William Shatner
Tostoise & Bonnie prince billy
Mission Uk
Sinead O'connor
Nick Cave
Supergrass
Japan
Matthew Sweet and Susanna Hoffs
twilight singers
REM
Dream Syndicate

The album is mainly backed by acoustic guitar work and the lyrics on many of the tracks are a sombre reflection of life in the mid-1990s in America and Mexico. Tom Joad(1995) is the hero of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath.

The title track of this album has been covered by Rage Against the Machine and Junip.The album's release was followed by Springsteen's solo acoustic Ghost of Tom Joad Tour.

In 1982, with Ronald Reagan in the White House and much of America torn between a newly fierce patriotism and the dispassionate conservatism of the dawning "Greed Is Good" era, a number of roots-oriented rock musicians began examining the State of the Union in song, and one of the most powerful albums to come out of this movement was Bruce Springsteen's stark, home-recorded masterpiece Nebraska.The Ghost of Tom Joad failed to find the same audience (or the same wealth of media attention) that embraced Nebraska, but on it's own terms it's a striking and powerful album, and certainly one of Springsteen's most deeply personal works.

Nico's 1973 album, The End, was her fourth release. It was her fifth collaboration with John Cale and third with him as producer, and the result was her darkest, most caustic work yet. It carried the same organic, harmonium-based gothic music heard on The Marble Index and Desertshore, but went one step further with the addition of Brian Eno's synthesizers and electronics. The mix of Nico's gloomy, hypnotic melodies and Eno's synthetic droning, as heard on "Innocent and Vain", produced an atmosphere of brooding apocalyptic destruction. Other songs that aren't as violently dramatic have a lingering distortion to them. "You Forgot To Answer" tells of the misery felt when she failed to reach ex-lover Jim Morrison by phone only to find out later that he had died. It's a simple mix of her vocals, Phil Manzanera's guitar, Cale's piano and Eno's synthesizer death-moans. The sound conjures up the Weimar Republic, with melodies reminiscent of Kurt Weill and angular, distorted electronics symbolic of Expressionism.

All but two of the songs on the album were written by Nico: a cover of the Doors' "The End" and the German national anthem "Das Lied der Deutschen", which has been considered by some critics as the most significative interpretation of a national anthem since Hendrix's rendition to his country's hymn in Woodstock, 1969. In retrospect, The End is a precursor to ultra-leftfield acts, such as Death In June and subsequently the neofolk movement, that blend European folk and classical with cutting-edge electronic experimentation.

The End is Nico's most uncompromising record and has become a signature of her work.

Amg Review

Not quite the return to the "rock" side of Radiohead as originally believed (although pretty close), the band's sixth album (produced again by Nigel Godrich) retains some of the experimental electronica elements of its predecessors Kid A and Amnesiac. Note that each of the tracks on the album has an alternate title, as does the album itself (aka 'The Gloaming').

Like all of the band’s best work, Thief requires more than a few listens to fully appreciate, but those who stick around will be richly rewarded.Amazon

Hail to the Thief , or "The Gloaming" as it is subtitled, is the sixth studio album by Englishrock band Radiohead, released on June 9, 2003 in the United Kingdom and June 10 in the United States and Canada. After two albums that mined a distinctive groove, with heavily processed vocals and few guitars, Hail to the Thief draws its ideas from every era of the band's existence, coupled with a new-found confidence and live energy — the bulk of the record was recorded in two weeks in Los Angeles.

The album is dedicated to "Patrick and Tamir and a future worth having." Patrick and Tamir are sons of Phil Selway and Jonny Greenwood, respectively, born since the release of Amnesiac.