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Artist: Left Hand Frank
Southpaw guitarist Frank Craig (like many of his peers, he played an axe strung for a right-hander, strapping it on upside down) never really transcended his reputation as a trusty sideman instead of a leader -- and that was just fine with him. But he stepped into the spotlight long enough to sing four fine tunes for Alligator's Living Chicago... [+] Read More
Artist: Pat Haney
Singer/songwriter Pat Haney didn't set his sights on a career as a recording artist. In fact, he never even referred to himself as a musician. He held onto his job as a gas jockey in Kentucky for a little while even after his debut, Wrong Rite of Passage, was released in 2000. Getting him to talk about his gift for storytelling is no easy task.... [+] Read More
Artist: Chris Bowden
Chris Bowden kicked around the acid jazz circuit for years, performing with everyone from K-Creative to Jhelisa Anderson. After putting in his time with these acts, he developed a distinct voice that he would utilize on his first solo album, 1996's Time Capsule. The record, released on Soul Jazz, combined his love of space jazz and kitsch into... [+] Read More
Artist: Guns N' Roses
At a time when pop was dominated by dance music and pop-metal, Guns N' Roses brought raw, ugly rock & roll crashing back into the charts. They were not nice boys; nice boys don't play rock & roll. They were ugly, misogynist, and violent; they were also funny, vulnerable, and occasionally sensitive, as their breakthrough hit, "Sweet Child O'... [+] Read More
Artist: Laver Bariu
The ancient, polyphonic singing tradition of southern Albania, in which one voice rides above a vocal drone (the ISO), has been preserved through the playing of multi-instrumentalist Laver Bariu . The son of a singer and llaute (Albanian lute) player, Bariu was inspired by the music that he heard his father play each night. Although he initially... [+] Read More
Artist: Bradley Kincaid
Bradley Kincaid, originally from the hills of Kentucky and armed with a wealth of folk tunes and mountain ballads, prefered to refer to himself as a folksinger. While at college in Chicago he began regularly appearing on the WLS Barndance (later National Barndance). In 1936 he discovered Lewis Marshall Jones and promptly renamed him Grandpa... [+] Read More
Artist: Derek Hilton
As the longtime musical director for Britain's Grenada Television, composer Derek Hilton authored hundreds of TV themes. He also served as an arranger for singers including Shirley Bassey, Tony Bennett, and Tom Jones. Born February 3, 1927, in Whitfield, England, Hilton began piano lessons at age six, and by 14 was leading his own band, the... [+] Read More
Artist: Virgil Thomson
Thomson is one of the few true modernists in America. Thomson's music is almost disconcertingly spare and direct. In the consciously American pieces especially, there is a kind of aural equivalent to Cubist collage, as ragtime, waltzes, tangos, two-steps, fiddle tunes, and hymns get pasted onto the texture. Unlike Ives, there's an unsentimental... [+] Read More
Artist: the daniel iorio group
Armed with a second-hand $9 computer mic, an acoustic guitar and PC, Daniel Iorio has forged his own path on the international indie scene. Daniel has opened for legendary rockers such as YES, Nazareth & April Wine. Formerly the front man of Makeastar.com champs ECCLESTONE, Daniel's lo-fi demos have topped cybercharts all over the world, enjoyed... [+] Read More
Artist: Rhys Chatham
Post-minimalist composer and New York downtown music figure Rhys Chatham was involved in music at an early age. He studied classical flute, and was already playing works by contemporary composers such as Luciano Berio and Pierre Boulez by the time he began studying composition (including serialism) in his early teens. Chatham started writing... [+] Read More
Artist: Al Johnson
Al Johnson's "Carnival Time" is as much a part of the Mardi Gras tradition in New Orleans as parades, floats, and masked revelers. The song has reigned supreme during the city's celebratory season for four decades with only a handful of rivals, such as "Go to the Mardi Gras" from Professor Longhair. Johnson's composition and recording of the... [+] Read More
Artist: Rob Cavallo
Rob Cavallo produced Green Day (the 14-million-selling album Dookie and the four-million-selling Insomnia), Goo Goo Dolls, L7, the Dance Hall Crashers, Alanis Morissette ("Uninvited" from the City of Angels soundtrack) ,Jawbreaker, and the Muffs.
Born in Washington, D.C., Cavallo's father Rob Cavallo owned the Cellar Door and became a manager... [+] Read More
Artist: Alan Jackson
After Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson was the most popular male country singer of the '90s. An heir to the new traditionalist movement of the '80s, Jackson's approach was rooted in classic honky tonk yet remained comfortably within the contemporary mainstream. Jackson's hallmark was consistency -- he wrote many of his own hits, and his way with a... [+] Read More
Artist: The Charles River Valley Boys
One of the first urban bands to play bluegrass and old-timey music, the Charles River Valley Boys helped to spark the folk revival of the early 1960s. While their original repertoire centered around songs by Uncle Dave Macon, Charlie Poole and Gid Tanner & His Skillet Lickers, the group's 1966 album, Beatle Country, marked one of the earliest... [+] Read More
Artist: Charles Guard
Charles Guard is one of the top harpists in the field of Celtic music, carving a name out for himself as a recording artist and performer during the 1980s and 1990s. He was born on the Isle of Man, in the island capital of Douglas, at a hotel overlooking Douglas Bay -- the Isle of Man is in the Irish Sea; appropriately enough, given Guard's... [+] Read More
Artist: Gladrags
Its taken four years and a few changes in the line-up.The upbeat, some call him neurotic, rock refugee Beezer Hill on vocals and guitar has got the Gladrags "powerpunkbubblegum machine" in tune, rockin', roarin' and ready to roll. The band consisting of Dave Vegafria on bass, Peter Marchese on the drums were playing club dates around the land to... [+] Read More
Artist: Carl Perkins
While some ill-informed revisionist writers of rock history would like to dismiss Carl Perkins as a rockabilly artist who became a one-hit wonder at the dawn of rock & roll's early years, a deeper look at his music and career reveals much more. A quick look at his songwriting portfolio shows that he composed "Daddy Sang Bass" for Johnny Cash, "I... [+] Read More
Artist: Sander Kleinenberg
A DJ whose sets range from sparse and dark trance to uplifting and deep house, Sander Kleinenberg keeps busy hopping around the globe to spin at high-profile clubs and producing tracks that end up on numerous compilations. Born and raised in The Hague, Holland, Kleinenberg's early influences were the American beats of Mantronix, remixer Shep... [+] Read More
Artist: Eric Johnson
Very few musical artists achieve a true signature style -- one which makes comparisons to other musicians impossible. But Texas guitarist Eric Johnson arguably comes as close to this echelon as any musician from the past quarter-century. Like fellow Lone Star State guitarists Johnny Winter, Billy Gibbons, and Stevie Ray Vaughan, Johnson blends... [+] Read More
Artist: Matt Dusk
Few artists manage to secure a 42-piece string section for their debut recording, but Canadian Matt Dusk is no stranger to big bands. The York University Oscar Peterson scholarship winner released four independent records while simultaneously performing with his own eight-piece outfit, playing nearly 20 shows a month in the clubs of Toronto.... [+] Read More
Artist: Habib Koité
The West African country of Mali has produced some great musicians. But as they age, people have wondered who'll step forward from the next generation. The big answer to that seems to be Habib Koité, who comes from the Khassonké griot tradition, that's the hereditary caste of musicians, but whose eyes are firmly on the future. Born in 1958,... [+] Read More
Artist: Charles Fulcher
Charles Fulcher was an influential Atlanta bandleader, composer and instrumentalist whose talents in the latter category seem particularly breathtaking, not to mention taxing for anyone helping carry his instruments around. He performed and recorded during the '20s on clarinet, trombone, piano and violin, indicating proficiency in four distinct... [+] Read More
Artist: Clarence Spady
Guitarist, singer and songwriter Clarence Spady, a 30-something blues musician, has a bright future. Spady, born and raised in Paterson, N.J., but now living in Scranton, PA, has been credited with taking the music in new and exciting directions, writing at times introspective, autobiographical blues lyrics for the 1990s.
His debut for the... [+] Read More
Artist: Thomas Mapfumo & the Blacks Unlimited
Backed by his band, Blacks Unlimited, Thomas Mapfumo has been at the cutting edge of the political struggle in his native Zimbabwe for over 20 years, even as he's become a major figure on the world music scene. Born in 1945 in the small town of Marondera, in the country that was then the British colony of Rhodesia, Mapfumo attended a colonial... [+] Read More
Artist: Jesse Fortune
Chicago vocalist Jesse Fortune's voice is as large as his discography is small. A mere handful of 45s headed by his 1963 classic "Too Many Cooks" and a 1993 album on Delmark constitute his entire catalog -- but as an active artist on the Windy City circuit, he still has time to fatten it up.
Fortune grew up in Hattiesburg, Mississippi,... [+] Read More
