SARAH SHOOK & the DiSARMERS - NIGHTROAMER

photo by Cowtown Chad

ROUTES & BRANCHES

featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music

February 26, 2022

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

Sarah Shook & the Disarmers - Nightroamer  (Abeyance)  Sometimes I'm just wrong. Last time I wrote about North Carolina's Shook, I recklessly predicted: Where Lydia Loveless veered into pop territory after her Bloodshot debut, my sense (and my hope and expectation) is that Shook will simply dig their heels further into the dirt with their subsequent projects. 

In that same review I also accurately identified Shook as one of the most important artists in our kind of music. A case could be made for 2017's Sidelong as among the keystone records from the past decade, and Years (18) demonstrated an impressive leap in Shook's maturity as a writer, a vocalist, and a bandleader. 

Nightroamer, Shook's third project fronting the Disarmers delivers plenty that meets our expectation, darker alt.country flirting with the fringes of honky-tonk. God is dead and heaven's silent, Shook warns on "It Doesn't Change Anything", pedal steel and electric guitar elbowing acoustic strumming for prominence. Tales of hard living and dirty damn lies still prevail, with the singer's low-slung vocal providing the perfect vehicle for songs like "Somebody Else" or the twang of "No Mistakes". Even when the bass becomes rubbery and the Disarmers make room for a bright organ on "Been Lovin' You Too Long", they stick close to the pocket they've established so well. Longtime guitarist Eric Peterson plays with dirt on his strings, and Phil Sullivan's pedal steel insures that listeners never forget to file Nightroamer under "C" for Country. 

Where my prediction has proven incorrect, however, is at the point where Shook pushes out from this familiar territory. Alongside producer Pete Anderson, the Disarmers speak to a range and a wider musical reach on the tuneful country-pop of "Stranger". There's almost a breeziness and a swing, with Shook exploring more vocal nuance, even as they haven't abandoned the barbed lyrics: Baby you ain't no game changer. Never a traditional singer, Nightroamer challenges them to target higher notes on "I Got This", or to add a bluesiness and a hiccup to the 60s influenced "If It's Poison": Love don't always gotta have a bitter taste / If it's poison baby we will know. These sessions invite Shook to embrace and diversify themself as a vocalist. 

Sarah Shook's most impressive moments on Nightroamer occur at the intersection of these evolutions, in compositions that are simply some of their best moments as a songwriter. The darkly romantic title cut seems as heartfelt and vulnerable a statement as they've made: Let the night swallow me / Its starry-eyed nightroamer. With Will Rigby's booming percussion and Aaron Oliva's melodic bass line, "Believer" is built around a mature and expressive arrangement. Two guesses where I been, Shook challenges. 

Fact is, roots music fans and reviewers seem to like their female artists waiflike, with voices like songbirds. Sarah Shook has always defied those trends, not to mention rocking badass tattoos and piercings (No man got no business tellin' you to smile). Still a strong an important artist in our kind of music, Nightroamer allows Shook to push out where they could have settled in, to boldly conquer new ground instead of bunkering down into their comfort zone. While not yet ranging as far afield as Loveless, Shook shares a commitment to stubbornly defining their own sound, and in that capacity remaining a relevant artist to keep watching. 

Amanda Anne Platt & Honeycutters - Devil and the Deep Blue Sea  (Organic, Feb 25)   We published the following last year, months before Platt's singles were gathered into the bouquet that is now available. Such a stellar collection certainly merits a second visit. The original review is edited for brevity. 

Ashville, NC's Amanda Anne Platt has been sharing two-sided singles since early in the year, deconstructed pieces from an eventual album she and her band are calling The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. With fourteen cuts shared to date, we're possibly close to having the entirety of the project under our belts. While there might be more to come, I simply want to make certain not to overlook some of the best straight americana being written. 

Each subsequent monthly release has featured one song each from the devil and the deep blue sea; one more outgoing piece and another more inward-looking and contemplative. For every upbeat "The Devil" (with its baritone twang) there is the reflective "Rabbit" (with its watery pedal steel). Platt and crew are fluent in both settings, the songwriter's lyrics as genuine whether following a reverie after watching a dog kill a rabbit or suggesting a more typical country setting: We were sitting in the backseat / Your Chevy Cavalier / Tom Petty on the stereo / You whispering in my ear. 

Like Lori McKenna, Platt is a spot-on lyricist, a great ear for dialog and a novelist's eye for life's small details. Of the woman beneath the late-night streetlight on the bluesy "Burn", she notes: A little heaven gets loose / When her voice cracks. She never reaches for the self-consciously poetic, working instead with a more rough-hewn everyday fabric. There is a simplicity in the strummed acoustic and piercing pedal steel of "This Night", down to the air brakes on the highway / Neighbor's news through the wall. 

This growing collection of singles constitutes some of the best pure americana available for our streaming pleasure. You'll hear it as Platt reaches for the upper ends of her vocal range on the melodic "Great Confession", and in her tribute to a woman's reality in the upbeat "Girls Like You". On the flip side is a plaintive ballad to her daughter, the profound and lovely "Always Knew": I thought I'd read more leatherbound books / Know how to clean and how to cook / And understand the time it took / To rebuild when my world got shook / I thought I'd have more big ideas / On world hunger, war and peace / And I thought I'd have some bigger dreams / Than a good friend to grow old with me. 

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This week's adds to A Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster include: The debut solo record by celebrated songwriter Aaron Raitiere. Produced by Miranda Lambert and Anderson East, Single Wide Dreamer makes its appearance May 6 via the Dinner Time label. On the heels of a handful of buzzworthy EPs and singles, Bailey Bigger has set March 25 as the release date for her own debut full-length, Coyote Red (Madjack). Ryan Gustafson has announced his next in a series of excellent records under his Dead Tongues moniker. Expect Dust to land wherever music matters on April 1 (Psychic Hotline). Onetime .357 String Band player Joseph Huber is looking at a May 12 date for his 6th solo album, The Downtowner. And Southern country-rockers Whiskey Myers are making a buzz in advance of their next project. Tornillo will strike July 29 courtesy of Wiggy Thump.