Monument/Orbison/Legacy
Among previous box sets honoring The Big O, three are significant: a 4-CD anthology (Columbia, 1988); a 4-CD official bootleg set (Orbison, 1999); and a 7-CD retrospective of his golden years (Bear Family, 2001).
Decca
Good musical guilty pleasures are few and far between these days, but the East Village Opera Company comes to the rescue with its third release, an amalgam of ’70s rock excess and bombast fused with some of the finest operatic melodies.
Country Discovery
One of the things that made late ’60s/early ’70s country rock so great was pedal steel guitar. There was something pleasantly anachronistic about hearing that old-fashioned sound amid electric guitars and hard-chargin’ rhythm sections.
Delta Groove
Bishop’s newest succeeds on three fronts: It’s a great album; it pays tribute to the Oklahoma-raised singer/slide guitarist’s early influences; and it assembles an impressive cast of supporting musicians, some of whom are old friends and some who are up-and-coming artists, both types to which he often humbly relinquishes lead vocals.
Telehog
There are a handful of Telecaster masters, and Volkaert is one of them. Some say he’s country, and much of his essence is rooted in the genre, but he’s more complex than that. One gets the sense there’s a rocker deep inside, as he gives off the same aura as the late Danny Gatton; John Jorgensen during his Hellecaster days; Junior Brown on any of his albums; or more recently, the well-kept secret that is Johnny Hiland.
