ROUTES & BRANCHES 
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 25, 2018
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

My wife keeps a playlist of songs to which she'll exercise on occasion.  They're invariably upbeat and positive.  When she reads, she prefers a happy ending.  Nothing wrong with that.  My wife won't be jogging to Adam Faucett's It Took the Shape of a Bird.  Adam Faucett sings the blues like Jason Molina.  He sings like Nick Cave and PJ Harvey and David Eugene Edwards sing the blues, like music from a dark heart.  And he doesn't do happy endings.

A couple years ago, Arkansas Times deservedly heralded Faucett's voice as "one of the state's most memorable and culturally significant exports".  All apologies to "aircraft, poultry, cotton, rice, graders, ammunition, organic chemicals, steel and shock absorbers", but his voice is a powerful and sometimes moving raw material, capable of bringing listeners to tears.  It's beautifully restrained on "Central Avenue", and a primal scream on "King Snake".

Fact is, Faucett could probably make a career singing simpler songs, melodic verse-chorus-verse crowd-pleasers that showcase this vocal gift.  But there are none of those cheap moments on It Took the Shape of a Bird.  Songs like "Sober and Stoned" include repeated phrases and climactic movements, but offer nothing like a proper chorus or singalong moment.  Faucett's melodies meander, and his lyrics can be cryptic:  The new king can't dance for nothing / His sad blood blue and gushing / On hordes of ex-husbands.

It's not pretty music, though it can be heartbreakingly beautiful at times.  "Central Avenue" is the album's most straightforward piece, a mournful tour of familiar haunts.  Like most of the collection, it finds Faucett working alongside his longtime backing band, Tall Grass.  Strings lift his voice above the electric guitar - bass - drums:  My last ride down old Central Ave / Who I was is who you are when you laugh / One more lap around my favorite bar / To see that it still stands at night.

The tunes borrow from blues, rock and roots, but also dip readily into the darkest folk traditions.  Faucett embodies a young orphaned girl on "King Snake", separated from her brother and abandoned to a cruel relative (find the video online for an indelible interpretation).  A heavy drum and bass beat as Faucett casts his vocal spell, howling like a backwoods Jim Morrison:  I go out in the woods / Pretend I'm with my brother / Crushing eggs as loud as we can / It's war, you're not my family.

A preoccupation with mortality rumbles throughout It Took the Shape of a Bird, whether that of the singer, a friend or a character.  "Mackay Bennett" is named for the ship that collected the victims of the Titanic, and one narrator bemoans, "If I let them take me from this ledge / It means I have climbed here for nothing".  "Dust" is one of the record's most striking moments, a passionately delivered meditation:  Some folks need God / This I never understood until I saw the dust of rock bottom on the knees of my friend / And how it was all taken from him / The world ain't clean / Put that gun down and lean on me / Let your god go and lay it on me.

This fifth CD comes four years after Blind Water Finds Blind Water, a project that brought the uncompromising artist great praise from certain circles.  It's my sense that It Took the Shape of a Bird will enjoy a similar reception, and deservedly so as Adam Faucett is a phenomenal talent.  His songs look deep into the dark of our lives, but also leave room for connection between the cracks.  He sings, "Now the good's a little stronger than the bad / If it wasn't true then evil's all we'd ever have.  And he's proven in interviews and from the stage that he's not a man without his humor.  On "Ancient Chord", possibly his most country piece, he remarks, There are bands I don't wanna play after / Some I don't wanna play before / I've played in front of a small crowd / I've played in front of a big old floor.

For my part, I neither pursue nor avoid dark content.  I tend to find myself drawn to what might be termed "Southern gothic" writing, contemporary heirs to Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor, but more for their grace with language as opposed to their haunted themes.  My perspective is that if a writer is successful in fostering a certain mood, if they're trading in honest emotions I'm along for the ride. On his new CD, Adam Faucett speaks from this tradition, and it's hard to look away.

- Paul Westerberg, "23 Years Ago" Folker  (Vagrant, 04)
- Cordovas, "This Town's a Drag" That Santa Fe Channel  (ATO, 18)
- Robbie Fulks & Linda Gail Lewis, "I Just Lived a Country Song" Wild Wild Wild  (Bloodshot, 18)
- Amanda Shires, "Charms" To the Sunset  (Silver Knife, 18)
- Tom Freund, "East of Lincoln" East of Lincoln  (Surf Road, 18)
- Colter Wall, "Saskatchewan in 1881" Songs of the Plains  (Young Mary's, 18)
- Kristina Murray, "Lovers & Liars" Southern Ambrosia  (Loud Magnolia, 18)  D
- Black Lillies, "Earthquake" Stranger to Me  (Attack Monkey, 18)
- Ryan Adams, "Pearls on a String" Easy Tiger  (PaxAm, 07)
- Adam Remnant, "Cross to Bear" Sourwood  (Anyway, 18)
^ Adam Faucett, "King Snake" It Took the Shape of a Bird  (Last Chance, 18)
- Ruston Kelly, "Big Brown Bus" Dying Star  (Rounder, 18)
- Jamie Lin Wilson, "Run" Jumping Over Rocks  (JLW, 18)
- Chris Stapleton, "When the Stars Come Out" Traveler  (Mercury, 15)
- Ryan Culwell, "Moon Hangs Down" Last American  (Culwell, 18)
- Dead Horses, "Turntable" My Mother the Moon  (Dead Horses, 18)
- Glorietta, "Someday" Glorietta  (Nine Mile, 18)
- Becky Warren, "We're All We Got (feat. Amy Ray)" Undesirable  (Warren, 18)  D
- Hawks & Doves, "Geek Love" From a White Hotel  (Julian, 18)
- Malcolm Holcombe, "Black Bitter Moon (feat. Iris Dement)" Come Hell or High Water  (Gypsy Eyes, 18)
- JP Harris, "When I Quit Drinking" Sometimes Dogs Bark at Nothing  (18)
- Robert Ellis, "All Men Are Liars" Lowe Country  (Fiesta Red, 12)
- War & Treaty, "Jeep Cherokee Laredo" Healing Tide  (Strong World, 18)
- Shemekia Copeland, "Great Rain (feat. John Prine)" America's Child  (Alligator, 18)  D
- Jason Isbell & 400 Unit, "Last of My Kind (live)" Live From the Ryman  (Southeastern, 18)
- Kendl Winter, "Beauty We Beg" Stumbler's Business  (Team Love, 18)
- Nathan Bowles, "Road Reversed" Plainly Mistaken  (Paradise of Bachelors, 18)
- William Tyler, "Kingdom of Jones" Modern Country  (Merge, 16)
- Sarah Shook & the Disarmers, "Over You" Years  (Bloodshot, 18)
- Bonnie Prince Billy, "I See a Darkness" I See a Darkness  (Drag City, 99)

My driving purpose behind this blog is to shine light upon music that matters.  The first R&B post happened almost exactly a decade ago - a playlist for what was then KRFC's Thursday Morning Mix.  Not a terrible one, all things considered.  That's morphed over the years as I shed radio, eventually adding a ROUTES-cast and a Routes & Branches Guide to Feeding Your Monster.

But stuff continues to evolve and grow, as it should and hopefully always will.  When I hear from folks who frequent the blog, they seem to value different things.  Most appreciate the review - intended more to draw your attention to something you should hear rather than to critique an artist's work.  Others rely on our playlists or the ROUTES-cast or the release calendar to keep tabs on what's new.  It's my sense that very few people not related to me visit R&B to hear my voice.

So I've given some thought to my R&B ROI, the time I spend cultivating the various parts of the blog and how happy it makes you and me.  And for the moment I've decided to remove my voice from the equation.  In all honesty, my voice is all over this thing.  Many folks comment that my spoken voice is very present in my writerly voice.  So I'm still here, and so is the music.  After awhile of working with Soundcloud, I've made the decision to retreat back to Spotify for the time being.

Down the road apiece, it's my intent to settle on a vehicle where I can make my home, where all these elements can coexist and forest animals of all stripes can roam freely.  Until then, almost everything on our Playlists is available thru the Spotify (tho sadly it seems JP Harris' excellent new song has yet to appear).  It also means that you'll need a Spotify account to listen to the stuff.  So enjoy this music that matters. 

ROUTES & BRANCHES
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 19, 2018
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

Southeast Engine.  I'm not sure why, but during their decade or so of recording, I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to the Athens, Ohio band.  Since their dissolution I've found myself turning and returning to their handful of releases, enjoying their smart, tuneful Midwest folk-rock racket (a'la Frontier Ruckus, Okkervil River, maybe a more literarily-driven Centro-matic).  Last year latter day bandmember and multi-instrumentalist William Matheny surprised and delighted with his Strange Constellations, the companion piece to which (Moon Over Kenova) hit the shelves a couple months ago.  Check that one out for a few new cuts and some fine live takes on his songs.

Adam Remnant served as guitarist and frontman for Southeast Engine.  He released his debut solo EP, When I Was a Boy, in 2016.

when I was a boy I spoke like a boy / but now those ways have come to an end / and I couldn't wait to understand / what it means to be a man / when I was a boy

Apparently, I missed that one too.  Fortunately, I have a chance to redeem my earlier oversight.  Remnant has released his first full-length project, Sourwood.   The basic tracks for the new album were completed during the same sessions as the EP, in the waning days of Southeast Engine.  While the production on the releases is different, there's some benefit to listening to both as a piece.  After years of touring with his band, Remnant dedicated himself to family life, retreating occasionally into his basement studio and applying himself to the painstaking process of learning how to set his new, more personal songs to tape.  While his cracked, worn voice will be familiar to fans of his band, Sourwood tells stories about the singer himself, and his process of giving into adulthood.

Remnant calls Sourwood, "9 New Songs Regarding Dreams and Realities".  The pieces explore the spectrum between the freedom of life on the road and the commitment of making a life at home.  They range from the allure and abandon of the dream tree in "California" to the deep local roots which reach throughout the collection.  It's that radical sense of place that largely defines this new phase of his life and work.  He's the yearning prodigal son, returning home in the evocative "Ohio":

Ohio, I'm gone with the spring and back with the fall / the boy with the map no one can draw / I thought you might still be my friend / I thought you might take me in / Ohio, Ohio

The sounds are primarily acoustic, with special praises owed to the lovely violin of Ryan Stolte-Sawa on tracks like "Ohio".  "Cross You Bear" adds some soulful keys alongside Remnant's most expressive vocal that recalls Tallest Man on Earth.  It's a warm and accessible quality that makes these songs ring truer and land closer to the heart.  Some lyrics sound like overheard conversations between Remnant and his wife Amanda (the carpenter's daughter) around an early morning breakfast table.  And while she's only occasionally mentioned by name, she's a presence throughout Sourwood, as an inspiration and an anchor, a source of guilt and strength and connection.  This speaks to the push and pull the writer feels, the attraction and restlessness generated by a life closer to home.  Each of those competing forces is present in "She Has a Way of Finding Me Out":  so forgive this actor / this small crowd attractor / and all of the money he owes.

The project's centrepiece is its title cut, a rambling, multifaceted mythology of small-town home that unspools beyond the seven-minute mark.  Instrumentation evolves from solo acoustic to keening strings and ringing electric guitars, verging on a Springsteen-like roots anthem.  You'll want to track down Remnant's lyrics, which read like a poetry of soul-searching:  she prayed to the crucified wires / she was afraid to dare look at the time / and she swore with her hands on the dashboard / I will reach my destination.

The spirit of Sourwood ranges from lush to fragile, from ambitious gestures to the sound of a man recording in his basement.  While Adam Remnant has surrounded himself with a capable cadre of accompanists, these are intensely personal statements.  It's not simply the continuation of his labors with Southeast Engine, but rather a wholesale reassessment of his musical expression.

- Southeast Engine, "Ruthie" Canary (Misra, 14)
- William Matheny, "Blood Moon Singer (live on Mt Stage)" Moon Over Kenova  (Misra, 18)
^ Adam Remnant, "She Has a Way of Finding Me Out" Sourwood  (Anyway, 18)  D
- Iron & Wine, "Waves of Galveston" Weed Garden EP  (Sub Pop, 18)
- Felice Brothers, "Radio Song" Felice Brothers  (Team Love, 08)
- Pollies, "Unknown Legend"  Transmissions  (This is American Music, 18)
- William Elliott Whitmore, "Hot Blue & Righteous" Kilonova  (Bloodshot, 18)
- Eric Lindell, "Heavy Heart" Revolution in Your Heart  (Alligator, 18)  D
- Kacey Musgraves, "Kansas City Star" King of the Road: Tribute to Roger Miller  (BMG, 18)  D
- Kevin Gordon, "Saint on a Chain" Tilt & Shine  (Crowville, 18)
- Devil Makes Three, "Pray for Rain" Chains are Broken  (New West, 18)
- Alejandro Escovedo, "Outlaw for You" The Crossing  (Yep Roc, 18)
- Bottle Rockets, "Bit Logic" Bit Logic  (Bloodshot, 18)  D
- Uncle Tupelo, "Long Cut" Anodyne  (Reprise, 93)
- Lucero, "Everything Has Changed" Among the Ghosts  (Liberty + Lament, 18)
- Lee Bains III & Glory Fires, "Red Red Dirt of Home (live)" Live at the Nick  (Don Giovanni, 18)  D
- Israel Nash, "Rolling On" Lifted  (Desert Folklore, 18)
- Bobby Bare Jr, "Motel Time Again" Touch My Heart: Tribute to Johnny Paycheck  (Sugar Hill, 04)
- Adam Hood, "She Don't Love Me (feat. Brent Cobb)" Somewhere in Between  (Soundly, 18)  D
- Larry & His Flask, "This Remedy" This Remedy  (Xtra Mile, 18)  D
- Adam Faucett, "Central Avenue" It Took the Shape of a Bird  (Last Chance, 18)  D
- Cat Power, "Woman (feat. Lana Del Rey)" Wanderer  (Domino, 18)
- Gold Star, "Get it Together (C'mon)" Uppers & Downers  (Autumn Tone, 18)  D
- Band of Heathens, "Hey Mister" Message From the People Revisited  (BoH, 18)
- Shinyribs, "Brokedown Palace" single  (Next Waltz, 18)  D
- Austin Lucas, "My Mother & the Devil" Immortal Americans  (Cornelius Chapel, 18)
- Gregory Alan Isakov, "Caves" Evening Machines  (Dualtone, 18)
- Kevin Galloway, "Hands on the Wheel" The Change  (Nine Mile, 18)
- Yarn, "Empty Pockets" Empty Pockets  (Ardsley, 08)
- Eric Church, "Heart Like a Wheel" Desperate Man  (EMI Nashville, 18)

ROUTES & BRANCHES 
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 12, 2018
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

Austin Lucas is due some credit.  Since his last release he has lost over 100 pounds, seen his partner through cancer, shaken his substance issues and recorded Immortal Americans.  He stares out from the jacket of his seventh record, perhaps scarred by his experience but stepping wide-eyed into what's to come.

Lucas has also moved back to Bloomington, Indiana where he came of age as a punk and an outcast:  I learned to be a man / Watching 80s action movies with my friends / I searched my reflection for traces of great American men.  "Killing Time" contributes to Part 1 of a collection that almost seems to be composed of two halves.  That first chapter features a familiar Austin Lucas, documenting the lives of the "immortal Americans" who scrape and scratch and make their way beneath the mainstream.  Pedal steel haunts both "Killing Time" and "Happy", and those instantly recognizable vocals dodge and stab.  Lucas deserves to be considered among the foremost of our lyrical princes:  You were born a little sparrow / With an arrow in your throat.

The title cut is foremost among these more standard Austin Lucas offerings.  With its anthemic spirit and its embrace of the young, passionate and overlooked, "Immortal Americans" serves as among the defining moments of his career:  Children turn the radio on / Fists hit the air, praising rock 'n roll gods / From the soil they are formed / Born to grow corn and cut stone.  Lucas has become a bard for the least of these, living on the outskirts of our mainstream.  He revisits the haunts of his childhood home, perhaps seeing himself in the kids who still populate the parking lots and the late night streets.  Music pumps through their veins:  Sha-la-la goes the rattle and hum / from the hearth of a midwestern home.

Lucas seems to address much of Immortal Americans to that younger self, unfolding his dreams and expectations in light of present realities.  Are you happy / With your new life / Are  you happy / With the new world / Are you drowning in the dream / Of a shiny new beginning / Just like me.  With the benefit of hindsight, we regard our younger selves with a certain ratio of shame and affection, wondering what that person might think of the choices we've made.

But Immortal Americans is largely defined by its second half, which might speak to the influence of co-producer Will Johnson and engineer Steve Albini.  Pieces like "My Mother and the Devil", "Eye of an Asp" and "Between the Leaves" are far more immediate than anything Lucas has released to date.  Those striking vocals seem closer, more fragile and even more impactful, owing to Albini's analog recording and the generous amount of space around the songs.

"My Mother and the Devil" alternates between moments of skeletal acoustic guitar and pounding drums and electric guitar.  Lucas hasn't recorded anything with this degree of vulnerability.  Bits of silence separate the moods, like deep breaths that allow us an uncomfortable pause for thought.  My father says the devil and my mother / Are the only ones who'll be there / Always and forever / No matter what I do.

Matter of fact, the banjo playing of his father Bob Lucas appears throughout the record, serving to anchor the sessions in the sounds of Austin's childhood.  "Eye of an Asp" is a gorgeous duet between the voice of the son and the father's primitive strings.  The backing vocals of Chloe Manor float throughout Immortal Americans, complimenting the arrangements perfectly.  Much of this second half is rooted in dark folk traditions, sounds which were applied to a more upbeat effect about a decade ago on Lucas' tremendous Bristle Ridge collection.  But the shadows that fall across these more recent pieces are new.

To my ears, these two forces come together most effectively on "Monroe County Nights", a more driving tune that sounds like a collaboration between Austin Lucas and Will Johnson.  Like a contemporary Edgar Lee Masters of song, Lucas takes a bird's eye view of the Bloomington home to which he has returned, touching upon how time has changed the people and the place, and how we are changed in return:  By and by / We all are shackled / Caged by county lines / Wired, blood-drunk and born into the fight / By and by / We are no easy prey / Creatures prone to flight / By and by / On a Monroe County night.  By relaxing into what comes naturally, by welcoming a degree of intimacy and uncertainly into his music, Austin Lucas has created the most honest and direct music of his career.

- Two Cow Garage, "Come Back to Shelby" III  (LC, 07)
- Hawks & Doves, "Dangerous Ones" From a White Hotel  (Julian, 18)
- Cordovas, "Step-Back Red" That Santa Fe Channel  (ATO, 18)
- Jamie Lin Wilson, "The Being Gone" Jumping Over Rocks  (JLW, 18)
- Arliss Nancy, "Finches" Greater Divides  (Gunner, 16)
- Ruston Kelly, "Faceplant" Dying Star  (Rounder, 18)
- Rev Peyton's Big Damn Band, "Poor Until Payday" Poor Until Payday  (Family Owned, 18)  D
- Cody Jinks, "Colorado" Lifers  (Rounder, 18)
- JP Harris, "Golden Ring (w/Kristina Murray)" Why Don't We Duet in the Road  (Demolition & Removal, 17)
- Jason Eady, "I Lost My Mind in Carolina" I Travel On  (Old Guitar, 18)
- Kevin Gordon, "Gatling Gun" Tilt & Shine  (Crowville Media, 18)
- Glorietta, "Golden Lonesome" Glorietta  (Nine Mile, 18)
- Eric Bachmann, "Jaded Lover, Shady Drifter" No Recover  (Merge, 18)
- Adam Faucett, "T-Rex T-Shirt" More Like a Temple  (Faucett, 11)
- Aaron Lee Tasjan, "The Rest is Yet to Come" Karma for Cheap  (New West, 18)
- All Them Witches, "Fishbelly 86 Onions" Atw  (New West, 18)  D
- Murder by Death, "Chasing Ghosts" The Other Shore  (Bloodshot, 18)  D
- William Elliott Whitmore, "Don't Pray on Me" Kilonova  (Bloodshot, 18)
- Whitey Morgan & the 78s, "Honky Tonk Hell" Hard Times & White Lines  (Morgan, 18)  D
^ Austin Lucas, "Killing Time" Immortal Americans  (Cornelius Chapel, 18)
- Black Lillies, "Ten Years" Stranger to Me  (Attack Monkey, 18)
- Bottle Rockets, "Kerosene" Bottle Rockets  (East Side Digital, 93)
- Malcolm Holcombe, "I Don't Wanna Disappear (w/Iris Dement)" Come Hell or High Water  (Gypsy Eyes, 18)  D
- War & Treaty, "Here is Where the Loving is At (w/Emmylou Harris)" Healing Tide  (Strong World, 18)
- Andrew Combs, "Expectations" 5 Covers & a Song  (New West, 18)
- Shooter Jennings, "Living in a Minor Key" Shooter  (Elektra, 18)
- Ryan Culwell, "Heaven Everywhere I Go" Last American  (Culwell, 18)
- Waxahatchee, "Chapel of Pines" Great Thunder EP  (Merge, 18)
- John Hiatt, "Cry to Me" Eclipse Sessions  (New West, 18)  D
- Alynda Segarra, "Drunken Angel" Blaze: Original Cast Recording  (Light in the Attic, 18)  D

by Kris Wixom

ROUTES & BRANCHES 
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 5, 2018
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

The cover of Israel Nash's Lifted looks like a crowded canvas from Howard Finster's folk art.  Or maybe one of those shadow boxes, where seemingly unrelated curios collect to form a personally meaningful tableau.  Fact is, there's a lot going on on his fifth studio record, which is also indicative of what happens when the music starts.

It sounds like a carnival.  A "modern-day hippie spiritual" is what Israel Nash himself calls it.  Following some ambient midway feedback, "Rolling On" erupts gloriously from the speakers, spattering anyone within earshot with colors and sounds and strings and the Aaaaahhhhhs of one-hundred bearded angels.  Phil Spector built his Wall of Sound.  Israel Nash has the psychedelic beaded curtain of Dripping Springs (TX Hill Country, where he's built his Plum Creek Studio).  It's honestly one of the musical year's most beautiful moments, the generous noise almost too much to accept at first.

Alongside producer Ted Young, Nash has created this wonder from that home studio, one I envision without a roof, where the lines between the natural world and a man's musical laboratory are blurred.  "Sweet Springs" is an ode to the idyllic space, delivered in his perfectly fractured Neil Young yawl: Think I'll sit and rest my bones / Low in my evening chair / I'll follow you right into the colors that float in the air.

He's readily acknowledged the inspiration of production-driven projects like Sgt Pepper's and Pet Sounds, little symphonies that incorporate the studio among the instruments.  The video for "Lucky Ones" portrays Nash in a stark white suit, roaming the surrounding wilderness like a lost Alan Lomax.  He holds out a microphone to the mountains and the hills and the trees and rocks, gathering found sounds and literal field recordings that he's hidden in these songs.

Lifted raises us on its inspirational breezes: You are scattered like light from a sunbeam / Piercing the heart of an old dream / That's spinning me out in the open.  It's an album of ambitious contrasts, isolation vs immersion, sinking deep roots in a rural community vs universal awareness.  It's one man's radically individual vision, lovingly pieced together and carried on the wind to the masses.

I've seen videos online of Israel Nash performing a couple of these pieces solo with an acoustic guitar and harmonica, so I know there's a solid song beneath all that noise and glory hallelujah.  Drums and guitar and pedal steel are never far from our ears, especially on "Northwest Stars" or "Lucky Ones".  But when the trumpet and strings sweep into "Looking Glass", it's hard to resist the wave.  Like those curio cabinets, the songs of Lifted are fascinating, inviting the listener to grab the headphones and disappear into them.  But at heart, it's still a man and his guitar, "farm-to-table rock 'n roll".  Like those classic sounds from Brian Wilson, Nash's heart still beats beneath the surface, and the crickets chirp and the wind blows and the thunder rolls.  Everything has a story / All things they must pass / Once it brought me strife and worry / Now at times it makes me laugh ...

- Willy Tea Taylor & River Arkansas, "Lazy Third Eye" Good Damn Dog  (WTT, 18)
- Jason Isbell, "Cumberland Gap (live)" Live From the Ryman  (Southeastern, 18)  D
- Neko Case, "Pitch or Honey" Hell-on  (ATO, 18)
- Phosphorescent, "New Birth in New England" C'est la Vie  (Dead Oceans, 18)  D
- Sons of Bill, "Easier (w/Molly Parden)" Oh God Ma'am  (Gray Fox, 18)
- Blitzen Trapper, "Furr (live at KCRW)"  Furr: 10th Anniversary Deluxe Edition  (Sub Pop, 18)
- Cordovas, "This Town's a Drag" That Santa Fe Channel  (ATO, 18)
- Robbie Fulks & Linda Gail Lewis, "Who Cares" Wild Wild Wild  (Bloodshot, 18)
- Amanda Shires, "Break Out the Champagne" To the Sunset  (Silver Knife, 18)
- Pollies, "Hold on My Heart" Transmissions  (This is American Music, 18)
^ Israel Nash, "Sweet Springs" Lifted  (Desert Folklore, 18)
- Tom Freund, "Broke Down Jubilee" East of Lincoln  (Surf Road, 18)
- Son Volt, "Driving the View" Wide Swing Tremolo  (Warner, 98)
- Cody Jinks, "Lifers" Lifers  (Rounder, 18)
- Hawks & Doves, "Bulletproof Hearts" From a White Hotel  (Julian, 18)  D
- Kevin Galloway, "Don't It Feel Good To Smile" The Change  (Nine Mile, 18)
- Kendl Winter, "Stumbler's Business" Stumbler's Business  (Team Love, 18)
- Rhett Miller, "Question" The Believer  (Verve, 06)
- Trampled by Turtles, "Wildflowers" single  (Banjodad, 18)
- Austin Lucas, "Monroe County Nights" Immortal Americans  (Cornelius Chapel, 18)
- Kevin Gordon, "Saint on a Chain" Tilt & Shine  (Crowville Media, 18)  D
- Dolorean, "The Unfazed" The Unfazed  (Partisan, 10)
- Dawn Landes, "Keep on Moving" Meet Me at the River  (Yep Roc, 18)
- Adam's House Cat, "Runaway Train" Town Burned Down  (ATO, 18)  D
- Band of Heathens, "Heaven Help Us All" Message From the People Revisited  (BoH, 18)
- Courtney Marie Andrews, "Irene" Honest Life  (Mama Bird, 16)
- Will Hoge, "Gilded Walls" My American Dream  (Edlo, 18)
- Jamie Lin Wilson, "the Being Gone" Jumping Over Rocks  (JLW, 18)  D
- Noah Gundersen, "Slow Dancer" Carry the Ghost  (Dualtone, 15)
- Over the Rhine, "Don't Let the Bastards Get You Down" Meet Me at the Edge of the World  (Great Speckled Dog, 13)