Agree again Marty---Mick Taylor's playing is excellent on the Stones albums, but not quite in the same spirit as everybody else---too sober!
Nick Lowe is a long-time favorite of mine as well (and Rockpile the only "Super Group" I really like, though The Traveling Wilburys would be were it not for Tom Petty, who seems oddly out-of-place), and I just got some news on him. He's going to be doing a U.S. tour, and his backing band will be Los Straitjackets, the Instrumental Band on the same label as Nick, Yep Rock. What makes this of particular interest to me is that I used to be in a Band (The Hillbilly Soul Surfers) with their bassist, Pete Curry. We've known each other since the first day of 7th grade!
Here's a Ry Cooder/Keith Richards/Stones story ya'll may find interesting: Brian Jones had died, and he had yet to be replaced (by the way, one of those who auditioned for his job was none other than...Dave Edmunds!). Cooder got a call to come over to England to do some jamming with them. He went in and played along on some new songs they had ready, finding it odd that Keith wasn't around. One day he showed up early, only to discover Keith playing along with the tapes that had been recorded with Ry playing, learning Ry's parts! He packed his bags and returned home. I'm tellin' ya, Keith has been coasting for a long time, trading on his legend and image.