Word: folke
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Their name had biblical vibes - Jesus' mother and his two chief disciples - and there was an apostolic sweetness to this trio, singing of brother- and sisterhood, of lemon trees and magic dragons. In the folk boom of the 1960s, no group had more success than Peter, Paul and Mary, in part because of their dramatic look: two serious gents in jackets and matching goatees and, between them, a strong-featured young woman with long blond hair in bangs and a supple, powerful voice. That was Mary Travers, who died Sept. 16 at 72 in Danbury, Conn., after a long bout...
Born in Louisville, Ky., in 1936, Mary Allin Travers moved as a baby with her writer parents to New York City's Greenwich Village, where she would join the blooming local folk scene in nearby Washington Square Park. In her teens, as a member of the Song Swappers, she sang backup for Pete Seeger and appeared on Broadway in the short-lived folk musical The Next President. She also earned money babysitting; one of her charges was an infant English aristocrat, the fifth Baron Haden-Guest, who as Christopher Guest would direct and star in the 2003 film A Mighty...
...consumers in the late '50s, folk music was the Kingston Trio, with their frat-boy élan and their repertoire purloined from Seeger and other traditionalists. Then one man suggested that the genre could be bigger. "The American public is like Sleeping Beauty, waiting to be kissed awake by the prince of folk music," said Albert Grossman, a Chicago entrepreneur, at the first Newport Folk Festival, in 1959. Bob Dylan, whose manager Grossman became in 1962, may have been that prince, but the raspy-voiced kid needed troubadours to sell his message to the masses. Grossman had seen Travers perform...
...stop shop for all of your summer needs. After a series of meandering electronic albums for backpack rap label Mush, British producer Stephen Wilkinson, aka Bibio, has taken a turn towards the pop. And despite corralling sounds ranging from Brazilian street music to trip-hop to Jose Gonzalez folk, Bibio has put out a colorful and surprisingly cohesive album, one of this summer’s best. For a producer whose output has mostly focused on heavy, introspective beats, the ease with which Wilkinson creates slower, warmer melodies is impressive. While the found sound production aesthetic of his past work...
...languish into its prescribed stoner-rock loveseat. The alleged indignity with which the original lineup dispersed (Mascis reportedly fired bassist Barlow without ever actually telling Barlow after “Bug” in 1988; Barlow would find renewed underground success with his Sebadoh and Folk Implosion projects) made a true reunion unlikely. That’s probably what made their reunion and resurgence—marked by the astounding “Beyond,” one of the best albums of 2007 hands-down, and now the excellent “Farm?...