Produced by Fat Possum Records’ Bruce Watson, this is a pretty irresistible slice of upbeat sacred soul from the 77 year old Memphis soul gospel queen Elizabeth King, who released her first single back in 1970. ‘Living In the Last Days’ is the title track to her debut album on the Memphis imprint Bible and … Continue reading
Gillian Welch Boots No. 2: The Lost Songs, Vol. 2 Acony Records Followers of Gillian Welch are hardy folk, having to endure long periods between albums to satiate their fandom. Sure they get to hear her on David Rawlings excellent albums as well but there’s no substitute for a pure Welch album, as she’s proved … Continue reading
Lists! We have a couple for you as usual as we wind down at the end of another year. I won’t rabbit on about the trials and tribulations of 2020, the good news was that the music still came down the pipeline with the same amount of quality and reward. We’ll have our overall list … Continue reading
Hot nights and a sultry blues rock groove are the order of the day on this new track from Indiana-based David Quinn. We last wrote about Quinn when he released his excellent album Wanderin’ Fool last year. This year’s new album Letting Go finds him broadening his sound and continuing his rich vein of songwriting. … Continue reading
It’s great to see Robert Connely Farr has a new album comin’ round the bend next week. We were really taken by his LP of 2019, Dirty South Blues, and everything we’ve heard so far from the new one, Country Supper, has sounded mighty good! Farr is a Bolton, Mississippi bluesman who has a knack … Continue reading
Super smooth and soulful jazz and country-blues flavoured sounds on this new single from Micah Edwards. The song has a lightness of touch about it that makes those melodies damn hard to shake. Perfect for this time of year as we head into spring in the Southern Hemisphere. Edwards hails from Houston and other than … Continue reading
Steve Earle & The Dukes Ghosts Of West Virginia New West Records The first sound you hear on Steve Earle’s new album is his solo voice, all gravel and grit as he leads a group chant which sits somewhere between the church and the railroad. It sets the scene magnificently for an album of songs … Continue reading
It was the voice of Arkansas songwriter Jonivan Jones that struck us when we first heard this new song, ‘After The Sunset’, with its acoustic blues/country sound that reminded us of fellow gravelly troubadour Ryan Bingham. Tough yet heartfelt, the song is written from the perspective of a veteran who has recently departed the service … Continue reading
Lucinda Williams Good Souls Better Angels Highway 20 / Cooking Vinyl Australia After a year spent looking back with her Car Wheels On A Gravel Road 20th anniversary tour, Lucinda Williams has now turned her mind to the modern world in the here and now, from internal battles of individuals to the heartless idiocy of … Continue reading
ALIVE AND KICKING On his debut solo album, What A Way To Die, Brandon Dodd shows he’s more than ready to step out of the shadows of his other musical projects with an accomplished and wide-ranging collection of roots music songs. If you’ve ever seen Kasey Chambers live in concert over the last five years … Continue reading
Brandon Dodd What A Way To Die Independent ‘Absolute’, the opening track on Brandon Dodd’s debut solo album sets a high standard with its warmth and intimacy, a wonderful blend of country, folk and heart-on-sleeve soul. The subtlety and restraint in the guitar playing and Dodd’s voice introduce a solo artist who has treaded the … Continue reading
Charley Crockett, today announced his latest studio album Welcome To Hard Times, released July 31st on Thirty Tigers. A bold new record from the definitive young voice in country and western’s modern reinvention. Produced by Mark Neill, with songwriting contributions from Pat McLaughlin and Dan Auerbach, Welcome To Hard Times’ is a genre-bending mix … Continue reading
Tami Neilson Chickaboom! Outside Music/Neilson Records On her latest album, Canadian-Kiwi Tami Neilson strips things right back to the core essence of song, rhythm and particularly a spotlight on her exceptional voice. Her focus was to record the songs as they would sound on stage, as performed by a three-piece band – her current preference … Continue reading
Today we’re featuring two new songs from Grey River & The Smoky Mountain, a folk group from Athens, Greece. Both tracks showcase the sensitivity with which they approach their music. The soulful vocal and the sparse instrumentation. There’s a bluesy country quality to their sound too, with shades of a darker gothic delivery. Both songs … Continue reading
Uncle Sinner released his new album Trouble Of The World in March and one of the highlights from it is this piece of raw folk blues in ‘Creation Myth’. A gravelly voice, primitive stomping percussion and rolling metallic banjo string plucking are the foundations for the song that takes off into a heady, psychedelic banjo … Continue reading
