Gary Hiland Trio

Catch Me

(Moondog Music)

Finnish Gary (real name Kari Kunnas) has impressive names Hi-Fly Rangers and Maibell & Misfires on his resume. So his papers are in soundly fractured order. Together now with slicked associates Janne and 'Dalle,' he locates finger-popping style with cooly understated bearing and articulates it with nonchalant fluency. (Look down the bar: Every guy staring wordlessly at the drink before him is deep in thought about a "Devil in High Heel Shoes." Whisperin' Bill once noted sagely "Honky Tonks are made for men with women on their minds.") 

Recommended: "Devil in High Heels," "Tomorrow," "Make with the Lovin'," "Keep Movin' On," "Shame," "Gipsy Woman," "Easy and Free," "Dirty Stroll"

Videos: "Devil in High Heels" (live 2026)   "Make with the Lovin'" (live 2024)   "Easy and Free" (live 2026)

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Swamp Music

Jungle Records

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Bear Family

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Train Holler

(Ditch Light Records)

When the night wind's just right, the scent of blood freshly spilled spreads for miles. Best not to ask after why, and just stay shed of it. Meanwhile, some of the finest stompdown (and darkly threnodic, when such is summoned) musicalizing that ever roused a barnful has come to call. If that don't beat the bugs bitin'. 

Recommended: "Killin' Kind," "View From the Ditch Light," "The Suitcase," "I Forsee," "Last Cattle Drink," "Calloused, Braised, and Marred," "Waterside Echo"

Videos: "Killin' Kind" (studio video)   "Last Cattle Drink"   "Waterside Echo"

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The Big Marteen's

Record Addict

(Sleazy Records)

Everything seizes attention at once: six strings erupting, high-and-mighty brass proudly abloom, skins slammed adamantly, and keys kicking up heels with massive exhileration. Comes brashly the voice, full of itself in the finest of manners; nary a note slighted, as tuneful bends unfurl. "Love and Compagny" conjures mesmerism with lower-case urbanity. A soothful moment amidst rumbustious schmozzle. As for "Good Rockin' Time" -- everyone's throwing wild on every instrument -- anyone who remembers the scene clearly wasn't really there. 

Recommended: "Big Lake," "Claudio," "Good Rockin' Time," "Record Addict," "Love and Compagny," "Bang Bang," "You Gave Your All to Rock'n'Roll"

Videos: "Big Lake"   "Claudio"   "Bang Bang"   "You Gave Your All to Rock'n'Roll"   

Facebook (Vince Bassou, guitar and vocals)

Sleazy

Beast Records

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Sasham Disques

Sweet Grooves Records

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Crazy Times Music

Juno

The Amazing Royal Crowns

Payback Live

(Kingdom Recordings/Monolyth Record Group)

Thundersome, torrential rainsquall Payback Live assumed shelf display in 2001. (It was preceded by the group's self-titled 1998 debut disc, and soon followed by Royal.) The live CD is now available in digital form on Bandcamp. Readers here will notice videos below are of mint vintage; having readopted original title, the Amazing Royal Crowns continue their Punk/Swing/'billy crusade, tearing up countryside and fortunate shoutalong fans alike. Fever recognizes no calendar page. (Early this year, the combo played shows w/saxman Tony from Hi Fi & the Roadburners.)

Recommended: "Baby's Out on Bail," "Shivering in the Corner," "Minute with the Maker," "Scene of the Crime," "Trouble at the Bali Hai," "Luckiest Man Alive"

Videos: "Baby's Out on Bail" (live 2025)   "Scene of the Crime" (live 2025)   "Luckiest Man Alive" (live 2026)

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Ruby Briggs

While at Sun, circa '56, Barbara Pittman waxed this (which she'd co-written with Stan Kesler). Miss Ruby is backed by gents of especial knacks, as she puts 100% into impassioned declarations. The lady means business. 

Video: "I Need a Man" (live at 2026 Rockabilly Rave)

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The Roundup Boys

So adrenalized was the jitter-jump, and so resplendent was it in neo-glad rags, that members couldn't help but shout along as styling, honed in nights of jukes and roadsters, slapped grins on every mug within dig-space. 

Video: "A Little Clock Rock" (live at 2026 Hot Rock n Boogie festival)

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Barrence Whitfield: It takes a savage man to lead a savage band

Perhaps it would be overly generous to remark that every generation has its Soul-shouting spectacle who tears up stages and reminds audiences how damn good it is to be alive, aware, and partaking of the hipness known only by the clever.

Golden eras of yore had Solomon Burke, the 'Wicked Pickett,' and Little Richard. The Hep-smart presently inhaling have Barrence.

He looms atop a recordings-stash (which dates back to 1984), and from that acme looses volleys of borderline unhingedness that is very much of old-school R&B manner, were said revered genre to stick a finger in a wall socket. 

In each ringing note, chunkablock chord architecture, and snapped-tight downbeat, thrives the bold truth that Barrence and the free-for-all roustabouts with whom he makes common wildside cause are so intimately proficient in and just plain in love with Rock'n'Soul's capacity for uplift that it would be an injustice of brobdingnagian proportion for them to be doing anything other than this right here.

Glory, his and the Savages' most recent wax, was issued in 2023 by Folc Records. Its 12 engravings make my above argument with staggering aplomb. "Bad Situation" commences bacchanalian matters with knees-high brass and percussive determination that wise folks shuffling in aisles expect from Barrence and gathered gang.

With trademark insistence (vented via yowling and gleeful whoops), the man whose name adorns the marquee cuts up without filter and at towerblock volume. In fact -- thankfully -- such is his way through and through.

The band that few others would even try to follow includes founding members and guest horns. Mere adjectives would surely falter in the task of conveying members' assorted front-of-class qualities. Listen for your own edification.

"Right Hand Man" and "I Do My Best to Survive" scatter audacious eminence across airspace, variously asserting sax blats, pumped-to-maximum rhythms, and wise-to-ways-of-nightlife guitar authoritativeness.

That's all in addition to Barrence's howling from the mountaintop. He's our season's Soul-shouting spectacle.

Videos: "Bad Situation"   "Right Hand Man"   "I Do My Best to Survive"   "I'll Be Gone"

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Just reissued by Cupcakes and Muffins is 2003's Strange Adventures, a collaboration between Barrence and former Radio King fret-massager Mike Dinallo. The two are billed as the Mercy Brothers. They are further enabled by Norwegian Blues guitar nobleman Vidar Busk. Material and performances here are much closer to orthodox Soul than Barrence and the Savages' boisterous ferality.