Hearing Strange Pilgrim’s self-titled debut comes at an oddly fortuitous time. I’ve been giving the Beach Boys a serious listen for the first time in my forty plus years on this rock and I hear a lot of their influence in singer/songwriter/guitarist Josh Barnhart’s compositions. It’s probably me projecting and…

Why mess with what works? Though it might be a system for flutists Steve Markoff and Patricia Lazzara, along with featured pianist Allison Brewster Franzetti, the latest release “Nights In White Satin” is a dreamy escape into a lovely emotional world. Sounding anything but formulaic, the trio bring together an…

“Inner opposition is the resistance you have with yourself; it’s resistance to your worth, your competency, or your ‘enough-ness’,” writes Amy Eliza Wong in her new book, Living on Purpose: Five Deliberate Choices to Realize Fulfillment and Joy. “It is self-doubt and a lack of faith or belief in your…

Carol Schultz’s new book is a simultaneous how-to when it comes to hiring practices in a modern-day workplace context, as much as the book is something of a what not to do for traditionalists, and dare I say it — old dinosaurs learning new ways. “Too many hiring managers don’t…

Andy Lazris’ new book is titled January 6th and the Millennial Horde. The timing of the book’s release could not be better. The book expertly marries fact and fiction about the titular event, a singular point in time in American history — in world history. To do so in a…

It is perhaps inevitable that the year plus long global pandemic and its associated lockdowns and general upheaval inspired countless music works. The reach of the pandemic’s effects reach far beyond the music world, naturally, but its effect on songwriters has perhaps been much more immediate. It’s arguable if opera…

Red Clay Blue Sky is the debut EP from exciting singer/songwriter Laura Sumner. The EP features the previously released single, “American Man”, a wonderful track reminiscent of the Laurel Canyon sound, as well as four additional songs that reveal joy and heartache from the Connecticut artist. While “American Man” touches…

Mary Kay LaBrie’s two decades and change long career as a leadership and staff development specialist with specific expertise in the field of personality theory and human behavior gives her a unique skill set as a writer. The Western Pennsylvania native brought up close to Pittsburgh first began to think…

Rockabilly and Americana have been practically everywhere in the past few years, penetrating the pop spectrum and numerous genres that were previously removed from both aesthetics. With their last few singles, The Roughhousers have been brilliantly incorporating it into children’s music, and the arrival of their latest cuts “Toenail Soup”…