Alicia Wiley speaks about singing

By |

It’s great when opening acts, instead of merely warming the stage, serve notice they are headliners in the making. Alicia Wiley, opening at The Cabooze several years ago for Willie Walker and The Butanes, did just that. Material from her debut album, Alicia, inventively jazz-tinged ballads, put one in mind of, say, the young Laura Nyro – stark with a sweet, avant garde edge. No wonder the disc won 2004 Minnesota Music Awards for Best Female Vocalist and for Best Self-Released Recording. Since then, Wiley has established a strong presence, captivating nightclub crowds, following with 2005’s CD/DVD in your sight. Continue Reading

Chris Shillock: Successor to the beatnik poets

By |

If you’re not quite old enough to know, ask your mama what a beatnik is. Today’s art of spoken word is fine and the whole nine, but for dyed-in-the-wool prose-poetry, the era of firebrands Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg and such is where it’s at. Thankfully, we have in the Twin Cities, strong successors like J. Otis Powell, Louis Alemayehu and one Chris Shillock, who’s been burning up the underbrush this past decade plus some with his books (The Revolutionary’s Creed, Testament of Fear, Millennium City, Irregular Conjugations) and appearance at, among other area outlets, Minnesota Spoken Word Association, Minnesota Fringe Festival and S.A.S.E.: the Write Place. Shillock hitches things up a notch, releasing Invisible Jazz, for which he partners with vocalist Tabatha Predovich, backed by David Gullickson (drums), Tom Zosel (tenor sax), Rich Patterson (guitar/composer), and Lynette Reini-Grandell (violin). He briefly spoke with Dwight Hobbes for the Twin Cities Daily Planet. Continue Reading