The Gateway Drug to Americana Music Finding an entry point into a genre that you previously had little interest in, even disdain for, can be a revelation, a hidden door leading to a lifetime of new discoveries and musical obsessions. For me it was having my eureka moment with the godfather of Americana – Neil Young. …
His debut album heralded the arrival of a timeless and exciting new country and folk voice, yet for Marlon Williams he’s only just starting to realise his songwriting ambitions with the baroque pop sound of his new album Make Way For Love. Down the phone line from New Zealand, Marlon Williams has just landed at …
IN THE WAKE OF THE NASHVILLE SOUND Ahead of his recent return to Australia with his band The 400 Unit, Jason Isbell took Chris Familton through what he’s been up to in the wake of last year’s The Nashville Sound. “I still don’t think of myself as a country musician,” says Jason Isbell, talking about the …
When Kyle Jenkins sings ‘I fell in love with your methadone eyes, upon the ground where we lied’, it gives you an idea of the territory that Suicide Swans are operating in – warts and all human emotion and experience. It’s tempered with a sympathetic and empathetic casting of Augusta’s characters and presented in a …
Today we’ve posted the first episode of our brand new online music show Post To Wireless. Its current home is on Mixcloud where we’ll be publishing a new show each fortnight. Join me, Chris Familton, for a selection of alt-country, folk, blues and rock ‘n’ roll songs, information and interviews. We’ll be drawing from the …
Here they are, the 40 albums that I personally felt were the most important, fascinating and listenable in 2017. It was a near impossible process to collate them on a spreadsheet and make decisions and adjustments as to the creative worth of one over another. I’d highly recommend all the albums on this list and …
Reinterpreting the song of another artist is a strong tradition in country music, perhaps more than any other genre. The catalogue of classic and iconic songs stretches back nearly a century. From The Carter Family to Hank Williams, George Jones to Waylon Jennings, Dolly Parton to Emmylou Harris – the collection of timeless songs to cover … Continue reading
SOBRIETY & SINCERITY So often artists are touted as the best new thing or re-inventors of a genre or style. There is of course a time and a place for all those things but there’s equally much to be said about an artist who captures the purity and authenticity of a style. An artist like … Continue reading
Darren Watson is a stalwart of the New Zealand blues scene with a lineage in the bands Chicago Smoke Shop and Midge Marsden Band. Primarily he’s cut his teeth as an electric guitarist and singer so this acoustic record is a departure from the template and as a result it feels like a special project. … Continue reading
In less than two years since writing her first song, Tori Forsyth signed to Universal Music here in Australia and has more than lived up to expectations on her Shane Nicholson-produced debut album. Forsyth inhabits the corner of Americana music where pop pacing and high-rise melodies nuzzle up to shuffling country rhythms and darker gothic-tinged … Continue reading
THE SONIC DIARY OF SUICIDE SWANS Over the last six years the QLD town of Toowoomba has been been echoing to the strains of Suicide Swans and their fascinating blend of folk, cosmic country and psychedelic rock. On their latest album La Jungla they’ve expanded their sound into new musical terrain. Kyle Jenkins is the … Continue reading
Kasey Chambers’ last release was a double album, a sprawling and diverse set that at times felt like it would have benefited from more editing and quality control. Perhaps in reaction to the nature of that album she’s retreated to the campfire as both a symbol and a literal focal point for this set of … Continue reading
Suicide Swans are seemingly a band on a mission. The dust has barely settled on the release cycle for their excellent Augusta album of last year and they’re already releasing it’s followup – the sprawling, psych, rock and cosmic country double album that is La Jungla. Recorded live in one day in an amphitheatre, the band … Continue reading
Melbourne singer/songwriter Eddie Nuardo is releasing his new solo LP The Good Whiskey Never Lasts next week on Tuesday June 12th. PTW is pleased to be able to premiere the first single/video from the album, ‘Honey Baby’. It’s a sweet sway of a song built on lilting guitar and vocal melodies and the voice of Helena … Continue reading
BOMBS AND BURIED OPTIMISM Davey Craddock’s first album was an impressive collection of Australian Americana music from the west coast of the continent, but on his second album he felt the need to mix things up and explore the pervasive sense of anxiety in these changing, uncertain times. When Craddock sat down to start writing … Continue reading
Davey Craddock draped his debut album in Americana sounds as he wove stories about places and people, primarily in Australia. It was a superb debut and its followup, One Punch, is equally compelling whilst coming from different angles. One Punch steps back, and assesses the world with a brutal honesty. It takes stock of the … Continue reading
This the second studio album from Young’s collaboration with Promise Of The Real, the band centred around Willie Nelson’s sons Lukas and Micah. The Monsanto Years was a much straighter country rock affair while The Visitor sets out for wider and more eclectic terrain, making it his best album since Psychedelic Pill. ‘Fly By Night’ … Continue reading
Singer songwriter Cat Canteri has been slowly been building herself an impressive career that now numbers three solo albums. The sense of patience, self-determination and the evolution and refinement of her songwriting makes Inner North her most rewarding record to date. Canteri’s ability to drift between styles is a real strength and the way she … Continue reading
Marlon Williams, The Weather Station @ Metro Theatre, May 17th 2018 Five years of hard work, countless hours in airport lounges, nights on friends’ couches and in bars and clubs is paying off big time with Marlon Williams’ current Australian tour sold out in the largest venues he’s headlined to date. This time around he he’s brought … Continue reading
Blues & Alchemy: Remembering Chris Whitley’s ‘Dirt Floor’ 2000 was a particularly big year for me personally. I’d finished high school in rural NSW the previous year and had transgressed to the metropolis of Sydney. I spent the year between two share houses, one in La Perouse, the other in Petersham. I’d be embarrassed to … Continue reading
Sydney trio The High Ceilings have released a new single, the precursor to a full length album they’ve been working on, with the majority recorded in a community hall on the South Coast of NSW. ‘Poppy Won’ has a wonderful blend of the slacker delivery of Dylan, the weary, ragged strum and melancholic vibe of Neil … Continue reading
