Del McCoury Band - The Cold Hard Facts
The father of bluegrass may have recently passed away, but the high-lonesome bluesiness of Bill Monroe can still be found in the music of the Del McCoury Band. Their recent string of albums for Rounder are perhaps the finest examples of traditional bluegrass in the '90s, and their latest
Ian Tyson - All the Good 'Uns
Keats once said of Shakespeare, "He lived a life of allegory." So it is with Ian Tyson. As a young songwriter, he left his native Canada to follow Dylan's lead during the folk revival but returned to build a fascinating mythology of the West. His chronicles,
Jimmy Webb - Ten Easy Pieces
For better or for worse, I must own up to the fact that my record collection contains approximately 250 different versions of the 10 songs on this disc. And while it may say something about my sanity (or lack thereof) that I spent countless hours in 1993 and '94
Ronnie Dawson - Rockin' Bones: The Legendary Masters
Anyone accustomed to the raunch 'n' growl of Ronnie Dawson's more recent recordings is in for a bit of a shock upon first perusal of this two-CD portrait of the artist as a young man.
Kicking off with a handful of demos from 1957, Rockin'
Rosie Flores - A Honky Tonk Reprise
I first became familiar with Rosie Flores because of the fine company she keeps -- dueting with Dave Alvin, singing along with Bob Neuwirth, appearing on A Town Sound of Bakerfield, backing Chris Gaffney, touring with Wanda Jackson, contributing a track to the Tulare Dust Haggard tribute. These are some
Tracy Nelson - Mother Earth Presents Tracy Nelson Country - The Best of Tracy Nelson/Mother Earth
Godmother of Americana? Perhaps the music of Tracy Nelson fits no more comfortably within the categorical confines of such terms than it did when she began recording it more than a quarter-century ago. Even so, these reissues suggest that this undersung heroine was way ahead of her time, both in