Dave Alvin - Public Domain
Dave Alvin should be long past the point where he has to see his name in the same sentence as the word "Blasters." But it just happened again, and it can't be helped. Alvin's solo career is a long, strong distillation of the retrospective
Magnetic Fields - Old Town School Of Folk Music (Chicago, IL)
Rock critics suck. They're cynical, jaded elitists who take pleasure in panning the popular and touting the purposefully obscure. How else to explain the avalanche of unambiguous praise heaped on the Magnetic Fields' 1999 album, the triple-disc 69 Love Songs, by the likes of the Village Voice
O, Brother Where Art Thou - Ryman Auditorium (Nashville, TN)
And they sat quietly. The whole house, full. Nearly silent, applauding often, rapt through 28 songs, except when Ralph Stanley took the stage and then they all stood, and when it was all over they stood for that, too, and were not then easily quieted.
Onstage were neither drums nor
Bill Mallonee - Eternal vigilance
Watching Bill Mallonee perform solo one evening at Eddie's Attic in the Atlanta suburb of Decatur, it's hard not to conjure obvious comparisons to his two heroes, Bob Dylan and Neil Young. Peering out from his round glasses and down over the harmonica rack dangling from
Loretta Lynn - On her own
The 1990s weren't so bad for some of the country singers who used to rule the airwaves, despite their virtual disappearance from mainstream country radio. Loyal long-term fans, younger alternative country audiences, and sporadic but intense interest from the media and institutions charged with celebrating American culture have
North Mississippi Allstars - Shake Hands With Shorty
The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion's resurrection of Elvis' pelvic thrust served to remind how sexy the blues can be. Beyond that, watching white guys play the blues can be a painful exercise, with far too many bad hamburgers and wretched versions of "Mustang Sally" being