Audio Interviews -

9/24/12 - Interview & Live Performance for Chicago Public Radio
3/27/2009 - Interview & Stevie Wonder cover for Chicago Public Radio
4/3/2008 - Eight Forty-Eight on Chicago Public Radio
1/17/2007 - Bob Edwards Interview

The Rumpus Interview

Without a Bird -

If Rachel’s voice were a tree branch, a ripe russet apple would hang at its end: a gift, there to take.
- saidthegramophone.com

This record is like taking a luxurious bath in an Art Deco tub on the rooftop of a lived-in brownstone on a starry night. Sound good? You bet it is. The disc is clean and natural-sounding: no studio gimmickry here, just gorgeous arrangements and Ries’ heart-wrenchingly elegant melodies.
- Seven Days, Vermont’s Alternative Weekly, Casey Rae-Hunter

I've been listening to it [Without a Bird] for weeks, but continue to hear new things in Rachel's classically trained voice, in the beautiful analog recording, and in the sparse yet perfectly aligned backing band.  It's hard to sum up any great songwriter in just one or two sentences, but for me Rachel's songs are such a marvel of simplicity and restraint.  Each lyrical phrase is usually just right, and when it is so carefully and fully enunciated in her vocals it's a joy to behold.
-Songs:Illinois, Craig Bonnell

For You Only -

Rachel Ries ensnares the listener in a gorgeous web of silvery vocals, homey fingerpicking and strumming, and literary lyrics wrapped in mercurial, yet soothing tunes. While her vintage sound is reminiscent of music from the 1920s and ’30s, her approach to writing is altogether contemporary, imbuing folksy imagery with a compelling sense of mystery.
- Acoustic Guitar, Judith Edelman

Rachel calls her music "prairie swing and city folk" and to our ears it nestles comfortable alongside Jolie Holland and Eleni Mandell: savvy lyrics and tender melodies, sung with a flexible voice imbued with echoes of the jazz age, and, best of all, graced by the audible stamp of analog recording...
-Border Radio in The Stranger, Kurt B. Reigley