Listen, I’m a late arriver to the whole Silver Jews thing, but so what? I love this one. It’s that Smog style narrative starry eyed James McMurtry goes to Bonnie Prince Billy twangie stuff that makes the day goes so well and makes the urge to take my self serious get toned way down. Wham, bam, thank you Drag City Records in that urban trend vortex known as Chicago! Following after an earth-shaking release by Mr. Bonnie this is another blast of great music, great personalities and…well, what more could I want? Especially when it all comes fronted by a …

JJ Grey and his collection of sidemen known as Mofro are back in the racks, just a year-and-a-half after releasing “Country Ghetto,” their debut Alligator disc. Grey’s idiosyncratic vibe — a world-beating blend of Southern rock, blues and Florida swamp soul — enjoys a further refinement on “Orange Blossoms.” The title track opens the album, and it’s a killer tune that hooks the listener with the opening riff. A horn section figures prominently in this love’s-labor-lost remembrance, and as the CD unfolds, we find Grey getting his money’s worth out of his horn players. The bluesy slow joint “She Don’t …

It’s one of the lost classics of the ’60s, a psychedelic masterpiece drenched in colour and inspired by life, love, poverty, rebellion, and, of course, “jumpers, coke, sweet mary jane”. The album is Cold Fact, and what’s more intriguing is that its maker — a shadowy figure known as Rodriguez — was, for many years, lost too. A decade ago, he was rediscovered working on a Detroit building site, unaware that his defining album had become not only a cult classic, but for the people of South Africa, a beacon of revolution.

Sixto Diaz Rodriguez was born in 1942 …