Tag Archives: Americana music

Gary’s favorite roots, rock, and Americana music of 2021

There was plenty of good Americana and roots music in 2021, but I didn’t hear a lot of great music in those categories. Which is fine, and understandable. We’re all struggling to stay afloat. These selections mostly reflect music that … Continue reading →

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Doran’s Doran

Doran is the sound of four young musicians engaged in the serious business of playing with sound. These four, who hail variously from the Pacific Northwest, New York City, and rural Virginia, have made one of the most spine-tingling and … Continue reading →

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Margo Cilker’s Pohorylle

Margo Cilker is the latest country musician from the far northeastern corner of Oregon to toss a debut album of songs into the world. There’s apparently quite a little music scene up there in Enterprise and Joseph and environs, churning … Continue reading →

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SUSS’s Night Suite

The latest recording from ambient country pioneers SUSS takes them out of their Brooklyn environs on a road trip to a part of the country that fully mirrors their sound. After putting out three albums in three years, culminating in … Continue reading →

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Laurel Premo’s Golden Loam

Solo guitar albums can be daunting to listen to and even moreso to review. Especially if you’re not a guitar player yourself and don’t have the knowledge to pick out what’s unique about the guitarist’s style, or the vocabulary to … Continue reading →

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Norman Blake’s Day By Day

I probably first read Norman Blake’s name on the extensive liner notes that came with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s landmark country album Will the Circle Be Unbroken, but I’m sure I first saw him perform a few years earlier … Continue reading →

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Michael Nesmith & the First National Band’s Magnetic South, Loose Salute, and Nevada Fighter

The blue, red and white trilogy of albums by Michael Nesmith & the First National Band (plus one later release in much the same vein) remain among my favorite albums more than 50 years later. Nesmith wasn’t the first rock … Continue reading →

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Asleep at the Wheel’s Half A Hundred Years

Not many bands make it to 50 years (we won’t get into the Rolling Stones, those great outliers). That’s what the Western swing band Asleep at the Wheel has achieved as of 2021, so of course they made a record … Continue reading →

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The Felice Brothers’ From Dreams To Dust

On my first spin through The Felice Brothers’ new album From Dreams To Dust I found my new favorite song of 2021. The second track “To-Do List” is a rootsy, rocking romp through existential angst disguised as a humorous list … Continue reading →

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Matthew Fowler’s The Grief We Gave Our Mother

Matthew Fowler’s The Grief We Gave Our Mother is a lesson in how arrangement and production can turn a collection of good songs into something more. Along the way a collection of confessional songs that started out as bare-bones acoustic … Continue reading →

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