David Fricke of Rolling Stone Magazine gave Spencer a nice little write-up in his 2015 Jazz Fest coverage.
“Spencer Bohren, April 27th, Louisiana Music Factory
Born in Wyoming, singer-songwriter Spencer Bohren is a longtime, local resident and treasure, fusing folk, blues and original observations on Southern life and spirituality with a warming tenor and keen eye. His in-store set at the Louisiana Music Factory – one of my favorite records stores and, with its messianic focus and deep catalog, a continuing American miracle – was mostly drawn from Bohren’s fine, new album, Seven Birds (spencerbohren.com). He also plugged in a lap-steel guitar to perform a song from his 2013 release, Tempered Steel, Bob Dylan’s “Ring Them Bells.” Bohren pointed out, in his introduction, that Dylan recorded his version, on 1989’s Oh Mercy, only three blocks away at producer Daniel Lanois’ French Quarter studio. But where Dylan’s singing was low and ravaged, Bohren’s performance was spare and gorgeous, with a near-whispered vocal framed by his clean sweeps and dives on lap steel and, at the end, harmonic chimes that sounded like the church bells, ringing over the neighborhood, that originally inspired Dylan. It was a simple, perfect summing of the song, its birth and my weekend – at once local, intimate and pregnant with resonance.”