WMS

Giddens Rhiannon: They're Calling Me Home [Vinyl LP]

The newest album from Rhiannon Giddens', You're the One is her third solo studio album and her first of all original songs. This collection of 12 songs written over the course of Giddens' career bursts with life-affirming energy, drawing from the folk music that she knows so deeply, as well as its pop descendants. Produced by Jack Splash (Solange, Alicia Keys, Valerie June), You're the One features some of Giddens' closest musical collaborators from the past decade, including multi-instrumentalists Francesco Turrisi and Dirk Powell, bassist Jason Sypher, and Congolese guitarist Niwel Tsumbu. The album features electric and upright bass, conga, Cajun and Piano accordions, guitars, a Western string section, and Miami horns, among other instruments, capturing the inclusive spirit that channels through all of her work. <br/><br/>"I hope that people just hear American music," Giddens says. "Blues, jazz, Cajun, country, gospel, and rock-it's all there. I like to be where it meets organically. They're fun songs, and I wanted them to have as much of a chance as they could to reach people who might dig them but don't know anything about what I do. If they're introduced to me through this record, they might go listen to other music I've made with a different set of ears."

East-West / In My Own Dream / Keep On Moving / The Paul Butterfield Blues Band / The Resurrection Of Pigboy Crabshaw

Nearly sixty years after they first played together, Ry Cooder and Taj Mahal, longtime friends and collaborators, reunite with an album of music from two Piedmont blues masters who have inspired them all their lives: GET ON BOARD: The Songs of Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee. With Taj Mahal on vocals, harmonica, guitar, and piano and Cooder on vocals, guitar, mandolin, and banjo-joined by Joachim Cooder on drums and bass-they recorded eleven songs drawn from recordings and live performances by Terry and McGhee.

Nearly sixty years after they first played together, Ry Cooder and Taj Mahal, longtime friends and collaborators, reunite with an album of music from two Piedmont blues masters who have inspired them all their lives: GET ON BOARD: The Songs of Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee. With Taj Mahal on vocals, harmonica, guitar, and piano and Cooder on vocals, guitar, mandolin, and banjo-joined by Joachim Cooder on drums and bass-they recorded eleven songs drawn from recordings and live performances by Terry and McGhee.

Eric Clapton's lifelong passion for the blues burns brightly in Nothing But The Blues. The film - which was broadcasted once in the U.S. on PBS in 1995 and nominated for an Emmy® Award - has been upgraded to 4K for its long-awaited official release. Written and produced by Scooter Weintraub and executive produced by Martin Scorsese, the documentary includes an in-depth interview with Clapton conducted by Scorsese. Throughout the interview, Clapton discusses his love for the blues and the profound impact bluesmen like Muddy Waters and B.B. King had on his music. Many of those artists (Robert Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Buddy Guy, T-Bone Walker) appear in the film through vintage performances, interviews, and photographs. The film also features 20 previously unreleased live performances recorded in 1994 during the legendary guitarist's tour supporting From The Cradle, his Grammy-winning, multi-platinum blues album.

"On this record, I wanted to stretch," says Bonnie Raitt. "I always want to find songs that excite me, and what's different this time is that I've tried some styles and topics I haven't touched on before."<br/><br/>With Just Like That..., her first new album in more than six years, Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Raitt continues to draw on the range of influences that have shaped her legendary career, while creating something that speaks to the circumstances and challenges of these unprecedented times.<br/><br/>The title comes from a line in one of her new original songs ("Just like that your life can change"), which seemed especially fitting "because there's never been a time that made me look around and say, 'Nobody saw this coming'-where all of a sudden, everything shifted." <br/><br/>But the biggest surprises on Just Like That...are the four songs written by Raitt. "Living for the Ones," co-written with her longtime guitarist George Marinelli, is a rocking dedication to the friends and family she has lost in recent years, while the sardonic "Waitin' for You to Blow," about the devil on recovery's shoulder, is a funk/jazz hybrid inspired by Mose Allison, Les McCann and Eddie Harris, and '70s funk. "There's something thrilling about creating something brand new out of feelings and styles that have always run so deep in me," she says.<br/><br/>Two songs were inspired by real-life scenarios: "Down the Hall" began when Raitt read a New York Times story a few years ago about a prison hospice program, and the album's title track was sparked by a local news segment showing two families deeply impacted on both sides of an organ donation. <br/><br/>"These stories moved me deeply," she says. "And in the face of so much hatred and cruelty the last few years, these examples of redemption, and people acting out of love, were healing for me, and what I wanted to focus on and write about. <br/><br/>"I've always loved the early guitar songs of Dylan, Jackson Browne, Paul Brady, and especially John Prine," she adds. "With songs like 'Angel From Montgomery' and 'Donald and Lydia,' John was able to just climb inside and sing these people's lives. With his passing last year, his inspiration meant even more in writing these two songs."<br/><br/>Bonnie Raitt has never felt more grateful that she can continue making music, contributing to causes, keeping her crew working, and connecting with her audience. "I'm really aware of how lucky I am and I feel like my responsibility is to get out there and say something fresh and new-for me and for the fans," she says. "It's really daunting not to repeat yourself, but I have to have something to say, or I wouldn't put out a record."