Here’s some the best Americana and roots-type music releases for July 26th, 2024. Click the artist or album links to find out more. The artist’s names link to their websites and the CD title links go to either Amazon, iTunes, Bandcamp or the artist’s site for ordering or downloading. A + sign means although not a featured release, it’s a notable album that’s still worth checking out. Also, this page will be updated as I find out about other new releases so check back again.
American Aquarium
The Fear of Standing Still (Losing Side Records)
For the last two decades, American Aquarium frontman BJ Barham has seemingly willed his band to survive. Armed with an incisive pen and a love for Whiskeytown and Drive-by Truckers on one hand and Springsteen and Petty on the other, he gradually steered the rotating cast of his outfit from dive bar revelry and heartbreak toward a more thoughtful, albeit scarred, maturity. In many ways, The Fear of Standing Still, the band’s 10th album of originals, feels like it stands on the mountain of the last 20 years and surveys the field. Pairing up once again with producer Shooter Jennings, who also worked with the band on 2020’s Lamentations, Barham and company turn in a concise set of songs that aim to make more use of their rock-and-roll impulses after the more folk-inflected 2022 effort Chicamacomico. While Barham is part of a host of Southern songwriters looking to broaden and complicate the scope and vision of the region, few are as exacting and forthright in that purpose. God bless him for it. (edited from No Depression review)
Yarn
Born, Blessed, Grateful & Alive (333 Entertainment)
Playing passionate but heartfelt bluegrass-influenced music with a gentle spirit but a rock & roll heart, Yarn are a band led by vocalist, guitarist, and songwriter Blake Christiana. His restless search for the chords and lyrics over the past 20 years has produced a plethora of memorable music, and since 2007 he’s led Yarn, a band that’s evolved from its earliest days as a bar band in New York City. For Christiana, it’s all about the song, and the collection of songs on Born, Blessed, Grateful & Alive reflect the range of the human experience. Says Christiana, “No one has any idea why we’re here, what we’re supposed to be doing here or what comes next, and there are very few things in this life to connect us to one another, other than the fact that we all don’t know these things. I like to think our music could be one of the places where we can connect.” (edited from band’s bio)
Also new this week…
Charley Crockett – Visions of Dallas (Son of Davy Records) +
Jeff Crosby – Another Petal Falls Off The Rose (Runnin’ Free Records)
Connor Daly – Colors Fade (independent) +
Bill Filipiak – Less is More (independent)
The Hanseroth Twins – Vera (Elektra Entertainment) +
Byron Hill – That Old Mountain (independent)
The Hillbilly Thomists – Marigold (independent)
Lasers Lasers Birmingham – Mystery Highway (independent) +
Gary Nicholson – Common Sense (Qualified Records) +
The Red Clay Strays – Made by These Moments (RCA Records) +
Erin Ash Sullivan – Signposts And Marks (Willoughby Music)
