Henry Carrigan

Rod Picott is one of our too-little-known songwriting treasures. Like Hemingway, he peers into the jangly tentativeness of the relationships between men and women. Like Harry Crews, he captures the spectral gothic shadows that haunt rural settings. Like Townes Van Zandt, Picott tells riveting tales about memorable characters — the moonshiner,

“Fall Apart World,” the track that opens Mary Gauthier’s new album, Dark Enough to See the Stars, might just be a perfect song. Danny Mitchell’s lush piano notes float over his soaring B3 strains, laying a shimmering bed for Juan Solorzano’s vibrato lead runs on the bridges,

Gentle guitars eddy under Courtney Jaye’s soaring vocals on “The Kingdom is Inside of Me,” the opening track of Hymns and Hallelucinations, her stunning new album. Climbing from a soothing lullaby to a resounding operatic embrace of the darkness and light of the soul, the song serves as invocation

The title of Dirt Does Dylan tells you everything you need to know: The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band makes more than a little magic covering the songs of Bob Dylan. Dylan and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band have shaped the music we now call Americana more than any other artists

Steve Forbert remains the great American troubadour, crisscrossing the country, guitar slung over his back and harmonica rack over his shoulders, celebrating the colorful diversity of life along America’s highways and byways. The swaggering title track of Forbert’s new album, Moving Through America, mimics the road tripping of