Country & Folk
![American Folk - The Movie [Movie]](/Photo/418458837266:300 "American Folk - The Movie [Movie]")
American Folk is the soundtrack to the award-winning 2018 independent film, American Folk, starring Joe Purdy and Amber Rubarth. In addition to both original compositions and classic folk song renditions by Purdy and Rubarth, the soundtrack includes John Prine's ''Some Humans Ain't Human'' and Jerry Garcia & David Grisman's ''Freight Train.''
See You Around is the full-length debut from I'm With Her, featuring multi-Grammy-Award-winners Sara Watkins, Sarah Jarosz, and Aoife O'Donovan. Before coming together these artists co-founded seminal bands (Nickel Creek and Crooked Still) and since have collectively contributed to critically acclaimed albums from esteemed artists including Yo-Yo Ma, The Civil Wars, Kris Kristofferson, John Mayer, Alison Krauss, John Prine, and many more. This much anticipated release reveals the commitment to creating a wholly unified band sound. With each track born from close songwriting collaboration, I'm With Her builds an ineffable magic from their finespun narratives and breathtaking harmonies. The result is a collection both emotionally raw and intricate, with layers of meaning and insight within even the most starkly adorned track. Co-produced by Ethan Johns (Ryan Adams, Laura Marling, Paul McCartney) and the band and recorded at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios in a tiny English village near Bath, See You Around delivers a warmly textured sound that proves both fresh and timeless.
180g black vinyl w/ download card.
LANCO's story begins in the small towns where all five bandmates Lancaster, bassist Chandler Baldwin, multi-instrumentalist Jared Hampton, drummer Tripp Howell and lead guitarist Eric Steedly were raised. Spread across Tennessee, Kentucky and Georgia, they lived normal lives full of late nights, long weekends, hard lessons and young love. Alongside award-winning producer Jay Joyce, LANCO focused on capturing the spirit of their exuberant live shows, sharing the same goal to make everything sound authentic and human. If a particular song didn't click, LANCO would take it on the road and perform the new tune every night until things fell into place.
The sessions that produced Out In The Open were brisk and instinctive, expansive yet intimate, visceral and immediate - and they would have had to be, for herein are songs that tell the big story by drawing the small ones. There is, to my ear, as much of Raymond Carver's literate and humane influence on display as the Osborne Brothers, as much Welty in the pointed details - both sublime and confounding - as Clark and Van Zandt. Compassion and determination act as connective tissue when, throughout this song cycle, the bones, muscle, and blood of daily life dance with loose-limbed motion toward the inevitable, guided by an ethos best articulated by Sam Beckett who directed that when we falter, we try again and ''fail better.''
While in the studio, the Rangers stood in a circle - facing each other and the music with a well-worn brotherhood that was as well open to all they could not imagine transpiring between them. The songs were written as a map, and their shared history a compass blade, but the road itself - the journey - was a moving target and, as with all relevant music, remains one. And the Steep Canyon Rangers are moving along with it. - Joe Henry
Chris Stapleton
Chris Stapleton’s From A Room: Volume 2 will be released December 1 on Mercury Records Nashville. The multiple Grammy, CMA and ACM Award-winning musician first shared the album news from stage during the first of two sold-out shows at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena this past Friday. Of the special hometown concerts, CMT praises, “…cemented his status as one of music’s greatest talents to emerge from the current decade.”
The forthcoming album takes its name from Nashville’s historic RCA Studio A (the capital “A” in “From A Room”) where it was recorded over the last year with Grammy Award-winning producer Dave Cobb. Along with Stapleton on vocals and guitar and Cobb on acoustic guitar, the album features Morgane Stapleton on harmony vocals as well as longtime band-members J.T. Cure on bass and Derek Mixon on drums. In addition to seven songs co-written by Stapleton, the album features versions of Kevin Welch’s “Millionaire” and the Homer Banks/Lester Snell-penned song made famous by Pops Staples, “Friendship”.
Volume 2 follows the release of From A Room: Volume 1, which debuted earlier this year at #1 on the Billboard Country Albums chart, #2 on the Billboard Top 200 chart and, with its RIAA Gold certification, remains the #1 best-selling country album of 2017. Stapleton’s 2015 double-platinum solo debut, Traveller, is currently the #2 best-selling country album of the year.
With a sound that recalls Country music's acid washed golden era, the '90s influenced band Hot Country Knights has finally revealed more details about their debut album THE K IS SILENT, from Capitol Nashville, available May 1st. Produced by Dierks Bentley, the multi-Platinum entertainer also serves as a co-writer on over half of the 10 brawny tracks, serving up one of the most musically satisfying debut albums since 1999. Standout track "You Make It Hard" best represents their High-T philosophy.
Penning seven of the 10 tracks, Bradbery embarked on a four-year songwriting journey in preparation of I DON’T BELIEVE WE’VE MET, alongside ACM Awards Male Vocalist of the Year Thomas Rhett as well as GRAMMY® Award-winning songwriter Emily Weisband and GRAMMY®-nominated songwriter Jeff Pardo to create songs that were an honest reflection of her story. Chart-topping songwriters Rhett Akins (Blake Shelton, Jason Aldean) and Nicolle Galyon (Kenny Chesney, Lady Antebellum, Miranda Lambert) also penned tunes on the project.
Co-producers Josh Kerr, Afterhrs (One Direction), Alysa Vanderheym, Jason Gantt (Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, Brooks & Dunn), Julian Bunetta (One Direction, Thomas Rhett) and Sam Ellis (Marina McBride, Hunter Hayes) all helped to fine-tune the “fresh new sound” (Rolling Stone Country) of the album.“I am more than ready to re-introduce myself with music that is true to my story and my sound after diving into the writing process over the past four years,” said Bradbery. “With I DON'T BELIEVE WE'VE MET, I got the opportunity to work with amazing writers and producers that brought out my unique style and allowed me to tap into so many different influences. This is the beginning of a new chapter for me, and I am so excited for everyone to hear what we've made."
A lot can change in a year: markets boom and bust, trends come and go, presidents get elected. In 2015, Margo Price was a country underdog just trying to keep enough gas in the tank to get to the next gig, but by the end of 2016, she was one of the genre’s most celebrated new artists and a ubiquitous presence on late night television and at major festivals around the world.
It’s the kind of year most musicians can only dream of, and the arrival of Price’s spectacular sophomore album, “All American Made,” proves that she hasn’t taken a moment of it for granted. Delivering on the promise of her debut and then some, the record finds Price planting her flag firmly in the soil as a songwriter who’s here for the long haul, one with the chops to hang with the greats she so often finds herself sharing stages with these days.
A prolific writer with a knack for candid self-reflection, Price has never had to look too far for inspiration, and on ‘All American Made,’ she and her songwriting partner/ husband, Jeremy Ivey, continue to depict the trials of everyday life with un inching honesty, painting poetically plainspoken portraits of men and women just trying to get by.
Highs and lows, long nights and hard days, wild women and cocaine cowboys, politics and sexism, it’s all in there, singularly filtered through Price’s wry, no-bullshit perspective. Throughout the album, her contemporary take on classic sounds is at once familiar and daring, an infectious blend of Nashville country, Memphis soul, and Texas twang that tips its cap to everyone from Waylon and Willie (who makes a guest appearance) to Loretta and Dolly, all while flipping a middle finger to the cookie-cutter pop that dominates modern country radio. Rich with swirling pedal steel, honky-tonk rhythms, and Price’s stop-you-in-your-tracks vocals, ‘All American Made’ is deeply reverent of tradition even as it challenges conventions, a nuanced exploration of conflicted emotions for our deeply conflicted times.
On his sixth album, Bryan wants to bring us together. “Let me hit you with some hometown truth,” he sings in the album’s title track, before sketching a series of country cliches—cowboys, ploughboys, kids running through Georgia pines—linked by their Southern roots. “We’re all a little different, but we’re all the same/Everybody doin’ their own thing.” Through philosophical musings on faith and fatherhood (“Most People Are Good,” “Pick It Up”) he bids listeners—and, notably, his sons—to be open-minded: “I believe you love who you love/Ain’t nothin’ you should ever be ashamed of.”
Vinyl LP pressing. 2017 release. Fifteen is the first recording in six years from contemporary folk's most popular group, The Wailin' Jennys. An entrancing collection of cover songs, it includes tunes by Tom Petty, Emmylou Harris and Dolly Parton, and is their first new music since 2011's acclaimed album, Bright Morning Stars. For founding members Nicky Mehta and Ruth Moody, along with longtime member Heather Masse, Fifteen celebrates a 15-year musical partnership that has resulted in four award-winning studio albums and one live recording on Red House Records, three of which landed the trio on the Billboard charts, while garnering the band a worldwide fanbase. All three band members sing and play a variety of instruments (acoustic guitar, accordion, banjo, ukulele) to create a shimmering tapestry of rich vocals and instrumentals. Additional musicians include Richard Moody (Ruth's brother), Sam Howard, Adrian Dolan and Adam Dobres. Produced by The Wailin' Jennys, Fifteen is a gorgeous feather in the cap of the band that has thrilled millions of listeners to A Prairie Home Companion radio
Warner Music Nashville's Gabby Barrett is setting the trend. Recently spotlighted as one ofCMT's Next Women of Country (Class of 2020), a 2020MusicRowNext Big Thing artist, aSiriusXM+PandoraAll-Genre and Country Artist to Watch, Radio Disney's Next Big Thing, andAmazon Music's Weekly One best performing Country female of 2019, she continues to rise through the ranks as "country music's next female superstar" (Country Now). Garnering critical acclaim, Barrett's current single "I Hope" was named one ofRolling Stone Country's "10 Best Country and Americana Songs To Hear Now" and claimed the #1 spot onSiriusXM's The Highway Hot 30 Countdown and onRadio Disney's Country Top 50 chart. "A voice you must hear, " (The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review) Barrett has opened forDierks Bentley, Kane Brown, Luke Bryan, Toby Keith, Chris Lane, Dustin Lynch, Jake Owen, Bebe Rexha, Cole Swindell, Sugarland, andCarrie Underwood, and will take the stage at mile marker festivals like Stagecoach, Tortuga Music Festival, and Country Jam in 2020. With over 130 MILLION on-demand streams to her credit, Barrett previewed her upcomingRoss Copperman-produced album releasing new song "The Good Ones." The Pennsylvania native began singing in her local gospel choir at nine years old, and performed 136 shows in 2017 alone before rising to national prominence as a Top 3 finalist on ABC'sAmerican Idol.
Country superstar Blake Shelton remains firmly rooted as a proud Oklahoman with his forthcoming album, Texoma Shore. “Lake Texoma has always been a place of great memories, new and old,” said Shelton. “I literally recorded this album here at its shore so it’s full circle to have the love of this place and the love of country music come together here.” Texoma Shore follows in the footsteps of Shelton’s last album, If I’m Honest, which was the best-selling country album released in 2016. That album earned Shelton a number of awards, including Top Country Artist at the Billboard Music Awards in May.So what can fans expect to hear on Texoma Shore? According to Shelton: “When you listen to the record it will go from something traditional to something that will make your head spin back to something even more traditional. That’s just what you can expect from one of my albums. At this point in my career it’s always good for me to try something different, with different sounds, and I think you'll hear hints of that on this record. I've explored about every part of country music you can explore and it seems like I always keep coming back to my roots, which is traditional country music. I love great songs and there are so many talented writers in Nashville, but I do have a song on the album that I wrote and I'm very proud of it.”
Vinyl LP pressing. 2017 live release. Shooter Jennings was the 48th artist recorded Live at Billy Bob's Texas in November 2016. The show was part of the Billy Bob's Texas 35th Anniversary celebration. Shooter Jennings is a singer/songwriter active mainly in the outlaw country music and Southern rock genres. He is the son of country music legend Waylon Jennings. Billy Bob's Texas is a country and western nightclub located in the Fort Worth Stockyards, Texas, United States. It promotes itself as "The World's Largest Honky Tonk," at 100,000 square feet of interior space and 20,000 square feet of parking space.
Country singer Ned LeDoux will be releasing his first full-length studio album "Sagebrush" on November 3, which pays homage to his musical roots.
2017 release. Two queens of contemporary country music join forces on this powerful album, combining voices, vision and talents to create one of the most exciting country releases this year! Altogether, these two artists have sold well over 10 million albums worldwide, not to mention they both come from country royalty - Pam is the daughter of icon Mel Tillis and Lorrie, the daughter of hitmaker George Morgan! Pam's grit meets Lorrie's glamour on such country classics as the title track, originally made famous by Dottie West, Billie Jo Spears' "Blanket On The Ground," and Dwight Yoakam's "Guitars, Cadillacs" plus early rock favorites such as Roy Orbison's "It's Over" and The Everly Brothers' "Walk Right Back!" Special guest appearances by Joe Diffie and Darryl Worley!
Vinyl LP pressing. 2017 release from the country music legend. Following in the musical footsteps of 2014's December Day, Willie Nelson and the Boys is another family collaboration, this time showcasing Willie and sons, Lukas Nelson and Micah Nelson, performing a selection of American country music standards and classics, including seven penned by Hank Williams Sr. Consisting mainly of studio recordings laid down during the 2011 sessions for Heroes, Willie Nelson and the Boys (Willie's Stash, Vol. 2) is produced by Willie's longtime friend and collaborator Buddy Cannon and recorded at Pedernales Recordings Studio in Austin, Texas. Includes Move It On Over', 'Healing Hands Of Time', 'Your Cheatin' Heart' and many others.
Hannah Walker and Jamie Elliott, better known as Vancouver based Indie-Folk duo Twin Bandit, return with their sophomore album Full Circle, releasing via Nettwerk. Inspired by day-to-day experiences reflecting on death, mental health and good ol’ fashioned heartache, this is a deeply personal album which aims to inspire those who hear it.
Midland intentionally nods to the wild west with Country music reminiscent of the 1970s and 80s, channeling idols Dwight Yoakam and Willie Nelson, both legends whom they previously opened for on the road. Their 2016 self-titled debut EP was featured in Rolling Stone, Entertainment Weekly and Billboard and their music video earned them their first CMT Music Awards nomination for Group Video of the Year. ON THE ROCKS is Midland's anticipated first full-length release on Big Machine Records.
2017 release. Together at last! Two folk legends of Laurel Canyon's countercultural music scene join forces on this gorgeous album of all new recordings! Features captivating versions of classic tunes by fellow folk icons Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen plus a few of their own compositions!
Chris Hillman, whose credits include co-founding Rock and Roll Hall of Famers the Byrds, as well as the Flying Burrito Brothers, Manassas and Desert Rose Band, is truly one of the architects of American music. His newest solo work, Bidin' My Time, produced by Tom Petty and executive-produced by Herb Pedersen, captures a rarity: an icon who has never sounded better, making music with old friends for the sheer love of it. Collaborators and admirers from Hillman's storied career appear throughout the record: Tom Petty; Hillman's Byrds bandmates David Crosby and Roger McGuinn; the Heartbreakers' Benmont Tench, Mike Campbell, and Steve Ferrone; Desert Rose Band's John Jorgenson, Pedersen, and Jay Dee Maness; premier upright bassist Mark Fain; singer/guitarist Josh Jové; and fiddler Gabe Witcher. The album kicks off with a new recording of Pete Seeger's and Welsh poet Idris Davies' 'The Bells of Rhymney,' which the Byrds recorded for their debut. 'Here She Comes Again' was co-written by Hillman and McGuinn and, until now, had only been recorded on a live Byrds album in Australia. 'She Don't Care About Time' was written by Byrds co-founder Gene Clark, and was the original B-side to 'Turn! Turn! Turn!' Covers of the Everly Brothers' 'Walk Right Back' and Petty's 'Wildflowers' round out this understated yet undeniable masterpiece. Folk, rock and roll, bluegrass and the unmistakable country-rock Hillman himself helped pioneer come together seamlessly on the triumph that is Bidin' My Time.
This record is the product of a strange and interesting time. When I started writing Gathering, I felt tired of living in the shadow of my earlier self, my earlier work, but more than discouraged, I felt charged with the possibility and the freedom of cutting myself loose from my own and others expectations. I began with an exciting sense of dissatisfaction, and what emerged, as I began to find my voice, was a record full of storms. Some, like Feels Like Lightning or Friendamine, are physical storms. Others, like Dreams, are interior ones. Listening to these songs now, I hear uncertainty, mania, laughter and sadness, all vying for their place on the album. I was surprised by the new voice.
I have been writing records for almost twenty years now. Each one has been different from the last in subject and form, but with Gathering I feel I've found a new electric dissatisfaction, a new way to rejoice as the storm rolls in.
