This weekend, slide on into some rock and a variety of other music styles:
— Howard ‘guitar’ Luedtke and Blue Max, an act from western Wisconsin that goes back to 1982 with their rockin’ electric blues, will play at the Willow River Saloon in Burkhardt on Friday, June 14. Luedtke, who first picked up a guitar in 1964, is known for his slide guitar and has played with or opened for dozens of music luminaries including Jeff Healey, George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers, and Johnny Winter.
— For a different twist, come back to Willow River on Saturday night. Rock Bridage, which plays songs from the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s, and bills themselves as being a tribute to the country’s men and women of the armed forces and its emergency services personnel, is on tap. The band’s web site is flowing with patrotic images of red, white and blue.
— Summer can be a wind down time for bands in River Falls on some weekends, since college is out, but Shooters Pub still will be going strong with live music on Friday and Saturday. On Friday, its a rock quartet of young dudes in Waves Alive, and the next night its more of an old time music groove with an act who goes, fittingly and simply, as Ole.
— Last weekend, when the Yellowstone Trail crowd trolled through Hudson, there was plenty of music but a more toned down vibe. At the Seasons on the St. Croix art gallery, they had a solo acoustic guitarist who plays all their events, Sam Salter. Urban Olive and Vine featured a classical Brazilian duo and there was, again, a trio of shirtless young dudes laying down the funk in the Lakefront Park bandshell. They were prominent enough to draw a between-songs mention from GB Leighton when he played the Smilin’ Moose that night. Speaking of the Moose, they have just now brought back their Thursday night deejay act.