Casey Holford

This young New York City "anti-folk" scene musician, who's making his second trip up to Northampton this week, hasn't actually cut the cord with the folk scene -not nearly. And that's good, whatever the repercussions are back in the mean old city.

Holford's EP offers a preview of his coming "Bad Spell, Good Spell" CD, which he promises to deliver this summer. The four songs show him to be working a proven formula - narrative voice leading an alter ego guitar - with good and original results that capture an urban sensibility.

In "On the Map," Holford looks for his place in a big map of the city, with its subway and transit lines that look like veins and arteries. "It seems to me that I can see a face, / if I just trace the lines." In "Window in the Wall," he muses over a friendship's value to lend perspective - as well as great, restorative gulps of fresh air. Another song finds him searching the classifieds for work, despairing over the number of "administrators" wanted. Please, fate, he says, don't make him be a waiter. ... "Cause there's a lot of roses left to throw."

The implied claustrophobia of "On the Map" compresses feeling at the EP's start. Holford has a bright, capable voice that opens a wide path into his stories. He pulls a full, rhythmic sound from his trusty 12-string guitar, that best friend of the folkie, "anti-" or not.

By LARRY PARNASS, Staff Writer

Thursday, July 18, 2002