Down your street | Music | Missoula Independent

Jameson & The Sordid Seeds just put out the best-produced album to ever sprout in Whitefish, Mont. A mish-mash of blues, reggae and rock with moments of gospelic duets, that year in the studio really paid off.

Still, it’s a bit trite, which is hard to say without sounding mean. But that’s my job, right? Identifying what went right and wrong and why. Balancing a necessary kindness our local artists maybe get a little too much of without sounding like their publicist.

Here’s the best track off the album. Let’s see if our opinions match, eh?

Back to basics at the Indy this week with a pair of album reviews.

 Kendl Winter | Arts Features | Missoula Independent

She’s got the quirky voice, the lo-fi production and simple poetry all the kids are into these days, but what sets her apart from the trend is the youthful honesty, sans pretention, present in her voice and structures. Check it out: K

Now for something completely different!

House of Quist | Arts Features | Missoula Independent

Here’s rock’n’roll if Journey never happened — these guys (and girl) take on the classic sound getting old on the radio and make it their own. There’s not much for surprises but something likable about it. Something so simple it doesn’t have a name. I’m going to call it…neat.

Seven semesters down, one to go. Time to remember how to read for pleasure and write in private, not just publication. Keep scanning the Independent for my name (and my talented colleagues’) over the winter and be safe over the solstice. The Mayans say it’s going to be a doozie.

Beyond Belief | Theater | Missoula Independent

Julie Cajune wants to know if you can name 10 famous American Indian women. Sound too difficult? She thinks so, too.

So starts the first theater review I’ve written without a chance to see the show. A one-night, one-woman show based on Julie Cajune’s family stories and Jennifer Finley-Greene’s poetry, the story behind the show became as important as the production itself.

“We all live through disappointment or times of great discouragement or grief that cause us to question beliefs,” Cajune says. “This is a universal story that doesn’t have cultural or gender boundaries. It’s just one way to deal with it. It’s not the way for everybody, but it’s my way.”

A rainy afternoon driving up to the Jocko Canyon in Arlee begot a friendly, concise interview. But because I couldn’t translate their grand ideas into something tangible for the audience, I narrated the process, the journey. Luckily my editor knows I can do better and gave me the right push to tell the story in a more productive way. Just as journalism is a long process of trial, error and feedback in search of a noble goal, so too does theater seek to clearly and cleverly tell the most important stories of our time.

“For me and the work that I’m doing, that means presenting a meaningful and authentic voice and image of American Indian people and American Indian women,” she says. “I couldn’t think of a more meaningful way of doing it than through theater.”