CD Reviews

Eddie Lenhart’s first album was back in 2008; Levittown found the local Americana singer/songwriter singing country-pop influenced songs, many of them introspective. He followed up with 2011’s Darkness, similar with more stripped-down arrangements. Both times, Lenhart wrote the music and surrounded himself with top-notch San Diego musicians. Lenhart is back with the place to be, […]

Indian Joe is familiar to many Troubadour readers for contributing guitar and songs to the Ramona band Dusty and the LoveNotes. Joe is a committed electric guitar specialist whose forte is straight ahead blues-rock guitar, and his influences are easily identified in his music: Chuck Berry, Keith Richards, Johnny Winter, and Billy Gibbons. In 2014, […]

Berkley Hart are celebrating 20 years together, and by now many if not most good roots lovers in town can instantly recognize the sublime organic blend of their harmonies, the lyrical insights of Calman Hart in his many musical character studies, and the humor and soul in Jeff Berkley’s liberating country rock. Their new album, […]

The roots of acoustic blues guitar come from the river valleys of America’s heartland, where even earlier forms from Africa found their voice with the field workers a hundred years ago, in their churches and music shows. It was blue collar music, most often played on beat up instruments handed down or rescued from pawn […]

While not all songwriters have the gift to write instantly catchy songs, Dave Howard has no problem. He has written music for six CD releases since the early 1990s and has worked with a roster of top local roots artists, including Cathryn Beeks, Jeff Berkley, Lisa Sanders, A.J. Croce, Cindy Lee Berryhill, Jewel, Steve Poltz, […]

It is at times like these that I’m extremely glad that I did not follow the advice of Ms. Kemmer, my high school guidance counselor, that I did not go to med school and become a doctor, that law school and becoming a lawyer was left out of the picture for me, that I did […]

Christina Friis is from Denmark by way of New Orleans, and her debut album is The Quiet of Knowing: Joni Mitchell Unknown. Friis writes her own songs and has a number of impressive, Nola-based YouTube covers, but this album brings her together with Fallbrook’s Dave Blackburn, the producer and guitarist whose work with wife, Robin […]

Matthew Haynie hasn’t much of a local footprint, but he has been appearing with various outfits in North County (and as afar as Northern Arizona) for a while, playing original music best described as rock-oriented Americana with folk and country elements, mixing both acoustic and electric instruments. He also has put together a debut solo […]

Give San Diego vocalist Sharon DuBois substantial credit for Into Light, her latest self-released effort, which features superb production values from John Staten and a cast of revolving heavy hitters, including bassists Christian McBride, Mark Dresser, and Greg McKinney with saxophonist Eric Person, violinist Mary Oliver alongside local heavyweights like Joey Carano and Derek Cannon […]