[From a review of new albums by these three artists published in The Boston Phoenix, April 21, 1995]
...Barbara Kessler's debut, Stranger To This Land (Eastern Front) launches a major performing and songwriting talent, albeit one that is almost too familiar. Kessler's resemblance to Shawn Colvin can be uncanny (her "Better Times" is a dead ringer for Colvin's "Diamond In The Rough"). The opener, "Deep Country," could well have been written by Colvin pal and labelmate Mary Chapin Carpenter (was that Kessler I was singing "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" at the Dylan tribute?). And "Kathy" boasts some very Bruce Hornsbyish hooks. But over the course of the album Kessler's own voice and sensibilities emerge; her dynamic vocal overpower all comparisons and wrestle them to the ground. Besides, Colvin probably couldn't pull off the unabashed R&B of "Take A Ride."
Kessler, moreover, is a lyricist of great economy---unlike the pedestrian Lavin, the poetic Colvin, and the prolix Carrie Newcomer. And though her stories and song structures can be formulaic, they're so damn catchy, they transcend stereotype. Again, it's a pop thing. It helps to have some of Boston's best helping out, including Martin Sexton, Duke Levine, Diane Zeigler, and the erstwhile Story. And the arrangements---recorded live at Cambridge's Kendall Cafe---are executed with state-of-the-art folk-pop flourish by her back-up trio.