Long Beard

In the blues world it's OK to be a late bloomer, and when it came to recording, Joe Beard was exactly that. The charismatic singer/guitarist, whose influences range from Jimmy Reed to Lightnin' Hopkins, worked "day gigs" when his kids were growing up and didn't start to build a catalog until he was in his fifties. Blues lovers who heard Beard's AudioQuest dates of the '90s found themselves saying, "Hey, this guy is very talented; why haven't I heard of him until now?" And, of course, the answer to that question is that his nine-to-fives and family life had kept him from being a full-time bluesman. But when his kids reached adulthood, the Mississippi native turned Rochester, NY, resident had more time to devote to music. Recorded in April 2000 (when he was 62), Dealin' is Beard's third CD for AudioQuest and underscores his ability to handle a variety of electric blues styles.

Spock's Beard are the quintessential American progressive rock band. Their music has consistently been brave, restless, and often visionary. On Snow, a double-CD concept album, they go for broke. Creatively, this is a new direction for the band in the sense that carrying out a sustained narrative of this magnitude stretches all compositional notion, as well as those surrounding production, arrangement, and consistency of voice. There is so much weight placed on each track to move a story forward, either expressionistically or narratively, that getting bogged down in it is always a risk. Happily, that is not the case here. Spock's Beard have taken all of their strengths instrumentally, lyrically, and vocally, and concentrated them in this effort about an albino boy on a noble, if idiosyncratic, quest. While concept albums have been done on much loftier notions, they seem to falter under their own weight, or the light of actual history…

Spock's Beard are the quintessential American progressive rock band. Their music has consistently been brave, restless, and often visionary. On Snow, a double-CD concept album, they go for broke. Creatively, this is a new direction for the band in the sense that carrying out a sustained narrative of this magnitude stretches all compositional notion, as well as those surrounding production, arrangement, and consistency of voice. There is so much weight placed on each track to move a story forward, either expressionistically or narratively, that getting bogged down in it is always a risk. Happily, that is not the case here. Spock's Beard have taken all of their strengths instrumentally, lyrically, and vocally, and concentrated them in this effort about an albino boy on a noble, if idiosyncratic, quest. While concept albums have been done on much loftier notions, they seem to falter under their own weight, or the light of actual history…

Spock's Beard began in 1992 when brothers Neal (lead vocals) and Al Morse (guitar) teamed up with drummer Nick D'Virgilio. After self-financing their first album, bassist Dave Meros joined, and The Light was recorded in 1994. Consisting of four lengthy songs, this debut album was well received by progressive rock fans, but received little public acclaim…

The musicians need no presentations and their play is as tight and inspired as usual. The quality is certainly as good as studio versions and in some cases higher…

The Light is the debut album from Spock's Beard, the Culver City, CA neo-prog rock band whose sprawling exercises in technical proficiency and suite-like compositions made them an underground legend almost immediately. One has to understand that The Light is nothing at all akin to anything being done in the mid-'90s. Yes hadn't yet made their full comeback, and the memories of Genesis with Peter Gabriel faded ever more pervasively form view with each subsequent Phil Collins solo release. Here are four sprawling, knotty, syncopated tunes, two of them, the title track and "The Water," are multiple-part suites that encompass no less than 48 minutes of the album's 67 minutes.

One of America’s premier Progressive Rock bands over the past two plus decades without question is Spock’s Beard. Forming in 1992, out in Los Angeles, CA, by brothers Neal and Alan Morse, Spock’s Beard has released 12 studio albums while building a reputation for their live performances. Speaking of which, they are no stranger to live albums, releasing a slew of them over the years, and now return with their latest, Snow Live…