Downriver Collective Give It All Away Self Release
Downriver Collective were named the IBMA Momentum Band of the year in 2024, and their first full length release fulfils the expectations that honour implies, and then some. Nashville based, and having met at the city’s Belmont University, they have been performing together in various permutations for several years. They describe themselves as ‘a bluegrass band that doesn’t write bluegrass music’ and the eleven impressive original songs (and one cover) on this album are a great introduction to one of the hottest young bands on the acoustic music scene right now. Ali Vance’s lead vocals immediately hit the listener full force throughout, but the supporting cast are equally impressive instrumentalists and songwriters.
Opening track Heal These Hands is a full on gospel song, written by Vance and band co-founder (and banjo and guitar player) John Gray Zahurancik, and reveals some jazz and soul influences. Vance’s phenomenal vocals could be equally at home singing soul, jazz or rock music, but let’s hope the secret stays within bluegrass! Dan Tyminski adds backing vocals to the fast, fiddle led, bluegrass tune Come On Back, where the protagonist pleads with his love to come back home. Restless Heart is a gorgeous mid paced ballad, featuring Rico Wallenda on mandolin and Bailey Warren on fiddle. Tears At The Bank pokes fun at a would-be boyfriend who ‘every time he hears me on the radio, he thinks I’m singing to him soft and low’ and Catch Me If You Can is another barnstormer, dealing with getting to a good place in life. There’s a dark undercurrent musically to suit the theme of tough times in a post-mining town, ‘I’ll find my peace when I make it up to heaven/ And make up for all this time in a living hell’. Eli Broxham’s bass lends more darkness to the haunting Devil in Me, Jonny Therrien’s dobro and the electric guitar of producer Caleb Christopher Edwards emphasising the sinister tone. Fiddle player Bailey Warren takes lead vocals on her own song More To Be Found, which also has jazz and pop influences, with an interesting percussive arrangement. The title of the album is taken from another band original, Bird’s Eye View, ‘moving so fast that I couldn’t see the moments .. and I’d give it all away for just a glimpse of what I had’. Gospel bluegrass singer Sonya Isaacs joins as co-vocalist on Vance’s own song, Words of Wisdom, with words of advice for a little girl, based on hard lessons learned. The closer is a dynamic version of Jimmie Rodgers’ Muleskinner Blues (Blue Yodel No 8) and I don’t think you will find a better one today.
Having seen them live at IBMA at Chattanooga last year, I can confirm that they sound even better live than on this excellent album. Check it out and see why it is one of my favourite releases from the past 12 months.
Eilís Boland
Michael Weston King Nothing Can Hurt Me Anymore CRS
That this album, which had its origin and inspiration in personal loss and tragedy, should also be one of the highlights of King’s career as a writer and performer is testament to his ability to share both grief and an undoubted love in a way that is open to all. He does so in a way that surmounts that pain to produce something positive that can be understood by anyone who has suffered such a loss - even without knowing the particular adversity that underscores it. That event was the death of his (and his wife’s and My Darling Clementine partner) six-year-old granddaughter Bebe in an unwarranted attack in Southport in July 2024. Both parties decided to express themselves via individual solo releases rather than as a duo at this time (Lou Dalgleish’s album will be released later this year while a single from that album The Empty Swing is currently available online).
The opening song The Golden Hour (a reference, in this case, to the importance of swift medical attention within he first hour of an incident) takes on a wider context and personal viewpoint here with the realisation that “I have no strength and I have no power / I’ve stood sentry at the tower of strong for far too long / So let me in / Let the healing begin.” That realisation that the time has come to try to heal the internal pain on its own terms. The title track is also another song that deals directly with the aftermath, with loss and memory “She is leaving us today / She has gone but we still hear her singing.” Of course many other songs here are a reflection of that deep hurt, they are not simply caught in that furrow, rather they are just a couple of examples of the very fine writer that Michael Weston King is and should be recognised more widely as such. The final track is a testament to that beautiful granddaughter who called herself by a name that would seem to sum her sense of life. Sally Sparlkes is a gentle reminiscence for a life that would have had so much ahead, but was lost in a moment of unrestrained and unwarranted hate. A reminder of how the world needs to listen so that no one will have to feel that hurt anymore.
Yet that is not the whole story, important as those song are here, it is the overall delivery that is equally outstanding. King’s delivery vocally is at a pinnacle and his production alongside that of Colin Elliot and Clovis Philips is entirely at one with bringing these songs to fruition in a way that suggests a career highlight. Both of the latter also contribute instrumentally throughout, with skill and understanding.
The brass used in Grow Old With Me enhances the song sense of longterm love. A Field Of Our Own is another gentle reminder of the things that can be achieved together with assured understanding. Philips’ contribution again is central musically. It features Jeb Loy Nichols on backing vocals on this track, but something that is used effectively on other tracks on the album. Into The West with the words “Our grief is written on white sheets / Pegged across yards the sun won’t heat” seems to head from an inherent darkness into something that can offer a glimpse of the light ahead. There is not a track that seems out of place here and many that continue to grow in appreciation with each listen. It is an album that should be listened to as a complete experience.
That the source of this recording stems from something so grievous and yet delivers some life-affirming music is a testament to how the human spirit can survive and what can be done when delivered by the hands of a musician with the collective skills that Michel Weston King has shown here.
Stephen Rapid
Stuart Warburton Love, Loss & The Thousand-Yard Stare Big Hat
The third album by English singer-songwriter Stuart Warburton is a twelve-song collection, five of which were recorded in Eindhoven, Netherlands, five in Freiburg, Germany, and the remaining two closer to home at Airtight Studio, Manchester, and House of Loop Aznavour, in Bury, Lancs.
The arrangements and instrumentation on the recordings recall the early-career work of Graham Parker and The Rumour. Warburton, aiming for a soulful sound often accentuated by horns, piano, and organ, brought in numerous musicians to play alongside his vocals, guitar, and harmonica.
Nostalgia and regret feature strongly on the album, arising either from first-hand experience or otherwise. In Not A Single Day, a failed relationship, clearly attributed to the writer, is recalled with regret. Leave of My Senses finds the protagonist ignoring the "once bitten, twice shy” signals and becoming smitten again. This liaison might be short-lived if I Always Knew refers to the same relationship. Why Can’t Love Play By The Rules? could be a meditation on those two songs, as the writer, now alone again, heads back into self-destruction mode.
Some Memories reflects on the lasting torment and tragic ripple effects of undisclosed and hidden sexual and domestic abuse. I Wasn’t There For You is a brutally honest admission about a long-term friendship, expressing the writer’s regret over the passing of his former helpmate and favours left unreciprocated. On a lighter note, Warburton is joined by Bella Nugent on the duet This Love, an uplifting tale of resilience and attachment.
Never intended to be a party album, unashamedly nostalgic, and with ‘busted-hearted’ songs at the fore, the aptly named LOVE, LOSS & THE THOUSAND-YARD STARE is a ‘real life’ store of songs, well written and supported by excellent instrumentation throughout.
Declan Culliton
The Long Ryders High Noon Hymns Cherry Red
Bookending their latest album with a cover of Bob Dylan’s Forever Young may have been directed at their loyal supporters or indeed aimed at themselves; either way, it’s a fitting finale to The Long Ryders’ sixth studio album since their formation over three and a half decades ago.
Three of those six albums, including this latest one, have been released in the past seven years. PSYCHEDELIC COUNTRY SOUL from 2019 was the band’s first recording in thirty-two years and registered highly in the Americana charts, kickstarting the second coming of the band that captured precisely what alt-country was about, a decade before the genre was formally recognised. SEPTEMBER/NOVEMBER followed in 2023, and HIGH NOON HYMNS continues the purple patch that the band are enjoying in recent years.
The core trio of Sid Griffin, Stephen McCarthy and Greg Sowders are now augmented by Murray Hammond on bass, replacing Tom Stephens who sadly passed away in 2021. This album was produced by their ‘go-to’ man, Ed Stasium, who worked on the band’s three previous recordings.
HIGH NOON HYMNS is classic Long Ryders, with high-energy rockers shoulder to shoulder with soulful country ballads. If their core sound remains the same, it’s little surprise that Griffin and McCarthy’s songwriting has matured, reflecting on worldly matters alongside a more retrospective outlook. Declarations such as Join My Gang and Final Wild Son from their debut album NATIVE SONS are replaced by songs that drill down deeply into present times, like the album opener Four Winters Away which awaits with enthusiasm the exit from the White House of its current tenant, and that song is followed by the equally heartening World Without Fear.
Though totalling thirteen songs and stretching over the fifty-minute mark, there is nothing approaching filler on the album. Standouts include the Griffin-composed "Stand A Little Further in The Fire," which opens with an instantly catchy T-Rex-esque riff and a driving rhythm. Also ticking that box are the fiery Down To The Well and the mid-paced Ramona, which could be an outtake from their debut album. It’s not all foot firmly on the gas either, Griffin reminisces about his younger days in the heady musical scene of Los Angeles and Knoxville. On The Line and Wanted Man in Arkansas are the best country ballads that McCarthy has written.
Thirty-four years since their formation, few are doing alt-country better than The Long Ryders and HIGH NOON HYMNS is another infectious hybrid of country, cowpunk and roots.
Declan Culliton
The Long Ryders play Kilkenny Roots Festival on Monday, 4th May.
Cat Clyde Mud Blood Bone Concord
‘Love was not present in my life, and I didn’t know where to find it or how to get it back’, confesses Canadian Cat Clyde, addressing her frame of mind that led to the writing in her fourth full-length album. Although Clyde opens the album with the questioning Where Is My Love, the album conquers self-pity as the writer reconnects with her indigenous Métis roots (mixed European and First Nations ancestry) and approaches her loveless situation as liberation rather than rejection.
That sense of rebirth and positivity comes through in the album’s closing track, Another Time, which measures the future with optimism, not fear (‘Dance me slowly baby, take me for a ride. Lead me back to someplace I can come to in my mind’). That resilience and ability to overcome rejection also emerges in Press Down, a co-write with Courtney Marie Andrews. It’s a stomping rocker, with Clyde’s vocals soaring above a full-blown rhythm section (‘If someday you find me and time has untied me, I’ll be moving like a mountain, Only the sky can press down’). Confidence and inner strength shine in an ‘ebbing and flowing’ cover of Marty Robbins’ My Love.
Clyde’s blues inspiration began as a young teenager, drawn to Lead Belly and Robert Johnson riffs. This early passion led to busking as a teen and joining the punk band Shit Bats in college. Those influences appear throughout the album with the stomping, punky Wanna Ride, bluesy Man’s World, and swampy Hold My Hand. I Am Now impresses as well, opening with simple piano and dreamy vocals before pedal steel, violin, and vibraphone arrangements bring the song to life.
Building on her early musical training, Clyde has developed her own unique style of folk music dressed in punk clothing, occupying a similar space to her peers S.G. Goodman and Angel Olsen. MUD BLOOD BONE is a melting pot of dreams, disappointments, memories and positivity, all beautifully articulated by an artist who has created something quite special across these eleven songs.
Declan Culliton
The Third Mind Spellbinder! Yep Roc
Continuing their adventure of jam-like psychedelic recordings, Los Angeles-based The Third Mind's latest offering takes up where they left off with their 2025 record, RIGHT NOW! In fact, the four tracks on the new album were recorded during the sessions for that last album.
The five-piece collective of Dave Alvin (guitar), Victor Krummenacher (bass), David Immergluck (guitar, mandolin), Michael Jerome (drums) and Jesse Sykes (vocals) is joined by guests Willie Aron on piano and Hammond organ, and Stevie Blackie, who arranged and played strings. The band was formed in 2018 by Alvin and former Camper Van Beethoven bass player Krummenacher. SPELLBINDER! is the fourth studio album by the West Coast supergroup.
The free-form instrumental opener and title track is an eight-minute-plus jam inspired by Hungarian guitarist Gabor Szabo. It transforms the jazz standard original into a prog-rock/Santana crossover, superbly delivered. Two of the inclusions here also featured in RIGHT NOW! The Mike Bloomfield/Nick Gravenites/Paul Butterfield-written ‘Reap What You Sow,’ previously recorded by Otis Rush in 1969, showcases Sykes' haunting and emotive vocals. Before We Said Goodbye, written by Sykes and Alvin, is also repeated, this time with lush strings, adding a further ethereal quality to the song.
The final track and the record’s tour de force is Darkness, Darkness/The Creator Has A Master Plan. At close to the fifteen-minute mark, the two-song melody captures the blissed-out, cosmic mastery that The Third Mind brings to the table. What began as an experimental liaison among a number of like-minded artists simply joining forces to jam and enjoy themselves has yielded some excellent listening experiences. SPELLBINDER! is no exception.
Declan Culliton
Iron & Wine Hen’s Teeth Sub Pop
The eighth album from Iron & Wine, the brainchild of singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Sam Beam, was recorded concurrently with his 2024 album LIGHT VERSE.
While working at Waystation Studio in Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles, Beam was joined by several renowned session players from the jazz, classical, and Americana genres for the recordings. The classically trained Jacob Cartwright played several instruments, including viola, violin, tenor guitar, mandola and mandolin. Tyler Chester was on keys, David Garza played guitars, and three drummers contributed: Griffin Goldsmith (Dawes), Beth Goodfellow and Kyle Crane. Sebastian Steinberg added the bass lines. Other guests included Beam’s daughter Arden, and I’m With Her members Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O’Donovan and Sara Watkins, all of whom provided vocal contributions.
Like LIGHT VERSE, this album is chilled, laid back, and listenable. Beam admits to being influenced by Van Morrison’s ASTRAL WEEKS during recording, and the arrangements and instrumentation from that seminal album often shape the sound of HEN’S TEETH.
A standout inclusion, Robin’s Egg features call and response vocals between Beam and the I’m With Her trio in a delightful ‘Laurel Canyon meets Brit-Folk’ affair; that union also surfaces on the dreamlike Wait Up. Grace Notes finds Beam harmonising with daughter Arden over stunning violin and mandolin. In Your Ocean is classic Iron & Wine, radio-friendly and instantly catchy, while Roses, the album opener, includes a dizzying string arrangement that recalls Al Stewart's PAST, PRESENT & FUTURE era.
Beam is in splendid voice throughout here, giving the players free rein to add their expertise to the recordings, resulting in exactly what you want and expect from an artist who continues to delight after two and a half decades.
Declan Culliton
Steph Strings Feel Alive Self Release
After three EPs since 2018, FEEL ALIVE is the debut album from Melbourne singer-songwriter Steph Strings.
Working with producer and fellow artist, and founding member of Australian band Boy & Bear, Tim Hart, the twelve-track album is a genre-hopping affair that dips into folk, country, rock, and pop. The title track embodies Strings’ emotional state at the time of writing and recording the material (‘So sing loud to the birds in the treetops and be proud of where you′ve come’). That positivity reappears throughout the tracks, with the overriding theme of joy and thankfulness.
A virtuoso fingerstyle guitarist, Steph sets her stall out on the opening track, Gratefully. Balancing a career that demands constant travelling far from her home, she happily acknowledges the downtime afforded to recharge her batteries (‘Seasons come and go, my time is gonna leave. I know to be strong, I live gratefully’).
Recorded live and a tribute to her home city, Melbourne Blue is a grand piano-led ballad that references The London Tavern, Hope St. Radio, and the Route 109 tram line, aspects of Melbourne close to the writer’s heart. On a more ‘poppy’ spectrum, Three Wishes was recorded with fellow Australian and electronic musician Alice Ivy. On the rockier side and ditching the more personal writing temporarily are the full-bodied Devil Woman and Rockstar/Gypsy.
An artist with a reputation for spirited live shows on her frequent travels, FEEL ALIVE is a further positive step up in the music industry, with the artist living up to the promise of her earlier work.
Declan Culliton
Pert Near Sandstone Side By Side Self Release
SIDE BY SIDE, co-produced by Pert Near Sandstone founding member Ryan Young (now of Trampled By Turtles), showcases the four-piece stringband’s modern bluegrass style.
Shared lead vocals and songwriting could have resulted in a disjointed end product, but the ten tracks flow well, and the instrumentation is top-notch. The opener Pipe Dream speaks of the band’s life as they plan to return to touring and the excitement and anticipation of performing (‘It seems the old life is here again, sweating it out in the van for an hour or ten. Can I muster up the excitement? Can I find the groove?’). Elsewhere, they skip from the Irish ballad-influenced Side By Side to traditional bluegrass in Shooting Star and old time in Sonnyboy. Chuck Will’s Widow is a mandolin-led instrumental, and Last Call Man is a barstool country twanger.
As witnessed by this writer at the Static Roots Festival in Germany last year, Pert Near Sandstone are at their most fluent in a live setting, a quality that SIDE BY SIDE captures, recreating the same dynamic and highlighting the easy chemistry between players who have perfected their sound over a two-decade period.
Declan Culliton