Fleetwood Mac The Middle Years (A Playlist), Like Crying - The Songs of Danny Kirwin 2025

 

From 1966 to 1969 Fleetwood Mac was a blues-rock band headed by Peter Green on guitar with Jeremy Spencer on guitar, Mick Fleetwood on drums and John McVie on bass. Danny Kirwin was added to the line-up in 1968. Peter Green left the band he founded in 1969. This playlist covers the “middle period” Fleetwood Mac between Peter Green’s departure in 1969 and Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks’ arrival in 1975. 

From 1970 to 1974, multiple line-up changes occurred. Kiln House was recorded by the remaining four members after Green left in 1969, plus Christine Perfect (McVie) on keyboards (uncredited). After Kiln House Jeremy Spencer left. For Future Games, Bob Welsh on guitar and Christine McVie on keyboards were added to the group. This same line-up recorded Bare Trees, after which Danny Kirwin left the group. On Penguin, Bob Weston on guitar and Dave Walker on vocals were added to replace Kirwin. Walker left after Penguin, leaving the Fleetwood, McVie, McVie, Welsh and Weston line-up to record Mystery To Me. Weston left after Mystery To Me, and the four remaining members recorded Heroes Are Hard To Find. After Heroes Are Hard To Find, Bob Welsh left the group, replaced by Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. This became the line-up that owned rock radio in the late 1970s. But the years between Peter Green and Lindsey Buckingham produced some great music, highlighting the songwriting of Kirwin, Welsh and Christine McVie, all built on the foundation of one of the great rock rhythm sections of John McVie and Mick Fleetwood.

So here's a 1970-1974 playlist I burned to CD from vinyl years ago, and which is now a playlist on my iTunes and on Qobuz. If you're streaming, it's easy to assemble for your very own pleasure:

From Kihn House 1970:

1. This Is The Rock (Spencer)

2. Jewel Eyed Judy (Kirwin, J. McVie, Fleetwood)

3. Tell Me All The Things You Know (Kirwin)

From Future Games 1971:

4. Future Games (Welsh)

5. Lay It All Down (Welsh)

6. Sometimes (Kirwin)

From Bare Trees 1972:

7. The Ghost (Welsh)

8. Homeward Bound (C. McVie)

9. Bare Trees (Kirwin)

From Penguin 1973:

10. Remember Me (C. McVie)

11. Dissatisfied (C. McVie)

From Mystery To Me 1973:

12. Somebody (Welsh)

13. Believe Me (C. McVie)

14. Hypnotized (Welsh)

From Heroes Are Hard To Find 1974:

15. Heroes Are Hard To Find (C. McVie)

16. Silver Heels (Welsh)

17. Come A Little Bit Closer (C. McVie)

Another way to appreciate this period of the band is with the recently released Like Crying - The Songs of Danny Kirwin (digital only release). Danny Kirwin was a fine guitar player and an excellent songwriter and singer. He joined Fleetwood Mac for Then Play On in 1969, Peter Green's last record with the band. Like Crying includes all the songs Kirwin wrote (in chronological order) from Then Play On 1969 through Bare Trees 1972. It also includes three songs that were released on singles, and in the case of Trinity from the Bare Trees sessions, not released at all until 1992 on 25 Years- The Chain box set. Kirwin's songs are very good, and the collection is a cool way to focus on one important songwriter's work.

The Rolling Stones Foreign Tongues 2026

After eighteen years without new studio material, the Stones made Hackney Diamonds three years ago. Now we have Foreign Tongues, the follow-up. Some of the tracks were apparently recorded during the Hackney Diamonds sessions, while most were recorded in new sessions more recently with Andrew Watt producing as he had for Hackney Diamonds. The sound of the two is very similar and Watt updates the Stones' sound similarly on both records. I'm not a huge fan of the overly loud, too clean, compressed sound Watt achieves, but it isn't the worst either.

Hackney Diamonds was a remarkable return to form for the Stones, with only a few disappointments. Foreign Tongues is not the equal of it's predecessor, but it's not bad either. Remove 14 minutes from this new one to make it equal in length to Hackney, and maybe it's almost as good.

Rough and Twisted gets things started with fine guitar interplay and a big Stones-y racket. In The Stars comes next and sounds a bit like a Start Me Up remake with more good guitars, great Jagger vocals and a hooky chorus. Mick breaks out the falsetto on Jealous Lover and it sounds like it would have fit nicely on Black and Blue. Mr. Charm took a few spins to convince me, but it rocks. Divine Intervention sounds like a Hackney outtake- it's almost saved by a fine lead guitar break. The classic Stones country tonk of Ringing Hollow scores with political commentary and hot lead guitar.

Never Want to Lose You isn't great but it's good deep cut material. Hit Me In The Head disappoints and again sounds like leftovers from Hackney. Whoever thought that they should cover Amy Winehouse's You Know I'm No Good was just wrong. They take a great song and do nothing particularly interesting with it, and Mick's vocal affectations sound forced. Some of Us is the requisite Keith ballad, and it's good, if not as good as Tell Me Straight from Hackney. Covered In You has a killer chorus, nice harmonica from Mick, and more politics. Side Effects is lame. Back In Your Life is an acoustic ballad with two nice lead breaks and an excellent lyric, and Mick gives it a sensitive reading. Beautiful Delilah is an OK Chuck Berry tune they could play in their sleep.

The guitars sound great. Mick Jagger sounds like the younger Mick Jagger and as invested in these tunes as he sounded on Hackney. That's probably why some other reviewers have been more generous.

Eight solid winners by my count, six I could do without. Not terrible, and roughly on par with Steel Wheels. It's no embarrassment, but Hackney Diamonds Two it is not. 

Dr. John, the night tripper GRIS-gris 1968

Just picture yourself in 1968 hearing this for the first time. I personally had no idea what to expect, but I was enthralled. And a bit confused. It is a dark backwater of a record where the rhythm of New Orleans meets the town's darkest soul.

And it still sounds weird today. It's a swampy New Orleans psychedelic trip through the delta. Made in LA with a relatively small group (several others also from the Big Easy), it sounds thick with voodoo, chanted group vocals, layered percussion, and Dr. John's gruff vocals.  

Swampy opener Gris-gris Gumbo Ya Ya, where Dr. John introduces himself as the shaman, sets the stage. The mystical chant of Danse Kalinda Ba Doom follows, full of percussion and flute and wordless chant. Soulful, funky Mama Roux lightens things a bit with a lilting chorus while it tells the story of a voodoo queen. Danse Fambeaux continues the percussion-thick chanting and strange off-kilter music.

Side two opens with Croker Courtbullion, a jazzy spaced out trip of guitar, flute, and sax solos that drift in and out through the percussive background and incomprehensible chanting. Jump Sturdy follows and offers a few minutes of melodic structure, chanted vocals, and Dr. John's funky vocals. The record closes with I Walk On Gilded Splinters, a classic that's been covered by many. It is Dr. John conjuring voodoo ritual with smoldering, ominous foreboding. It's a deep, threatening groove. 

The record takes you into the dark, swampy delta with it's magical mojo. Dr. John never made another just like it, and no one else has either. A truly unique musical experience. 

Dave Edmunds Plugged In 1994

Dave Edmunds made a bunch of fine records in the 70s and 80s. Then in 1994, in response to all the "unplugged" records being made, Edmunds went with Plugged In. A solo record all the way, Dave produces, sings, and plays all of the instruments. Not always a good idea, but Dave does it as well as anyone.

Edmunds never writes a lot of the songs on his records (two on this one), but he has impeccable taste in songs to cover. Chutes and Ladders is a driving opener with a hot riff. A bluesy riff pounds away on Billy Gibbons' One Step Back. Dave's own I Love Music has a funky backbeat, the sentiment is clear, and Dave rips a nice lead break. Jim Lauderdale's Halfway Down is another hot rocker, and Dave lays on the reverb on the vocal. Beach Boy Blood (In My Veins) is a wonderfully fun pastiche of Beach Boy melodies and vocals that more than simulates the real thing. Jerry Reed's instrumental The Claw gets the rockabilly guitar twang from Edmunds, and it's a skill set he's particularly good at.

I Got The Will is an Otis Redding tune that Dave turns into a stomping soul rocker. Then Dave does A Better Word For Love, the lovely Al Anderson/NRBQ ballad that is one of Anderson's best songs. Standing At The Crossroads rocks hard, and Dave's high tenor and smoking guitar are all the song needs. Edmunds' own It Doesn't Really Matter is rockabilly magic with a cajun feel and something that sounds just like an accordion. The records ends with Sabre Dance '94, a remake of Khachaturian's classical piece, and Dave's first hit song from 1968 with the band Love Sculpture.

And there you have it. A fine outing that stands up to comparison with Dave's best from his productive 70s and 80s. He made three more good records records after this, but this is the last one that sounds like the ones he made with Rockpile.

Big Al Anderson

Big Al Anderson is a songwriter, guitarist, and singer. For twenty-two years he was the lead guitarist and one of three singer-songwriters in NRBQ. He wrote many NRBQ classics including It Was A Accident, Feel You Around Me, Never Take The Place Of You, It Comes To Me Naturally, Ridin' In My Car, Crazy Like A Fox, and A Better Word For Love. He not only sang his own songs, but many covers and quite a few of bandmate Terry Adams' songs. His high clear tenor could belt them out or deliver a sensitive ballad. In 1993, he cowrote the #3 Carlene Carter hit Every Little Thing, and on that note, he amicably left NRBQ and moved to Nashville to focus mainly on songwriting.  

After a regional hit single, No Good To Cry, with The Wildweeds, Anderson made his eponymous first solo record in 1972 just before joining NRBQ. The record features all the of Anderson's skills singing, writing and playing hot guitar licks. His country leanings are all over the record. Mostly ignored on release, it was reissued in 1998, and is a fine early outing.

His next solo record was Party Favors 1988. A mix of NRBQ-like rockers and good songs that sound like they didn't quite fit the NRBQ mold, it's an entertaining diversion. 

Post-NRBQ, Pay Before You Pump 1996 is great Al Anderson. A solid band, Al's fine vocals, and every song is a co-write with an all-pro Nashville songwriter. The co-writing with other great tunesmiths will continue on all of the remaining Anderson records. The songs are uniformly strong, and Al's vocals really stand out. The rockers rock hard, and Al rips some great, concise leads. Even with NRBQ, Al always played the perfect lead without overplaying, and without long extended solos. This one displays the fine songwriter he had become, and the great guitar player he had been all along.

The journey continues with After Hours 2004. As the title suggests, this one is more laid back, but none the worse for it. Again, all of the songs are excellent. Al does the definitive version of A Better Word For Love, and there's several other well-crafted ballads. The songs have a more country feel, but maybe not enough to call it a country record. Two songs are sung by their female co-writers. It's a lovely record, and Al's vocals show new nuance and depth.

In 2007 Al returned to rocking with Al Anderson and the Balls' Pawn Shop Guitars. I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but it's another keeper. Playing with a core band of Nashville stalwarts, the band sounds like they've been playing these gems for years. There's a few good ballads, but this one rocks. In many ways it sounds like one of those great Dave Edmunds records from the seventies and early eighties. Twangin' indeed. Songwriting is wonderfully varied, band is tight, and Al fully understands his own strengths by now.

2012's Strings opens with the beautiful tear-jerking ode to his father, I Have Loved These Days. Right after that Al sings the lovely title track, a thank you to his guitars. This one goes back to the laid back feel of After Hours, with acoustic instrumentation and help from a bevy of country music stars including Vince Gill, Jerry Douglas, Chris Stapleton, and Glenn Worf. It is both mellow and more country than any of his other work. The songs are good enough to compete with Guy Clark or Lance Cohen, and the bar doesn't get any higher than that.

Also in 2012, the tongue in cheek World Famous Headliners was released. Al is joined by fellow singer-songwriter-guitarists Pat McLaughlin and Shawn Camp, plus Greg Morrow (drums) and Michael Rhodes (bass). They rock the country pretty fine. While they share the spotlight and make some good music, it's not really an Al Anderson record, but it is good. They also made a live record Now Appearing in 2015 which I have not heard and doesn't seem to be available for streaming.

For rocking, Pay Before You Pump and Pawn Shop Guitars are indispensable. Both After Hours and Strings are great in a gentle way that is nothing like Al's work in NRBQ, revealing the sensitive side of Al's fine songwriting.

Trisha Yearwood The Song Remembers When 1993

Trisha Yearwood has made plenty of fine records. Her eponymous debut was a huge success in 1991, and then her second, Hearts In Armor 1992 was a major step forward, and would become the record to be compared to everything that would follow. Thinkin' About You 1995, Everybody Knows 1996, Inside Out 2001, Jasper County 2005, and Heaven, Heartache and the Power of Love 2008 are all very good to excellent. More recently, Every Girl 2019 and The Mirror 2025 (where Yearwood co-writes every song) have been well received and are definitely worth hearing. She always sings everything with her pristine, pitch-perfect voice, and nails the appropriate emotion for each song. She has fun with the rockers and digs deep for the ballads.

Her third, The Song Remembers When, is as good as any of them, and may well have the single best collection of songs in her entire catalog. The title track is a lovely sentimental longing for lost love. Rodney Crowell's I Don't Fall In Love So Easy drips with heartache, and promise. Hard Promises To Keep tells of the fragility of love, and Willie Nelson harmonizes. Mr. Radio gets a faithful reading to Linda Ronstadt's version. Jude Johnstone's The Nightingale is a beautiful song given a wonderful reading here (I'm still partial to Jennifer Warnes' version). One In A Row is a great Willie Nelson play on words, and again, it's perfect with a Willie guitar solo. The record ends with Matraca Berg's Lying To The Moon, and again Yearwood's version is breathtaking.

There's three other songs, and Better Your Heart Than Mine, If I Ain't Got You, and Here Comes Temptation are all upbeat ones that keep things from getting too slow. Every song is great. Every song. No weak songs, not even a "pretty good" one. Songs, production, accompaniment, and A++ singing. This is one of those rare perfect records.

Bruce Cockburn How I Spent My Fall Vacation 1980

From Bruce Cockburn's Humans 1980:

How I Spent My Fall Vacation

Sun went down looking like the eye of God

Behind icy mist and stark bare trees

Inside the dim empty cinema two guys in leather jackets

Glance at each other and shiver, 

"They never built these places with winter in mind"

Out the window down the gray road

You can see old walled monastery

Now become a barracks for the paramilitary police

I saw an old lady's face once on a Japanese train

Half lit, rich with soft luminosity

She was dozing straight upright head bobbing almost imperceptibly

Wheels were playing fast in 9/8 of a time

Her husband's friendly face suddenly folded up in a sneeze

Across the straight a volcano flew a white smoke flag of surrender

In a Roman street on a full moon night

I was sick and there was a young cop in a circle of yellow light

As we drew near he snapped the safety off his machine pistol

And slid a trembling finger to the trigger

I wanted to say something calming but couldn't catch his eye

He didn't want contact, he was trained to see movement

"Well don't shoot me, man, I'm a graceful slow dancer

I'm just a dream to you not real at all"

I wonder if I'll end up like Bernie in his dream

A displaced person in some foreign border town

Waiting for a train part hope part myth

While the station changes hands

Or just sitting at home growing tenser with the times

Or like that guy in 'The Seventh Seal'

Watching the newly dead dance across the hills

Or wearing this leather jacket shivering with a friend

While the eye of God blazes at us like the sun

Marcia Ball

The Boston Globe described her music as "an irresistible celebratory blend of rollicking, two-fisted New Orleans piano, Louisiana swamp rock and smoldering Texas blues from a contemporary storyteller." Ball has spent fifty years touring and gigging in her adopted home of Austin. She has released eighteen records in a career that provided endless good times to anyone listening. She gave a great performance at every show, and won over her audiences with skilled piano and effective singing, not to mention rock solid bands backing her up.

She first recorded in 1972 with Freda and the Firedogs, an Austin country band. That record, which is excellent, wasn't released until 2002, apparently due to the band refusing to sign with Jerry Wexler and Atlantic. It's a weird story, and seems to have no logical explanation. 

Her first record under her own name was Circuit Queen in 1978 for Capitol. Not available for streaming, the record is available on YouTube, and it's more country than what is to come. It's OK.

Her real debut that features the kind of music she would continue to make for the rest of her career was made for Rounder in 1984, the very fine Soulful Dress. In many ways the record  sounds like she could have produced it any time during her career. Her formula of New Orleans-styled piano, good time Texas boogie and blues, and soulful blues and ballads is all here. It includes fine covers as well as her gifted songwriting. Soulful Dress was followed by Hot Tamale Baby 1985 and Gatorhythms 1989, which included more of her own songs. All three are well worth hearing and are available for streaming.

In 1990, Marcia Ball, Lou Ann Barton and Angela Strehli made Dreams Come True, and the music lives up to the name. Barton was a blues belter that fronted Stevie Ray Vaughn's Double Trouble and Roomful of Blues early on. Angela Strelhi is a blues singer/guitarist of note, and the three of them combined for a swampy blues and R&B manifesto that stands as a classic today. Not to be missed.

Ball followed that with Blue House 1994 and Let Me Play With Your Poodle 1997. Both are good, and Blue House is a stand-out in a busy catalog. Sing It! 1998, with Irma Thomas and Tracy Nelson, is simply one of the best records ever made. By anybody. It sounds like hyperbole to me too, but you need to hear it. Ball rises to the occasion, singing with two of the greatest vocalists of their generation. Song selection, production, and steaming heaps of talent make for a great record.

After Sing It!, Ball moved to Alligator Records for the rest of her career. Her first two for Alligator, Presumed Innocent 2001and Too Many Rivers 2003, are both killer. The recording quality (and cover photography) of both of them seems superior to most of her other work, and the music is deserving of the effort to present it so well. You can't go wrong with either one.

Three live records followed from 2004-2007, and they are good. She's wonderful live. From 2008 through 2018, she made four remarkably similar records. She wrote great songs, sang them beautifully, had excellent support, good recordings, and the whole package. Peace, Love and BBQ 2008, Roadside Attractions 2011,  The Tattooed Lady & The Alligator Man 2014, and her last, Shine Bright 2018 are hard to criticize. Professional musicians with a fun, serious, bluesy, swinging handle on this marvelous woman and her killer songs.

The highlights of her magnificent career would include Dreams Come True, Sing It!, Presumed Innocent and Too Many Rivers. Honestly, Shine Bright is right there, too. And there is time well spent with the entire catalog. A body of work that is both exceptional and vastly under appreciated. She has received many professional awards and accolades and in 2026 was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.

Marcia Ball was diagnosed with ALS in 2025 and has retired. Send some positive energy into the world on Marcia Ball's behalf. And get some positive energy of your own with any of her fabulous records.

George Harison with Eric Clapton and Band Live In Japan 1992

George Harrison put the Concert for Bangladesh together in 1971, and toured America in 1974. That tour received mixed reviews, many by people that didn't appreciate the Indian music sections of the performance. Harrison played a number of one-off concerts throughout the eighties, including several benefit shows and an all-star Carl Perkins and Friends live show in 1985. 

Then in 1991, George's friend Eric Clapton offered himself and his band to Harrison for a twelve date tour of Japan, from which this live recording was made. It was Harrison's last hurrah live performance, and both performance and recording are outstanding.

The band that Clapton had was the creme de la creme: Eric Clapton – lead guitar, rhythm guitar, acoustic guitar, backing vocals; Andy Fairweather Low – rhythm guitar, backing vocals; Nathan East – bass, backing vocals; Chuck Leavell – piano, Hammond organ, keyboards; Greg Phillinganes – keyboards, backing vocal; Steve Ferrone – drums; Ray Cooper – percussion, drums; Katie Kissoon – background vocals; Tessa Niles – background vocals.

The set list was exemplary. Nine Beatles songs: I Want to Tell You; Old Brown Shoe; Taxman; If I Needed Someone; Something; Piggies; Here Comes the Sun; While My Guitar Gently Weeps; Roll Over Beethoven. Ten Harrison solo songs, sort of a greatest hits: Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth); What Is Life; Dark Horse; Got My Mind Set on You; Cloud 9; My Sweet Lord; All Those Years Ago; Cheer Down; Devil's Radio; Isn't It a Pity. The entire show in the order it was performed. Six songs from the tour are not here. Two songs that Harrison performed the first two nights and then were dropped from the set list, and four songs performed by Clapton in the middle of the set.

Harrison plays quite a few leads, often on slide guitar. The band is stellar, and well rehearsed. They never miss a beat. Harrison is in good voice, and of course the Japanese audience is in awe. 

It's a really fine record. It is both a best-of compilation and a hot live set. It's the second best record he ever made, and it doesn't come with a weak jam record. It went almost unnoticed on release. It made it to #15 in Japan, #125 in the U.S., and didn't even chart in the U.K. Available in CD, vinyl and streaming formats. Lots of people have never heard it. Don't be one of them.

Paul McCartney The Boys of Dungeon Lane 2026

 

I haven't seen a Paul McCartney record get this much hype since New, and this is much better than that one. You've probably read enough about it already, but I'm excited about it, so here goes.

There's at least eight very good to great songs here. The opener, As You Lie There, is one of Paul's best songs maybe ever. It's nostalgic, but it rocks, and it's just everything, all at once. Lost Horizon is a good mid-tempo rocker. Days We Left Behind is classic McCartney nostalgia, it's pretty. It's great even if it sounds like McCartney could do this all day. The guy can write a melody. Another decent rocker follows in Ripples In The Pond. The story of Paul and John hitchhiking in Down South is both nostalgic, a fine story, and another excellent McCartney melody. Come Inside is another solid rocker. Home To Us features a duet with Ringo, and it is an irresistible melody again. First Star of the Night is a little of that too sweet Paul, but it scores despite itself. 

I'm not as wild about the end of the record as several other reviewers. There's a good chance you'll like Salesman Saint and Mamma Gets By more than me. There's four others that are at least OK, but let's not put the bar too high. My first three times through it, I was quite happy listening to every song. That doesn't happen all that often. 

My Top Five Paul records: Band On The Run, Chaos and Creation in the Back Yard, Venus and Mars, The Boys of Dungeon Lane, and One Hand Clapping. I really want to love Ram and Wild Life, and I'm working on it. Memory Almost Full and Driving Rain get honorable mention. All this is recent for me. I'm one of those "I gave up on Paul after Venus and Mars" guys Sal at Burning Wood complains about, but I've gone back and explored the whole catalog. 

Both the Wings 2025 compilation and the The 7" Singles 2022 (159 tracks!, including the B sides) will provide endless entertainment and demonstrate how much excellent music Paul McCartney has made.

My friend Sal over at Burning Wood just reviewed this, and so has everyone. Sal's review is well worth checking out.

Cal Everett The Weight Of Early Promise 2026

This record apparently took ten years to record, and forty years to write. Boy, it better be good. And if you like a well-crafted piano-centric pop record, it's a darn fine one.

Older Now kicks things off in style, a piano-led pop rocker in the Billy Joel vein that builds into an expansive instrumental with a chorus of voices. Gimme Some Time features another chorus of layered vocals on top of a McCartney-esque melody. The rocking Teenager's Belief brings some nice hooks and another chorus of well-arranged vocals. The baroque-like Lover's Hollow Promise features piano and string quartet and has shades of the Left Banke. The Sloan-like Communication is the first guitar rocker and that's good, but it could use a hot lead break that's missing. Wake Up To The Nightmare rocks and features two different voices playing off each other to good effect.

The smart lyrical twists of Old Enough would be plenty, but they are laid on top of a melody that sounds like Paul McCartney and Brendon Benson woven together. Compromises is another solid pop tune with a fine lyric. The big production of I'll Never Go To Africa and brilliant vocal arrangement of Never Change My Mind show off Everett's skills in musical design and flourish. We finally get a guitar break on Help Is On The Way, a solid mid-tempo rocker. Then Epilogue ends the record with a big love song, a 30 second silent break, and then a bigger love song/come-together call for humanity. It's Big.

There's four I left off, and they are all good, just not as good as the rest. Summer Girls In Their Cars isn't the catchiest melody, and More To Love is saved by an interesting baroque string quartet. A couple near the end, Won't It, Wendy and Emily are just a bit too saccharine for my taste, like when Paul McCartney gets all twee. Along the way, there are six little less-than-one-minute interludes.

The artist suggests listening to the record as a whole, and I did that the first couple of times, and that works. But that takes an hour. Without the little interludes and maybe four of the songs, it would be a perfect 45 minute record, and that's a big deal. Perfect is a high bar. 

I hear echos of Billy Joel, Paul McCartney, Brendon Benson, ELO, Left Banke, Beach Boys and Sloan. Everett is a skilled songwriter, a talented multi-instrumentalist, and a fine singer. But his greatest skill seems to be in the arrangements. The instrumental flourishes and the multi-part vocals really stand out. It's worth going out of your way to hear it. 

Lemon Twigs Look For Your Mind 2026

The Lemon Twigs have been at this gig for ten years, and it seems they just get better. Their last record, A Dream Is All We Know, was outstanding and made my best of 2024 list. This one might even be better. They get labeled power pop, glam rock (they're not really that very often), jangle pop, and several other labels. They define their influences as Beatles and Beach Boys, and bands that were influenced by Beatles and Beach Boys. That sounds about right, and if I needed an easy label, it would still be power pop.

How do you make a Lemon Twigs record? Take portions of several of these bands: Beatles, Beach Boys, Searchers, Byrds, Raspberries, Left Banke, Todd Rundgren, Badfinger, Big Star, Matthew Sweet, Greg Kihn, Rubinoos, Sloan, and Hollies. Mix well, add new lyrics. Next, pick a different three from the list and do it again. Rinse and repeat.

That sounds easy enough, but it's much harder than it sounds. There are plenty of bands that have done this before, but not many have done it as consistently well as the Lemon Twigs. It's actually shocking how well they pull it off. Can you listen carefully and find chord progressions and bits of melody and identify the source? Absolutely. If you want to play that game, you'll have fun. But it won't work all the time. Sometimes you'll just hear those influences blended into something new that can't be referenced, and it's still great. And that's the difference between these guys and Records, Shoes, Spongtones, et.al. They are just plain better at it than the bands that have done this before. Plus, they've got that sibling vocal harmony thing that is clearly genetic and inimitable. Oh, and they have a killer drummer.

I'd do a track-by-track review, but all I really want to do is get you to listen to it. Go listen to it. If you like half the bands in the list above, I'd be stunned to find out you don't like Lemon Twigs. It's just like listening to those bands, but newer.

Taj Mahal Time 2026

Taj Mahal and the Phantom Blues Band recorded this record in 2010. How a record this good sat unreleased for sixteen years is a mystery. Since this recording, Mahal has released several live and studio projects that were recorded many years ago, two recent live records, a Christmas record with The Blind Boys of Alabama, a record of great American songbook covers, a tribute to Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee with Ry Cooder, and two records of contemporary blues with Keb' Mo', and it's still surprising this one sat around without release. 

I haven't followed Taj Mahal's career as he collected five Grammys and several other awards. I have loved the one Taj Mahal record in my collection, 1977's Music Keeps Me Together since it was released. His mix of traditional roots blues, Brazilian, African and Caribbean influences, and his skill on vocals, guitar and harmonica plus an all-star cast of supporting musicians make it just a great record. I'm embarrassed that I didn't pursue more of his music after loving that one so much.

Of his more recent ones that I have heard, Get On Board with Ry Cooder was a just a bit too acoustic traditional blues for me (it's very good), and TajMo with Keb' Mo' was too MOR blues-pop for my taste, as is much of Keb' Mo's more recent work.

But this record is pretty great. Life of Love kicks it off with an upbeat blues celebration. Wild About My Lovin' is a good time with an island rhythm. Crazy About A Jukebox is New Orleans swing featuring Jon Cleary's piano and wonderful horn charts. The title track is a lost Bill Withers song that is nice R&B. You Put The Whammy On Me is just OK but a hot Johnny Lee Schell guitar break saves it. Ziggy Marley guests on his father's Talkin' Blues, and Taj does reggae proud every time, so it's solid. The Chicago blues of Sweet Lorene is good R&B. 

Taj's take on Ask Me 'Bout Nothing (But The Blues) is a highlight, and Taj gives it the best vocal performance on the record. It's a great song, and Taj nails it. The fast blues of It's Your Voodoo Working rocks. The funky down home blues of Rowdy Blues is killer, and Cleary again stars on piano. The record could have featured a few more in this vein.

There's a few weak lyrics on a couple songs, but that's nitpicking. The Phantom Blues Band is more than capable, and with Cleary on piano and Mick Weaver on organ the instrumentation is excellent. 

Recommended. Now I have to go spend some time with fifty years of Taj Mahal's back catalog to hear what I've been missing.

Donovan

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Donovan Leitch is little more than a footnote today, but in the mid-sixties the names Donovan and Dylan often showed up in print together when the nascent folk music scene was emerging. The Scottish Donovan initially leaned heavily on traditional Scottish folk music while incorporating pop, psychedelia, jazz, Eastern music, and music for children. His work became synonymous with the flower power movement of the sixties.

His first two records, Catch The Wind 1965, and Fairytale 1965 were heavy on the folk and contained his early hits Catch the Wind, Colours, and Buffy Sainte-Marie's Universal Soldier. Sunshine Superman 1966 gave birth to psychedelia with the title track, and also included the oft-covered Season Of The Witch, and strong songs Ferris Wheel and The Trip. 1967's Mellow Yellow featured the title track, further pushing the psychedelia and flower power themes. The stand alone single Epistle To Dippy was released one month prior to Mellow Yellow.

A Gift from a Flower to a Garden 1967, (a double album also released separately as Wear Your Love Like Heaven and For Little Ones) contained the title hit, and was well received in the press. The Wear Your Love Like Heaven record verges on twee, but Donovan's heartfelt delivery and a plethora of fine melodies saves it. The second record of children's songs is a lovely collection of lullabies heavy on fables  and fairy tales, but plays well enough to enjoy as an adult of the flower power persuasion. The Hurdy Gurdy Man 1968 continued the hits with the title track and the lilting Jennifer Juniper. 

Donovan's Greatest Hits 1969 is the record most likely to be found in any record collection with a focus on the sixties. It collects his hit singles, including three singles that had not ever been issued on LP, Epistle to Dippy, There Is a Mountain (the melody was used by Allman Brothers for their Mountain Jam), and the lovely Laléna. It's a classic of the era, and a stellar collection. If you want to know how a talented artist and a golden touch producer can turn disparate influences into radio gold, Donovan and producer Mickie Most give a class A example right here. Later CD reissues included Riki Tiki Tavi from Open Road 1970 and three fine singles from Barabajagal 1969; the title track, To Susan On The West Coast Waiting (an unusually sweet anti-war song), and Atlantis. The addition of those four singles makes this the essential Donovan, as no singles released after Barabajagal ever charted.

Not that Barabajagal is any slouch. A mix of his fey innocence, some classic singles, two songs with the Jeff Beck Group (Barabajagal and Trudi) and heartfelt love songs, it is one of his most successful single albums for a reason. Open Road followed and sold well on the heels of Barabajagal, but didn't deliver the chart singles so important to his work. It is telling that it is the first Donovan record without Mickie Most since the first two records.

That's the end of the story for most listeners. Cosmic Wheels 1973 attempted unsuccessfully to align Donovan with glam rock, and several other attempts at commercialization in the seventies just didn't get it done. Times and tastes change, and Donovan's association with the naivety of the flower power sixties didn't translate to the times. He continued to release music (sometimes without US release), and his last record, Gaelia (The Sulan Sessions), Celtic folk music, was issued in 2023. Several of the "invisible" releases over the years are available for streaming, and some are worth a listen. Try Sutras 1991, a spare production by Rick Rubin, or Beat Cafe from 2004. 

Anouar Brahem The Astounding Eyes Of Rita 2009

There's almost no world music mentioned here. There are occasional jazz reviews, most of them quite mainstream popular. No free jazz or fusion. Nothing terribly challenging. This record by Anouar Brahem, a Tunisian oud (think eleven-string lute) player is a breathtakingly lovely blend of jazz with Arabic classical and folk music that is quietly intimate and deeply satisfying. It is a true amalgam of styles, creating something unique.

Brahem is accompanied here by German Klaus Gesing on bass clarinet, Swedish bassist Björn Meyer, and Lebanese percussionist Khaled Yassine. The music is quiet, etherial, and beautiful. This is not the music you hear at the masseuse, although that would be nice. It is very much more than that. The interplay of Brahem and Meyer is particularly special. They have that "two minds thinking together" thing that marks many of the best musical collaborations, whatever the style. Gesing mostly provides atmosphere, and Yassine's percussion is perfect for the setting. 

Describing the music is difficult. It is the opposite of frenetic. But it is not in any way boring, or "background music". It is serene, but there is a lot going on. Brahem's compositions unfold slowly, revealing themselves as they go. The musicians are working to complement and expand these works, always listening to each other as much as playing. 

If any of that sounds interesting, I highly recommend giving it a listen.

I listened to several other of Brahem's records, often with ensembles that include saxophone, piano, and/or accordion, and those instruments seem to overwhelm Brahem's oud more than the combination here. Maybe you'll like them as much as this one, but check this out first. It really is special.

Joan Jett and the Blackhearts Live At The Ritz NYC 1981 2026, Profesor Longhair Mardi Gras In Baton Rouge 2026

Record Store Day always comes with some mixed feelings. What once was great has been diminished somewhat by greed. The first store I went to opened fifteen minutes earlier and had a line of about eighty people waiting to get in. No way. Second store was small, two minute line, and pretty good supply of RSD product. Third store was new, small, no line, and had a very good supply of RSD releases, more than I'd seen in one place in several years (I'm never the first one through the door). That's where I picked up these two very different records.

The Joan Jett is big fun. Kinda like the Ramones, everything is fast, loud and buzzsaw simple. Recorded New Year's Eve 1981, it's a fine show. This single disc LP is almost an hour long, although there is a digital version on Spotify that is about twice as long with many more songs. This one has the highlights, and it's good. I'm not sure that the sonic quality of vinyl is needed for this music, but who cares? Ricky Byrd rocks on lead guitar.

Professor Longhair's Mardi Gras In Baton Rouge was released on CD in 1991. It was recorded in 1971 and 1972 in Baton Rouge and Memphis, and is from the same sessions as House Party New Orleans Style: The Lost Sessions, 1971–1972 from 1987. That CD highlighted less familiar Professor Longhair songs, while this one has a bunch that show up on several other releases. It's a good recording, there's a horn section on some of the songs, and while the piano and Fess's voice are the stars, the bands on these recordings are stellar. Snooks Eaglin's guitar is crazy good, and half the record also features the great Zigaboo Modiste (from the Meters) on drums. While I am not all that familiar with Professor Longhair's records in general, this is a good recording and sounds great. Longhair's 2 CD Anthology on Rhino seems like everyone's go-to Fess record, but this is no slouch. The Professor is the man most responsible for the piano stylings we have come to associate with New Orleans as he influenced Alan Toussaint, Dr. John, Harry Connick, Jr., Jon Cleary and every other recent NOLA piano star.

Joe Jackson Hope And Fury 2026

Jackson is often called a stylistic chameleon, and indeed he has dabbled in jazz, jazz-pop, classical, jump blues, English music hall, and movie soundtracks. But the vast majority of his work has been his bread and butter, pop-rock. He rode in on the new wave with his 1979 debut Look Sharp!, and he has produced some 28 studio and live albums in the last four and a half decades. His Steely Dan-esque jazz-pop Night And Day from 1982 was his biggest hit. He has toured regularly behind almost every release, always puts on a good live show, and is generally well-received in the press. Why he hasn't sold more records is beyond me, but every one of his stylistic diversions most likely turned off a portion of his audience.

This one is not a diversion, it is straight up pop-rock with smart lyrics, solid tunes, a crack ace band, and Jackson's solid vocals. I'm Not Sorry, Made God Laugh, Fabulous People, After All This Time and End Of The Pier are all highlights, but the whole record is a good listen straight through. It compares well to Big World, Blaze Of Glory, Laughter And Lust, and Volume 4. 

If you haven't heard those, where have you been? Maybe you gave up after his late-nineties non-pop outings. Check this new one out, and when you realize you gave up on Jackson too soon, go back to his catalog. There's plenty of smart song craft available there.

This One's For Him: A Tribute To Guy Clark 2011

 

If you were to ask around Nashville who the greatest songwriters are, most everyone would name Guy Clark before they got to number five. He's written songs performed by almost every roots-based Country/Americana artist, and he produced thirteen studio and four live records under his own name. His records were made almost entirely with acoustic instruments, simple and effective arrangements, and Clark's wonderfully expressive voice. And great songs. Exceptional songs.

Since everyone seemed to love Clark and revere his songs, it was no problem to gather the cream of the Country/Americana A-listers to perform on this record. There are no new untested artists that the record company wanted to promote thrown in, as is often the case. There's just Rodney Crowell, Vince Gill, Lyle Lovett, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Rosanne Cash, Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Joe Ely, Emmylou Harris, Robert Earl Keen, Steve Earle, Radney Foster, Jerry Jeff Walker, and many more. The 2 CD set has thirty songs and thirty artists. 

The performances honor Clark's own recordings by presenting the songs the way Clark played them himself, with simple arrangements and acoustic instrumentation. There might be a couple of electric guitars, but maybe not. Verlon Thompson, Clark's longtime recording, performing and songwriting partner plays guitar on almost all of the songs.

Often with tributes such as this, the original recordings are hard to beat, and the versions presented pale by comparison. As great as Guy Clark's records are, his songs are so amazing that they transcend even his own fine renditions. If you're not familiar with Clark, go check out Boats To Build or Sometimes The Song Writes You. If you already enjoy Clark, here's another way to appreciate his art.

The Double Album, Edited

 

There have been some great double albums, even some that play well from beginning to end. Layla is difficult to edit. XTC's English Settlement needs no editing, even if some listeners prefer the single disc version with five less tracks. There is an occasional exception for greatest hits records and compilations. Chuck Berry's The Great Twenty-eight is pretty much perfect. The Kink's Kronikles is also hard to mess with. 

Most double albums need some editing to approach perfection, and turning them into a single record of 45-50 minutes almost always makes them better. So making a playlist of an edited down single disc record can enhance the enjoyment of these often bloated double albums.

Then there's double CD releases that often run 140-150 minutes. They all need the work of a hatchet. 

So here's a few personal edits of double albums. I'll start right out with the sacrilege of reducing The White Album. Here's the improved Beatles White Album:
Back In The U.S.S.R.
Glass Onion
While My Guitar Gently Weeps
Happiness Is A Warm Gun
I'm So Tired
Blackbird
Yer Blues
Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except For Me And My Monkey
Helter Skelter
Revolution 1
Savoy Truffle
Dear Prudence

Grateful Dead Grateful Dead (Skull And Crossbones):
Bertha 
Mama Tried
Big Railroad Blues 
Playin' In The Band
Me And My Uncle
Big Boss Man
Me And Bobby McGee
Johnny B. Goode  

See what I did there? It's side 1 and side 3. Anybody that says you can't possibly exclude The Other One (there are 50 other versions) is obsessed about The Dead. Don't bother to argue with them. Sides 1 and 3 of Allman Brothers At The Fillmore is another easy edit.

The Who Quadrophenia:

The Real Me 

Quadrophenia

The Punk And The Godfather

I'm One

5:15

Sea And Sand

Drowned

Doctor Jimmy

Love, Reign O'er Me

The Byrds (Untitled):

Lover Of The Bayou

Positively 4th Street

Nashville West

So You Want To Be A Rock 'n' Roll Star

Mr. Spaceman

Chestnut Mare

Truck Stop Girl

All Good Things

Yesterday's Train

Just A Season

Cream Wheels Of Fire:

White Room

Sitting On Top Of The World

Politician

Those Were The Days

Born Under A Bad Sign

Crossroads

Spoonful

The Kinks Everybody's In Showbiz:

Sides 1 and 2 (Just remove sides 3 and 4, the live material.)

The same can be said of The Rascal's Freedom Suite (Removing the boring jams on sides 3 and 4).

And again for Moby Grape's Wow/Grape Jam (Skip the jams again.)

Todd Rundgren Something/Anything?:

I Saw The Light

It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference

Sweeter Memories

Breathless

The Night The Carousel Burned Down

Saving Grace

Marlene

Black Maria

One More Day (No Word)

Couldn't I Just Tell You

Dust In The Wind

Hello It's Me

Bruce Springsteen The River:

The Ties That Bind

Sherry Darling

Independence Day

Hungry Heart

Out In The Street

Crush On You

You Can Look (But You Better Not Touch)

I Wanna Marry You

The River

Fade Away

The Price You Pay

Drive-By Truckers Southern Rock Opera:

Ronnie And Neil

72 (This Highway's Mean)

The Southern Thing

The Three Great Alabama Icons

Wallace

Zip City

Let There Be Rock

Women Without Whiskey

Shut Up And Get On The Plane

Prince Sign 'O' The Times:

Sign 'O' The Times

The Ballad Of Dorothy Parker

Housequake

U Got The Look

If I Was Your Girlfriend

Strange Relationship

I Could Never Take The Place Of Your Man

The Cross

Adore

I know, I left off the best song. How could I? Feel free to tell me about it in comments or propose your own edited version of one of these or any other double LP that needs editing. It's a fun and rewarding exercise.

Robert Palmer Anthology

Robert Palmer is one of my very favorite artists. While his work in the 1970s is my preference, I like everything he ever did, with a small caveat for the second Power Station record, and even that has a few killer tracks. I discussed his catalog several times. Those posts are here.

Back in the pre-streaming days, when I owned a CD recorder that allowed me to record CDs from CD and vinyl sources (I still miss that device), I recorded lots of personal Best Of and Anthology CDs. Palmer got the full Anthology treatment, with a three-CD set assembled chronologically.  

Today of course you can just go to your streaming service and assemble a playlist for your listening pleasure. Neither Qobuz or Spotify have Living In Fear, the second Power Station release, but everything else is available. To replace the two from Living In Fear, you could throw in All Shook Up, a 1991 B-side, and It Hurts Me Too, a bonus track on the reissued Drive.  So if you'd like to take the deep dive into Palmer's catalog, curated by a serious Palmerophile, here's your playlist. (Addendum: I just discovered that Qobuz does not have Rhythm and Blues or Live at the Apollo. Spotify has them both.)

CD #1
from Sneakin’ Sally Through The Alley 1974:
1. Sailing Shoes
2. Hey Julia
3. Sneakin’ Sally Through The Alley

from Pressure Drop 1975:
4. Give Me An Inch
5. Back In My Arms
6. Here With You Tonight
7. Trouble
8. Fine Time
9. Which Of Us Is The Fool

from Some People Can Do What They Like 1976:
10. One Last Look
11. Man Smart, Woman Smarter
12. Some People Can Do What They Like

from Double Fun 1978:
13. Best Of Both Worlds
14. Night People
15. You Overwhelm Me
16. You’re Gonna Get What’s Coming

from Secrets 1979:
17. Too Good To Be True
18. In Walks Love Again
19. Mean Old World
20. What’s It Take?
21. Remember To Remember

CD#2

from Clues 1980:
1. Looking For Clues
2. Johnny And Mary
3. Woke Up Laughing

from Maybe It’s Live 1982:
4. Some Guys Have All The Luck

from Pride 1983:
5. Pride
6. You Are In My System
7. You Can Have It (Take My Heart)
8. What You Waiting For

from The Power Station 1985:
9. Some Like It Hot
10. Lonely Tonight
11. Harvest For The World

from Riptide 1985:
12. Hyperactive
13. Addicted To Love
14. Trick Bag
15. I Didn’t Mean To Turn You On

from Heavy Nova 1988:
16. Simply Irresistible
17. Change His Ways
18. She Makes My Day

from Sweet Lies movie soundtrack 1988 and Addictions Volume 1 1989:
19. Sweet Lies

CD#3
from Don’t Explain 1990:
1. Dreams To Remember
2. History
3. I’ll Be your Baby Tonight
4. Mercy Mercy Me / I Want You
5. Top 40

Option to replace Living In Fear tracks:

All Shook Up 1991 Happiness (from Don't Explain) B-side

from Ridin’ High 1992:
6. Aeroplane
7. Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me

from Honey 1994:
8. Honey B
9. Know By Now
10. Honeymoon
11. You Blow Me Away

from Living In Fear by The Power Station 1996:
12. Scared
13. Taxman

from Rhythm & Blues 1999:
14. True Love 

15. No Problem
16. Let’s Get It On 99
17. Stone Cold
18. Twenty Million Things

from Live At The Apollo 2001:
19. Riptide

from Drive 2003:

Option to replace Living In Fear tracks:

It Hurts Me Too, bonus track on expanded Drive 

20. Why Get Up?
21. I Need Your Love So Bad

Take Me To The River: A Southern Soul Story 1961-1977 2008

The Kent label, a subsidiary of Ace Records in England, has produced some of the best reissue box sets/series exploring the finest Southern "deep" soul music. No Motown, no Philly, just Memphis, Muscle Shoals, Miami and several other deep south locations. The pinnacle of their success in this vein is probably the Dave Godin's Deep Soul Treasures series, which is rife with great songs and artists you've never heard.

This 3 CD set mixes big hits with lesser-knowns. So there's Sam and Dave, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, Aretha Franklin and Al Green, but also Eddy Giles, O V Wright, Jimmy Braswell, Bobby Newsome, and Denise LaSalle. In that sense it is a bit like a smaller version of the Beg, Scream and Shout box that Rhino did in 1997. There is plenty to discover here.

The booklet has a nice introduction essay, and then discusses each song with a reasonable level of detail, not just a two-sentence blurb. The book/disc holder format is the same one used for The Fame Studio Story, also a Kent release that focuses on similar material all produced in Rick Hall's famous studio in Muscle Shoals.

I remember my trip to Columbus, Georgia in 1966, and how amazed I was with all the incredible soul music that was absent from radio airplay north of the Mason-Dixon line. Motown was big in the north, but many of the artists on this and other deep Southern soul compilations will be new to many listeners. New, and excellent, music to your ears from a mere 70 years ago.

Ronnie Lane 1946-1997

Ronnie Lane was one talented guy. A fine singer, a skilled bass player, and one heck of a songwriter. And generally considered a very nice chap to boot. He died an early death in 1997 at age 51 from multiple sclerosis. His medical bills were paid by Ronnie Wood, Jimmy Page, and Rod Stewart because he needed help and was a great friend.

If you're old enough, you are probably more familiar with his work than you realize, especially his songwriting. In the Small Faces, he co-wrote most of the band's material with Steve Marriot, including Tin Soldier, Itchycoo Park, All or Nothing, My Way of Giving, and Lazy Sunday. With the Faces, he wrote or co-wrote Had Me A Real Good Time, Last Orders Please, Debris, If I'm On The Late Side, and Ooh La La. After leaving Faces in 1973, he made four solo records (three with his band Slim Chance), a soundtrack record with his old Faces buddy Ronnie Wood, and the classic Rough Mix with Pete Townsend. 

He played bass, wrote, and sang on two of the best records made in the 1970s, the Faces A Nod Is As Good As A Wink...To A Blind Horse and Rough Mix.

His solo records show off his rock writing and singing as well as his interest in English folk music. His singing is heartfelt and charming. His solo output is collected on a six-CD box set titled Just for a Moment: Music 1973–1997 from 2019 that includes all of his solo releases, bonus tracks, and quite a bit of live material from his time living in Austin in the 1980s. There's also a single CD Just For a Moment (The Best Of) from 2006 that is a fine introduction to his solo work, and a great place to go after A Nod Is As Good As A Wink and Rough Mix.

A great unheralded sideman? No, a great unheralded primary contributor to two great bands, and a woefully neglected solo artist.

Joni Mitchell Joni's Jazz 2025

In the last five years, Joni Mitchell's original work has been reissued in multiple box sets, and expanded in multiple box sets of live and previously unreleased material. Eight multi-disc sets have been issued as well as several single discs illuminating individual classic releases. The five Archive sets have presented 26 discs of live and previously unreleased material. It's a lot.

Joni's Jazz is a compilation 4-CD set that samples Mitchell's jazzier side, with only five tracks from before 1975's The Hissing of Summer Lawns, and with half of the tracks from 1994's Turbulent Indigo or later. If you're not fond of Mitchell's work in the nineties and oughts, this isn't the set for you. Or you might be surprised. 

Technically not everything is jazz, but close enough. Mitchell of course famously alienated her folk audience when she branched out into jazz and jazz-influenced styles in the late seventies. But the retrospective evaluations of her later works have been very complementary, and her singing shows that she is the real deal as a jazz singer. She also made most of this music with some of the finest jazz musicians in the business.

The music presented here is very good. Mitchell's later work holds up well. But what is most impressive about this set is the sequencing. It's not chronological. It's not consistently thematic. It took me several days to listen to the whole of it, and every time I restarted listening, I was taken aback at how well the songs sounded in the order they are presented. It would be a real shame to hit shuffle.

If you already own much of Mitchell's later work, this might be an unnecessary expense. But if that is you, I might suggest that you assemble a playlist of the songs in this order, and maybe purchase the individual tracks to fill the holes in your collection. There are only three songs which were released on other artists records, and only two that were previously unreleased.  

It is a wonderful set, artfully assembled with great care.

Always On My Mind

 

I'm a big fan of greeting cards. Birthdays, Valentine's Day, Christmas, sometimes just for the heck of it. I'm particular when I'm looking for a good one. If I open the card and there's a lot of words, I put it back. If there's a lot of words, I know some of them won't express my sentiment. I like the succinct card that has a brief but effective message. Sweet, funny or punny are my favorites.

My least favorite is the apology card. There's a ton of them, and for all the aforementioned occasions. These cards are from a man to his sweetheart/wife/significant other. They start with a line like "I know I don't say it enough" or "I'm not the guy that does that thing you really want from me". I'm not perfect, but when I know something my wife wants from me, she's going to get it. I say I love you every day. I do things that I know will make my wife happy. And I never need to buy a card that starts with something I haven't done that I know I should have done.

The guys that buy these cards are assholes. Their wives should not forgive them for being a jerk (or worse) because they bought an apology card. And when it comes to expressing love for someone, starting with what is wrong with you is just stupid. Don't apologize. Stop being a jerk. Change.

Which brings us to Always On My Mind. It is a lovely song, a great melody that enhances the melancholy with some minor chords and sevenths. Just beautiful. But the lyrics are straight out of an apology card, and just godawful. I didn't tell you how happy you make me, I didn't treat you well, I didn't love you often enough, I didn't hold you when you needed me, and little things I should have said and done, I never took the time. Well, that's because I'm a shithead that doesn't deserve you. 

But you were always on my mind. Bullshit. If you were thinking of her and didn't do anything to express it, it doesn't count.

And when he finally says " Tell me that your sweet love hasn't died, and give me one more chance to keep you satisfied", she should be calling an attorney and filing for divorce. You can do better, and if not, you're still better off without this guy who does not deserve your love. 

Elvis Presley Sunset Boulevard 2025

Oh boy, another Elvis Presley release. According to Wikipedia, there have been 840 Elvis Presley releases:

Studio albums 24

EPs 38

Soundtrack albums 17

Live albums 8

Compilation albums 21

Budget albums 19

Box sets 81

Posthumous compilations 334

Remix albums 23

Follow That Dream albums/EPs  275

If we stick to original, non-compilation, material released during his lifetime, and ignore the EPs (most of that material is duplicated elsewhere), we get 49 records. Still a pretty good sized stack, although most of the soundtrack records were 1 or maybe 2 hits plus filler, so 32 without the soundtracks.

This set of five CDs includes one CD of songs recorded in 1972 and 1975 at RCA's Sunset Boulevard studio C in LA. The 1975 recordings were Presley's last studio recordings. The songs are remixed and stripped of overdubs, which gives them a more immediate sound than the previous releases of the material. The songs were originally released on Elvis (The Fool album) 1973 (two songs) and Today 1975 (all ten songs). The second CD is outtakes and alternate takes from the same sessions, also with the new mix applied. 

The last three CDs consist of in-studio rehearsals for live tours recorded on July 24, 1970 and August 16, 1974. There's some good stuff there, but the recording isn't particularly great, and Presley is rehearsing. Sometimes he sounds fully invested, sometimes he's just walking through.

So why would anyone, other than the obsessed, need this release? No reason, really. But if you're streaming, the first CD is quite good. It's well worth a listen, and the stripped back mix removes a layer of muck that makes the songs sound better than the original releases. Presley was still a powerful singer even if not all the material was deserving of his voice, which is the common complaint for his 70s output.

As for actually purchasing this set, see "the obsessed" above. But the best of the first two CDs is also available on a 2 LP set, and that might make a nice gift for a vinyl-loving Elvis fan.

Lance Cohen Against The Grain 2025

I raved about Lance Cowen's debut So Far, So Good from 2024. As Country/Folk/Americana music goes it doesn't get any better. Ditto this sophomore effort. This record is equally ideal. And beautiful.

Excellently recorded mostly acoustic music, the warm and cozy voice, and exceptional writing both melodically and lyrically.

Beautiful melancholic love songs One More Chance, Will Belinda, Love Anyway, and More or Less. The story of growing up in a coal town that is Old King Coal. Prayer For a Child expresses the hopeful sentiment of every parent. The sensitive character pieces that are Against the Grain and Going South. The downright rocking near desperation of Ragged Edge of Nothing, and the self explanatory sense of loss that is I Can't Stand the Winter. Ten songs, every one poignant and true.

Cowen writes and sings these lovely compositions and gets help from A-list Nashville musicians including Vinnie Santoro (drums), Jay Turner (bass), Todd Smith (piano), Dan Dugmore (pedal steel, dobro), Pat Flynn (guitar), and Chip and Billy Davis (harmonies).

Words can't do it justice. Find a way to hear it.

Van Morrison Somebody Tried To Sell Me A Bridge 2025

Van just keeps cranking them out. This one is mostly blues covers with four Morrison originals, including the title track. There's twenty tracks, and while most of them are good, 80 minutes is too long. You can see it as value for your dollar, or you might think Van needs a producer that would cut the chaff. I'm leaning towards the later opinion.

At 81, Morrison is in excellent voice. He has a highly skilled band behind him as usual, and there are several guests, including Elvin Bishop, Taj Mahal, and Buddy Guy.

Tempos are perhaps too similar throughout. But then there's an unusually slow version of Fats Domino's Ain't That A Shame that transforms the song in an interesting way. 

Song selection is just fine. It's a who's who of classic blues composers.

Taj Mahal plays harmonica and sings along on four tracks. He's good, and a better harmonica player than Van. Elvin Bishop plays guitar on five songs, and he's a hot guitarist, but Anthony Paule in Morison's band is no slouch and plays plenty of good leads. Bishop's fills and leads on Loving Memories and You're The One are pretty special. John Allair plays Hammond organ and piano throughout, and also gives a featured boogie-woogie piano break on his own (Go To The) High Place In Your Mind. 

But the guest star that makes the most impact is Buddy Guy on the last two tracks. Guy's idiosyncratic guitar playing is nothing short of amazing, and the two tracks he plays on own the record.

So I could do with 4 or 5 less songs, as several seem interchangeable, and eighty minutes is too long. It could have been compressed into a stone classic. With too many songs, it plays like the 30th anniversary version with the songs that were rightfully cut added to a perfectly fine record. As it is, it's good. 

Play On: A Raspberries Tribute 2025

 

Here's a fine idea. Get a bunch of pop and power pop bands and artists to cover Raspberries songs from their four LPs, which were released between 1972-1974. 2 CDs, 37 songs, only two artists get more than one song. Lemon Twigs get two, and author and musician Ken Sharp gets two. Sharp also plays on and produces many of the recordings. Usually these things stick mostly to the hits, but there's plenty of deep cuts here. In fact, those four original records contain a total of 39 tracks, so all but three songs are represented here. That math doesn't work, but there is also a cover of Please Let Me Come Back Home, a demo that was only included on the Raspberries - Greatest Hits Columbia CD from 2000.

Plenty of big names contribute, but so do some less well known bands and artists, as well as a few names I didn't think were still recording (Shoes, Spongetones). Almost everyone does a fine job. In fact, the quality of these covers is consistently very good compared to how discs like this usually go. That may be due to the level of respect that The Raspberries have achieved, or maybe the songs are just that good. Spending time with those four originals certainly supports the later theory. 

I could nitpick and point out the three or four efforts that are inferior. But four out of 37 is darn good for a various artists tribute record. So this is one great tribute to one great band, who deserve the adulation they have belatedly achieved.

There is only one better way to listen to these songs. I made a playlist of the originals in the same order as this set. You can do a good job of covering The Raspberries, but you can't really improve on the originals. 

Carl Perkins Some Things Never Change 2025

I need an editor. If I had one, she would have told me some time ago to stop using the phrase "there's not a weak track". I'll be working on that, but this new Carl Perkins record is going to test my resolve.

Recorded in 1990 and produced by the talented Bill Lloyd, the recording was lost until Lloyd found it in his archives in 2024. It is essential Perkins. It sounds like the follow-up to Perkin's debut, the wonderful Dance Album of Carl Perkins from 1958, which was a collection of singles released on Sun Records between 1955-1958. 

It is 33 minutes long. Lots of artists make records that are too long in this CD era. This one leaves you wanting more. 

The record kicks off with Perkins' Baby, Bye Bye, a classic rockabilly stomper, followed by Don't Cha Know I Love You, a fine mid-tempo rocker with Perkins' southern drawl and sweet pedal steel guitar from Pete Finney. Then it's on to John Hiatt's great Memphis In The Meantime, and Perkins does it even better than the original and gives it a hot lead guitar break. Messin' Around With Rock and Roll tells the story of a young man in love with country and blues who discovers that his rockabilly is indeed rock and roll, and Perkins lays down some serious chicken-pickin' leads and fills.

The title track is a sweet love ballad about love that lasts, and is enhanced by Joe Schenk's piano. Miss Muddy is a piano-led boogie-woogie blast of an ode to the Mississippi river with more hot guitar in Perkin's inimitable style. The country-folk of Where Does Love Go makes heartache sound fresh, and again Carl adds a simple yet perfect lead. Since Carl played lead guitar in Johnny Cash's band for a decade he has the right to do a cover of Get Rhythm, and while nothing new, it's a fine version again with Carl's guitar featured. Finally Heart Of My Heart is pure stomping rockabilly with more guitar and steel guitar.

Every song is an opportunity for Perkins' country twang of a voice to light up the room. He's a fine singer, a great songwriter, and a killer guitarist. His sons make up the rhythm section, and they are competent professionals. In addition to the aforementioned sidemen, Jerry Douglas helps out too.

Perkins made five or six more records after this before his passing in 1998. But like that Jerry Lee Lewis record I reviewed recently, this is a late career masterpiece. Available for streaming and on all physical formats, including vinyl.