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Lynn Darroch for The Oregonian Nov. '97
S. P. Clark for Two Louies June '97
John Chandler for The Rocket, March 26, '97
Dan DePrez for Willamette Week, March 19, '97
Scott Lewis for Anodyne Feb'97
Dan DePrez for Willamette Week, Oct. 2, '96
Kyle O'Brien for The Oregonian, Nov. '96
Lisa Lepine for Lisa Lepine Promotions, Sept. '96
Bonnie Carter for Positively Entertainment, Aug. 6, 1996
Now this is how pop music should sound - smart.
Singer-songwriter Kristy Hinds' first solo CD, "Into the Fray" has a cool, hip sound that goes down easy. But her music is laced with punch and beauty. Imagine Sade singing late-period Joni Mitchell, or a feminine Donald Fagen. Smart pop has depth of feeling and individuality as well as the catchy hooks and simple grooves you need on the radio. And Hinds' music is in the smart pop mainstream.
Harmonic sophistication runs beneath the bright, smooth jazz-adult contemporary surfaces, supporting her 11 original tunes on a solid foundation. With a strong voice and smooth delivery, the Portland-based singer crafts clever phrases out of wry and insightful lyrics such as these from the title tune:
"Sometimes wonder why I simmer and seethe. Gasping for air while others breathe. Maybe I'm just a fish out of water. Maybe just another lamb lining up for the slaughter. I remember being handed a prescription to follow but the pill was too bitter, I could not swallow."
"Now this is how pop music should sound -smart."
Tastefully produced by Portland musicians Robert Brown, Ramsey Embrick [sic] and Calvin Walker, the performances are enhanced by several top jazz players, including Peter Boe, Al Criado and Carlton Jackson. But they're only helping to animate the singer's personal vision.
That vision has its roots in Hinds' native New mexico, where her first gig - at age 9 - was with Bo Diddley's family band, in the company of the rock pioneer's daughters. The girls were Hinds' riding partners during Diddley's brief sojourn as a deputy sheriff in the Southwest. The earthy adventure of that experience may still inform her work, because it's both inventive and honest beneath its glossy exterior.
All pop music should sound like this.
Far from the mainstream, exploring a runlet all her own, Kristy Hinds combines elements of folk, rock and jazz with erudite lyrics to create a unique style of music. This collection of recordings, made over the past five years, while being a tad uneven at points, for obvious reasons, still emphasizes Kristy's melodic inventiveness and originality -her lyrical depth.
Nimble Robert Brown (AKA Robert Rude), Calvin Walker and jazz pianist Ramsey Embick shared the producers chair in helping to shape the individual songs, which range from feeling like Poe singing Dave Matthews songs to Flora Purim fronting Return to Forever doing late period Joni Mitchell.
"Rodeo" is sort of a combination of the two, with Brown's novel lap steel contours conforming neatly with John Sanders' doughy Wurlitzer tones. Over a groove that sounds like Sheryl Crow meets Deodato, Kristy sings, "Turning, twisting, try and unseat me/I stick like a burr, there's no way to beat me/I was raised on the smell of sweat and leather/And I'm hear for the rodeo."
The ballad "Castle in the Air" nicely captures the best aspects of Kristy's wonderfully adventurous approach to melody and her educated songwriting style. Peter Boe's scintillating piano solo ads the perfect touch of Floyd Cramer like sadness to the mix.
"Kristy Hinds devises some of the most
complexly futuristic pop ever perpetrated
upon this neck of the universe."
One thread that runs through much of her poetry is a seeming familiarity with the greasy underbelly of the big corporate beast, hence a mighty distrust of its one-track mind and vociferous appetite. "Images in a Box" crystallizes her perceptions into a nightmarish vision. Over Calvin Walker's soul-flavored dance beat,. Brown accents Kristy's slippery chord progression, as she scats a dark prophecy: "Every time I open up a magazine, it's the same thing. A message that cannot be missed./They say walk this way, hey talk this way/You should look like her. You should buy this./Well I don't really need another smack in the brain with your slick corporate ad campaign/I don't need an image. I imagine lots of stuff for free/And I don't really know whatever it is the current market value of a soul is worth. But what I do know just might scare you./There's a corporate plan to rule the earth." Dave Bones' tasty trombone solo enlivens the jazzy/soul mien of Brown's precise guitar interplay with Sanders' electric piano.
"Shoot the Moon" combines Al Criado's fat bass and drummer Carlton Jackson's perpetual superlative artistry with guitarist Michael Gargano's reggae flavored upstroke interactions with Peter Boe's subtle, flutey marimba synth patch. Over this dynamically spacious landscape, Kristy weaves a quizzical tale -"Strange to come across your name on a dirty yellow page. I found it at my grandmother's house/You were only 22 when that page when that page was printed new. I imagine you had a headstrong attitude./It was Mountain States Telephone then. Annoyance calls -page 10. Covering all of Bernalillo County." Gargano's plucky solo lends the finishing gloss to a strangely compelling song.
Kristy Hinds' command of language, verbal and musical, affords her a supremely rich means for expression. For some, the melange may be too rich. And it's possible that she may get carries away at times, where more of a rock sensibility might help to stabilize her mercurial tastes. But when she hits it right, which is more than half the time, Kristy Hinds devises some of the most complexly futuristic pop ever perpetrated upon this neck of the universe.
Portland-based Kristy Hinds has released an eleven song CD entitled Into the Fray. The resourceful Ms. Hinds fuses Latin, jazz and pop for a sound that defies labeling.
With the increasing number of wannabe divas out there exorcising old boyfriends left and right, I hope that someone as sincere and straightforwardly bright as Portland's Kristy Hinds doesn't get lost in the shuffle. She neither melts down into emotional puddles, not comes across as a cheesy sexpot (actually, I've never seen her play live so her wardrobe is a mystery to me), but simply as a woman with things on her mind. The music on her debut album is a flexible cross between light jazz and swinging bongo pop, with Hinds making decidedly arch observations. Her lyrics effortlessly coat radio-smart arrangements, casting several quizzical looks at a world which seems to grow less coherent as time passes.
"VH-1? Adult-contemporary? Whatever.
Kristy has the combination to crack any safe."
In "Castle in the Air" she notes that "...nothing will last/I've been busy spinning a web/But I spun it too tight." The uncertainty Hinds faces in songs like this one and "Images in a Box" are countered by a graceful romanticism on "Passionate Plea" and "Love Like You've Never," though even during the latter love song, there are some dark clouds on the horizon ("Affection and fear/That's what I'm finding here"). "Eagerly is a sure winner -sleek and sexy like a torchy James Bond title song. The ensemble musicianship is impeccable, befitting some of Portland's more esteemed jazzbos (drummers Calvin Walker and Carlton Jackson, and keyboardists Ramsey Embick and Peter Boe are all bandleaders in their own right). VH-1? Adult-contemporary? Whatever. Kristy Hinds has the combination to crack any safe.
The delightfully distinctive sounds of this singer aren't available in Portland clubs that often, but Hinds has produced one of the most personal and polished CDs to come from the local scene in years. Her blending of jazz, pop and blues begs for comparisons to Steely Dan's Donald Fagen. Instead of endless variations on self-indulgent topics, Hinds points out the absurdities around us with the wide-eyed wonder of a preschooler and the deliberation of a graduate student.
Want to show your parents that Portland's musical scope isn't all g-rock and alt-country? Have them listen to Kristy Hinds. Hinds is a Portland guitarist/jazz vocalist who has crafted Into the Fray's eleven upbeat, poetic tunes over the past decade and enlisted assistance from a slew of area talent to bring her visions to life. To say that this debut is well produced is understatement; each track, every instrument is distinct and the balance of their interplay is without flaw. "Under Control" bounces along via south of the border accents and Hinds' nimble voice before the title trackdrifts along with its heady resolve. Hinds' vocal style has garnered comparisons to Sade and Basia but those peggings undermine her ample helpings of pep, humor and wry outlook best exemplified in the light cha-cha-cha of "Images in a Box." "Eagerly" highlights Hinds' penchant for molding intricate ballads and the album ends with the airy light gallop of "Passionate Plea." Hinds is a talent and Into the Fray is a quality piece of work, even if it is swimming against the tide.
What do Jeanette Katt, Lisa Germano and Wendy Maharry have in common? All are singer-songwriters whose music doesn't fit into the average "modern folk" take, and all are still laboring in various degrees of obscurity after releasing dynamic albums on major labels. The good news is that Portlander Kristy Hinds has released an album as ambitious and polished as the works of these women. The bad news is that it might suffer the same fate. Hinds, a graphic artist by day (not surprisingly, her CD has some of the best art on any local release in years), also operates under the handicap of not having a club following. It's doubtful that the typical lounge-singer situation would benefit the originals on Into the Fray, but at least it would give Hinds some name recognition.
Not that she needs it. Her songs are pleasantly quirky, varied and free of the self-indulgence that haunts most songwriters when they commit their work to tape. Tracks such as "100% Humidity" and "Castle in the Air" flow more like haikus than pop songs. When Hinds does tackle the love thing in a song, it's with bare knuckles and a strong heart, as in "Under Control": "For no other reason than we're alive and we're alone here tonight, show me the man behind the lines./We've got fragile egos and reputations at stake. You show me yours, I'll show you mine."
"Instead of endless variations on self-indulgent
topics, Hinds points out the absurdities around us
with the wide-eyed wonder of a preschooler and the
deliberation of a graduate student."
Except for what sounds like a pitch problem on "Passionate Plea," the production on Into the Fray is first-rate. As a vocalist, Hinds comes across as both smart and genially goofy, begging comparisons to Kate Bush or Bjork as much as to Joni Mitchell or Bonnie Raitt. At a time when Portland musicians are trying their best to stand out from the pack, it's invigorating to see a local songwriter who's not afraid of sounding like herself.
Portlander Kristy Hinds has a voice that jumps with energy, clean and bright, which makes a nice complement to the polished pop-jazz tunes she has written for her new CD "Into the Fray." Hinds' songs can sound like a slow Sade bossa one minute and a complex Steely Dan fusion the next.
"From the packaging to the production to the songwriting to the exquisite Basia-like vocals, "Into the Fray" emerges triumphant. An absolutely gorgeous debut! Kristy Hinds deserves national notice for her savvy and sophisticated radio-ready jazz-pop."
On "Into the Fray", Hinds demonstrates a strong songwriting flair. She melds Latin-influenced rhythms, chordal structures worthy of Steely Dan, and a silky smooth vocal style reminiscent of Basia or Sade, into a rich jazzy-pop. Hinds enlisted some of Portland's finest musicians to perform on her debut including Peter Boe, Carlton Jackson and co-producers Calvin Walker, Robert "Rude" Brown, and Ramsey Embick.
A great CD crossed my desk recently. Kristy Hinds' "Into the Fray" is a long-time coming labor of love that definitely was worth the wait. It's a beautiful collection of eleven tunes written and sung by Kristy herself. It's hard to categorize her sound as it's so unique. Each tune has a style of its own. It's definitely in regular rotation on my list.
