Jim Shahen

The spotlight may be shining on Robert Finley relatively late in life, but the bombastic blues singer is making the most of his moment. His 2021 LP Sharecropper’s Son was his coming out party, a dynamic blend of blues and gritty Southern soul (ND review). A stint opening for

On new album Shindo, The Shindellas — the trio of vocalists Tamara Chauniece, Stacy Johnson, and Kasi Jones — present a sound they call “New American Soul.” It’s a style that touches on more than a half-century of music, from the classic girl groups of the 1950s and ’60s to funk

Movie of the Week, the latest by singer-songwriter Shakey Graves (the nom de plume of Alejandro Rose-Garcia), has an intriguing backstory. It started out in 2018 as an entirely different thing altogether, a soundtrack Rose-Garcia had recorded for some friends who were making a movie. His vision of the film

Tyler Childers is an outstanding singer and songwriter, and he heads a pretty killer band to boot. He also knows how to make his albums feel unique. Purgatory and Country Squire positioned him as a breakout roots-country star. His 2020 release Long Violent History veered sharply from that direction, a

The king is back. Bluesman Bobby Rush, the 89-year-old King of the Chitlin’ Circuit, is still going strong. In 2021, he released Rawer Than Raw, a solo acoustic LP that earned him a Grammy nomination for Best Blues Album (ND review). This week, he’s back with a full band

Grace Potter has always been a free spirit. It’s the throughline in her career, from the rootsy rock of her mid-2000s group Grace Potter and the Nocturnals to her present-day solo turn. That sensibility is what propels her new LP, Mother Road, as Potter mines her experiences as a