Contributor
19 items by Don Shewey
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Aimless Love | ALBUM REVIEW
After eight albums on two major labels, John Prine has gone the route of many a fine though commercially marginal singer/songwriter and released an album on his own independent label. It's a treat. Though perhaps it lacks...
June 20, 1985 12:00 AM ET -
Various Positions | ALBUM REVIEW
Oh, no, moans an aging hippie after being bitten by a vampire. "Now I'll be half-dead and half-alive, kinda like Leonard Cohen." I always laugh at Leonard Cohen jokes, but I don't share their derisive sentiment. It's...
June 20, 1985 12:00 AM ET -
Whitney Houston | ALBUM REVIEW
Blessed with one of the most exciting new voices in years, Whitney Houston sings the hell out of the pleasant but undistinguished pop-soul tunes on her album, which was put together by a consortium of top producers:...
June 6, 1985 12:00 AM ET -
Milk & Honey | ALBUM REVIEW
Milk and Honey was conceived as a companion piece to Double Fantasy. Each is subtitled "A Heart Play," and while the earlier album was meant to be something of a healing ritual (coming after John and Yoko's...
March 1, 1984 12:00 AM ET -
Busy Body | ALBUM REVIEW
As a soul man, Luther Vandross has a unique image. Forsaking the role of Demanding Lover or Five-Star Stud played by the likes of Teddy Pendergrass and Marvin Gaye, Vandross is usually pursuing a woman who is...
February 16, 1984 12:00 AM ET -
Hello Big Man | ALBUM REVIEW
Hello Big Man is Carly Simon's best album in years. After the primal-scream therapy of Come Upstairs and the somewhat sterile sidestep into standards with Torch, Simon has returned to the sort of beautiful, folk-based singing and...
November 24, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Swordfishtrombones | ALBUM REVIEW
Tom Waits' new album is so weird that Asylum Records decided not to release it, but it's so good that Island was smart enough to pick it up. Half of the fifteen cuts — the dirty blues,...
November 24, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Hearts and Bones | ALBUM REVIEW
Paul Simon's new album is all about heart versus mind, thinking versus feeling, and how these dichotomies get in the way of making music or love. He addresses the issue directly in "Think Too Much" (which was...
November 24, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Madonna | ALBUM REVIEW
Madonna, who crashed onto the dance charts last year with "Everybody," has a voice that takes some getting used to. At first, it doesn't sound like much at all. Then you notice its one distinguishing feature, a...
September 29, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Get It Right | ALBUM REVIEW
Aretha Franklin teamed up with singer-song-writer-producer Luther Vandross last year to produce Jump to It, which featured a superbly consistent set of tunes and easily the finest singing Lady Soul has done in ten years. The second...
September 15, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Too Low For Zero | ALBUM REVIEW
Elton John and Bernte Taupin have written some great hit singles, but since the early Elton John LP, they have never produced an album of consistently first-rate material. And although Too Low for Zero is a big...
June 9, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Going Where the Lonely Go | ALBUM REVIEW
Duet mania seems to be sweeping country music, but the trend is getting old fast. Not that it's a new trick for two hit artists to team up for a song; the occasional lovey-dovey duet is always...
March 3, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
A Taste Of Yesterday's Wine | ALBUM REVIEW
Duet mania seems to be sweeping country music, but the trend is getting old fast. Not that it's a new trick for two hit artists to team up for a song; the occasional lovey-dovey duet is always...
March 3, 1983 12:00 AM ET -
Green Light | ALBUM REVIEW
The good news first: Bonnie Raitt plays more guitar on Green Light than on any album in years, the band boasts a "live" feel that makes the rock & roll cuts really kick, and the record contains...
April 15, 1982 12:00 AM ET -
Dad Loves His Work | ALBUM REVIEW
Dad Loves His Work is a typical James Taylor record. The tunes are simple and memorable — you can sing along with most of them after two listens. This is especially true of the LP's hit single,...
May 28, 1981 12:00 AM ET -
Pearls: Songs of Goffin and King | ALBUM REVIEW
Nine of the ten cuts on Pearls — Songs of Goffin and King are rerecordings of oldies, and they represent Carole King's implicit acknowledgment that her songwriting talent has failed in recent years. There's no shame in...
August 7, 1980 12:00 AM ET -
Joe's Garage Acts I, II & III | ALBUM REVIEW
Frank Zappa's satirical rock opera, Joe's Garage, is ambitious and mad, brilliant, peculiar and incoherent — epithets that have also been applied to German expressionist Georg Buchner's unfinished play, Woyzeck. This may seem like a ludicrously lofty...
March 20, 1980 12:00 AM ET -
Back To Earth | ALBUM REVIEW
Cat Stevens was one of several post-folk-pop innocents who came along in the early Seventies and were immensely comforting at the time. Carole King and James Taylor were two more singer/songwriter siblings of this sort, with Joni...
March 22, 1979 12:00 AM ET -
Blue Valentine | ALBUM REVIEW
Tom Waits tells the same stories all the time — the small-time gangster who gets blown away by the big boys, the tough whore who sleeps with a torn-up teddy bear under her pillow, the barely employed...
March 22, 1979 12:00 AM ET
