featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
August 17, 2025
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
IF YOU ONLY LiSTEN to ONE RECORD THiS WEEK
Last week we were pressed for time, but would've tagged Ada Lea's when i paint my masterpiece for your listening assignment. This Episode, we're recommending an ambitious seven-piece prog-folk outfit, Racing Mount Pleasant. In 2023, a band named Kingfisher shared an ill-lit video of "Your New Place" for NPR's Tiny Desk Submissions. In a remarkably small space, the members shoehorned cinematic strings, bright horns, gritty electric guitar, and celebratory vocals for a dramatic result. That song introduces Racing Mount Pleasant, the new thirteen-track studio project from the group, now recording under that same name. While several writers have likened RMP to Black Country New Road, another act with plenty of members, these sessions seem more purposeful, perhaps less self-aware. Even with evolving rhythms and key signatures, there is an abiding laid-back spirit that is more pretty than indulgent. Racing Mount Pleasant catches an ensemble still exploring the boundaries of their collaboration, a musical snapshot on the road from one place to the next.
ROUTES-cast August 17, 2025
^ Racing Mount Pleasant, "Outlast" Racing Mount Pleasant (R&R, 25)
- Floating Action, "Shell of Former Self" A Hand Carved Garden Tool (Airloom, Aug 29)
- Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, "Magic Moment" Mossy Oak Shadow (Run for Cover, Sep 19)
- Trace Mountains, "Dark Don't Hide It" I Will Swim to You: Tribute to Jason Molina (Run for Cover, Sep 5)
- Foot Ox, "Bed of Violets" Lighthouse With Silver Dog Eyes (Ernest Jenning, Aug 29)
- Neko Case, "Winchester Mansion of Sound" Neon Grey Midnight Green (Anti, Sep 26)
- Cataldo, "Cathode Glow" Two Way Mirror (FIIJDIM, Oct 10) D
- Margaret Glaspy, "Jesus Etc (ft Norah Jones)" Golden Heart Protector EP (ATO, Sep 12) D
- Cass McCombs, "Asphodel" Interior Live Oak (Domino, 25)
- Carson McHone, "Idiom" Pentimento (Merge, Sep 12)
- Dillon Warnek, "Pistol and a List of Demands" As the Neighbors Tried to Sleep (Soggy Anvil, 25)
- Fruit Bats, "Let You People Down" Baby Man (Merge, Sep 12)
- Katie Pruitt, "Risk" single (Rounder, 25) D
- Hans Chew, "She's a Seer" Land of Dreams (Chew, Sep 5) D
- David Newbould, "Rainy Day Heart" Average Fidelity Vol 1 (Blackbird, 25)
- Silver Synthetic, "Happy Ever After" single (Curation, 25) D
- Joey Kneiser, "Haint Blue" Nothing's Wasted on the Soul (Young Buffalo, 25) D
- Caitlin Canty, "Electric Guitar" Night Owl Envies the Mourning Dove (Canty, Oct 2)
- Third Mind, "Reno Nevada" Right Now! (Yep Roc, Sep 19)
- Kyle Morgan & Tamar Korn, "Life's Railway to Heaven" Darkening Green (Jalopy, 25)
- Joseph Decosimo, "Glory in the Meetinghouse" Fiery Gizzard (Dear Life, 25)
- Jonny Fritz, "Debbie Downers" Debbie Downers (Gar Hole, Oct 24) D
- Joelton Mayfield, "Turpentine (You Know the One)" Crowd Pleaser (Bloodshot, Oct 24)
- Ruston Kelly, "Waiting to Love You" Pale Through the Window (Rounder, Sep 12)
- Langhorne Slim, "Dream Come True" single (Dualtone, 25) D
- Molly Tuttle, "Everything Burns" So Long Little Miss Sunshine (Nonesuch, 25)
- LC Franke & Silverada, "Prisoner (Southern Bloom)" The Prisoner EP (Side Hustle, Sep 23) D
- Mike Reid & Joe Henry, "Weather Rose" Life and Time (Work Song, Sep 5)
- St Paul & the Broken Bones, "Full Moon" St Paul & the Broken Bones (Oasis Pizza, Oct 10)
- Jeb Loy Nichols, "First Night Away From Home" This House is Empty Without You (Timmion, Oct 7) D
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