Music & More

It's been a long nine years since Loreena McKennitt's last album, The Book of Secrets (1997) . This fall, Loreena will release her seventh studio album, An Ancient Muse . Check out the e-card announcement. Here are all the details from the official Quinland Road / Verve Records press release. For Immediate Release August 8, 2006 LOREENA McKENNITT TO RELEASE NEW ALBUM, AN ANCIENT MUSE THIS AUTUMN ON VERVE /QUINLAN ROAD This autumn, Verve/Quinlan Road will release Loreena McKennitt’s label debut, An Ancient Muse. As with her earlier albums, McKennitt takes her inspiration from the Celtic peoples, fusing the melodic sensibility of Scottish and Irish balladry with musical traditions from Greece, Turkey, Spain, and even Scandinavia. The recording is McKennitt’s first new studio album since 1997’s multi-platinum The Book of Secrets. Produced by Loreena McKennitt, An Ancient Muse continues McKennitt’s exploration of Celtic themes on a journey that sweeps across eras and musical genr

Following up last year's 885 Greatest Albums , which itself was a sequel to 2004's 885 Greatest Songs , WXPN has launched this year's listener survey to determine the 885 Greatest Artists of all time. Dismissed as silly by some but hotly debated and agonized over by others, these surveys provide great fun during the voting and a great listen when the results get counted down on the air. Go to xpn's website to submit your top ten list which also enters you in a contest to win the complete cd catalog of each of the top three artists as voted by the listenership. Voting deadline is September 10th. Check out the xpn discussion boards which will heat up as the countdown gets closer, with real time critiques, reaction and tears as the results are revealed. Also check out xpn's staff and artist picks , and xpn's music blog . Listener JimGPhynn of Horsham got the ball rolling very nicely on the discussion board with this post, Letterman style, of the top ten reasons

Kiki & Herb previewed their new Broadway show for four nights at Philadephia's Wilma Theater this week. Initially thinking this to be something of a self-test of my own open mindedness, Kiki & Herb's show quickly exploded the notion that one needs to be gay to enjoy drag queen musical comedy cabaret lounge act theater (not that there's anything wrong with that). Having honed their act for the better part of the past twenty years, Justin Bond totally becomes the aging diva Kiki, and Kenny Mellman is equally at home in the role of her piano man Herb, variously described in the act as a "gay Jewish retard." Essentially, it's a parody of a lounge act where Herb plays piano and Kiki sings and drinks. The songs are interspersed with lengthy asides that are both historical (tales of their characters' history) and hysterical. As outrageous as the comedy is (the stuffed toy cow on the piano was described as having been in the manger when Jesus was born, a