ALBUM REVIEW: Cowboy Junkies Break New Ground with ‘Such Ferocious Beauty’
Written in 2021 during the COVID epoch, while the Timmins family was navigating their father’s worsening dementia, Such Ferocious Beauty unflinchingly addresses impermanence and the ways we strive to find meaning and connection. While Cowboy Junkies draw from the bluesy Americana of their early work (The Trinity Session, The
ALBUM REVIEW: Ruen Brothers Bring the Wild West to the Modern World
A full decade has passed since “Aces,” an early single from the Stansall brothers, Rupert and Henry, born in Scunthorpe, England, first turned the heads of tastemakers at BBC Music. The retro sound stood proudly on the shoulders of their childhood musical heroes Roy Orbison, The Everly Brothers, and Johnny
ALBUM REVIEW: Ben Folds Packs Stories and Characters into Songs of ‘What Matters Most’
Some musicians are poets, exploring the human condition in rhyme. Others are storytellers, writing 3 ½-minute short fiction with fully fleshed-out characters and the kind of fine details expected of a novelist. On What Matters Most, Ben Folds proves himself an able manipulator of the story song, with a
No Depression Sessions at DelFest: The Del McCoury Band
We were honored to have the opportunity to cover the 15th annual DelFest on behalf of No Depression, featuring intimate sessions that we recorded in the tiny press box atop the grandstands with over a dozen of this year’s incredibly talented artists. Can I get a Del Yeah!?!
We
THROUGH THE LENS: Festival Fun at High Water and Stagecoach
This week the column reports from two roots festivals held last month in opposite ends of the country: High Water in North Charleston, South Carolina, and the Stagecoach Festival in Indio, California.
High Water took place at the picturesque Riverfront Park, filled with old oak trees draped with Spanish moss,
BONUS TRACKS: Tina Turner’s Country Side, Women on Country Radio, and More
I think just about everyone in the world stopped and sighed when we heard that Tina Turner had passed away this week. Tributes poured in for the “Queen of Rock,” and that she most definitely was. But it caught my attention as I read about her remarkable life and music