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Over the years, going as far back as Blind Lemon Jefferson, who tragically died in a snowstorm a few days before Christmas in 1929, blues men and women have sung about the holiday season while playing the blues.

This week’s Rush Hour Blues digs into Santa’s sack of bluesy Christmas tunes. Join Sacramento’s K-ZAP this Friday, 5p as your host Bill Prescott plays some of the best blues Christmas songs ever.

RHB is sponsored by @blackrockauto, 1313 C Street, Sacramento. “They can do stuff.” 

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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@theblackcrowes enjoy Grammy Awards love again several decades after first nomination

The first time Chris and Rich Robinson were at the Grammy Awards, it was 1991. The New York Giants had won the Super Bowl, and the U.S. was in the midst of the Gulf War.

The siblings behind the band The Black Crowes had just released their debut album “Shake Your Money Maker” and were nominees for best new artist. They didn’t have high hopes. Sure enough, Mariah Carey would take the crown.

The Black Crowes’ rollicking “Happiness Bastards” is up for best rock album against “Romance” by Fontaines D.C., “Saviors” by Green Day, “TANGK” by IDLES, “Dark Matter” from Pearl Jam, “Hackney Diamonds” by the Stones and “No Name” from Jack White.

“To be in a place where it’s all clicking and it all feels right, that’s the real special feeling,” says Chris Robinson. “I think it reinforces our commitment and where we’re going.”

“Happiness Bastards” is a 10-track romping tour of rock, from the Southern boogie of “Rats and Clowns” to the stuttering stomp of “Cross Your Fingers” and the airy cool of “Wilted Rose.”

There’s blues harmonica, some glam rock, ‘70s harmonies and fun AC/DC-like riffs.

“It’s funky and it’s rockin’ and it’s kind of a little bit salty here and there. But ultimately, I think it’s very interesting,” says Chris Robinson. “It’s just integrated with everything that we’ve done and where we’re going.”

The band last released a studio album in 2009, and the volatile Robinson brothers needed a decade apart before they regrouped in 2019.

Critics have welcomed the brothers back, with Paste magazine calling the new album “a respectable collection of bluesy rockers that showcase the brothers’ strengths” and Rolling Stone describing it as “fun, energetic and, unmistakably not-crusty.”

“Well, we did it and we’ve been successful. And all these years later we wrote these new songs and, boom, here we are,” says Chris Robinson. “The validation of that is really unique to us.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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@chrissiehyndemusic Apologizes to Fans After Divisive Live Show Policy, Says Phones at Concerts Makes Her Want To Hang Up Her Guitar

Chrissie Hynde always knew the rockstar life was for her. Growing up near Akron, Ohio, she moved to London in May 1973 at just 21 years old. Five years later, Hynde formed The Pretenders with lead guitarist James Honeyman-Scott, bassist Pete Farndon, and drummer Martin Chambers.

However, Hynde made waves in October 2024 when she announced The Pretenders’ divisive new live show policy. Now, the 73-year-old rock vocalist has taken to social media to clarify her stance on the matter, as well as share her feelings about seeing phones at gigs.

The Pretenders kicked off an almost exclusively sold-out tour of the United Kingdom in October 2024. That same month, Chrissie Hynde stirred up quite the controversy when she announced that the band would remove concertgoers from the front row if they attend more than one show.

This message came to the chagrin of many listeners, some of whom accused Hynde of kicking her most devoted supporters “in the teeth.” Taking to social media Tuesday (Dec. 17), the “Brass in Pocket” singer reiterated that she and her bandmates made the decision in the spirit of equity.

“I will reinstate that we love to see people come back for more, but we travel the world to play to a new audience each night, so it’s good to see the locals up front,” she wrote. “Come one and all…… but be fair!”

In the post, Chrissie Hynde also explained why she often asks crowd members to stow away their phones during live performances.

“There’s no way to explain how distracting it is and why I have a meltdown when I see a phone,” she wrote. “Every night I come off stage scolding myself and saying it’s just not worth it and maybe it’s time to hang up the guitar and find another vocation. But I love the band and I love playing live for you. I just don’t like being stalked.”

“I know pop acts encourage phones because they want to be on social media,” she said. “But we are not a pop act.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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Michael Brewer of Brewer & Shipley Dead at 80

While exploring a career in the music industry, Michael Brewer worked with songwriters and musicians like Billy Mundi and Tom Mastin. Although finding some success, Brewer found his calling when joining forces with his old friend Tom Shipley. Commanding the stage as the folk-rock duo Brewer & Shipley, the singers used their vocal harmonies to sing about social issues at the time. Spending several years together, the duo gained fame thanks to the hit song “One Toke Over The Line.” While leaving his mark on the industry, Brewer recently passed away at 80 years old. 

Reports indicated that Brewer spent the last few years battling numerous illnesses. While at his home in Missouri, Brewer passed away on December 17th. With the news of his death making headlines, Shipley took a moment to share a picture and honor his late friend. He wrote, “Michael Brewer, my friend of 65 years and music partner for over 60, had to go. I saw him on Saturday at Cox Hospital in Branson and he told me he wanted to go home. He was weak and very tired. They took him home on Sunday and his wife Scarlett called this morning to tell me he was gone.”  

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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How @johnnywinterofficial Crafted a Masterpiece in ‘Second Winter’

In late October 1969 when Beaumont-born bluesman Johnny Winter released “Second Winter,” arguably the pinnacle of his long and storied career.

Either way, the talented six-string phenom grasped this opportunity and let loose a powerful display of fret prowess across all three vinyl sides of “Second Winter.” As anyone with a prized original copy, or a long memory, can tell you, the album was released as a rare three-sided set, the product of an inspired Nashville recording session that yielded too much great material to be pared down into a regular two-sided LP but not quite enough for a four-sided double.

So, rather than short-change fans or themselves, Winter and his bandmates — bassist Tommy Shannon (who later joined Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Double Trouble), drummer Uncle John Turner and keyboard-and-sax-playing little brother Edgar — released the bulk of the sessions and left side four blank.

Winter starts it all off by showing off his soulful voice on a cover of Percy Mayfield’s “Memory Pain,” before he surrenders the spotlight to Edgar’s nimble keys on the self-penned “I’m Not Sure.” It wraps with a strangling of his Gibson Firebird’s neck on Dennis Collins’ “The Good Love.”

Side two, somewhat surprisingly, turns into an old-time ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll dance party, as Winter wails his way across classics like “Slippin’ and Slidin”’ and “Miss Ann” (both made famous by Little Richard), and Chuck Berry’s ripping “Johnny B. Goode.”

But the biggest surprise was saved for last: a reinvention of Bob Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited” featuring a slide-guitar tour-de-force that would go down as a highlight of Winter’s career.

Side three shifts the focus back to Winter’s songwriting, including the amusingly contradictory “I Love Everybody” (another slide-swathed standout) and “I Hate Everybody” (a jazz-based departure) sandwiching the tongue-in-cheek “Hustled Down in Texas,” and the experimental “Fast Life Rider.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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‘In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida’ the Iron Butterfly album is a melee of contradictions.

It’s a huge hit, but it is 17 minutes long. It defines the loud voice of counterculture, but it’s largely instrumental. It’s a staple of psychedelia that references the Latin Mass rhythms of the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Bachian geometry of ‘feminine’ classical melodies. And it sold over 30 million copies, despite the band not knowing they were being recorded.

The anthem is an oddity that stands alone, with references in The Simpsons still sporting its relevance and new revelations revealing its enigmatic nature. Beyond its prominent position in pop culture, helping to usher avant-garde acts towards the reality that there was a weird bridge to the mainstream to be found somewhere, and its soloing ways bringing about heavy metal.

Now, the song not only remains one of the best-selling records of the era, but it is also one of the most widely covered and sampled songs in the entire psychedelic rock cannon. It is a phenomenon quite out of the ordinary—a huge hit that defies every rule of what a hit should be.

The sound of summer 1968, these days its reputation is predicated on the sprawling title track, which takes up the whole of the second side of the vinyl version. A cultural phenomenon, the track is far from the sole positive on an album where dysfunctional psychedelia meets a pumping garage sound.

They’re generally dismissed in the shadow of the Himalayan range that is In-A-Gadda…, yet those five three or four minute poppier songs stand up well today and are rather fun. Their acid-licked sunshine serves as a radiant counterbalance to their negative’s majestic gloom. “Flowers And Beads, “My Mirage” and “Are You Happy” are content to have their own summer of love whether anyone else is playing along or not.

It may have been a freak, but it’s still a beautiful monster.

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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‘Talk is Cheap’: The album that liberated @officialkeef

As with many other great bands, The Rolling Stones were forged on an excellent songwriting partnership. Under the musical guidance of Keith Richards and the lyricism of Mick Jagger they cemented their place as being one of the finest rock groups ever with their continued exceptional work in the decades after, and the band continue to work with the duo at their core to this day.

However, no matter how strong their songwriting became as a pair, their relationship had its ups and downs, and Richards and Jagger were known for falling out with each other on a regular basis by the mid-1970s.

Things got especially heated in the ‘80s, where Richards felt as though his contributions to the band were being suppressed, and despite his best efforts to overcome battles with addiction, Jagger was becoming increasingly controlling due to his distrust of his bandmate for his erratic past.

By 1988, Richards decided to venture out on his own to put together a solo record, something that Jagger had already done by this point.

In an effort to express the creative freedom he felt he wasn’t getting in The Stones at that moment in time, he assembled a band to work on “Talk is Cheap.”

In an interview with Mojo in 1997, Richards explained how it felt to finally take the leap into working as a solo artist, and by this point, he had also released a second album, “Main Offender,” in 1992. “My job up to that point had been writing songs for Mick to sing,” Richards told the magazine. “I’d been confining songwriting to that point of view. So I guess really what “Talk Is Cheap” did for me was that suddenly I could take them in my direction.”

The songs, even by Richards’ own admission, weren’t so remarkably different from what he had previously contributed to The Rolling Stones. “Most of the songs Mick could have sung,” the guitarist conceded, “But they wouldn’t have taken such funny, quirky leaps because I just sing differently and I hear different melodies.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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The Late @jeffbeckofficial Reveals He ‘Couldn’t Deal’ with the ‘Looseness’ of Mick Jagger and @therollingstones

Jeff Beck, one of rock’s most celebrated guitarists, has opened up about why he never became a member of The Rolling Stones

He was candid about his reasons, explaining that he didn’t want to become part of the Stones’ established routine, which often involved performing their biggest hits. “I didn’t want to spend my life playing ‘Brown Sugar,’” Beck continued.

Beck’s disinterest in joining the Stones was not just about the music itself but also about their approach to rehearsals and band dynamics. According to Beck, the Stones’ informal rehearsal environment didn’t sit well with him. “I couldn’t deal with their looseness,” he recalled. “I was rehearsing with the Stones and I hardly ever saw Mick Jagger.” Beck noted that when Jagger did arrive, someone else would leave, making the process feel chaotic.

Beck, who had always valued discipline in his work, found this approach frustrating. “I’m there to work, and they’re going: ‘Shall we pop over to Las Vegas, or Barbados?’ No! I like to have bottled attention and discipline.” He further elaborated, “Get the damn thing done, and then you can mess around. It was crazy.”

Despite Beck’s decision to not join the Stones, the legendary guitarist’s talent did not go unnoticed by those within the band. In 2023, Stones guitarist Keith Richards reflected on the rumors surrounding Beck’s attempt to join the band. “We felt that Jeff had his own furrow to plow and that he was not a team man,” Richards told Guitar Player magazine. “He was a soloist to the max. He was such an individualist. It wouldn’t have worked with the Stones at all. We’re all about teamwork.”

While Beck never became a full-time member of The Rolling Stones, his influence on rock music is undeniable. As a solo artist and a sought-after collaborator, Beck’s distinctive playing style — marked by his use of the tremolo bar and his pioneering work in jazz fusion and blues rock — earned him a place among the most respected guitarists in history.

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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Details on this benefit event to support Brian McKenna on Monday, December 23rd at Harlow`s can be found on our events page at:
https://k-zap.org/event/special-benefit-show-for-brian-mc-kenna-an-open-jam-to-power-his-recovery …

More than 30 minutes of live @blacksabbath footage from 1976 has appeared online

The video was shot on the band’s “Technical Ecstacy” tour show at the 10,000-capacity Selland Arena in Fresno, CA, USA, on November 9 1976, a night when they were supported by Boston and Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band.

Black Sabbath played 14 songs on the night, and six of those are featured in the clip: “Symptom of the Universe,” “Snowblind,” “All Moving Parts (Stand Still),” “War Pigs,” “Gypsy” and “Children Of The Grave.”

Of those songs, “Children Of The Grave” has been available on YouTube since 2017 via the account of Reelin’ In The Years, a production company that licences live music and interviews for use in feature films, documentaries, TV commercials, DVDs, CDs, museum exhibitions and concert tours.

“For the “Technical Ecstasy” tour we didn’t have a very big production, just musical equipment, a snow machine and dry ice,” wrote Tony Iommi, in his book Iron Man: My Journey Through Heaven and Hell with Black Sabbath. “Nothing fancy, no coming in through the stage or flying in from the rafters. But Bill had this brilliant brainwave of having a big sea shell built behind his drums.

“It was made out of fibreglass and it was loud, as it projected the sound. And every night he had tons of fresh flowers around his kit as well. He started getting more loony, but the shell was better than his original idea, where he wanted all these tubes around his kit with water going through it, changing colour. He had all these fancy ideas. They were great until you tried to get them to work: impossible.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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Mike Rutherford reveals his secret studio sessions with @eddievanhalen – and sheds light on their unreleased songs

Van Halen had just come across Rutherford’s second solo album when he called the Genesis co-founder to collaborate.

Genesis co-founder and @officialmatm Mike Rutherford has revealed that he owns a tape of songs he recorded with Eddie Van Halen back in the mid-1980s. Reflecting on this perhaps unlikely collaboration, Rutherford discusses his relationship with Van Halen and sheds light on how these recordings – never released publicly – came to be.

“I think Eddie heard a song from my second solo album [1982’s “Acting Very Strange”]which I sang – God knows how I thought of this! – and he rang me up and said, ‘Will you do some writing?’ I mean, my voice for God’s sake!” he says on My Planet Rocks.

Rutherford and his gear made their way to Los Angeles, ready to get to work. However, Van Halen had other plans. “He says, ‘Hey Mike, come over about 1:30.’ And I thought, ‘Well, that’s going to work for me, a little lunch.’ [Eddie says] ‘a.m.’ He starts at nighttime and works through the night. I just couldn’t really do that.”

As for what exactly emerged from these nocturnal studio sessions, Rutherford remains vague. “We had some sessions. We wrote some songs. Bits. I’m not quite sure… I can’t find the tape. Quirky stuff, but it was fun to do.”

And if any Van Halen fans are expecting these lost tracks to come out anytime soon – well, don’t get your hopes up. As Rutherford explains, “I’ve got two boxes of cassettes. I’m not sure I’m mad enough to go through them! Lots of cassettes.”

He concludes, “But it was fun. I mean, he was a great player. We did some good time (in the studio) but it’s that starting at 1:30-2 a.m. in the morning. It’s not my mode!”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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‘The Second Arrangement’: The long-lost @steelydan_official song

One of the crushing creative and professional issues for the band was that three-quarters of a song that was touted as a single from “Gaucho””The Second Arrangement’, was accidentally erased by an engineer, who producer Gary Katz had asked to ready it for listening.

Not only did Katz and the band’s trusty primary engineer, Roger Nichols—who worked on all seven of their albums—think the song was an instant classic, but they’d already spent 80 thousand dollars and many months of their time on it. The news destroyed everyone who had worked on it.

Steely Dan, in their typically mischievousness, added to the demand. They have only performed ‘The Second Arrangement’ live once, which was at New York’s Beacon Theatre in 2011. Before playing it, Donald Fagen said: “We tried to reconstruct it, but we just didn’t have the heart to do it over.”

Luckily for fans, in August 2020, Nichols’ daughter, Cimcie, posted a photograph of an old cassette to his fan account. She had found it while archiving his possessions, and within an hour, the news spread to Reddit and started making waves among Steely Dan fans. People couldn’t believe it, it is a never-heard-before recording of ‘The Second Arrangement’, and a nearly complete one at that.

While Roger died of pancreatic cancer in 2011, aged 66, the cassette wasn’t thrown away by his family because of its sentimental value; it had his handwriting on it. Due to the pandemic, Cimcie couldn’t get the tape, which was falling apart, remastered and had to wait until 2021.

That wasn’t all. A short time later, it was revealed in the Steely Dan newsletter that Cimcie had discovered another tape with “2nd Arrangement” on the label. Apparently, it sounds even better than her previous discovery. 

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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Tango in the Night,’ Fleetwood Mac’s Ultra-Successful Last Gasp Before Lindsey Buckingham Split

In 1987 @lindseybuckingham started working on music he assumed would be the basis for a new solo album. But Mick Fleetwood, who was helping out on the sessions, convinced Buckingham to pivot instead to creating a new record with the band.

Buckingham capitulated, but it was clear he would be in charge. To that end, the bulk of the music created for “Tango in the Night” came at his home studio. The rest of the band, wary that close quarters might lead to conflicts, parked an RV nearby as a kind of way station they could use while recording was in progress.

At the time, each and every member of the band was dealing with personal problems, with substance abuse issues the main culprit. In particular, Stevie Nicks had kicked a drug habit, but alcohol problems popped up. Coupled with the fact she was also touring her last solo record, she wasn’t much of a presence at all in the sessions. Buckingham often cut her backing vocals when they weren’t up to snuff.

The odd thing about “Tango in the Night” is even though it was made by the band at its most fractious, it ended up sounding as upbeat and together as anything in the band’s catalog. Buckingham’s ability to layer vocals had a lot to do with that. Even when there are only three band members singing, it sounds like there are about 50.

It’s hard to argue with the colorful sound created on the hit singles. And they’re a sharp bunch: Buckingham’s brooding “Big Love,” Nicks’ ebullient “Seven Wonders,” and Christine McVie’s hook-filled “Little Lies” and “Everywhere.”

Unsurprisingly, not all the album tracks stand out in the same way. But “Tango in the Night” ends strong. “When I See You Again” sounds like one last tortured conversation between Nicks and Buckingam, before the latter sends things out on a breezy, hopeful note with “You and I, Part II.”

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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‘Peace & Love For Christmas’: Lennon, Harrison, Clapton, Moon, And More

The UNICEF event featured @johnlennon and @georgeharrisonofficial’s first scheduled performance since The Beatles’ last concert in 1966, and Lennon’s last UK live appearance.

A historic concert that, surprisingly, sometimes goes under the radar in the history of some British rock royalty took place at London’s Lyceum Theatre on December 15, 1969.

It was a charity event for UNICEF, the United Nations’ international fund, called Peace and Love for Christmas. The concert marked the live debut of the extended Plastic Ono Band, on this occasion featuring the incredible line-up of John Lennon, Yoko Ono, George Harrison, Eric Clapton, Delaney & Bonnie, Billy Preston, and various other Beatles and Clapton alumni, with a brief appearance by Keith Moon.

The concert turned out to be Lennon’s last live appearance in his home country.

The concert took place during a period when Harrison and Clapton were touring as part of Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, as they were billed. The Lyceum stage was adorned with a giant “War is over” message banner, previewing the sentiment of John and Yoko’s subsequent Christmas single.

This supergroup performed Lennon and the Plastic Ono Band’s then-current single “Cold Turkey” and its B-side “Don’t Worry Kyoko (Mummy’s Only Looking For Her Hand In The Snow),” both in extended versions.

Lennon is quoted, by The Beatles Bible and elsewhere, expressing his enthusiasm for the night. “I thought it was fantastic,” he said. “I was really into it. We were doing the show and George and Bonnie and Delaney, Billy Preston and all that crowd turned up. They’d just come back from Sweden and George had been playing invisible man in Bonnie and Delaney’s band, which Eric Clapton had been doing, to get the pressure off being the famous Eric and the famous George.

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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Spirit‘s ‘Nature’s Way’ Became a 1970s Rock Anthem and Classic-Rock Radio Staple

“Nature’s Way,” the acoustic-based cautionary tale from Spirit’s 1970 psychedelic album “Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus,” echoed that haunting refrain, “It’s nature’s way of telling you, something’s wrong.”

The album, a loose-knit sci-fi concept album, became the best-selling album by one of the best, most eclectic and least appreciated West Coast bands of the 1960s and ’70s rock era. Neil Young cohort David Briggs produced the record.

The album continues to have an impact: Walter Becker of Steely Dan, who lived in the same apartment building as Randy California, reportedly has credited the Spirit guitarist’s bluesy style as a major influence and has noted that Spirit’s jazz-inflected prog-rock paved the way for Steely Dan’s distinct 1970s pop sound (many have noted the similarity between the piano figure that opens “Space Child” and the intro to Steely Dan’s hit “FM”).

More recently, the lo-fi indie-rock icon Sam Beam of Iron & Wine shaped part of his song “Wolves” after “Prelude—Nothing to Hide,” from “Twelve Dreams,”and both hip-hop star Common and rocker Pink have sampled Spirit recordings.

Spirit’s lineup was a musically diverse bunch. Ed Cassidy, who was guitarist Randy California’s stepfather, had played drums for Thelonious Monk, Roland Kirk and other jazz greats.

He was a founding member—along with Taj Mahal and Ry Cooder—of the Rising Sons. Keyboardist John Locke also had strong jazz roots. While vocalist and percussionist Jay Ferguson was classically trained and immersed in bluegrass before turning to rock and then film and TV composing (most recently, he wrote the theme to the hit TV series The Office).

At 15, Randy California (nee Randy Craig Wolfe) played guitar for Jimmy James and the Blue Flames, the New York band led by Jimi Hendrix—Hendrix dubbed him Randy California to avoid confusing him with another band member.

In 1997, Randy California drowned while saving his 12-year-old surfer son from a riptide near a friend’s home in Molokai, Hawaii.

Catch the stream at k-zap.org, on the k-zap apps or at 93.3 FM in the metro Sacramento area.
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