• Smith/Kotzen

    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

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The Warren Hood Band

Not one but two royal bloodlines of Texas music flow through the Warren Hood Band. Violinist Hood’s father, the late Champ Hood, was one-third of Uncle Walt’s Band, along with David Ball and…

Nathan East

Nathan East’s phone hasn’t stopped ringing in 40 years. Offered gigs with Quincy Jones, Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, Beyoncé, and Daft Punk, he’s crisscrossed genres from pop to jazz. His smooth yet percolating…

Derek Trucks Band – Already Free

Derek Trucks is one of the top guitarists of his generation. He has helped write a new chapter in the history of the Allman Brothers Band, was an integral part of Eric Clapton’s…

Emerson, Lake & Palmer

Shout Factory

Coinciding with ELP’s recent reunion show is this quadruple-CD box set containing 40 years of unreleased live tracks. The anthology is nicely arranged and annotated with one distinct era per disc – early-’70s,…

Luther Allison – Where Have You Been?

The title of this disc echoes the question many blues fans ask when they first hear Luther Allison’s amazing Alligator releases, Soul Fixin’ Man and Blue Streak, and learn that he walked away…

Christone “Kingfish” Ingram

Live In London

In a world where Red Bull-injected athletes have hijacked blues guitar, Christone “Kingfish” Ingram is a welcome return to feel, nuance, style, communication, and imagination. Drawing from the most-outstanding performers of the African-American…

Chip Taylor & Carrie Rodriguez – The Trouble With Humans

The Trouble With Humans

Some famous musical duos originate in the womb, like The Louvin or Everly brothers. Others are created by love, like Ian and Silvia, Richard and Mimi Farina, and Buddy and Julie Miller. Finally…

Doug Brod

They Just Seem a Little Weird: How Kiss, Cheap Trick, Aerosmith, and Starz Remade Rock and Roll

This book connects the dots among four bands that emerged in the ’70s, describing how Aerosmith’s Joe Perry, Cheap Trick’s Rick Nielsen, and Starz’s Richie Ranno played guitar on Kiss vocalist/bassist Gene Simmons’…

John Scofield – This Meets That

It’s never good to expect anything from John Scofield because he likes to throw a curve. With his latest release, he mixes great originals with surprising covers on a trio record… sort of.…

Melvin Taylor and the Slack Band – Rendevous with the Blues

Rendevous with the Blues

This is Melvin’s fourth record for the Evidence label, and like the rest, it’s a showcase of his dazzling technique and deep soul. This guy is a treasure. Perhaps it’s because he’s hard…

Vince Gill

In the four years since his Guitar Slinger album, Vince Gill kept busy producing others, recording an album with the Time Jumpers and a Bakersfield tribute with pedal steeler Paul Franklin. This time,…

Eric Gales

This is the kind of album only Eric Gales could make. It’s full of fiery lines and repentant testimonials about rebirth and sobriety. He forsakes his adventurous rock personality in favor of the…

Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys featuring Ricky Skaggs and Keith Whitley

Formed in 1946, the Stanley Brothers were the second bluegrass group, following Bill Monroe’s. But lead singer and rhythm guitarist Carter Stanley died in 1966 at age 41. Banjo-playing brother Ralph formed the…

Stamey & Holsapple – Mavericks

It’s nice to see this 1991 classic re-released, hopefully to a bigger audience than it did on its original release. In the 1980s, Holsapple and Stamey were charter members of the db’s, which…

Jason & the Scorchers – Halcyon Times

Playground Music

It’s an unlikely story that cow-punk pioneers Jason and the Scorchers would be releasing an album in 2010. It’s even more unlikely, so early in the year, to say it may end up…

Holden

Think of Holden as the Velvet Underground with a French accent. This noise-pop duo differs, however, in chronicling not the wild side of the ’60s, but the existential estrangement of modern-day life –…

The Go-Go’s

Alison Ellwood (director)

When Police drummer Stewart Copeland discovers the Go-Go’s are not in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, he’s incredulous. “The most important aspect of musicianship is feel,” Copeland declares in this 90-minute…

Ronnie Wood

Eagle Records

This is Wood’s first solo album since 2001, which isn’t surprising, seeing as it’s only his seventh studio album in 36 years – his solo output usually dictated by his schedule with his…

Mark Makin

Amazing Worlds

Tackling the long and winding history of the Dopyera brothers – John, Rudy, Emil, Robert, and Louis – has proved daunting for guitar historians. Mark Makin does it in style with this huge…

Greg Allman

Rounder Records

Allman’s solo albums have been good to excellent and generally more satisfying than most of the Allman Brothers post-Duane releases; they’re bluesier, darker, more down-home. With a band built around Mac “Dr. John”…

Joe Louis Walker – Pasa Tiempo

Pasa Tiempo

Joe Louis Walker has long been one of the best-kept secrets of the blues. That might be a fine thing for blues fans, but for a musician, being a secret is not where…

James Hunter – Believe What I Say

This U.S. release of Hunter’s ’96 U.K.-distributed album shows Hunter honing the skills that would lead to his new album, People Gonna Talk. If you’re familiar with that one, this mix of Sam…

Roy Orbison

The Ultimate Collection

Playing the role of a lonely, heartbroken teen, Roy Orbison was the Enrico Caruso of early ’60s pop, his voice gracing more than a few torchy hits. “Oh Pretty Woman” from 1964 remains…

Merle Haggard – Roots, Vol. 1

Norm Stephens isn’t a household name, even to country music fans who have no doubt heard his guitar playing. But to Merle Haggard, Stephens – the original guitarist behind Hag’s biggest influence, Lefty…

Country Joe and the Fish

Country Joe and The Fish were one of the most original, eclectic, and just plain good San Francisco bands of the mid to late ’60s. Joe McDonald, in particular, wrote songs that were…

Michael Landau, Robben Ford, Jimmy Haslip, and Gary Novak

Shrapnel Records

When four musicians the caliber of these get together, you always hope for the best, but sometimes it doesn’t happen. Here, however, it does. Michael Landau and Robben Ford supply most of the…

Johnny Bush – Kashmere Gardens Mud

Johnny Bush is a true Texas original and one of the best living examples of real honky-tonk music. Looking back on all aspects of his 50-year career, he cut much of Kashmere Gardens,…

  • Yes

    Yes

    Close to the Edge: Super Deluxe Edition

John Davis – John Davis

John Davis was a member of Superdrag, which gained some notoriety in its 10-year run. They were a mix of influences including punk, early British rock and roll, and pop. Davis left the…

Los Lobos – El Cancionero – Mas y Mas

There’s a new four-CD retrospective con-taining 86 tracks, clocking in at five hours, spanning a dozen albums by one of the greatest bands in rock history. These guys reveal deep roots without pickling…

The Beach Boys – Singles Collection

At this point, there are far more retrospectives of the Beach Boys than original albums. Their catalog has been recycled in every way imaginable. Or so one would have thought. Any new wrinkle…