Raves & Faves Best of 2015
Essayist and scholar, Vincent L. Stephens, has listed Karen’s new album among his 2015 Raves & Faves on his blog Riffs, Beats & Codas.
Under his category, Less-is-More Awards, he includes two albums from this year: Tony Bennett’s The Silver Lining and Karen’s album Just You, Just Me.
He writes:
On Just You Just Me vocalist Karen Marguth and bassist Kevin Hill build from the promise of previous efforts and tackle classics like “You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To,” “I Got it Bad,” and “Imagination,” perfectly capturing their melodic and rhythmic contours and emotional essence in the sparsest of settings. She makes her greatest impact on her scat-laden rendition of the title track, a surprisingly blues-y and quite humorous rapid fire “Blues My Naughty Sweetie Taught Me,” and fresh songs like her loping version of Phoebe Snow’s “Harpo’s Blues” and the charming Johnny Mercer tune “Love’s Got Me in a Lazy Mood.” Other inspired choices include takes on Nellie Lutcher and Rickie Lee Jones. Marguth is quite assured in a variety of modes, and she and Hill have faultless chemistry.
Riffs, Beats & Codas is written for people interested in reading a fresh perspective on popular music. The site’s regular features include a featured essay blog, a book review blog, and excerpts from the Learning to Listen (LTL) book project. LTL is comprised of excerpts from the chapters in Vincent’s manuscript on great post-WWII singers. The site also features Learning to Listen interviews, a blog spotlighting interviews with diverse individuals discussing key moments when they “learned to listen” to music critically. R, B, & C also features links to other books, encyclopedias, scholarly journals, and websites featuring Vincent’s writing.
Vincent’s writing has been featured in Popular Music, Popular Music and Society, the Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World, Volume VIII, All About Jazz Online, African-American Review, and The Journal of Popular Culture.