This album came out in 1987 and bam – that was it. We’re playin’ catch up here on a few months’ worth of missed (AotM entries), so here’s the beginning of a few quick hits of some interesting albums…
Ya know what? Madonna actually played drums with these guys in the early ‘80’s ??!!! Kinda cool, eh?
Play the Expressway to Your Heart cover on this album and their claim-to-somewhat-fame tune (Right on Track) and you might not wonder why a lot of folks were keen on hearing what was next from these kids. Admittedly, this is simple stuff - sugary pop, but its seriously infectious if you’re in the right mood. This was a pre-game tune for my beer league hockey games. Yea, the police showed up to more of those games than was in any way remotely acceptable, but I couldn’t be blamed for all that shit.
Not a bad album – enjoy.
Us Folk
The Belmar Guitar Crew

​Another album in our list released in 1971, by Warner Brothers… this offering by Ireland’s best export is made for March, a month full of promise and Irishness.
 
The title song came a little late to my ears (about ’77-ish) via Philly’s progressive rock station, WXPN. I had heard the album’s opening tune, Wild Night,  before and appreciated it. But hearing Tupelo Honey itself in particular and the rest of the album in general, that minor hit (WN) turns out to be a bit pedestrian in comparison. Really it’s a great song, but I’m so moved by the other songs’ lyrics and their melodies’ homespunedness (selfmade-up word right there).
 
In March of 1986, some mates on St. FXU’s rugby team were coming home from the Truro 7’s tournament (we came in 2nd (late try by Pictou County sealed our fate)). Jeremy Jackson’s professor dad had a place in the woods. Forrest Spencer Peter O’Flarity, Pete Doucette and I were his appreciative guests. Memory serves, we dined on some spaghetti, maybe some red wine, maybe a little rum, but definitely a bit of hash and a lot of Alexander Keith’s ale. There was an awesome stash of music and we just ‘re-hashed’ our tourney, our X rugby careers (we were all seniors) and just relaxed in our own company – super great fellas. Obviously, we spun dozens of LPs, but Tupelo Honey and Moondance got quadruple and triple duty respectively. An unforgettably wonderful night and Van Morrison’s impact was not small.
 
Tupelo Honey is fantastic from start to finish (yea, including Wild Night) and it’s a great driving record, cleaning your house or backyard album… a tendin’ to your bruises album, a contemplatin’ the world album and more effective even, than a Barry White record as a makin’ love album.
 
The Railhammers were a local Jamtown band (Monmouth County, NJ), often playing St. Stephen’s Green in Spring Lake Heights. The guys were cool and accomplished, but I wouldn’t say polished. In 2009, I asked ‘em to play my wedding and pleaded with them to learn Tupelo Honey for our nuptials. They did – with a Stone’s Dead Roses/Grateful Dead’s Cassidy kinda vibe… and holy smokes!!! What a performance!!!
I’m fairly certain that the way they so uniquely mastered that Van the Man classic, is why Ivanice and I are still a God blessed, happily married, gorgeous and humble couple.
 
Buy the album if unfathomably, you don’t have it or buy another copy if ya lost yours, but give this album a (new) listen or two (or 17). Van’s positivity and passion are impossibly infectious. You’ll leave the listen a more at-peace guy or gal. It’s country-y, folky-y and singer/songwriter-y… and thoroughly, it’s an incredibly, beautifully and soulfully romantic record for the ages.
 
Thanks for visiting us here at Belmar Guitar.
 
God bless you and your March of ’24.
Jammin’ Joe, Ivanice, Johnny, Chris, Mikey, Nejad and Ryan.

​Released in 1971 by an almost apologetic guitar hero... though he wasn't a 'hero' to many folks too far from Oklahoma at that point in time, JJ Cale put himself on a bigger map with this album. 
Eric Clapton scored a big hit with 'After Midnight', but not without letting everyone know it was his soon-to-be good buddy, Cale who wrote the now-classic.
'Don't Go To Strangers' has been covered by shitloads of folks. It's a relatively new one to me and I went from Paul Weller to someone else to Boz Scaggs thinking what's everyone covering this shitty song for and who fucking wrote it to begin with? Found out it was JJ and gave his a listen, fearing the worst (he's been a hero to me for a looonnnggg time)... but the hero came through! What a fuckin' great lil' ditty!
Then you have 'Magnolia' and if you hear of a buddy who dances with a girl to this tune and can't get past second base, your buddy is a lost cause... or he bats for the other team. But I digress, a bit.
Yes, all the songs are too short (it would've been a fantastic jam band double album) and no, you can't appreciate his nuanced guitar and compositional splendor via a quick listen, but this is one fabulous record to enjoy, over and over again.
The best of February to yas !
JJ & the Belmar Guitar crew 

Though it's not classically 'rock' or 'classic rock', this album from 1966 freakin' ROCKS with both energy and musical virtuosity.
Critically acclaimed guitarists Elvin Bishop AND Mike Bloomfield on the same album make this record work where often 'all-star' bands fail, from either egos or incompatible talents. Paul Butterfield could possibly be credited for this, but does it matter? 
The record is a serious classic. 
Give'r a listen and God bless your January of 2024.
Cheers,
JJ and The Belmar Guitar Crew

​I’d love to feature a new-ish album for yas, but well, it’s the month of Christmas and this 30+ year old album features the best Christmas song ever fuckin’ written.
Cockburn’s clear, lucid and semi-poetic lyrics put you in a song like few writers can. Springsteen was able to from the 70’s to the early 80’s, Jackson Browne did it as well, early in his career… Van Morrison is still doing it (on a whole other level), but y’all get it, this is a rare ability.
This album doesn’t rock out, but when you have Jim Keltner, Edgar Meyer, Mark O’Connor and Booker T. Jones lending a hand, it can’t be anything but awesome. The album is a serious piece like a lot of BC’s work, but it’s beautifully musical. T Bone Burnett’s help on guitar is there, but Cockburn is a fantastic 6-stringer himself. Check out Booker T’s organ work on Mighty Trucks of Midnight – freakin’ sublime.
I have to admit, when this came out in 1991, I was spending a lot of late nights alone in a barn, fixin’/makin’ furniture and refinishing antiques. This is a great album for this kind of solitary work.
The album as a whole is VERY listen-able, but my ‘standout’ picks would be Somebody Touched Me and the aforementioned Christmas tune, Cry of A Tiny Babe.
Give’er a listen and let us know whatcha think.
 
The Merriest of Christmases to You – God bless.
JJ and the Belmar Guitar Crew

​Out in 2018, without much fanfare (but anticipated by Dinosaur Jr./Mascis fans), this album did nuthin' but supply us with lush melodies, intelligent lyrics and mounds of uniquely overdriven, fuzzed out 'n compressed guitar wonderfulness. 
Give 'er a listen, enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving.
JJ & the Belmar Guitar Crew

​Tardy in getting this up for y’all… so we’ll use a cheater, since half of the great month of October is already over. A ‘cheater’ in this context, is a “Greatest Hits” collection.
When the singles, “Heard it a Love Song” and “This Ol’ Cowboy” hit the mainstream airwaves in the mid-1970’s, I heard the vocal and dismissed Marshall Tucker as ‘unworthy country trash’. I was a blinders-on classic/progressive rocker then.
Lead vocalist, Doug Gray, had/has that ‘immediately recognizable as country’ voice and my arrogant-at-the-time sensibilities didn’t let me give the songs a true listen. I think I heard “Can’t You See” with the awesome guitar in ‘er a few years later and wanted/needed MORE ! I was turning into a classic/progressive/jam band rocker quickly… was even being wonderfully poisoned by the best disco of the era (I hate(d) to admit, but this is another story for another time).
So what’s the most cost effective research available in pre-computer/Google times? A greatest hits album, of course. Maybe I matured or got hit in the ears by meteor ‘er sumthin’, but I recognized the special concoction of jazzy country jam wonderfulness all over this album – even/especially in the two tunes I erringly discounted a few years earlier. The Marshall Tucker Band has a lot of material not represented in this compilation, but as an initial MTB dive-in, this album is it. ‘Fantastic musicianship’ doesn’t even start to do it justice. Enjoy.
JJ & the Belmar Guitar Crew

Imaginary Voyage
(Jean Luc Ponty  - 1976)
 
I was turned on to this music whilst still in grade school, thanks to WIOQ -  a commercial, progressive rock station out of Philadelphia way back when.
Usually, the quality of music and passion and intelligence of the staff was the stuff you can only find on well-funded public radio stations. WIOQ was a seriously wonderful exception. Anyway, check this album out. This’ll most probably make you delve more into Ponty and his discography (a prudent and great thing)… it’s a soul stirring affair that’s just fucking beautiful.
Please pardon the vulgate and enjoy.