Maxfield Lane

A few years back there were a lot of artists and albums being lauded as the savior of the guitar, each purportedly reviving the relic instrument that once held pride of position in the Rock n Roll world. The problem was that every time I went to listen, eager to bare witness to this glorious rebirth, I was always wildly underwhelmed. Setting aside the fact that there's an enormous number of YouTube shredders and insanely talented guitarists out there now, these articles seemed blatantly disingenuous, considering their examples set against the pantheon–from Chuck Berry to Angus Young, B.B. King to Slash, Chet Atkins to Mark Knopfler, and on an on–these new saviors lacked any real chops, much less the magical feel the greats all had and still have.

That was inspiration for this album.

I drew musical inspiration from Mark Knopfler and Dire Straits, and songwriting inspiration from Jackson Browne, Fleetwood Mac, and all the classic rockers of the 70's and 80's, writing tunes with one rule: that there would be a guitar solo in every song that had style and feel. The aim was to do justice to the boys in Thin Lizzy and the Eagles, Beck, Vaughan, May.

I am not in that rarified air. Probably never will be. But, if the bar is as low as all these articles make it seem, I figure I have a real shot at saving the guitar with this album...

I hope you like the songs. And I hope the guitar work stands on its own.