Jason Isbell Announces Summer Tour with Father John Misty

Summers are always made better when there’s great live music to attend.

Jason Isbell hitting the road with Father John Misty is just one of those highly anticipated summer evets.

See dates and buying info below.

Get tickets at jasonisbell.com

**PRE-SALE BEGINS TOMORROW (2/13) AT 10AM LOCAL.**
PASSWORD: FJMISBELL
GENERAL ON-SALE STARTS FRIDAY FEBRUARY 15 10AM LOCAL^

June 6 – San Diego – Cal Coast Open Air Theatre $ +
June 7 – Santa Barbara, CA – Santa Barbara Bowl $ +
June 8 – Berkeley, CA – The Greek Theatre At UC Berkeley $ +
June 9 – Bend, OR – Les Schwab Amphitheater $ +
June 11 – Redmond, WA – Marymoor Park $ +
June 14 – Minneapolis, MN – The Armory $ +
June 15 – Chicago, IL – Huntington Bank Pavilion $ +
June 16 – Milwaukee, WI – BMO Harris Pavilion $ +
June 17 – Detroit, MI – Fox Theatre $ +
June 19 – Brooklyn, NY – BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival $ +
June 20 – Canandaigua, NY – CMAC $ +
June 21– Columbia, MD – Merriweather Post Pavilion $ +
June 22 – Philadelphia, PA – Metropolitan Opera House $ +
June 24 – Richmond, VA – Altria Theater $ +
June 25 – Cary, NC – Koka Booth Amphitheater $ *
June 27 – Irving, TX – Pavilion At Toyota Music Factory $ +
June 28 – Houston, TX – White Oak Lawn $ +
June 29 – Tulsa, OK – BOK Center $ +

$ – Father John Misty
* – Jade Bird
+ – Erin Rae
^Unless otherwise specified.

John Paul White Readies “The Hurting Kind” For Spring Release; Hear New Single Now

John Paul White Readies "The Hurting Kind"

There are many ways to describe the work of master singer-songwriter John Paul White. If forced to distill to a single word to describe his aesthetic it would be bittersweet.

So, to learn that White’s upcoming third solo release is entitled “The Hurting Kind” made perfect sense. The king of melancholy is back in the saddle.

Then you hear the single ‘The Long Way Home’ (listen below) from the album and, damn if it isn’t jaunty, defiant even. The cover displays White in his usual dark suit casual dapper persona and tassel of hair, his briskly strummed acoustic guitar strides right into a backbeat and, what’s that, pedal steel! But just behind the sonic rhinestones are weary miles of separation from loved ones, and hope and longing intertwin to lead him back to hearth and home. I’ve read that this song brought White’s youngest child to tears. That’s the power and humility of art.

I have no inside knowledge of this, but it’s been a theory of mine that the isolation of the road was once os the main reasons the Civil Wars called it a day at the height of their popularity. We all see the glamour of the working musician with no thought to the grind that it can be,

But this is no woe-is-me lament. This is a song with a higher intention. To celebrate and focus, on the big portrait of the loved ones that make the cookie-cutter hotels and stale-beer bars tolerable.

‘The Hurting Kind’ is out April 12 on Single Lock Records. Pre-order it here.

The Hurting Kind Tracklist:
01. The Good Old Days
02. I Wish I Could Write You a Song
03. Heart Like a Kite
04. Yesterday’s Love
05. The Long Way Home
06. The Hurting Kind
07. This Isn’t Gonna End Well (featuring Lee Ann Womack)
08. You Lost Me
09. James
10. My Dreams Have All Come True

Joy Williams Releases Two New Songs, Gets Back To Roots

Joy Williams - Front Porch

In the wake of the seemingly sudden dissolution while their ascent to superstardom (well, as much superstardom as a nebulous root genre can afford) Americana duo The Civil Wars’ Joy Williams and John Paul White went their separate ways each gravitating to the sounds they explored before uniting in 2008. White to the sparse, gritty side of the tracks his 2016 release “Beulah,” and Williams to the pop side, albeit with a world music bent, on her 2015 solo outing ‘Venus.”

Two newly-released tracks, from Williams’ anticipated new album ‘Front Porch,’ shows her sonically tracking more closely to the path that led The Civil Wars to acclaim. This might be helped along by Milk Carton Kids’ Kenneth Pattengale taking the production helm.

As a sweet side note, Williams worked on ‘Front Porch’ in Nashville while pregnant with her second child. She gave birth to a daughter, Poppy Louise, over the summer.

‘Canary, the more rootsy of the two cuts, is a haunting Gohic-tinged cut of cautioning and resolve.Williams is in fine form here and is in great voice and appears reinvigorated being accompanied with the rustic strings oh acoustic guitar, upright bass, and fiddle.

Joy Williams – Canary (Live)

‘The Trouble with Wanting’ is a guitar-driven lover’s lament featuring glistening harmony by her backing band. The song ebbs and flows in rhythm with William’s expressive sways, as if the music is running through her and aching to be shared.

Joy Williams – The Trouble with Wanting (Live)

From the presser: Produced by Kenneth Pattengale of The Milk Carton Kids and engineered by Matt Ross-Spang, Front Porch represents a new chapter in Williams’ career, who recorded the album in Nashville during the pregnancy of her second child. She reflects, “There is an energy that is very creative in having a baby. It gives a sense of urgency on top of all the creative energy. Cellularly, your body is experiencing something really different. Everything you are feeling is elevated. And you have a time-stamped sense of urgency.” Already receiving critical acclaim, Rolling Stone states the new music, “…is both familiar and new, and explicitly clear that there’s nothing missing when she goes it alone.”

“So much of this is about coming home,” says Williams. “Whether to a physical place or to yourself. The lines on my face, I can see them more clearly now. But a lot of them are laugh lines. This record feels like breathing more deeply into who I am. Come what may.”

I can’t wait to hear the rest of the album.

Joy Williams Tour Dates:

November 1—Birmingham, AL—Workplay
November 2—Athens, GA—The Foundry
November 16—St. Louis, MO—Blueberry Hill Duck Room
November 17—Chicago, IL—Old Town School of Folk Music
November 18—Indianapolis, IN—White Rabbit Cabaret
November 30—Cincinnati, OH—20th Century Theater
December 1—Louisville, KY—Headliners Music Hall
December 2—Lexington, KY—The Burl
December 7—Austin, TX—3TEN at ACL Live
December 8—Dallas, TX—The Kessler Theater
December 9—Houston, TX—The Heights Theater

‘King of the Road’ Roger Miller Tribute Recruits Alison Krauss, Kacey Musgraves, Willie Nelson

Roger Miller

Few people these days are aware of the gENius of Roger Miller. If he’s known at all it’s for his deceptively goofy sons like ‘Dang Me’ and Z”You Can’t Rollerskate In A Buffalo Herd.” He was also the one of the greatest songwriters to ever work the country music genre snagging 11 Grammy Awards, a Tony Award for writing the music and lyrics for the Broadway play “Big River’ and was voted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1973 and the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1995. He performed, and was friends with greats like Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson.

Speaking of Kris Kristofferson, Miller was also the to record and commercially release his “Me and Bobby McGee” a full year before Janis Joplin made it a classic.

Now his friends and new blood that owe him a debt have come together to pay tribute. ‘King of the Road: A Tribute to Roger Miller,’ out Aug. 31 via BMG, pays long overdue respects to one of American music’s premier entertainers and songwriters. The two-disc collection contains new renditions of Miller’s songs by Ringo Starr, Dolly Parton, Eric Church, Loretta Lynn, John Goodman and more than two dozen others, including Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson and Merle Haggard on one track. Produced by Miller’s son, Dean Miller, and Colby Barnum Wright, ‘King of the Road’ offers a fresh look at the work of a creative giant who has been gone 26 years but whose genius continues to shape contemporary music in ways both overt and subtle.

Read more about the project in a new interview at The Tennessean: https://tnne.ws/2toJY7B

Before Miller’s premature death of cancer at age 56, the Country Music Hall of Famer had 31 Top 40 Billboard country hits (10 of which crossed over to the pop chart), including his signature songs “Dang Me” and “King of the Road.” He held the record for most GRAMMY wins in a single night until Michael Jackson and ‘Thriller’ broke it in 1984. Miller wrote songs and voiced a character for Walt Disney’s 1973 Robin Hood film. He also wrote the music and lyrics for the Tony-winning Big River, helping launch the career of actor John Goodman, who reprises the musical’s “Guv’ment” on ‘King of the Road.’ As Dean Miller writes in liner notes accompanying ‘King of the Road,’ “Roger Miller was too gigantic to be contained by genres and definitions.”

‘King of the Road’ includes versions of Miller’s biggest ’60s hits, like “Chug-A-Lug” (Asleep at the Wheel ft. Huey Lewis) and “England Swings” (Lyle Lovett), and lesser-known treasures from a catalog full of gems. As with Miller’s own output, the album contains plenty of unexpected turns — country superstar Eric Church’s playful take on Robin Hood’s “Oo De Lally,” for instance, or Starr’s selection of “Hey, Would You Hold It Down?,” a song from Miller’s long-out-of-print 1979 ‘Making a Name for Myself’ album. By any standard of measurement, Miller was “one of the greatest songwriters that ever lived” — even if he did say so himself. And he did, in the first of a handful of the album’s live-performance interstitials that capture the spontaneous wit of a mind that operated at a breakneck pace.

There is a television event in the works, more information coming soon.

The scope of material and performances on ‘King of the Road’ both capture Miller’s personality and convey an astonishing legacy that’s still felt today. “Roger Miller didn’t have to say much,” Dean writes in the liners. “You were simply drawn to him. He had a magnetic smile, and electric wit and a passion for life and music that transcended generations.”

‘King of the Road: A Tribute to Roger Miller’ Tracklist:

Disc One
Greatest Songwriter (Banter)
Chug-a-Lug – Asleep at the Wheel ft. Huey Lewis (!)
Dang Me – Brad Paisley
Leavin’s Not the Only Way to Go – The Stellas/Lennon and Maisy
Kansas City Star – Kacey Musgraves
World So Full of Love – Rodney Crowell
Old Friends (Banter)
Old Friends – Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Merle Haggard
Lock Stock and Teardrops – Mandy Barnett
You Oughta Be Here With Me – Alison Krauss ft. The Cox Family
The Crossing – Ronnie Dunn, The Blind Boys of Alabama
In the Summertime – The Earls of Leicester ft. Shawn Camp
Fiddle (Banter)
England Swings – Lyle Lovett
You Can’t Rollerskate in a Buffalo Herd – Various Artists
Half a Mind – Loretta Lynn
Invitation to the Blues – Shooter Jennings, Jessi Colter
It Only Hurts Me When I Cry (Live) – Dwight Yoakam

Disc Two
Hey, Would You Hold It Down? – Ringo Starr
Engine, Engine #9 – Emerson Hart ft. Jon Randall
When Two Worlds Collide – Flatt Lonesome
Oo De Lally – Eric Church
You Can’t Do Me This Way and Get By With It – Dean Miller ft. The McCrary Sisters
Chicken S#$! (Banter)
Nothing Can Stop Me – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Husbands and Wives – Jamey Johnson ft. Emmylou Harris
I Believe in the Sunshine – Lily Meola
Guv’ment – John Goodman
Old Songwriters Never Die (Banter)
The Last Word in Lonesome Is Me – Dolly Parton ft. Alison Krauss
I’d Come Back to Me – Radney Foster ft. Tawnya Reynolds
Reincarnation – Cake
One Dying and a Burying – The Dead South
Do Wacka Do – Robert Earl Keen, Jr.
King of the Road – Various Artists

Jim Lauderdale To Release Two Records This Summer

The legend that is ‘Mr. Americana” Jim Lauderdale is set to release not one, but TWO releases. the albums are entitled ‘Time Flies” and “Jim Lauderdale and Roland White’ and both will be released Friday, August 3rd Yep Roc Records.

These 30th and 31st studio albums respectively will be followed by upcoming live dates, including headline shows and festival performances such as this Saturday’s Appalachia Rising event at the Carter Family Fold in Hiltons, VA (May 19) with additional dates to come.

“Time Flies” (cover above) sees Lauderdale doing what he does best, writing and performing classic Americana distinctively infused with striking notes of country and soul. Produced by Lauderdale and Jay Weaver at Nashville’s Blackbird Studio and House of Blues Studios, the album is among the most striking works of this one-of-a-kind artist’s three decade career, once again demonstrating his remarkable lyrical gifts and genre-agnostic musical approach. Songs like the stirring title track offer able evidence that Lauderdale’s creative mission continues unabated, his ability to rejuvenate his sound indomitable.

“Jim Lauderdale and Roland White’ is Lauderdale’s previously unreleased first full-length record, a collection of classic bluegrass recorded in the basement of Earl and Louise Scruggs’ Nashville home in the summer of 1979 and then lost for nearly four decades. Lauderdale was new to town at the time, while White was already a true bluegrass legend, known for his mastery of the mandolin and foundation of such iconic groups as The Kentucky Colonels and Country Gazette. Sadly the master tapes went missing for 39 years and were only recently rediscovered at the bottom of a box by White’s wife. As remarkable, energetic, and original today as it was when initially recorded, JIM LAUDERDALE AND ROLAND WHITE provides an intimate look into the nascent beginnings of a truly extraordinary American artist.

Hear the wonderfully wistful title cut from “Time Flies” below.

“Time Flies” (Yep Roc) Release Date: Friday, August 3

Tracklist

1. Time Flies
2. The Road is a River
3. Violet
4. Slow As Molasses
5. Where the Cars Go By Fast
6. When I Held The Cards
7. Wearing Out Your Cool
8. Wild On Me Fast
9. While You’re Hoping
10. It Blows My Mind
11. If the World’s Still Here Tomorrow

“Jim Lauderdale and Roland White’ (Yep Roc) Release Date: Friday, August 3

Tracklist

1. Forgive and Forget
2. Gold and Silver
3. (Stone Must Be The) Walls Built Around Your Heart
4. Six White Horses
5. I Might Take You Back Again
6. Try and Catch the Wind
7. Don’t Laugh
8. Regrets and Mistakes
9. February Snow
10. (That’s What You Get) For Loving Me
11. Gonna Lay Down My Old Guitar
12. Nashville Blues

Jim Lauderdale Tour Dates

MAY
19 – Hiltons, VA – Appalachia Rising @ The Carter Family Fold
26 – Lafayette, LA – Warehouse 535
29 – Nashville, TN – Honky Tonk Tuesday Nights @ The American Legion
31 – Nashville, TN – The Station Inn

JUNE
29 – Chicago, IL – The Hideout
30 – Chicago, IL – The Hideout

JULY
19 – Buffalo, NY – Sportsman Tavern
20 – Trumansburg, NY – Trumansburg Fairgrounds
29 – White Sulphur Springs, MT – Jackson Ranch

AUGUST
25 – Black Mountain, NC – Pisgah Brewing Company

Ry Cooder To Release New Album ‘The Prodigal Son,’ May 11th, Hear The Cut ‘Shrinking Man’ Now

The Prodigal Son, Ry Cooder

The words Renaissance Man is often thrown around to apply to anyone that has more than one interest. When applied to Ry Cooder his nearly 50 years as a master guitarist/musician, producer, songwriter and mentor give those words their proper significance.
The Santa Monica, California native has explored music and culture from across the USA with his roots rock solo offerings as well as the rest of the world, as with his collaborations with Malian singer and multi-instrumentalist Ali Farka Toure and his Grammy-winning work with the Cuban musician ensemble Buena Vista Social Club.

Ry Cooder will release ‘The Prodigal Son,’ his first new solo release in six years on May 11th, 2018 on Fantasy Records.

Recorded in Hollywood, CA, and produced by Ry and his chief collaborator, drummer (and his son) Joachim Cooder, ‘The Prodigal Son’ is all America – our spiritual, hopeful voices, our raw cries and our sly provocations, voiced through the songs of the Pilgrim Travelers, The Stanley Brothers, Blind Willie Johnson, and Ry Cooder himself.

The album’s 11 tracks, including three Cooder originals and a carefully selected collection of his favorite spirituals of the last century, share a particular resonance in this time and place, forming an unflinching look at the state of play in modern America. “I do connect the political/economic dimensions with the inner life of people since people are at risk and oppressed on all sides in our world today,” he stated. “There’s some kind of reverence mood that takes hold when you play and sing these songs. ‘Reverence’ is a word I heard my granddaughter’s nursery school teacher use, a Kashmiri woman. She said, ‘We don’t want to teach religion, but instill reverence.’ I thought that was a good word for the feeling of this music.”

Cooder will bring The Prodigal Son Tour to venues throughout North America this spring and summer, his first full tour since 2009. Confirmed tour dates are below with more to be added soon. For ticket information, please visit: RyCooder.com

Listen to the lead track, “Shrinking Man” below.

Pre-order The Prodigal Son here.

The Prodigal Son Track List:
 
 1. straight street (James W. Alexander / Jesse Whitaker)
2. shrinking man (Ry Cooder)
3. gentrification (Ry Cooder / Joachim Cooder)
4. everybody ought to treat a stranger right (Traditional; Blind Willie Johnson, Arr. by Ry Cooder)
5. the prodigal son (Traditional: Arranged by Ry Cooder /Joachim Cooder)
6. nobody’s fault but mine (Blind Willie Johnson / Arranged Ry Cooder / Joachim Cooder)
7. you must unload (Alfred Reed)    
8. I’ll be rested when the roll is called (Blind Roosevelt Graves)
9. harbor of love (Carter Stanley)
10.Jesus and woody (Ry Cooder)
11. in his care (William L. Dawson)
 
Ry Cooder – Tour Dates:
 
June 3 – Alexandria, VA – Birchmere 
June 4 – Alexandria, VA – Birchmere 
June 6 – Ridgefield, CT – Ridgefield Playhouse 
June 7 – Boston, MA – Wilbur Theatre 
June 8 – New York, NY – Town Hall Theatre 
June 9 – Derry, NH – Tupelo 
June 26 – Toronto, ONT – Massey Hall 
June 27 – Ottawa, ONT – Centerpoint 
June 29 – Montréal, QE – Jazz Festival @ Maisonneuve 
June 30 – Burlington, VT – Flynn Theater 
July 1 – Lenox, MA – Tanglewood 
July 3 – Philadelphia, PA – Mann Center 
July 14 – Courtenay, BC – Vancouver Island MusicFest 
July 17 – Portland, OR – Revolution Hall 
July 20 – San Francisco, CA – Great American Music Hall 
July 21 – Napa, CA – Uptown Theatre

Kacey Musgraves Teases 2018 Album ‘Golden Hour’

Kacey Musgraves On Jimmy Fallon's “Tonight Show”

Entertainment Weekly reports that neo-trad singer/songwriter Kacey Musgraves will release a spanking new album in “early 2018.” Reportedly entitled ‘Golden Hour’ this will be the Texas-native’s third LP of original material and a follow-up to 2015’s Pageant Material.

Reportedly ‘Golden Hour’ was ‘musically influenced by everything from Sade to Neil Young’ as well as Musgraves’ newlywed status with singer-songwriter Ruston Kelly and specifically deals with the ‘different masks one uses to represent oneself.’

“None of the masks are solely us, but they’re all us,” she tells EW. “On this record, there’s the lonely girl, the blissful girl, the new wife, the girl that’s missing her mom, the angry girl, the sarcastic girl, the Sixties-sequined Cruella de Vil with the beehive, the shy girl, the life of the party, the winner, the loser – they’re all characters on this record. None of them alone are me, but the golden hour is when they all come together and you see me as a whole.”

Musgraves is not detailing the proper release date or song titles, but she did work with frequent collaborators Shane McAnally, Luke Laird and Natalie Hemby on the project. She also notes that she’ll be including a new song she’s been performing live for fans, but doesn’t share the title, which may or may not be the unreleased tune “Butterflies” (hear it below) she’s performed at many of her 2017 shows.

News of a new album only adds to what appears to be another great year for Musgraves as she continues to build out her career. Starting in February she’ll join Little Big Town and Midland on The Breakers Tour, running through May. Followed up by a June, run with with Harry Styles solo arena tour of the United States.

Robert Ellis and Courtney Hartman To Release ‘Dear John,’ Tribute to John Hartford

Robert Ellis and Courtney Hartman 'Dear John,'

Texan Robert Ellis and Coloradan Courtney Hartman bonded backstage at a music festival in 2013 over their mutual love of John Hartford songs. After a few years of friendship and collaboration led to the creation of ‘Dear John,’ a collection of both well-known and obscure material that reveals witty and tender layers found in Hartford’s lyrics. The album also allows Ellis and Hartman to showcase their perfectly blended vocals and the playful ebb and flow of their shared guitar playing.

“I feel like Courtney Hartman and I must have known each other in a previous life. We share a deep love and obsession with a lot of the same music. There is a unique cross-section of songwriting craft, tradition and it’s context, and musicality that we both really get excited by,” says Ellis. “John Hartford is sort of the apex of this and it came as no surprise to me that he was a big influence on both of us and what we do. These songs, and playing them with Courtney really seemed to recharge my spirit in some way. Through playing these songs we are connected to each other and to John in a way that makes me feel like I’m at home.”

The album encompasses ten cuts that span John Hartford’s 30+ discography including his best-known song “Gentle on My Mind” – later recorded by Glen Campbell – for which Hartford earned two GRAMMY awards for Best Folk Performance and Best Country & Western Song. Versions of the song were also recorded by Elvis Presley, Aretha Franklin, Frank Sinatra, Johnny Cash, Bing Crosby, Lucinda Williams, and most recently Alison Krauss.

Throughout his career, Hartford earned two additional Grammy awards, for ‘Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording’ for his record ‘Mark Twang,’ as well as Album of the Year for his work on the watershed soundtrack to ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou?’

John Hartford’s son Jamie noted, “They have captured a subtle part of my dad that gets overlooked way too often. Now they have an obligation to the world to get this out. I wish them much success.”

From the 1980s onwards, Hartford had Non-Hodgkin lymphoma. On June 4, 2001, he died of the disease at Centennial Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee. He was 63.

In support of the new release, Ellis and Hartman will hit the road for a limited tour kicking off on December 9 in Austin, TX at the Cactus Cafe, and ending at Stage One in Fairfield, CT on December 21. In between, they will make stops in Baton Rouge and Denver before two nights at Rockwood Music Hall in New York City.

Hear their gloriously heartfelt rendition of “Gentle on My Mind” below, and see ‘Dear John’ track listing and tour dates below:

‘Dear John’ Track List:
– Old Time River Man
– Them Way Long Time Ago Times
– Gentle On My Mind
– Right in the Middle of Falling for You
– Here I Am In Love Again
– Howard Hughes Blues
– Morning Bugle
– Delta Queen Waltz
– Up on the Hill Where They Do the Boogie
– We Did Our Best

Robert Ellis & Courtney Hartman Tour Dates:
12/7 – Dallas, TX @ The Rustic
12/8 – San Antonio, TX @ The Rustic*
12/9 РAustin, TX @ Cactus Caf̩
12/13 – Baton Rouge, LA @ Manship Theatre
12/15 – Denver, CO @ Swallow Hill Music
12/16 – Austin, TX @ Moody Theater^
12/18 – NYC @ Rockwood Music Hall (stage 3)
12/19 – NYC @ Rockwood Music Hall (stage 3)
12/21 – Fairfield, CT @ Stage One
12/26 – Houston, TX @ House of Blues^
*Robert Ellis full band w/ Courtney Hartman opening
^Robert Ellis full band opening for Robert Earl

Loretta Lynn to Release New Album ‘Wouldn’t It Be Great’ on August 18

Loretta Lynn to Release New Studio Album, Wouldn't It Be Great,

The latest volume of Cash Cabin Sessions, recordings is going to be one by a country music legend.

Loretta Lynn will celebrate her 85th birthday not only by playing two sold-out shows in the hallowed halls of Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium on April 14th, but by also releasing ‘Wouldn’t It Be Great’ a few months later on Friday, August 18. This latest Cash Cabin Sessions release is produced by Patsy Lynn Russell and John Carter Cash at Johnny Cash’s Cash Cabin in Hendersonville, Tenn.

‘Wouldn’t It Be Great’ will premiere new compositions like “Ruby’s Stool,” “Ain’t No Time to Go” and “I’m Dying for Someone to Live For” and will revisit classics “God Makes No Mistakes,” “Coal Miner’s Daughter” and “Don’t Come Home A’ Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ on Your Mind)” that have been written or co-written by Lynn.

“I think you try to do better with every record you put out, It’s just everyday living—and everybody wants to know, ‘Well, what is it about your songs that people like?’ I think you’ve got to tell your stories. I just think it hits everybody, you know, the songs.” Loretta said of the record and her songwriting approach.

Preorder ‘Wouldn’t It Be Great.’

Wouldn’t It Be Great Track List and Songwriters
“Wouldn’t It Be Great” (Loretta Lynn)
“Ruby’s Stool” (Loretta Lynn, Shawn Camp)
“I’m Dying for Someone to Live For” (Loretta Lynn, Shawn Camp)
“Another Bridge to Burn” (Loretta Lynn, Lola Jean Dillon)
“Ain’t No Time to Go” (Loretta Lynn, Patsy Lynn Russell)
“God Makes No Mistakes” (Loretta Lynn)
“These Ole Blues” (Loretta Lynn, Patsy Lynn Russell)
“My Angel Mother” (Loretta Lynn)
“Don’t Come Home A’ Drinkin’” (Loretta Lynn, Peggy Sue Wells)
“The Big Man” (Loretta Lynn, Shawn Camp)
“Lulie Vars” (Traditional, arrangement by Loretta Lynn)
“Darkest Day” (Loretta Lynn)
“Coal Miner’s Daughter” (Loretta Lynn)

John Moreland : New Album ‘Big Bad Luv’ Out May 5th. Stream ‘It Don’t Suit Me (Like Before)’

John Moreland : New Album 'Big Bad Luv',

Few people embody the genuine soul of Americana and roots music than Tulsa, Oklahoma’s John Moreland. A new album from this unassuming poet of the human landscape is always a cause for celebration. On May 5th Moreland will release his fourth album, entitled ‘Big Bad Luv’ on England’s 4Ad label- an em print better known for alert rock like the Cocteau Twins and the Wolfgang Press, or post-rock noisemakers like The Throwing Muses and The Pixies. Though the label does have some folk and alt.country Cree signing band’s like The Red House Painters, The Mountain Goats and Tarnation. The one thing 4AD is consistent with is the quality their artists display in their craft.

This is just what they get with John Moreland, an artist that sits solitary on stage and pulls a silenced audience along his stories of unflinching emotion. The album is being described as ‘…an honest, bruising experience. A record about love, faith and the human condition..” Sounds like a John Moreland album to me.

Big Bad Luv, was recorded in Little Rock, AK, and mostly with a crew of Moreland’s Tulsa friends: John Calvin Abney (piano and guitar), Aaron Boehler (bass), Paddy Ryan (drums), Jared Tyler (dobro) and Lucero’s Rick Steff (piano). Coming together in three sessions over ten months, which were sandwiched between touring dates and life, the final album was then mixed by GRAMMY winning Tchad Blake, who has worked with iconic acts from Al Green to Tom Waits.

If the track from the album below, ‘It Don’t Suit Me (Like Before)’, is any indication of the tone of the album there seems to be a stylistic and thematic move away from the shadows. This walk on the sunny side might be due in large part to his marriage last Summer.

Preorder at johnmoreland.net.

Tracklist and U.S. and Europe tour dates below.

John Moreland : 'Big Bad Luv',

Big Bad Luv tracklist

1. Sallisaw Blue
2. Old Wounds
3. Every Kind of Wrong
4. Love Is Not an Answer
5. Lies I Chose to Believe
6. Amen, So Be It
7. No Glory in Regret
8. Ain’t We Gold
9. Slow Down Easy
10. It Don’t Suit Me (Like Before)
11. Latchkey KidBig

June 1 – St. Louis, MO – Off Broadway*
June 3 – Cleveland, OH – Beachland Tavern*
June 4 – Washington, D.C. – Rock & Roll Hotel*
June 7 – New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom*
June 8 – Boston, MA – The Sinclair*
June 9 – Montreal, QC – Le Ritz*
June 10 – Toronto, ON – Velvet Underground*
June 13 – Ann Arbor, MI – The Ark*
June 14 – Chicago, IL – Thalia Hall*
June 16 – Minneapolis, MN – Turf Club*
June 17 – Maquoketa, IA – Barnstormers at Codfish Hollow*
July 11 – Fayetteville, AR – George’s Majestic Lounge
July 12 – Memphis, TN – 1884 Lounge at Minglewood
July 18 – Asheville, NC – Grey Eagle
July 19 – Carrboro, NC – Cat’s Cradle
July 22 – Oxford, MS – Proud Larry’s
* = Will Johnson (Centro-matic) opening

May 6 – Glasgow – Oran Mor (UK)
May 8 – London – Union Chapel (UK)
May 9 – London – Union Chapel (UK)
May 11 – Paris – Les Etoiles (FR)
May 13 – Hamburg – Kampnagel (DE)
May 14 – Berlin – Passionkirche (DE)
May 16 – Amsterdam – Paradiso (NL)