SHARK-FIN AWARDS

Ricky Comeaux’s eleven song solo effort If I Ruled the World is the talented singer’s first release on his own and he’s chosen songs to cover that highlight his talents. The impressive cross-section of compositions included on this release range from Leonard Cohen to songs popularized by Al Jolson and Tony Bennett …

“Cause it’s hot in the city / It’s so hot in the city / You know it’s hot in the city / And I just can’t stand the heat” croons a seductive Julie Amici in the song “Hot in the City,” one of the cornerstone tracks on her new album …

At the age of 27, Sam Kempe, the multi-instrumentalist behind the moniker Pinewood, shows wisdom and experience in finding his audience. His four-song EP, All Things With Symmetry, is all things under the spell of this talented Georgian. Defining his own way, and taking the leap from band to solo artist, …

Divinely conjoined to an adjacent instrumental wallop and the mighty melody it produces in any given scenario here, Marilyn Castillo’s vocal is the flash point of the most powerful of harmonies in Project Grand Slam’s East Side Sessions. Castillo, along with Alex Blade Silver on sax, is one of the newest …

Clawing out of the silence with nothing more than the sharp talons of a toned electric guitar, Izzie’s Caravan get the ball rolling in their new EP Zephyrs quietly, only hinting at the massive melodies awaiting in the next twenty-four minutes of play. “Holy in Your Smile,” the first song that we …

With pulsating melodic ribbonry to lead the way, “The Distance Between Us,” the first song in SoloS’ new self-titled EP, starts to wrap its slender hook around us with a relaxed ease. These first couple of bars are more than enough to lull listeners into a false sense of security …

A gentle vocal utters sweet French verses to us against a slowly blossoming melody from a nearby guitar, its strings easily as evocative as any single lyric ever could be – if not a bit more so, when it counts the most – as the elegant “Roses De Picardie” begins …

In the original incarnation of AV Super Sunshine’s “Smile,” which was first released back in 2016 on the Bass Face EP, an acoustic guitar provides a near-perfect foundational melody for the acclaimed AV to weave together a soft but brooding lead vocal, and though its strings play a smaller role in “Smile …

American folk music has never been as diverse a genre as it is today, and that’s more than obvious even when engaging in a cursory listening session with Haley Johnsen’s London Sessions (Live From Abbey Road, 2020). Johnsen, a product of the Oregon underground, isn’t content to rehash the same rhythm …

Though nestled against a backdrop as vibrant and vivacious as the bright lights of Vegas amidst the arid desert night, the vocal harmony in “Point of View,” one of the new songs on Gordy Hunt’s Mood Swings LP, is as much of a sonic centerpiece as listeners could have hoped for in …