There is a strangely magnetic pull to Paper Mountains’ released debut album, "An Olive Tree and a Warm Breeze." Toby Lloyd, the music producer, songwriter, and frontman steering this solo project, has stepped away from the background of crafting sounds for others to finally map out his own mind. Leaning into the soul and folk-pop sensibilities of Iron and Wine and Sam Cooke, Lloyd...

To listen to Stevie Hawkins’ take on "A Song For You" is to have a conversation with a ghost in a dimly lit room after the show has ended. Hawkins, long the rhythmic engine for the song's originator Leon Russell, steps from behind the drum kit to the microphone, and the space between these two roles compresses decades into four and a half minutes....