On Money & Power, Ally Venable wields the power of wisdom and emotional connection. It’s an album about empowerment and comeuppance, but there’s plenty of playtime with guest stars Shemekia Copeland and Christone “Kingfish” Ingram. An audio bluesfest, it’s songwriting brings substance carried by guitarists swinging for the fences. What does the albums title represent?What

Betting On Yourself
The British effect on American blues is undeniable. From the wicked guitar stylings of Paul Kossoff and Mick Taylor to the supernatural resonance of Peter Green and Gary Moore, the…

Good Company
In 1972, one of Britain’s best bands, Mott The Hoople, still hadn’t made any impact on the charts. Its record company, Island Records, was getting impatient. Then, a future rock…
The Feats and Famous Friends
Barrere onstage at a recent show with his trusty ’72 Fender Stratocaster. Photo: J. Kosack. It’s been well over a decade since Vintage Guitar talked with Little Feat’s Paul Barrere,…
When Hubert Sumlin sideman Sean Chambers played a gig with Savoy Brown bassist Pat DeSalvo and drummer Garnet Grimm, the result was blues-rock ecstasy. Live From Daryl’s House Club is the next best thing to being there. Fans of incendiary slide playing and Rory Gallagher, look no further. How did you meet Pat and Garnet?I
On Lari Basilio’s latest record, Redemption, art and life collide to make beautiful music. Effortless instrumental guitar techniques merge with rib-sticking melodies to captivate and astonish. Bassist Leland Sklar and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta are back to add rhythmic fire, but Basilio’s muse is life’s challenges and, of course, super cool gear. You became a mother.
A songwriting blues-rocker in the purist sense, Dudley Taft is succeeding in an era when nothing comes easy for his ilk. His new album, The Speed of Life, required a departure from the norm; while his previous three were recorded at his own studio in Cincinnati, this one used down time during a European tour
Checking in with L.A. studio stalwart
Casher with actress Brooke Shields at a soundtrack recording session. He’s called “The Papa of the Wah-Wah Pedal” and has been a top session cat since the early 1960s, introducing…

Return with Rio
It’s hard to believe that 34 years have passed since Trevor Rabin issued a solo album featuring his vocals. But it’s true – Can’t Look Away was released in 1989.…

Already busy touring and recording with Deep Purple, axe virtuoso Steve Morse has added another dish to the menu – Flying Colors. Featuring well-known aces like drummer Mike Portnoy and…

In Ep 88 of “Have Guitar Will Travel,” host James Patrick Regan speaks with Liily’s guitarist Sam De La Torre, and with members of Wild Rivers. Sam De La Torre…
Still Broadcasting
Television always seemed to be from another planet. Alien-like, the band was an anomaly: a dichotomy of punk attitude and intellectual musicianship. To put it another way, they hated hippies,…

Return of the Battlin’ Brothers
“The title says it all,” explains Dave Alvin of his reunion with older brother Phil on Lost Time. Known for a long-standing sibling rivalry, they hadn’t recorded new music together…
Acclaimed as bassist for The Flower Kings, Jonas Reingold is a master four-stringer. He’s recorded with many artists, including Jon Anderson (of Yes), and has become an integral part of Steve Hackett’s band, re-creating the complex bottom of early Genesis. Twenty years ago, Reingold started the prog group Karmakanic (repeat it slowly a few times),
Tommy Emmanuel is a real guitarist in its truest sense. On Live At The Sydney Opera House, he stands onstage with only an acoustic guitar, and mesmerizes a packed house. His virtuosity employs country, Celtic, and folk fingerpicking styles that lift the spirit. The set is loaded with fan favorites, but a song suggestion from
After landing on American shores in 2002 to study bluegrass, then shifting into a career as a country singer/songwriter/picker, Jedd Hughes has spent 20 years on an alternate – but rewarding – path as A-list session player and touring sideman. While being busy tempered his flow of original music, in 2014, he returned to songwriting.
As a teenager who just wanted to play music, Norm Harris lived with the reality that he and his band weren’t going to be millionaires anytime soon. So he did what musicians do – side-hustled. But when most were manning the counter at a music shop or serving tables, Harris was up at the crack
If you’re making a list of beloved bands with a long string of hook-heavy hits, the Doobie Brothers will surely be on it. Their new album, Walk This Road, features the creative core of vocalist/guitarist Patrick Simmons, vocalist/guitarist Tom Johnston, multi-instrumentalist John McFee, and vocalist/keyboardist Michael McDonald. The news of Walk This Road generated significant
Season 03 Episode 10 In Episode 3.10 of “Buy That Guitar,” host Ram Tuli is joined by Robb Lawrence and Kim Shaheen. Robb’s experience in the vintage market spans from the golden age of electric-guitar innovation to the modern world. Beyond simply studying the history, he lived it, documented it, and played alongside giants who

Sky Above The Note
The new album from Robben Ford is packed with beautiful music and the indelible ingredients that for decades have made him a force on guitar. Night In The City was…
Philip Kubicki, a renowned guitar designer and builder who was active in the musical-instrument industry for more than 50 years, died March 18, 2013, at his home in Laconia, New…
Birthday congrats to Paul Gilbert, who today hits the big 5-0! Paul and his Trio are on tour in support of his album, “I Can Destroy.” They’ll play the U.K.…

Constant Creator
The elements of life that mold a person are constant and ever-evolving. Influence is all about perspective. Philadelphia-born Nick Perri grew up in a strict Catholic household where pop music…

Taking a spin with Chicago sons The Steepwater Band and their latest CD, Revelation Sunday, is an experience akin to traversing the backroads of American blues and rock, then maybe…
Blues Beyond Belfast
Considering his lengthy resumé, one might expect Irish guitarist Vivian Campbell would have released a solo album long before September of 2005. And Campbell’s efforts in bands such as Dio,…

Bill Woodward's 1953 Gibson Les Paul
Gravitational heavyweights in our culture, beyond baseball, hot dogs, and apple pie, few things say “American” more than music and road trips. This guitar is symbolic of both. One of…

Birth of the Brown Sound
In the late 1970s, hard rock was on the ropes. Always a guitar-dominated form of music, it had been diluted to the point of near extinction. But with the 1978…

Rock legend’s thunderous return Forty years after “Fantasy,” Canadian rock legend Aldo Nova has returned with two new projects. One is a semi-autobiographical rock opera called “The Life and Times…

Michael Schenker
Michael Schenker is back with an album covering the music of his early days. My Years With UFO is a tribute to his time in that band and features some…

Spacesaver Sale
Eyebrows raise with news that a superstar guitar collector is preparing to sell iconic instruments. Alarms might trigger, even. But don’t dial 9-1-1 for Neal Schon. Holder of 800 instruments…

Star Grabs Vintage J-50 for “Ain’t the Truth Enough? An in-demand sideman for more than 50 years, guitar wizard Nils Lofgren has worked with Bruce Springsteen & the E Street…
Bedlam in Belgium: Electric Guitar & Amp Museum
Ivan “Lord Bizarre” Symaeys with a 1965 Wandré Bikini and an assortment of guitars. All photos by Joe Bigley. When most Americans think of Belgium, it’s usually beer, chocolate, or…
Cool and Greasy
“I wanted to make the type of album I would’ve liked to have heard when I was 13 – cool and greasy,” said ex-Blackhearts guitarist Ricky Byrd of his debut solo…

Hometown Noir
Mark Sebastian’s new album, The Real Story, is a paean to his musical roots in the Big Apple. “About a year ago, I realized I had almost an album’s worth…

The Blues Man’s Jazzy Side
Stevie Ray Vaughan is the uncontested blues champion of the new age. Though he’s been gone more than 30 years, his music still reverberates and much continues to be written…

Honky-Tonk Hammerin’
Dale Watson remembers well a conversation he once had with Leo Fender. “Leo gave me a guitar, and it was so shiny and new, I said, ‘Well, I just hate…

Studio Snap-Back
It’s not often a superstar performer willfully steps away from creating new music for a decade. For country singer/songwriter/guitarist Travis Tritt, though, it was a move with purpose. “I decided…
Crystal Vision
Eric Gales’ new release, Crystal Vision, is an autobiographical blues-rock tour de force with inspired twists and turns. Long labeled by myopic music critics as a Hendrix knock-off, Gales actually…
Mick Taylor
Taylor strums a flat-top with The Rolling Stones in early 1973. Photo copyright Marty Temme. The mid/late 1960s were a fertile and progressive time for rock guitar, with “Swinging London”…

Heart-less But Guitar Laden
Guitarist/ producer/ entrepreneur Howard Leese has come a long way since his early days with Heart in the 1970s. He was onboard when the band’s first hit single, “Barracuda,” swam…