Familiar, Fresh & True to the Human Experience
On a most impressive debut, JOHNNY & THE MONGRELS leap immediately into the front ranks of chicken-fried southern soul and swamp-rock on CREOLE SKIES.
Spotlight Album
Blues Built to Last
Chicago blues masters BOB CORRITORE and JOHN PRIMER have delivered blues built to last on THE GYPSY WOMAN TOLD ME, containing performances every bit as classic as the cover art by VINCE RAY.
The Dark Saint Rises
A genuine Statement record, IVY FORD's CLUB 27 finds the gifted Chicago-based blues artist-singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist--coming into her own in a powerful way. One of the year's best here.
Kicking It Up a Notch (or Two, or…)
KENNY 'BLUES BOSS' WAYNE comes out rockin' and rarely lets up on GO, JUST DO IT! In a tour de force performance, the Piano Hall of Fame inductee offers 10 original songs and terrific covers of two PERCY MAYFIELD tunes and a JJ CALE chestnut.
Being About the Needed Balance of Persistence and Faith
Like a bridge over troubled waters, ROD McCORMACK's FINGERPRINTS offers safe passage through perilous times--an instant classic of a debut album
Standing on Big Shoulders
From Robert Johnson to the present day, SPECIAL CONSENSUS celebrates the Windy City's musical legacy on their 45th anniversary recording, CHICAGO BARN DANCE. The consensus? It's special.
Fashioning a More Thoughtful World
Scottish classical guitarist SEAN SHIBE, playing with lovely clarity and thoughtfulness, adds his own innate sense of the elegant to a trio of BACH lute compositions he has seamlessly transposed to his own instrument.
‘I Just Can’t Let Us Forget’
Continuing her 'lifetime retrospective' project, RORY BLOCK pays glorious tribute to some outstanding female blues artists of yore, some undeservedly obscure..but no longer so.
Believe
Being about the moment and the moment far ahead, BILL CURRERI's HARD ROAD HOME sends a message of buoyant self-realization at a time when it's most needed.
In Praise of the Torch Holder
In his second solo outing, JUNIOR SISK honors Polonius's advice: "To thine own self be true." In doing so, he creates a traditional bluegrass gem in LOAD THE WAGON.