I've been waiting patiently for Cait and the Critters to release another full length album. Cait Jones is one of many talented young bandleaders in the New York City scene, but unlike some she won't be very well known to our readers, yet.
An excellent songwriter in the classic style, with a great ear for guiding arrangements to satisfy an audience, during normal times her and the band stay busy. Her last two releases, an album in 2016 and EP in 2018 respectively, gave me a western swing vibe, or rather that slice of early 50s popular vocal recording that brought a slight country feel to some of the records released by popular mainstream vocalists. She captured the essence of a very real but not well remembered moment as only one who has deeply listened to those records can.
On her latest full length album she goes directly for the classical vocal material she grew up on, talking in the notes about the impact her mother's Ella Fitzgerald LPs had on her musical direction, something many in our generation can relate to. Mel Tormé, Peggy Lee, and Nat King Cole, are other names in those notes, inspiring the track choices and arrangements on this excellent album.
Female vocalists finding joy in presenting the American Songbook is nothing new. Most of their material ends up being forgettable and without the spark of those great vocal records that dominated the transition period bet
