New Wax Little Wings is Kyle Field, a fascinating visual artist and prolific yet overlooked musician with a growing catalog under his belt. While he released an album under the name Be Gulls with Lee Baggett in 2008, Field returns with his first album under the Little Wings moniker since 2007's Soft Pow'r . On Black Grass , Field's voice sways and cracks over an engaging set of off-kilter tunes that could vaguely and probably insufficiently be described as lo-fi Americana. Think old Will [...]
New Wax Fear not, devoted CO readers, I'm not dead, I just took a little mental vacation. What better to draw me out of hibernation than a new Rural Alberta Advantage album? With their accomplished 2008 debut Hometowns , Nils Edenloff and company unveiled a collection of songs brimming with nostalgia, loss, and unbridled emotion that made the songs feel life-affirming even when the lyrical content was at its most downtrodden. One glance at the snowy album cover for Departing , which is due out March [...]
New Wax You can usually expect most reissues to include some demos, outtakes, a few b-sides, maybe even a live recording. With the reissue of Bruce Springsteen's classic Darkness On The Edge Of Town , the Boss's artistic reaction to the whirlwind of attention Born To Run garnered, fans get more than an album's worth of unreleased material written and recorded back in 1977 and 1978 during the Darkness sessions. Billed by some as a lost album, this collection of songs didn't [...]
New Wax It was easy to overlook Doug Paisley's criminally underrated 2008 self titled debut. The unassuming Canadian built a rock solid alt. country album on sound songwriting and subtle, intelligent musical decisions. Back with a new album entitled Constant Companion , Paisley turns in another classy batch of tunes that sound to me like a breezier take on Beck's Sea Change rather than the more idiosyncratic Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, who Paisey, for some odd reason, often gets compared to. Vocally, Paisley sometimes reminds me [...]
New Wax I've been an advocate of Loch Lomond since I heard the addictive track "Carl Sagan" off of their 2007 album Paper Thin Walls . Headed by lead singer/multi-instrumentalist Ritchie Young, The Portland-bred symphonic chamber-pop collective is set to release their new album Little Me Will Start A Storm on February 22nd via new home Tender Loving Empire. The 9-song album employs a sextet of talented musicians, and while moments of grandiose complexity pepper Little Me Will Start A Storm , Ritchie and [...]
New Wax I mentioned Lexington, KY's Andrew English, aka Englishman, when he released last year's handcrafted EP Taxidermy, which won me over with its oddball charm. After sharing the stage with the likes of Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Deer Tick, and Fruit Bats, the songwriter is back with his self-titled debut full-length and he's employed the production talents of These United States member Justin Craig, who also serves as honorary bandmate for English's stage shows. The album, which was recorded in a converted Ohio barn, explores the [...]
New Wax Prolific songwriter James Jackson Toth, otherwise known by his pseudonym Wooden Wand, has run the gamut from psychedelic explorations to dark folk music and has personally tackled the turmoil of a major-label deal gone bad. That being said, his newest release Death Seat , his first for Michael Gira's avant-garde sanctuary Young God Records, equally tangles bitterness and redemption and offers a dose of deadpan wit along with aching melancholy. On the blues-tinged "Servant To Blues," Toth turns in what sounds like what could be [...]
New Wax With History From Below , Delta Spirit built on their sometimes-racuous, sometimes intimate brand of vintage-hued Americana to turn in one of the more impressive albums of 2010. Now they are offering up a new EP entitled The Waits Room . The EP derives its name from a special room at Prairie Studios in Cotati, CA. The "Waits Room" was a former closet that Tom Waits converted for use during the recording of Mule Variations . On their new mini-album, Delta Spirit offers [...]
New Wax If you're familiar with David Strackany, aka Paleo, you've probably heard of his songwriting opus The Song Diary , which found the heavy-touring musician documenting a year in his life by recording a new song daily. Yes, that's right, 365 days worth of songs. For all you brave souls willing to delve into this overwhelming catalog of songs, they are still available for download at Paleo's website . Now partnered with Partisan Records, home to the likes of Deer Tick, Dolorean, Holy Sons, and [...]
New Wax With 2009's New Denver , Brooklyn's Motel Motel married raucous indie-rock with Americana-hued soundscapes. With jangle to spare, it was an album just as fit for the plains of the Midwest as it was for busy New York city streets. With their new album The Big Island , the band boldly veers away from the outright country twang of New Denver and opts for guitar work more reminiscent of early-90's indie-rock. On The Big Island , lead singer Eric Engel's voice [...]
New Wax With Everybody, Come Outside! Cincinnati's Pomegranates managed to make a fun record with a playful dose of high concept easily disregarded by casual listeners seeking some catchy tunes. While the peach-colored, skull-adorned artwork on the cover of their new album One Of Use might be a tongue-in-cheek statement on newfound darkness, the band's previously uber-accessible brand of indie-pop has ventured boldly into more complex, experimental territory. With reverb-soaked vocals, tripped-out atmospheric interludes, and existential song titles like "Perception," "Create Your Own Reality," [...]
New Wax A collaboration between Canada's Colin Huebert (former Great Lake Swimmer) and Erik Arnesen (current Great Lake Swimmer), Siskiyou is named after a mountain range that spans from Oregon to Northern California and is rumored to be the home of Sasquatch, hence the fitting album cover. Musically, all the familiar folk trappings rear their head on Siskiyou's self-titled debut: acoustic guitar, banjo, and subtle percussion. Still, Huebert, who serves as principle songwriter, is as informed by the likes of early Modest Mouse and Neutral Milk Hotel (for [...]
New Wax Portland's Al James (aka Dolorean) has been putting out dependable country-tinged folk-rock albums for nearly a decade. With The Unfazed , due out January 18th on new home Partisan Records (Deer Tick, Mountain Man, and Holy Sons), Dolorean will release its first album since 2007's shamefully overlooked You Can't Win . While January may seem far away, the album will be available for preorder tomorrow through Partisan Records . Aptly titled, The Unfazed finds James sounding like a man put through [...]
New Wax With 2008's criminally overlooked Wagonwheel Blues , Philadelphia's ironically titled The War On Drugs melded Dylanesque wordplay with hazy 60's psychedelia and lo-fi noise. The band is back with Future Weather , an EP due out on October 26th that inhabits the same sonic landscapes as their aforementioned full-length debut. The mini-album is full of spaced-out wonder. Take, for example, the knee-slapping Americana of "Baby Missiles," a track reminiscent of Wagonwheel's highlight track "Taking The Farm." Layered guitars, harmonica, and lead singer/songwriter [...]
New Wax Following her gorgeously downtrodden 2009 debut Because I Was In Love , New York songstress by way of Tennessee Sharon Van Etten returns with the ironically titled Epic . Clocking in at a brisk 32 minutes, the 7-song album finds Van Etten stretching outside the boundaries of barebones folk music. From the garage-rock strum of "Peace Sign" to the country-tinged "Save Yourself," to the steady groove of "One Day," to the unexpected post-rock-esque guitar on "Love More," Van Etten conquers new sonic territory while [...]
New Wax If you are familiar with Tim Showalter's backstory (a fire, a breakup, homelessness) and his solid 2009 debut under the Strand Of Oaks moniker, Leave Ruin , then you might expect a similarly personal yet well-crafted album in Pope Killdragon , but the new LP is much denser both thematically and musically. While the stripped acoustic vibe is still Showalter's specialty, songs on Pope Killdragon unexpectedly break out into Crazy Horse-esque rock-outs and the instrumental tracks swimmingly veer far beyond the folk [...]
New Wax J. Tillman was churning out sparse, intimate folk albums long before he ever manned the drums for Fleet Foxes, but the exposure has helped shine a light on his previously overlooked solo material. The prolific songwriter is back with yet another studio album, his third full-length release in the last two years. Entitled Singing Ax , the new LP scales back the growing instrumentation trend found on his last few releases and revisits the barebones aesthetic of his earlier material. Singing Ax , which [...]
New Wax Nothing gets to me like a good country song, and Athens, GA's Futurebirds seem to be well versed in the artform. They are, after all, from the same town as Drive-By Truckers, a band considered by some to be the cream of the alt. country crop. While Futurebirds' foundation is decidedly twangy, they are far from one-note. Fresh off the heels of their buzzworthy 2009 self-titled EP (which can be had for FREE here ), the band turns in their debut LP Hampton's [...]
New Wax Well, I think it's safe to say that Colour Revolt doesn't care what we think. They are going to continue doing whatever they want. Luckily for us listeners, every direction they seem to take is a good one. After a couple of rough years involving member changes and uncertainty, Jesse Coppenbarger, Sean Kirkpatrick, and a revolving cast of friends and musicians have revived Colour Revolt and have poised themselves to release a very strong album. Upon first listen to [...]
New Wax We've sung the praises of Doug Burr numerous times on CO. His 2007 album On Promenade was my introduction to Burr and it was an unexpected jewel filled with lush instrumentation and accomplished songwriting. 2009's The Shawl , which found Burr reworking passages from the book of Psalms, was yet another solid contribution to the genre. Now Burr is back with another alt. country/folk-infused album of original work entitled O Ye Devastator , and its fitting cover art candidly depicts a bride [...]
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