Top 10 New York City 2017

Raised in New York City, Anastacia came from an entertainment-oriented family: her father was a singer, and her mother an actress in musical theater on Broadway. Despite being diagnosed with the chronic intestinal illness Crohn's disease at age 13, she developed a career as a dancer, appearing on Club MTV and in such music videos as Salt-N-Pepa's "Everybody Get Up" and "Twist and Shout." In 1999, she was a finalist on the MTV talent contest show The Cut, which attracted the interest of record labels. She signed to the Daylight custom label of Sony Music's Epic Records and recorded her debut album, Not That Kind, which was released internationally in 2000.

New York’s punk/blues girl band, follow up their 2016 covers debut No B! with a collection of mostly original material, but the noise levels remain intact. Opening with the lip-curling vocals of Dana “Danger” Athens on the rocking “How Ya Doin’?”, name-checking just about every American city, through to the Lawler – Thornton cover “Black Rat”, the pace never lets up. Having said that, “How Bright The Moon” is a classy ballad, Athens accompanying herself on piano, interspersed with reverent guitar work from Tracy Hightop/Tina “T-Bone” Gorin. The pace hots up again with the rhythm section of drummer Melissa “Cool Whip” and bassist Hail Mary Zadroga doing a sterling job on the Don Robey classic “Turn On Your Love Light”. If classic slow blues is your thing, closer “The Breeze” is for you, cracker! With the plethora of female artists on the blues/rock scene at the moment, gaining momentum must be difficult. But there is enough class on this album for this relatively new band to pull it off. Oh, lastly, keep those names!