Blog Posts by Martin Dio

The massive tragedy of the Haitian earthquake has been enormous in scope--and the responses to that tragedy have been, in some ways, similarly enormous.

One of the most conspicuous responses was Friday night's charity telethon, Hope For Haiti Now: A Global Benefit For Earthquake Relief. Check out the video below and keep watching for a steady flow of the night's highlights.

It's no small event when an artist as musical and commercially successful as Norah Jones joins us in the Yahoo! Music Studios--and her appearance here a few weeks ago was about the best possible holiday present any of us could imagine.

In town to promote her superb new album The Fall, Norah--whose career sales have just surpassed 40 million worldwide--brought an amazing band into the studio with her. Included among the cast of musician's musicians were Sasha Dobson (guitar, backing vocals and percussion), John Kirby (keyboards), Joey Waronker (drums), Gus Seyffert (bass) and Smokey Hormel (guitar).

The Fall, Jones' new LP, in some ways represents a shift from the "girl at her piano" image that the massive success of her 2002 debut Come Away With Me could not help but cultivate. It's superb. The varied arrangements, the upbeat nature of several numbers, even the fact that, as you'll see, she now often stands while energetically performing--some might say it's a whole new Norah.

Take a

One could say that there's a fine tradition of young blonde females emerging from the California pop music landscape--must be something in the air, no?--and if one did, one could place Sara Haze in the epicenter of that fine tradition.

Haze, whose new album My Personal Sky hit the streets last month, is also a participant in yet another tradition: Establishing a career partly due to strategic placements of her music in films and TV shows. At last count, Sara's seen over 30 of them!

Most notable of those placements may have been that of  her song "My Own Hands To Hold," which after a particularly wrenching scene in reality show The Hills drove over 300,000 plays on her MySpace page.

Thus, Y! Music was delighted a few weeks back when Sara and her crew stopped by our office to deliver an informal rendition of "Beautiful Day"-a soulful track that's just a hint of Haze's songwriting talents.

Want more info? Check out the Sara Haze site here and you'll get the full scoop! 

Get Sarah's album

She has been called "every nerd's dream girl," and it's always meant as the highest praise imaginable.

Indeed, LIGHTS--the Canadian singer/songwriter born Valerie Poxleitner--may be the most interesting female to set foot on our great planet!

The attractive young singer/songwriter, who's already won Canada's esteemed Juno Award for her talents, came to visit Y! Music recently in conjunction with the release of her fabulous new album, The Listening, and knocked most of us out with her talent, geniality, and exhuberance.

So what's the big deal about this "nerd's dream girl" stuff? LIGHTS is actively involved in many fields of entertainment aside from music, and most prominent among them may be videogaming-World Of Warcraft, anyone?-and comic books, of which she is both a conspicuous fangirl and participant. And do check out this link to find out more about Audio Quest: A Capt. Lights Adventure, which aired on MTV and, as animation goes, is hip stuff indeed.

To find out what LIGHTS is all

Just three words can convey one very large picture. Consider these three: Beatles. Shea Stadium.

In 1965, the Beatles made history by opening New York's Shea Stadium for music with a performance that has become a cherished part of rock 'n' roll lore. In many ways, the legendary Liverpool quartet's massive gig has become the bar by which all other "record-breaking" pop performances need be measured.

And in many ways, that band's very famous singer/songwriter/bassist Paul McCartney was at it again this year.

This summer, McCartney generated headlines when he was asked to open New York's Citi Field stadium--to many, regarded as "the new Shea"--and did so for no less than three nights. Luckily, McCartney and his band's performance was captured by a full sound and video crew; this month, the end result can be see via McCartney's new CD/DVD combo, Good Evening New York City. Featuring 33 tracks taken from the performance, the set shows that McCartney, a full 44 years after his earlier Shea

One of the major reasons country superstar Tim McGraw has held on to that "superstar" status has been the consistency of his excellent work and--maybe more importantly--his continual artistic growth.

Evidence of that growth has never been stronger with the release of his latest album, Southern Voice--his tenth studio album overall and very possibly his best.

On the basis of its striking title track alone, which evokes the best and most relevant of popular figures from all spheres--music, sports, politics--Southern Voice captures a  wealth of mature, personal material and hones it to a fine point that only a voice as authoritative as McGraw's could deliver so movingly.

McGraw's career achievements remain remarkable: Since releasing his debut album in 1993, the singer has scored 30 No. 1 singles, received 3 Grammys, 14 Academy Of  Country Music Awards, 11 Country Music Association Awards, and 10 American Music Awards--and also sold 40 million albums. For that matter, marrying Faith

On a brand new label and with what might be the best album of their career under their belts, Switchfoot have returned in a very big way.

Now preparing for the release of Hello Hurricane, the seventh full-length Switchfoot album due out Nov. 10th, the band will launch its tour Nov. 8th in San Diego, make a stopover at the Jimmy Kimmel Show on Nov. 12th, then cross the country in the month to come.

The band-- Jon Foreman (vocals/guitar), Tim Foreman (bass), Chad Butler (drums), Jerome Fontamillas (keys/guitar) and Drew Shirley (guitar)--is truly going all-out with Hello Hurricane: Those who pre-order from the band's website can purchase a multitude of configurations, from regular to deluxe: a standard CD, a deluxe CD/DVD set, vinyl with CD, digital edition, and a "collector's edition" featuring the CD, DVD, an additional CD of outtakes, poster and hardcover book.

In hand with the release of the new album, the band is launching a new website--theworldyouwant.com--with a stated goal of

It may border on the cliché for her, but to call young singer-songwriter Diane Birch "well-traveled" may be understating it. The talented vocalist, whose debut album Bible Belt was released in May, has lived in Michigan, Zimbabwe, South Africa and Portland, Oregon in her short life--and there are many more miles to travel.

Birch's music--which has all the elements of classic pop and R&B--is documented splendidly on her debut album, and largely aided by an all-star musical cast including George Porter of the Meters, Lenny Kaye of the Patti Smith Group, Adam Blackstone from the Roots, drummer Stanton Moore, and Eugene Pitt of the classic vocal group the Jive Five. No less impressive is its trio of producers including Steve Greenberg (founder of her label, S-Curve Records), soul legend Betty Wright and Mike Mangini.

Birch, whose life as a world traveler was largely the result her family life--her father was a pastor who moved quite frequently--led a pop-free existence as a youth,