When I last saw John Howie Jr., it seemed like he was everywhere. I was in downtown Carrboro, North Carolina outside Chapel Hill a couple of springs back. On the streets downtown posters of the dashing Howie under his trademark cowboy hat were seen promoting his upcoming show with the Rosewood Bluff. Inside at Cat’s […]
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Onstage at the Birchmere Music Hall across the river from Washington, DC, Rusty Young had something to share. “Here we are still together,” he said with emotion in his voice, “all of us and you.” After 50 years, the band Poco and their fans reverentially known as “Poco Nuts” gathered like they were at a class […]
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On the night after Thanksgiving, Willie Nile was in a playful mood. Standing onstage at Jammin’ Java, just outside Washington, D.C., Nile dedicated songs back to back to Abe Lincoln and Malcolm Young of AC/DC. The first came after the frivolity of wordplay in “All Dressed Up and No Place To Go” in which Nile […]
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photo by Gregg Inhofer It may have been an inadvertent mistake but feels like a universal action of karmic retribution. When lyrics from a four-page section of a Bob Dylan notebook were left out of a lavish new box set More Blood, More Tracks, what might have been an oversight instead carries with it the […]
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It’s only been a little more than a year since Glen Campbell passed away and a few more since his family revealed he was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Anyone who watched the documentary I’ll Be Me felt the tears swelling as Campbell watched old home movies and was mystified by the people he was watching on […]
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Imagine if one of your favorite artists allowed you to watch them write a song. You’d probably jump at the chance. If you’re intrigued by the thought, then you’ll enjoy seeing the new documentary on DVD about Sarah Shook, What It Takes: Film en Douze Tableaux directed by Gorman Bechard (What Were We Thinking Films). […]
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In one line the Flatlanders tell you all you need to know about living in 2018. It’s the fearless who love and the loveless who fear
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The road in life does not always follow a linear path. As Teresa Williams stood onstage at Gypsy Sally’s, she admitted that as a girl from West Tennessee, she was somewhat in awe of being in the nation’s capital. Williams, who spent several decades in New York City, hails from the cotton country of Peckerwood […]
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Showmanship and work ethic was on full display onstage at Jammin’ Java outside Washington, D.C. as Lewis joined Robbie Fulks for the beginning of a tour behind Wild, Wild, Wild the album largely of songs Fulks wrote describing her life history.
As the boogie woogie pianist thrashed the keys, Lewis’ fingers were moving so fast it seemed like they were suspended in a tremor, blurred in mid-air by some supernatural force
Listening to Amy Helm’s This Too Shall Light is less like playing a new album than it is a journey to the center of your soul. This is a meditative fest of both traditional and modern day spiritual songs. Helm takes you to transcendent moments built from a lifetime of singing. She has been toiling […]
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