​J.P. Reali (from the E.P. Grateful Blues available as a self-release) (by Danny McCloskey)
J.P. Reali drifts into Grateful Blues on an “Easy Wind”. His recently released E.P. brings a Dead fan into the studio to reinvent, reinfuse, and recreate the music of the Grateful Dead through a Blues Filter. A nod to Stevie Ray Vaughn’s Texas-style boogie Blues guides J.P Reali as he shouts out “I Need a Miracle” from the Grateful Dead’s Shakedown Street release while a slow-moving swamp groove provides a foundation for a deep cut Dead tune, “Mr. Charlie”, from the Europe ’72 live double disc.
Returning to Europe ’72, J.P. Reali presents “Tennessee Jed” as a front porch Country jam, heading to Memphis for the down and dirty Blues of “Loose Lucy”. In keeping with the legend of the band, Grateful Blues was released on July 31, the day before Jerry Garcia’s birthday on August 1. An ominous growl is the beat that begins the story of “West L.A Fade Away” when J.P. Reali takes the rhythms of the cut into a late-night dark highway noir groove. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​Leslie Waugh (from the album Night Bloom available as a self-release) (by Danny McCloskey)
On the receiving end of the demands of an unforgiving world, Leslie Waugh admits to her mistakes as she points towards the realities of life, confessing ‘what is done is done’ in “Trigger”. A caffeinated beat carries the wisdom of “I’m Your Friend” as drifting soundscapes wrap around the struggles in “To Be Poor”. A regimented rhythm supports the fingers-crossed request for a second chance for “Troubles on My Mind”. Leslie Waugh offers clear-eyed stories about the human condition; her words pointing to both the author and the life around her in the words and music collected in Night Bloom, her recent release.
Sticking to home ground, Leslie Waugh recorded Night Bloom at The Zone Recording Studio, sharing co-producer credits with Pat Manske. The musical backing was provided by Trevor Nealon (The Band of Heathens) on keyboards and multi-instrumentalist Dennis Ludiker (Asleep at the Wheel, Milkdrive) on fiddle and other instruments. Mike Stinson steps up to the microphone to provide backing vocals, duetting with Leslie on the relationship guide that serves as a muse for “Pay Attention”. Night Bloom uses the white lines on the highway as a groove for “Black Cadillac” as it drives slowly on a hushed melody through “Stilstown”. Leslie Waugh stands firm behind her choices in the declarations of “Let Me Be Me” before exiting Night Bloom on the horn-dappled bounce of “Dependably Undependable”. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​Keb’ Mo’ (from the album The Breakdown available on Concord Records) (by Danny McCloskey)
The back story for The Breakdown, the recent release from Keb’ Mo’, shows the man in a personal upheaval. Surviving life-saving open heart surgery and the ending of his 20-year marriage became the unplanned-for muse in the songs on the album. The Breakdown marks a first in the legendary career of Keb’ Mo’, the cuts created with a stripped-down presentation featuring just the man and his guitar. The exception to the man/guitar model takes on the tunes occurs when two tracks bring in vocal assistance. Soweto Gospel Choir provide vocal backing in “Hand It Over” while Gospel group Take 6 step in for the memories gathered within the storyline of “They Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To”.
Gentle guitar notes sparkle with a subtle shine underneath Keb’ Mo’ and his suggestion for “Living in the Moment” while he claims to have no time for any drama that will drag him down in “More Yesterdays”. He becomes the searcher in the journey of “Walking on Water” as a rhythmic groove becomes the foundation for the job postings in “We Make Love”. The Breakdown steps among a disjointed note pattern to tell the story in “Every Step of the Way” and unveils a “Stitched Up Heart” for as it finds footing with new love. Keb’ Mo’ picks out sharp notes to take a stand against “Fussing and Fighting” while he exits the album with gentle acoustic notes cradling the promises of “One Day Away”. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​Futurebirds (from the album Far Out Country I available on Dualtone Records) (by Danny McCloskey)
There is feeling about Far Out Country I. The sound of the album fits perfectly into the moments when Cosmic Country psychedelicized the music coming from the AM radio in truck cabs. The songs on Far Out Country I do not mimic the Cosmic Country era, however Futurebirds certainly dose their sound with a similar punch. Album opener “Sienna Life” rises up like the sun, its musical backing slowly coloring the world as the movement of the arrangement keeps going up and up until it fills every space with its light. A solemn chord strum carves out a groove across “Gsus Takes the Wheel” as Futurebirds add an Indie form and feel to the Folk Rock coursing underneath “Fly On” and a line is drawn as limits are pushed in the tale of “Sleepless in a Cage”.
The Athens, Georiga-based band has released a steady stream of album since 2010’s Hampton’s Lullaby. Hints of Southern Rock, Country, Folk, and Americana tumble and frolic within the music of Futurebirds. The common factor is the Rock’n’Roll god that shines its light into every note of Far Out Country I. Rhythms propel “Nervous Ground” as country life pens the story in “Marco Polo I” while Far Out Country I watches new love form with “Wishin’”. Futurebirds ride a roller-coaster beat underneath the “Ghost Moon” before exiting the album on the soft-breeze summer sway of “Featherbed”. 
The full Far Out Country package will come together in September with the release of Far Out Country II (due 09-04-26), arriving as a solo release and a double-disc vinyl that include both FOC I & II. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​The Kearns Family (from the E.P. Side Trips available on Goat Mountain Records) (by Danny McCloskey)
Only five songs are available on Side Trips, the recent E.P. release from The Kearns Family. The duo does justice to their Hi Desert environs on every note,  granting the songs breathing room, much like the wide-open spaces in which they were born. Four of the songs are covers, with one original written by Pat Kearns along with Will Amato, “The Ballad of Bobby Furst”. The story champions Bobby Furst who passed away on June 8, 2025. The song takes you ‘to the Hi Desert where the Joshua Trees grow’, moving alongside Bobby as he travels from Laurel Canyon, following the Route 62 highway up and up, seeing the beauty of life in every artifact buried in the sand and revealed by the wind. Bobby Furst built Frustworld; The Kearns Family describing his being and the space as ‘a place for art, and a passion so real’.
A slowly unraveling rhythm defines the dusty groove of “When the Nights Are Cold”; a Butch Hancock tune brought to life by Jimme Dale Gilmore. Reimagining Abba as Barstow bar band, Side Tripsopens its song cycle with “Dancing Queen” as The Kearns Family trudge over a molasses slow rhythm to deliver Townes Van Zandt’s “Nothin’”. Offering another opinion for Roly Salley’s “Killing the Blues”, The Kearns Family (Pat Kearns on vocals, guitar and Susan Kearns on upright bass) take the hesitated hopes talked about in the lyrics and provide a soundtrack that matches the roller-coastered emotions of the tale to perfection. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​Clay Street Unit (from the album Live from the Road Vol. 1 on Leo33 Records) (by Bryant Liggett)
The latest from Denver’s Clay Street Unit has enough musical umph to satisfy Southern Rock, Roots music, and, of course, festival going string-band fans. With cuts pulled from various shows around the country, Live from the Road Vol. 1 finds the band digging into heady ballads, intricate mountain music, and loads of jam band musical stretches. Live from the Road Vol 1 is a recording that will connect the dots between Folk, NewGrass and Southern Rock with plenty of panache; it also showcases their ability as a live band. 
Boogie-grass is ever present in album opener “Freightline Blues”, a cut ripe for a festival field or to soundtrack driving your big rig down the highway while “Let’s Get Stoned” is a steel-guitar heavy Country cut ready for a slow dance or relaxing in a haze of smoke.
Funky Southern Rock blend with a NewGrass jam for “One Last Time,” a cut clocking in just past nine minutes that is tripped out psychedelic. The closing cuts on this live release likely whip their fans into a frenzy; their cover of MGMT’s “Kids” and The Band’s “The Night They Drove Ol’ Dixie Down” are played with few liberties taken, save for a huge jam dropped within the former, while every soloist takes a trip in the latter.
This is a great document of a great band’s live show. Clay Street Unit falls right into place alongside the canon of Colorado string bands. (by Bryant Liggett)
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For more information and purchase options, please visit the Clay Street Unit website
 

​J.P. Reali (from the E.P. Grateful Blues available as a self-release) (by Danny McCloskey)
J.P. Reali drifts into Grateful Blues on an “Easy Wind”. His recently released E.P. brings a Dead fan into the studio to reinvent, reinfuse, and recreate the music of the Grateful Dead through a Blues Filter. A nod to Stevie Ray Vaughn’s Texas-style boogie Blues guides J.P Reali as he shouts out “I Need a Miracle” from the Grateful Dead’s Shakedown Street release while a slow-moving swamp groove provides a foundation for a deep cut Dead tune, “Mr. Charlie”, from the Europe ’72 live double disc.
Returning to Europe ’72, J.P. Reali presents “Tennessee Jed” as a front porch Country jam, heading to Memphis for the down and dirty Blues of “Loose Lucy”. In keeping with the legend of the band, Grateful Blues was released on July 31, the day before Jerry Garcia’s birthday on August 1. An ominous growl is the beat that begins the story of “West L.A Fade Away” when J.P. Reali takes the rhythms of the cut into a late-night dark highway noir groove. (by Danny McCloskey)
Listen and buy the music of J.P. Reali from AMAZON
For more information and purchase options, please visit J.P. Reali website
 

​Elanor Moss (from the album The Knife, The Needle available on Merge Records) (by Danny McCloskey)
A wandering reverie holds the pen for Elanor Moss as she relates the story of “Sarah Waiting in the Car”. Classical strings hover like angels over the acoustic guitar picking and deep breaths of sonic accents that become the drifting melody cradling the fragile, yet sturdy, words that tell the tale. Elanor Moss’ vocals appear as breaths, her voice christening each word with its own emotion. The gently plucked guitar notes accent the melodies like stars peeking out from behind a cloudy night sky. Her recent release, The Knife, The Needle gently lays out the “Secrets of the Universe” on hesitant notes, slowing to reverential note patterns to present a heartfelt wish with “Again, My Love”.
A lonely horn calls out to the finger-picked guitar notes that freckle “Fixer” while fragility as thin as fine china tells the tale of “Louise”.. The soundscape of The Knife, The Needle can find peers in the basement clubs and bare bulb-lit stages to play host to Folk musicians. Playing tag across the songs of The Knife, The Needle, joy and pain step lightly over Psychedelicized Folk music, Elanor Moss guiding the stories with a birdsong warble and masterfully delivered classical guitar. The unknown becomes a character in the love story snug in the outside ambience of “The Way That It Feels” as The Knife, The Needle is a fly on the wall as Elanor Moss wears the skin of a traveling troubadour in “Clothes in a Hotel Sink” while she tenderly whispers “You Are Coming Home Tonight”. (by Danny McCloskey)
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​Elizabeth Cook (from the album Great Television on Agent Love Records/Thirty Tigers) (by Danny McCloskey)


Stepping from personal accounting to stories focusing on specific moments in American history, Elizabeth Cook sashays with determined steps across “Sunset Promenade”, the opening track on her recent release, Great Television. She references the album title muse the song, citing ‘turns out hurricanes make great television’, penning her own goals into the storyline stating ‘I just want a friend I can stand and do my time with’. The songs of Elizabeth Cook are always real. To the benefit of the song, the musician/songwriter cannot separate how she feels from the stories she tells. Great Television revisits a Georgia chemical plant explosion when she heads back to 1971 with “Thiokol Tripwire” while she turns the time clock back even further to a time when a ‘secret city’ was built in Eastern Tennessee. The event references the 1942 seizure of 60,000 acres of rural land by the U.S. government around Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The name of ‘atomic city’ was given to the expanse of land that housed 75,000 workers who enriched uranium for use in the atom bomb. Elizabeth Cook brings a human component to the memories when she introduces the “Girls of Atomic City”.
 
Produced by Shooter Jennings, Great Television rattles and rolls on a mixture of styles, blending Rock’n’Roll and Country into a musical mix of sounds that gives the backing band freedom to pack both subtlety and a sonic punch into the songs. Turnpike Troubadour’s Evan Felker joins Elizabeth Cook when the pair make a plan to ‘drive this truck through a razor wire wall’ in “Razorwire Wall”, while she caffeinates the groove for her version of The Rolling Stones “19th Nervous Breakdown”. An ambient haze of musical notes sparkle like a night sky to begin “Lightly” as a gently swaying shot hits its mark for “In Your Veins”. Elizabeth Cook hits the road on a white-line rhythm ‘listening to Willie and smoking my diploma’ for “Caledonia and the Love Convoy” and sluggishly walks through the swampy groove of “Okeechobee Mud”.
 
Joining Great Television behind the microphone, Wynonna Judd partners with Elizabeth Cook on “The Easy Kind”. The movie of the same name recently made its New York City premiere at IFC Center. The film stars Elizabeth alongside David Letterman, Karen Allen, Susie Essman, Melissa Jackson and Charles Esten, and is about Elizabeth's life as one of Country music's most incredible storytellers, and someone who has spent decades fighting against Nashville conformity. (by Danny McCloskey)
 
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For more information and purchase options, please visit the Elizabeth Cook website
 

​Ray Wylie Hubbard (from the album Reel 2 Reel 4 Real on WylieWorld Music/Soundly Music) 
 
Texas Outlaw Blues legend, Ray Wylie Hubbard, gets back to his gritty roots on his 20th album, Reel 2 Reel 4 Real. This album is as far away from Pop music’s polished, autotuned brand of entertainment as possible. Some musicians are a little rough around the edges; Ray Wylie Hubbard is rough all the way through.
“Cassette Mix Tape” is a rocking Texas Blues coming of age story, akin to Bob Seger’s “Night Moves”, but instead of the nostalgic reminisces of a middle-aged man, this song plays like a diary entry from a hormone driven seventeen-year-old. Instead of ‘working on mysteries without any clues’ (Bob Seger – Night Moves), Hubbard is driving to meet a friend of a friend who ‘wasn’t particular about who she got it on with’. Dueling electric lead guitars add to the intensity, and seem to fan the flames of passion. In the background, Hubbard recalls the music playing on his old mix tape. Neil Young, The Rolling Stones, Golden Earring, and fittingly, Bob Seger, provide the soundtrack for his night to remember. Like the aforementioned Seger song, “Cassette Mix Tape” is a testament to the power of music. Even after passions fade, music can still stir memories like nothing else.
“Cobwebs” leans into industrial Blues as Hubbard sings of his ‘raggy taggy’ lover. ‘She Plays Crazy Mama’ celebrates J.J. Cale and a woman who loves his music. Ray Wylie Hubbard adds a touch of Delta Blues to criticize new salesmen selling the same old snake oil on “Look What the Cat Drug In”. Hubbard’s voice, which is part Hayes Carrll and part Grim Reaper, gives a dark edge to these songs. He increases that edge to haunted cemetery levels on “El Diablo Esta Ganado”, “A Murder of Crows”, “Dog or Wolf”, and “Tip Your Hat to the Black Crow”. Hubbard’s songs aren’t so much about death and dying as they are about giving up hope on living. “The Night,” encapsulates his nihilistic vision. Despite the lively Rock and Roll backbeat, Ray Wylie Hubbard sings ‘went and got a desire chip. I meet the requirements for membership. Didn't have any faith, I got a little hope. But when the sun goes down it’s a slippery slope’. Continuing, he sings ‘the night is when a deal with the devil is made’. Stephen Hawking once said, ‘Heaven is a fairy tale for people afraid of the dark’. To which he received the reply ‘Atheism is a fairy tale for people afraid of the light’. Ray Wylie Hubbard’s songs play like a haunted hymnal for those in the latter category. (By Brain Rock)
 
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