Michelle Lordi,’s Break Up With The Sound (Cabinet Of Wonder) runs an eclectic course from Hank Williams’s heart-tugging country classic “I’m So Lonesome” to songs by Ms. Lordi herself, plus pieces by Cole Porter and members of The Beatles. It is popular, mostly American, music that maintains C&W earnestness without sliding into the heart-on-the-sleeve sentimentaility that constricts so many of today’s mainstream country performances. Lebowsky and Newman’s “The Wayward Wind” kept Gogi Grant at the top of the charts half a century ago. Tex Ritter then made his country version nearly as big a hit as Grant’s. The band that backs Lordi includes enervating, often gritty, tenor saxophone solos by Donny McCaslin, the penetrating, atmospheric, guitar work of Tim Motzer, brilliant drumming by Rudy Royston and the muscular bass work of Lordi’s fellow Philadelphian Matthew Parish.
To come: Further recent listening in brief.
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