The leaves are changing, the kids are back in town, and everyone’s trading in their iced coffee for the real thing as fall has hit full force in Boston.  For the last month of this short-lived summer, Gab, Jessie and I spent at least a night a week at the Lizard Lounge and it’s smaller, [...]

It was a gorgeous Indian summer afternoon, there were root beer floats on the table, and Mark Zaleski was cracking up about how he and the members of his band somehow wound up all smushed in the back of a van in California. What more could you ask for when it comes to a pleasant setting for an interview? Jessie and I met up with Mark for a quick snack and a quick chat at Cafe Luna in Central, and this meeting’s been a long time coming…

Before I properly introduce him I think I need to qualify my own stance and let the reader know that I, Hilary Hughes, am an unabashedly, embarrassingly huge fan of the Boston blues/rock/soul/big-haired/high-voiced/folk powerhouse that is Jesse Dee.

The first time I saw Lake Street Dive perform was in the murky days of early spring this year and, due to the sardine can-like conditions of the crowded room at the Lizard Lounge that night, I was forced to spend the show peeking my head out from behind one of the concrete reinforcement pillars in the basement bar. Normally, I would’ve been pissed: I’m small enough in stature that most people can push me around in order to get a better look at those performing on Lizard’s well-worn oriental-carpeted stage, but I was too busy gawking at bassist Bridget Kearney and drummer Michael Calabrese as they owned downbeats and tripped over complex rhythms to care, as I could see them fine if I leaned to the left just so from behind my pillar post.