The singer-songwriter Amy Rigby got her start in the late 1980s and early 1990s in spry, New York-based country throwback groups Last Roundup and The Shams. Starting with 1996âs Diary of a Mod Housewife, Rigby has steadily released solo work that can break your heart with the contagious ache in her dry, distinctive voice or make you laugh out loud at the concussive put-downs she doles out. Rigby has a particular knack for turning the quotidian mythic and reminding us that the mythologized are ultimately just some guys. The music has remained rooted in country, but not confined by it. Hers is a guitar-forward style that can incorporate the bright highs of acoustic pop rock, crunchy roadhouse grooves, R&B, and even jazz. Alex Johnson, in his review of Rigbyâs most recent release, Hang In There With Me, called the album âtough, witty rock and rollâŚ[that] catalogs a lifetime of drags, uncertainties and disasters, but returns, again and again, to the people, moments and experiences that make it worthwhile, or bearable enough.â
Here are some things that Rigby has been listening to lately.
Warmduscher â âEight Minute Machinesâ
Discovered via an online review of their Brooklyn show last year, one that made me want so badly to be sweating in a crowd with this band onstage.
Amelia White â âGet To The Showâ
One of my Nashville pals and I love this track from her latest album. Amelia is always out working and rocking, written with the great Gwil Owen⌠Sometimes I really do miss Nashville!
Daniel Romano â âImpossible Greenâ
You know when you discover an artist and think wow, this kidâll go far, then realize theyâve been at it for years, made tons of records, play all the instruments, write, sing and tour their ass off? Thatâs how it is for me with Daniel Romano. This track comes from his 2017 album Modern Pressure.
Gina Birch â I Play My Bass Loud
Ginaâs debut solo album came out just a year ago â Iâve been a fan since hearing the Raincoats in the late 1970s and getting to see them live when they came to NYC back then. Sheâs one of my heroines for being an artist and uniquely herself in whatever it is she does â music, video, painting. The bass and her opening line: âSometimes I wake up, and I wonder â what is my job?â Pure Gina/genius!
Wreckless Eric â Inside The Majestic
Heâs my husband and labelmate so what the hell â this is from his most recent album Leisureland. People know Eric for his voice and lyrics and guitar, but this is an instrumental track thatâs just glorious. I want to see the movie it soundtracks, or at very least a choreographed dance routine with Eric at the piano in a tuxedo.
Michele Stodardt â âThese Bonesâ
A big attraction for me with the Magic Numbers was Michele Stodartâs bass playing and cool vocal contributions, love hearing and seeing her do her solo thing.
Meshell Ndgeocello â The Omnichord Real Book
For the last dozen years, I was bartending/selling books at a small shop in New Yorkâs Hudson Valley. The first time Meshell came in I was tongue-tied, knowing her as a bass playing legend and poet, and thought if she lives here, itâs kind of the center of the universe, right? I really hope to see her play live sometime.
TBHQ â âPlanet of Painâ from TBHQ
A radio host on a show I guested on was playing this great track when I walked in. âI really like that,â I thought, and then realized it was my daughter Hazel Rigby who records under the name TBHQ. Sheâs been performing and recording for years, often instrumental/noise but her voice and lyrics are so wise and honest.
Dory Previn â âThe Comedianâ
Thereâs never been anyone like Dory Previn, the pain and ridiculousness of being a human so acutely depicted in song. Thereâs a new documentary about her, On My Way To Where, by my friend Julia Greenberg with animated segments by Emily Hubley, just making its debut out there. She had a fascinating, fruitful, difficult beautifully productive life and I canât wait to learn more about her.
Mary Timony â âDominoesâ from Untame The Tiger
Love everything about Mary Timonyâs latest solo album Untame the Tiger â the songs, the guitar playing, her voice, the cover!
Swamp Dogg â âSynthetic Worldâ
One of my favorite tracks of all time. Jerry Williams (Swamp Dogg) is still out bringing his music to the people. Iâm looking forward to seeing the new documentary Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted â thereâs just nobody like this guy.
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Two years ago, Meshell Ndegeocello released a tribute album to the renowned singer/songwriter, jazz pianist and civil rights activist Nina Simone. Unsurprisingly, Simone has been a major influence on Ndgegocello's life and work. Although Simone came of age as a person and as an artist in an era in which black voices -- and in particular, black female voices -- were actively and quickly silenced, both artists have an uncanny resemblance to each other. Both Simone and Ndgeocello have long been known to be fiercely uncompromising and iconoclastic spirits, always doing things their way.Â
Pour Une Ame Souveraine (For a Sovereign Soul): A Dedication to Nina Simone was an album comprised of traditional classic songs (âFeelinâ Goodâ), songs written by her (âReal Realâ) and for her (such as, Weldon Irvine's âTo Be Young Gifted and Black.â). And her rendition of "To Be Young, Gifted and Black" with Cody ChesnuTT was probably one of the more uplifting and gorgeous songs I heard that year.Â
Comet, Come to Me, which is Ndgeocello's forthcoming new album manages to mark the first release of new material by the singer/songwriter and bassist in a couple of years, and is slated for a June 3rd release. "Conviction," the first single off the new effort is a seductive but mercurial soul song which consists of a sinuous bass line, Ndgeocello singing in a breathy falsetto about, handclaps that punctuate the song's hook, and a subtle, dusty country twang.Â
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I love Rihanna, and I really love Katy Perry, and I like their music but I don't think I'm even in their league. It's such a different business now, I mean, I couldn't imagine being as young as they are and with everything's that happening now in the world and that happens to them. I hope that one day I'll meet them, and you know, hopefully they're nice people and they realize that all this comes and goes. You're in fashion now and could be all the rage now but then things change, and hopefully, the music in their lives is something they enjoy and will continue to do in other ways, not just as pop-stars. The pop-star thing has just as much to do with your personal life as with your music, and that's one thing that I'm definitely not going to participate in.
Meshell Ndegeocello, from our conversation about her new album of Nina Simone covers.Â
