Winnebago as a rolling drug lab.

Breaking Bad blends drama and comedy to nice effect and it leaves you in the strange position of kinda rooting for a guy looking to make a fortune by making and selling illegal drugs. Cranston’s bravura performance…a potent combination of resignation, disappointment, and, after his life is given an impending end date, cunning, new purpose, and a new sense of fatalistic fearlessness…he’s wonderfully appealing in the role. The other actors have their moments (especially Paul, whose Jesse finds himself in the perplexing situation of being in partnership with a teacher who failed him) but the pilot is carried by Cranston.

Like Mad Men before it, Breaking Bad is another well-written, well-acted gem for AMC (which seems determined to break out of the box of just showing old movies) and I am really looking forward to seeing where this one will take us.

Duets...Friends and Legends

There are a few ways that pop stars who were popular in the 60’s or 70’s (or even 80’s) can make a bit of splash on the scene long after radio has relegated them to the oldies stations; one of them is to gather together some famous friends and fans and take a trip through the old songbook with a collection of duets.

Anne Murray’s voice is not as supple as it was 30 years ago (but then whose is?) but it still has beguiling warmth that caresses the lyrics and brings a smile to jaded ears. On this disc, Murray (aided and abetted by legendary producer Phil Ramone) and her friends (all women) remake some of her old hits to very fine effect.

Murray’s creamy voice blends sweetly with her still potent contemporaries including the great Dusty Springfield (a charming take on “I Just Fall in Love Again”), the always-amazing Emmylou Harris (the sweetly plaintive “Another Pot o’ Tea”), Olivia Newton-John (the lovely, bittersweet “Cotton Jenny”), and Carole King (the wistful “Time Don’t Run Out on Me”).

She also holds her own with younger singers: Shelby Lynne (the feisty “You Won’t See Me”), Martina McBride (a grand take on “Danny’s Song”), the Indigo Girls (the hopeful “A Little Good News”), the ever-remarkable k.d. lang (a very beguiling version of “A Love Song”), Amy Grant (a luminous “Could I Have This Dance”), Sarah Brightman (a neat remake of Murray’s first big hit “Snowbird”), Shania Twain (“You Needed Me”), Celine Dion (a charming live duet on “When I Fall in Love”...see below), Celtic Woman (“Song for the Mira”), Nelly Furtado (“Daydream Believer”), Jann Arden (“Somebody’s Always Saying Goodbye”), Dawn Langstroth (who is Murray’s daughter, on a lovely spin through “Nobody Loves Me Like You Do”), and Isabelle Boulay (on a stately French version of “If Ever I See You Again”).

17 fine duets… as comfortable and soothing as a warm summer’s day…coming together to make a very fine CD.

American Idol 7

It’s back.... It’s been a mixed bag for American Idol alumni over the past year…some have had extraordinary success on the charts (Chris Daughtry, Carrie Underwood), one became an Oscar winner (Jennifer Hudson), another made a big splash on Broadway (Fantasia) while, on the other hand, others have had relatively tepid sales of their newest CDs (Kelly Clarkson, Ruben Studdard, Katherine McPhee, Taylor Hicks, Jordin Sparks, Blake Lewis with Studdard, McPhee, and Hicks all losing their major label contracts)…but with the ongoing writers’ strike crippling television production, the return of the show itself is a godsend for both fans and the Fox TV network.

Idol began its 7^th cycle with “been there, done that” efficiency…Simon Cowell, Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul, and Ryan Seacrest (see above) could phone in their opening round comments and expressions now (and in the 2-hour season premiere that’s basically what they did)…and the early episode parade of would be William Hungs is also extremely familiar (though, that said, the two Star Wars geeks…um, I mean “fans”… and the guy who sang the song about stalking were especially sad and disturbing…is being on TV really so important to some people that they are willing to willfully make themselves the butt of jokes in front of millions of viewers? Apparently so…)

Some of the people who got the “Welcome to Hollywood!” shout showed promise but, as usual, most of the folks who make the final cut before fans start voting will probably not get much (if any) screen time until the Hollywood round begins in earnest.

Idol remains a television juggernaut despite a mildly disappointing 6^th season (producers swear that this cycle there will be less emphasis on mentors and guest performers and more emphasis on the contestants which is a good thing) and with the strike it seems poised to be an bigger player on the small screen this year (even if no one picks up the mantle of Sanjaya :-)

Once they get through the freak show rounds, things will doubtlessly pick up and Idol will carry us through the spring in an entertaining fashion.

U2 - Pride (In The Name Of Love) (Rattle and Hum)

"...for the Reverend Martin Luther King, everybody sing..."

Cashmere Mafia

I don’t know if Cashmere Mafia executive producer Darren Star cares if people think of the new show as Sex and the City (another production of his) with more high-powered jobs and less nudity but in any case that’s what it is.

Mafia is fast-paced (sometimes the cuts are quick enough to give a guy whiplash), often amusing, soapy, and full of fabulous clothes being worn by consistently good looking folks who always ready with a sharp bon mot. The leads…Lucy Liu, Frances O’Connor, Miranda Otto, and Bonnie Somerville…are all in fine fettle in their roles.

Two episodes in (I think that ABC has seven in the can) and the subplots are flying fast and furiously (one of the principals has a cheating husband, another is exploring lesbianism, another has gotten the job of her dreams but lost her fiancée in the process, while the fourth is juggling a demanding career, demanding kids, demanding nannies, and a husband who feels neglected) but these ladies with their hectic, demanding work lives still manage to find time to lunch together (sort of like the way the Sex ladies always managed to find time to go clubbing together.)

And it’s all good. In these writing strike hobbled times, Mafia is frothy and fun…everything a good prime time soap should be…and a reasonably entertaining alternative to the glut of “reality” shows hurtling down the pike.