Reviews
On Monday night in New Orleans, the House of Blues was graced with the presence of one of the next generation’s blues guitar heroes, Gary Clark Jr. Clark, who spent his years learning guitar in Austin, Texas, was preceded onstage by fellow Texans the Moeller Brothers, both bands lending a similar southern blues rock sound to a sold-out room of ears.
Musicians that decide to go the solo route, all by their looooooooooooooonesome, are deserving of respect just for the sake of displaying the confidence it takes to share their creativity and talents to make good things happen. Solo acts have to deal with huge expectations ranging from thousands of folks in a big venue looking to catch the best version ever of their favorite songs or simply being the focus of fifteen people in a small club with strings of Christmas lights as the stage lighting.
Certain casual fans of the Creole Rock Granddaddy Jamband Little Feat may be under the false impression that the band’s true color died along with founding guitarist, singer, de-facto bandleader Lowell George in 1979.
Some things never change.
It’s already out that Mazzy Star’s Seasons of Your Day—their first album in some seventeen-odd years—is a lark’s call back to ’82 and the Paisley Underground, boasting the same beautiful shoegaze melodies behind She Hangs Brightly and So Tonight That I Might See that so endeared singer Hope Sandoval, guitarist David Roback and company within their underground circles in their heyday.
BIG Something sounds like Incubus and 311 had a baby and played moe.
With twenty-one records released through the genre bending marathon existence that is Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey, the band has plenty of material to choose from. Original founder and ivory tickler Brian Haas, along with his well-versed cohorts, dug deep into their songbook for a set of re-worked classics spanning their twenty-year career last Thursday at Dazzle Jazz in Denver, Colorado.
If the Colorado Bluegrass Community wasn’t already tried as strong, this month represented a milestone for community support. Last month’s “100 Year Flood” damaged and displaced thousands in Boulder County. The worst was the devastation in Lyons, Colorado, home of the Planet Bluegrass Ranch and much of the Colorado Music Roots community. The Ranch hosts at least two huge annual festivals onsite that after 40 years of legendary performances have built a loyal following of devotees nationwide.
Few people are truly aware of the extent of Buddy Guy’s influence. If you do not think that he is one of the greatest guitarist’s of all time, then your favorite guitarist probably does. Without this legend, other legends such as Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Eric Clapton, and Jimmy Page would not have been who they are. Guy was the bridge between the blues and rock n’ roll.
And I don’t even mind. Elephant Revival’s Bonnie Paine is nothing short of magic. Greek mythology tells of dangerous and beautiful creatures called Sirens who would lure nearby sailors with their enchanting music, only to have them shipwreck tragically on the shores of their islands. A Siren is a symbol of the dangerous yet sacred temptation embodied by beautiful women and song, and if you’ve ever heard Bonnie sing, you would be convinced she is, in fact, one of them.
