ALBUM REVIEW•Steve Earle & The Dukes - JERRY JEFF
The relentless renegade displays his admiration for an influential icon.
ALBUM REVIEW•Banditos - Right On
This relatively sharp break in the Banditos’ sound breathes fresh life into an outfit outfit looking to expand boundaries while maintaining its core musical mojo.
ALBUM REVIEW•Wilco - Cruel Country
Wilco come home to their alt-country roots - sort of - with a surprise double album of intimate group performances steeped in reflections on America.
ALBUM REVIEW•Hannah White - About Time
There’s no numbing the pain in White’s world, only walking—and sometimes stumbling—through it, feeling everything and alchemizing it with music and love.
COUNTRY CLASSICS•Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood - Nancy & Lee
The songs on Nancy & Lee helped both artists to shape their sounds at pivotal moments in their lives; creating a dark, complex and ethereal synergy that would inform generations that followed.
STAFF PICKS•Zach Bryan - American Heartbreak
American Heartbreak sculpts the entire breadth of human experience, as Bryan stitches together songs of love, loss and life’s fleeting nature with brilliant command.
ALBUM REVIEW•Mavis Staples and Levon Helm - Carry Me Home
Fans of Staples and Helm will be thrilled with this magical, professionally recorded and mixed concert, hidden away for over a decade, that puts us right at the heart of the 2011 action.
ALBUM REVIEW•Avi Kaplan - Floating on a Dream
Avi Kaplan's debut full-length introduces a compelling, convincing and emotional singer whose mellifluous baritone is as gripping as any instrument.
ALBUM REVIEW•Lyle Lovett - 12th of June
The Texan master’s first album in a decade alternates between the large-ensemble jazz of his childhood and the stripped-down twang that’s long been his signature.
ALBUM REVIEW•Mama's Broke - Narrow Line
Two sisters in song continue a journey informed by their encounters in far-reaching travels
COUNTRY CLASSICS•The Black Crowes - The Southern Harmony and Musical Companion
Though Southern Harmony was followed by The Black Crowes’ slow descent from mainstream visibility, it marked the beginning of a vibrant creative streak that still resounds beautifully this many years later.
ALBUM REVIEW•49 Winchester - Fortune Favors the Bold
Even if the small-town concepts expressed on Fortune Favors the Bold have been heard before, authentic lyrics and the band's warm southern country rock make them fresh - and even inspiring.
STAFF PICKS•Leyla McCalla - Breaking The Thermometer
With near unmatchable vocal strength, McCalla uproots hidden histories that hold the key to her ancestral past.
ALBUM REVIEW•Brennen Leigh ft. Asleep at the Wheel - Obsessed with the West
The purity and spirited personality Brennen Leigh projects, her obvious adulation of the genre’s history and of course stellar support from Asleep at the Wheel on Obsessed with the West creates a set that is a consistent delight.
COUNTRY CLASSICS•Bobbie Gentry - Fancy
Put this record on and turn the volume up, this is our one chance to not let Gentry down any further.
ALBUM REVIEW•Midland - The Last Resort: Greetings From
The Last Resort: Greetings From unfurls as an eclectic, vibrant tapestry of an escapist trip along the Florida Keys, as Midland continue to stride confidently down their own unique path.
ALBUM REVIEW•Graham Nash - Live: Songs for Beginners / Wild Tales
Even though this live record might sell tickets, it’s hard to recommend these readings over the classic versions that retain their modest yet earnest emotional punch.
ALBUM REVIEW•Luke Winslow-King - If These Walls Could Talk
King has found his niche in a feelgood sound that succeeds due to his aw-shucks personality, along with a homespun style that paves the way for further evolution in a still young and promising career.
STAFF PICKS•Miranda Lambert - Palomino
Palomino revels in the idea of how good it feels to not be tied down to anything or anyone, to always be passing through the world and all the possibilities it becomes rich with when you do.
STAFF PICKS•Caroline Spence - True North
In an era where we are collectively reassessing meanings of life and death, the singer-songwriter's latest will stand as a lasting memento 一 an apt discernment of time and aging.
ALBUM REVIEW•Say ZuZu - Here Again: A Retrospective (1994-2002)
Say what? A new compilation offers a few good reasons why Say ZuZu may be worth more than a mention.
ALBUM REVIEW•Willie Nelson - A Beautiful Time
His windswept voice that cracks and strains displays the wear and tear of decades. But that just makes these performances reverberate with the truths Willie Nelson wants to communicate.
LIVE REVIEW•Chris Stapleton: Concert For Kentucky At Kroger Field, 4/23/22 - Gallery
Stapleton, Sheryl Crow, Madeline Edwards and one Willie Nelson delivered a euphoric night at the first-ever show at Kroger Field.
ALBUM REVIEW•Eli Paperboy Reed - Down Every Road: Eli Paperboy Reed Sings Merle Haggard
Hopefully, we don’t have to wait for another pandemic to hear a follow-up - Haggard’s rich catalog is ripe for such interesting reinterpretation.