Author Archive
07 Feb 2025
Hamish Anderson is All About the Live Experience
Not so many years ago, the only path to success for a recording and performing artist was to land a record deal. The marketing and administrative muscle of the major […]
06 Feb 2025
Book Review: Down on the Corner: Adventures in Busking & Street Music
Busking has a long, storied and often proud history. The practice of performing music in public spaces – ostensibly for free, presumably for tips – has been part of the […]
05 Feb 2025
Album Review: London Underground — Live at the 19th Dream of Dr Sardonicus Festival
One of the most musically luxurious yet overlooked subgenres of the 1960s was soul jazz. While within the jazz world, artists like Cannonball Adderley were finding the sweet spot in […]
04 Feb 2025
Five Great Genre-bridging Replacements Tracks
While mainstream rock has its pantheon (from the Beatles on down), alternative rock has a set of heroes all its own. And even the shortest list of alterna-rock heroes includes […]
03 Feb 2025
Take Five: Great Songs from Sweet
Initially a vehicle for the bubblegum-meets-hard rock songcraft of the ChinniChap songwriting team (Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman), London-based glam rockers Sweet scored an impressive run of hit singles during […]
02 Feb 2025
Music Blurbs. Vol. 7
More of my capsule commentaries. Sixpence None the Richer This alt-rock band originally from New Braunfels, Texas is something of an outlier in the world of popular music. Fronted by […]
01 Feb 2025
30 Days Out, February 2025 #1: Secret Agent 23 Skidoo, Fantastic Negrito, Judy Collins, Michael Marcagi
Great artists from here (Asheville) and there (everywhere else), from now (Fantastic Negrito) and then-to-now (Judy Collins). Those are among the highlights for the the third 30DO of this new […]
31 Jan 2025
Five Great Covers by the Who
The Who released Odds & Sods on their own Track Records in October 1974. A compilation of rare tracks, the record was assembled by the band’s bassist John Entwistle in […]
30 Jan 2025
Five Notable Grace Slick Guest Vocals
Grace Slick is one of the most distinctive voices in rock. First with the Great Society (with whom she recorded the earliest versions of two classics, “White Rabbit” and “Somebody […]
29 Jan 2025
Five Great Performances from Jon Anderson
Jon Anderson is one of rock’s most distinctive vocalists. An alto tenor, he was the primary voice of Yes for most of the period between that group’s inception in 1968 […]