Reviews

HOT BUTTERED RUM LONESOME PANORAMIC No Label No Number Hot Buttered Rum brought their high energy into the studio for the band’s sixth studio release, Lonesome Panoramic. As tasty as the band’s name implies, the self-produced disc was recorded at Panoramic House Studio in Stinson Beach, Cal., with a beautiful view of the western Marin County…

COUNTRY MUSIC USA: 50th ANNIVERSARY EDITION By BILL C. MALONE AND TRACEY E.W. LAIRD Univ. Of Texas Press 9781477315347. Hardcover, 768 pp., 63 b&w photos, $45. (Univ. of Texas Press, 3001 Lake Austin Blvd., 2.200, Stop E4800, Austin, TX 78703, www.utexaspress.com.) This tome has long been held as thereference on country music. It has been used…

THE EARLS OF LEICESTER LIVE AT THE CMA THEATER IN THE COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME Rounder Records 1166100425 With the bluegrass genre being the way it is at times, the battle over the heart of the original bluegrass sound never ends. Roots and branches of the genre keep the music alive and interesting, yet…

GEORGE McCLURE FREEDOM TRAIN JIP Records JIP-5327 George McClure is back on track with Freedom Train, a nine-song collection of some of his favorite bluegrass songs from his road warrior days in the ’90s. “As a prolific writer, I have literally hundreds of bluegrass songs and instrumentals,” McClure said. “I had some of the more popular…

HOT RIZE 40th ANNIVERSARY BASH: AN ALL-STAR BLUEGRASS CELEBRATION Ten in Hand Records THR-9002-3 Hot Rize is a band we keep coming back to and with much success. Over 40 years ago, Tim O’Brien, Pete Wernick, Nick Forster, and Charles Sawtelle came from parts East to the beautiful Rocky Mountains in Colorado, found each other,…

BOBBY BRITT ALAYA No Label No Number If you’ve ever heard Town Mountain play live in recent years, then you’ll know they’re on fire and that their fiddler Bobby Britt is one of the best in the business. From Chapel Hill, N.C., and an alumnus of the Berklee College of Music, Britt can take a…