ROUTES & BRANCHES
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
March 31, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
March 31 marks the one-quarter point for 2024. As is our habit, let's take account of our ten (10) favorite albums for the first three months of the year. In order of appearance.
WHAT's SO GREAT ABOUT the FiRST QUARTER of 2024?!!
Brown Horse, Reservoir (Loose, Jan 19)
Frontier Ruckus, On the Northline (Sitcom Universe, Feb 16)
Tucker Riggleman & Cheap Dates, Restless Spirit (WarHen, Feb 17)
Hurray For the Riff Raff, The Past Is Still Alive (Nonesuch, Feb 23)
Leslie Stevens, Leslie Stevens (Stevens, Feb 23)
Hanging Stars, On a Golden Shore (Loose, Mar 8)
Adrianne Lenker, Bright Future (4AD, Mar 22)
Rosali, Bite Down (Merge, Mar 22)
Waxahatchee, Tigers Blood (Anti, Mar 22)
Scott Ballew, Rio Bravo (La Honda, Mar 29)
Also under strong consideration for this vaunted honor were releases by Willi Carlisle, Sarah Jarosz, Britti, Glass Hours, and Cody Jinks.
And, since this Episode is also the last of March, we'll also commit to our favorite songs for the past 31 days. This one is ordered by preference.
WHAT's SO GREAT ABOUT MARCH?!!
1. Hanging Stars, "Sweet Light" On a Golden Shore (Loose, Mar 8)
2. Lawrence Rothman, "LAX (ft Amanda Shires)" Plow That Broke the Plains (KRO, Apr 26)
3. Myriam Gendron, "Long Way Home" Mayday (Thrill Jockey, May 10)
4. Kacey Musgraves, "Too Good To Be True" Deeper Well (Interscope, Mar 15)
5. Waxahatchee, "Ice Cold" Tigers Blood (Anti, Mar 22)
6. Anna Tivel, "Disposable Camera" Living Thing (Fluff & Gravy, May 31)
7. Adeem the Artist, "One Night Stand" Anniversary (Four Quarters, May 3)
8. Rosali, "Hills On Fire" Bite Down (Merge, Mar 22)
9. Efterklang, "Getting Reminders (ft Beirut)" single (City Slang, Mar 19)
10. Scott Ballew, "Mutiny" Rio Bravo (La Honda, Mar 29)
Finally, consider this: You're speaking to a music aficionado. They are deeply knowledgeable and opinionated with regard to contemporary indie music, past and present. They're also pretty ignorant (and opinionated) about our kind of music, dismissing it as soulless and lacking edge. You'd like to convince them otherwise, even as you recognize the validity in their statement at some level. Your friend challenges you to recommend five solidly mainstream americana/alt.country artists, stuff that could sway their sentiments. Who would you suggest? Who could you stand behind, who is worthy of the banner this is americana and this is cool (note to self: consider this for a future R&B tagline)?
This question hangs over all we do at R&B HQ, and could be the topic for a much longer piece if we had nothing better to do. We'll drop a spoiler here, however, the americana artist who is first to mind when it comes to integrity and edge: Alejandro Escovedo.
Escovedo has just released Echo Dancing, a fourteen-cut collection that offers re-recordings of songs from his back catalog, even reaching to his past work alongside True Believers and Buick MacKane. This is by no means an especially original idea, though Escovedo's new sessions differ in a couple ways: 1) These are not his greatest hits, and 2) These new recordings depart from the originals in some pretty interesting ways.
For Echo Dancing, Escovedo reached out to a pair of Italian artists with whom he had collaborated on the tour for 2018's The Crossing: producer/guitarist Don Antonio, and keyboardist Nicola Peruch. Aside from a pair of backing vocals and a soprano sax, everything we hear is the product of this trio, with Peruch programming drum tracks. A 1997 Buick MacKane number, "John Conquest" opens with a mess of macerating guitar, adding some urgency to the original as well as more rhythmic percussion and a barking punk delivery from Escovedo. Preening and stuttering, guitars hone a sharp edge on a song that boasts more fire and fury that the 73 year-old artist has demonstrated since his early punk days.
While the mix on Echo Dancing can be thick with static, the trio maintains a lean approach throughout. Originally from 1999's Bourbonitis Blues, then revisited for '06s Boxing Mirror, "Sacramento & Polk" speeds forward unabashedly on a locomotive drum track, adorned by little more than a restless jazz piano: They vaguely remember some plans / But that was long ago. The track for "Everybody Loves Me" is glitchy and nearly industrial. Alejandro Escovedo has never shied away from the avant in his work, commenting: I always feel that a well-written song can withstand a lot of abuse. His best-known song, Man Under the Influence's "Castanets" is subject to the most manipulation. Once banned from his shows because of its appearance on George HW Bush's iPod, Escovedo morphs the tune into a cumbia, sounding like Los Lobos' more experimentally-minded material.
Rather than reviving more familiar songs, Echo Dancing succeeds in assembling a very cohesive collection of lesser known stuff from his entire oeuvre. From 2008's superb Real Animal, "Swallows Of San Juan" presents a more organic, intimate sound that mines the artists' soul reserves. Reaching back to 1992's iconic Gravity, "Bury Me" lays a junkyard groove over the original, with bluesy guitar and keys. Escovedo looks back to True Believers' Hard Road record to retrieve "Outside Your Door", delivering the lyrics with a spoken/sung Lou Reed recitation: Smokey sings to me / As I dance alone / Wrapped in reverie. The soulful sway of the original is deconstructed, 80s keys and Bernard Sumner guitars generate a new wave-adjacent chill. Most impressively, Escovedo never treats his work with kid gloves. He follows his muse and his trio through layers of noise and electricity, generating a final product that both honors and alters the original.
Alejandro Escovedo indicates that he's readying another all new project, reminding us that at 73 he remains creative and relevant, warmly embraced by the americana community even as he's rarely toed their line. There are pieces on Echo Dancing that may be more palatable for traditionalists, but the prevailing spirit is one of reinvention and flaunting expectations. Escovedo's choices also seem to speak to his own self-assessment, no matter how much time has passed since their initial recording. From 2016's terrific Burn Something Beautiful: Thought I'd let you know / Party's over / There's no more furniture to break / Glasses left to smash.
ROUTES-cast March 31, 2024
- Anna Tivel, "Bluebird" Living Thing (Fluff & Gravy, May 31)
- Sarah Shook & the Disarmers, "Give You All My Love" Revelations (Abeyance, 24)
- Waxahatchee, "Crowbar" Tigers Blood (Anti, 24)
- Adam Remnant, "Three Days" single (Coiled Myth, 24) D
- Jessica Pratt, "World On a String" Here In the Pitch (Mexican Summer, May 3)
- GospelbeacH, "Nothin' But a Fool" Wiggle Your Fingers (Curation, Apr 26)
- Scott Ballew, "Trouble Darling" Rio Bravo (La Honda, 24)
- Lost Dog Street Band, "Survived" Survived (LDSB, Apr 26)
- Sierra Ferrell, "Wish You Well" Trail Of Flowers (Rounder, 24)
- Dave Alvin & Jimmie Dale Gilmore, "We're Still Here" TexiCali (Yep Roc, Jun 21) D
- Ashley Monroe, "I Like Trains" single (Monroe, 24) D
- Cody Jinks, "Take This Bottle (ft Pearl Aday)" Change the Game (Late August, 24)
- Jenny Don't & the Spurs, "Pain In My Heart" Broken Hearted Blue (Fluff & Gravy, Jun 14) D
- Charlie Overbey, "Champagne, Cocaine, Cadillacs and Cash (ft Jaime Wyatt, Marcus King)" In Good Company (Lone Hawk) D
- Sarah Gayle Meech, "Love Me" Easin' On (Good Timin' Woman, May 3)
- Trummors, "I Can Still Make Cheyenne" 5 (Ernest Jennings, Apr 12)
^ Alejandro Escovedo, "Swallows Of San Juan" Echo Dancing (Yep Roc, 24)
- Scott H Biram, "I'll Still Miss Ruby" One & Only (Bloodshot, 24)
- Hallelujah the Hills, "Vitamin C" single (Discrete Pageantry, 24)
- Secret Sisters, "Never Walk Away" Mind Man Medicine (New West, 24)
- Lawrence Rothman, "Yesterday Tomorrow" Plow That Broke the Plains (KRO, Apr 26)
- Adeem the Artist, "Rotations" Anniversary (Four Quarters, May 3)
- Valerie June, "Big Dream" My Black Country: Songs Of Alice Randall (Oh Boy, Apr 12)
- Yarn, "Heart So Hard" Born Blessed Grateful & Alive (Symphonic Distribution, Jul 26) D
- Rose Hotel, "Drown" A Pawn Surrender (Strolling Bones, Jun 7)
- Tommy Prine, "You Don't Care For Me Enough To Cry" Apple Music Nashville Sessions (Nameless Knight, 24) D
- Rosali, "Hopeless" Bite Down (Merge, 24)
- Adrianne Lenker, "No Machine" Bright Future (4AD, 24)
- Elizabeth Cook, "Straight To Hell (ft Butch Walker)" Said the Firefly To the Hurricane (Tasty Goody, 24)
- Miko Marks, "Lay Your Burdens Down (ft Buddy Miller)" single (Redtone, 24) D
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