★★★★★
Suggesting both Dusty Springfield's breathy yearning and Karen Carpenter's AM plainstyle, Jones is a Bonnie Ronstadt for the local-band era--a nonwriter ready to raid the enormous store of good songs only pop cultists have ever heard...
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-17
★★★★★
Seeking airplay worthy of Bonnie Raitt if not Linda Ronstadt, Don Dixon slows Jones down a little, to less than no avail--the airplay has failed to materialize (or whatever airplay does), and the tempos reveal the reluctance of perfectly hooky modern songwriters to say something and/or the inability of a perfectly attentive modern interpreter to make you ignore it. I know the world is confusing enough to warrant indirection. But when you're going nowhere, do so either fast or in fine style.
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-07-10
★★★★★
Marti Jones ? whose offbeat intelligence made her three previousalbums connoisseur's favorites has more than a hint of classic country twang in her voice. That, plus her ear for melodic pop hooks, makes you think her music might be less complicated than it turns out to be. But she didn't get to be a connoisseur's favorite by doing thesame things everyone else does...
- ew.com
2009-06-12
★★★★★
She satisfies that familiar hankering for self-expression, a disquiet known to any female interpreter worth her salt, by doing her lesser songwriting buddies some favors--at least their material will be identified solely with her. Best track is the outright cover, written and originally performed by that closet feminist Graham Parker.
- www.robertchristgau.com
2009-06-06
★★★★★
'Used Guitars' is one of those rare albums that catch your ear with their modest charm and then take on a deeper significance. It is, first of all, a collection of songs by some exemplary writers, including John Hiatt and Graham Parker...
- www.rollingstone.com
2009-03-21
★★★★★
For the all-star Match Game, Marti Jones and producer Don Dixon are joined by guests including Marshall Crenshaw, Mitch Easter, T-Bone Burnett, Darlene Love, Richard Barone, and Paul Carrack; the song selection is similarly impressive, drawing from the pens of David Bowie ("Soul Love") and Free ("Soon I Will Be Gone") as well as Crenshaw, the dBs, and the Bongos. Nonetheless, the album is Jones' show, and her rich, expressive performances never relinquish the spotlight.
- music.aol.com
2008-08-28
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