Caropop

I first noticed Marc Ribot’s slinky, spiky guitar playing as “Jockey Full of Bourbon,” from Tom Waits’ Rain Dogs, slithered over the opening of Jim Jarmusch’s Down By Law. Rain Dogs was a breakthrough for Ribot, who previously had played in Brother Jack McDuff’s soul-jazz band, backed Wilson Pickett and Solomon Burke, and been a member of the Lounge Lizards. More Waits collaborations followed, as did work with Elvis Costello, Sam Phillips, McCoy Tyner, Yoko Ono, Robert Plant and Allison Krauss, Elton John and Leon Russell, and many others. Here Ribot reflects on his robust studio-musician and solo career; his love of Latin American music; the creative leeway that Waits, Costello and others gave him; the impact of producers such as T Bone Burnett and Hal Willner; his decision to sing lead for the first time on his long-gestating 2025 album, Map of a Blue City; and his fight for indie musicians’ rights with the Music Workers Alliance. (Photo by Eric van den Brulle.)

In our annual check-in with renowned mastering engineer Kevin Gray, he reflects on a very busy 2025 that included his Rhino High Fidelity versions of Fleetwood Mac and Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks’ long-out-of-print Buckingham Nicks. How did Gray and fellow mastering engineer Chris Bellman feel about Rhino releasing separate versions of Buckingham Nicks mastered by each of them? Gray also discusses the Rhino High Fidelity John Coltrane: 1960-1964 Mono box, for which he revisited some albums he’d previously mastered in stereo. Gray's RHF version of T. Rex’s Electric Warrior followed the label’s reel-to-reel tape release of that album—which should sound better? Of course, we had to address the hullabaloo sparked by Gray’s comments on Caropop a year ago criticizing the One Step pressing process. Was he surprised? Does he feel vindicated? Other topics covered: Gray’s Blue Note Tone Poet work with producer Joe Harley; the jazz albums Gray is recording and releasing on his Cohearent Records label. What’s in store for 2026?

Mitch Easter and Don Dixon, accomplished producers and performers on their own, came together to produce one of rock’s greatest debut albums, R.E.M.’s Murmur. That 1983 classic plus the preceding, Easter-produced EP, Chronic Town, have gotten the all-analog, One Step treatment in a numbered, limited-edition vinyl release from Interscope-Capitol’s Definitive Sound Series. We reunited Easter and Dixon to discuss the making of Murmur plus the follow-up they produced, Reckoning. What did they each bring to the process? Why does one of them consider Murmur to be the Dark Side of the Moon of the New Wave era? What had changed by the time they recorded Reckoning? Easter also talks about working again with R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck and bassist Mike Mills on the latest Baseball Project album, and Easter and Dixon offer details about Murmur that even this longtime R.E.M. fanatic found revelatory. (You’ll never hear “Radio Free Europe” or “Perfect Circle” in the same way.)

Robyn Hitchcock turned 14 in 1967, the year that blew his musical mind open. This English boarding school student and future singer-songwriter-musician already looked to Bob Dylan for the meaning of life when along came the psychedelic train powered by the Beatles, the Syd Barrett-led Pink Floyd, the Jimi Hendrix Experience, the Kinks, the Incredible String Band and much more. Hitchcock reflects on his awakening with a vivid memoir, 1967: How I Got There and Why I Never Left, and a mostly acoustic, mostly covers album, 1967: Vacations in the Past. Here we bat around perhaps the most creatively explosive year in the rock era, and he applies his whirligig mind to such questions as whether the music of 1967 would have had such an outsized impact on his own music if not for where, how and at what age he experienced it. He also discusses the newly remixed, remastered version of his 1988 album Globe of Frogs.

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Many of us first heard Wesley Stace on the 1990 album Here Comes the Groom that he recorded as John Wesley Harding, the name taken from Bob Dylan’s stripped-down late-1967 album that itself misspelled a Texas outlaw’s name. The English singer-songwriter has enjoyed a robust folk-rock career as Harding but also has written four acclaimed novels under his own name and began recording albums without the pseudonym in 2013. Still, he recently performed as John Wesley Harding at a Wild Honey Foundation tribute concert to Warren Zevon and on his own tour. Here he discusses where Harding ends and Stace begins (or vice versa), how he evolved as an artist, why he mined Frank Capra projects for early album titles, what Zevon once told him, how he reacted to not-so-nice comments from Elvis Costello and why he decided to become a U.S. citizen in 2025. Stace, no surprise, is as thoughtful and witty in conversation as in song. (Photo by Ebet Roberts)

Dave Specter didn’t pick up a guitar till his late teens, yet in his 20s he was Son Seals’ rhythm guitarist for two years, and soon he was a bandleader himself. Specter grew up amid Chicago’s blues scene and became one of its great players and ambassadors. Here he recalls the glory days of Chicago’s blues clubs and the varying vibes. He recounts the evolution of his sound and his progression of guitars. He explains how he creates a solo and why, after years of playing mostly instrumentals with the occasional guest vocalist, he began singing. He tells how his recently released “The Times They Are Deranging (The Buck Stops Where?)” fits in with the songs of conscience he always has admired. And he offers the origin story of Space, the excellent, musician-friendly Evanston, Ill. club where he’s a partner. (Photo by Mike Hoffman)

Running a boutique audiophile label is not easy, as Shane Buettner has learned in the 10 years since he founded Intervention Records. There are licensing agreements to be negotiated, artists to please, mastering engineers and pressing plants to be engaged, vinyl formulation and cover design to be arranged, plus marketplace changes and ever-increasing competition to be navigated. The label’s first release was Stealer’s Wheel’s debut, with standout pressings featuring Joe Jackson, Judee Sill, Matthew Sweet, the Flying Burrito Brothers, Peter Frampton, Everclear and others to follow. With so many labels jumping into the audiophile pool, has licensing recordings become harder? What dictates pricing? Do Buettner’s customers care more about 180-gram vinyl or tip-on jackets? And how did he land Intervention’s new Sun Records deal, with Kevin Gray-mastered 45 RPM releases from Carl Perkins and Johnny Cash on the way?

It's our Thanksgiving message for 2025!

Louie Pérez has written many great songs for Los Lobos, but “Saint Behind the Glass” is especially close to his heart. It was inspired by a saint statue from his family’s home and now is part of the exhibit American Prophets: Writers, Religion and Culture at the American Writers Museum in Chicago. Perez offers that song’s origin story, digs into his songwriting dynamic with singer-guitarist David Hidalgo, discusses their trippy side project the Latin Playboys, reflects on the impact of Los Lobos’ smash cover of Richie Valens’ “La Bamba” and says whether, 10 years after their last album of original material, Los Lobos is preparing new music. He also reveals a recent health issue and whether it affected his return to the stage, he addresses how artists can respond to the current administration’s toxicity toward immigrants, and he offers inspiring words for anyone involved in the act of creation.