Judged among its peers and the patterns that Blake Shelton has carved for himself in now nearly 20 years of releasing music, “God’s Country” is unexpected, expressive, passion-filled, and hard not to feel the power of. But it won’t be interesting enough to assuage Johnny Cash hipsters to pay attention to commercial radio.
Hot damn son! Wondering where the hell all the hard charging, kick ass, phase guitar and pedal steel-filled good ol’ Outlaw country music has gone in 2019, and without skimping on the songwriting, thank you very much? Well it all seems to have been sucked up and put to good use by Alabama native Ben Jarrell.
It seems strange to characterize George Strait’s latest record Honky Tonk Time Machine as a return to his roots. After all, this is George Strait. But nonetheless, it’s a fair accreditation to make, and a welcome conclusion to settle upon when you appreciate the authority with which George Strait can deliver a honky tonk heartbreaker.
We could say that it’s a strange time in country music when someone like the front man of the California indie rock band The Mother Hips is releasing a record, and it’s 95% more country, a leagues better than most of what you’ll hear in the mainstream of country today. But in truth this is not a new phenomenon.
Roger Alan Wade may be one of the best, and most emotionally potent songwriters and storytellers of our generation—a strong bullet point that is bolded and underscored with his latest album of all original songs, and his first after a five year gulf called ‘Simmering Rage.’ There are songwriters, and then there is Roger Alan Wade.
This album is a story of America, and who better to tell it than Tom Russell. His years have only embellished and refined his wit and craftsmanship, and he never lost his hunger along the way. There are good reasons why Russell is so revered by his musical and literary peers, and those reasons remain evident on “October in the Railroad Earth.”
Singer and songwriter Emily Scott Robinson has released a remarkable work of cutting autobiographical stories mixed with brilliant works of fiction that even from this early perspective in the calendar year can confidently be presented as one that will challenge for one of the best collections of songs released in all of 2019.
Maren Morris certainly isn’t the first, will most definitely not be the last, and can’t even be described as the worst to ply pop elements in country either in part or predominantly. It is certainly true from any honest and objective perspective that Maren Morris’s second record, GIRL, is one of the most exclusively pop albums to ever be released in country.
This story has been updated. Here in the age of information, when the access to music is infinite, and every bit of recorded material from artists past and present is right at your very fingertips at any given moment, releases of old archived scratch material from an artist who’s been dead over twenty years rarely […]
Those versed in country music knowledge are very aware that the Everly Brothers are in the Country Music Hall of Fame. Those even more versed in country knowledge know that the songwriting pairing of Felice and Boudleaux Bryant who wrote many of the Everly Brothers’ biggest hits are also in the Country Music Hall of […]
There was a time when we looked upon the drunken poet Hayes Carll, and the rugged cowboy Ryan Bingham, and saw the future of alt-country laid out right there before our very eyes. Both were outstanding as writers and performers. Both carried such promising futures. Both were signed to Lost Highway Records, which had the […]
The best don’t sing and write songs because they want to. They do it because they have to. They hate music, and love it all the same. They feel the need to pursue fame, but hate all the attention. They want their music to be heard by as many as possible, but revile having to make money from it.
When it comes to popular music, every generation has its goat. And no, we’re not talking about the hip social media acronym for the “Greatest of All Time.” We’re talking about the sacrificial kind—the one synonymous with an ornery horned land animal that eats your garden and shits everywhere.
Dale Watson is incapable of hiding his roots. He’s so damn country, he started his own genre called Ameripolitan just to get away from what country music has become. There is nobody less likely skid off the tracks and abandon their country principles on this big sphere of rock hurdling through space than Dale Watson.
When you hear an artist like Charles Wesley Godwin sing, there is no need to power cycle your sense of disbelief. The sinewy roots of West Virginia’s hardscrabble existence seem to be intertwined with Godwin’s synapses and muscle tissue, almost as if he’s a construct of the land itself, like a scrub tree clinging to life.
Regularly playing shows at places like The Broken Spoke, Luckenbach, and The White Horse, Weldon Henson is Texas country honky tonk served straight no chaser, meant to send two-steppers twirling and to pull the slow dancers closer. Weldon Henson and the Honky Tonk Frontier Band are Texas country front to back.
Who would have thought that Clint Eastwood would still be directing and starring in movies at the age of 88? Who would have thought that Toby Keith would write and perform a song as good as “Don’t Let The Old Man In”? Who would have thought that a site like Saving Country Music would be praising a Toby Keith song?
His name is Joshua Ray Walker, and he’s from Dallas, TX. And with his debut album he’s slinging out the deep and ugly gut bucket country blues with enough brokenhearted bad times and broke bad regrets to get you curled up in a fetal position and sobbing like a little girl on the cold, hard, sawdust floor.
‘Into The Blue’ is a worthy and compelling showcase of Alice Wallace’s stellar voice and refined songwriting skills, all steeped deeply and proudly in Southern California textures and lore. Though more classic in style, the work is fiercely relevant in moments, almost eerily so.
For how many years have country fans from all across the world looked towards the two parallel one-way streets just east of downtown Nashville called “Music Row” with frustration, bewilderment, and even outright disgust, and then dreamed of a scenario where the whole mess could be switched out like a reversible sweater for what’s happening […]
This song doesn’t belong anywhere near country music, and neither does Maren Morris. “GIRL” capitalizes, underscores, bolds, and bolsters this blatantly obvious and unequivocal conclusion, leaving no room for discussion or argument anymore.
The Steel Woods have arrived ladies and gentlemen, and with them a whole new legacy of Southern rock to enjoy in the present tense, and look forward to for the foreseeable future. With ‘Old News’ they lay it all to bear, leave nothing to chance, throw out their best shots, and scream for rightful consideration.
Tag Randy Houser’s Magnolia as yet another entry into the evidence file that the era of Bro-Country continues to wane, and it’s slow but steady expiration has allowed the latitude of some established artists to return, giving them the ability to select and record the material of their choosing, and reuniting them with their more […]
Josh Turner does a great job on I Serve a Savior to make Gospel music that is accessible, not just from the passion that you can feel coming through his performances, or his voice that puts signature touches on old standards such as “I Saw The Light,” and the super low tones he perfects on “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.”