Mark Kemp | Rolling Stone

Contributor

69 items by Mark Kemp

Live at the Troubadour | ALBUM REVIEW

In the Seventies, James Taylor and Carole King practically invented the sensitive singer-songwriter. Nearly four decades after first singing together onstage at L.A.'s Troubadour, the pair returned in 2007 for three nights of concerts to adoring audiences,...
May 10, 2010 7:44 PM ET
Pizza Box | ALBUM REVIEW

Texas country rocker Danny Barnes likes to do wild things with his banjo — check out the explosive picking on his old band the Bad Livers' turbocharged hillbilly version of Iggy Pop's "Lust for Life."...
January 19, 2010 12:10 AM ET
The Live Anthology | ALBUM REVIEW

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' only previous live album, 1986's Pack Up the Plantation, was a stone bore: The note-for-note versions of "Refugee" and "American Girl" didn't come close to capturing the excitement of a Petty show....
November 23, 2009 3:48 PM ET
The Live Anthology | ALBUM REVIEW

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers' only previous live album, 1986's Pack Up the Plantation, was a stone bore: The note-for-note versions of "Refugee" and "American Girl" didn't come close to capturing the excitement of a Petty...
November 23, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! The Rolling Stones in Concert - 40th Anniversary Deluxe Box Set | ALBUM REVIEW

Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! — recorded in 1969 over two nights at Madison Square Garden — is the last official live document of the Rolling Stones in their swaggering Sixties prime; it's also...
November 3, 2009 3:50 PM ET
I And Love And You | ALBUM REVIEW

North Carolina trio Avett Brothers once sounded like Appalachian Beatles: chirpy harmonies over effervescent acoustic guitar, banjo and upright bass. They've gotten moodier in recent years, and for their major-label debut, producer Rick Rubin has turned...
October 1, 2009 2:35 PM ET
Before The Frost... Until the Freeze | ALBUM REVIEW

The idea is inspired: gather an intimate audience of your biggest fans and put them in Levon Helm's Woodstock, New York, barn to watch you record your new material. That's what the Black Crowes did for their...
August 31, 2009 12:00 AM ET
The Blue Ridge Rangers Rides Again | ALBUM REVIEW

In Creedence Clearwater Revival, John Fogerty often sounded like acountry singer hiding out in a rock band, and he proved it on his first solo album, the 1973 covers disc The Blue Ridge Rangers. This long-delayedfollow-up finds...
August 31, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Time Flies When You're Having Fun | ALBUM REVIEW

Except for a set of pre-rock pop standards, Smokey Robinson has been largely absent this decade. He returns here with the smooth "quiet storm" vibe he invented on his 1975 album of the same name, duetting with...
August 24, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Les Paul (1915-2009) | ARTICLE

August 13, 2009 6:20 PM ET
From Elvis In Memphis | ALBUM REVIEW

After a decade of putting Hollywood glitz above his Memphis roots, Elvis Presley staged a musical comeback on TV in 1968 and then returned home for two extraordinary albums: From Elvis in Memphis and Back in Memphis....
August 5, 2009 2:10 PM ET
Reckoning (Deluxe Edition) | ALBUM REVIEW

Murmur is the more inventive of R.E.M.'s early albums, but their second disc, the powerful Reckoning, established the band as bona fide leaders of the new American indie-rock underground. Drummer Bill Berry shines here, propelling the spiky...
June 22, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Abnormally Attracted to Sin | ALBUM REVIEW

After splitting into five separate personalities for 2007's American Doll Posse, Tori Amos pulls herself back together again on her latest. The result is a set of prog-inspired balladry with less bounce than her last disc. The...
May 18, 2009 12:00 AM ET
One Foot In The Grave (Reissue) | ALBUM REVIEW

Before he was a midnight vulture or a guero preaching the gospel of Latin groove music, Beck was a subversive folkie, inspired equally...
May 12, 2009 12:00 AM ET
You Never Can Tell: His Complete Chess Recordings 1960-66 | ALBUM REVIEW

Chuck Berry's Sixties work doesn't have the marquee value of 1950s hits such as "Maybellene" and "Johnny B. Goode." But unlike his peers Elvis Presley and Little Richard, Berry didn't experience any real drop-off in quality: Tunes...
April 1, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Paul's Boutique: 20th Anniversary Remastered Edition | ALBUM REVIEW

In 1989, few people imagined that the bratty trio who took "You Gotta Fight for Your Right" to the Top 10 would do more than try — and fail — to replicate the success of Licensed to...
February 19, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Retrospective III (1989-2008) (Reissue) | ALBUM REVIEW

By the Nineties, Rush had all but abandoned their synthesizers for the Zeppelin-style riffs and prog-pop melodies of their Seventies albums. This one-CD (plus bonus DVD) anthology tracks the band as it drifts from the shimmery, grunge-flavored...
February 19, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Willie And The Wheel | ALBUM REVIEW

In the early Seventies, Atlantic R&B producer Jerry Wexler signed Willie Nelson; the duo shared a fondness for the Western swing of Bob Wills and planned to record a tribute to the music. It got put off...
February 19, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Remixed | ALBUM REVIEW

This set of heavily doctored Johnny Cash tunes almost succeeds as musical comedy. Pete Rock adds an electronic shuffle in an otherwise faithful sendup of "Folsom Prison Blues," and the result is pleasantly goofy. And producer Philip...
February 5, 2009 12:00 AM ET
Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall | ALBUM REVIEW

In 1998, the aging members of this Cuban collective realized a lifelong dream: playing to a sold-out audience at Carnegie Hall. That show, captured on this two-disc set, is even more emotionally engaging than the group's eponymous...
October 30, 2008 12:00 AM ET