John Meeks doesn’t just listen to classic country, he lives it. “That was the music on the radio in the car when I was a kid.” His dad performed country music in honky-tonks across New …

NOTE: This show was canceled at press time. At the age of 17, Mick Taylor became a member of the legendary Bluesbreakers, following in the footsteps of heavy predecessors Peter Green and another guitarist often …

Two teenage boys walk into Steel Guitars of North County in Oceanside, scan the assortment of vintage oddities arranged on the walls, do a quick appraisal of the pack of 50-somethings trying them out, turn …

Last October, Creative Commons, a San Francisco nonprofit at the forefront of the copyleft movement, announced on its website that it had found the right entity to take its ccMixter to the next level: ArtisTech …

When he recorded The American in 1998, singer-songwriter Martin Sexton took a road trip through human emotion and gave voice (and in some cases, dialects) to characters he found along the way — in three …

Graham Dechter’s jazz-guitar sound is right out of the ’30s and ’40s, a musical era that he can have heard only on disc — Dechter is in his early 20s. Dechter’s phrasing is hip, confident, …

In Pikeville, Tennessee, near the Blue Ridge Mountains, Earl Thomas is money. It is a small town, explains his friend Michael Kinsman, and aside from a bluegrass performer or two, no one has ever made …

“We got evicted from P.B. for having six of us living in a two-bedroom place,” says Chris Jones. “We built bunk beds to fit everybody. Our crazy-old-lady landlord lived in the backyard. She accused us …

Larry Zeiger says it was he who gave pop star Adam Lambert his first studio break. Lambert, who graduated from Mount Carmel High School in Rancho Peñasquitos in 2000, recorded a song for Zeiger’s musical …

Sounding as free-spirited as Brian Wilson and as tight as anything from the Tom Tom Club, Animal Feelings — the latest from Rafter Roberts — comes off like a white guy’s take on Parliament-Funkadelic, a …

“Vinnie Cavarra and I both worked at Guitar Trader,” remembers Thom Beebe, “and we were talking to [KGB DJ] Jim McInnes about forming a band. We were going to do a spoof on [’80s-era club …

“I’ve been doing benefit concerts for the past few years for the Flight 93 Memorial project,” says Greg Keiling. “One of my good friends, a person I used to work with, was a passenger. Her …

Ramble John Krohn, also known as RJD2, listens to so many new albums in a week that he uses Post-it notes to keep track of what is useable. Krohn, a former club DJ, is now …

Frogger Dogger is the name of a new music blog, and from the outset, one gets the sense that its content providers, three ex–music writers from the Union-Tribune, are on something of a crusade. “Where …

“Today we’re launching San Diego Online Radio,” says Dale Seibert, who describes himself as its main guy — owner, producer, program director, and head of marketing. “It’s the new voice of San Diego,” he says. …

What some have called a huge loss for the rock band Chicago is a big gain for fans of an off-and-on-again soul band with its roots in the psychedelic ’60s called the Sons of Champlin. …

Gary Beck has a certain way about him. He is the midday disc jockey at KSDS, the City College radio station otherwise known as Jazz 88.3, and his demeanor takes me back to 1971 to …

It’s a safe bet to assume that nobody plays air guitar to old Stephen Stills records. Better known to the masses as one of the voices of Crosby, Stills & Nash, it might come as …

The Mexican Institute of Sound is not an institute, nor is it much of a band. Rather, it is the side project of one man, a Mexico City–based record company executive named Camilo Lara, whom …

The best funk band working today is not from the U.S., where funk was invented, but from Leeds, England, where funk and soul have been undergoing a revival for some time. On the soul/R&B side, …

The Mother Hips can sound a bit like the Eagles or the Byrds or even as psych-rock as Wilco. There are these nice, occasional arena-rock riffs, scaled way down to club size, and now and …

One thing that’s clear from the start is that Mario Escovedo is not all that comfortable talking about himself. After 13 years of playing guitar and fronting the Dragons, he’s had enough time in the …

Robin Henkel hoots, hollers, walks out into the audience with his guitar, sits at their tables, and tells stories. He favors the raw end of what his instrument can sound like, and when he sings …

“Suzy Bogguss and I knew each other when we were teens,” says Jessica Baron. “I was a music teacher who gigged a little bit. Suzy was already an early celebrity. She would come through Chicago …

It’s a great name for a band, We Were Promised Jetpacks. The Glasgow indie quartet is something like a motorcycle — their songs are made for speed. The faster WWPJ plays them, the better and …

The jazz fan may be confused by my statement that Medeski Martin & Wood is a jam band with traditional jazz roots. After all, isn’t jamming, or improvising, the province of traditional jazz? But in …

The Onyx Room’s website says there is a live jazz jam on Tuesday nights. But as of this writing, the site has not been updated to indicate that the jam’s founder and host for the …

We know the year Mississippi Delta blues legend Booker T. Washington White died, but we can only guess at when he was born. Sometime around 1909? By the age of 16, Bukka, as he was …

On a January evening, Phil Bensimon stood on the porch of his home on Highfield Avenue in La Mesa. The front room of the house had been converted into a recording studio. Bensimon listened through …

Jazz in North Park is the new name for an old concert series that hopes to pick up where it left off over a year ago. In 2008, Jazz in the Park (as in Balboa Park) went dark when its host, the San Diego Museum of Art, pulled the plug after a seven-year run.

“Some people say we sound kind of like groovy ’60s music, and some people say we sound kind of like surf punk,” says Erica Putis, bassist in the alt-rock trio Recordable Colors. Putis says that …

In 1969 Tom Chapin was the sound guy on a film crew that spent several months at sea in search of great white sharks. The footage resulted in the spooky nature thriller Blue Water, White …

Alan Garth’s record collection is too big to fit into his North Park row house. For now, he keeps his 2000 or so discs in storage. Garth’s living room is without television and instead is …

Claire Daly blows the biggest of big saxes, the baritone sax. It is a monster, maybe twice the size of its cousin, the tenor sax. It takes big air to make sound come out of …

Members of Dynamite Walls write and record radio-ready pop-rock from their Encinitas home base. But if Tom Pritchard had not broken up with his girlfriend five years ago, there might not be a band today. …

Like a modern-day John Lee Hooker, Otis Taylor can make an entire song from a single riff. Hooker conjured powerful emotions with little more than a guitar and a somnolent mumble. Taylor, a multi-instrumentalist and …

Lowell Kiesel, founder of the Carvin Corporation, died in San Diego on December 28. He was 94. Carvin, based in San Diego, is one of the oldest manufacturers of guitars and amplifiers in California. “His …

“Let’s hear it for Carey Driscoll,” says singer Tom Russell from the stage of a Methodist church in Normal Heights. “Carey Driscoll, my favorite promoter, tryin’ to keep folk music alive. Man! Some of those …

It is doubtful that anyone who knows who these guys are would mind my calling them a supergroup. In the classic sense of the term, that is exactly what they are — a traveling supergroup …

JamBase.com says that L.A.’s KROQ aired the Squirrel Nut Zippers’ 1996 single “Hell,” a giddy calypso thing with Sunday-school overtones, as a joke. But “Hell” became a hit. “Now the d and the a and …

“We’ve been planning a Big Mountain album,” says singer-guitarist Quino McWhinney of his dormant reggae band. “But what it’s gonna be, we’re not sure.” McWhinney and his brother James have remained the nucleus of Big …

Margaret Noble says local clubs gave her the cold shoulder when she set out to become a DJ here. “The Underground Lounge was the most receptive. Bar Dynamite was a great place to play, and …

Camper Van Beethoven is a California band and were somewhat big in the ’80s. CVB integrates country rock, psychedelic, and faux ethnic things with violin. Imagine the Grateful Dead doing a Strawberry Alarm Clock retrospective …

In 2002, someone planted some homemade bombs — dry-ice sealed in plastic jugs — at the apartment of Unwritten Law guitarist Steve Morris. MTV’s website said that the bombing was the result of a feud …

“The African American Musicians Heritage Foundation was formed to recognize the life and legacy of local African-American jazz musicians,” says Hollis Hassell. “It’s a part of the dynamic ministry,” he says, “of the Church of …

“Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp decided that because it was Breast Cancer Awareness Month,” says Laura Roppé, “they should have a spot for a breast cancer survivor, so they contacted the Keep A Breast foundation …

Grace Potter, a Vermont organist-guitarist and singer, showed up on the indie scene five years ago with a rock quartet and the usual stuff: a strong appreciation for the music of a generation that was …

The major eons of rock: In the ’60s it was psychedelic, folk rock, and the British invasion. The 1970s were punk and new wave. The ’80s gave us glam and big-hair rock, and the ’90s …

Jazz pianist Mike Wofford once performed with Michael Jackson. Sort of. “This was when it was the Jackson Five,” says Wofford. “It was a summer TV show. I’m thinking it was about 1969 or 1970…I’m …

Georgia rockers the Black Crowes launched their career on the back of two hit records from their landmark debut album Shake Your Money Maker, which includes songs that are as dissimilar to each other as …