Yesterday we revealed our favourite 2018 local releases from Australia (and NZ). Today we go global with our 40 favourite albums of 2018. We were going to make it a list that excluded the local albums, seeing as we’ve already published those favourites, but as with previous years we decided we don’t want to separate …
2018 was another strong year for the local alt-country, folk, blues and Americana scene here in Australia. We’ve put together a list of our favourite local releases, plus one New Zealand album that made the list this year. We highly recommend all of these records – check them out on streaming services, buy a CD …
COWGIRL IN THE SAND, VOL. II (2018) Back in 2014 we put together a mixtape featuring many of our favourite female singers and songwriters. We had great feedback about it and so in this day and age of Spotify playlists we thought it’d be a great idea to put together a second volume, this time … Continue reading
Savannah Conley has been getting a bit of attention of late, with her torch-song country soul sound. She’s got one of those voices that dances on melodies while searching the bottom of a whisky glass. ‘Same Old Eyes’, from her EP Twenty-Twenty, rides on a slow and lonely backbeat and shimmering guitars. Lovely stuff. If … Continue reading
This is a really nice slow-burn of a song. It slowly unfurls and reveals itself on the back of sparse guitar, distant organ and shuffling drums. Mike Powell‘s voice is the clincher though, with just the right amount of grit and grain in his tone to convey the heavy emotion of the song. A plaintive … Continue reading
A DIFFERENT SKYLINE Paul Andrews took a leap of faith and boarded a plane to Nashville with the finest songs he could write. The result of that experience is the new Family Fold album Ashfield Skyline. Rising from the ashes of 00s indie band Lazy Susan, Family Fold released their first album Lustre Glo in … Continue reading
LeBarons hit a Calexico vibe on this opening track from their new LP Summer Of Death. You can hear open desert roads, cacti standing tall in the setting sun and the melting asphalt beneath car tyres. It’s an evocative tune, a desert noir I guess. It reminds me of Sydney group The Morrisons in some … Continue reading
Kevin Welch has built a career both as a songwriter, respected and covered by his peers, and a solo and collaborative recording and touring artist in his own right. It’s his songs that are his calling cards, that and an open approach to the way he dresses and dances with each of them. On his … Continue reading
This track caught our ear with its noir verses and power pop on codeine chorus. It’s lush and swooning in the way it glides and soars at different times. Rich Webb hails from Melbourne and Stoner’ comes from his album Le Rayon Vert which you can check out on Spotify and purchase via his website. … Continue reading
Here comes the break-up album. It’s a tried and true fallback for a million songwriters out there but only a small percentage really nail the heartache, despair, fallout and renewal that comes from a fractured relationship. Marlon Williams has taken an approach that doesn’t shy away from the bruises and open wounds, instead he presents … Continue reading
For Kevin Welch, it seems like a lifetime ago that he rolled into Nashville in the late 70s, one of the countless budding songwriters seeking fame and/or fortune. In the cut-throat country music capital it’s usually the best that survive and it wasn’t long before Welch became recognised for his songwriting and gained respect from … Continue reading
Album number three for Melbourne-based songwriter Matt Joe Gow and this one finds him hitting his stride with his most compelling and realised set of songs to date. Gow co-produced the album and it certainly sounds world class with space for the songs to breathe and backed up with some wonderful and stylistically varied playing … Continue reading
Mike Viola was a member of Ryan Adams band for a while (and has worked with a number of other artists) and you can certainly hear a shared kinship for strummed and sparkly guitars, classic riffs and strong and heady vocal melodies. This one sways along with a melancholic power pop sound, really nice song. … Continue reading
It’s been five years since Matthew Houck released his last Phosphorescent album and by all reports he’s gone through a bunch of stuff in that time – falling in love, starting a family, leaving New York for Nashville, building a studio from the ground up and nearly dying from meningitis. As a result, C’est La Vie … Continue reading
Delafaye is a singer songwriter from Louisville, KY who has a new EP out called Acid Tongue. It features an acoustic version of this song, ‘Time And Money’, which was originally released as a full band single in 2016. It’s a wonderful song, lilting guitar chords hanging in the air while Delafaye cuts to the … Continue reading
Frog are a band out of Queens, NYC and they mix up a cool blend of wonky, askew Americana. Firmly operating on the cosmic side of the tracks, without sacrificing song-craft and hooks, the duo released their new LP Whatever We Probably Already Had It a couple of weeks ago. You can hear bits of The … Continue reading
Kramies recorded the EP Of All The Places Been & Everything The End in an old castle with the help of Jason Lytle (Grandaddy), Todd Tobias (Guided By Voices) and Jerry Becker (Train). It’s a swirling, hypnotic dreamscape of a song that recalls Mercury Rev and a floating-in-space Perry Farrell-fronted Porno For Pyros. At its heart … Continue reading
