Ken Tucker

At once a punk and an artiste, Smith had to grapple with the question of what it meant to be avant-garde when you also love the Marvelettes.

That's The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game, a 60s hit for Motown's Marvelettes, written by Smokey Robinson and adored by Smith, who has always had juicy taste in oldies.

The new 50th anniversary edition of Horses includes some alternate takes of songs from this album and others that would appear on subsequent releases.

It's pretty easy to hear why Snowball didn't make the horse's cut.

It's a more conventional pop song, one that doesn't possess the grand delirium Smith was going for.

Right from the start, she knew how she wanted a sound and reportedly fought with her producer, the Velvet Underground's John Cale, to achieve the sounds she heard in her head.

These days, Patti Smith is still touring.

She has a sub-stack newsletter to chronicle her dreamiest thoughts and has a new memoir called Bread of Angels.

The reissue of Horses fits right into her current context, sounding as urgent and immediate as it did a half century ago.

Look at that signal.

It's drifting.

Maybe somehow it's the time signal out of Fort Collins.

Showing all the feelings you hide.

Showing all the feelings you hide.

Showing all the feelings you hide.

It's easy to adopt the attitude that pop music is primarily entertainment, a pleasant distraction from whatever's going on in your life or in the world around you. Sometimes, however, you come across songs and performers who offer more than entertainment. They provide comfort, nourishment, reassurance. One of these artists is Ken Pomeroy, the 22-year-old woman whose voice began this review.

It's easy to adopt the attitude that pop music is primarily entertainment, a pleasant distraction from whatever's going on in your life or in the world around you. Sometimes, however, you come across songs and performers who offer more than entertainment. They provide comfort, nourishment, reassurance. One of these artists is Ken Pomeroy, the 22-year-old woman whose voice began this review.

It's easy to adopt the attitude that pop music is primarily entertainment, a pleasant distraction from whatever's going on in your life or in the world around you. Sometimes, however, you come across songs and performers who offer more than entertainment. They provide comfort, nourishment, reassurance. One of these artists is Ken Pomeroy, the 22-year-old woman whose voice began this review.

Pomeroy has just released an album called Cruel Joke. She's from Oklahoma, a Cherokee Native American, and her songs about farms and cowboys, sung with an acoustic country twang, mark her as one smart high plains drifter.

Pomeroy has just released an album called Cruel Joke. She's from Oklahoma, a Cherokee Native American, and her songs about farms and cowboys, sung with an acoustic country twang, mark her as one smart high plains drifter.