10 Country and Americana Artists You Need to Know

Here's ten artists that'll get you excited about country music in 2026.

We've got a songwriter from Woodstock, Georgia, who has caught the attention of Luke Combs, Ella Langley and Charlie Puth, a six-piece from Lubbock, Texas, who add a little rock 'n' roll flair to their red dirt and two (TWO!!!) Australians!

There's all this and more as we dive into a roundup of our latest loves; a who's who of the most exciting prospects leaving their mark on the country music landscape.

When you've got Luke Combs, Avery Anna, Ella Langley and Tracy Lawrence all commenting on your videos on TikTok, you must be doing something right. Either that or you're just posting really funny cat memes.

After commenting beneath the original clip of him singing 'I Gave Her the Moon' with just an acoustic guitar on TikTok, Charlie Puth even went so far as to reshare the song on his own channel, adding in guitar, percussion, pedal steel and backing vocals to show how easy it can be to give a song the full production it needs to be a huge hit.

"It's a wonderful song," Puth declared at the end of the clip. "I'm legitimately obsessed with it."

'I Gave Her the Moon' is truly a wonderful song, and like all the best country songs, its deceptive simplicity belies the songwriting craft it takes to write a song as universal and immediately timeless as a 'Crazy' or 'Drinkin' Problem.'

"It was quite the surprise to see all the love on it," admits Whitmire. "My amazing publisher Lauren Lieu pushed me for months to post the song and I’m real glad she did. I’ve looked up to lots of the folks that were nice enough to comment on it, and Charlie Puth making a video about it truly blew my mind. God is good!!"

Hailing from Woodstock, Georgia, Kenny Whitmire is the latest in a long tradition of country singers and songwriters from the Peach State that's produced everyone from Dallas Davidson to Megan Moroney.

"Country music is a huge part of the whole state of Georgia and definitely had a big impact on my sound and what I talk about in my songs," Whitmire says. "I’m incredibly proud to play a small part of continuing the tradition. I grew up listening to a wide variety of stuff, from country music to classic rock to whatever else was playing in the football locker room in high school."

After moving to Nashville in 2022, Whitmire began to collaborate with emerging artist Austin Snell, leading to him jumping in as a touring guitarist in Snell’s band. Since then, he's shared the stage with everyone from Jason Aldean and Brantley Gilbert to Chase Matthew and many more, all the while honing his skills as a songwriter in the town’s artist-writer community, landing cuts with Austin Snell for 'Some Things Just Stick,' Cole Goodwin’s 'Fast Track Back' and Colin Stough’s 'White Trash' among others.

"I spent a few years on the road with Austin Snell and had a blast, but my heart has always been in putting out my own music and playing that music to anyone that might want to listen," Whitmire explains, and a string of solo singles that began in 2022 with the appropriately titled 'Holler' gave regular notice that he was very much an artist to keep an eye on.

Pairing his clever, heart-on-its-sleeve songwriting with the kind of goosebump inducing croon that Keith Whitley or Randy Travis possessed, Kenny Whitmire is a country traditionalist who's tearing up the rule book as he reads from it.

"I reckon these days folks call it old school or traditional country," he says about his own sound. "I’d personally just call it country music, coming from a mix of my favorites like Merle Haggard, Keith Whitley and Vince Gill."

His last single, 'Me Being Me,' is a blast of classic two stepping dance hall honky-tonk that puts him immediately up there with all the Zach Tops and Drake Milligans of the world.

"I’m a plain Hane's t-shirt and straps on my denim / My boots got about 100,000 miles in 'em," he sings. "I’m out here minding my biscuits and gravy / Only listen to the crickets, the Lord and my baby”

“I wrote this song for the simple livin' folks like me out there,” Whitmire says about 'Me Being Me.' “It's really just a song about my life. Whether I'm wiping bloodhound slobber off my overalls or laid up in the shade with some cold ones, it really is just me being me. And I figure there's a whole lotta folks out there that can relate.”

If things keep going the way they're going, Kenny Whitmire's life might be about to get a whole lot more unrelatable.

Listen If You Like: Zach Top, Jake Worthington, Randall King

- Jof Owen

In just over a year, Stella Lefty has made quite the name for herself, becoming one of the most promising newcomers in the ever-evolving, blurred-lined intersection of pop and folk.

Hailing from the suburbs of Chicago and raised on artists like Brad Paisley, Taylor Swift, Keith Urban, Tim McGraw and the like, the now twenty-something singer-songwriter found her way to LA a mere eighteen months ago to take her dream of making music and turn it into a reality.

Lefty's debut single, the hypnotizing 'Kiss Me,' arrived in November of 2024, leading to a peppering of equally tantalizing one-off releases in 'Cynic,' 'See Through,' 'Decay' and 'Grace,' all building to the release of her 2025 debut EP, Tragic, Really.

Lefty continues to garner a steadily increasing fanbase across TikTok, while also solidifying herself as a sonic chameleon. Bounding the full spectrum of alternative to indie pop with flourishes of country and folk thrown in for good measure, the Illinois native has proven herself less married to genre and more concerned with sentiment.

"I really try not to think about genre," Lefty shares with Holler. "My parents introduced me to the music that I listened to growing up, which in turn inspired me to make the music I make now! I’m super lucky to be a fan of all sorts of music. I love adding country influences to pop melodies and vice versa."

Put simply, she explains, "I just try to make music that I’d want to listen to."

Almost a year to the date of the release of 'Kiss Me,' the independent artist got the chance of a lifetime when country-rap trailblazer Jessie Murph pegged her as an opening act on the Australian leg of her Worldwide Hysteria Tour in late 2025. Taking the stage in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and more, the opportunity opened the burgeoning hitmaker up to the masses, and the songs that she's graced us with so far in 2026 have only added to the growing intrigue around the star-in-the-making, including the long-teased standout single, 'Thinking 'bout You,' which arrived at the very top of the year.

Set to build on the major groundwork laid in 2025, Stella Lefty has plenty in store for the new year that will be announced in due time. As she shares, "I’m playing some shows and playing some festivals that I can’t say much about yet. I'm also going to keep writing and putting out as much music as possible!"

Listen If You Like: Dasha, Kelsea Ballerini, Megan Moroney

– Lydia Farthing

A country singer with a life spent growing up on cattle stations, it’s a tale as old as time - that farm being down under, though? That’s not quite so classic.

While the rising neo-traditional country star Mack Geiger may hail from Queensland, he knows the ins and outs of a day’s hard work on the land: “there’s still a lot of empty space, a lot of working class battling it out, and a lot of shared good times and hardships… I think this tends to come out in my songs a fair bit.”

Bringing the classic country sound over to Australia and leaning into the musical moments from his childhood that transcended across the Pacific Ocean, Geiger’s rural rooted releases sit comfortably in the 90s country revival sound. “Dad had countless CDs of 90s country, stuff like Brooks and Dunn, Travis Tritt, Alan Jackson,” Geiger recalled, “I guess that seeped into my veins”.

The Aussie up-and-comer might only have two tracks under his belt right now, but they’re pretty promising signals of what’s in store. His tongue-in-cheek debut release ‘About Time’ leans into that infectious 90s sound.

His second release, ‘String By’, is more of a heartbreak-ridden ballad. Having already racked up millions of streams, it has clearly resonated with his quickly established fans.

Geiger is walking the same road as neo-traditional revivalists like Braxton Keith and Jake Worthington. That’s not saying that he wants to be put in a box though - Geiger’s only at the beginning of his career and with inspirations coming from country legends like George Jones to Strait, an affinity for contemporary voices, and a life spent in Australia, possibilities of sound seem pretty endless. “I’m always open to experimentation and by no means put walls around the music I make,” the newbie says.

When asked about what’s next though, it’s clear that Geiger has that hard-worker, big-dreamer, determined energy in him. His 2026? “Going all in this year. We have some Aussie festivals coming up such as CMC, as well as a bunch of new music up our sleeve we’ve been working really hard on. Also planning to get over to the states this year.”

Sounds like Geiger’s going global.

Listen if you like: Jake Worthington, Zach Top, Braxton Keith

- DI

In case you didn’t get the memo, folk music is no longer exclusively owned by the Fall. There are a host of new voices emerging in the space, incorporating bright, optimistic textures while staying true to the genre’s pared-down, minimalist heart. Bebe Stockwell is at the forefront of this wave.

There’s a vibrant intricacy that permeates Stockwell’s burgeoning discography, where the songwriting is vulnerable and often nostalgic, but there’s a refreshing tone of warmth and optimism laced throughout.

Stockwell’s debut EP, Driving Backwards, captures this delicate balance between soothing, hopeful instrumentation and raw, emotionally-charged candour.

Folk is the dominant impetus, but you can hear strands from jazz, soul and Americana making their way into both Stockwell’s delivery and her composition choices. This is, as she explains to Holler, a product of her eclectic musical upbringing, “I grew up listening to a lot of jazz - artists like Billie Holiday, Nina Simone, and Frank Sinatra - along with a lot of folk and singer-songwriters like Bob Dylan, Brandi Carlile, Grace Potter, and Gillian Welch. There was even a little Madonna and Whitney Houston sprinkled in there for good measure, too”.

Much like the music of modern folk’s flag-bearer, Noah Kahan, Stockwell’s songwriting often utilises place as a visceral metaphor, whether she’s viewing London through a newly melancholic lens on ‘Ruined’, or feeling increasingly out-of-place in her own home on ‘Minor Inconveniences’.

The fast-emerging artist reflects, “I'm from Boston, Massachusetts, right in the heart of the city. To me, part of Boston's charm is that it has such a strong sense of community. Whether it’s people coming together over sports, the shitty weather, or just sharing a love of music. My parents are huge music lovers and we had a lot of teachers from Berklee College of Music coming through our house all the time. Being around people and learning from those who actually lived and breathed music made it feel like a possible career path to me”.

As she continues to hone a sound she describes as “Americana Soul”, Stockwell is showing no signs of slowing down. There is plenty of new music on the horizon. She reveals, “I spent the majority of 2025 working on my first studio album, so releasing that into the world is next on my list! It's truly my favorite work I have ever done, and I'm so excited to share it with the world”.

Listen if you like: Noah Kahan, Gigi Perez, Lily Fitts

~ Maxim Mower

What do you get when you blend 90s country with 80s rock? Bella Lam, that’s what. She’s taking the core of traditional country music and ramping it up with electric guitars and explosive drums, bringing that arena-ready sound to her fans.

Listening to Lam’s music, you can hear the influences of her journey and places she’s called home. From the rockabilly sounds of Jackson to those well known Memphis blues, Lam’s music brings together pieces of her Tennessee adventures in fun, relatable songs.

“Moving from city to city wasn’t just growing up in different towns,” Lam tells Holler, “it was immersing myself in musical cultures.”

With opening bars that wouldn’t be out of place on a Jon Pardi track, ‘Tears in My Tequila’ brings together Lam’s Tennessee drawl and her fun, toe-tapping storytelling. It’s clear that Lam not only loves country music, but has lived it, too.

Her new song, ‘Take It Out On My Guitar’, which has already been well-received on her social media teasers, further demonstrates that Lam is an artist who already has the formula for a country hit.

“It's my take on a full-throttle country girl anthem,” says Lam about her new music, “the song channels heartbreak into something loud, fearless and unapologetic.”

Written with Lauren McLamb and Chris Rafetto, the song explores turning ‘pain into power’, with a little satire inspired by Carrie Underwood, Taylor Swift and Miranda Lambert.

2026 is set to be a big year for Bella Lam. She’s focussed on writing and finishing her upcoming album, whilst hitting the road and heading out on tour.

Listen if you like: Carrie Underwood, Rae Lynn, Mirand Lambert.

- Georgette Brookes

Lubbock, TX is forever etched in history for being home of greats. Buddy Holly learnt to rock 'n' roll with his family in the Great Plains, Waylon Jennings was born a mere 40 minute drive away in Littlefield, and more recently, Flatland Cavalry formed out at Texas Tech.

Today, the city is home to a new group of aspiring rockers with a taste for roots-driven country music and the open road.

The Graham St. Clair Band originally formed at Baylor University out in Waco, TX, jamming frequently before realising they had something substantial on their hands.

"Naturally people have become good musicians because there’s not much else to do. My taste in music was shaped by my hometown."

Rooted in a traditional country sound with flourishing rock, blues and West Texas textures, The GSCB possess the sonically and lyrically emotional breadth of their contemporaries in Flatland Cavalry and Shane Smith and The Saints, but also possess the catchiness and musical dexterity of The Jack Wharff Band and even Treaty Oak Revival.

"There’s a big country scene and a west Texas style that I pull from. Lubbock kind of shaped everything for me musically".

Growing up on a steadfast diet of Texas royalty in Robert Earl Keen and Lyle Lovett, frontman Graham St. Clair's world was completely opened up by the advent of streaming.

"When streaming music came out, I had the whole world of music at my fingertips and got into kind of everything. Some of my favorite folk guys are Shakey Graves and Caamp. I like classic rock stuff a lot. I like the Eagles and Bruce Springsteen".

The group released their debut album Roaming Home back in 2023, before releasing a spate of excellent singles from last year up to today. 'Lose Ourselves' is a particular example of that - a deft, alluring number that possesses a hefty rasp and weighty harmonies that will sit with you for some time.

Listen If You Like: Treaty Oak Revival, Ole 60, Low Gap

If you like your country music honest, smoky, and a little bit soul-soaked, Julianna Rankin is one of those artists who feels like she’s been there all along, even if you’re just finding her now.

A seventh-generation Texan, Rankin was born in Gonzales, Texas, and you can hear that lineage in everything she does. Her writing pulls from real life with no frills: family, heartbreak, mistakes, the kind of memories that stick to your boots. It’s not performative Texas - it’s lived-in Texas, the kind you don’t have to explain.

Rankin’s influences read like a perfect mix of grit and glow. Her dad raised her on Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, and Waylon Jennings; the Mount Rushmore of classic country truth-telling. Her mom brought the edge and emotion: Stevie Nicks, Carole King, Bonnie Raitt, and Linda Ronstadt.

That blend is exactly what makes her stand out now: traditional at the core, but with a voice that carries a little rock-and-roll ache.

Rankin describes her sound as “country with a side of soul,” and it fits. Her vocal has a smoky flare that makes even simple lines feel heavy in the best way.

One of her biggest moments so far came with “Bad Habits and Good Horses”, which landed on the season finale of Landman. Written during a one-day sync writing camp at Big Loud Texas, the track was crafted with intention, but still rooted in a story she fully relates to. For Rankin, it wasn’t just a placement. It was a dream.

Next up: more new music, and touring with Paul Cauthen and Jake Worthington - two stages that feel like a perfect match.

Listen if you like: Kaitlin Butts, Sierra Ferrell, Bonnie Raitt

- Caitlin Hall

Red McAdam doesn’t come from the places country music typically tells you it does, and that’s precisely the point.

Raised in Jersey City, New Jersey, McAdam’s relationship to American roots music was forged not in wide-open spaces but in density and overlap, where cultures collide and sound travels freely through open car windows. His early songwriting leaned heavily on Northern New Jersey and New York, drawing from a folk tradition that runs quietly but deeply on both sides of the Hudson. In a city shaped by immigration, labor, and constant reinvention, McAdam learned early that roots music doesn’t belong to one geography. It belongs to the people building lives within it.

Music was ever-present in his upbringing. The radio never went quiet, cycling through jazz stations from Newark and Manhattan, Irish music on Sunday mornings, and folk and country pulled from college airwaves. Family gatherings doubled as informal jam sessions, steeped in the sounds of Jim Croce, The Band, and Dylan, while his mother’s love of country music filled the house with Lucinda Williams, Sheryl Crow, Patsy Cline, and Hank Williams. Those early contrasts still echo in McAdam’s work, which resists easy classification by design.

McAdam’s work isn’t a defining sound, it’s guttural movement. He treats genre as a suggestion rather than a rule, favoring sharp turns and emotional whiplash over cohesion. That restless instinct runs through his latest singles, ‘Apocalypse West Texas’ and ‘Crown Vic,’ two starkly cinematic songs that examine collapse, masculinity, and moral reckoning through a Western gothic lens.

Bleak, surreal, and deeply literary, they place McAdam not as an observer of American myths but as an incisive interrogator, questioning who gets to tell these stories and what happens when the familiar narratives begin to rot from the inside.

Listen If You Like: Colter Wall, Terry Allen, Guy Clark

- Soda Canter

With influences like The Carpenters and John Denver, Aussie singer Rachael Fahim’s musical sensibilities have been shaped by brushes of country and a deep dedication to telling stories.

"It’s country-pop with a big focus on storytelling," she says of her music. "I grew up on both, so my songs are emotional and honest, but they’re also melodic and modern."

One of the most precocious of the absolutely thriving Australian country music scene right now, she’s followed in Keith Urban’s footsteps by winning the prestigious Toyota Star Maker Award and has already achieved 5 Australian Country Radio No.1 singles.

Her new single 'Never Coming Back' is heading in exactly the same direction. The euphoric anthem has already peaked at No.18 on Australian radio, and it's easy to see why from its punching-the-air belt of a vocal and early 2000s era pop-country hook.

‘Never Coming Back’ came from that moment in my breakup when everything finally clicked. I learned to love myself harder, knew I was done, and there was no going back. Writing it became my way of choosing myself and moving forward.. and also gave me a song I could dramatically belt out in the shower.

2026 looks to be a landmark year for Fahim, with a supporting spot on Jordan Davis’ Australian tour in March and a debut album ‘Who You Are’ set for release in May.

Listen If You Like: Dasha, Chanel Yates, Megan Moroney

For years, Morgan Nagler has been your favorite artist’s favorite songwriter. Before that, she was a young actor, in a world that she says made her “well-versed in the absurd”. But that feels like a story for another time.

Nagler’s musical career began when she picked up a guitar and a pen in between filming scenes for a cable television series. It was this endeavor that allowed her to access and express her own feelings rather than merely playacting the ones presented to her in a script. Influenced by everything from the ‘60s folk of Joni Mitchell to ‘90s hip-hop à la A Tribe Called Quest to the millennial indie rock of Elliot Smith and Modest Mouse, her sound would become an amalgamation of them all as she spent time fronting bands, like Los Angeles’ Whispertown and Supermoon, tackling grueling tour schedules and co-writing with an array of famous friends.

In the last few years, she’s collaborated with the likes of Kim Deal, HAIM, Margo Price, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Phoebe Bridgers – their work together on her 2020 hit, ‘Kyoto’, earned Nagler a Grammy nomination for Best Rock Song – and more. Her fearless commitment to lyricizing humanity has become a hot commodity in the writing rooms of today.

“Most of my songs are born out of picking up the guitar and seeing what comes out,” she tells Holler of her craft. “In my writing process, I try to remove the filter of my analytical brain and let the underlying thoughts come through.”

Weaving a finely honed wit with an effortlessly poetic depth, Nagler has helped fellow musicians get to the true heart of their emotions and candidly tell their stories through song. Now, it’s her turn, her pen poised to lay bare her own journey.

Come March 13, the West Coast raised songstress will release her solo debut album, I’ve Got Nothing to Lose, and I’m Losing It, a collection that showcases her singular songwriting and brand of what she describes as “solo roadtrip music for hopeful realists.” Featuring the scuzzy alt-Americana of her previously released ‘Cradle The Pain’ and the silly jangle-folk of her latest single, ‘Grassoline’, Nagler’s debut is equal parts introspective and light-hearted, just as pensive as it is fun. Along the way, Nagler – not the actor, not the shadowy co-writer, but the artist mining empathy and joy – will be revealed.

“I feel most like myself than ever before on this collection of songs,” she shares of the upcoming release. “The hope is to offer some connection and relation to folks in these troubled times of disconnect.”

'Grassoline' is out now. I’ve Got Nothing to Lose, and I’m Losing It arrives March 13, via Little Operation Records and More.

Listen If You Like: Lucinda Williams, John Prine, MJ Lenderman

- Alli Patton

Listen to a selection of songs from our 10 Artists You Need To Know on the playlist below.

For more of the monthly editions of Holler's 10 Artists You Need To Know, see below: