Music: {allcanada} Listen Up: Leonard Cohen, Gotye, Ruth Foster

Monday, January 30, 2012

{allcanada} Listen Up: Leonard Cohen, Gotye, Ruth Foster

Ruth Foster, Let It Burn

* * * * BLUES

Foster fashions a stirring blues album from an eclectic set of hymns, originals and covers of the likes of William Bell, Johnny Cash, David Crosby and Adele. She reworks the classic songs so that they sound new. Four tracks with The Blind Boys of Alabama take Foster back to her gospel roots, and there is no denying the spirit. — Steve Jones

>>Download:Welcome Home, Ring of Fire, Long Time Gone

Gotye, MakingMirrors

* * * 1/2 ART POP

The Australia-based sonic architect Gotye is part chameleon, part master blender. His U.S. debut mixes pop, soul and electronica textures with a dexterity that evokes other studio savants from Trent Reznor to Peter Gabriel to Lindsey Buckingham. Gotye's vocals shift, too, from a hushed rasp to a keening, exuberant tenor. — Elysa Gardner

>>Download:I Feel Better, Save Me

Leonard Cohen, Old Ideas

* * * 1/2 SINGER/SONGWRITER

It has taken decades, but Cohen, 77, finally has achieved a near-perfect synchronicity between his deep, street-wise voice and the profound poetry of his songs. On his first album in eight years, the gentleman hipster adopts a deliberate pace on 10 ruminations on faith, love, lust and mortality. Though he refers to himself in Going Home as "a lazy bastard living in a suit," Old Ideas is the work of a master craftsman. — Jerry Shriver

>>Download:Going Home, Amen, Darkness

Gretchen Peters, Hello Cruel World

* * * 1/2 POP

"It ain't your fears so much as what your fears reveal," sings Peters, who has written hits for Martina McBride, Faith Hill, Sara Evans and others. She reveals plenty as she assumes the personae of a knife-thrower's assistant, a matador's lover, a luncheonette waitress. Peters faces down her fears with strength and eloquence. — Brian Mansfield

>>Download:Hello Cruel World,Woman on the Wheel