Minneapolis’ Jayhawks always had more in common with their compatriots the Replacements and Prince than may have been apparent at first blush. The ’Hawks too had a magical way with a melody, crafting glorious hooks that made them stand out as forerunners, bringing a pop sensibility to their music – in the Jayhawks’ case, alt-country [...]
Barry Cleveland takes his music to another dimension with Hologramatron. It’s like a cross between the Velvet Underground and Portishead, but completely unique – and uniquely eccentric. Cleveland’s compositions, arrangements, and guitar work here are a fusion of fusions, as he masterfully treads into ambient, avant-garde metal, psychedelia – even protest music. And the layers [...]
Pete Anderson needs little introduction as a guitar slinger and producer with sublime guitar taste. For his production work on albums with Dwight Yoakam from 1986 to 2003, he has taken home a Grammy while the records have gone multi-platinum, selling more than 25 million copies and counting. While his guitar work with Yoakam was [...]
After 30-plus years, seven studio albums, a live album, and two DVDs, Social Distortion may have just released its masterpiece. The band came rocking out of Fullerton, California, in 1978, playing a tough brand of rock equally inspired by the Rolling Stones, punk, and Hank Williams. They’ve been through ups and downs, drug addiction and [...]
>Royal Trux took the Velvet Underground’s “Heroin” and made a career of it. The band was founded after the implosion of Washington, D.C. punkers Pussy Galore by guitarist Neil Hagerty and girlfriend Jennifer Herrema, who relocated to New York City. They named their combo after their skateboard’s “trucks,” and crafted a dark, lo-fi, underground sound [...]
“Unapproachable” is right. “Indescribable” may also be justified. Just like the myriad musics of Memphis, from where Tav Falco hails, his longtime band Panther Burns remains a fascinating and ongoing conundrum. The band was named for a Mississippi Delta town where a marauding panther was trapped in a thicket and burned. The cries of that [...]
Many supergroups lack true superpowers, but Derek and the Dominos was the real deal. Burned out on the supergroup phenom after his troubled times in Cream and Blind Faith, Eric Clapton sought anonymity from stardom and its demands behind the moniker “Derek.” He also ached to get back to the companionship of a band of [...]
From the opening notes of “Slow Train” to the echo of the last note of “Prisoner,” modern blues guitarslinger Joe Bonamassa’s Dust Bowl is a masterpiece. Bonamassa has released 11 previous solo albums and was crowned Billboard’s Blues Artist of 2010. But many blues-guitar fans have been hip to him for far longer. Dust Bowl [...]
After more than a decade of recording and playing his own original compositions, Tom Feldmann decided it was finally time to pay homage to the music the first inspired him to pick up a guitar. Tribute collects his versions of old-time gospel songs by the likes of Muddy Waters, Blind Willie Johnson, Fred McDowell, Lightnin’ [...]
Jon Spencer formed his Blues Explosion ensemble in New York City in 1991. The band was instantly hated and beloved; purists saw them as treading on age-old blues traditions with no respect. Others were fascinated by the band’s deconstruction and reinvention of the music. At heart, the Blues Explosion was pure power trio. Spencer, then [...]
