(Mary McBride) She rocked the house. With an amazing band featuring Blondie’s Paul Carbonara on guitar, singer-songwriter Mary McBride delivered an impassioned and inspirational show Tuesday night for the lucky residents and staff of L.A. Family Housing’s Valley Shelter. And not only did this internationally-acclaimed artist provide a rousing two hours of great music to [...]

Skip Matheny— currently a songwriter in the band Roman Candle and former bartender in a retirement community — recently talked with Madeline Follin and Brian Oblivion of Cults. Their debut LP is out now, on Columbia / In the Name of and is currently making several best-of 2011 lists. This interview took place on their tour bus. [...]

For his second solo album, Cloud Maintenance, Kevin Hearn –  a former member of Barenaked Ladies and Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson’s touring bands — called in some favors. The Band’s Garth Hudson plays keys on “The House Of Invention,” and 50′s music icon Arnold Robinson agreed to add vocals to “Don’t Shuffle Me Back,” [...]

We were in awe of String Cheese Incident’s recent epic one-night-stand at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. The veteran Colorado jam band, who mix a healthy dose of bluegrass into their ever-percolating sonic stew, performed their first set stripped down and acoustic (a tour exclusive). On this night, they were joined by mandolin great (and Nashville regular) [...]

Nashville musician and photographer Joshua Black Wilkins has filmed a new video for his song “Church On The Hill,” a low-down Springsteen-esque number about a worker’s migration cycle from farm to city in search of work, and then back again. The song comes from his new album The Girlfriend Sessions, which was produced by Cali [...]

It’s been a good year for rock legend Bob Seger, and it can be a good year for you too. We’re giving away a copy of Seger’s two-disc Ultimate Hits set, as well as a special lithograph of the cover image. All you have to do is tell us your favorite Bob Seger song, and [...]

Michael Buble has the number 1 album in the country right now. This is not a joke. But the jazz vocalist was in on one of Saturday Night Live’s better sketches in recent memory over the weekend, singing Christmas duets with the likes of Taylor Swift, Scotty McCreery, Sting, Thom Yorke and more. Even Kanye [...]

In 1960, following the pop success of “What’d I Say,” Ray Charles signed a new record deal with ABC-Paramount. A new five-volume box set, Singular Genius: The Complete ABC Singles, from Concord Music Group covers this era, which followed his productive years at Atlantic Records. Charles’ post-”What’d I Say” career can be characterized by an [...]

(Photo: Songwriter Seth Swirsky with Ringo Starr) As the sole writer of the classic “Love Is a Beautiful Thing,” recorded by Al Green and several others, and a co-writer of hits by Taylor Dayne (“Tell It to My Heart”), Michael McDonald (“Tear It Up”) and more, Seth Swirsky has bragging rights to a lot of [...]

“Each person comes to have this musical experience, this moment with us, where they get to sink into our world for a little while. It’s this very unhurried world. It’s fairly quiet, it’s contemplative, but it can be quite panoramic. I think people think interesting thoughts at our shows, and they go rather deeply into [...]

Bill Wyman left The Rolling Stones in 1992. He was one of the five founding members — along with Brian Jones, Keith Richards, Mick Jagger, and Ian Stewart. (Drummer Charlie Watts didn’t join until 1963.) In a recent interview with Rolling Stone magazine, Jagger said of the current incarnation of the Stones (which includes Ron [...]