Jan Bell: Press
NEW ALBUM REVIEWS:
4 STARS - Critics Pick NXNE "Wonderful chiller thriller of a new album, Jan Bell and company are the real deal"
Tim Perlich, Senior Editor, Now Toronto
"A mighty fine album! Simple, well sung songs,the way it should be."
Phil Edwards, Americana UK
Jan Bell and the Cheap Dates completely won me over! Her melodies are rich and meaty....Songs for Love Drunk Sinners is an album of deceptively layered depth, really fine songs, creative arrangements and crisp playing." Sing Out! Winter 2008.
" Dreamy, beautifully modulated and exquisitely arranged folk country blues"
3rd Coast Music
" Well crafted modern songs...smartly conceived and capably executed." Jerome Clark, Rambles.net
LIVE SHOW REVIEWS:
"Amazing show! Sweetly haunting melodies, and an ace banjo player to boot!"
Alt.country Canada
Jan really makes you feel each note...I was speechless that such soul and volume could come from one little lady. I'd rank Jan bell in the top that i saw at NXNE this year. "
Toonage.com
"Thank you for your wonderful musical artistry!"
Woody Guthrie Archives, NYC
"One of the best singer songwriters...soulful, beautiful"
Jolie Holland (Magnet Magazine Interview Top Ten)
"The highlight of the d.u.m.b.o. arts festival"
Time Out, NY
"Its country blues all the way, in a delivery that'll knock your socks off!"
Fayetteville Free Weekly, AR
"Jan exceeded my hopes and expectations - the inmates truly loved her music. Wonderful!
NY State Women Judges Association
"In Jan's songs and stories there is the strength and struggle of all humanity. She is a truth teller, a true troubadour, heart breaker and heart mender"
-Samantha Parton, The Be Good Tanyas
"Maybe growing up in Nottinghamshire is what sets Jan Bell apart from the run of local lady folkies. Or maybe its the slide guitars, harmonicas, mandolins and banjos. Dark, old timey spareness......gorgeous"
Chuck Eddy as Senior Editor, Village Voice.
Previous ALBUM REVIEWS:
"Perhaps because of her British heritage, Jan Bell is more of a traditionalist than anyone in either Nickel Creek or the Duhks....never once sinks into mere bluegrass reverence. A triumph!"
Mikael Wood feature (The Maybelles) The Village Voice Fall 2005
First place, New Orleans Sam Adams City wide Singer Songwriter Contest 2004
Performing Songwriter Top Ten DIY w/The Maybelles
WINNER New Jersey Folk Fest 2007 - Singer Songwriter Contest
Top Ten Folk Albums - Village Voice Eddytor's Choice w/The Maybelles
New Orleans City Life Music Issue Top Ten 2005 w/ The Maybelles
Dutch review (translation by Myshkin) www.hanx.net
Jan Bell lives in the new Austin, namely Brooklyn, New York, from where hundreds of of musicians and artists try to take on the world.Where the rent is (was?) still affordable Where there are enough (folk) clubs to play. Jan Bell plays those gigs solo, with her Cheap Dates or with the Maybelles, a group of women that play Old Time County music. No Old Time on "Songs for Love Drunk Sinners",
produced by Samantha Parton of the Be Good Tanyas, at least not in the pure sense, but plenty of dark nostalgia. The same kind of nostalgia heard in Jolie Holland's music, who also sings on this cd. Country Folk on a whispering boat. But Jan Bell is good, and the music is fresh, for all the nostalgia. She lets her heart speak, even in songs written by others, such as "Miners" by Wilfred Owens:
There was a whispering in my heart Sigh of a coal
Grown wistful of a former earth (uit: Miners)
(Patrick Donders)