Based on the track Jackson, Kaitlin Butts is with us today (Ann Powers is equally responsible for her compelling copy, cited below). Red-headed young country singers may be a dime a dozen and sometimes end up at the bottom of the remainder bin, dead letter post office basement, Iowa City, Idaho.
Robert Cray is one of the defining voices of modern blues, a musician whose influence extends beyond technical prowess into storytelling. While many bluesmen lean heavily on tradition, Cray reshaped the genre’s future, fusing soul, R&B, and contemporary rock sensibilities into his sound.
In 1964, just four months before his sudden death in Berlin at the age of 36, Eric Dolphy recorded Out to Lunch!—an album that continues to rattle the walls of jazz orthodoxy. Released by Blue Note Records, it is the only album Dolphy made for the label, but it stands as one of the most important and uncompromising statements of the avant-garde jazz movement.