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I refused to part with my vocal CDs. Ditto for my LPs and 78s, though my only turntable was destroyed in transit. All that media plus eight large boxes of CDs and SACDs that inexplicably slipped…

In October 2022, a notable group of accomplished musicians including Lyle Lovett, Jason Isbell, Kacey Musgraves, Steve Earle, Bob Weir, Valerie June, Dwight Yoakam, and others gathered at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville to perform and record the soundtrack for the film You Got Gold: A Celebration of John Prine. The concert film, which began limited screenings across the US in May 2026, will continue to make the rounds of galleries and arthouse screens until its final dates in New York City leading up to the Christmas season.

Along with playing Prine's music…

Few bands are as, shall we say, onomatopoetic as The Claypool Lennon Delirium. The Delirium is the umbrella under which bassist/vocalist Les Claypool (Primus, Fearless Flying Frog Brigade) and guitarist/vocalist Sean Ono Lennon (The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger) gather occasionally and combine their creative forces to make some of the weirdest, wildest, wackiest soundscapes imaginable. Their latest—The Great Parrot-Ox and the Golden Egg of Empathy (Prawn Song/Chimera Music/ATO), a double album three-plus years in the making—includes 14 songs that hammer home the…

The Grateful Dead's recordings have been released so many times, in so many formats, that the rainbow of bears should be dancing in the shape of the international recycled symbol. Warner Music and Grateful Dead Enterprises are nothing if not persistent in monetizing their assets. Whatever new format or medium comes along, the Dead will always be a "content provider."

Just in the past decade, Workingman's Dead has been…

Playing the larger system in this Fidelity Imports room at Audio Advice Live 2026, I was impressed at how the components refused to dress up bad recordings—or put lipstick on a pig.

Vintage '80s prog rock sounded one-dimensional and flat, while modern country and jazz…

The Grateful Dead ushered in an era of open-minded experimentation and endless touring that paused occasionally but never really expired until its participants did. It follows that saying goodbye to cofounding Grateful Dead guitarist/vocalist Bob Weir, who passed away at age 78 on January 10, 2026, truly signifies the end of an era.

That phrase—the end of an era—gets thrown around too much when musicians of a certain stature die. But when it comes to Weir, one of the last, strongest, most direct connections to the mid-1960s migratory music movement…

This LP, which compiles material from two earlier Savant Records CDs, arrived the day before Sonny Rollins died. Even though Snidero plays alto, it reminded me of the great tenor player.

Why did it remind me of Sonny? I wasn't sure myself. I thought about it. The first reason, I think, is the ensemble sound. This is a…

More than two years after its Brooklyn premiere, Terry Riley's mesmerizing The Holy Liftoff receives a definitive multitracked recording by its commissioner, flutist Claire Chase, and the ever-adventurous JACK Quartet. The genesis and completion of the work is unusual even by the standards of the 90-year-old father of…

You're Gonna Need a Little Music is Yard Act's third album, and it's their first to be recorded together as a band in a studio. Their first two albums were made on laptops, each member recording their own piece separately. That may be what makes this their best album so far.

Their earlier work's directness and simplicity remain, but here it is fuller and more…