Here’s some the best Americana and roots-type music releases for April 21st, 2023. 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.
Esther Rose
Safe to Run (New West Records)
Esther Rose is a songwriter for trying times. Be it the too frequent extremes of climate change or the loneliest moments of a co-dependent relationship, she articulates that dizzying mix of melancholy and anxiety with astounding empathy. Listening to each of Rose’s records chronologically is like hearing her grow up, and true to the journey, her latest, Safe to Run, is Rose at her most grown. The sometimes-messy road to a kind of jagged wisdom is paved with Safe to Run’s golden-voiced confessions and nostalgia-laced stories. Rose is careful with her heart in these songs, but unguarded enough to share the shadowy corners of doubt and disappointment that inevitably come with putting yourself out there. On Safe to Run, self-preservation is the name of the game, and though the mirror Rose holds up to such a cruel world can be heavy, she never buckles under it. She just keeps going, contending with all the new, tricky parts of herself each step of the way, and figuring out how to love them anyway. (edited from No Depression review)
Also new this week…
Arkansauce – OK to Wonder (self-released)
Rob Cheatham and Co. – Painting Self Portraits (self-released)
Joey Frendo – Bound For Heartache (Horton Records)
The Infamous Stringdusters – A Tribute to Flatt & Scruggs (Americana Vibes Records) +
The Lucky Valentines – Losses (self-released)
Ivan Neville – Touch My Soul (The Funk Garage/Mascot Group)
Trapper Schoepp – Siren Songs (Grand Phony Music)
Bella White – Among Other Things (Rounder Records) +
Cinder Well – Cadence (Free Dirt Records)
Coming out soon… Taj Mahal, Rickie Lee Jones, Marty Stuart, The Milk Carton Kids, Robert Ellis, Caitlin Canty, Tommy Emmanuel, Ward Hayden & The Outliers, Rodney Crowell, Bruce Cockburn, Abe Partridge, Leftover Salmon, Parker Millsap, Eilen Jewell, Paul Simon, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, The Rough & Tumble, Lucinda Williams, Shinyribs, Tim O’Brien, Miles Miller, Brennen Leigh, Caitlin Canty and more!
