by Derrick Lord Occasionally jazz and blues fans need to be reminded that we don’t have to limit ourselves strictly to musical recordings. Keep in mind there is plenty of great artwork available that would be a nice addition to any collection or music room. You May Also Like: NoRead More

Pretty much for the last twenty years, there have been two types of Monty Alexander records: one that features exuberant, evocative mainstream New York jazz and one that showcases Alexander’s unique Jamaican-styled jazz. Earlier this year, the Kingston piano great released the straight-up jazz trio live chronicles Uplift, a tremendousRead More

by Mark Saleski Superfluous. Meaningless. Pointless. Redundent. Obligatory. No, I haven’t been playing with my thesaurus. These are just some of the words that are often used to describe live recordings. You May Also Like: How Tesla’s ‘Real to Reel’ Set Redefined the Classic Rock Cover Album

The Austin, Texas-based Hickoids, a shambling, couldn’t-give-a-sh–t group of cowpunk nutjobs, cover their share of oddball Anglophile items on the new Kicking It With the Twits, out on Saustex Media in San Antonio. There’s the Stones (“Have You Seen Your Mother …”). Eno (“Needles in the Camel’s Eye”). The MoveRead More

These two Paul McCartney albums show a willingness to strip down what had become a varnished sound. But they haven’t aged in the same way.

by Mark Saleski The news reports have been (necessarily) very sketchy at this point. All we know is that Clarence Clemons has suffered a stroke. You May Also Like: Reevaluating Bruce Springsteen’s ‘The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle’ Patti Scialfa Once Again Showed She Could Stand onRead More

This remarkable lost classic was not released until 2000 — because the tapes were thought to have been destroyed … until they were found in a warehouse in 1999. Done just three weeks before Otis Spann’s death from liver cancer, Muddy Waters‘ most sympathetic pianist is featured primarily with hisRead More

Black Country Communion may not invented any new formulas but they are executing the old ones closer to perfection than anyone else.

by Mark Saleski I have to purchase my Peter Brötzmann only very occasionally because it takes a while to get over the blatant intensity. Recorded at the Molde International Jazz Festival, this is really what European improvised jazz is all about. Well, maybe not all, but certainly a side ofRead More

There aren’t a whole lot of lyrics to this Steely Dan song, but I’ve never been quite able to decipher them. No one else seems to be too sure what they mean, either.