June was a ridiculously busy month in the greater Best Country Music universe, and not every worthy record released could fit into the column below. So here’s a quick shout out to Katsy Pline’s spaced-out country covers, the bright-eyed bluegrass of The Barrel Boys, Ella Hanshaw’s early 20th-century gospel-folk, the easygoing honky-tonk of Rollo White, S.G. Goodman’s slow-burning Americana, Joseph Allred’s acoustic guitar excursions, James McMurtry’s enduring roots rock and the archetypal Western swing of Hot Club Of Cowtown. Below, you’ll find more of the bounty, including bluegrass, cosmic gospel music, a fictional country hit-maker, and a gourd banjo player. Enjoy!
When we last encountered Kelsey Waldon, she was putting her own spin on classic bluegrass and old-time music. But she signed to John Prine’s Oh Boy Records back in 2019 on the strength of her own songs, and her new album Every Ghost is a rock-solid reminder of just how good she can be when she’s singing from the heart. Waldon makes no-frills country music out of its basic building blocks—fiddle, pedal steel guitar, hard times, and healing—but she does so with a deep-seated authenticity and understanding of the genre that’ll have you hanging on every note.
On the Bandcamp page for this album, you’ll find the words “Graves is:” followed by a list of 14 names, but none of those names are Gary Owens, Jr. So, who is Gary Owens, Jr.? Great question, and I don’t have a solid answer, but I suspect it’s an alter ego of sorts for Greg Olin, the primary songwriter behind Graves. For many years, Olin has made excellent lo-fi indie rock akin to, say, Jeff Tweedy’s demos. On Super Hits Volume 3, he and his pals jump feet first into mellow classic country, á la Merle Haggard or Roger Miller. Those are big names, but then again, maybe Gary Owens, Jr. is a big name, too.
Andrew Marlin and Emily Frantz changed their band’s name from Mandolin Orange to Watchhouse in 2021, but their sound has been remarkably consistent for more than a decade. Marlin writes the songs, plays a bunch of acoustic instruments, and sings lead most of the time. Frantz plays a bunch of acoustic instruments and provides beautiful harmonies and backing vocals. Together, they make bluegrass-rooted folk music that unfolds slowly and glows softly from within.
Josiah Flores’s second full-length album was recorded on ½-inch 8-track tape at the analog Speakeasy Studios in San Francisco, and it sounds incredible. Listen to Doin’ Fine on good headphones and you’ll feel like Flores—a Chicano singer-songwriter and part-time poet from the Bay Area—is playing from inside your skull. His tunes stand up to close listening, too; these are classic country-folk numbers about life, love, leaving, and learning along the way.
Y’all know that we here at Best Country Music on Bandcamp love us a good banjo record, whether it’s full of instrumental meditations, tender old-time music, or airy mountain jams. Add to that list this collection of sublime sounds played on a gourd banjo by Baltimore-based folk music mover and shaker Brad Kolodner. On Old Growth, he picks one thing and does it perfectly: conjuring warm, earthy, comforting tunes using only his fingers, his mind, a gourd banjo, and a bit of Charm City charm.
. 00:10 / 00:58 After releasing a very promising EP last year, Moe Reen is back with a full-length that decisively delivers on that promise. The Ohio singer-songwriter has a big following on TikTok thanks to their distinctive covers of old Patsy Cline and Johnny Mathis songs, but Scribbled Lines is filled with original tunes about love and loss, the distance between the two, and the longing that fills that space. Moe Reen is blessed with a classic crooner’s voice that’s perfect for singing about those topics. Here, they show that they can write evocatively about them as well.
The fertile music scene in Western North Carolina just keeps on giving. This time, it’s Drunken Prayer, the “cosmic gospel” project of songwriter Morgan Geer and Drive-By Truckers bassist Matt Patton. On Thy Burdens, they endeavor to draw out the universal truths in old hymns and traditional songs by recording them as “snarling country-soul” rave-ups and get-downs. The result is a record about life and death, right and wrong, sin and redemption, and the pursuit of an answer to the age-old question: Can you get into heaven by rocking the hell out? Don’t let the song titles scare you, non-believers—this is Southern-gospel-blues-rock ‘n’ roll done right.
Let’s just come right out and say it: Jesse Daniel is one of the best honky-tonkers out there honky-tonkin’; his last album appeared in this column just a year ago. Now he’s back with Son Of The San Lorenzo, a set of songs that trace Daniel’s journey through the ups, downs, and rock-bottoms of his upbringing on California’s Central Coast. That’s where he absorbed country music from nearby Bakersfield and classic rock from the radio, and it’s what made him who he is today.
If you haven’t yet heard New York’s The Nude Party and their Stones-y rock ‘n’ soul, you should rectify that today. But first, check out Last Cowboy On The Prairie, the debut solo album from the band’s frontman, Patton Magee. It’s a sprawling set of 15 songs that bounce around the American music landscape, from hippie-fied honky-tonk, cowboy ballads, and Southern boogie to slinky rock ‘n’ roll, alt-country, and Southwestern twang-noir. It takes a special combo of versatility and swagger to pull off a project like this. Turns out Magee is just the guy to do it.
If I’m counting correctly, I’ve written about Willi Carlisle’s music four different times in this column. Here’s the fifth. If this seems like overkill—well, it’s not. Carlisle keeps popping up here because he’s one of the best folk singers, songwriters, and live performers in the game at the moment, and Winged Victory is another set of well-chosen and well-played songs that are thoughtful, sad, joyful, and inspiring, often all at once.
