The Crooked Jades arrive in Scotland and play to ecstatic audiences, recording two sessions for BBC Radio Scotland and one for Andy Kershaw on BBC Radio 3. Giving a 4-star review of the band’s Edinburgh gig in The Herald, Rob Adams wrote: ‘Old-time may take on a different meaning when you've spent the day wandering around buildings that predate the music you play by centuries. But the Crooked Jades needn't have felt upstaged by Auld Reekie's history.
’Their old-time is broadly, the period between settlers arriving in rural America and the advent of entertainment for the masses. And they portray it so well that at any given point they could have been playing on the stoop at a Kentucky country fair to gingham-clothed tables instead of serenading St Brides' candle-lit cabaret.
’This is string-band music before the knots and gnarls were smoothed out, when character, rather than speed and fluidity, counted and dancers didn't need a strict tempo.
’The songs, although often written by the band themselves, have a similar, sepia-tinted hue. Founder Jeff Kazor's Goodbye Trouble The Soul of Man, with its brassy slide guitar, has the sound of a primitive blues holler before its title's prolonged repetition takes it into a revivalist prayer meeting. And guitarist-mandolinist Jennie Benford's singing of her own Can't Stare Down a Mountaineer has simple country-gal charm to burn.
’For all the rustic, yesteryear connotations, though, this is very much living music, as the Jades' energy and touches - such as the high-calling fiddle on Old Cow Died and Indian War Whoop's invitation to the audience to dance in their seats (or pep step) underlined emphatically.’

Reviewing Alastair Moock's album, 'Let It Go' on the strictly-for-grown-ups website, www.sleazegrinder.com Stu Gibson shows he really gets it, enthusing: 'Moock has songs that Steve Earle would divorce for in the flash of a well-placed piece of back-porch poetry and Tom Waits would weep whiskey into cigar filled ashtrays in sheer frustration. A weathered voice belying his relative youth, Moock dredges fundamental philosophies from the dregs of the ever-eventful everyday drudgery. 'Not once stepping, never mind sinking, into saccharine schmaltz the sweet moments are necessarily (naturally?) bitter'.

Two Brookfield-Knights acts land support slots for the Scandinavian dates on John Fogerty's summer tour. The Willy Clay Band and Eva Eastwood & The Major Keys - each big fans of the one-time Creedence frontman - are sure to end up with even more fans following these dates. Bonnier/Amigo have released the great single 'Like That No More' from Eva's brand new album, scheduled to hit the record stores and airwaves on August 30 (we can't wait!)

The Steep Canyon Rangers play the world-famous Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, original home of the Grand Old Opry, and the track ‘One Dime At A Time’ from the album of the same name, takes first place in the National Bluegrass Survey for Bluegrass Unlimited magazine.

The ‘live’ review in Maverick magazine says:

“Right now, this band is positively radiant,” adding, “this is the kind of act that is a festival promoter’s dream - good-time music that also connects on a whole range of various levels, but most of all is instantly memorable right across the board”.

“Sweet melodies, rock crunch and varied instrumentation, including lap steel and banjo which merge with Schlappich's infectiously lazy drawl to make songs you can't get out of your head.”

Crooked Jades “Most Wonderful”, Says Bob

Pre-release copies of The Crooked Jades’ fifth album, ‘World’s On Fire’ find their way straight on to some of Europe’s biggest-audience radio shows. Bob Harris is the first to feature tracks and telling listeners to his BBC Radio 2 programmes it is a “absolutely charming -  a most wonderful album”.

 “One brilliant track follows another as they gather such a head of steam that by the end, the only thing to do is stick it back on and start all over again and again, and again.

“She may rightly be highly regarded for her ‘need-another-fix-of’ vocal style and clawhammer banjo flair, but in this company, the stakes are raised to a level that brings her into the kind of circle where Tim O'Brien, Dirk Powell and Jerry Douglas occasionally join hands....Check out this album and get set to have yourself a helluva time”.

In America, Joe Cline, a popular presenter on our favourite radio station, WNCW 88.7 broadcasting great music out of Spindale, North Carolina, said the album was “the best recording Laura's ever done - good old-time, good swing, good music.”

“This is a band that blows the cobwebs off everything around them while sharing out such a feel-good vibe that it’s thoroughly infectious. Approaching  something like The Blasters with a sprinkling of Revillos’ punky attitude and armed with a catalogue of songs all guaranteed to slap a smile on your face,  there’s a debut album due for release any time now, and if it even comes close to capturing the essence of the ‘live’ performance, these guys are destined for great things.” 

“If the demo is anything to go by, the new material, while retaining enough of the early feel to keep her committed fans happy, is much more ‘now’ too. There is already talk about its potential to produce several hit singles. If she gets the exposure she deserves in Britain and America, this is someone with the potential to hit super duper big time.”