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On my way to interview Josh Rouse, with his songs murmuring in my iPod, I wondered how best to ask the question that was really bothering me: Does this still matter? Not "this" as in Josh Rouse, per se, or Nashville, his well-crafted new album, but "this&

Nanci Griffith was sure she wouldn't be around to see the domestic release of her new album, Hearts In Mind -- around meaning on U.S. soil. A singer and songwriter who has long worn her lefty politics on her sleeve and skirt, too, she had sworn if

The cover of Shooter Jennings' debut album, Put The 'O' Back In Country (more on that title shortly), depicts a vinyl LP in a yellowed inner sleeve. To the left of the spindle hole is a stylized letter W, the longtime logo of his dad/mentor, the

Her career began in prewar country and gospel, yet Martha Carson reached her peak with a style diametrically opposite to the primitive sounds of her early work -- so much so that that Carson, who retired decades before she died December 16, journeyed far from her roots in rural Neon,

With the stubborn integrity he brought to every aspect of his life, Mickey Newbury fashioned an uncategorizable song catalogue of abiding excellence and ensured that his commercial possibilities would always be limited. In Crystal & Stone, biographer Joe Ziemer shows how that was all of a piece with Newbury'