Posts by Leslie Michele Derrough

For those who have rocked with Brian Johnson in AC/DC for the last 42 years, his new memoir, The Lives Of Brian, will have you foaming at the mouth happy; but not if you’re wanting the whole story of his AC/DC adventures

Taking the drum seat of the late Alan White, for Jay Schellen, Yes has been like coming home as the band celebrates 50 years of Close To The Edge.

Judy Collins released her 29th album, Spellbound, a record entirely all her own compositions. She may be the goddess of interpreting songs by Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, and Bob Dylan, but when it comes to her own words, she is at her brightest.

Spending the majority of 2022 celebrating the 25th anniversary of his hugely successful second album, Trouble Is…, Kenny Wayne Shepherd will continue his celebratory tour in 2023

As far as influential musicians of our most recent past, Talking Heads have certainly made their imprint on the scene, both musically and visually. You can’t not know who they are upon hearing one of their songs and you didn’t walk away from a show without feeling completely mesmerized by their presence on the lighted […]

Changes often have to happen for someone to move forward in their life or their career. They can be scary, stressful, or exciting; usually a combination of all three. So when Tyler Bryant and his band The Shakedown made the decision to leave the safety of a record label to form their own, they took […]

Some artists become legends in a burst of electricity – like Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin – while others ascend to that status steadily, by being consistently good over long periods of time. Pete Sears is among the latter. With his career beginning in 1965, he has built up a stellar reputation on bass and […]

When you think of some of the most well-respected musicians in the business, it’s a good bet that Jeff Baxter, better known as Skunk, ranks very high on that list. Known for his exceptional guitar work with Steely Dan, the Doobie Brothers, and on many notable albums by big-name artists such as Rod Stewart, Dolly […]

Shinedown fans have been waiting a little longer than they expected for the new album to show itself. Planet Zero was originally supposed to be released in late April but because of some production details it was pushed back to the mid-summer, which excitedly, was this past Friday, July 1st. The title track serving as […]

Siblings who pursue the same career are not unusual. It’s been happening since time began. But when they form bands together, sometimes the most iconic songs have been created: “Highway To Hell,” “Barracuda,” “Midnight Rider” and “Unchained,” to name but a few. Okay, so the Bacon Brothers haven’t reached that mountaintop yet but they do […]

With John Doe’s new solo album, Fables In A Foreign Land, released on Friday, May 20, the X singer/bass player finds himself in a pre-industrial state of mind, where living wasn’t easy but people were less cluttered with hyperkinetic flashes of social media, spending their lifetimes focused on pretty much what was right in front […]

After a downpouring of rain the night before, it turned the grounds of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival into a simmering, steaming bowl of roux. Thankfully, the mud was at a minimum and the music was blasting. From hyper harmonica solos to an instrumental “Amazing Grace,” the Fairgrounds helped you sin, sweat, and […]

Imagine a teenage girl in a room filled with posters pinned to her walls, calling the local radio station on request night and asking them to play a song called “Ball & Chain” by a new singer named Aldo Nova. Fast-forward to 2022 and that former teenager is talking to that now seasoned artist about […]

If you don’t know that Shooter Jennings is a multi-dimensional artist by now, you’re lost somewhere back in 1970’s Outlaw Country. The son of country music legends Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter has made his career diving headfirst into all aspects of the word music. He has done country, sure, but his heart has multiple […]

Joss Stone is a multi-talented lady. She’s a singer, songwriter, actress and can cook in her kitchen with hundreds of her fans watching her culinary successes … and disasters. But whatever she does, it’s always with a smile on her face. Not even covid could deflate Stone’s happiness, although it did deter her plans for […]

“I’m fresh from my walk and feeling good,” Joan Osborne tells me when I call in for our interview. “I live mostly on the East Coast so it’s great to be someplace where it’s 60 degrees in the middle of January.” Osborne is indeed refreshed from the sunny California weather and spends our time together […]

For rock & roll fans, when they imagine what a country music concert must be like, it usually consists of lower-volumed music, lots of cowboy hats in the crowd, and a setlist full of twangy ballads about two-timing men and broken-hearted women. Obviously, they haven’t seen Travis Tritt. Yes, he has ballads and drinking songs, […]

“At the end of the day, we’re all still a bunch of kids cause we play music for a living, right,” Samantha Fish says with a knowing laugh. Having been a musician since her teens, she is very familiar with life on the road, playing guitar and singing songs of her own creation. She was […]

Ask any guitar player about their favorite instrument and they will talk about it’s attributes like it was the most precious thing in the world to them. They detail it’s beauty using terms such as sexy and enchanting, how it’s soul is the real instigator of the songs the musician ends up creating with it, […]

If you ever wanted to watch a MasterClass, where the best of the best show you how it’s done, then sitting in the audience at the recent Chris Hillman, Herb Pedersen and John Jorgenson concert was exactly where you needed to be. When it comes to Mandolin, no one is better than Hillman; although Jorgenson […]