Hello there, and a very warm welcome to Guitar World editors’ picks – our new-and-improved, comprehensive monthly guide to the guitar tracks that have captured the attentions of our editors over the past four weeks or so.
With the aid of our Spotify playlist below, we’ve rounded up all our favorite new releases from the month of March, and put them under the microscope to wax lyrical on the playing, tones, and songwriting that have set our six-string senses a-tingling.
Without further ado, let’s hand things over to our EIC MAB to kick things off…
Michael Astley-Brown – Editor-in-Chief
All eyes have been on Gary Clark Jr. this month, after the so-much-more-than-a-blues-guitarist dropped his frankly jaw-dropping opus, JPEG RAW. A dizzying amalgamation of the many genres he’s absorbed over the decades, it’s a reminder that a stinging pentatonic lick can add a dose of urgency to hip-hop just as well as it can funk, rock and soul.
Speaking of pentatonics, another new Pearl Jam single dropped this month, and I’d be remiss not to mention the fact that I attended a listening party for forthcoming Andrew Watt-produced effort Dark Matter, during which Eddie Vedder handed me a beer. True story.
But the thing that struck me most during the album actually appears on newly released punk-rock cut Running. Skip to 1:23. Is it just me, or is that Stone Gossard and/or Mike McCready doing The Gojira Pick Scrape™? It’s the crossover episode I never knew I needed.
Other things I simply must mention: The Black Crowes released their long-awaited new album – and possibly the best-named full-length of 2024 – Happiness Bastards. It’s a strutting, Southern-fried classic-rock, erm, classic. Truly. Flip to the other side of my ADD-addled brain and I have been wearing out the digital tape on Standards’ latest technicolor epic. Two-hand tapping wizard Marcos Mena has been seriously honing his thump chops, which bolsters his already breathless math-rock technique locker with fresh rhythmic sass.
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Shoutout, too, to pop-punk titan Olivia Rodrigo’s collab with space-age guitar hero St. Vincent. Obsessed is awash with tasty guitar overdubs that showcase Annie Clark’s unique ear for tones in an addictive new context. No wonder Rodrigo has been donning a St. Vincent Goldie to play the track on tour.
My (sadly not yet tangible) solo of the month gong, however, goes to Adrenaline Mob heavy-hitter Mike Orlando, who has joined forces with Living Colour’s Corey Glover for a new supergroup of sorts, Sonic Universe. The name gives me a minor case of the ick, but there is absolutely no arguing with the guitar playing on debut single I Am. Pentatonic swagger, frenzied alternate-picked flourishes and Whammy squalls: Orlando’s solo is a tour de force.
Jackson Maxwell – Associate Editor
March always feels long, doesn’t it? This one’s been no exception. The dreariness that can sometimes accompany this month, though, was offset by a bounty of killer new guitar-driven music.
Personally, I’d start with a true ‘did not have this on my bingo card’ recording involving two of my biggest guitar heroes. In tribute to the late Lou Reed, the one and only Keith Richards took on the Reed-penned, street-smart Velvet Underground classic, I'm Waiting For The Man. Though Keef, of course, doesn’t break into anarchic feedback squeals, the fact that his true-to-self approach – always in the pocket rhythm work and bluesy fills with that vibrato you’ll recognize in a second – fits the song like a glove is testament to Reed and Richards’ shared grounding in the work of early rock guitar riffmasters like Chuck Berry.
It was also a fine month for one of my personal favorite genres, indie folk. Big Thief’s Adrianne Lenker returned with Bright Future, her first solo full-length in four years. Though it features none of the scorching and freewheeling electric leads that’ve punctuated her band’s most memorable work (her astonishing three-minute spin-out on Not remains one of my favorite solos of the 21st century) Bright Future highlights like Free Treasure showcase Lenker’s formidable fingerpicking acumen.
Moseying on over to the country side of things, we were blessed this month with Tigers Blood, a new album from Katie Crutchfield’s Waxahatchee project. The whole record’s really worth a spin, but 365 really hits that ‘open highway at 3 a.m.’ sweet spot. Go through the interviews on this website and it won’t be long until you read a guitarist mention the importance of economy – making a solo sing, the importance of leaving space between notes, doing more with less…
All of those qualities are epitomized in a gorgeous, perfectly articulated MJ Lenderman solo that stands as my personal favorite guitar moment of the month. It has an amazing sense of space – you practically hang on every individual note – and rounds out the song perfectly.
Matt Owen – Staff Writer
I’m a sucker for Jacob Collier’s Djesse trilogy, so his Djesse Vol. 4 was one of my most anticipated releases of the year – not least because it was set to feature Steve Vai, John Mayer, Brandi Carlile, Lizzy McAlpine and more. It dropped at the start of the month and, as expected, it's a music marvel: Mayer (whose track was actually released a while back) was soulful as always, Vai was on top form for his solo cameo, and Carlile’s country-tinged contribution was sublime.
Plus, there was the small order of that 5-string Strandberg, which absolutely steals the show on WELLLL, which is perhaps Collier’s most riff-heavy song to date. I might have to give that funky alternate tuning a go...
I was also particularly taken by the return of Black Country Communion – whose new single Stay Free finds Joe Bonamassa doing his thing over a seriously tasty swamp blues bop – as well as Al Di Meola, who merged flamenco and fusion with Fandango. It’s served to continue my current acoustic obsession that Julian Lage started last month, and has further pushed me to explore my unplugged improvisation.
My thirst for indie rock and alt pop, meanwhile, was suitably quenched this month, with Ten Tonnes returning with yet another crowd-pleasing, Vaccines-on-steroids bop titled Little Lovin’. I’ve also been waiting (im)patiently for a new Bleachers album, and the Jack Antonoff-fronted outfit finally dropped their self-titled album this month, which was a production triumph. Jesus Is Dead, with its quirky turnarounds and main hook, is a particular highlight.
I’d also like to give an honorable mention to Greywind and Slow Joy, who have rounded out my monthly playlist with a nice touch of noisy, no-nonsense emo riffage thanks to Swing and Sway and Pulling Teeth. Very tasty stuff indeed.
Matt Parker – Staff Writer
This month, I’ve been getting excited about the return of NYC/Brooklyn indie rockers Les Savy Fav, who release new album Oui LSF in May. They have somehow not made an album since 2010’s boisterously melodic Root for Ruin, but first single, Guzzle Blood, is dark, and sludgy – and shows they have come back because they actually have something to say.
Elsewhere, cult label Italians Do It Better is adored by retro electronic fetishists for good reason. Of course, its output is usually associated with the synth-ier end of the spectrum, but Elegant Death – a taster single from new signings Curses – is an exception to that rule. It reimagines new-wave and goth-y electro-pop, blending in effects-laden guitar toplines and melodies where you’d traditionally expect to find synths – and, as such, melds two of my favorite worlds together at once.
On the unplugged front, our colleague and Guitarist magazine editor Jamie Dickson has shared the fruits of his recent studio labors (produced by Ida Mae guitarist Ben Turpin), in the form of his new album Withershins. It follows in the footsteps of some fine British fingerpickers and does a beautiful line in the woodsmoke and weather-beaten Celtic tanglings of the likes of Bert Jansch, or more latterly, Ben Walker. And he’s not even offered me beer money to write that.
Back on US shores, Nathan Salsburg is a player that you can depend on to bring something fresh to something old. I loved 2022’s Landwerk No. 3 album (which imaginatively repurposed hypnotic loops of old crackling folk recordings as beds for eerie guitar instrumentals). However, despite his credentials, I still balked when I learned Salsburg had teamed up with James Elkington to cover Neneh Cherry’s Buffalo Stance – which, even as I write this knowing better, still sounds like a horrible gimmick.
It is not. Somehow the duo have breathed new life into the ’90s hip hop stalwart, turning it into a lost pastoral classic with the kind of grassy, woven acoustic melodies that could come right off a William Tyler record. I don’t hold a candle for the original but here it is utterly transcendent and the playing – repurposing rap and vocal elements into fingerstyle lines – is superbly inventive.
