Way Sheen

Kim Richey celebrates the 20th anniversary of her album Glimmer with, A Long Way Back: The Songs of Glimmer, featuring new recordings of the songs from Kim's classic album. Whereas Glimmer, produced by Hugh Padgham, had a pop sheen to its sound, A Long Way Back. . . strips everything down to a more raw essence. Produced by Doug Lancio, who also plays most of the instruments, A Long Way Back. . . allowed Kim to reinterpret these songs and give them a fresh, yet timeless sound. Other musicians on the album include Nielsen Hubbard and Dan Mitchell.

Delivering powerful blues rock with a psychedelic sheen and a strong thread of improvisational imagination, Simo is a power trio from Nashville, Tennessee led by guitarist J.D. Simo. J.D. grew up in Chicago, Illinois, and developed a taste for the blues as a kid, listening to a Chess Records collection his sister often played. J.D. started playing guitar when he was five, and once talked his mom into taking him to see the abandoned Chess Records building on South Michigan Avenue. By the time he was 18, J.D.'s family was living in Arizona, and he was headlining clubs and playing festivals with his backing combo Dirty Pool; they issued an EP, Burnin' Live, which sold an impressive 5,000 copies as an independent release.

"On The Way To The Sky" is a fourteenth studio album released by Neil Diamond in 1981. It contained the hit "Yesterday's Songs", which reached #11 and the title track which peaked at #27 in the US. The album marked a transition into a period of creative and commercial decline for him that lasted, to one degree or another, until the release of the 2001 album "Three Chord Opera", followed by his collaboration with producer Rick Rubin and the release of 2005's 12 Songs and 2008's "Home Before Dark". While Diamond continued having some success, some significant periodic hits, and some television specials and film appearances, the period beginning with the release of "On The Way To The Sky" did not have for him the same level of sales, notoriety or fame that the preceding times did.

As a sometime member of Porcupine Tree and a resume containing being a guitar tech for Marillion, John Wesley certainly has the prog rock credentials so it’s no surprise to find he has carved a resolutely progressive career from his own music. From the Marillion aided Under The Red And White Sky through to 2014’s Disconnect, Wesley’s music has developed from emotionally wounded ballads to more esoteric fare. His influences may have always shone through, but along the way Wesley developed a sound of his own…