• Paul Johnson

    Music

    Paul Johnson

    The Hepcats Live at the Ajax Novelty Company

    This isn’t live, there may not be an Ajax Novelty Company, and the three felines known as the Hepcats are actually the brainchild of Paul Johnson, whose Belairs were early-’60s pioneers of surf music. Suspend reality and dig how the “trio” expertly articulates layers of acoustic guitar. Across decades, Johnson has embraced folk-rock, psychedelia, and…

    Read more >>

Lexie Roth – One Long Blink

Roth was 17 when she started recording this project, 19 when she finished, and it’s testament to her talent and maturity that you can’t tell where the performances fell chronologically. Her six originals…

Freddie King

Getting Ready/Texas Cannonball/Woman Across the River

A three-in-one reissue, this Freddie King package encompasses the LPs he recorded for Leon Russell’s Shelter label from 1971 to ’73. On Getting Ready, King dodges sugary arrangements to deliver smoldering licks on…

Thin Lizzy

Vagabonds of the Western World 50th Anniversary

Long before “The Boys Are Back in Town,” Thin Lizzy was a pugnacious Dublin trio with bassist Phil Lynott and guitarist Eric Bell. Vagabonds was their third album and there’s nothing else like…

Nels Cline

Lovers

Nels Cline has quite the musical resumé, and yet has always been hard to pin down. Whether doing some form of fusion, manning the lead-guitar chair in Wilco, or serving up dissonance and…

Yarn

UFO

On its third album, this Brooklynbased country/roots band pushes further into the darker side of Americana. Guitarist/lead vocalist Blake Christiana guides the band, with Trevor MacArthur on guitar and vocals, Andrew Hendryx on…

The Rolling Stones

Eagle Rock

Some people think Exile On Main Street is the best album the Rolling Stones ever recorded. Those people are wrong. And it’s certainly not “the rock and roll Bible,” as Sheryl Crow proclaims…

Tony Furtado

Funzalo Records

If you had picked up Golden without hearing one of Tony Furtado’s previous 14 albums, you’d never guess he was once a banjo prodigy. After winning the National Bluegrass Banjo competition at 19,…

Ralph Towner, John Abercrombie Quartet, Wolfgang Muthspiel, Dewa Budjana

Fusion Heros

The ECM label is renowned for its brand of atmospheric jazz-fusion highlighted by gorgeous audio quality. Two of its guitar masters – Ralph Towner and John Abercrombie – have released new albums. An…

Led Zeppelin: Goin’ To California

How the West Was Won

The members of Led Zeppelin were of course British, but loved American culture and had a special relationship with southern California – both for epic gigs at the L.A. Forum and Long Beach…

The Robin Nolan Trio – Swings & Roundabouts

If you like gypsy jazz and you haven’t heard The Robin Nolan Trio, you should. Solo guitarist Nolan is joined by rhythm guitarist Jan P. Brouwer and bassist Paul Meader on Swings &…

Greg Trooper – Floating

Floating

Singer/songwriters are a lot like fleas during the summer; they’re everywhere, but you don’t notice them until they bite you someplace sensitive. Greg Trooper writes songs that can penetrate even the thickest skin…

Jim Beloff – Jim’s Dog Has Fleas

Jim Beloff has a love affair with the ukulele. Ever since he stumbled on one at a flea market, he has devoted his life to the instrument’s legacy. Beloff has organized several collections…

Caroline Gnagy

Stars Behind Bars

Sometimes the most interesting books are ones that delve into a subject readers didn’t know about and never considered. And except for now-elderly people who were around the right place at the right…

Mike Barfield – Living Stereo

Living Stereo

This might come as a surprise to those familiar with the singer from his days with the countrified Hollisters. Barfield downplays the country and plays up the southern soul vein, with great originals…

Envy of None

Envy of None

Let’s start with the obvious: Alex Lifeson’s new project sounds little like Rush. Billed as “dark, cinematic alt rock,” Envy of None pulls from ’90s industrial and early-2000s synth rock with electro-drums, pulsating…

A Tribute to Eric Clapton

Various artists

Music’s most-popular purveyor of American blues continues to fail upward with this homage from peers, fans, and virtuosos. Released by Cleopatra Records, A Tribute to Eric Clapton stands above other such recordings, benefiting…

Moondi & Gaudreau – 2:10 Train

Jimmy Gaudreau and Moondi Klein have been playing together for more than 10 years. They first met when T. Michael Coleman, Mike Auldridge, and Klein asked Gaudreau to join them in Chesapeake. When…

Willie Holcomb and Danny Barnes

Prior to 1961, Roscoe Holcomb had never “performed,” as such. John Cohen of the New Lost City Rambler found him in Daisy, Kentucky, and drove him to his first concert, in Chicago that…

Chet Atkins and Mel Cochran – Chet Atkins: Me and My Guitars

Chet Atkins: Me and My Guitars

Chet Atkins has a deserved reputation as a great guitar player and all-around nice guy. So it’s a pleasure to see a book that is part biography and part history of his personal…

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…

Bill Frisell

Music Is

Bill Frisell is a musical treasure who has proven himself in so many musical situations he’s impossible to categorize. His latest effort is his first “solo” record in many years. And it’s not…

Neil Young

Uncle Neil’s at it again, issuing the seventh disc in his live Archives Performance Series. Once more he’s alone with his Martins and a piano (a “really outta sight” Steinway), this time post-Thanksgiving…

Blues Icon John Mayall

Check This Action

Few living blues artists could merit a package of 35 CDs. But what makes John Mayall: The First Generation most remarkable is that it only documents the British blues legend’s career up to…

Robert Gordon: Memphis Rent Party

There’s no city like Memphis when it comes to music. And thankfully, there’s Robert Gordon to chronicle its story. Gordon has written books and helmed documentaries about Muddy Waters, Stax Records, and, of…

Jim Walsh and Dennis Pernu

Of all the cool ’80s alternative rock bands, the loveable ramshackle jag-offs in the Replacements were the least likely to give a toss about, oh, anything much at all. That attitude permeated everything…

Buick 6

Rocks Well With Others

You’re likely wondering, just who is this Buick 6 and who do they play well with? Good questions. The trio is Lucinda Williams’ backing band, which has also become her opening act for…

Play All Night! Duane Allman and the Journey to Fillmore East

Bob Beatty

This book examines the importance of guitarist Duane Allman as a musician, his leadership of the Allman Brothers Band, and the power of ABB’s seminal 1971 album At Fillmore East, presented by an…

Hadden Sayers Band – Swingin’ From The Fabulous Satellite

If tasteful, solid, rock is your thing, this band is for you. Storming out of Texas and led by guitarist Hadden Sayers, they blend blues, classic rock, country, and good old-fashioned pop music…

Don Rich and the Buckeroos – Country Pickin’: The Don Rich Anthology

The Don Rich collection is a 24-song retrospective featuring songs recorded when the late guitarist/fiddler was the instrumental hero of Buck Owens’ band. There’s lots of stuff here you’d expect. Killer instrumentals like…

Joe Negri

Noteworthy Jazz

A regional star, local TV luminary and jazz virtuoso even before beginning his 32-year tenure as Mister Rogers’ favorite handyman, Joe Negri (see feature in the September ’10 issue) was woefully under-recorded until…