Nappy Roots
Watermelon, Chicken & Gritz
For most hip-hop acts, hailing from the Bluegrass State would be a handicap tantamount to being known homosexuals. For Nappy Roots, though, being from the country is the trump card that separates them from the multitude of inner-city rhyme-slingers currently flooding the market with hymns to the bling-bling and cha-ching.
B. Stille, Big V, R. Prophet, Skinny Deville and Scales pride themselves in celebrating more than just expensive cars and diamond-studded jewelry. In fact, the former Western Kentucky University students shine brightest when they prove to be the antithesis of the P-Diddy movement and opt for lyrics such as this one from "Blowin' Trees": "Being average is OK, being different is alright/ Long as you stay in your means/ Then you know you keepin' it real with yo'self."
Nappy Roots is not all about positivism, though. Take the abysmal "Hustla," a how-to-succeed-as-a-dope-dealer-in-the-country mess in which the rappers boast that they "took the college degrees and applied them to the streets."
In terms of sonic thrust, this major-label debut from Kentucky's most unlikely musical messengers is solid throughout. Old school funk, scratching, and even touches of organ and blues guitar make this a warm plate of soul food that never slips into blandness. Hopefully, in time, the Nappy Roots' rhymes will be as consistently enticing. (Atlantic).
—Wade Tatangelo 
Face to Face
How to Ruin Everything
Face To Face is undoubtedly the most influential punk-rock band to come out of Southern California since the first wave of West Coast fast 'n' loud broke on the shores of Orange County and receded. Hundreds of bands have aped the now-trio's hookier elements without equaling its originality, muscle or compulsion. By now, you know what you're gonna get from a Face to Face release (the excellent but ill-advised foray into alt-rock called Ignorance Is Bliss notwithstanding), and their first full-length of original material for Vagrant delivers on all counts. Melodic yet bludgeoning, hooky yet substantial, anthemic yet intimate, How to Ruin Everything fuses the band's undeniably modern sound with a love for British upstarts like The Buzzcocks and The Jam — F2F has rarely sounded so old-school. Everything from the opening "Bill of Goods" to "Double Standard" smolders and races, but more memory-adhesive fare like "The New Way" and "The Compromise" stands out on the strength of its stinging riffage. Even the Mike Ness-influenced acoustic closer, for which the disc was named, seems natural and gritty. Need a little more meat than you're apt to find in the usual pop-punk? Here you go. (Vagrant)
—Scott Harrell
Tomasz Stanko
Soul of Things
Reputation-wise, he is Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Clifford Brown and Wynton Marsalis all rolled into one — in his native Poland, at least. Tomasz Stanko is 60, an age when trumpet chops often begin to wane. But there is no evidence of such on this gorgeous collection of contemplative ballads and occasional undulating neo-bop. His lonesome soliloquies are captivating in their intimacy; his rare forays into aggro bursts are welcome detours from the disc's overall introspection. As for comparisons to Miles and Chet — the two most oft-sited benchmarks of trumpet balladeering — Stanko's sound is brassier, less breathy; in all, more robust. The horn man is joined by his working band, a trio of young Poles on piano, bass and drums. They provide sensitive support throughout, and pianist Marcin Wasilewski excels at probing Bill Evans-ish forays. Stanko's lovely melodies have an engagingly cinematic feel, evoking rain-soaked city streets in the wee hours. (ECM, www.ecmrecords.com)
—Eric Snider
Denali
Denali
This Richmond, Va., quartet's full-length debut comes off as glacial in every sense of the word — slow, remote, coldly beautiful and possessing irresistible force. While the opening "Rapture" gives off a whiff of generic, girl-fronted space-pop, the listener is soon after entranced. Layers of oscillating guitar, sparse rhythms and assorted textures ebb and flow in sync with Maura Davis' simultaneously anguished and detached vocals (comparisons to Bjork are somewhat unwarranted, but shades of Billie Holiday and Portishead's Beth Gibbons are apparent). The disc builds to a crashing, mesmerizing centerpiece with "Magazine" before its subsequent comedown, "Rehearsal," returns to an austere, yet totally enthralling, plane. It's the intangible tug-of-war between vulnerability and icy reserve that makes this disc so compelling. (Jade Tree, www.jadetree.com)
—Scott Harrell 
Little Axe
Hard Grind
Electronic musicians often cop samples from the blues, trying (in vain, for the most part) to lend an earthiness to their music. Little Axe flips the notion on its head. Multi-instrumentalist Skip McDonald builds a foundation out of the blues and then subjects it to the dub treatment by On-U Sound producer Adrian Sherwood. The result is far more genuine, and acres more earthy, than anything (including Moby) that comes from the electronica camp. Hard Grind — much like its predecessor, 1996's The Wolf that House Built — simmers along, its core sound coming from the Delta, all spectral slide guitars, wailing harps and moanin' vocals. The dub elements — loops, echo, general sound mutation — lend an ethereal feel, a pervasive throb to the sound. (A minor complaint: At times, Hard Grind goes too heavy on the spoken-word samples.) In the ever-expanding world of musical hybridization, dub-blues could've come off as an ill-fated lab experiment, but here it emerges as a vital, organic fusion. (Fat Possum, www.fatpossum.com)
—Eric Snider
This article appears in Apr 24-30, 2002.