Pokey LaFarge lives in a black-and-white world, where people gather round the radio, not the cathode teat. You can almost picture him in a seersucker suit down Nawlins way, toothpick protruding from the corner of his mouth. He's an old-fashioned confidence man hawking foot-tapping good times and the blues' resilient ethos. As he works a rich palette of rag, bluegrass, country and jump blues, it's part tent revival, part backwoods hoedown. Though his voice is a little reedy, it's also very expressive, slowly insinuating itself into your good graces. With the Dirt Daubers. —Chris Parker