Some interviews you prepare for. You build the questions, you do the research, you know exactly where you want the conversation to go. And then the person on the other end of the line says something that stops you cold—something that has nothing to do with the prepared question in front of you and everything to do with why you got into this work in the first place. That’s what a thirty-minute phone call with Sammy Hagar on a Wednesday morning will do to you.

I had just come off reviewing his Best of All Worlds Tour residency at Dolby Live at Park MGM in Las Vegas—a show that ran 145 minutes, covered 17 songs, and left me genuinely undone in the best way a rock and roll show can. I had left my camera at home that night and experienced it purely as a fan. By the time “Eagles Fly” came around, I wasn’t holding it together. By the time the house lights came up, I knew I needed to talk to this man.

Here at The Vinyl District, we write about music because we believe it matters—not as background noise, not as content, but as the thing that reaches into places language alone cannot touch. Sammy Hagar has spent sixty years proving that point, and this tour, with this band—Michael Anthony, Joe Satriani, Kenny Aronoff, and Greg Phillinganes—may be the finest chapter of the whole remarkable story.

What follows is a conversation about beginnings and legacies, about what it means to stand on a stage at seventy-eight and still feel something new, about vinyl and the records that shaped a life, and about a homeless man in Las Vegas who recognized the Red Rocker at midnight and quoted things he said onstage thirty-two years ago. It’s about a song called “Eagles Fly” that his mother asked him to sing at her funeral, and that mine would have loved just the same. It’s a conversation I will carry for a long time. I think you will too.

Take me all the way back to the very first time you stepped onto a stage. Not a rehearsal, not a garage—an actual stage in front of actual people. What did that feel like, and did any part of you in that moment know this was going to be your life?

I remember a few different early moments, but the one that really sticks was playing a party for five dollars at a little union hall for a car club called the Swampers in Fontana, California. My brother’s friend—an older guy, really hip, really into cool music—taught me how to play a couple of songs on rhythm guitar. We had one amplifier, two guitars, and a microphone, all running through the same amp. I was probably fifteen.

We played “Gloria” and some surf songs, and I just loved it. I got dressed up, I felt like a performer—and the second I stepped on that stage, it became official. There was an adrenaline rush like I had never felt in my life. I thought I wanted to do it long before I even knew how to play guitar, but I didn’t feel it until that moment. From then on, I knew this is what I’m going to do, by hook or by crook.

Every musician has a shortlist of artists who fundamentally rewired how they heard music—the records and performers that made them think, “I want to do that.” Who were yours, and is there one that stands above all the others?

Honestly, it was more about the people around me than any particular rock star. I was in my teens, and I had three or four friends who genuinely believed in me. We’d get together, listen to music, and I’d tell them I was going to be famous someday. I dressed the part—psychedelic clothes, the right hairdo, the language—and they’d introduce me to people at parties saying, “This guy is going to be a big star.”

They really believed it and they had me convinced too. Having that circle of people around you who see what you’re going to become before you’ve become it—that’s the thing that drove me. I could already play a few songs from that guy who taught me when I was fourteen, and I could sing them. I just hadn’t started a band yet. But those friends, that belief—that’s what lit the fire.

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I was going to open this review of West Texas hard rock band Bloodrock by saying something withering, like they weren’t even fit to open for Grand Funk Railroad. Then I discovered Bloodrock did indeed open for Grand Funk Railroad in 1970.

Although the more I think about it, the more I think opening for Grand Funk Railroad makes Bloodrock even worse than I thought.

1970’s Bloodrock 2 was the band’s only taste of success, thanks in large part to “D.O.A.,” a plane crash song inspired by guitarist Lee Pickens’ brush with an actual plane crash. “When I was 17, I wanted to be an airline pilot,” said Pickens. “I had just gotten out of this airplane with a friend of mine, at this little airport, and I watched him take off. He went about 200 feet in the air, rolled and crashed.”

I’m assuming Pickens saw this and decided that remaining earthbound as a rock and roll guitarist was a safer career path.

I’ll get to “D.O.A.” later—the first thing I want to say is that Bloodrock, who I really wanted to like because I’m the world’s foremost expert on and biggest fan of plane crash songs, are an unfortunately mediocre proposition. Bloodrock 2 has its moments, but there’s no ignoring its host of flaws, the most impossible to ignore being that it has too many weak songs, and the songs that have a modicum of punch are saddled with lyrics so funny bad they’re worth quoting at length.

In short, Bloodrock 2 is a plane crash of an album, and the amazing thing is that it not only charted but stayed on the charts for several months.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Los Angeles power pop/punks Flyboys and Frontier Records, Sun Valley’s premiere punk rock label since 1980, announced today the release of the definitive collection, The Complete Flyboys 1978-1980 on April 10, 2026.

The 14-track, digitally remastered album contains the band’s first, self-titled EP—Frontier Records’ first release in March 1980—now expanded to include seven tracks making their LP and CD debut: Both songs from Flyboys’ second 7” single (“Square City”/”Crayon World”) plus five previously unreleased demos from 1979. The album will be released on limited-edition white vinyl, compact disc, and digital streaming and is now available for pre-order from indie distributor, Independent Label Distribution.

Pasadena’s Flyboys were a power pop/punk band that began in 1977 with singer/songwriter John Curry and Jim “Trash” Decker from The Crowd (and tangentially, Jay from The Simpletones, who would later sign to Posh Boy). Flyboys gigged all over the Southland, paying their dues opening for every national and local punk band from Huntington Beach to Hollywood. They were anything but typical punks with their day-glo clothes, Cuban heels, and maddeningly catchy songs. Infectious hooks and John Curry’s bleached-blonde pompadour were the band’s trademarks.

Lisa Fancher interviewed Flyboys when she was a rock scribe at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. The band’s lack of traction in the LA scene gave her the notion to finance an EP with the band and release it herself. The recording began in 1979 at Leon Russell’s Paradise Studios in North Hollywood, California (where Concrete Blonde’s Johnette Napolitano was the receptionist) with Jim Mankey (from the original Sparks) as the engineer and Dickies’ manager Scott Goddard as producer.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | With undeniable cultural gravity, the team of Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan join luminaries such as Bob Dylan, Chuck Berry, Randy Newman, Carole King and Gerry Goffin, Leonard Cohen, Lee Hazlewood, Brian Wilson and Laura Nyro in Ace Records’ long-running series of multi-artist compilations celebrating the great American songwriters of the modern era. Hundreds of artists from all walks of music have recorded songs from Waits and Brennan’s matchless catalogue, 19 of the finest of which comprise this hand-picked selection, including many chosen by the songwriters themselves.

Few artists have remapped the terrain of popular music, and culture at large, like Tom Waits. Over the course of five decades, he has forged a singular aesthetic that defies genre and turns the marginal into myth. His work is neither fully inside nor outside the mainstream tradition but moves restlessly between them, drawing from vaudeville, blues, jazz, folk, theatre—and just about anything else that catches his ear—to craft something wholly his own. His influence reverberates not just through the underground and avant-garde, but across theatre, film, literature, and visual art.

With his long-time creative partner and wife Kathleen Brennan, he has dismantled and reassembled the idea of song itself, crafting works that exist as both raw expression and high art. This collection honors not only the extraordinary versatility of Waits and Brennan’s songwriting, but the importance of an artist who continues to haunt and inspire from the edges inward.

Ace’s selection is sequenced chronologically by song, opening with Bruce Springsteen’s live recording of “Jersey Girl,” Waits’ ode to Brennan from 1980’s Heartattack And Vine, and closing with folk matriarch Joan Baez’s version of Waits and Brennan’s anti-war “Day After Tomorrow” from Waits’ more recent Real Gone.

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Remembering Dash Crofts. —Ed.

Seals & Crofts have moved into our house! It’s true! And here’s how it happened. Yesterday we got a knock on our door. I had no intention of opening it because most likely it was our crazy neighbor from across the street who’s been accusing our garden gnome of shitting on his lawn. Then I caught a whiff of jasmine and said to myself, “No way is it the legendary soft rock duo whose gossamer thin sound has enriched the lives of so many.”

But it was! Seals & Crofts in the flesh! And they were wondering if they could move in with us for a couple of days because times were tough and they were tired of living in a lean-to by the railroad tracks running past the lake of toxic sludge near the abandoned nuclear reactor.

And of course I said YES! Who wouldn’t? And they couldn’t express how grateful they were because everyone else had slammed their doors in their faces, including our neighbor from across the street who accused them of shitting on his lawn.

“How could anyone think that?” asked a perplexed Jim Seals. “In the bushes by the railroad tracks, sure. But that’s out of sheer necessity.”

“Where’s your stuff,” I asked. All they had with them were their acoustic guitars.

“We had to hock everything,” said Dash Crofts, “including our gold record for ‘Summer Breeze.’ I don’t know if you’ve heard, but the railroad hobo economy is in the tank.”

“Would you like to take a shower?” asked my wife. “You’re caked with coal dust and radioactive slime. And I’m catching the distinct aroma of urine.”

“That would be me,” said Seals. “And that shower would be much appreciated.”

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | On May 8, 2026, Camera Obscura will celebrate the 25th anniversary of their debut album, Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi, with a vinyl reissue via Merge Records.

Out-of-print on the format since its initial UK release on Andmoresound in 2001, the 25th anniversary edition is the most definitive version of Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi ever pressed to vinyl, featuring both “Eighties Fan” B-sides—“Shine Like a New Pin” and “Let’s Go Bowling”—which were later added to expanded CD reissues of the album.

In addition to the black LP available from Merge Records, a limited edition, green and gold swirl vinyl edition, which includes a band-signed facsimile of the flyer advertising the release of “Eighties Fan,” is available exclusively from Glasgow’s Monorail Music.

“We’ve been working towards a re-release of this album for some time now,” says Tracyanne Campbell, “so we’re really delighted that it’s happening and pleased that folk can finally have their own vinyl copy.”

Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi first reached Stateside in 2004, after the success of Camera Obscura’s 2003 Merge debut Underachievers Please Try Harder. New fans who weren’t keyed in to the UK import market or to what John Peel was spinning on his BBC Radio programs would be forgiven for mistaking Biggest Bluest Hi-Fi as a follow-up to their breakthrough album as opposed to their first.

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Has a single interesting thing ever happened in the state of Virginia? Sure, my old friend Steds broke his jaw after falling flat on his drunken face in a McDonalds’ bathroom during Spring Break at Virginia Beach, but hundreds of people must break their jaws every year after falling flat on their drunken faces in McDonalds’ bathrooms at Virginia Beach during Spring Break.

And then there’s the mystery of the lost colony of Roanoke Island in Virginia, but that cryptic message they left behind (“Croatan”) tells me everything I need to know—Croatan was obviously the name of a doom metal band, and the entire colony got lost on their way to see them at Virginia Beach during Spring Break.

But to answer my own question, one interesting thing has happened in the state of Virginia, and that’s Happy Flowers, the lower-than-lo-fi duo of cheerful chaos agents Mr. Happily Charred Infant (aka John Beers) and Mr. Anus (aka Charlie Kramer). Happy Flowers got their start at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia, and quickly established their signature shtick—primitivist songs about childhood that are as amusing as they’re hard to listen to unless you’re an aficionado of cheerful caterwaul. These guys make the Butthole Surfers sound like Steely Dan.

The 1987 compilation Making the Bunny Pay (which has a simply wonderful cover) comprises the band’s first two releases: the 1984 EP “Songs for Children” and the 1986 EP “Now We Are Six.” It includes their first and possibly greatest song, “Mom, I Gave the Cat Some Acid,” which makes the EP worth owning all by itself. (Sonic Youth did a cover, but their version is but a shadow of the original.) Happy Flowers would release four subsequent full-lengths before breaking up, although they’ve briefly reunited to enthralled listeners on several occasions, reminding us that horrible noise is its own reward.

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WILMINGTON, DE | As I drove into Wilmington, Delaware, for the festival, I made a meaningful stop—visiting the home once owned by Bob Marley’s mother, a place where Bob himself spent time over the years. It felt only right, a quiet moment of reflection before celebrating the 50th anniversary of Rastaman Vibration. This was going to be a special show highlighting roots and reggae in the Northeast, and one that I could not miss.

The evening was curated by local reggae artist Kenny Vannella, who assembled an exceptional band and welcomed a couple of true legends to the stage. But this wasn’t just a night of reggae—it was a community-driven event, with proceeds benefiting The Music School of Delaware. Opening performances by Cecilia Grace and Lower Case Blues brought diverse musical textures that enriched the night. Hosting duties were handled by Kenny’s friend, Sahr Abu, who kept the energy flowing.

Personally, my anticipation extended beyond the music. As a longtime fan, the opportunity to see—and meet—former Wailer saxophonist Glen DaCosta and Bob Marley’s cousin Jimmy Malcolm made the night even more special. The evening delivered on every level.

Cecilia Grace opened the show with a voice that was bold, clear, and angelic, yet grounded in a raw emotional honesty. Her ability to shift between powerful, slightly raspy belts and soft, controlled tones gave her performance real depth. Whether performing original songs or covers, she held the crowd effortlessly. Her guitar work was equally impressive—dynamic and rhythmic, creating a full sound that made it feel like more instruments were present. She was the perfect tone-setter for the night.

Next up was Lower Case Blues, a powerhouse trio featuring Jake Banaszak (guitar), B.J. Muntz (bass/vocals), and Tristan Gilbert (drums). From the moment they hit the stage, they brought an explosive energy that had the crowd fully engaged. Their sound was massive for a three-piece, blending blues, funk, and rock with an improvisational edge.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Jazz Dispensary returns with another sought-after rarity from Craft Recordings’ deepest vaults: The Visitors’ spiritual jazz masterpiece, Motherland.

Out-of-print since its initial release in 1976, Motherland showcases the genius of saxophonist brothers Earl and Carl Grubbs, who led their band (pianist Joe Bonner, bassist John Lee, drummer Victor Lewis) through heady originals and beloved standards. As with all releases in Jazz Dispensary’s album-centric Top Shelf Series, Motherland features all-analog (AAA) mastering by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio and is pressed on 180-gram vinyl at Fidelity Record Pressing. Rounding out the package is a stylish tip-on jacket that faithfully reproduces the album’s original design. Motherland, which arrives May 29th and is available for pre-order, will also make its long-awaited debut on streaming platforms in standard and HD audio.

Motherland is the second release in a year-long slate of anniversary programming from the curators at Jazz Dispensary, with more out-of-print cult classics, groove-forward compilations, special releases, global listening events, and additional surprises set to roll out throughout 2026.

Formed in Philadelphia in the early ’70s, The Visitors were a short-lived but highly respected spiritual and free jazz quintet, led by saxophonists and brothers Carl Grubbs (alto) and Earl Grubbs (tenor and soprano). The brothers often drew comparisons to John Coltrane—and for good reason, as their cousin Naima was the iconic saxophonist’s first wife. In their youth, the Grubbs were fortunate enough to learn from the best, with Coltrane and fellow jazz legend Eric Dolphy both serving as mentors.

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Celebrating Steven Tyler on his 78th birthday. —Ed.

Back in the day I went back on forth on Boston Very Baked Beans like a yoyo—liked ‘em in high school, loathed ‘em in college, then did what any sane person would do and put ‘em out of mind altogether. “Dude (Looks Like a Lady)” didn’t exactly make me want to keep abreast of what Aerosmith was up to.

First year in the dorms at Shippensburg College Aerosmith were inescapable, what with my floor’s resident dope dealers Sheesh and Shrooms cranking the Toxic Twins around the clock, and I’ll never forget the day in the dining hall I warned ‘em Aerosmith would rot their brains, and if they really wanted to improve their minds they’d switch to Frank Zappa! Who at the time, if I recall correctly, was producing such IQ-raising fare as “Crew Slut” and “Wet T-Shirt Nite”!

Yeah, I was full of shit for sure. Because like ‘em or not, Aerosmith were on to something. Steven Tyler, Joe Perry and the boys fused the New York Dolls’ glam-rock sleaze with Led Zeppelin’s sonic bombast to produce a brand new kinda high-stepping boogie strut. Aerosmith translated the leer into sound, brought David Johansen’s trash raunch aesthetic to the unwashed masses, and gleefully knocked the blues topsy-turvy, tossing in a whole bunch of dirty limericks in the process.

Theirs was garage rock of a sort, but the garage had a supercharged 1964 Pontiac GTO in it. Fact is Aerosmith boogied faster than almost any machine on the streets back in 1975. Punk was considered the fleetest thing on wheels at the time, but the title track of Toys in the Attic crosses the finish line before anything on Never Mind the Bollocks, and it came out a year and a half earlier! And Tyler’s nursery rhymes for adults are anything but dumb–anybody who can fit poor Paul Getty’s ear into a lyric is A-OK by me.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | MutMuz Gallery, the creative space founded by Mark Mothersbaugh, is proud to present DEVO: The First 50 Years, an exhibition celebrating the visionary legacy of DEVO through a photographic anthology honoring the band’s groundbreaking cultural influence.

Taking place on Friday, April 24, from 6-10 pm in Chinatown, Los Angeles (971 Chung King Rd., Los Angeles, CA, 90012), the exhibition offers a fitting home for this photographic tribute to the band’s first fifty years. Spanning live performances, defining moments, and legendary portraits, the photographs trace DEVO’s evolution from experimental art-punk innovators into global cultural icons. Emerging from Akron, Ohio, in the 1970s, the band fused music, conceptual art, satire, and design to create a visual and sonic language that continues to resonate across generations.

The exhibition brings together work by acclaimed photographers Allan Tannenbaum, BC Kagan, Bob Gruen, Chris Stein, Chuck Statler, Edward Colver, Moshe Brakha, Norman Seeff, Richard Peterson, and Ruby Ray. Their images capture the band’s unmistakable energy, aesthetic experimentation, and enduring cultural impact. Together, the images capture the creative spirit and radical ideas that have defined DEVO for more than half a century. More information is available here.

MutMuz Gallery represents a significant milestone in Mark Mothersbaugh’s career, providing an intimate look into his intellectual curiosity and visual imagination. The gallery’s name derives from Mutato Muzika, his Los Angeles-based production studio, which itself takes its name from the playful fusion of “Mutant” and “Potato.”

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Genesis, the sole album from the teen femme duo Wendy & Bonnie was released in 1969 to no fanfare, but over the decades it has quietly grown into a solid cult item. 2008 found Sundazed issuing a 2CD/3LP set with a massive helping of extra tracks, but that still in-print edition is a reward for the record’s most ardent converts.

Calling Genesis a period piece will automatically impact some readers as a putdown, in part due to many folks’ yardstick of measurement for the art of the past relating directly to whether or not it’s relevant to right now. On the other end of the spectrum, at least a few of Wendy & Bonnie’s most passionate fans surely prize the duo’s only LP precisely because it is indeed so evocative of the time and circumstances of its making.

Though I’m generalizing, those who love Genesis purely for its Flower Power era ambience are likely to value Roger Corman’s ’67 film The Trip over the great cinematographer Haskell Wexler’s first directorial effort, ‘69’s Medium Cool. The former is a spirited teen-exploitation flick that uses clichés and stereotypes as inspired playthings, but the latter is a one of kind motion picture with a seriousness of intent specifically concerning the upheavals of the tumultuous year of 1968.

And people who expressly use the term period piece as an insult could easily be prone to burdening The Trip and Medium Cool with that problematic bag, though with the possibility that Corman’s movie might be “appreciated” as camp and Wexler’s effort referenced as symbolic of the folly inherent in attempting a formally challenging, legitimately political cinema. And if the denigrators were asked to pair Genesis with one of these films on the basis of shared traits, I’m pretty sure the majority would choose The Trip.

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