Award-winning soul blues singer/harmonica master Curtis Salgado will undergo surgery on July 18 in Portland, Oregon, to remove a cancerous growth from his lung

I haven’t thought about The Offspring in quite a few years, but when their latest record landed on my desk this week, I had to give it a try for old times’ sake.

It is both interesting and somewhat telling that Eagle Rock’s Pink Floyd documentary The Story Of Wish You Were Here both begins and ends with footage of the band performing “Wish You Were Here”

The cello-driven folk of Dare Me delights not just because of its offbeat instrumentation, but also in the way that it plays with dichotomies, with shadows and light, both musically and lyrically.

And now for the final installment of my first-ever, mid-year assessment of what are the best records we’ve covered here on SER. This time, we survey that murky hybrid world called “fusion jazz.”

Even the most noble of tribute efforts can be sunk by a maudlin sense of care, the feeling that the great works being presented are sacrosanct — rather than living, malleable pieces of art. This album deftly avoids those mistakes.

Maybe it’s just me but I’m getting sort of tired of the steady stream of articles and books that attempt to apply scientific analysis to our perception of music.