by Chris Parker
“This one goes out to the kids“: It’s arguably the hoariest sentiment in all of music, running alongside “Are you ready to ROCK?” Fortunately, it’s increasingly taken on a different meaning in the last several years as artists of all stripes cash in on the growing market of kids’ music. Appealing to preschoolers makes sense; thumb suckers don’t know anything about torrents.
The parents are obviously the key, so it doesn’t hurt if you spent a couple decades enticing Mom and Dad at campus dives and indie rock clubs. The real reward comes in soothed nerves and freedom from the kind of psychotic breaks induced by too much exposure to a certain purple dinosaur. …
Sara Hickman: A talented songwriter who’s also a tireless activist, Hickman blends adult contemporary pop, Laurel Canyon folk and Texas country with a lot of uplift and resilience. That generally upbeat attitude lends itself to kid’s music, a form she’s explored over three albums tied to [children’s] advancing age, beginning with 1999’s Newborn through 2001’s Toddler and 2003’s Big Kid. From odes to the cat to little moral anecdotes, it’s smart, well-crafted stuff.
From Independent Weekly