Wait, JJ Cale wrote “After Midnight”? And he’s dead?

Until just a minute ago, I had always assumed that JJ Cale was a really talented younger guy putting his own spin on older genres, maybe like a JD McPherson or a lesser-known Dwight Yoakam.  This based solely on a few great songs that had popped up in my Spotify playlists in the past couple of years.

But it turns out that he’s been around since the 1960’s, is considered to be one of the founders of the “Tulsa sound,” wrote the biggest hit song from Eric Clapton’s first solo album, and died ju...