Ray Charles

Here are Five Charity Songs that Sucked for the 28th Anniversary of "We Are the World"

Way back in the '80s, people liked feeling magnanimous. "I hear there are starving kids in Ethiopia." "Fuck that! We can feed people with a song!" And thus, the idea for "We Are the World" was born. Maybe. I haven't actually talked to Lionel Richie about his motivation for coordinating the song, bu ... More >>

Rickie Lee Jones

8 p.m. Saturday, November 24. The Wildey Theatre, 252 North Main Street, Edwardsville, Illinois.

Nick Waterhouse

10 p.m. Friday, September 28. Plush, 3224 Locust Street.

Chiddy Bang is Coming to Plush

Party starter and most-important-meal espouser Chiddy Bang will be returning to St. Louis -- Plush (3224 Locust Street, 314-535-2686), specifically -- on August 9. Tickets go on sale today at noon. Chiddy Bang is having a big year. The Philadelphia duo released its debut full-length, Breakfast, e ... More >>

Van Dyke Parks on His Invisible Career, Surviving the '60s and the Role of the Beta Male

Van Dyke Parks doesn't give interviews; he speaks in pull-quotes and aphorisms. If Mark Twain and Dorothy Parker had spent their formative years among rock & roll royalty, as Parks did as an arranger, songwriter and singer, they might have viewed that world with the same big-hearted verbosity that P ... More >>

JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound Compel St. Louisans to Get Down

There aren't any surveys statistically showcasing St. Louis concertgoers' antipathy toward dancing. But even if lethargy was widespread in the Gateway City, JC Brooks says his band succeeded in shaking complacent people out of a stationary funk.

JC Brooks & the Uptown Sound

9 p.m. Saturday, December 10. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Avenue.

Double Your Pleasure

The Isley Brothers at Chaifetz Arena, 9/17/11: Review and Setlist

​The Isley Brothers | El DeBarge | After 7 Chaiftez Arena September 18, 2011 Things got off to a bit of a rocky start at this weekend's Superstars of Soul concert. Just prior to start time, lines for the box office practically stretched out of the doors, thanks mostly to a number of tickets b ... More >>

Sorry, Jim Carrey: Eight Actors Who Can Actually Sing

​Great. We've got another actor who thinks he can sing on our hands. At least Jim Carrey's sticking to karaoke bars for his awkward warbling of Radiohead's "Creep" and Smashing Pumpkins' "Bullet With Butterfly Wings", instead of taking the Gwyneth Paltrow route of bringing awkward warbling t ... More >>

A Kirkwood woman recalls her long-time relationship with Ray Charles in her memoir, Ray & Me

Marci Soto Dated Ray Charles for Years -- And Wrote a Memoir, Ray & Me, About The Relationship

courtesy of Marci SotoThe author with Ray Charles​{Editor's Note: To hear some unreleased Ray Charles performances given to A to Z by Marci Soto, please go here.] Everybody's fallen in love with a singer at some point. They've listened to a song over and over, until they know not just every ... More >>

Exclusive: Stream Unheard Ray Charles Performances

In Aimee Levitt's profile on Marci Soto, who wrote a memoir about her relationship with Ray Charles titled Ray & Me, she noted that Soto taped a lot of her correspondence and casual times with the music legend. The author was kind enough to share some of these tapes with A to Z. Below, please ta ... More >>

Homespun: The Bottoms Up Blues Gang

Handle It
(self-released)

Show Review Setlist: Michael McDonald Brings It All Back Home at the Touhill, Friday, July 23

​Hometown legend Michael McDonald returned to St. Louis for a sold-out concert at the Touhill Performing Arts Center on the campus of the University of Missouri-St. Louis. The show was a well-paced mix of hits from McDonald's tenure with the Doobie Brothers as well as solo songs and soul cover ... More >>

Interview Outtakes: Michael McDonald on Recovering from Addiction, His Local Music Roots, Working with Ray Charles and How That Grizzly Bear Collaboration Happened

​On Friday night, Ferguson, Missouri's own Michael McDonald is returning to the area for a solo show at the Blanche M. Touhill Performing Arts Center. The concert is a benefit for the St. Louis-area branch of the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse. Tickets are still available here. ... More >>

Anti-McKee Lawyers: City Ignored Facts That "Even Ray Charles Could've Seen"

Photo by Jennifer Silverberg​Late last week, the legal team trying to shoot down developer Paul McKee's huge plan for the north side filed their post-trial brief. At 47 pages, it's the most detailed argument to date from attorneys Eric Vickers, Bevis Schock and Jim Schottel, and reiterates their m ... More >>

The Dive Bomber: The Office, Breckenridge Hills Branch

Robin Wheeler writes for the blog Poppy Mom. She also has a strange attraction to drinking establishments with jars of pickled -- or possibly fossilized -- eggs. She reports on these dives for Gut Check every Friday.For eight years, I lived in Breckenridge Hills, a wee municipality sandwiched betw ... More >>

Special Delivery : Eli "Paperboy" Reed delivers tales of his busking-soul roots

JJ Grey and Mofro

8 p.m. Thursday, February 19. The Pageant, 6161 Delmar Boulevard.

Don't Fall to Pieces!

Hock the Line

Sending up the biopic, Walk Hard sells cheap laughs, lame cameos and lifeless Cox.

The Kids Were Alright

Unknown Pleasures

Joy Division portrait proves the exception to the rock biopic drool.

Beat the Crowd

Glastonbury

Jamie Foxx

8 p.m. Wednesday, January 10. The Fox Theatre (527 North Grand Boulevard).

Old Black Water

The Big Muddy Blues Festival is back and bigger than ever, while B-Sides finds out that Michael Bolton isn't an assclown and spotlights photography superstar Tammy Leahy,

Van Morrison

Pay the Devil(Lost Highway)

Hello, He's Not Johnny Cash

Walk the Line never strays from the dull telling of a tall tale

Beat Happenings

Week of August 31, 2005

Dead First

We rank musical deaths, embrace Failure and remember the Old School

Crash and Yearn

Howard Hughes gets what he wants, in this case a fun and loving biopic

Messed Around

As Ray Charles, Jamie Foxx turns an ordinary bio into an extraordinary one

Sea of Change

Don't like what's playing at the Red Sea? Come back tomorrow.

Finding Your Religion

Pick your personal Jesus, plus three questions for a pop princess and the poetry of heavy metal

Sweet Jane, You Ignorant Slut

These are the best rock & roll conversations in the world. No argument.

Wonk Jams

A St. Louis rocker is laying down the Democratic soundtrack. Is that a good idea?

Hallelujah, I Just Loved Him So

RIP, Brother Ray

Summer Film Previews

Our critics enter the summer-movie fray

This Week's Day-by-Day Picks

Changing Seasons

Nadine is ready for the next step -- no matter what it is

Jimmy Scott

Wednesday-Saturday, February 5-8; Jazz at the Bistro

Forty-Year Itch

After decades in limbo, a jazz classic from Jimmy Scott finally sees the light of day

Declaration of Independents

The St. Louis International Film Festival proves "indie" isn't a category but a way of life

Time Is Tight

Dangerous Kitchen comprises some of St. Louis' best musicians -- and they make the most of their time away from their day jobs

Fair to Poor

Critiquing that haven of musical has-beens, Fair St. Louis

Hank Crawford and Jimmy McGriff

Wednesday, Feb. 2-Saturday, Feb. 5; Backstage Bistro

VOCAL APPROVAL

Following local record label MAXJAZZ's upward trajectory

Hank Crawford and Jimmy McGriff

Friday, Sept. 10; Spruill's

1998: The Year in Music