Stacy Chandler

It’s one thing to write songs about jerks. It’s another to fully inhabit them, willfully and convincingly becoming an unlikable narrator. That only works if the songs are enormously likable. And Austin singer-songwriter Curtis McMurtry once again strikes that balance on his fourth album, The Pollen & The

There’s excitement at the start of something new, but oftentimes the magic is in the middle. The songs on Kim Richey’s new album, Every New Beginning, build their stories from looking back on the past, looking toward something better just ahead, or, sometimes, just looking around, with scenes