Donald “Duck” Dunn, R.I.P.
Sean MurphyDid you know how great this guy was? Nevermind the fact that his best friend, the equally brilliant Steve "The Colonel" Cropper --who played with him for more than four…
Ian Anderson: Living in the Present
However unwittingly, Ian Anderson wrote his artistic epitaph all the way back in 1976. “Too Old to Rock ‘n’ Roll: Too Young To Die!”, the hit from the album of…
Beauty and The Beast, Featuring Sonny Sharrock
The name alone is epic: Sonny Sharrock. I won't resist the urge, because I can't, to pick a low-hanging pun and opine that Sonny put the rock back in jazz.…
Adam Yauch, R.I.P.
This hurts. Word is hitting the wires that Adam Yauch, a.k.a. MCA, has succumbed to cancer. This is awful news, obviously, but also surprising since it sounded like he had…
Props on Pops: 70th Birthday Edition
I have written more than once about my mother (here and here) but I haven't said a great deal (here) about my old man. That is, in part, because he…
Let’s Get Ready To Rumble
With a major h/t to my friend, and prolific author, Robert Rodriguez (if you are a music fan and especially if you are a Beatles fan, you need to get…
Beauty is a Rare Thing: Celebrating International Jazz Day
All hope is not lost. At least enough people are still making --and listening to-- jazz that we can even attempt to initiate what hopefully becomes an ongoing occasion. In…
The Song Remains The Same or, The Agony of Influence (Revisited)
Two thoughts from T.S. Eliot: April is the cruelest month... Whatever. Good poets borrow; great poets steal. Now we're talking. And here is where it gets interesting: debate rages (well,…
Levon Helm: So Real It Makes You Believe
There are probably countless ways to talk about what makes a particular artist compelling, and all of them are true. There are not that many ways to articulate how or…
Happy 90th, Chazz
Today would have been (and, still is) Charles Mingus's 90th birthday. I've written about him often and I'll continue to write about him, not only because he is one of…