Million Pretty Girls [live] at the Spectrum

Million Pretty Girls! Tommy Conwell and the Young Rumblers perform "Million Pretty Girls" live at The Spectrum in Philadelphia, February 20, 1987.

Guitar Trouble Review

Guitar Trouble longbox image.

          Sony tapped longtime Dwight Yoakam producer Pete Anderson to helm Tommy Conwell and the Young Rumblers' sophomore LP Guitar Trouble, outsourcing the majority of songwriting duties as well. The end result is a corporate roots rock record with none of the cheeky bar band charm of Conwell's debut effort, Rumble, spelling the swift end of the group's major-label tenure. The album seems slapped together from spare parts; the youthful nihilism of Conwell's self-penned "I'm Seventeen" is completely at odds with Anderson's slick adult alternative production, which adds Bruce Hornsby's elegant piano to further distort the song's intent, while entries like "Rock with You" and the title cut are distressingly mundane, scrubbed clean of all their grit and passion. Guitar Trouble is frustrating proof that not only can you take the band out the bar, but you can take the bar out of the band as well.

~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide

Tommy Conwell and the Little Kings, Grape Street, 1995

Images of Tommy Conwell and the Little Kings at Grape Street in 1995, courtesy of Billy Kerns, playing bass in the background. (And Darryl Ray, too!)

See a Tommy Conwell and the Little Kings performance on YouTube, performing "I'm Not Your Man" live on PRISM at the Chameleon in Lancaster, PA 1997.