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Grant Britt

Elvin Bishop and Charlie Musselwhite Offer a Tour Through Their '100 Years of Blues'

Elvin Bishop and Charlie Musselwhite Offer a Tour Through Their '100 Years of Blues'

You can't call this stuff unplugged. It's stripped down, but there's too much electricity crackling around the pairing of Elvin Bishop and Charlie Musselwhite to contain in an acoustic environment. For 100 Years of Blues, their first studio pairing, Bishop and Musselwhite left the

Watermelon Slim Plays Blues Shaped by Life as a ‘Traveling Man’

Watermelon Slim Plays Blues Shaped by Life as a ‘Traveling Man’

Bill Homans looks as rugged as the blues he plays. As his alter ego, Watermelon Slim, Homans honed his rough-and-tumble, bare-bones blues style bouncing around the country in a variety of blue-collar jobs . A Vietnam vet, he recorded an anti-war protest album, Merry Airbrakes, in 1973, learning to play slide

Lost Radio Recordings Give Picture of Hank Williams in Final Years

Lost Radio Recordings Give Picture of Hank Williams in Final Years

A few weeks before his death in 1953, Hank Williams was having a problem getting through a matinee performance in San Diego due to an over-serving of what iconic country comedian Minnie Pearl referred to in her account of the incident as “help from outside causes.” Tasked by the promoter

Tanya Tucker Channels ‘Livin’ into a Career Highlight

Tanya Tucker Channels ‘Livin’ into a Career Highlight

EDITOR’S NOTE: In December, we like to take a look back at albums we didn’t get around to reviewing earlier in the year. While I'm Livin' was released in August. Tanya Tucker has survived more rounds than most professional pugilists. The smoky-voiced singer has climbed

Five Generations of Carters Celebrate The Carter Family’s Songs and Sound

Five Generations of Carters Celebrate The Carter Family’s Songs and Sound

It's as advertised, a tribute to the original three members of The Carter Family delivered by a family tree full of Carters, spanning five generations of the first family of roots music's legacy. Scrolling through the list of family contributors is like wading through the begats

Box Set Traces Evolution of the Bakersfield Sound

Box Set Traces Evolution of the Bakersfield Sound

Buck Owens and Merle Haggard are the poster boys for the unique sound of their hometown, but wagonloads of musical pioneers were churning up the Bakersfield, California, dust before them two good ol’ boys rode out of town toward brighter lights. For The Bakersfield Sound, 1940-1974, Bear Family Records has

Rick Estrin & the Nightcats Tap into the Past for Their ‘Contemporary’ Sound

Rick Estrin & the Nightcats Tap into the Past for Their ‘Contemporary’ Sound

Rick Estrin is a time traveler. Surfing sound waves from the past, the Nightcats' vocalist/harpist pays homage to blues masters like James Cotton, Junior Wells, and Little Walter, incorporating their musical personalities into his own eclectic sound. Clad in suits that look like they might have been all