‘Leather (Deluxe Edition)’ doesn’t just add 13 tracks to his current album. It continues to add to Cody Johnson’s solid legacy as a consistent and trusted traditional-leaning performer, impervious to the temptation to sell out.
For his latest project, Willie teams with his youngest son Micah. f nothing else, the album gave the two lots of quality and creative time together, and moments that will forever be preserved into the grooves of vinyl.
Paul Cauthen is not a unimportant or insignificant character in country music. His footprint and fan base are impressive. But Paul Cauthen is also the performer who most fundamentally gives into the id and the ego.
‘Hot Motel Nights’ is one hell of a honky tonk record with excellent songs, and superb and tasty instrumentation throughout. It’s albums like these that make a strong case for the evergreen relevance of classic country
The Bridge City Sinners and front woman Libby Lux use dark stories and even darker sounds to exorcise internal demons and personal doubts, and to refract the darkness that comes barreling toward the human soul.
The Lowdown Drifters are your favorite band’s favorite band. “Big” John Cannon is your favorite frontman’s favorite frontman. If you see someone with a Lowdown Drifters shirt or hat on, you know you’ve found a friend.
It’s only fitting that Lindi Ortega would make her ominous return with Halloween right around the corner. This Gothic country mistress conjures up a song cycle meant to leave one haunted by the spirits of past lives, and past lovers.
Wyatt Flores boasts the ability to channel roiled and unraveling emotions into coherent and confident songs that become curiously entertaining for such heavy material due to an elevated melodic component.
One of the signs that it’s a new day in country music is how a host performers who started as street buskers, train hoppers, and hitchhikers have now become some of the premier names in genre.
Jelly Roll is America’s favorite feel good story, whether that story is true or not. People want to believe it, because it gives them hope, either in themselves, or in society at large, or both. It’s intoxicating. And so they indulge.
Bob Wills and Western Swing were just as much jazz as they were country, and the same goes for Sweet Meg and ‘Bluer Than Blue.’ It’s boldly and steadfastly traveling back to the ’20s-’40s period, and reviving the era in sound.
They’re Americana anti-stars, working in obscure dialects that sit between the margins of more popular styles, taking up the influences and sounds that have been orphaned by the rest of music and making them feel loved.
Since the Grammy Awards are one of the few awards that weigh artistic merit over commercial success, it makes it a bit more important to pay attention to for fans and advocates of independent artists.
Lucky for us, The Franklin County Trucking Company is here to pull this proud tradition out of the ditch, shine up the chrome, tie some steer horns to the grill, and get it tearassing back down the road.
It’s a warning you’ve likely read here at Saving Country Music quite a few times over the years: Go see your favorite up-and-coming artists in smaller venues and for cheap ticket prices while you still can.
Here we are in a moment in country music custom made for the neotraditional sounds of Midland, and here they are invoking the era in music when folk rock turned into mom rock on the easy listening station.
Billy Strings has taken bluegrass to the arena and beyond. And every time you believe he’s going to abandon the discipline or stretch it too far, he doubles down on his bluegrass roots like he does with “Highway Prayers.”
As self-deprecating and under-the-radar as JP Harris may be, he is no less than a living legend to a lot of the independent country performers in East Nashville and beyond, and to the handful of fervent fans he’s accrued.
Eliza Thorn offers a super tasty, diverse, enriching, and involved album for her official debut that shows off a wide array of influences and talents across a spectrum of roots music, fulfilling the appetite of the audience.
Clearly the death of his father inspired a dramatic recalibration of priorities for Chase Rice, and that is reflected in the songs of this album. It’s definitely more mature and meaningful than his earlier stuff.
During multiple sets over multiple days, the sound and lighting on the Row One stage was so horrendous—both for the audience and the performers—it inspired this whole article to be written about it.
Now that it’s all in the books—and after four long days of humpin’ around from stage to stage in the middle of a late season Ohio River Valley heat wave—here are some of the things that were seen and heard.
The 2024 installment of AmericanaFest transpired in Nashville last week, giving fans, members of the industry, and fellow artists an opportunity to check out much of the talent in the independent side of country and roots.
‘The Last Frontier’ is quietly genius in its simplicity and efficiency. It feels like the best album that Reckless Kelly could squeeze out of themselves in this season of their career. And it feels like that deserves a slow clap.