There's a curious jolt in hearing a title like "Us Against The World" from an act called The Cockney Cowboy. The name itself is a glorious contradiction, a pairing of gritty East London reality with the wide-open romance of Nashville. You half expect a joke, but what Justin Vella delivers is a dead-serious, straight-shooting country ballad that smells less of hay bales and more...

It's only fair that a young vocalist with as much potential as Nini Uppuluri gets all the praise she can get. You can't possibly dispute that she is who she claims to be. The energetic performer has just released a new single called "Carafe - Bittersweet v2," which is a highly engaging and entertaining piece of music. Her voice is as luscious as sugar and as...