Chops Not Chaps
Doors keyboardist Ray Manzarek finished his third collaboration with slide guitarist Roy Rogers shortly before he died. He and Rogers had just signed off on cover art when Manzarek left for Germany, where he succumbed to bile duct cancer May 20 at the RoMed Clinic in Rosenheim.
Cookitup
Guitarist extraordinaire Starski’s roots go back to his early teens, playing bass in a Detroit church band. He evolved as a guitarist in Florida through blues-rock and jump/swing outfits, before serving a seven-year tour of duty with Memphis-based prog blues combo Jason Ricci and New Blood. For the last couple of years, he’s toured and/or recorded with kindred blues performers including pianist-singer Kelley Hunt, former Little Feat singer Shaun Murphy and banjoist-guitarist-singer Otis Taylor.
Capitol/EMI
San Francisco Bay Area-based Ancient Future was all about “world fusion” before world music was even a genre. To honor the band’s reunion this summer after a 15-year performance hiatus, Capitol/EMI is giving their fifth and most accessible disc its first digital release.
Eclecto Groove
For her sixth studio album (counting her 1998 debut as a member of Hush), Yugoslavian singer-songwriter-guitarist Popovic left her Amsterdam base for three months to descend on the Crescent City and craft her finest release.
Tallest Man
British retro-soul group The New Mastersounds have been around since they rose like a Phoenix in 1999 from the ashes of the original Mastersounds (not to be confused with America’s late ’50s/early ’60s easy-listening bop combo of the same name).
