By Robert Spuhler

Special to MSN Music

 

This September, the OutKast double album “Speakerboxxx/The Love Below” turns 10 years old. The Grammy Award-winning record featured, essentially, two solo albums: Andre 3000's “The Love Below” was an eclectic mix of hip-hop, soul and funk, while Big Boi's “Speakerboxxx” was the Platonic ideal of Southern hip-hop.

 

In the decade since that album's release, Andre 3000 has spent more time in front of a camera than behind a microphone, while Big Boi has released two solo albums. But the greatness of their work as a duo has overshadowed everything either has done since; rarely does an interview or fan encounter for either go without a question about an OutKast reunion.

 

By Alan Light

Special to MSN Music

 

NEW YORK -- Tom Petty is a first-ballot Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, an arena and festival headliner for several decades, a friend and cohort of folks like Bob Dylan and George Harrison. So how is it possible that the guy is still underrated? He is unquestionably one of rock ‘n’ roll's greatest songwriters, yet — perhaps because in 35 years, he has never released a bad album, but never released a perfect one, either — he's still often given pats on the head like the New York Times' recent description of him as "Classic Rock's ultimate Everyman."  

By Peter Gerstenzang

Special to MSN Music

 

PORT CHESTER, NY -- If you’ve  been recently concerned  that the younger generation is spending too much time tweeting about how Kanye West’s $750,000 car got squeezed into the size of an Aluma Wallet, don’t despair. On May 19, at the restored Capitol Theatre, 14-year-old hipsters (and 55-year-old ones) went absolutely apoplectic over every horn flourish, every zing of the strings, every clever lyrical turn and each gorgeous tenor note that emerged from the stage on which stood Iron and Wine. They knew the words. They swooned at the opening chords of fan favorites. They asked for (and got) a snatch of “Free Bird.” All with the hushed, religious fervor usually reserved for that other great jazzy pantheist, Van Morrison.

 

 

By Paul Pearson
Special to MSN Music

 

SEATTLE – There are your everyday guys who just knock on heaven’s door and then see generations of bar bands cover it for years to come. Alternatively, there’s Jim James, who shows up on heaven’s porch, checks the door, and spends an hour pacing the front yard on a bullhorn trying to negotiate his way in. Grace is too easy. He wants to figure out how he got here in the first place. Then, if it’s convenient for all involved parties, sure, he’ll come in for a bit. What’s for dinner?

 

That’s precisely what I got from James’ staggering performance at the Neptune Theatre on May 15. The driving force behind My Morning Jacket and one-fourth of the supergroup Monsters of Folk played a 16-song, two-hour set, including the whole of his solo debut album, “Regions of Light and Sound of God” in sequence.

 

By Melinda Newman

Special to MSN Music

 

WEST HOLLYWOOD – Inside Tom Jones is a great soul singer; it just took him 70 years to come out. Jones’ most recent albums,  2010’s “Praise & Blame” and his new set, “Spirit in the Room,” cover vintage and contemporary gospel, blues, soul and rock tunes. It was from this meaty menu that he drew inspiration for his May 11 show at the Troubadour, his first of two sold-out nights at the 400-capacity club. 

 

By Robert Spuhler

Special to MSN Music

 

CARSON, Calif. – Commercial radio exists for commercials. The music is there only to get the listener to stay tuned in until the next ad break. The live music experience, however, is much more about the connection between the artist and the audience.

 

Wango Tango, the annual concert put on by Los Angeles pop radio station KIIS-FM, found a novel way of translating the radio experience to the live concert setting. Instead of leading off with minor acts and building to the superstars, the 16th edition of the show kicked off with Bruno Mars, one of pop music's biggest stars, drawing fans into the Home Depot Center for the beginning of a nearly seven-hour show and giving KIIS a larger set of captive eyeballs to show a barrage of advertising throughout the afternoon and evening. 

 

By Danielle Cheesman
Special to MSN Music

 

NEW YORK – You may not have known it, but if you were at James Blake's show at Terminal 5, you had really been granted access to his dungeon laboratory, because the London-born singer is, simply put, a mad scientist. Red-haired head hung, shoulders hunched and fingers spread across his piano and synthesizers, Blake looked every bit the part of an evil genius at work.

 

By Robert Spuhler

Special to MSN Music

 

LOS ANGELES -- Armin van Buuren has been named the top DJ in the world for five of the last six years by electronic dance music bible DJ magazine. The Dutch superstar has one of the most popular radio shows in the genre, his weekly “A State of Trance.” In late March, the performance for that show's 600th episode sold out Madison Square Garden. So what was this giant of EDM doing playing the Hollywood Palladium, a Los Angeles venue that's listed capacity is less than 4,000?

 

“You travel each day in search of these special moments,” the video wall behind van Buuren said just before the DJ took the stage. “Those moments when it all makes sense. Where you feel one with the universe.”