Pushing play on Blackberry Smoke’s “Six Ways to Sunday” is like cracking open a time capsule buried about 35 years or so ago in the neighborhood of Jacksonville , Fla.

I hadn’t thought about this song in years, but as I was writing another piece, I stumbled across a 2010 cover of it by Jackyl and Darryl McDaniels of Run-D.M.C.

Judging from the photo gracing the front cover sleeve of “Past Perfect Tense,” one would understandably be inclined to believe the Raves are a Beatles tribute act.

Atlanta guitarist Jacob Deaton began the year with a new album—his first one, in fact—and makes a good initial impression.

John Mellencamp and Stephen King’s dramatic “roots musical,” in the works for more than a decade, will finally debut this spring.

They say everything is bigger in Texas. Waco-born Mace Hibbard cuts an imposing figure, like someone who spent his Friday nights (and perhaps even Saturday afternoons) on the gridiron as a teenager. But to this son of notable Texas trumpet player Dave Hibbard, “big” means the full, dulcet sounds coming out of his saxophone.