InRadio 2: Roller Skate

Here are some of the groundbreaking artists you will hear on InRadio's second disc. To hear these and other great artists, order now.

Ember Swift
"May the few who ignite sound fuel a change in the night. May the few who fuel change ignite sound into light." - Few'll Ignite Sound label motto

With her jazz-steeped, acoustic punk stylings, and seven recordings under her belt on her own independent Few'll Ignite Sound label, Ember Swift continues to solidify her reputation as one of Canada's finest independent artists. A genuinely compelling and uncompromising performer, Ember and her band have toured extensively throughout North America and Australia, averaging nearly 200 shows per year. Her shows promise a rockin' good time, with sheer fun as important an ingredient as her extraordinary voice and unflinching lyrics. InRadio 2 features a humorous track from Ember's most recent release, Stiltwalking.

Zell Miller III
"There is no choice but to bear witness to his lyrical gymnastics. I thought I was going to detonate listening and watching him turn phrases and words into atom bombs of truth." - The Villager Newspaper

Zell Miller III is a groundbreaking interdisciplinary theater artist and spoken word performance poet. He is also an accomplished playwright/director/educator and mentor. Recently, his spoken word collective, Xenogia, was selected to perform at the 2002 Singers of Daybreak Spoken Word Conference, along with such luminaries as The Last Poets and Slam poetry founder Marc Smith. As an educator, Zell created an interactive arts program focusing on how writing can serve as a powerful medium for self-esteem. The program has served more than 10,000 junior high and high school students. InRadio listeners will have an exclusive listen to a track from The Evidence of Silence Broken, Zell's upcoming release on TruRuts Endeavors/Speakeasy Records.

Bobi Cespedes
"(Her) album is a tapestry of electro-acoustic colors. Fusing digital with traditional, she uses these colors to propel her soulful voice to intriguing heights." -Jesse Varela, Latin Beat Magazine

Bobi Cespedes possesses one of the most powerful, poised, and elegant voices in the world, and Rezos, her solo debut on Six Degrees Records celebrates her arrival. The Cuban-born singer, percussionist, and Yoruba-Lucumi priestess carries on a centuries-old tradition of Afro-Cuban singing and drumming. Her deep, rich voice and her ear for contemporary Latin, jazz, and dance music, combine to make Rezos a new record with an old soul. Now living in the San Francisco Bay Area, Céspedes maintains a rigorous schedule of concerts, religious rituals, and travels lecturing at the university level. InRadio is excited to bring listeners a selection from Cespedes' amazing solo debut.

Calexico
InRadio 2 features a track from Calexico's newest release, Feast of Wire. Here's what people are saying:

"(Calexico), who got its handle from the California-Mexico border town of the same name, is a lively, sometimes moody brew of Latin-fused sounds and Southwestern flair. Still brimming with the band's unique union of mariachi flamboyance and laid-back country, Calexico's newest release, Feast Of Wire, also finds the Tuscon-based band forging new territory, both musically and lyrically." - Mar Yvette, Mean Street

"Feast of Wire is a loosely assembled gumbo of the band's Tucson-rooted boogies, dusty whiskey waltzes, and the occasional Tabasco-seasoned pop song. At times the album saunters lazily between the three like a drunken coyote, but the music itself--especially when flushed out in a live setting--has the power to transport even a horn-rimmed hipster to the parched, turquoise- and tumbleweed-strewn landscapes of mariachis and margaritas." - Village Voice
Touch and Go/Quarterstick Records

Midlake
One of InRadio's favorite young bands, Midlake's four founding members met while in the College of Music at the University of North Texas in the fall of 1997. Their first collaboration, an acid jazz quartet called The Cornbread All-Stars, didn't fulfill their musical cravings though Midlake's chemistry was apparent from the start. Influenced by the Beatles, Radiohead, Bjork and David Bowie, Midlake recently released Grand Milkmaid Army, their debut EP. The self-released album blends a gritty, low-fi sophistication with richly textured melodies and carries InRadio 2's title track: Rollerskate.

Myshkin's Ruby Warblers
" A marriage of punk's irreverence with the refinement and emotion of the jazz torch singers of old...an exhilarating musical ride." - New Orleans Times-Picayunne

Led by a woman who stole her name from Dostoevsky, Myshkin's Ruby Warblers are inventing a style of music known as gypsy-torch-punk. Originally based in New Orleans, they pull on jazz, latin, klezmer, mountain, delta, desert and rock and roll like taffy. Now calling Portland, Oregon home, Myshkin weaves disparate musical traditions together seamlessly on Rosebud Bullets, an album put out on her own Double Salt Records.

Out Hud
" Out Hud can express more in one elegant passage than a week's worth of Derrida, and all without saying a word...(Their) sprawling works short-circuit traditional neural pathways, wire the brain directly to the feet, and actively stimulate both." - Pitchforkmedia.com

Out Hud established a reputation early on in their career as a dynamic live band on an all-ages punk rock circuit that demands volume, impact and elan. After a move from Sacramento to Brooklyn and with their debut album (S.T.R.E.E.T. D.A.D.) out after a nearly two-year wait, Out Hud are poised to seize the collective hipster consciousness by the backside.
Kranky Records

Kinnie Starr
" ... an artist with vision and something really important to say... [she is] hypnotic and entrancing, with serious rhyming skills, boundless amounts of creativity, intellect, originality and powerful poetry." - Rock 'N Roll Reporter.
Vancouver-based Kinnie Starr has built a strong underground following with her edgy visual arts, graffiti, rhymes, outspoken race and gender politics, decidedly unorthodox performances, and envelope-pushing, beat-slamming recordings. After a brief and unhappy stint on a major label, Kinnie decided to walk and self-release her last record. On Sun Again, her latest release, Kinnie's smooth, seductive and easy voice has floated to the forefront.
MapleMusic Recordings

M. Ward
" M. Ward's (new record) is a house filled with ghosts, from the spirits of friends who have passed away to the departed legends of American roots music." - popmatters.com
M. Ward is a Portland based songwriter whose music bridges the gaps between the roots of various American musical traditions-folk, country, blues and rock. Armed with a guitar, harmonica, sparse percussion and a tin-pan alley-esque piano, Ward spins timeless classics that seem to flow effortlessly; simple yet eloquent tales alive with metaphor and imagery, told in a raspy, sepia-toned croon. InRadio 2 brings listeners a selection from Transfiguration of Vincent, the newest release from one of America's most enigmatic songwriters.
Merge Records

J. Otis Powell!
J. Otis Powell! is a poet, philosopher, performance artist, curator, arts administrator, and media producer. He is currently a producer of Write On Radio!, a literary radio show at KFAI-FM, a community radio station in Minneapolis. J. Otis also works as Communities' Liaison at The Loft, the nation's most comprehensive literary center. InRadio brings listeners "Amnesiacs", a poem that J. Otis contributed to Words Will Heal the Wound, a spoken word anthology series.
Tru Ruts Endeavors/Speakeasy Records

Bettie Serveert
" ...Everyone is talking about the White Stripes' "Elephant" as the early frontrunner for album of the year. But, to my ears, nothing has sounded better so far than Log 22..." - Jim Harrington, Oakland Tribune
InRadio 2 features a track from Log 22, the new release from indie-rock stalwarts Bettie Serveert. (Since you ask, the name means 'Bettie to serve', after Dutch tennis player Bettie Stove, who lost the Wimbledon Ladies Final in 1977.) Led for more than a decade by Canadian-born, Netherlands-reared singer/guitarist Carol van Dyk, Bettie Serveert delivers dreamy, articulate rock.
Hidden Agenda / Parasol Records

Madgesdiq
Says the Portland, Oregon-based hip-hop visionary: "In these days and times, rappers have become bogged down in a quagmire of wackery, selling the culture short in order to make the dollars offered by the mainstream. Being original is no longer important as cats have become content to be like the next man, repeating the same ol' tales of jewels, cars and street life." InRadio is proud to bring listeners a track from Madgesdiq's newest self-release, The Rebirth.

Happy Apple
" ...playful, rebellious spirit and enterprising methodologies... [Happy Apple's] unique sound has already spawned a rash of imitators within the modern jazz circuit." - All Music Guide

In their own words: "Jazz group. Saxophones, bass, drums. Formed in 1996 in Minneapolis, MN. Named after a Fisher-Price toy from the '60s. Have released five studio albums to date, as well as a limited-edition 3-disc live set. Have toured the U.S. extensively and Europe not-so-extensively over the last four years. Perhaps you have seen us. We are not that good-looking (see left)." InRadio 2 features the title track from, Youth Oriented, this pioneering group's newest release.
Sunnyside

Kathleen Edwards
" Debut albums this impressive make you wonder where the artist has been hiding." - Buzz McClain, Washington Post

InRadio 2 features a track from this 24-year old Ottawa-native's debut release, Failer. Though she began writing songs only three years back, her classical training as a violinist gave her the musical grounding she needed, while talent - and trusted peers among the Ottawa music scene - helped give shape to the material found on Failer. Edwards possesses a Lucinda Williams been-there-done-that vibe, yet she can pull out winsome pop just as easily. She is the latest artist to prove that you don't have to be American to know how to create stellar Americana.
Rounder Records / Maple Music Recordings

The Lascivious Biddies
" Gliding effortlessly over genres of jazz, pop and cabaret, the four Biddie girls show their voices are as luscious as their talents are curious." - The Pittsburgh City Paper

The Biddies are an all-girl jazz quartet whose unconventional arrangements of original compositions and standards often include four-part harmonies and blur the line between jazz, pop and cabaret. Recently back from a national tour, they earn hardcore devotion from fans one show at a time. InRadio 2 features an upbeat track from I Feel Biddy, the latest EP from this amazing foursome, released on their own label: Biddilicious Music

Even
One of Australia's premiere independent rock bands contribute a humorous indictment of mainstream commercial radio to InRadio 2. Their reputation as one of the country's best live acts is well deserved, though they've toured extensively worldwide. Even is part of a diverse group of artists that call Australian indie label Rubber Records home.
Rubber Records

Little Sue
InRadio 2 brings listeners the title track from Little Sue's most recent, self-released masterpiece, The Long Goodbye. Here's what critics are saying about it: " One of the most beautiful albums that great community (Portland, Oregon) has ever been proud to call its own." - Jeff Rosenberg, Willamette Week

" Delivering heartbreak as bittersweet as Tammy Wynette's, told in Emmylou Harris' bee-stung voice, the Portland country-pop chanteuse's songs swim into the heart and settle in quite nicely." - Scott Lewis, The Oregonian

You can also read about the artists featured on other discs by going out our Past CDs page.