ROUTES & BRANCHES
featuring the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music
January 21, 2024
Scott Foley, purveyor of dust
I'm not great at genre lines. I stumbled into radio one Summer by agreeing to cover for a friend's Saturday afternoon folk program. A couple weeks into my stint, I received a call from a listener wondering whatever happened to the folk music show that used to be broadcast during this time. Same thing happened when I agreed to sub-host a bluegrass broadcast, and my great tradition of missing the mark continued as I developed my own Routes & Branches "americana" show. Why wasn't I playing americana music? Where was the Guy Clark?!!
Show me where the lines are and we'll cross them. While it's apparently still very possible to create a folk music playlist full of earnest acoustic ditties and whatever remains of the 90s and 00s singer-songwriter epidemic, the folk that draws our attention at R&B HQ is vastly wider ranging, edgier and more creative than its reputation might have one believe. Urban as opposed to rural, possibly electric as opposed to acoustic, more experimental than predictably trad, THAT is the folk music we follow.
Which raises the point of Brown Horse and their debut collection, Reservoir. The record's title track serves as a suitable orientation: Rowan Braham's accordion lowing beneath a fingerpicked acoustic and a divebombing electric guitar. Vocalist/guitarist Patrick Turner's keening, unsteady voice delivers the songs unspooling lyrics so that few lines are intelligible. When woven together, "Reservoir" haunts beautifully, like little we've heard before.
Brown Horse hail from the unlikely environs of Norfolk, a largely rural outpost in the east of England. Starting out as a four-piece band in 2018, they have grown to a sextet for their debut full-length, most of the members contributing to a collective approach to writing, even if it's Turner's enigmatic voice that we hear on songs like "Stealing Horses". Citing Jimmie Rodgers' "Muleskinner Blues", we hear Emma Tovelll's buzzsaw lap steel circling a strummed electric guitar and Braham's essential accordion, the whole a wonderfully thick hum, especially as guitar threatens to overshadow the proceedings. "Bloodstain" launches from that Crazy Horse-inspired squall, Turner's voice layered with singer-songwriter Phoebe Troup to lovely effect: Call it distraction / Call it despair / No matter what you call it / You can feel it when it's there.
As heard on "Outtakes", the outfit maintain an appealing looseness to the Reservoir sessions, even in the midst of their sonic cloud. The song rambles ahead, Turner beckoning: Come a little further in the door. On another side of the spectrum, Brown Horse can be equally alluring when they dial back the noise. Sometimes silence rings like a bell, they sing on "Sunfisher", featuring a rare fiddle to complement the accordion. The measured "Everlasting" progresses on a bluesy piano. Most impactfully, "Paul Gilley" pays shimmering tribute to the legendary, short-lived lyricist: If Paul Gilley wrote the words to the saddest song that Elvis ever heard / Maybe he could work something from the feeling that I've got.
On "Silver Bullet", Patrick Turner confesses: I've had one true feeling in about a thousand years. Elsewhere, Brown Horse have called themselves alt country nobodies. There is a melancholy spirit that pervades Reservoir, a downcast, moon-shadowed mood that might recall Jason Molina. It dovetails with a first-project humility that lends a rare magic to the sessions. Lines might be drawn to other entrancing classics such as Cowboy Junkies' Trinity Sessions or Tonight At the Arizona from the Felice Brothers.
... or maybe it's NOT folk music. There's a chance that we just don't get it, that we're calling apples oranges here. Which is why acts like Brown Horse fit so well beneath our umbrella: the very best of americana, alt.country and roots music. Our decision years ago to loosen the hazy parameters of R&B were only to set the stage for music like Reservoir. Call it what you will, Brown Horse's debut is one of the brightest records we've heard during this early year.
The march toward declaring March 22 a national music holiday continues apace on A Routes & Branches Guide To Feeding Your Monster, our peerless release calendar. With Big Thief, Adrianne Lenker released our favorite record for 2022. She has announced a solo collection to appear on March 22, Bright Future (4AD). On the verge of superstardom, Sierra Ferrell has set that same crowded day for her next full-length. Trail Of Flowers will hit shelves courtesy of the Rounder label. With the Bloodshot label back in business, Scott H Biram is ready for his next project. Expect The One & Only only a week later, on March 29. After an absence of five years, we're pleased to announce the next record from the Pernice Brothers. New West plans an April 5 debut for Who Will You Believe. Finally, Yola will be blurring genre lines on her forthcoming EP. My Way lands on May 24.
- Pernice Brothers, "Who Will You Believe" Who Will You Believe (New West, Apr 5) D
- Buffalo Tom, "Helmet" Jump Rope (Scrawny, May 24) D
- Gold Star, "Wild Boys" single (Like Ltd, 24) D
^ Brown Horse, "Paul Gilley" Reservoir (Loose, 24)
- Fust, "Rolling Prairie" Songs of the Rail: Early Demos (Dear Life, 24)
- Magic Tuber Stringband, "Days Of Longing" Needlefall (Thrill Jockey, Mar 22) D
- Son of the Velvet Rat, "Rosary (ft Jolie Holland)" Ghost Ranch (Fluff & Gravy, Mar 22)
- Glass Hours, "Same Old You" Glass Hours (Cornelius Chapel, Mar 1)
- Old Heavy Hands, "When the Lights Go Out" Small Fires (Spitting Daggers, 24)
- Scott H Biram, "Easy Rider" The One & Only (Bloodshot, Mar 29) D
- Khruangbin, "A Love International" A La Sala (Dead Oceans, Apr 5) D
- Cedric Burnside, "Hill Country Love" Hill Country Love (Mascot, Apr 5) D
- Marcus King, "Fuck My Life Up Again" single (Republic, 24) D
- Sam Evian, "Wild Days" Plunge (Flying Cloud, Mar 22) D
- Bridget Kearney, "Security Camera" Comeback Kid (Keeled Scales, Apr 12) D
- Madi Diaz, "Everything Almost" Weird Faith (Anti, Feb 9)
- Lizzie No, "Heartbreak Store" Halfsies (Miss Freedomland, 24) D
- Stephie James, "Company" As Night Fades (James, Mar 1) D
- Sierra Ferrell, "Dollar Bill Bar" Trail Of Flowers (Rounder, Mar 22) D
- Sophie Gault, "Fixin' Things" Baltic Street Hotel (Petaluma, Apr 12)
- Shane Smith & the Saints, "All the Way" Norther (Geronimo West, Mar 1)
- Blackberry Smoke, "Azalea" Be Right Here (3 Legged, Feb 16)
- Will Hoge, "End Of the World" Tenderhearted Boys (Edlo, Apr 12) D
- Chatham County Line, "Way Down Yonder" Hiyo (Yep Roc, Jan 26)
- Doug Paisley, "Take the Stars Out Of the Sky" Sad Old World (Paisley, 24)
- Leslie Stevens, "Blue Roses" Leslie Stevens (Stevens, Feb 23) D
- Marika Hackman, "No Caffeine" Big Sigh (Chrysalis, 24) D
- Adrianne Lenker, "Sadness As a Gift" Bright Future (4AD, Mar 22) D
- Shovels & Rope, "Gotta Get Out of Here" Let's Go Dancing: Said the Firefly To the Hurricane (Tasty Goody, 24)
- Shakey Graves & Jess Williamson, "True Love Will Find You In the End" Texas Wild (LCRA, 23)
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