Music Reviews

A few months ago, I was fortunate enough to catch the last few songs of a Blue Mafia show at the Down Home in Johnson City, TN. Though I’d heard the band on the radio plenty of times (their 2015

In today’s music world, where the boundaries between genres are ever blurrier, many artists choose to step outside of their musical comfort zone and record an album in a different style. Sometimes they take a huge leap – Steven Tyler,

The title of Eliza Mary Doyle’s latest recording, It Ain’t What It Seems, is somewhat accurate when it comes to the music featured on the album’s twelve tracks. It’s not fair to only describe the songs as old-time, even though

For someone who came of age in the 1970s, one of the things I miss most on the contemporary scene is the old style fiddle albums that were so prevalent in the '60s and '70s. The top bowmen of the

Guitarist Tyler Grant, a National Flatpicking Champion and winner of the RockyGrass and Wayne Henderson guitar contests, among others, has spent much of his career in the jam band realm, playing with Drew Emmitt and Bill Nershi of Leftover Salmon

Nothin’ Fancy leans heavily on band originals for Where I Came From, their latest project for Mountain Fever Records. With six songs from mandolin player Mike Andes, and two from guitarist Caleb Cox alongside a few covers from artists like

One thing for sure looking back on this year is that 2016 has been a banner year for ClayBank. The western North Carolina-based band has gone from dominating at band competitions in the early part of the year to their

It’s somewhat rare for a banjo player to release a solo album that’s not mostly instrumental, or at least packed full of classic banjo-heavy numbers. Stuart Wyrick, current banjo player for Flashback and formerly of Brand New Strings and Dale

Every year, National Media Services, a studio and disc replication company in northern Virginia, chooses one of its clients to record a Christmas album in-house. It’s a pretty sweet deal, with the opportunity for media attention on both sides of

The name Clarence White is uttered in reverent tones in the bluegrass world, and deservedly so. The young guitarist was in the midst of redefining the role of the acoustic guitar in bluegrass, and the electric in the burgeoning field