David Newbould is a lifer. Since kickstarting his career with 2007’s Big Red Sun, he’s made his mark as a heartland roots-rocker, Americana artist, and amplified folksinger, writing songs that chart the ups and downs of an adulthood often spent onstage and on the road. He turns a new page with his fourth full-length studio album, Power Up! (Blackbird Record Label, June 10, 2022) a record whose messages of persistence and unshakeable survival are driven forward by the grease, grit, and guitar-driven swagger of rock & roll. Recorded with producer/collaborator Scot Sax (Wanderlust) during a global pandemic that brought both musicians’ schedules to a halt, Power Up! is an album for the modern moment. These are songs about taking stock of the present, counting one’s blessings, and putting one foot in front of the other. Newbould recorded the tracks in a makeshift basement studio in Sax’s Nashville home, with the two musicians separated by a pane of glass for health’s sake. Sax played drums, bass, and other instruments, while Newbould handled lead guitar and vocal duties. They worked together as a self-contained unit, only reaching out to friends like Newbould’s live band and Americana Music Award-winning violinist Kristin Weber (who contributed to the album’s cover of Crystal Gayle’s “Ready for the Times to Get Better”) for guest appearances. Steadily, Power Up! took shape during six months of quarantined recording sessions. “We both love albums from the 1970s, when artists had total freedom in the studio and were pushing boundaries, experimenting with sounds, and having fun,” says Newbould. “That’s the vibe we achieved with this album, too. It’s a basement rock & roll record. Some guitar solos have mistakes in them, but they have a vibe, too, so we kept them. Some drum tracks were recorded with an iPhone. We didn’t get too precious with it.” “Fidelity is an interesting thing,” he continues. “You want your album to sound sweet, but you can get diminishing returns if you try to get more than what’s there. We were in a garage. We maxed out what we had and it felt just right to me — and honest. There are a million records out there. The only way you can connect with anyone who hears it is by being as you as you can be. We were just doing what we had to do to make an album during a crazy time, between homeschooling our kids, supporting our wives, and keeping ourselves from going crazy.” Newbould isn’t used to sitting still. Born in Toronto, he relocated to New York City as a teenager and logged time in Austin’s fertile music scene before ultimately settling in Nashville. There, he found a community that was every bit as diverse as his own history. Albums like 2013’s Tennessee shone a light on his cross-continental travels and inner journey, too, while 2019’s Sin & Redemption found him fronting an A-list studio band whose members included drummer Brad Pemberton (Steve Earle, Ryan Adams) and rock legend Dan Baird (Georgia Satellites). On Power Up!, Newbould veers from the talking blues of “Home Depot Glasses” (where he pays tribute to one of his longtime influences, John Prine) to the guttural, riff-ready rock of the album’s title track. “’Power Up!’ is partly about an old TV that wouldn’t turn on, and partly about staring down time,” he says. “These days, everything seems to take on the same level of importance.” Meanwhile, “Peeler Park” — named after a riverside greenway close to Newbould’s home — unfolds like an internal dialogue set to a rollicking “Steve Earle meets-Nick Cave’s Grinderman groove,” while the rest of the album also makes room for the politically-tinged fury of “Blood on my Hands,” the atmospheric soundscape of “The Lawn,” and the optimistic, folk-rock sway of “Sunrise Surprise.” The result, he says, is an album that’s “dirtier-sounding than much of what I’ve put out. It feels like a garage to me. There’s not a whole lot of daylight to it.” With a catalog of critically-acclaimed releases, thousands of live performances, and placements in programs like Criminal Minds and Dawson’s Creek, David Newbould has carved his own spot in the roots-rock world. Power Up! finds him leaning into the qualities that set him apart from the pack. It’s a record that wears its homemade origins on its sleeve, while still highlighting the unique sound and carefully-constructed craft that have piloted Newbould’s career for more than a dozen years.

A 1970s-inspired folk-pop songwriter, Suzie Brown responds to the seismic changes of the modern moment with 2022's Some See The Flowers, out May 20th. Written somewhere between her shifts as an Advanced Heart Failure/Heart Transplant cardiologist at Vanderbilt Hospital and her responsibilities as a mother of two, it's a record about resilience, resolve, and maintaining perspective in difficult times. It also finds Brown — an award-winning musician whose songs have earned recognition from the Great American Songwriting Competition, Forbes Magazine, People Magazine, and the long-running television program CBS This Morning — nodding to the soul singers, folk artists, and roots-rockers who came before her. Some See the Flowers finds Brown reuniting with Billy Harvey, who previously produced her 2019 release, Under the Surface. Working together during a series of quarantined recording sessions, the two experimented with new beats, new arrangements, and new narratives from a storyteller who'd previously taken the stage not only as a musician, but also as a featured speaker at medical events like TEDMED. When the dust settled, they'd created Some See the Flowers — a boundary-breaking Americana album that's every bit as diverse as its creator.  "I love everything about you, Suzie — you're wearing a lot of hats, and wearing them all very well," said broadcast journalist Gayle King during an episode of CBS This Morning that showcased Brown's unique balancing act between music, medicine, and motherhood. Some See the Flowers turns that balancing act into music, spotlighting an artist who has spent a decade rolling with the punches, adjusting to the changing times, and writing the ever-evolving soundtrack to her journey.

His dramatic southern sound will draw you in, his voice will have you hanging on every lyric and his songs will stick with you like a good friend does. Boo Ray is a southern troubadour who has forged & honed his sound in South Georgia honky-tonks, Gulf Coast jukes, Nashville nightclubs & Los Angeles songwriter joints. Hailing from the mountains of Western North Carolina and now spending equal parts time in Nashville, Tennessee; Los Angeles, California; and Athens, Georgia; Boo Ray is set to release his fifth album.

With a sound anchored in the roots and grooves of Americana music, Nellen Dryden offers up a mix of past and present with Standstill.  Although recorded in Dryden's adopted hometown of Nashville, TN, Standstill's mix of cosmic country, southern R&B, and roadhouse rock & roll began taking shape in New York City. It was there that Dryden began mixing her childhood influences — including her father's country music favorites — with the jazz, soul, and blues music she'd studied at Sarah Lawrence College.  A modern-minded album about the human condition, Standstill is rooted in sharply-written songs that encourage Dryden's audience to love, listen, and live with compassion. There are references to racism (the socially-conscious "What the Differences Are"), feminism ("She Wants It All"), and the detrimental effects of technology upon real-life interactions ("Come on Honey"), with Dryden's lyrics focusing not only upon the songwriter herself, but upon the world around her. Set to a soundtrack of grooves, guitars, and Stax-worthy keyboards, Standstill is something rare in the Americana world: an album that's both danceable and lyrically-provoking. It's music that targets the heart, head, and feet. Music with movement and a message.  It's also a testament to Nellen Dryden's strength as a live performer. Standstill was recorded straight to tape in East Nashville, without click tracks or studio trickery. The band performed together, capturing each song in a series of live takes, with Jules Belmont serving as Dryden's multi-instrumentalist. Also steering the helm was producer Josh Hahn, who'd previously worked with Dryden on her earliest recordings in New York City. Rounding out the studio crew were drummer Jon Truman, bassist Jonathan Beam, keyboardist Jimmy Matt Rowland, and acoustic guitarist and singer Cy Winstanley, the latter of whom can be heard trading harmonies with Dryden on the album's final track, "Cowboy and a Comforter."   The group tracked each song on an RCA analog console from the 1950s, playing together in real time, capturing everything — including Dryden's vocals — at once. The old-school approach suited the songs' natural charm. Warm, gritty, and clutter-free, Standstill nods to the way records used to sound, long before this kind of rootsy, southern-leaning music was ever called "Americana."   The album's title even nods to that simpler era — a time when people could live at a slower pace, without the noise of the modern world pushing them along — while also referencing contemporary events. Recorded during the summer solstice, while the sun seemingly stood still during its long, slow trip across the June sky, Standstill now makes its debut in 2020, a year in which disease and racial injustices have brought the globe to its own standstill. There's never been a better time for universally-minded songs like these, shot through with socially-progressive lyrics and honest, human emotion.   Influenced by Lucinda Williams' phrasing, Erykah Badu's rhythmic emphasis, Bonnie Raitt's bluesy belt, and Patti Griffin's melodies, Nellen Dryden isn't just standing still with her debut record. She's standing tall, too.