Click on each cover pic to watch a video or hear an audio cut.
Candice Ivory
New Southern Vintage
The Memphis native has been a professional singer since age 14 when she started making a name for herself in the Beale Street Scene. She’s never strayed too far from her roots, though this album is more definitively a blues record. “And because blues is an ancient-to-the-future music—vintage and new—I invited a number of brilliant younger artists to join me on New Southern Vintage…There are also some special international guests who hail from around the globe and nonetheless fit right into the Southern sounds of New Southern Vintage, showing that no matter how far we travel down the blues highway, we can always go back home to the land where the blues began.”
Willie Nelson
Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle
Well, these days, at 92 years old, Willie is putting out a new album almost as often as we’re putting out magazine issues. But of course we’re proud to keep boosting the signal. His 155th(!) album pays tribute with eleven of Willie’s favorite Merle Haggard songs, including “Silver Wings,” “Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down,” “Okie from Muskogee,” and of course “Workin’ Man Blues.” Produced by Mickey Raphael, the album was recorded at Nelson’s Pedernales Studios near Austin and features the final recordings with his sister Bobbie Nelson and longtime drummer Paul English.
Jeb Loy Nichols
This House Is Empty Without You
This singer/songwriter/artist/writer originally hails from Wyoming, and these days prefers life out in the Welsh countryside (yes, as in Wales). He’s dabbled in other genres along the way, now settling into mellow-groovin’ old-school Southern soul. Backed by the Timmion Records house band Cold Diamond & Mink, these ten tracks are at once new and timeless, sweet and soulful, and so smooth as to almost seem effortless. “A masterclass in understated soul, This House is Empty Without You proves that Jeb Loy Nichols isn’t just still here—he’s still growing, glowing, and finding new ways to tell the truth.”
–Timmion Records
The Red Clay Strays
“People Hatin’”
“Born in the red dirt clay of Mobile, Alabama,” as they like to say, these guys have been tearing up the festival circuit with their infectious sound straddling Americana, classic country, and Southern rock. This new single, from a forthcoming album, is an instant anthem calling out hatred. “We got so sick of people putting politics over humanity that we had actually wrote a song about it in April in the studio…We weren’t going to put it out as a single at first. But after the Charlie Kirk thing, we got together and we were like, ‘I think we need to put ‘People Hatin’ out instead for the first single.’ Because we’ve got to stop killing each other over beliefs and stop hating each other over beliefs.” That message and the righteous Southern boogie groove make this one hell of a step in the right direction.
Roberta Faceplant
“Brisket & Cigarettes”
The name and song title already had me grinning before I even clicked Play, but this fun Outlaw Americana band out of Philly brings serious chops to this hilarious, twangy rocker about a brisket outing gone all wrong, complete with barhopping, a police chase, and a lost pet lizard. It’s truly a shame there’s not an epic story video for this. “You don’t get fed in the slow lane, no, baby, you gotta keep up, hit one honky tonk, move on to another, we ain’t ever givin’ it up…” The live footage from their EP release keeps the fun going even longer.
Texas Headhunters
Texas Headhunters
Jesse Dayton’s Hardcharger Records just about has a regular spot in this section, but that’s because they keep delivering the rockin’ real-deal goods. From the website: “Ian Moore, Johnny Moeller, and Jesse Dayton—three of Texas’ fiercest fretmen—join forces at last as Texas Headhunters, a band born from deep roots, old friendships, and a shared reverence for the raw, swaggering spirit of Texas blues. Their self-titled debut isn’t a nostalgia trip. It’s a declaration. Cut over five days at Willie Nelson’s Pedernales Studio, Texas Headhunters deals twelve tracks of grit, groove, and gut-level truth.”