WHAT's SO GREAT ABOUT THiS WEEK?!! (August 7, 2026)

ROUTES & BRANCHES

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

August 7, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

WHAT's SO GREAT ABOUT THiS WEEK?!!

As we've stated, there is no shortage of good new singles on an average week. We can disappear down a deep dark hole mining for just the right songs. We also appreciate a fun video, though we have absolutely none of those this week. Good stuff, though, so just close your eyes and make up your own visuals. 

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Futurebirds, "Pretty Eyes" Far Out Country  (Dualtone, Sep 4)

All of the sudden Futurebirds strike gold. At this point we've heard about half of their forthcoming double LP, Far Out Country, and it's been fine. Over the years we've had no problem representing their slightly sticky alt.country to our playlists, but nothing has hit like this pretty, simple ballad: We're gonna learn to fight it, like it or not / So come on give in to me, dust to divinity. 

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Left Arm Tan, "Rolling Under the Stars" When Tigers Smoked  (LAT, Oct 9)

There's a great story behind Left Arm Tan's return, and we're hoping they'll tell it as the release date approaches. For now, we're happy to share the initial single from When Tigers Smoked. So much to like here, from the insistent low-end pulse to the watercolored pedal steel, and those border-adjacent horns. While we wait for more, we'd recommend you all listen to the band's superb three-album run from 2013-2018: Alticana, Lorene, El Camino ...

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Kacy Lee Anderson, "Giving In" Hello I'm Irrelevant  (Earth Libraries, Oct 23)

Known for her work as one-half of Kacy & Clayton, Canada's Kacy Lee Anderson returns with one of the best LP titles of the year. Where her duo tended towards trad and pastoral, this debut single offers a more updated profile. From her publicity: she's writing the songs she wants to hear, whether anyone else cares or not. Not always the most advisable move, it seems to be working just fine here. 

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Odyssey Cult, Vol 3  (Silver Current, Aug 21)

Here is the only song we've ever represented that has been likened to Lemmy-era Hawkwind. The project of guitarist Ethan Miller, there is certainly a heavy-osity to this one. The evolving outfit's third project includes contributions from an impressively diverse range of friends, from legendary drummer Steve Shelley and squaky sax-player Zoh Amba to long-lost vocalist Paula Frazer. 

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Margo Cilker, "Little White Crosses" Little White Crosses  (Fossil, Oct 9)

The Washington State songwriter turned to Bruce Robison to co-produce her third full-length, following Pohorylle and Valley Of Heart's Delight. Comments Cilker, You could definitely call it a concept record. If that concept is that I got really sad and went to Texas. "Little White Crosses" covers a 2022 song by Christy Hays, a writer who also deserves to be discovered (have you heard "Don't Let Me Die In California"?). 

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A ROUTES & BRANCHES GUiDE to FEEDiNG YOUR MONSTER (August 6, 2026)

A ROUTES & BRANCHES GUiDE to FEEDiNG YOUR MONSTER

good news about good noise

August 6, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

Here's where we provide readers with a quick and incomplete survey of some of the more engaging stories and sights we've collected this week during our regular jaunts across the 'net. While we strive to populate our own site with as much original content as possible, we're eternally grateful for our fellow bloggers, many of whom are listen among our Good Place To Start links. One of our favorite stops has been Brooklyn Vegan, especially valuable for information regarding new singles. Unfortunately, BV was effectively gutted this week, the operation seemingly shuttered by the site's parent group. With other conglomerators crouching behind a paywall or shutting down altogether, the voices of independent music writers are increasingly valuable. 

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^ Sam & Louise Sullivan perform under one of the least sexy names in all of popular music. Perhaps this is not a surprise, their excellent new Love & Devotion project recorded by a pair of Quaker school teachers from Philadelphia. We hope Stereogum's recent interview hasn't disappeared behind a paywall, but give it a try anyway. 

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Wow. Has it really been since 2019 that we were gifted a new LP from Pieta Brown? We share Twangville's enthusiasm about Dreamin' Of, due later this month. The singer-songwriter spills the details in an interview addressing borrowing her mother-in-law Iris Dement's touring van. And more. 

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Jon Spencer has been an essential force in the continuing fight to land the sound of punk-blues music in every garage in the country. He speaks freely to Retrofuturista on the heels of June's Songs Of Personal Loss and Protest, holding court about overwhelming municipal sewers, the importance of Little Richard in light of the current administration, and Devo's great drummer. 

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We fell in love with Mary In the Junkyard's recent debut, Role Model Hermit. DIY offers a nice interview with the trio, who liken the process of readying their project to giving birth to a horse. 

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As we celebrate the one-year anniversary of Racing Mount Pleasant's self-titled debut, the outfit visits KEXP for a wonderful thirty-minute set. They've brought along a violin, a sax, and a pocketful of ambitious progressive folk. 

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While we're enjoying some video content, Paste has cornered Case Oats for a short acoustic set during Wilco's Solid Sound festival. 

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We'll be featuring a new single from This Is Lorelei's forthcoming album very soon. As an apertif, please enjoy this week's long-form interview with the project's ringleader, Nate Amos. Also a member of Water From Your Eyes, the indie rock rascal (their words) chats about growing up the son of bluegrass legend Bob Amos, being banned from Distrokid for uploading too many epic drone dirges, and mainlining Blink 182's All the Small Things on repeat. 

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NYT Popcast offers a nice, long conversation with Conor Oberst, who has been creating music in one form or another since his mid-teens. 

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The talented members of the talented trio, Magic Tuber Stringband wander through the extensive library of Thrill Jockey Records to pull and share some of their favorite and most influential albums from their archives. Thank goodness they are talented, since Magic Tuber Stringband is a phenomenally bad name for a music act. 

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A Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster is our way of keeping track of all the year's new and forthcoming releases. This week we added news of Down & Dirty, the down & dirty new LP from David Quinn, awaiting an August 28 street date. Valerie June has announced the pending arrival of Brighter Blue, a new EP courtesy of the Concord label (Sep 11). We're looking forward to hearing some live stuff from Bonnie Prince Billy. No Quarter will release Ghosts Of American Psychonauts come September 18. Ian Noe has (finally) set a date for his long (long)-awaited new record. Canyon Falls Trailer Band will appear wherever music matters on September 25 (Leo13). Finally, Kacy Lee Anderson (one-half of Kacy & Clayton) is looking to October 23 for the unleashing of a solo project, Hello I'm Irrelevant via Earth Libraries. 

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LOOKBACK MACHiNE: Mojave 3

ROUTES & BRANCHES

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

August 5, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

As declared on yesterday's post, this week's Lookback playlist observes the 4AD label's release of remastered editions of Mojave 3's five-LP oeuvre, creatively titled Mojave 3 (1995-2006). While Neil Halstead, Rachel Goswell and Ian McCutcheon served as a marginal note in our kind of music, it's worth your indulgence. Listeners might recognize notes of more familiar artists like Iron & Wine, Horse Feathers, or Beachwood Sparks/GospelbeacH, though the recordings of Mojave 3 are set apart in light of Halstead's distinctly British sensibility. Tangential links might also be drawn to earlier work from Cowboy Junkies and even Jayhawks. 

What with our always-forward orientation, it's been too long since we spent time with the songs of Mojave 3. Previewing our playlist served to remind us how relevant this stuff remains, how Halstead's artistic formula has proven visionary if not underappreciated. 

MOJAVE 3: thirty favorites

- "Love Songs On the Radio" Ask Me Tomorrow (1995)

- "Sarah"

- "Tomorrow's Taken"

- "You're Beautiful"

- "This Road I'm Traveling" single (1998)

- "Between Us" single (1998)

- "Go Lady Go" single (1998)

- "All I Want" single (1998)

- "Who Do You Love"  Out Of Tune (1998)

- "Give What You Take" 

- "Some Kinda Angel"

- "To Whom Should I Write"

- "In Love With a View"  Excuses For Travellers (2000)

- "Trying To Reach You"

- "My Life In Art"

- "Any Day Will Be Fine"

- "Prayer For the Paranoid"

- "Bringin' Me Home"

- "Girl From the North Country" single (2000)

- "Bluebird Of Happiness" Spoon and Rafter (2003)

- "Starlite #1"

- "Tinkers Blues"

- "She's All Up Above"

- "Too Many Mornings"

- "Between the Bars"

- "Star In the Sky" single (2006)

- "Truck Driving Man" Puzzles Like You (2006)

- "Breaking the Ice"

- "Big Star Baby"

- "The Mutineer" 

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To enjoy any Spotify ROUTES-cast, just open Spotify and search for "routesandbranches" to access this most recent playlist, as well as many others from past months.  Or click here for a preview:

IF YOU ONLY LiSTEN to ONE RECORD THiS WEEK (August 4, 2026)

ROUTES & BRANCHES

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

August 4, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

Back atop the proverbial horse after our week of wayfaring. Fortunately, it hasn't been an especially eventful time for new stuff (though it's our contention that there's always new music if you know where to look). 

Our Tuesday posts are dedicated to celebrating just one record from this constant stream of novelty, knowing that it requires work to keep up with what's new. 

IF YOU ONLY LiSTEN to ONE RECORD THiS WEEK

This week we're going to direct your valuable attention back to the late 90s and 00s, when Mojave 3 grew out of the dissolution of Slowdive. Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell (with an evolving cohort including drummer Ian McCutcheon) projected Slowdive's shoegaze forward, opening the hazy buzz to emphasize elements of folk, country, and pop. Over the span of their five (5) records, that evolution included regular use of pedal steel, which occasionally lent Mojave 3's music a subtly rural air. 

The legendary 4AD label has remastered and reissued the British band's LPs in a lovely box set (Mojave 3: (1995-2006) that has since sold out, though the records are individually streamable). Mojave 3 was introduced on 1995's Ask Me Tomorrow, a project that dealt in a low-key psychedelic shoegaze, sometimes trading out Slowdive's electric hum for a more acoustic setting. The band's follow-up, 1998's Out Of Tune, found Halstead and Goswell increasingly defining a more distinct, heavier direction, incorporating more pastoral pop influences in addition to keys and electric guitar. Later collections paid greater attention to melody and songcraft, flirting less with with any country influences. 

Beginning in 2002, Neil Halstead began devoting increased time to solo and side projects (2008's Oh! Mighty Engine is especially worth your attention). Following the release of 2006's Puzzles Like You, Mojave 3 declared a hiatus, and an eventual reformation of Slowdive made any further recordings unlikely. 

Our celebration of Mojave 3's reissues will continue on tomorrow's Episode, when we look back at thirty of our favorite songs from the act's relatively short run. 

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ROUTES-cast August 2, 2026

ROUTES & BRANCHES

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

August 2, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

ROUTES-cast August 2, 2026

^ Elijah Wolf, "texaco lights" track star  (Mtn Laurel, 26)  D

- Little Gold, "Pissin" Public Dog  (Tall Texan, 26)

- James Steinle, "Ragged Gunner" single  (Soggy Anvil, 26)  D

- Next Of Kin, "Dimestore Jesus" single  (Next Of Kin, 26)  D

- Chris Gantry, "Boldness Of Spirit" Worth Every Nail  (Appalachia, Oct 23)  D

- David Quinn, "Long Time Gone" single  (Quinn, 26)  

- Lindsay Lou, "I've Endured" Bluegrass Women  (Work Of Bart, Aug 14)

- Billy Strings, "Mill Town Flood" So Much For Goodbyes  (Reprise, Aug 28)

- Mountain Grass Unit, "Suspicion" Appalachian Smoke  (Dualtone, Aug 27)

- Colby T Helms, "Armed and Dangerous" One For the Losers  (Photo Finish, Oct 23)  D

- Angela Autumn, "Heavy Tobacco" Believer  (Gar Hole, Sep 11)

- Ian Noe, "Heidelberg Fisherman's Ball" Canyon Falls Trailer Band  (Lock13, Sep 25)  D

- Bures Band, "Delta" single  (Love Police, 26)  D

- Son Volt, "Serenade Song" Sound Signal Serenades  (Transmit Sound, Aug 28)

- Krista Shows, "Done My Time" single  (Shows, 26)  D

- Kyle Kimbrell, "Helmet Head" Lonesome In the Sky  (Cornelius Chapel, Oct 16)  D

- Ned Collette, "Commandeered Parade" Mixed Light  (Collette, Aug 28)

- Richard Thompson, "Cocaine Walking Booze Talking" Hippies Thugs and Heroes  (New West, Oct 16)  D

- Charlie Parr, "Rooming House" Rooming House  (Smithsonian, Oct 16)  D

- Pieta Brown, "Glitter Town" Dreamin' Of  (Righteous Babe, Aug 21)

- Shannon Lay, "What Does It Mean" Past the Veil  (All the Best, 26)

- Flora Hibberd, "Shelley" Mammoth  (22Twenty, Oct 16) D

- Brennan Wedl, "Let's Be Models" Brennan Wedl  (Anti, Aug 21)

- Sunken Man, "Hearts" Sunken Man  (Single Lock, Sep 25)

- Lawrence Rothman, "Kamakaze (ft Amanda Shires)" Here Lies Love/Sawdust To Stardust  (KRO, Sep 25)

- Yawpers, "Words On Shirts" single  (DTTW, 26)

- Valerie June, "Smokestack" Brighter Blue EP  (Concord, Sep 11)  D

- Sir Richard Bishop, "Sweet Lips Spiritual" Hillbilly Erotica  (Drag City, 26)

- Michael Nau, "Bless Your Wheels" Blue Anymore  (relearn to boogie, 26)

- Caleb Nichols, "A Feeling Of a Feeling Of a Feeling" Stone Age Is Now: Poems From Lithic  (Royal Oakie, Oct 2)  D

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MiSSiNG, PRESUMED HAViNG a GOOD TiME

We're afield this week, roaming on-and-off-the-grid, succumbing to distraction at every turn. While we might find a moment of clarity now and then, there's a good chance we won't have the time to honor this week's daily posting commitments. If something does show up, consider it a bonus. Otherwise, watch this space, and we'll see everyone on the other side of this tangle. 

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ROUTES-cast July 26, 2026

ROUTES & BRANCHES

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

July 26, 2026

Scott Foley, purveyor of dust

ROUTES-cast July 26, 2026

^ Orville Peck, "Too Little Too Late" Mule  (Warner, Sep 17)  D

- Charles Wesley Godwin, "Hallelujah High" Christian Name  (Big Loud, 26)

- Chaparelle, "Two Steps Closer" single  (Western Pleasure, 26)  D

- Cody Jinks, "Know It All" In My Blood (Deluxe)  (Late August, 26)  D

- Mac Cornish, "I Fear (It's Becoming Clear)" Wayfaring Woman  (Cornish, Sep 25)

- Mo Pitney, "Happy Hour" Outskirts Of Town  (Curb, Mar 26)  D

- Wilder Blue, "Chasin' the Sun" Cinco  (Hill Country, Aug 28)  D

- Sally Rose, "Trash Heap Mountain Treasure Baby (ft Palmyra)" Feral  (Rose, Nov)  D

- Maya de Vitry, "Adaptation" All My Faith  (Mad Maker, 26)

- Fruition, "I'm Not Afraid" Something More  (Bloodshot, Aug 28)

- Katie Pruitt, "Little Boxes" Fools For the Fleeting  (Rounder, Sep 18)

- John Prine, "World Without Love" Found Dogs  (Oh Boy, Oct 9)  D

- Ray Wylie Hubbard, "Look What the Cat Drug In" Reel 2 Reel 4 Real  (WylieWorld, Aug 21)

- Buddy Miller, "Don't Look Back (ft Dan Penn)" Buddy Miller  (New West, Sep 11)  D

- Son Volt, "Coalfield Wars" single  (Transmit Sound, 26)

- Jayhawks, "American Midnight" Sanctuary Park  (SHAM, Aug 28)

- Brennan Wedl, "Two Dollar Pistol" Brennan Wedl  (Anti, Aug 21)

- Rayland Baxter, "The Fool" single  (ATO, 26)  D

- Stef Chura, "Danny" Dancing Alone On the Concrete  (Saddle Creek, Oct 2)  D

- Nathaniel Rateliff, "Aerosol Ball" Felice County Fair: Celebration Of the Felice Brothers  (Sony, Oct 16)

- Nicole Atkins, "Singing In the Mirror" Drama  (Sun, Sep 17)

- Sera Cahoone, "Not How I Hoped" I've Missed You All These Years  (Sub Pop, Aug 28)

- Ned Collette, "Curious Thing" Mixed Light  (Collette, Aug 28)  D

- Johanna Samuels, "Full Story" Sorry Kid  (Jealous Butcher, Aug 13)

- Sam & Louise Sullivan, "Since I Left" Love & Devotion  (Historic New Jersey, 26)

- Lambchop, "New World Wave" Punching the Clown  (Merge, Aug 21)

- Alex Izenberg, "South California Blues" single  (Mexican Summer, 26)  D

- Alex Dupree, "I Can See Her In Your Eyes" Talking To the Dog  (Scissor Tail, Aug 14)

- Greg Freeman, "Indu" All Set the Bone  (Transgressive, Oct 2)  D

- Wild Pink, "500 Is the New 250" Still Coming Down  (Fire Talk, Aug 21)

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