Amos Lee

Ninety percent silk and ten percent grit, Philadelphia blue-eyed-soul man Amos Lee's pipes are steeped in both the smooth R&B stylings of Billy Paul and Smokey Robinson and the Seventies singer-songwriter tradition of James Taylor and Harry Chapin. The late-twenty-something schoolteacher turned singer -- whose unfussy, jazzy folk-soul tunes and nice-guy demeanor frequently get him lumped in with the likes of John Mayer and Josh Rouse (Rolling Stone once called him "Norah Jones's male counterpart") -- has, in just a couple short years, gone from playing the Philly coffeehouse circuit to touring with Jones and warming up crowds for Bob Dylan last year. The only knock on Lee is that he occasionally sounds like that weenie from Train, but for the most part, his albums -- including his recently released sophomore disc, Supply and Demand -- are quite likable.