Need to replace a blown fuse? Don’t call Billy Bragg. His dad probably could’ve done the job, but the family line lost its handyman skills once Billy came into the picture, eager to play his guitar but totally disinterested in his father’s tool collection. On that note, here’s Billy Bragg’s “Handyman Blues.” Starring a handful [...]

Jacob Jones knows how to throw a house party. Margaritas? Check. Dancing? Check. Enough comfort food to soak up the alcohol? Of course. Ray Charles on the stereo, cranked as high as it’ll go? You bet. “Play it Loud, Ray!” is Jones’ new single. Stacked high with trumpet, trombone, boogie-woogie piano and electric guitar, it’s [...]

Respectability is just a shot away for Taylor Swift, a talented pop-country songwriter who’s had to put up with more than her share of haterade from folks who find her overrated and over-exposed. But the 23-year-old mega-star is more gifted than she’s given credit for, as our 2011 cover story attests. Last night in Chicago, [...]

Dead Wood Guitars of Athens, Ga is stuck in the 19th century, and we mean that in the best way possible. The company’s founder Jason Booth specializes in creating beautifully handmade acoustic and electric guitars, and in Dirtty Toe Productions’ fourteen-minute documentary on the subject, we can see what makes the final product so perfect. [...]

To the untrained ear, there’s not a ton of difference in the “thin, wild, mercury-sounding” vocal stylings of Tom Petty and Bob Dylan. The two songwriters go way back; Petty and The Heartbreakers first backed their hero on tour in 1986. In 1988, Petty and Dyan found themselves working under a new arrangement — as [...]

Working for a music magazine in Music City has its benefits. In addition to the hotbed of talent that makes its home here, there is also an endless stream of talented musicians passing through town while on tour. Some of that talent makes its way into our office, and we get to hear live performances [...]

Here’s a new song from urban folk artist Jen Chapin, the daughter of legendary folksinger Harry Chapin. An activist and educator who the Jazz Times calls “a first-rate storyteller,” Chapin has performed onstage with Bruce Springsteen and opened for artists like Smokey Robinson and The Neville Brothers. Her new album, Reckoning, is due May 28. Watch [...]

While Crooked Still takes a break from the road, bandleader Aoife O’Donovan is shifting her attention back towards her solo career. Fossils is the singer’s full-length debut, a collection of folk, bluegrass, and old-timey songs produced by the same man who brought us Tift Merritt’s Traveling Alone and the Decemberists’ The King is Dead. “I [...]

After logging several years in Norah Jones’ backup band — and performing alongside Jones in the pair’s country-gal side project, Puss N Boots — Sasha Dobson is going solo. On her new record, Aquarius, she leaves her jazz and country roots behind, working with collaborator Joel Hamilton (producer of BlakRoc’s self-titled debut; engineer of Sparklehorse’s [...]

It took an entire album of scrapped tunes and 1,150-mile move from Denver to Nashville for The Rouge, a four-piece rock band with folk roots, to find their sound. For Blurry, the guys teamed up with Adam Landry and Justin Collins — the production team behind Deer Tick’s Divine Providence – and emerged with a [...]

Foxygen “No Destruction” Rating: 4.5 out 5 stars Nostalgia plays an essential part of Foxygen’s aesthetic — at any given point throughout the 4 minutes and 56 seconds of new single “No Destruction,” the band channels Dylan, the Velvet Underground, Sticky Fingers-era Stones, and maybe even a little Pavement. But the bigger takeaway from the song [...]

The Rolling Stones gave fans something to talk about at their San Jose, California show last night when Bonnie Raitt joined the band on stage for a rendition of “Let It Bleed.” The concert, the third stop on the Stones’ “50 & Counting” tour, also featured guest performances by former band member Mick Taylor on [...]