Willie Lane

It’s been a few years since we’ve had a proper solo stint from Northeastern luminary Willie Lane. The guitarist has been a fixture in the New England psych scene, working with MV & EE, Stella Kola, and alongside his perennial foil Wednesday Knudsen. His trio of instrumental LPs stretching from ’09 to 2016 have long been essentials of the East Coast aura, but with his latest, Lane subverts expectations, turning in an album of tender, if slightly toasted, country blues. With a backing band culled from some of the region’s finest, Ryan Jewell (Chris Forsyth, Ryley Walker) on drums, and Rob Thomas (Sunburned Hand of the Man, Stella Kola) on bass, Willie sinks deep into the woodsmoke on Bobcat Turnaround.

Circling the ‘70s slide through acoustic blues, hung with the saddlebags of country and folk, the record picks at early Hot Tuna, The Groundhogs, MU, and Siren. Lane and the trio char their songs into the tape, leaving a lingering smell of ash and a heat ripple warping the air around the speakers. There’s certainly a kindred spirit with the kind of ‘Get Right Church’ linoleum-bound backroom blues of his days with MV & EE, but Lane makes the genre his own here, carving his own initials into the soft wood of Americana and letting the moss take root. Like quite a few of Lane’s LPs, this one’s scant in its run, with only 350 available, so hesitate at your own risk on picking up a copy. This is an early essential of 2025, and one that’s gonna fester the whole year through. Get it on the turntable quick.

Support the artist. Buy it HERE.