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

The Sacred Steel, Family, and SRV
Living testament to the versatility of the pedal-steel guitar and a rarity in pop music, Robert Randolph adroitly addresses the challenge of acting as front man of the Family Band…

Outlaw Twang, Rockabilly Swagger
Country music icon Dwight Yoakam employs one of the hardest-working bands on the road today. A quintet including Yoakam, they’re keeping alive the outlaw edge of the genre’s past. With…
A Discussion with Tom Johnston and Patrick Simmons
American music rarely is more pure than when it comes from the minds, hands, and mouths of the Doobie Brothers. An uncommon mix of talent, the Doobies have, since their…
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

Michael Rhodes, a bassist who for decades appeared on recordings by elite Nashville talent, died March 4 after battling pancreatic cancer. He was 69. Rhodes’ prolific career in Music City…

New York State of Mind
As the longtime lead guitarist for Garland Jeffreys and Ian Hunter, Mark Bosch’s resumé reads like a who’s who of the rock and roll world. Over the past four decades,…

Chicago native leans into the Benson/Green playbook on “Suspects” Guitarist Bobby Broom has recorded with legends including Kenny Burrell, Dr. John, and Sonny Rollins. When he’s not recording or…

Cali-Style Southern Rock Southern-fried rock from California? You bet it’s tasty. Check out the guitar work of Henry James Schneekluth riffing on the title track from the band’s latest EP,…

Rhythm-Minded
From 1975 through ’85, John Oates and Daryl Hall created a trove of era-defining R&B-influenced pop/rock hits on the way to being inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of…

Detroit Rock Royalty
Playing Detroit in 2013, Joe Bonamassa had a special treat in store for the crowd. “The best, most badass guitar legend that ever came out of this town,” he declared.…
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
Still Alive and Well
John Dawson Winter has been a troubadour for the blues for over 40 years, plying his razor sharp licks from the Texas roadhouses where he first cut his teeth in…

Alive and Shredding
One of the most rugged, resilient rock musicians ever, Megadeth founder Dave Mustaine is a thrash-metal pioneer who has weathered band turnover, addiction, and throat cancer. Megadeth’s new studio album,…

Vintage Guitar is happy to offer the premier of the new music video by Grammy nominee Duke Robillard. “Lowdown” is the first single from his upcoming album, Blast Off!, set…
By integrating traditional blues with heavier, more flamboyant rock styles, Eric Sardinas has carved a raw, fiery sound, favoring electric and acoustic resonator guitars to deliver the appropriate vibe. Growing…
Millennium Mercury Man
One of the more respected musical aggregations to emerge from the fabled San Francisco “psychedelic music” era in the late ’60s was Quicksilver Messenger Service, a guitar-based quartet that offered…
String Theory
If David Lindley played just one of the stringed instruments in his arsenal, and concentrated on just one of the styles he has mastered and/or mutated, he would doubtless be…

Sounds Abound
I’ve always loved sounds. Even before I became a ‘Tele guy,’ I had a Les Paul and loved making car horn sounds. I … go away from the fretboard, or…

Greg Martin’s infatuation with the sunburst Gibson Les Paul Standard started in 1966, when, “I saw the picture of John Sebastian of The Lovin’ Spoonful with his ’59 on the…

Special Addition
It’s routine for Vince Gill, as one of Nashville’s true connoisseurs of electric and acoustic gear, to receive tips about rare guitars for sale. In 2012, one such call shined…
Vintage Guitar magazine Presents Greg Martin's Head Shop
This is a regular series of exclusive Vintage Guitar online features where The Kentucky Headhunters’ Greg Martin looks back on influential albums and other musical moments. On November 30, 1966,…

A Likely First
Had he survived to this day, Elvis Presley – cultural icon extraordinaire – would be 80 years old. The man who would rise from very modest means to become arguably…
The Silent Giant
His name may be unfamiliar to even the most shrewd audiophile and TV/movie buff, but his clean, economic, and tasteful guitar style has filled the ears and hearts of millions.…

Lasting Legacy
It’s ironic that Robbie Robertson was famous mostly for his songwriting, because beneath the minimal, compositional style that marked his work with The Band hid a true guitar stylist and…

Versatility and Joy
Eddie Perez is back with The Mavericks, playing music influenced by Tex-Mex, R&B, ska, country, blues, and roots rock. He joined the group in 2003, recorded two albums, then was…

Genre Giant
In 1984, Kerrang magazine coined the buzzword “thrash,” signaling the arrival of an unprecedented heaviness in rock music – not only in volume and aggression, but precision, velocity, complexity, and…

Gypsy jazz, direct from Amsterdam Reinier Voet shows us bits of “Swing 49” and the solo-guitar piece “Bagatelle Nr1,” both from “Images,” the new album by the Reinier Voet Quartet.…
Blue Cheer Flashbacks
Blasting out of the San Francisco Bay area with an amped-to-the-heavens heavy blooze/hard rock style, Blue Cheer spewed forth a lo-fi garage sound that found the trio lobbing grenades on…
Yesterdays… and Today
The Bangles are back! After a 10-year separation, the band that rose to prominence in the 1980s with such hits as “Manic Monday” and “Walk Like an Egyptian” reunited in…

Mexican guitarist Javier Batiz, a teacher and inspiration to Carlos Santana and other musicians, passed away December 14 at his home in Tijuana, Baja California. He was 80. Known as…

Tribute to “Brother Johnny”
Edgar Winter describes making Brother Johnny in tribute to his late brother, blues-rock guitar icon Johnny Winter, as “one of the most intensive and rewarding recording experiences I’ve ever had.”…

Gold Coast Gigmeister
On August 16, 1966, the Beatle-esque guitar riff that opens “Last Train To Clarksville” crackled out of radios across America for the first time. The debut single of the made-for-TV…