SPOTLIGHT: Willi Carlisle on Singing Honestly and Bearing Witness to the Now
EDITOR’S NOTE: Willi Carlisle is No Depression’s Spotlight artist for July 2022. Learn more about him and his new album, Peculiar, Missouri, in our interview, and watch an intimate performance of “Life on the Fence” in this video.
I wake up laughing, full of an old love. It’
ALBUM REVIEW: Beautiful Questions Take Flight on John Moreland’s ‘Birds in the Ceiling’
“Life is a beautiful question,” John Moreland sings on the title track of his latest, Birds in the Ceiling. It’s the closing song on the album, and leaving the listener with such an open-ended statement is the point. Moreland isn’t necessarily seeking answers as much as he
ALBUM REVIEW: Joe Pug Returns to Songs of ‘Nation of Heat’ with New Perspective
Everything changes.
Nothing changes.
As an itinerant songwriter settled into Chicago in 2007, Joe Pug recorded Nation of Heat in the space of others’ canceled sessions, carrying only a guitar, a harmonica, and his voice. It was necessarily a sparse affair, limited by time and money.
When Pug finally had
ALBUM REVIEW: Ben Harper Puts Soul (and Funk) into ‘Bloodline Maintenance’
Ben Harper is a master of trickeration. That's the term gospel icons The Dixie Hummingbirds used to describe what their lead singer Ira Tucker did: in-your-face showmanship that soul men lifted right out of church, the gospel aspects of the music trying to bust out and
ALBUM REVIEW: Dawes Jams to a Contemporary Concept on ‘Misadventures of Doomscroller’
“Let’s enjoy each other’s company,” Dawes harmonizes on “Someone Else’s Cafe/Doomscroller Tries to Relax,” the monolithic lead track on the group’s latest LP, Misadventures of Doomscroller.
In the context of the song, it serves as a call to pull yourself away from your phone, social
ALBUM REVIEW: ‘Colder Streams,’ Last Album with Dallas Good, Finds The Sadies at Their Best
“Colder Streams is a record made with love by loved ones. The Sadies have released a lot of records. This is one of them,” wrote Dallas Good in the bio for the 11th studio album from The Sadies. Reading it with the knowledge of his tragic and untimely passing earlier