Also this issue:

Random House
The Twin Atlas’ curious methods and haphazard road map to rock.
-Brian Howard

The Nut Never Sleeps
-Sam Adams

Melt Banana
-Paul Burress

Alexi Murdoch
-Nicole Pensiero

Tom Tom Club
-A.D. Amorosi

DJ Buck
-Sean O’Neal

Yerba Buena
-A.D. Amorosi

The Gossip
-M.J. Fine

July 10-16, 2003

musicpicks

Mary Lee's Corvette

It's been a smooth ride these past two years for New York rock quartet Mary Lee's Corvette. First there was singer/songwriter Mary Lee Kortes' last-minute (and ultimately career-defining) decision to tape her band's inspired performance of Bob Dylan's Blood on the Tracks at a New York club in 2001. That "little tape that could," as she calls it, resulted in a self-released CD, a huge amount of buzz and ultimately, a record contract with Bar/None (which rereleased the album last year). Now Kortes is back with another gem, 700 Miles, a diverse song-cycle about "change, discovery and freedom," she says. "It really was the record I wanted to make," Kortes said of the CD, which she produced with her husband Eric "Roscoe" Ambel, lead guitarist in Steve Earle's band. "Very personal with some universal themes." Kortes -- who once dreamed of being a book editor -- recently contributed a quasi-autobiographical short story, "Summer Vacation," for the Greg Kihn-edited collection of musicians' fictional tales,

Carved In Rock (Thunder's Mouth Press).

Thu., July 10, 8:30 p.m., $8, with Cowmuddy, The Tin Angel, 20 S. Second St., 215-928-0978.

—Nicole Pensiero