Rock Music Reviews
Listen Turning Up The Volume On The Electric Blues
November 29, 2012 – A new compilation traces the history of electric blues from its rocky start through its heyday.
Watch The Insect Trust: An American Band Deconstructed
November 20, 2012 – Free jazzers, hippie rockers and country-blues musicians made up this ragtag late-'60s band.
Watch Neil Young Still Vital On 'Psychedelic Pill'
October 30, 2012 – Whenever things get too cozy on Psychedelic Pill, Crazy Horse is there to rearrange the furniture.
Listen The Big Man Behind 'Shake, Rattle And Roll'
October 22, 2012 – Big Joe Turner's hardest-hitting R&B singles have been collected on a new compilation.
Listen More Than This: The 'Complete' Roxy Music
October 15, 2012 – Ed Ward connects the dots of the band's eight studio albums, which were just collected in one box.
Listen Low Cut Connie: The Self-Deprecating Bar Band
October 3, 2012 – The band's new Call Me Sylvia is as raucous as its debut, though it's slightly more self-conscious.
Listen Out Of Industrial Wasteland, The English Beat Was Born
October 1, 2012 – Ed Ward reviews the reissued catalog from the multiracial, multi-generational ska band.
Listen Aimee Mann: The 'Charmer' And The Disciplined Id
September 24, 2012 – Ken Tucker says Mann's latest album is a song cycle about getting rid of a cynical frame of mind.
Watch Haunted Harmonies On The xx's 'Coexist​'
September 14, 2012 – On the follow-up to its moody debut, the Mercury Prize-winning British band magnifies its grooves.
Listen ZZ Top: Taking The Blues Back To The Future
September 13, 2012 – After years dabbling in different genres, the band returns to a classic sound on La Futura.
Listen Bob Dylan's Baffling And Sometimes Beautiful 'Tempest'
September 11, 2012 – Ken Tucker says that some of Tempest's songs are as precisely crafted as any Dylan has written.
Listen Cat Power Rips It Up, Starts Again
September 6, 2012 – On Sun, her first album of new songs since 2006, Chan Marshall leaves behind her sad, sparse sound.
Watch Harmony, Teenagers And 'The Complete Story Of Doo-Wop'
September 6, 2012 – Street Corner Symphonies is a 15-volume year-by-year survey of doo-wop by scholar Bill Dahl.
Listen When Ian Hunter Is 'President'
September 4, 2012 – Ken Tucker says Hunter reaches back into rock's past while linking it firmly to the present.
Watch Shoes: After 18 Years, The Power-Pop Band Re-Ignites
August 31, 2012 – Ken Tucker says Ignition retains the same pop-rock rigor heard in the band's 1970s records.