Son Little at the Redstone Room -- December 21.
Saturday, December 21, 8 p.m.
The Redstone Room, 129 Main Street, Davenport IA
With NPR deeming him an artist whose “musical palette continues to hit all of those musical sweet spots,” R&B, soul, and hip-hop performer Son Little headlines a December 21 concert at Davenport's Redstone Room, the singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist's most recent album Like Neptune hailed by American Songwriter as "soul music of the most raw and affecting type."
Born Aaron Earl Livingston in Los Angeles, and eventually raised in Philadelphia, Little studied at Columbia University before enrolling at Temple University, and began his professional career as a guest artist on the Roots' 2011 album Undun. Later that year, he collaborated on a project titled Icebird alongside hip-hop musician Rjd2, a partnership that resulted in the full-length recording The Abandoned Lullaby. Still working under his birth name, Little released a series of digital albums including Aaron Livingston's Greatest Hits, Vol. 1, and in 2014, after changing his professional name, the artist signed with Anti Records, dropping the six-song EP Things I Forgot That November.
The following April, for iconic gospel and soul singer Mavis Staples, Little produced the EP Your Good Fortune, which eventually earned its performer a Grammy Award for Best Roots Performance (for the song “See That My Grave Is Kept Clean”). But 2015 also proved instrumental in regard to Little's own singing/songwriting career, as his self-titled solo album received critical praise and led to the artist headlining club engagements and touring in support of acts including Mumford & Sons, Shakey Graves, and Kelis. Little's second solo album, New Magic, debuted in 2017 and was inspired by his new life as a touring talent; Paste magazine called the album “enchanting in its spare intimacy,” adding that Little “can make old sounds like new by animating them with his own distinct and necessarily contemporary voice.”
In Little's 2020 release Aloha, the artist played nearly all of the recordings instruments himself, resulting in a work that PopMatters deemed “soulful and comforting,” and one that, according to No Depression, boasted “a liberating sexiness” in which “not a single note feels rushed or chaotic.” More recently, the artist's 2022 album Like Neptune earned similar raves, this expressly personal recording lauded by AllMusic.com as "a well-crafted and smartly entertaining piece of work."
Son Little plays his Redstone Room engagement on December 21 alongside special guests Wolfskill & the Wild and Kyah Bratz, admission to the 8 p.m. concert is $25-30, and more information and tickets are available by calling (563)326-1333 and visiting CommonChordQC.org.
