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"Lavin knows how to keep her audience guessing, thinking and laughing at the same time." - Washington Post "An enchanting stage performer." - Cosmopolitan Long acclaimed as a "comic observer of contemporary manners" (The New York Times), the hilarious Christine Lavin quite literally shines in live performance as she straps on a miner's headlamp and twirls her glowing batons. But the real sparkle comes from Lavin's sung and spoken wit - this singer-songwriter-guitarist-creative firecracker regales and involves her legion of fans with riotously acute original songs, comic monologues, quizzes, contests, and, in this case, her quest to identify and crown Mr. Colorado Springs in the audience at the 2003 benefit concert captured on this CD. "Sometimes Mother Really Does Know Best" is the award-winning Ms. Lavin's seventeenth album in a recording career that stretches back to 1981 and a touring schedule that encompasses almost 52 weeks a year. She also manages to juggle ever-expanding sidelines in freelance writing, radio program hosting, her serious obsessions with knitting, cooking, and her cultural heroine, Dame Edna, and using the Internet for instant-action song postings reflecting current events. Some of the ten songs on "Sometimes Mother" have appeared on previous Lavin studio and live CDs, but never like this! One of Christine's signature compositions, "What Was I Thinking?," resurfaces with updated topical needling of Martha Stewart, while the gentle, affectionately rueful "You Look Pretty Good for Your Age" is wrapped around Christine's search for Mr. Colorado Springs. Five other favorites are captured "live" for the first time, including the tranquil-to-berserk tropical ordeal recounted in "Wind Chimes," the introductory "Strangers Talk to Me," and the anthem of the uncoordinated, "Ballad of a Ballgame." There are also three new songs presented - Joanne Hammill's increasing frantic round, "A Question of Tempo (When I'm Under Pressure)"; Christine's battle with bureaucracy, "The Legal Ramifications of a Crackerjack Vendor Who Works in Yankee Stadium"; and the closing title song, with its moral lesson about the consequences of "a permanent reminder of a temporary fad," be it eyebrow ring or facelift, a controversial modern day topic. At least half the fun of this CD comes from Christine's giddy but incisively sarcastic song introductions and a half-dozen comic monologues. "What kind of a ridiculous glamour trajectory am I on?" conveys the tragicomic outrage of being mistaken for an ex-nun and a lunch lady by her fans; "Bernice, Carol, and tonight's crowd compete for the science prize" is a spontaneous quiz that involves such philosophical brain teasers as "How many roads MUST a man walk down before they call him a man?" Armed only with a guitar, a Boomerang sampling device that multiplies and delays Christine's vocals into harmonies and swirling rounds, and a wry, mocking self-awareness and boundless insight into contemporary culture, the Christine Lavin experience in concert is just as funny when heard at home, as preserved on Sometimes Mother Really Foes Know Best. Lighten up and laugh for almost 75 minutes! About Christine Lavin "Everywhere I go, strangers talk to me," sings Christine Lavin on her latest CD, "Sometimes Mother Really Does Know Best," and she's been singing, writing and talking right back to them from her witty and wonderfully insightful perspective for more than twenty years. One of the funniest songwriters and performers on the contemporary music scene, Christine's music sometimes recalls that of Tom Lehrer, the erudite Harvard professor whose recordings and shows in the late '50s and early '60s addressed topics ranging from the periodic table to pigeon-poisoning. They share an incisive and irreverent sense of humor, a broad spectrum of frequently unlikely lyrical subjects, and a sensational rapport with their adoring audiences. Releasing albums since 1981, Christine is capable of great sincerity and tenderness in her music, but it's her perceptively humorous original compositions that attract the most attention. Her songs, featured in several Off Broadway musicals (including her trademark "Sensitive New Age Guys" in Joan Micklin Silver's A . . . My Name is Still Alice) are the basis for a new musical currently in preparation in Los Angeles. Christine's songwriting achievements have already been recognized by a NAIRD Award, two New York Music Awards, five ASCAP composer awards, the Kate Wolf Memorial Award and the 2001 Backstage Bistro Award for Outstanding New York Singer/Songwriter of the Year. Along with her seventeen solo records, Chris has also produced eight compilations showcasing other singer-songwriters, and was a founding member of the Four Bitchin' Babes recording and performing collective between 1990 and 1997. Christine maintains a non-stop tour schedule that regularly crisscrosses American, Canada and countries abroad, and she has been featured on ABC-TV's "Good Morning America," NBC-TV's "The Today Show," and, on the radio, on CBS, CNN and NPR. Christine's first CD for family audiences, "The Runaway Christmas Tree," was an a cappella recording released by Appleseed Recordings in October 2003 to such raves as "A highly original CD . . .[that] stands far above the stockingsful of tripe released every season" (The New York Times) and "Great, goofy fun" (New York Daily News). Within the past year, Christine was commissioned by Lincoln Center to premiere a song and serve as emcee for the Center's annual "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" event. She also joined over 100 musical celebrities for a "Wall to Wall Joni Mitchell" tribute concert produced by Symphony Space in New York that drew an audience of more than 5000 people. Christine has been building the resume of a modern-day Renaissance woman even as she extends her recording and touring career into its third decade. In recent months, she has been a regular guest host on the popular "Sunday Breakfast" show on New York public radio station WFUV-FM, and even more recently has started to present folk shows on "The Village," the folk channel of XM Satellite Radio. Chris has embraced the Internet as a medium for spreading topical music quickly: early this year, she posted a free mp3 of her new solo recording of The Beatles' "All My Lovin'" in honor of the fortieth anniversary of the Fab Four's first Ed Sullivan appearance, and in mid-March 2004 she recorded, posted and circulated a "musical tough love" anti-smoking song and video, "The New Street Person," with a class of Florida high schoolers as their project for the American Lung Association's "Kick Butts Day" on March 31. Christine's own full-length video concert, "Girl UNinterrupted," is available through her website (www.christinelavin.com). In other creative realms, Christine's writing career moves forward with the late March 2004 publication of "Knit Lit, Too" (Random House), a compilation of writings about knitting that contains Chris's account of knitting on the road (and sometimes on-stage); last fall's "The Amoeba Hop" (Puddle Jump Press), an illustrated children's book that uses Christine's song of the same name as its text; and "Remember Me When I Am Gone" (Adler Press), in which Chris and other notables such as Larry King and Oprah Winfrey write their own obituaries. Christine's essays and articles have also appeared in the Washington Post, Delta Sky Magazine, the St. Petersburg Times, Inside Arts, Performing Songwriter and other periodicals. Check out the artist's website: http://www.appleseedrec.com Track List: 1. Strangers Talk to Me in Colorado Springs on a Thursday Night 2. Rocky Mountain . . . Hi! (spoken) 3. Wind Chimes 4. You should have seen the frightened looks on your faces (spoken 5. What kind of ridiculous glamour trajectory am I on? (spoken) 6. What Was I Thinking? 7. Martha Stewart . . . Victoria's Secret . . . Bob Dylan . . . Pac 8. The Tacobel Canon 9. Steve . . . you are so busted! (spoken) 10. A Question of Tempo (When I'm Under Pressure) 11. Planet X 12. Planet? Planot? Goofy? (spoken) 13. Who are the brainiacs in the house tonight? (spoken) 14. Bernice, Carol, and tonight's crowd compete for the Science Priz 15. You Look Pretty Good for Your Age 16. Art Jensen, Mr. Colorado Springs, your life will never be the sa 17. Flashback to 1956: How do you spell Cassiopeia? (spoken) 18. Boston Red Sox fans: the most loyal, most tenacious, yet most tr 19. Ballad of a Ballgame 20. The Legal Ramifications of a Crackerjack Vendor Who Works in Yan 21. Sometimes Mother Really Does Know Best Suggested CDs:
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