On Songs & Albums

A collection of 496 posts

On Songs & Albums

Sunday Song: Listening Closer to Jon Batiste and Allison Russell

A new feature at Looking Closer — "Sunday Song" — will feature one or two recent releases that are in frequent rotation during my weekday commute jam session. Here are two of my favorite 2021 songs so far, from Jon Batiste and Allison Russell.

On Songs & Albums

Favorite Recordings of 2020: Part 3 (#20–#1)

[This post is dedicated to the Looking Closer Specialists — especially Laure Hittle, Timothy Grant, and Winston Chow — whose contributions make this website possible.] The word for this year was survive. The Holy Scriptures caution us that with increasing wisdom comes increasing pain, and that to love is to suffer. The

On Songs & Albums

Favorite Recordings of 2020: Part 2 (#35–#21)

The countdown continues! Having listed my Honorable Mentions, I move on to my list of 35 favorite recordings from 2020. This post counts down #35–#21.

Music Reviews

Loma's "Don't Shy Away" asks us to delve and discover

"...Don’t Shy Away is an invitation. It honors the sacred space of uncertainty, acknowledging lingering darkness while trusting in the possibility that brighter, more brilliant worlds lie within reach." — Allison Hussey, Pitchfork If you've ever walked alongside someone suffering from terminal cancer, and struggled to

Journal

New adventures in hi-fi: Check out the new Looking Closer podcast!

It seems inevitable: a Looking Closer podcast!

Interviews

A Bright Moon Over the Dunes: Memories of Japan Become Music in Eric Gorfain's "Kyo Shu"

Here's my conversation with composer and musician Eric Gorfain, whom you have probably heard many times on albums you love. But wait until you hear his new solo work!

Journal

"Hymn for the 81%" — a new anthem addressed to the American church

I'm grateful for this new hymn.

On Songs & Albums

Overstreet's Favorite Recordings: 2019

Here it is — a music festival, a playlist, a countdown of my favorite albums of 2019.

On Songs & Albums

Favorite Recordings of 2019: Honorable Mentions

A prelude to my countdown of 25 favorite records fro 2019, here's a long list of albums that probably deserve to be in that top 25 but... well... math is unforgiving. Explore. Listen. Discover some new favorites.

Journal

Cinemarginalia: Justin Chang & Ins Choi at The Glen Workshop; Criterion sale; Scorsese in Seattle

You can spend a week in Santa Fe with Justin Chang, Ins Choi, Over the Rhine, and more. Also: The new Scorsese film is getting the best possible projection in Seattle. Read about these things and more here...

On Songs & Albums

Overstreet Radio: Wilco, Lucy Dacus, Innocence Mission, R.E.M., Bruce Cockburn, and more

Here's a long list of new songs that are heating up my cold autumn days. Enjoy!

On Songs & Albums

Famine Walk - the new Joe Henry opening track is here

I heard this in the car today, and I had to pull the car over.

On Books & Writing

In the Cosmos of the Arts, a Christian Cosmonaut Is Born Again

“NASA Twins Study Confirms Astronaut’s DNA Actually Changed in Space.” That’s the headline that makes you choke, then narrow your eyes, and forget what you were searching for.Come on. This isn’t The Twilight Zone. A man left earth and came back as somebody else? If you

On Books & Writing

Turn and Face the Strange: a challenge to artists and churches

In April, I closed the Sacrament & Story conference in Seattle by posing a challenge to artists and churches, and by addressing a question that has kept you awake at night, I'm sure: If you go into space, will your DNA be rewritten and turn you into an alien?

On Songs & Albums

Aretha Franklin, Beyoncé, Sam Phillips: Three New Concert Films

I’m under headphones above 10,000 feet, and Aretha Franklin is flying the plane. At least it feels that way. Anne and I are headed to what we call “a homecoming,” an annual gathering of authors at the edge of the Frio River in the Texas hill country — inspirations,

Music Reviews

Love & Revelation: a 'magic hour' with Over the Rhine

Linford Detweiler and Karin Bergquist return with songs of ruin, loss, and hard-won hope.

On Songs & Albums

Overstreet's Favorite Recordings of 2017

Before you correct me, let me explain: This really is my 2017 list, posted here more than a year late. In 2017, I posted my favorite recordings countdown on the Looking Closer Facebook page and enjoyed conversations about those records with my community there. But then, somehow, in the busyness

On Songs & Albums

Overstreet's Favorite Recordings: 2018

I've been keeping year-end music lists since I was thirteen or fourteen years old. When I look back through those lists, it's like reading a diary: Memories of albums inspire memories of the contexts in which I experienced those songs. I remember hearing The Joshua Tree

On Songs & Albums

Favorite Recordings of 2018: 35 Honorable Mentions

I gave substantial attention to more albums this year than in any previous year — nearly one hundred records. And I heard so many impressive things that I almost gave up on the annual ritual of making a Favorite Recordings list — a ritual I began when I was 13 years old.

On Songs & Albums

Hearts Beat Loud (2018)

Just what the summer movie season needed: a light, fun, frivolous 90 minutes in a record store with Nick Offerman.

Music Reviews

The Decemberists record the a-pop-alypse

Basking in the bright colors of a bold new sound, the Decemberists will lift your spirits at the end of the world.

On Songs & Albums

Jóhann Jóhannsson: Arrival and Departure

This is unreal. This morning, I sat down to write in a quiet corner at the back of the Roy Street Coffee shop, opened my laptop, put on my headphones, and pressed "Play" on Jóhann Jóhannsson's strange and mysterious score for the Denis Villeneuve film Arrival.

On Songs & Albums

Wheels on fire

Hansard sings of hope and vision on Between Two Shores.

On Songs & Albums

Your favorite song of 2017?

What was your favorite song of 2017? Feel free to post details and a link in the Comments. It would have been easy for me to pick a politically charged song, since the year has been overwhelmed by an uprising of art and imagination voicing anguish, rage, and protest against

On Songs & Albums

U2 Rangarok?

There are some strange correlations between the new Thor movie and the new U2 songs.