
In high cotton: Charlie Musselwhite is thoroughly content with his return to the Delta. “We love living here,” he says. “It just makes sense, and it feels like the blues is alive and well in the Delta and you can just feel it rising up from the earth, it’s so present.”
On his new album, Mississippi Son, the harmonica giant steps out on guitar, evoking the legends of country blues 6-string and earning his place among them.
For Charlie Musselwhite, the blues isn’t just a style of music. It’s a sacrament. And Musselwhite is one of its high priests. With a palmful of bent notes on the harmonica—the instrument on which he’s been an acknowledged master for more than a half-century—or the fat snap of a guitar string, he has the power to summon not only the blues’ great spirits, but the places they rose from. If you listen closely, you can envision the Mississippi Delta’s plantation lands, where the summer sun forms a shimmering belt on the low horizon and even a slight breeze can paint your face red with clay dust. It’s a place both old and eternal—full of mystery and history and magic. And the music from that place, as Musselwhite sings in his new song “Blues Gave Me a Ride,” “tells the truth in a world full of lies.”
“Blues is the only thing I’ve ever wanted to play,” says Musselwhite, who is 78. “It’s more than just another kind of music. Whatever life throws at you, blues is there for you. It’s your buddy when you’re up and your comforter when you’re down, and it’s got this depth and substance that a lot of other music just doesn’t have. So, in that way, it has a sort of spiritual quality, and it really can be your partner in life. It gives you a way to go.”
Although Musselwhite’s parents moved him to Memphis from his native Kosciusko, Mississippi, when he was 3, the blues has, indeed, seemed to be his guiding hand ever since. Most recently, it’s led him to record Mississippi Son, the first of his more than 40 albums that is built around his guitar playing—spare as a skeleton’s rib cage, but as beautiful as a fresh magnolia blossom with hints of dust on its petals.
Charlie Musselwhite - Mississippi Son (Full Album) 2022
Slowly, over the past few decades, Musselwhite has been incorporating guitar into his live performances—sometimes in duets with his longtime compadre Elvin Bishop, who he met in Chicago in the early ’60s, just before integrated blues bands like those they would join and form began making mainstream albums. “Charlie’s guitar playing is way good,” says Bishop. “I really love the way he nails the old deep blues, the country blues. He only plays what’s necessary, and every note has nuance. His tone is dark and deep. He can play slide like Robert Nighthawk, and what Charlie does on the guitar has a good emotional effect on his music. It’s perfect for his singing and harp playing.”
Musselwhite’s life with the guitar and harmonica began when he was around 13. With an acoustic Supertone in hand, he discovered the E7 chord and the old-school Delta sound and began to learn songs like Mississippi Son’s “Pea Vine Blues.” With lyrics that illuminate how the lonesome sound of a distant train whistle can torture the brokenhearted, the song is prime country blues, first recorded by Charley Patton in 1929.
“At some point I remember coming to the realization that every culture probably has its music of lament.”
Luckily, Musselwhite had more than old shellac 78s to learn from. During his teenage and young adult years in Memphis, legendary artists like Furry Lewis, who by then swept Beale Street for a living, and Will Shade, the leader of the Memphis Jug Band, became mentors, cementing his love of the rural blues sound.
“I learned more about slide and open tunings from Furry, and regular tuning and harmonica from Will Shade,” Musselwhite says. He also met harmonica legend Big Walter Horton—a fellow acolyte of Shade’s—in Memphis, and Musselwhite would continue to be under Horton’s sway when he moved to Chicago in the late 1950s. Lesser-known artists like Willie Borum and Earl Bell were also part of Musselwhite’s education in the Bluff City. “I had no idea I was preparing myself for a career,” he says, chuckling. “I would have paid a lot more attention. I was just having fun. And I loved the blues and had to play it, but I didn’t know it was going to become my life and put me on the road.”
Out in front of Clarksdale, Mississippi’s Shack Up Inn, Charlie Musselwhite displays his Harmony Bobkat and steel slide, worn tight on his pinky.
Photo by Rory Doyle
Musselwhite left Memphis for practical reasons. “I’d been working around Memphis, doing construction work and different factory jobs and stuff, and the pay was so low, so I had done a little moonshining on the side, and one day I noticed the police were following me. I thought that was a bad sign. I’d been thinking about going to Chicago, because friends of mine had gone up and gotten jobs in these factories, and they’d come back to visit driving brand new cars ’cause they got paid so much better—and they had benefits. I’d never even heard of benefits before, so that’s why I went to Chicago—just like thousands of other people getting out of the South because it was economically depressed. I was looking for a better life.”
He found that, and a lot more. “I knew nothing about the blues scene there,” he continues. “I’d been told that anybody in the entertainment field either lived in Hollywood or New York City, and even though I had all these records that had Chicago written on ’em, with Vee-Jay and Chess labels, I thought, ‘Well, that’s just where they manufacture the records.’ I didn’t know that’s where all these guys lived. But lucky for me the first job I got in Chicago was as a driver for an exterminator, and I drove him all over Chicago, so I learned the city really well, really fast. Driving around, I started seeing posters and signs for guys like Muddy Waters and Elmore James, and I couldn’t believe it! All my heroes were right here in Chicago! So, I’d make a note of where these clubs were and at night I’d be hanging out listening to live blues right in front of my heroes that I only had records of before.”
For a spell, he lived in the basement of the now-historic Jazz Record Mart music shop, where he also occasionally worked, with the irascible 9-string-playing bluesman Big Joe Williams as his roommate. “Oh boy, you never knew what was going to happen,” Musselwhite offers. “We had a great time. I really wish I’d written down the stories that he told me. We’d go around town visiting friends and relatives, just like I did with Shakey—which is what they called Big Walter in Chicago—always looking for a little taste. That was kind of a common hobby among many of the older blues guys, and often we’d sit up late at night just drinking beer and Joe would be playing guitar and I would be playing harmonica with him, and he just seemed to enjoy doing that, so it was awful encouraging. I picked up little tips on his playing. Occasionally I’d pick up his guitar to try to play it, but, man, the strings were like cables. It was hard to even fret it, but he would play it like it was butter.”
Musselwhite and his manager and wife, Henrietta, have lived and learned in the court of blues royalty. The other gents in this photo are Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker.
Photo courtesy of Charlie Musselwhite
Williams’ guitar—albeit reduced to its original 6-string setup—makes a cameo on Mississippi Son, on “Remembering Big Joe,” an instrumental reflecting the savvy gutbucket style of the bluesman noted for the first recordings of “Baby Please Don’t Go” and “Crawling King Snake.”
“I just played off the top of my head, thinking about Big Joe, and that’s what came out,” says Musselwhite. “That’s what I remember him sounding like.”
In Chicago, Mussselwhite also had access to the canonical harmonica players of electric blues: Horton, Little Walter, Sonny Boy Williamson II, and his fellow young trailblazer, Paul Butterfield. And by the mid-’60s, Musselwhite’s own mojo was working. In 1965, he met producer Samuel Charters, who was making his influential Chicago/The Blues/Today! trilogy of recordings. Billed as Memphis Charlie, Musselwhite appeared with the Big Walter Blues Harp Band on the third volume. Later that year, Musselwhite played on John Hammond Jr.’s So Many Roads album, and a session of his own with Charters yielded 1967’s Stand Back! Here Comes Charley Musselwhite’s Southside Band.
Charlie Musselwhite’s Gear on 'Mississippi Son':
Back home in the Delta, Charlie Musselwhite plucks a Harmony Bobkat as he sits on the porch of a former sharecropper’s residence at a Clarksdale, Mississippi, hotel compound called the Shack Up Inn, where his live 2012 Juke Joint Chapel album was recorded.
Photo by Rory Doyle
Guitars
- Vintage Gibson L-4
- Harmony Bobkat
- 1967 Silvertone solidbody
- 1954 Gibson J-45
- Vintage Gibson L-7
Amps
- Laney A3012
Strings & Slide
- .011-gauge sets
- Steel slide
As luck, or, perhaps, the blues’ guiding hand, had it, the album arrived when freeform FM radio was an emergent force in American music and Musselwhite’s reputation spread throughout the country. Riding this acclaim, he relocated to San Francisco, where his bona fide sound was embraced by the rock counterculture scene anchored at the Fillmore West.
Since then, Musselwhite’s star has burned. At times more brightly than others, but he has consistently toured and recorded and remained not only in the eyes and ears of blues fans, but in the general music loving public’s. It’s not just a matter of his excellence—his ability to blow pure soul through his main axe’s tiny reeds. Musselwhite, despite his devotion to bone-deep blues, is no purist. Over the decades he’s collaborated and made albums with Bonnie Raitt, Flaco Jiménez, the Blind Boys of Alabama, John Lee Hooker, and Ben Harper, exploring jazz, gospel, Tex-Mex, Cuban, and other world musics.
“I discovered that a lot of music—flamenco, Greek, Arabic—has a sound or feel that reminds me of blues,” Musselwhite observes. “It’s got the same kind of heart— especially flamenco. If it ain’t blues, I don’t know what it is. It has that spirit, that same energy. At some point I remember coming to the realization that every culture probably has its music of lament. And there’s a guy on the corner singing about ‘my baby left me’ wherever you go in the world.”
“Every now and then I’d sneak in a track on an album where I was playing guitar. A lot of people never even realized it was me.”
Musselwhite has also hosted a series of world-class guitar players in his bands, from Harvey Mandel and Robben Ford in the ’60s, to Matthew Stubbs and Kirk Fletcher in recent years. “Every now and then I’d sneak in a track on an album where I was playing guitar,” Musselwhite says. “A lot of people never even realized it was me.”
Now, with Mississippi Son, the feline is out of the flour sack. And Musselwhite is back in his native state. He and his wife and manager, Henrietta, purchased a home in the blues mecca of Clarksdale, Mississippi, some years ago, but in 2021 they departed the West Coast to take up permanent residence in the small Delta burg with a downtown that looks frozen in 1966. In Clarksdale, Musselwhite befriended guitarist, songwriter, and producer Gary Vincent, and in 2012 Vincent produced Musselwhite’s live Juke Joint Chapel, at the hip local venue bearing that name.
This time, they regrouped in Vincent’s downtown studio, Clarksdale Soundstage. “With the pandemic, I had all this time on my hands, and Gary’s studio is three blocks from me. He’s got a ton of guitars, so I spent a lot of time over there playing them. At one point, he said, ‘Ya know, we should tape some of these.’ I said, ‘Yeah, go ahead.’ So, the album started spontaneously. We were just recording tunes for posterity.”
With a borrowed white Stratocaster, Musselwhite evokes the old school onstage at the Blues Cazorla Festival on July 22, 2011, in Cazorla, Spain.
Photo by Jordi Vidal
Posterity should be pleased. Mississippi Son’s 14 songs add up to one of the best new albums of country blues recorded in decades—since the early ’90s titles cut by Junior Kimbrough and R.L. Burnside for the Fat Possum label. But Musselwhite’s proclivity for acoustic and clean but lightly hairy electric guitars takes the sound back even earlier, to the days when Chess, Vee-Jay, and Sun were cutting records by artists straight out of the cotton fields. His repeated sliding chords and up-picking on the tunes “Hobo Blues” and “Crawling King Snake” evoke the spirit of John Lee Hooker, who cut their most famous versions. But many of the songs are Musselwhite originals with lyrics that also conjure visions of the Delta of yore, alluding to the ’Frisco (the St. Louis–San Francisco Railway), the itinerant bluesman’s life (the semi-autobiographical “Drifting from Town to Town”), and the endless flow of the Mississippi River.
Musselwhite is joined on five songs by drummer Ricky Martin and upright bassist Barry Bays, and he overdubbed his own harmonica. But some of the album’s most profound performances are just Musselwhite and his guitar. The heart-squeezer “The Dark,” a Guy Clark number, is especially hypnotic. As he lays out lightly surging riffs on the Gibson L-4 acoustic archtop that’s one of the album’s MVP 6-strings, he gently intones the lyrics in a way that transforms the small elements of a fading day—a June bug on a window screen, a dripping kitchen faucet, the Earth turning its back on the sun—into something existential. “One way or another,” Musselwhite observes in the third verse, “we’re all in the dark.”
The album’s other guitars were a 1967 Silvertone solidbody electric borrowed from the Clarksdale guitar shop Bluestown Music, a 1954 Gibson J-45, and the Gibson L-7 that belonged to Big Joe Williams. A tube-driven Laney A3012 was the amp Vincent used for Musselwhite’s guitar and harmonica. This model amplifier was made in the ’80s and ’90s and has four 12AX7 preamp tubes and two 6V6 power tubes, but in Musselwhite’s control it sounds like a vintage tweed Fender or a Valco Sears special—an old man of a soundbox with more than a hint of experience in its voice. Vincent recorded the amp with a Neumann U 87.
"I really love the way he nails the old deep blues, the country blues. He only plays what’s necessary, and every note has nuance.”—Elvin Bishop
Musselwhite’s tunings, besides standard, were textbook Delta blues. “Furry Lewis taught me Spanish and Vestapol,” he says, using the terms typically used to describe the open G (Spanish, or cross-tuning for minor-key variations á la Skip James) and open D/E families of tunings. After he plugs in, “I turn the treble all the way off and the bass all the way up, the mids about half-way, and I’m ready to go.” Pedals? Of course not.
When we spoke, Musselwhite had some dates on his schedule with Elvin Bishop, and both artists were looking forward to playing country blues—and especially some country blues guitar—together again, as they have intermittently since meeting in the music’s ultra-fertile ’60s Chicago scene.
“I loved the sound of Chicago blues and where it took the electric guitar, but I’ve always been a big fan of country blues guitar,” says Musselwhite. “There are so many subtleties in it. That’s where the real beauty of the blues is—in those subtleties … just listening to the way those guys accompanied themselves. One guy with a guitar: whether it’s John Lee Hooker or Lightnin’ Hopkins or Charley Patton. I love that stuff and so I guess that’s why I play like I do. I also knew a lot of the old-timers, and they weren’t shredders by any stretch of the imagination. That sound captivated me when I was a kid, and it still does.”
Charlie Musselwhite - Blues Up The River
Charlie Musselwhite plays his song “Blues Up the River,” from Mississippi Son, on a new Epiphone John Lee Hooker model Zephyr.
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Jason Isbell's first entirely solo acoustic album, Foxes in the Snow is set for release March 7. The first single, “Bury Me” is out now.
Foxes in the Snow was recorded in New York City at the famed Electric Lady Studios in October, 2024. Recorded entirely on the same all-mahogany 1940 Martin 0-17 acoustic guitar, and in the span of just five days, the album captures an artist at the peak of their powers; the virtuosic guitar playing and commanding vocal delivery on this collection is some of the most impressive of an already remarkable recording career. Isbell is one of the most highly lauded songwriters of his generation, and this stripped back, bare-bones format puts his immense talent for evocative storytelling and the complete mastery of his craft on full display.
This release marks Isbell’s first new music since the award-winning Weathervanes, with his band The 400 Unit, in 2023. Isbell’s breakthrough solo album, Southeastern, was released in 2013 and spawned a modern classic in “Cover Me Up”. Since then, he has gone on to win six GRAMMY Awards and broken records as the first artist to ever take home the trophy for Best Americana Album three times. He recently added ‘actor’ to his skillset with a formidable performance opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in Martin Scorsese's Killers Of The Flower Moon. He will next be seen in RZA's upcoming One Spoon Of Chocolate.
The album announcement follows news of an entirely solo US tour; An Intimate Evening With Jason Isbell kicks off on February 15th in Chicago. All dates below.
Foxes in the Snow
Foxes in the Snow Tracklist
1. Bury Me
2. Ride to Robert's
3. Eileen
4. Gravelweed
5. Don’t Be Tough
6. Open and Close
7. Foxes in the Snow
8. Crimson and Clay
9. Good While It Lasted
10. True Believer
11. Wind Behind the Rain
ALL TOUR DATES
Jan 16–20: Mexico City, Mexico - Súper Ocho
Jan 18: Mexico City, Mexico - Lunario del Auditorio Nacional
Feb 2: Berlin, DE - Columbia Theatre +
Feb 4: Cologne, DE - Kulturkirche Köln +
Feb 6: Amsterdam, NL - Paradiso +
Feb 10: London, UK - Barbican +
Feb 12: Dublin, IE - Vicar Street +
Feb 15: Chicago, IL - Auditorium Theatre +
Feb 16: Ithaca, NY - State Theatre of Ithaca +
Feb 17: Portsmouth, NH - The Music Hall +
Feb 18: Providence, RI - Providence Performing Arts Center +
Feb 20: Port Chester, NY - Capitol Theatre +
Feb 21: New York, NY - Beacon Theatre +
Feb 22: New York, NY - Beacon Theatre +
Feb 23: Princeton, NJ - McCarter Theatre +
Feb 27: Washington DC - Warner Theatre +
Feb 28: Washington DC - Warner Theatre +
March 1: Washington DC - Warner Theatre +
March 12: Oakland, CA - Calvin Simmons Theatre +
March 13: Oakland, CA - Calvin Simmons Theatre +
March 14: Los Angeles, CA - Walt Disney Concert Hall +
March 15: Santa Barbara, CA - Arlington Theatre +
March 20: Nashville, TN - The Pinnacle +
March 21: Nashville, TN - The Pinnacle +
March 22: Nashville, TN - The Pinnacle +
March 28: Nashville, TN - The Pinnacle +
March 29: Atlanta, GA - Fox Theatre +
April 3: Austin, TX - ACL Live at The Moody Theater
April 4: Austin, TX - ACL Live at The Moody Theater
April 5: Austin, TX - ACL Live at The Moody Theater
April 6: Durant, OK - Choctaw Grand Theater
April 8: Houston, TX - 713 Music Hall
April 10: Clearwater, FL - Ruth Eckerd Hall
April 11: St. Augustine, FL - St. Augustine Amphitheatre
April 12: Savannah, GA - Savannah Music Festival
April 13: Greenville, SC - Peace Concert Hall
April 15: Greensboro, NC - Steven Tanger Center for the Performing Arts
April 16: Columbia, SC - Township Auditorium
April 17: Nashville, IN - Brown County Music Center
April 30: Colorado Springs, CO - Sunset Amphitheater *
May 1: Denver, CO - Mission Ballroom
May 2: Denver, CO - Mission Ballroom
May 3: Morrison, CO - Red Rocks Amphitheatre *
May 5: Sandy, UT - Sandy Amphitheater
May 6: Sandy, UT - Sandy Amphitheater
May 7: Billings, MT - Alberta Bair Theater
May 9: Saskatoon, SK - TCU Place – Sid Buckwold Theatre
May 11: Edmonton, AB - Winspear Centre
May 12: Kelowna, BC - Prospera Place
May 13: Vancouver, BC - Orpheum
May 15: Walla Walla, WA - Wine Country Amphitheater
May 16: Spokane, WA - First Interstate Center for the Arts
May 17: Boise, ID - Outlaw Field at the Idaho Botanical Garden
May 19: Eugene, OR - Silva Hall
May 20: Portland, OR - Keller Auditorium
June 19: Telluride, CO - Telluride Bluegrass Festival
June 21: Cincinnati, OH - The Andrew J Brady Music Center
June 22: Cincinnati, OH - The Andrew J Brady Music Center
June 25: Milwaukee, WI - The Riverside Theater
June 26: Detroit, MI - Fox Theatre
June 27: Evansville, IN - Victory Theatre
June 28: Birmingham, AL - Coca-Cola Amphitheater @
July 4–5: Missoula, MT - Zootown Festival
July 9: Regina, SK - Conexus Arts Centre
July 11: Sioux City, IA - Orpheum Theatre
July 12: Rockford, IL - Coronado Theatre
July 14: Fort Wayne, IN - Embassy Theatre
July 15: Baltimore, MD - Pier Six Pavilion
July 16: Red Bank, NJ - Count Basie Center for the Arts =
July 18: Beech Mountain, NC - Beech Mountain Ski Resort
July 19: Richmond, VA - Allianz Amphitheater at Riverfront =
July 20: Charleston, SC - Charleston Gaillard Center
July 21: Wilmington, NC - Wilson Center at Cape Fear Community College
Aug 26: Perth, WA - RAC Arena ~
Aug 29: Brisbane, QLD - Brisbane Entertainment Centre ~
Aug 30: Sydney, NSW - QUDOS Bank Arena ~
Sept 2: Hobart, TAS - MyState Bank Arena ~
Sept 4: Adelaide, SA - Adelaide Entertainment Centre Arena ~
Sept 6: Melbourne, VIC - Rod Laver Arena ~
Sept 7: Melbourne, VIC - Rod Laver Arena ~
+ Jason Isbell Solo
* w/ Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway
@ w/ Band of Horses
= w/ Garrison Starr
~ supporting Paul Kelly
Tickets available HERE.
Adding to the line of vintage fuzzboxes, Ananashead unleashes a new stompbox, the Spirit Fuzz, their take on the '60s plug-in fuzz.
The Spirit Fuzz is a mix of the two first California versions of the plug-in fuzz used by Randy California from Spirit, Big Brother & The Holding Company or ZZ TOP among others, also maybe was used in the "Spirit in the Sky" song.
A handmade pedal-shaped version with less hiss and more low-end with modern fatures like filtered and protected 9V DC input and true bypass. Only two controls for Volume and Attack that goes from clean to buzzy fuzz with some fuzzy overdrive in-between, also it cleans well with the guitar's volume.
The pedal offers the following features:
- Two knobs to control Volume and Attack
- Shielded inputs/outputs to avoid RF
- Filtered and protected 9VDC input
- Daisy-chain friendly
- Popless True Bypass switching
- Low current draw, 1mA
Each of the Hornet 15 Li amplifiers is designed to leverage Mooer's digital modeling technology to provide 9 preamp tones based on world-renowned amplifiers.
This modeling amplifier comes in two colors (White, Black), each of which is paired with its own carefully curated selection of preamp models.
The modulation dial can be adjusted to choose between chorus, phaser, and vibrato effects, whereas the delay dial facilitates analog, tape echo, and digital delay. Also, the reverb unit includes room, hall, and church emulations, making sure that there is an atmosphere and effect chain that works for any practice scenario.
A unique feature of this amplifier is how it can be used in two modes: “Live” and “Preset” mode. When using Live mode, guitarists will be able to browse the device's built-in preamp tones, which they can then enhance if they wish to throw the effect units. In contrast, the "Preset" mode allows users to save these effects and dynamic parameter changes into each preset, enabling them to customize them without overwriting the originals.
As any good amplifier should, the Hornet 15 Li is complete with industry-standard features, such as three-band EQ adjustment dials, volume and gain dials, a 1/4" guitar input, and both an auxiliary input and headphone output. However, MOOER has gone above and beyond to pack the amplifier with several special features; for example, this modeling amp boasts separate tap-tempo buttons for both the modulation and delay units, in addition to a dedicated tuner button and function, allowing guitarists to use the device's screen to ensure their guitar tuning is precise. What's more, the Hornet 15 Li also supports Bluetooth input, meaning that any guitarist can stream their favorite songs and backing tracks directly to the amplifier, making practice sessions and rehearsals easier than ever.
Arguably, the most impressive feature of the Hornet 15 Li is the fact that, in addition to being powered by a mains supply, it can also operate on battery. The device is built with an integrated 4000mA.h lithium battery, empowering guitarists to practice guitar on the go for hours–even when there’s no power source nearby. Combining this with how the amp weighs just 2.9kg and comes with a built-in handle, it’s clear that MOOER had portability and convenience in mind when designing this product.
Features:
- Available in 2 colors (White, Black), each with its own selection of classic preamps
- 9 high-quality preamp models, each captured through MOOER’s MNRS technology (controllable through the 9-way tone rotary switch)
- Modulation effects unit (chorus, phaser, vibrato) and dial
- Delay effects unit (analog, tape echo, digital) and dial
- Reverb effects unit (room, hall, church) and dial
- Three dials for three-band EQ adjustment (treble, mid, bass)
- Gain and master volume dials
- Live/Preset mode toggle switch
- Tap tempo buttons and features for modulation and delay effects
- 15 watts of rated power, ideal for practicing
- Digital screen for displaying functional and tuning information
- Built-in digital tuner
- ¼” guitar input
- 3.5mm auxiliary input
- 3.5mm headphone output
- Bluetooth support for high-quality audio input playback, perfect for backing tracks
- Convenient handle for easy transportation
- Rechargeable 4000mA.h lithium battery for portable play
- Power switch for easy on/off control
The Hornet 15 Li is available from distributors and retailers worldwide now.
Did Holdsworth's fretboard wizardry make him the Coltrane of the guitar? And more questions that emerged as we did our deep dives.
Here at 100 Guitarists, we thought we knew a lot about Allan Holdsworth. But after we did our deepest of dives, we only emerged with more questions: Was Holdsworth the John Coltrane of the guitar? Was he the quintessential fusion guitarist? Why isn’t there a Holdsworth signature Synthaxe? And how do you read his weird chord charts?
We might not have all the answers—and when it comes to his chord charts, we definitely do not—but we’re taking some big swings. We also share our top picks, which includes Tony Williams rippers, slick Ted Templeman-production, and a Beatles cover.
In our current listening segment, we’re talking about a Wayne Horvitz/Bill Frisell archival release and Jersey Boys.