How to Be Single by Liz Tuccillo, co-author of He's Just Not That Into You, is a book that attempts to tackle the massive conundrum of single life for women: It's important to be happy while single, but who wants to spend time working on being happy and single when you can spend time finding a man to make you happy? And that, quite frankly, is the downfall of this book for me, though it might serve as satisfying chick-lit for the masses. Tuccillo, one of HBO's Emmy Award-winning executive story editor's for "Sex and the City," puts her personal spin on the single . . .

Like many modern Irish bands, Minneapolis’ Boiled In Lead views the traditional sounds of the old country as merely a starting point, often burying their Celtic motifs behind a grinding lead guitar. Although hometown critics have dubbed them Irish folk-punk, their 2008 album, Sliver, actually owed more to progressive . . .

Boiled in Lead may be a rock band steeped in Irish tradition, but it would be hard to mistake them for The Pogues, Black 47 or most other bands that proudly wear the green. The Minneapolis group forged its own links between pub music, rock 'n' roll and Anglo-Celtic folk, coming closer to Fairport Convention at a rowdy. . .

Before his death in 2003, Howie Epstein played in bands with John Hiatt and Tom Petty and on recordings by Bob Dylan, John Prine and many others. He has a pre-history few people remember. Before leaving Milwaukee in the mid-'70s, Epstein sharpened his skills with local groups such as The Craze and Forearm . . .

Racinebassist William Kopecky may be spending time in France these days, but he left behind Nest of Storms, the second release from Yeti Rain, a dark and ambient duo that Kopecky formed with wind-synthesizer wiz Roger Ebner. At times almost orchestral in nature . . .

Vocalist Nappy Brown's recent CD is appropriately titled, as it's been years since he released an album. But Brown is back, following the encouragement of Muddy Waters Blues Band's Bob Margolin to tour and record again. Long Time Coming includes many well-known musicians, including guitarists Margolin . . .

   The tension was there from the beginning. Rowdy and soused, the crowd cheered for a rock show. What they got instead was Eddie Vedder alone on a stool, wearing a leisurely pair of white pants, singing Cat Stevens.   In misguided d...

Many words have lost significance through overuse or misuse, and nowhere is this truer than in music jargon. The meaning of "Americana" is at the heart of a travelogue by music critic Amanda Petrusich. The journey takes her to Memphis and the Mississippi Delta, the Woody Guthrie Archives in New York and the homes of neo-hippie "free folk" musicians in New England. Petrusich is a little iffy on the history, often drawing . . .

"Any conductor reflects clearly the instrument he played. My sound is what it is because I was a violinist." So explained Budapest-born American conductor Eugene Ormandy (1899-1985). He was one of the last great giants of conducting whose name became inseparable from the ensemble he led-the Philadelphia Orchestra. His association with Philadelphia began in 1936 and ended in 1980. During this lengthy tenure he fashioned what became known as the "Ormandy Sound"-silken strings, precision in details and overall voluptuousness.

In a little village in Bangladesh a wedding has been prepared for a couple that has never met. Nazneen's father has arranged her marriage to an older Bengali man living in London. Dressed in bridal finery, Nazneen is placed at the stern of a boat casting off from her birthplace. She looks out from under her veil with forlorn eyes at her unsmiling family watching her recede into the distance. It's a sad parting and the beginning of an uncertain future. Most of Nazneen's story, told in the sterling British production Brick Lane, takes place in a dreary London neighborhood crowded with Pakistani and Bangladeshi immigrants. Murmurs of English xenophobia against Muslims . . .