Search results for

We discovered Rissi Palmer at her wonderful sets at last year’s Earl Scruggs Music Festival – and we’re happy to report she’ll be returning there over Labor Day weekend. This new EP includes an anthem of survival in which she collaborates with another great newcomer, Miko Marks, and a powerful song that was inspired by the Mexican proverb 'they tried to bury us, they didn't know we were seeds'.

You may know of her sister Maya, who has followed her Stray Birds work with a burgeoning solo career. Now it’s time to get to know Nina, with this wondrous full-length debut! These are sincere songs from the heart here, whether romantic, familial, self-love, or love for music itself. As she writes, “I believe music to be one of the strongest healing forces in the world. I believe that as we all lean into the creative voices within us, we will find our way towards deeper healing, greater peace, and a more loving and understanding world. More than ever before, I feel called to lean into creating and sharing music that might provide hope and healing. In the immense human mosaic that we all take part in creating, I aspire to contribute a small piece of light.”

One of our favorite bands calls Brevard and Asheville home, and they can now add Saluda to that list. Welcome to the first Rangers album with singer/songwriter/guitarist Aaron Burdett added to the lineup. Recorded in Bat Cave this year with Darrell Scott joining with production and additional guitar work, this one includes songs about Alabama, Glasgow, the changing West Asheville neighborhood, and Aaron’s giant plunge into the band’s scene. The rest of the band has Graham Sharp on banjo and vocals, Mike Guggino on mandolin/mandola and vocals, Nicky Sanders on fiddle and vocals, Mike Ashworth on drums and vocals, and Barrett Smith on bass, guitar, and vocals. The album will be available on September 8th, the first day of their 17th annual Mountain Song Festival in Brevard.

Nathan is the frontman and songwriter for the Dallas, TX outlaw country/garage rock band Ottoman Turks, which also includes Joshua Ray Walker. Walker joins this as backup vocalist and co-producer. Punk, honky-tonk, Southern rock… Get ready for all of it on this one.

Vivian Leva & Riley Calcagno have been making sweet old-time fiddle/banjo/guitar music together, both under that name, and in the quartet The Onlies, out in Portland, Oregon the past few years. They’ve now moved to Durham, NC, and have more of an indie/folk/pop sound on this wonderfully recorded album of songs covering a wide array of subject matter. They play Asheville on September 22nd, and Charlotte on the 23rd.

“I was trying to let my age and experience guide me through making a record I wished I’d made when I was younger,” McKenna explains. “I really wanted it to sound like if I made a rock record in the ’90s, and then I remembered that I made my first album in 1998. There’s something so 30 years ago in my head about this record. In a way, I wish I could start again and know what I know now.” Small towns and what happens in them has been one of the hot topics among songwriters this summer… Lori’s perspectives from her small hometown (in Massachusetts, where she raises her 5 kids) are reflected here among these ten songs. She’s spent this summer promoting the album with her “Town In Your Heart” tour, named after one of the songs.

Doug Sahm: an oft-underrecognized Tex-Mex music pioneer, who was a member of the Sir Douglas Quintet and the Texas Tornados. Son Volt’s Jay Farrar immersed himself in Sahm’s music during the COVID-19 pandemic, and found him to be “kind of a musical shapeshifter.” “From Tex-Mex to country to blues to San Antonio rhythm and blues to ‘60s pop to Cajun fiddle music. He’s always mostly following the inspiration – and then, occasionally, follows the money enough to find inspiration. He’s kind of a role model in that respect.” Check out this great tribute to him with Son Volt’s renderings of a dozen songs of his you may or may not know!

As Noah Berlatsky writes in No Depression, the band that got its start in Boone, NC has been playing traditional music with a reverent irreverence, and/or an irreverent reverence, for some 25 years now, and have become “virtually a tradition in itself. Their latest album, Jubilee, is a celebration of their own past and ongoing relevance, and of old-timey music as a hoedown that never ends but might pick up a fair number of new steps along the way.” They’ve picked up a few new members over the years, too, replacing some who’ve moved on. One of them, cofounder Willie Watson who left over a decade ago, has reunited with them on one song here, “Miles Away”. They’ve also picked up guests Sierra Ferrell and Mavis Staples, for one song each.

After a three year hiatus, Oklahoma’s Turnpike Troubadours return with this, their sixth studio album. Produced by three-time Grammy winner Shooter Jennings, the 10-song album is a tale of reliability, rebirth, and redemption. The first single “Mean Old Sun” has already hit #1 on Americana and Texas Radio Charts. Let’s see if this album ranks in our end of year Top 100!

13 tracks on this, their 8th studio album. As for the theme, Jason remarks: “There is something about boundaries on this record. As you mature, you still attempt to keep the ability to love somebody fully and completely while you’re growing into an adult and learning how to love yourself.” "Jason Isbell hits a brutally beautiful songwriting peak with Weathervanes. One of the best singer-songwriters in the game delivers catharsis for grim times… it’s Isbell’s strongest album to date." (Rolling Stone)