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InRadio 3: A Year of Seconds Here are the inspiring artists you will hear on InRadio's third disc. To hear these and other great artists, order now. Portastatic Amy led cowpunk pioneers
Last Roundup and folk pop trio The Shams before her first solo album got
the attention of critics and music fans. Combining
reality-based lyrics and transcendent melodies with a passionate music fan's
collection of pop, rock and country influences, one listen will confirm that
Amy Rigby continues to earn the praise and respect she's generated. http://signaturesounds.com You can also read about the artists featured on: |
Portastatic is the solo project of Mac McCaughan, known for his work in Superchunk
and as co-owner of 
Compared to everyone from Elvis Costello to Carole King, Amy Rigby "has
no peer on the current pop scene," according to the Chicago Reader. Amy's
new release (Til the Wheels Fall Off) is her fourth solo album and her first
on the Signature Sounds label. It features songs of hope, humor, cynicism and
survival, played with spirit and style by Rigby and a deep supporting cast
of musicians. 
Colonialism, independence, diaspora, and economics. These ingredients have been
brewing with tradition for decades in West African music. Just as a good stew
tastes even better the next day, the best pioneering bands of Afropop have returned
in recent years sounding more fresh than ever. Now comes Bembeya Jazz, formed
in 1961 by the Guinean government, with their first recording in fourteen years.
Originally created to propagate a newfound post-colonial African identity, a
significant economic decline in Guinea in the 1980's sent band members looking
outside the music scene to make a living. But now they're back and they're sure
to stun audiences the world over. 
Jeremy Fisher is a folk singer, songwriter and touring cyclist who lives on Vancouver
Island in British Columbia. His independent debut, Back Porch Spirituals, is
a collection of freewheelin' travel songs that trace the cultural outline of
North America along its winding back roads in the tradition of Woody Guthrie.
In the past four years, Jeremy Fisher has peddled tens of thousands of miles,
self-contained on his bicycle, between Seattle, WA and Halifax, NS, Canada playing
his music at festivals, coffeehouses and pubs along the way. InRadio is pleased
to bring listeners an unreleased track from Jeremy's upcoming sophomore release.
A three-piece from Brooklyn, NY, Enon takes influences and chops them up, adds
a little spice, makes a fine puree, and serves it to you with a smile. Combining
elements of Tom Tom Club, Love, early Cure, and a flash of Japanese pop and
punk esthetic, Enon sticks them together like some kind of artful mixed tape
a thoughtful
friend would make you. Bridging gaps. Jumping genres. Blending styles. But
let's not get too scientific about this. Enon is a pop band with a fully loaded
clip
and a cocked smirk. InRadio's listeners will have the chance to meet this cutting
edge band before their new record hits the streets this September on InRadio
3's featured independent label: 
From the unlikely stomping grounds of upstate New York come the Gym Class Heroes.
Together for nearly six years, GCH has brought different tastes and influences
to the table, creating its own batch of hip-hop flavor. Coming from diverse musical
backgrounds, (and having shared stages with Run DMC and Blackalicious) GCH prefer
live instrumentation to canned goods. Characteristically, GCH music is a blend
of crisp guitar rhythms, deep melodic bass lines, head cracking' beats and conscious
lyrics.
Formed in Portland in 1999, The Standard has earned a reputation as a dynamic
live band. Behind fragile yet ferocious vocals, the band layers intricate guitar
parts over keyboard lines that are alternately massive and delicate. Their
sound has matured into moodier and more introspective territory, as evidenced
on their
2002 
Here's what critics are saying about Austin, Texas up-and-comers Zykos:
Xavier Rudd's debut full-length release, To Let, which has been proclaimed as
one of Australia's top independent recordings of the past year, kicks off with
immediate evidence of his own unique sound. Led by a powerful solo didgeridoo,
the first track brings you in with a low growl and up into what
This latest pairing of technophilic European producer and soaring African vocalist
is nothing you'd expect. Marc Minelli, who's soaked up plenty of jazz, R&B,
and rock from his Paris home, brings a swinging, soul-jazz sensibility to Mamani
Keita's traditional songs and vocals. The freewheeling Afro-centric atmosphere
brings to mind vintage Nina Simone or Randy Weston albums; although Keita's high,
strident voice is nothing like Nina's. A backup singer with Salif Keita, she's
kin to Oumou Sangare's school of feminist African divas. With each song more
surprising than the last, Electro Bamako bodes well for such intercultural, intercontinental
cooperation.
Pamela Means is arguably the only Boston-based Out folkie whose punchy political
songs have worn a hole in her guitar. Pamela's kamikaze guitar style, politically-charged
lyrics and funky 'fro are all her own. 
Small Town Murder Scene (
Dirty Three are an instrumental, violin-led trio, lauded by the music intelligentsia,
but embodying the primitive appeal of rock'n'roll unlike any other band. Formed
in 1993 in Melbourne as a "background music combo", they progressed
rapidly and have since released six full-length albums and toured with such
diverse acts as Nick Cave, Rickie Lee Jones, Beck, the Beastie Boys and Sonic
Youth.
Dirty Three's music has been called lyrical, passionate, original, inspiring
and has earned them admiration and renown across the globe. Dirty Three provide
InRadio 3's only instrumental track, and they are one of the three groups from
this issue's featured independent label: 
In a time when the ability of the music industry to fabricate "introspective
singer-songwriters" is rivaled only by the enthusiasm to bleat about the "new
Gram Parsons", any time a pedal-steel guitar weeps, Tim Bluhm gives us
evidence that real songcraft still exists. Perhaps the only musician in the
world with
seven albums who lives in a van, Tim Bluhm has always balanced his music career
with the life of a vagabond, drifting between the California coast and its
mountain ranges in a Chevy van crowded with mountaineering gear and surfboards,
and as
he puts it in his characteristic understatement, "looking around".
As a result, few artists are as inseparable from a place as Tim Bluhm is from
California. InRadio 3 brings listeners a beautiful track from his latest release. 
Eclectic electric twang meets masterful songwriting on The Execution of All
Things, Rilo Kiley's second full-length album. With Liz Phair narrative sensibility,
Bettie Serveert (InRadio 2) compositional beauty, and Beachwood Sparks sunshine,
Rilo Kiley's latest is a lyrically dense treasure that will have you searching
for the story behind the evocative songs. It didn't take much for the burgeoning
Omaha, NE,