Another day, another senses-shattering round in the 2011 KidVid Tournament! Today’s matchups are being hosted by kindie kingmaker Bill Childs over at Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child — let’s take a look at our contenders in the Pete Seeger Regional division. #1 Seed: Keller Williams, “Hula Hoop to Da Loop” I like Keller Williams, and I enjoyed his kids’ album (aptly titled Kids), but on the surface, “Hula Hoop to Da Loop” seems like kind of an odd choice for a video. I mean, the song doesn’t do much, does it? Happily, Williams gets around this with one of the more enjoyable clips I’ve seen in awhile. First of all, I love watching artists play with loops; second, the way that shot is framed is just lovely — there’s something almost inspirational about watching
Read More »If you’re already familiar with Justin Roberts and are just wondering if his latest release is as good as his others — or if you’re simply the kind of person who likes skipping to the “star rating” portion of the review — I’ll make things easy for you right up front: Roberts is awesome, and so is his new album, Jungle Gym. Pre-order it now. Now I’ll get a little more in-depth as to just exactly why Justin Roberts is so awesome, and why, if you’re the type of parent who loves music and would like to pass that along to your kids, you need to add his music to your family playlist. In pure songwriting terms, Roberts outclasses most of the “grown-up” artists I listen to on a daily basis. Like any other kids
Read More »Justin Roberts – Pop Fly (2008, Carpet Square) purchase this album (Amazon) I listen to a lot of it now, obviously, but I’ve never been all that proactive about finding new kids’ music — partly because I’ve been lucky enough to have a steady stream of the stuff sent here for work, and partly because I’ve always made a conscious effort to feed my children a varied musical diet. My daughter loves Danielle Sansone as much as she loves Springsteen, and the only time I feel a panicky need to find something new for her to love is when she asks to listen to the mix CD of songs by the cursed Raffi that a family “friend” sent us, which is part of why I’m only just now hearing Pop Fly, the latest release from
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