On Money & Power, Ally Venable wields the power of wisdom and emotional connection. It’s an album about empowerment and comeuppance, but there’s plenty of playtime with guest stars Shemekia Copeland and Christone “Kingfish” Ingram. An audio bluesfest, it’s songwriting brings substance carried by guitarists swinging for the fences. What does the albums title represent?What

King’s X Guitarists’s solo work is mindful, complex Ty Tabor used his Player Strat (with a JB Jr. pickup at the bridge) to play this cool rendition of “Insane,” from…

The Core of Big Apple Jazz
Every noted jazz artist in the world is familiar with Vic Juris. His body of work commands serious respect and admiration from today’s music cognoscenti. A child of the ’60s,…

Pawn Shop Guitars
Since last spoke to him, songwriter and master of the Telecaster Al Anderson has been extremely productive. More than a dozen of his songs appear on Vince Gill’s new These…
When Hubert Sumlin sideman Sean Chambers played a gig with Savoy Brown bassist Pat DeSalvo and drummer Garnet Grimm, the result was blues-rock ecstasy. Live From Daryl’s House Club is the next best thing to being there. Fans of incendiary slide playing and Rory Gallagher, look no further. How did you meet Pat and Garnet?I
On Lari Basilio’s latest record, Redemption, art and life collide to make beautiful music. Effortless instrumental guitar techniques merge with rib-sticking melodies to captivate and astonish. Bassist Leland Sklar and drummer Vinnie Colaiuta are back to add rhythmic fire, but Basilio’s muse is life’s challenges and, of course, super cool gear. You became a mother.
A songwriting blues-rocker in the purist sense, Dudley Taft is succeeding in an era when nothing comes easy for his ilk. His new album, The Speed of Life, required a departure from the norm; while his previous three were recorded at his own studio in Cincinnati, this one used down time during a European tour

Greg Martin’s infatuation with the sunburst Gibson Les Paul Standard started in 1966, when, “I saw the picture of John Sebastian of The Lovin’ Spoonful with his ’59 on the…

Indisputable Cred
Joe Louis Walker has enjoyed a long and enviable career making artistically satisfying music while entertaining audiences all over the world. He’s a genre-busting artist who knows how to please…

Deeper Roots
Calling Steve Dawson a “roots” artist seems a disservice to a musician so eclectic and wildly talented. On Eyes Closed, Dreaming, he effortlessly mixes earthy rock and roll, soul, Hawaiian,…

Unison Groove
While Boston-based guitarist Ron Bosse was inspired to begin his six-string journey while listening to classic rock, he became a jazz player and has been active for decades. “The first…

Reflective take on the world In his review of Graham Parker’s “Last Chance To Learn The Twist,” Dan Forte recalls that the singer/songwriter emerged as part of the ’70s new-wave…

Sting Guitarist’s Serene Harmonic Expressionism Using his new artist tribute model classical (the label says “1/1”!) made by K. Yairi, Dominic Miller plays “Mi Viejo,” a track from his new…
Acclaimed as bassist for The Flower Kings, Jonas Reingold is a master four-stringer. He’s recorded with many artists, including Jon Anderson (of Yes), and has become an integral part of Steve Hackett’s band, re-creating the complex bottom of early Genesis. Twenty years ago, Reingold started the prog group Karmakanic (repeat it slowly a few times),
Tommy Emmanuel is a real guitarist in its truest sense. On Live At The Sydney Opera House, he stands onstage with only an acoustic guitar, and mesmerizes a packed house. His virtuosity employs country, Celtic, and folk fingerpicking styles that lift the spirit. The set is loaded with fan favorites, but a song suggestion from
After landing on American shores in 2002 to study bluegrass, then shifting into a career as a country singer/songwriter/picker, Jedd Hughes has spent 20 years on an alternate – but rewarding – path as A-list session player and touring sideman. While being busy tempered his flow of original music, in 2014, he returned to songwriting.
As a teenager who just wanted to play music, Norm Harris lived with the reality that he and his band weren’t going to be millionaires anytime soon. So he did what musicians do – side-hustled. But when most were manning the counter at a music shop or serving tables, Harris was up at the crack
If you’re making a list of beloved bands with a long string of hook-heavy hits, the Doobie Brothers will surely be on it. Their new album, Walk This Road, features the creative core of vocalist/guitarist Patrick Simmons, vocalist/guitarist Tom Johnston, multi-instrumentalist John McFee, and vocalist/keyboardist Michael McDonald. The news of Walk This Road generated significant
Season 03 Episode 10 In Episode 3.10 of “Buy That Guitar,” host Ram Tuli is joined by Robb Lawrence and Kim Shaheen. Robb’s experience in the vintage market spans from the golden age of electric-guitar innovation to the modern world. Beyond simply studying the history, he lived it, documented it, and played alongside giants who

Pandemic Re-Think
Six Strings, the debut EP by 26-year-old Alex Hall, establishes the Georgia native as one of the new generation of guitar-slinging country vocalists. The work is different from the album…

“Buy That Guitar” podcast with special guest Howie Statland Season 01 Episode 10 In Episode 10 of VG’s “Buy That Guitar” podcast, host Ram Tuli is joined by Howie Statland…
Six-Strings, Studios, and Songs
Guitarists often cite instruments as sources of inspiration. For musician, songwriter, and producer Dave Stewart, it wasn’t a ’57 Strat or a ’Burst that recently caused a creative flurry, but…

Voodoo Carnival
Scott Henderson continues to blow minds with his ever-evolving guitar mastery. From his early years blending bop and Holdsworth to his magical Jeff Beck-meets-SRV blues-fusion machinations, Henderson brings it all…

Rebuilding the Queensrÿche Brand
The highly publicized firing of singer Geoff Tate from the band Queensrÿche has divided fans and spawned two touring bands using the name; Tate assembled a group of well-known sidemen,…

Loud and Proud
Nashville Pussy is fronted by the husband-and-wife team of Blaine Cartwright and Ruyter Suys. Its new album, Up The Dosage, is the band’s first in five years, and it’s jammed…

Guitar Icon
George Fullerton, whose decades-long association with Leo Fender earned the two early electric-guitar innovators a place in history, He died July 4, 2009 at the age of 86. He succumbed…

From Israel to NYC
Twenty-five-year-old Tomer Cohen plays jazz with the earthy feel heard in improvisations by Bill Frisell, Julian Lage, and early Pat Metheny. He studied and gigged in New York City, which…

Now We All Know
In his new autobiography, Only You Know & I Know, guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Dave Mason looks back on his incredible life, including becoming a founding member of Traffic, sitting in as a…

Riverboat Music
On his new album, Riverboat Sky, Carl Verheyen combines passionate musicality, spellbinding virtuosity, and ebullient rock and roll. It’s also a tone fest, as Verheyen morphs chicken-fried banjo rolls with…
Legend Steeped in the Blues
Buddy Guy, Bayfront Blues Festival, 1997. Photo by Ward Meeker. When referring to the all-time great legends of the blues and the guitar, the formidable Buddy Guy comes to mind…

Free As You Wanna Be
Malcolm Brickhouse was excited but confident after his band, Unlocking The Truth, recently performed its first headlining gig, at The Troubadour, in Hollywood. The 13-year-old guitarist has seen his Brooklyn-based…

The sociopolitical attitude of the American population is often said to be gauged in reference to a town in Illinois. But “How will it play in Peoria?” isn’t the only…
At the height of the disco era, 1976 marked a transition as funk went pop and became the prevalent dance form in clubs and on record. It was also the…

Filmed at one of our favorite local dive bars, Tin Dog, this is “110.” I played my main guitar, a battle scarred Tele style I built from scratch in 2006.…

Roots Artists Expands the Genren The wildly talented Steve Dawson uses a modern National Tricone for this take on “Singin’ the Blues,” then offers a look at his Celtic Cross…

Back Cat
Epitome of the restless designer/tinkerer, Mark Sampson has co-founded four guitar-amplifier companies, two of which – Matchless and Bad Cat – are indelible figures in the trade whose original builds…

Fresh Harmonics
Guitarist in the megastar band the Police, author, photographer, and solo artist Andy Summers can never be accused of having false modesty. His dedication to music led to being in…
Musical Modernist
Bleeps, squawks, and other sounds emanate from the guitars of Adrian Belew, who has gigged with the likes of Frank Zappa and Talking Heads, not to mention his quarter-century association…

Crowe’s Feat
When not playing with the Black Crowes, guitarist Isaiah Mitchell works with Earthless, a power trio that just released Night Parade of One Hundred Demons. With just three tracks –…

Reflections From A Kink
Twenty-seven years after their last performance, the Kinks still command a loyal following. The 60th anniversary of this fascinating British Invasion group is celebrated on the 38-track The Journey, Part…