Tobacco City is a Chicago-based band that blends cosmic country with a mix of psychedelic rock and honky-tonk soul. Their sound captures the essence of small-town nostalgia while embracing modern-day themes, exploring heartache, longing, and the bittersweet nature of life. With their uplifting energy and authentic songwriting, Tobacco City continues to carve out a unique space in the country-tinged
Americana scene.

On Horses, the highly anticipated follow-up to their critically acclaimed debut, Tobacco City, USA, the band takes listeners on a nostalgic journey through the haze of youth, where time feels suspended and plans are nonexistent. The album’s lyrics conjure vivid images of small-town life—smoking schwag behind the grocery store, drinking cream from a gas station with your first love—capturing that carefree, uncertain time when the future felt distant. The music channels the spirit of '70s country with influences from legends like Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris, bringing a timeless, uplifting energy to each track. At the same time, the lyrics intersect with modern-day themes, blending the beauty and innocence of youth with the harsh realities of life. Horses feels like a contemporary take on classic country, merging a nostalgic past with the complex world of today, all while remaining undeniably authentic and heartfelt. This follow-up to Tobacco City, USA—which received high praise from NPR and Rolling Stone—cements the band's place at the forefront of a new wave of country-tinged Americana.

Fry up some Punk and Southern Rock'n'Roll, smother it in a healthy ladel of Stoner Rock, and pepper in the wry Country sarcasm that can only be found in the dimmest, smokiest highway honky tonks, and the resulting truckstop delicacy might look and taste just like Smoker Dad. Simultaneously as warm and familiar as your favorite six-pack of cheap beer and as edgy and powerful as a 70s Trans Am with all the bells and whistles, Seattle's Smoker Dad harkens to simpler days, while flooring it into the heart of the 21st Century. You gotta see 'em to believe 'em, and even then you might not buy a word they say... but you're gonna love 'em anyway!

On Laith’s debut record, ‘Lightning’, he carries us across state lines from LA to Arizona, Colorado to Espanola, Houston to New Orleans, Utah on to the Great Northwest, where he currently lays his head, dreaming of running these roads until the wheels don’t touch the ground. And his writing does just that. It burns along the asphalt until there’s none left. And that’s when Laith takes us beyond, on phantom track lines through the abstract geography of his mind. He flows seamlessly between railway signs and lost trains of thought. Like a true American surrealist.

Give me highways
Give me road signs
Peace of mind at a stop light
Where I noticed if I had to let you go
Then this road would never end
It’d just go onward into the abyss of a great life unknown
(from “Gentle”)

‘Lightning’ was recorded in two pieces over about 6 months in Portland, Oregon. Laith worked closely with Kevin Christopher, who engineered and mixed using three different studio spaces to create something loose and alive, but also deeply focused and highly intricate. The bulk of the album was made at Ruby Machine, a studio Kevin helped build, and the remainder was done at Trash Treasury and Heavy Meadow Sound.

The first sessions began with a highly experimental approach, in which Laith would write the song in the studio while recording. These sessions included Casey Klep Matson, Kevin Christopher, and Cooper Trail. This collaboration became the basis for Laith’s current backing band - The Texas Birds.

The later sessions began with finished material arranged song-by-song utilizing the aforementioned trio, as well as, a loose circle of wildly talented neighbors - Merle Law, Erik Clampitt, Jeff Munger, Carolina Chauffe, Sam Wenc, and Anna Jeter.

The result is a 12-track traveling companion for the wild-eyed western mystic drifting along the winding highway, pulling off for all the old haunts - love, money, and hysteria. It’s outsider country rooted in the Texas songwriting tradition; buzzing with the subtle hum of northwestern psychedelia. And with a voice that literally sounds like smokestacks and lightning, Laith takes the listener from bar room to bedroom and back again, cruising along the vibrant soundscapes of The Texas Birds. It’s a timeless sound laden with thundering pianos and padded with Rhodes and organ; dusty acoustic guitars and ghostly harmonies fade in and out of the ether; the spirited twang of the electric guitar and the raw wah thump of the clavinet squabble in the dark while the pedal steel takes to the sky; all held within the deep pocket of a dynamic rhythm section.

I’m from the city of smokestacks and lightning
(from “No One’s Ever Gonna Put You Away”)

This album is alive with hunger and humility, madness and mourning, love and loss, and the eternal coming-and-going of all things. A map dotted with lightning strikes. Marked with these moments of crystalized awakening and reflection. The songs carry you through a gentle landscape punctuated by this raw phenomena. A little bit lucky. A little bit lethal. Like mainlining magic with the voice of God. And, then moving on…

Lord knows, I’ve been broken & doused
Lightning, the only time I feel him
Lightning, lightning just shining in
(from “Ghost”)