Praise for Assembly's album "January EP":

"Imagine Celtic folk music. Hear those fiddles? Play them fast and add jazzy piano riffs. It's getting very busy, a bit avant-garde. That's the music of southern Vermont quartet Assembly showcasing their new CD, January EP." -The Village Voice

"Southern Vermont quartet Assembly play Celtic music with flourishes of free-jazz attitude and unabashed experimentalism. The resulting "avant-folk" sound is a summation of both New England traditions and cutting-edge modernism. Their debut release, January EP, is a fascinating ride through Assembly's rootsy yet studious musical world." -Seven Days VT

"Sam, your fiddling sounds like glass breaking - sharp, clear, and dangerous." -Sam Bartlett

Praise for Strangest Dream:

"To me, Popcorn Behavior's music equals: energy, feeling, innovation, depth, fun and life-great tunes, skillfully arranged and played with fire!" -Jay Ungar

" I listened to this brilliant CD sitting along the rushing waters of the Tom Tigney river in Nova Scotia, Canada. The aquatic flowing forces matched the rapturous riverrun sounds of Popcorn Behavior's music. These Vermont youngsters evoke a passionate whirlwind tour of various world styles from upstream traditional folk to downtown jazz. Their creative currents splash covers of Astor Piazzolla, Dollar Brand, Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan. Popcorn Behavior rises and shines with adventurous original compositions as well. In the superb liner notes, they are not afraid to admit to stealing a bassline from Herbie Hancock. Remember T. S. Eliot said, "The mature artist steals, the immature artist imitates." But indeed with Sam Amidon on fiddle, Thomas Bartlett on piano, Keith Murphy on vocal and guitar, and Stefan Amidon on drums, this foursome is effervescent with originality. Popcorn Behavior beams with fresh grooves and virtuoso execution." -Flipside Magazine

"A fiery celto-grass amalgam!" -Dirty Linnen Magazine

Named 10 Best of 2001 by WPRB's "Music You Can't Hear On The Radio" (103.3 FM)

"This album chips granite in all directions - deep underground slapping cool." -Sam Bartlett (Thomas' seventeenth cousin thrice removed)

"Ground-breaking." -Michael Alpert of Brave Old World

Praise for Journeywork:

"Thomas' playing is not only prodigious, but deep and insightful, mature beyond his years." -Martin Hayes

"Now, if ever there was a long-awaited second album, this was it! The raw talent of Sam, Stefan, and Thomas exhibited two years ago has developed and refined in wonderful ways. The playing is even more soulful and sensitive, with a bit more respect for the tunes, and showing lots of imagination along the way. A highlight for me was Sam's faultless fiddling. He's not only hitting the notes, but giving each of them a shape and meaning. A wonderful job...The sheer listenability of this album...overwhelmed my need to dance to it. I was impressed, moved, and transfixed." -Dan Pearl

"Well, you've done it. You've unseamed the contradance aesthetic from the nave to the chops. You set a new standard of teeth on a new animal: wooly, large and sleek, a thing that pounces in the dark and knocks you down a flight of stairs and then jumps on you and tells you a very good joke and then jumps on you again. You guys are the Jackie Chan of dance bands." -Sam Bartlett (no relation to Thomas)

" About a year ago I wrote a tune entitled, 'Popcorn Behavior', trying to capture some of the energy, spirit and coloration of this band's music. Boy was I flattered when they not only began playing it, but recorded the definitive version! Definitive is a good word for their new CD. I've listened to it over and over. It combines some of my favorite musical qualities: playful inventiveness, rhythmic drive and sensitivity. "Popcorn Behavior" has selected some great tunes and played the "popcorn" out of them!" -Jay Ungar

"Remarkable ... inventive ... virtuosic: What can you say about a band that consists of three teenagers and plays like a house on fire? I'm sure the members of the band - brothers Sam and Stefan Amidon, and Thomas Bartlett - are weary of having their ages mentioned in reviews, and eager for the day to arrive when they'll be referred to as "a great band" and not "a great young band." Yet their ages - 15, 13 and 14, respectively - have a lot to do with why this recording is such a standout.

"It's always a source of wonderment to me when young people in our culture choose traditional music, work hard at it and excel: The odds are stacked so formidably against them. And yet, many do. It's possible, with the help of technology, for today's young musicians to aspire to greatness, with so many recordings of the masters available to them.

"To say that Sam Amidon's playing reminds me of Liz Carroll, Tommy Peoples or Kevin Burke is not inferring that he's a skilled imitator, but rather remarking that his fiddling has both the mastery and the depth of a much older musician. He's predictably fiery on the opening cut, a Thomas Bartlett reel called "March of the Ents," but plays with such reserve and intensity on Philippe Varlet's "Big Red" that you'd think he'd lived 20 years in the interim. The playing of Stefan Amidon is no less controlled, as he takes the humble dumbek from solid backup to an actual part of the melody in "Bulgarian Copenica," one of the showstoppers on this CD. Bartlett contributed seven compositions to the recording including the fabulous "Shadowfax," a tune in 5/8 time. Bartlett's keyboard playing is superb, whether handling a solid contra dance-style rhythm, or taking a flight of fancy.

"This is ensemble playing of the highest caliber, augmented by Pete Sutherland's skillful production, and some smashing session work on guitar and mandolin from Keith Murphy of Nightingale. Clearly, Popcorn Behavior is a force to be reckoned with: But where do they go from here?" -SingOut! Magazine

"Forget for a minute that the players range in age between 10 and 13. Just put the headphones on and tell me what you hear: good, solid, inventive playing, excellent production values, choice tunes, and a swell cover to boot." -Selma Kaplan: WAMC radio, Albany, NY

"Jaw dropping virtuosity." -New England Folk Festival Dance Series