Flashes of Panic

I’ve been dinning in your collective ear for years now about how great Josh Ritter is. But look, don’t take my word for it; you can hear for yourself. Here’s how I would do it:

• Go to Josh’s website. In addition to having the entire new album streaming (which does have the inconvenience of requiring you to keep that page open in a browser tab somewhere), you can download—free!—”To the Dogs or Whoever” from the newest album on the news page of the site, plus two each from each of the four previous albums on the music page. I recommend “Girl in the War”, “Kathleen”, “Me & Jiggs”, and “Harrisburg”. Altogether there’s nine free songs on the site, which is a decent greatest-hits disc. There’s more on the fan site, but we’re not digging that deep right now.

• NPR’s “All Songs Considered” recently broadcast a full concert from the 9:30 Club in DC. You can get it most easily by subscribing to the ASC podcast (Bog, did I just type that ugly neologism?) and listen to the whole show on one drive, as I did on my way back from Amherst last night. It’s pretty cool, very similar to the show I saw here in Somerville down to the Springsteen cover in the encore, and I like the podcast as well; being able to slurp down hour-long showcases of new music and good concerts for nothing sounds like a great deal to me.

Now Playing: To the Dogs or Whoever from The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter by Josh Ritter

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