This record by slide guitar wunderkind Derek Trucks has a lot of down home appeal. In more ways than one.
If there was a guitarist who grew up learning guitar at the knee of Son House while listening to Sun Ra records, who toured with Jimi Hendrix, became a star in his own right in the early Seventies and is now putting the finishing touches to a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame career, that guy would probably sound a lot like Derek Trucks. Only thing is,...
He might be singing the blues, but he sure brought a smile to my face.
You see them on the street corners of almost every major city in the world. Some of them have elaborate set-ups including battery powered amplifiers, others are one man bands playing a kick-drum, strumming a guitar, and blowing on a harmonica. Some of them can barely play their instrument, while others are virtuosos. Yet, no matter how good or bad...
The album is beautifully lo-fi, radiating a warm glow of late night atmosphere amid some softly seductive vintage performances.
As soon as a promising white, blues-tinged, female soul singer arrives on the scene, it tends to ignite the inevitable comparisons to the likes of the legendary Dusty Springfield, amongst others. That, of course, is a huge legacy for any aspiring young singer to carry around. One of those who, along with Dusty -- and Amy Winehouse, for example --...
A sequel that bests the original...
There have been a lot of film and literary sequels and most of them suck. Sometimes it's because the idea or premise of the original was so completely terrible that a second or third serving can't help but suck out loud. Some sadist in Hollywood green lighted not one but two Duece Bigelow films. I wanted to make a joke about the...
There's routes and there's roots.
I’ve heard every one of the American Routes shows that this two-cd set excerpts – at least twice - and I can truthfully say, I never turned off any one of them. Sure, there were times that I wasn’t a particular fan of the spotlight guests, but I swear, Nick Spitzer’s narration could make an interesting case of paint drying....
