Wednesday, July 16, 2008

[Record Crate] Let's Hear it for the Girls

Two red-haired, piano-playing women with roots in Baton Rouge return with bragging rights on successive nights at the Spanish Moon: Lindsay Rae Spurlock returns from NYC to fete the release of her new CD on Friday, and Brooke Waggoner takes a break from charming the pants off Nashville to play Saturday with Paper Route. I have not yet heard Spurlock's CD, Heart On, but Waggoner's 2008 album, Heal for the Honey, is rather exceptional for someone so young: tension and drama slyly packed in a lush, hushed atmosphere and a breathless landscape.

Syreeta Neal offers a soulful, sophisticated facet of the Neal family legacy, mixing adult contemporary with a delightfully understated jazz mood and a killer voice. Really, I'm not what I'd call fan of adult-contemporary, but her passionate delivery, especially on funny and moving "The Groupie Song," have me sold. Corinne Bailey Rae, Alicia Keys and the like might want to think about making some room.

Donna Angelle and the Zydeco Posse make a pit stop at Boudreaux & Thibodeaux before a heading overseas for a week of festival performances in the Aquitania region of France. The key ingredient in a good zydeco song is having a bluesy, soulful swing to one's chank-a-chank. Just listen to the undulating pulse of her song "Rodeo Show" or the smoky, he-did-me-wrong blues number "I'd Rather Go Blind" to see how it's done.

Link to original with local events calendar

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