Little Feat: Dixie Chicken (Warner Bros.)

CATEGORIZING ROCK is of pretty limited usefulness. Unlike terms in other music that refer to specific and exactly defined forms, rock labels merely indicate broad, often overlapping areas, inclusion in which depends upon hazy definitions or similarity to an established card-holder, viz the prefix syndrome – heavy – , punk – , folk – , acid – , soft – , glam – , etc. Such thumbnail definitions satisfy nothing more than a pigeon-hole mentality. Their limitations become particularly apparent whenever you hear a band you can't label. So it is with Little Feat.