Reviews for Roxanne Potvin

Le 19 avril prochain, la guitariste et auteure-compositeure Roxanne Potvin lancera son quatrième album intitulé Play.

It isn't easy to shine a piece of crap. But damn if Montreal-based singer/songwriter Roxanne Potvin doesn't do a good job making Right Said Fred's campy "I'm Too Sexy" listenable by giving it some vocal sass and, along with her supporting cast, a sturdy instrumental foundation.

La guitariste, auteure-compositrice Roxanne Potvin, lancera le 19 avril prochain son quatrième album intitulé Play, avant de partir pour une tournée qui débutera le 29 avril au Cagibi à Montréal, ville d’adoption de cette artiste d’exception.

Après trois albums à saveur blues-rock, qui lui ont permis de côtoyer les Colin Linden, John Hiatt, Bruce Cockburn, Sue Foley et Deborah Coleman, la guitariste, auteure-compositrice et chanteuse Roxanne Potvin décide, en 2009, de quitter Toronto, sa maison de disques et son gérant, pour carrément revenir à la case départ.

Sur son quatrième album, Play, Roxanne Potvin fait tomber moult barrières pour tâter la liberté de celle qui se jette dans le vide. Simplement pour savoir où elle retombera.

As we’ve learned from the copious amounts of covers of the infamous “Friday,” sometimes covering a bad song has its merits. And today’s song isn’t just bad – it hits #8 on AOL Radio’s 100 Worst Songs Ever list. What is the aural atrocity, you ask? Well, the name Right Said Fred may not ring a bell, but how about the title: “I’m Too Sexy”?

Roxanne Potvin is best known as a blues artist. With Play–her fifth album, due April 19–she moves impressively into dark pop terrain. The album was recorded in Vancouver with Black Hen head honcho Steve Dawson, who knows a little a bit about helping roots artists expand their horizons without compromising what made them interesting in the first place.
mp3: “You Told Me” by Roxanne Potvin

After four albums that had defined her as a blues artist, Canadian singer/songwriter Roxanne Potvin decided to start over, leaving her record label and her manager, and moving back home to Montreal from Toronto.

What a breath of fresh air! It’s a cliché, but this is the kind of album that’s always fun to have when springtime finally rolls over Montreal. The brand of folk-pop onetime blueswoman Roxanne Potvin plays with on this fourth album sometimes flirts dangerously with corniness, but more often than not she fills her songs with enough genuine emotion, wit and attitude to get away with it.

Born in Regina and raised in Gatineau, Roxanne Potvin knows Canada quite well. In 2006 she settled in Toronto, and three years later she moved to Montreal. She also recently flew to Vancouver to work with Steve Dawson, creative director at Black Hen Music.

En 2009, après trois albums à saveur blues/folk, Roxanne Potvin a mis un frein à sa carrière, histoire d’en redéfinir les termes. De cette retraite volontaire est née une nouvelle approche de la musique, basée sur la notion de pur plaisir.

All blues and no play made for an unfulfilled Roxanne Potvin. Her smart and sassy new album Play, though, finds the Montreal-based artist pushing new buttons and continuing her evolution from a stylish, bluesy guitar slinger to a more tuneful pop-orientated performer.

If there’s anything one can learn from singer-songwriter Roxanne Potvin it’s that she’s got the ability to make almost any genre of music very enjoyable.

Roxanne Potvin is a singer and songwriter based out of Montreal. Her last three albums have been heavy into blues, soul and the R&B scene, but her newest album, set to be released in April 2011, is more like a fairy tale gone right.

It is an album of many moods. Play is a wild musical ride that takes us from the political to the personal via original atmospheric ballads, danceable pop, a punk rock song, a hard rock closer and a slice of vintage francopop worthy of France Gall. Oh, and a down-home cover of I’m Too Sexy.

Fans of Roxanne Potvin (and you are many) rejoice. The Montreal chanteuse has finally emerged bleary eyed from too much studio time clutching new album ‘Play’, which dropped last Monday, precipitating the first of a series of supporting tours.

Born in Regina, Saskatchewan and currently based in Gatineau, Quebec, singer/songwriter Roxanne Potvin heretofore has incorporated the influence of such musical visionaries as Dinah Washington, Solomon Burke, Irma Thomas, Ruth Brown, the Staple Singers and Bessie Smith into her original work.

Taking a step back and reassessing one’s life and career and changing course is never easy, but it can be fun. Play from Roxanne Potvin shows an artist doing just that, making a change and having fun.

If there’s something familiar about the music of Roxanne Potvin, a singer/songwriter from Canada, it’s probably the result of your having grown up in a house where an abundance of good music on vinyl could be heard on a regular basis.

For fans of Roxanne Potvin​, the Juno Award-nominated Montreal based singer-songwriter, two years might seem like an unbearably long time between albums, but just one spin through the songs on Play will be more than enough to convince them that it’s been worth the wait.

With numerous albums under her belt Roxanne Potvin has perfected her sound, which is clearly evident by her fan following and 2007 Juno nomination. As Potvin told the crowd during her recent show at the Blue Chair cafe, she hasn’t played with her drummer or bassist in a couple of months, since they completed their last studio album in November.