Derek Trucks
Derek Trucks is the nephew of Butch Trucks, the founding drummer of the Allman Brothers Band, and the younger man has been imitating Duane Allman's slide guitar ever since he started gigging as an 11-year-old. Now at age 18, he leads his own jazz-rock quartet through its debut album,The Derek Trucks Band. Jazz producer John Snyder convinced the teenage guitarist to include compositions by John Coltrane, Miles Davis, and Wayne Shorter alongside the seven originals on this mostly instrumental project. Trucks's band is able to set its amplified instruments to a crisp swing, and the leader proves himself fast and agile on the guitar, but neither he nor keyboardist Bill McKay are able to come up with solos as melodically captivating as those of the Allman Brothers Band or as harmonically startling as those of the Coltrane and Davis groups. But, at 18, Trucks still has plenty of time to evolve.--Geoffrey Himes