This album’s a total vibe in a “push play and let it roll” kind of listening experience. Their fifth album is solely devoted into leaning into what they do best, which is capturing a mood that reminds you of the late ’70s.
In 1,000 parallel universes, it feels like Billy Strings only ends up as an improbable arena-level bluegrass star in one of them. But luckily, that’s the universe the rest of us inhabit with him.
Whether through his work with the New Orleans-based music collective The Deslondes, or his numerous collaborations with other performers, or his first solo album a few years back, some probably recognize the name Riley Downing.
Tony Hannah’s Love It Or Leave It is one of those albums you don’t really need to make a convincing argument for. You simply press play, and the music does the rest. It’s so hard to find fault in, and so easy to fall in love with.
Though the rest of the world knows him as the frontman for the new wave rock and roll band The Killers, he might have just accidentally hauled off and made an Album of the Year contender in country.
Kimmi Bitter is country music’s throwback honky tonk sweetheart with a voice like Patsy Cline, and a style like The Ventures. She doubles down on the mod/Countrypolitan/surf/’60s sound that’s so succulent to the ear.
There’s no need to close your eyes and suspend disbelief, or stoke the imagination with intoxicants or potions to be transported to the West Texas universe where the songs of Red Shahan dwell among the sandpaper winds.
Delightfully unpretentious, and insulated from all the trend chasing back east, they’re just writing, recording, and releasing country songs and records that emulate their heroes, and come with immediate appeal.
Wyatt Flores is one of the most thoughtful, honest, expressive, and gripping songwriters of this new generation of Texas and Red Dirt performers. But let’s just be open and clear-eyed about exactly what “Scared of Heights” is.
Ultimately, “Little Miss Twain” will not be what Shania Twain is remembered for. But what you can take away is that getting more personal and pulling from your own life’s story while trying to be more true to yourself always results in better art.
“Christian Name” is a recount of the last couple of years of Godwin’s life, just like many albums are. It just happens to be that the last few years have seen a renewed dedication to faith by Godwin, and for good reasons.
This record and the songs on it are so good, you’re a little mad about it. You’re not mad that theses songs are finally seeing the light of day. You’re ecstatic about that. You’re angry that it took so long. But there’s no looking this gift horse in the mouth.
To a good consensus of old school country fans, Gary Stewart is far and away the most underrated, and under-heralded country artist of all time, with his catalog wielding incomparable influence on artists of his era, and contemporary ones.
Nathan Evans Fox is originally from rural Glen Alpine, North Carolina and a 4th generation farm. His new album Heirloom very much embraces and symbolizes the confluence of contradictions in the American South.
West Virginia’s John R. Miller gratifies a whole host of musical erogenous zones on his new album The Great Unknowing, including honky tonk country, Appalachian folk, feral folk rock, and a few other things.
Mr. Keith has crafted a classic country record, and a darn good one too, filled with great country instrumentation, clever and true-to-country lyricism, and good old-fashioned heartbreak. It reminds you why you’re a country fan.
It’s the way that River wields an uncanny ability to craft incredibly infectious melodies, and then brings them to bear on music otherwise colored with dark themes. It’s the way the music mixes country and rock…
Amid the race to the bottom that right-leaning mainstream country performers such as Lee Brice and Brantley Gilbert are currently devolving into, the extremely left-leaning politically-focused Bryan Andrews just bested them all.
Jason Eady isn’t just a master craftsman songwriter whose services are considered invaluable in the Texas scene and beyond. He’s a tireless student on the music as well, soaking up any and all knowledge he can about the various modes.
Like something sweet left outside for any extended period of time in the summer, the voice of Bella White attracts a multitude of living things with its siren-like quality calling out for yearning hearts to come be filled from its bounty.
The perfect balance between familiar and accessible, and involved and thought-provoking. This is country music at an elevated level that belies Addison Johnson’s otherwise underdog status.
“Banks of the Trinity” finds Cody Johnson exploring much more contemporary, radio-friendly sounds as opposed to sticking to the more traditional sound his fans have become accustomed to.
Never losing touch with the heavy emotions and hard choices so many of the people in his own audience are weighted down and faced with, BJ Barham and American Aquarium deliver an impassioned, propulsive, and potent experience.
“Feet On Fire” feels like an especially inspired and more original work from Mr. Chapman. It feels more personal, more intentional, more in line with the best works from artists like fellow Georgian Brent Cobb, or maybe Marcus King.