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Music
Smith/Kotzen
Black Light/White Noise
This is the third album from rock veterans Adrian Smith (Iron Maiden) and Richie Kotzen (The Winery Dogs). The busy axeslingers – especially Kotzen, who is always involved in solo and band projects – released their full-length debut and an EP in 2021. Smith-Kotzen has happily blossomed into a going concern. What’s interesting about Smith/Kotzen’s
Swervedriver
The shoegaze revival is peaking, so what better time for one of its leading lights to hop on the wagon while the hopping is hot, right? Not so fast. Swervedriver reunited seven years…
Charles Brown – A Life In The Blues
This is more than just an album by the late R&B great Charles Brown. It’s truly the story of a life – a scrapbook of history, photos, testimonials, music, vintage film clips, a…
Robben Ford
Made To Last
When Robben Ford approaches traditional blues, he takes ownership, transporting it to new places. This latest five-song EP is no different, as he wields Willie Dixon’s “Crazy For My Baby” and injects his…
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Chris Walz
All I Got and Gone
This traditional folk singer/guitarist’s solo debut is impressive. He’s been an educator at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music for three decades, but his approach is by no means academic. He not only reveals the influence of folk and blues legends such as Doc and Merle Watson, Elizabeth Cotten, Etta Baker, Dave Van Ronk,
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Nels Cline
Consentrik Quartet
ls Cline long ago established a parallel career as an eclectic instrumentalist and contemporary jazz virtuoso. His fourth Blue Note album is an extended set that unveils Consentrik Quartet, his new band with acoustic bassist Chris Lightcap, drummer Tom Rainey, and tenor/soprano saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock. Their concepts are ambitious and their sound is free, Cline
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Charlie Musselwhite
Lookout Highway
John Mayall is invariably cited for the succession of guitar greats who passed through his band. But Charlie Musselwhite just might be the American equivalent. In a 60-year career, his six-stringers have included Harvey Mandel, Luther Tucker, Louis Myers, Tim Kaihatsu, Robben Ford, Fenton Robinson, Johnny Heartsman, Junior Watson, Andrew “Jr. Boy” Jones, John Wedemeyer,
Harry Taussig – Fate Is Only Once
In his liner notes to this extremely rare 1965 album, Harry Taussig lists Woody Guthrie, Jesse Fuller, Mance Lipscomb, Scrapper Blackwell, Libba Cotton, Mississippi John Hurt, John Fahey, Ravi Shankar, and koto master…
Sam Bush and David Grisman – King of My World
If you see Sam Bush perform live, the first thing you’ll notice is what a wonderful time he has on stage. Few performers enjoy playing music as much as Sam, and it shows.…
Mark Doyle – Guitar Noir
I love this. Doyle has been in the music biz for some time. His first band, Jukin’ Bone, made a couple of obscure albums for RCA in the early ’70s and in the…
Neil Young + Promise of the Real
Neil Young often does whatever he pleases. And now, at age 70, that’s truer than ever. This new album proves the point: It’s a thematic concert combining new takes on 13 previously released…
Rodney Crowell
Rodney Crowell, who gained fame during country’s New Traditional era of the 1980s, has always drawn from his personal life for inspiration. He doubled down on that on his 2001 album The Houston…
The Yawpers
Boy In A Well
The Yawpers’ latest finds the raucous Denver trio playing it a bit against the beery roots-rock type, instead presenting (of all things) a song cycle concerning a mother who has given up her…
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Popa Chubby
I Love Freddie King
The latest from blues dynamo Popa Chubby is a star-studded tribute to the late great Freddie King. Produced by Mr. Chubby and Mike Zito, I Love Freddie King is a blues guitar love-fest covering some of King’s most potent and popular songs. With Popa fronting the band on guitar and vocals, guests include Eric Gales,
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Rush
Rush 50
The goal of any anthology is to capture the broad scope of an artist’s career. Rush 50 is a strong attempt, starting with their first singles (previously unreleased) all the way to their final live recordings in 2015. In between are reams of epic studio and stage recordings, summing up the band’s career in one
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Rik Emmett
Ten Telecaster Tales
At the risk of starting a brawl, Rik Emmett’s guitar work was arguably too good for Triumph. As evidence, his latest project centers on a custom-built Loucin that inspired both a book and accompanying music. “Magic Power” this is not. On Ten Telecaster Tunes, Emmett delivers 10 solo performances on the instrument he calls Babs,
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Check This Action: Up Jumped Elmore
When someone recently asked me to recommend the most essential Elmore James album, I answered, “Any and all.” I’ve never heard a bad Elmore cut, and I’ve heard nearly everything he recorded. Everybody knows that he set the standard for slide guitar in electric blues, but he was also a fantastic singer and wrote some
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Greg Koch
Blues
The Gristle Master returns with scintillating blues and the influences that made him the six-string slayer he is today. On this live recording, Koch uses an array of guitars including his signature Reverend, a Deluxe Tele, Custom Shop Les Paul, and a Custom Shop Strat while sharing stages with Larry McCray, Jimmy Hall, Malford Milligan,
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2025 December Issue on Spotify
This month, we feature Rick Derringer, Kid Ramos, Booker T and The M.G.’s, Steve Stevens, Phil Manzanera, Doug Aldrich, Kenny Burrell, Eric Johanson, Gary Moore, and more! Spotify is free or available without ads via a paid subscription. Go to www.spotify.com and search “Vintage Guitar magazine,” or if you already have an account Listen to
Rick Vito – Rattlesnake Shake
Covering the Peter Green title track may be a subliminal (or subconscious) way of reminding listeners of his early-’90s stint with Fleetwood Mac, but Vito was a Green devotee well before Green had…
Chris Walz
All I Got and Gone
This traditional folk singer/guitarist’s solo debut is impressive. He’s been an educator at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music for three decades, but his approach is by no means academic. He not…
Check This Action: Everybody Gone Surfing?
My favorite quote about the demise of surf music is not the oft-repeated Hendrix line in “Third Stone From The Sun” (“And you’ll never hear surf music again”); it came at the 2018…
Anson Funderburgh and The Rockets – Which Way Is Texas?
Which Way Is Texas?
Anson Funderburgh is one of the few – if not only – blues guitarists I’ve ever seen get an ovation for a chorus solo. Such applause might be common for jazz shows, but…
Kansas – Two for the Show: 30th Anniversary Edition
Sony/Legacy
One iconic artifact of the late-’70s rock scene was the ubiquitous “double live album,” a marketing ploy usually timed for the Christmas rush, but one that also yielded much good music. Following the…
Black Label Society
Doom Crew Inc.
BLS’ 11th album has Zakk Wylde sharing duties with guitarist Dario Lorina. Huge tones, harmonized lines, and blistering solos dwell in the realm of metal-infested stomp and fretboard intensity. Dedicated to their roadcrew…
Pieta Brown
Red House Records
Put two great guitar players like Bo Ramsey and Richard Bennett together with one of the best songwriters to appear in the past decade, and there’s a chance you’ll get a great record.…
Big Joe and the Dynaflows
Severn Records
Big Joe Maher’s latest showcases his bluesy, swinging vocal style and rocksolid drumming on a dozen tracks split evenly between originals and covers, including B.B. King’s “Bad Case of Love” to Billy Wright’s…
Stan Martin: Long Nights
You’d think guitar man Kenny Vaughan had been playing with this combo for years. He has musical history with the rhythm section of drummer Dave Roe and bassist Jerry Roe. But it’s a…
Mike Zito
Resurrection
The very title of bluesman Mike Zito’s new album – and the fact it’s the follow-up to 2020’s Quarantine Blues – strongly suggests the arrival of songs celebrating post-pandemic life. There’s indeed a…
J.D. Simo
This latest shoehorns J.D. Simo’s Nashville six-string virtuosity with the soulful blues phrasing of Chicago, and the heart-pounding adrenaline of rawk. Embedded within a raucous ’60s psychedelic gumbo, Simo summons copious amounts of…
Santana IV
Describing Carlos Santana’s guitar playing, Greg Rolie, the Santana band’s original keyboardist, declares, “It’s real music; it’s not just a bunch of notes put together.” Truer words were never spoken. They’re just part…
Spirit
Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus
Coco Montoya – I Want It All Back
Ruf Records
Fans familiar with Coco Montoya’s blistering guitar work and gruff vocals are in for a surprise when they hear I Want It All Back, on which Montoya serves up music tilted to traditional…
Preston Shannon – All In Time
I admit I’m a fool for soul music. Why? Because there is no such thing as a mediocre soul singer. They get weeded out immediately. There is lots of “half-steppin” in the blues…
Long John Baldry – Remembering Leadbelly
The Brits, in at least as far as the blues is concerned, have always been our archivists. With a few exceptions in the ’60s, including John Hammond, Butterfield and Bloomfield, Taj Mahal, and…
Adrian Raso
Black Mamba Records
Adrian Raso understands that, just as a guitar solo is not just a place-holder between lyric lines, an instrumental is not just a bunch of notes that sound good together. Guitarists may have…
Toby Keith
Toby Keith’s previous two albums – Bullets in the Gun (2010) and Clancy’s Tavern (2011) – were two of his finest, enhanced by first-rate original material, powerful vocals, and restrained, hard-edged production. His…
Speedy West – Steel Guitar
At the opposite end of the spectrum from Sundazed’s Burton-Mooney collaboration, which balances restraint with fire, is this collection of singles by steel trickster Speedy West, which Capitol originally released in 1960. This,…
The Steepwater Band
Diamond Day Records
If you like your rock and roll loud and with no-frills, you’ll love The Steepwater Band. A trio with plenty of great influences, the 14 cuts on this live disc touch on blues,…
Elvin Bishop and Little Smoky Smothers – That’s My Partner
Elvin Bishop should receive some sort of award. How many years now has he been serving up killer blues-rock and having more fun that any one person should be allowed to have? Here…
Claudia Thompson with Barney Kessel
Goodbye To Love
In 1956, Julie London’s “Cry Me A River” was the unlikeliest of hits, yet her breathy reading of a minor-key ballad, written by a schoolmate, reached the Top 10. With austere backing of…
