Reviews

It’s no empty figure of speech to say this Canadian mandolin/mandola master’s debut album was nearly two decades in the making. Maybe you could call it perseverance, or maybe you can call it procrastination, or maybe you could call it both. But in his liner notes, McNulty, who spent 40 years as a journalist, explains…

Boar Hog Bluegrass 3408 Bluegrass icon Jack Tottle has a ton of stories to tell, I’m sure. Here, he unfurls a bounty of wonderful, inventive original instrumentals and other tunes to let those stories shine. Buoyed by the floational flatpicking guitar of Tim Stafford, Tottle presents 13 original and traditional tunes here in a mostly…

The Henhouse Prowlers have spent the last eight of their 17 years together as “cultural ambassadors” for the U.S. State Department. In this capacity, they’ve played everywhere from Siberia and the Middle East to various points in Africa and the Americas (75 countries, all told).  As their new album attests, they are worthy representatives indeed….

Billy Blue Records Doyle Lawson recently announced that he will be retiring from touring at the end of 2022, but it’s clear with his new album out that he plans on exiting with a bang.  Roundtable is a collection of a dozen songs that can simply be described as what you’d expect from Lawson and…

Jesse Brock, winner of the 2009 and 2015 IBMA “Mandolin Performer of the Year” awards, burst on to the scene while he was still just a kid.  Since then, he has performed with numerous bands, including the CW Brock Family, the Lynn Morris Band, Chris Jones and the Night Drivers, Audie Blaylock and Redline and…

Georgia-based John White is an accomplished banjo player as well as a student of the instrument’s history. In the past, he’s recorded with gourd banjos, fretless banjos and Victorian banjos. On this solid collection of original songs, White has teamed up with some front-line pickers: Tim Crouch on fiddle, Tony Wray on guitar, Randy Kohrs…