Founder and mainstay Andrew Grimm is responsible for the eleven songs that grace the band’s impressive new album, How We See It Now, putting emphasis on a cool caress and a decidedly soothing sensibility. Comparisons to Old 97s morphed with The Jayhawks and the Gin Blossoms also come to mind, especially given the depth and devotion that Grimm and company share in each of these songs.
Nostalgic country-roots singer Katie Jo has an approach sharp & delightful on her debut. Sings of topics few country singers dare. Has a young voice but a lived-in voice. Lots of authority. The 9-cut Pawnshop Queen (Big Ego Records) came on April 9th. Think Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, Tammy Wynette & Kitty Wells. When Katie sings in her less twangy voice (title track) she’s an edgy original. Easily a voice for road songs, & saloon tales.
Katie Jo’s new debut record, Pawn Shop Queen, is deeply in tune with country music of a bygone era, adorned with pedal steel guitar and the singer’s authoritative and authentic voice. In some ways, it harkens to the country music that came out of Los Angeles in the early ’70s via bands such as The Flying Burrito Brothers or as heard on early albums from Jackson Browne and the Eagles.
But there’s something that goes even further back, into the music’s rural roots. The lyrics are untouched by trappings of contemporary life: There are no references to heartbreak delivered via text message or old flames reignited thanks to the wonders of social media. Instead, the songs emanate from the most timeless of places: the heart.
Joined by an impressive cast of musicians, Katie Jo has delivered a debut album that connects on a deeply human level and leaves the listener spinning their own ideas about the threads that connect the material on Pawn Shop Queen as they return for multiple listens.
This is the title track from Katie Jo’s new album – and it is glorious. Some songs are so perfect you can’t help but wonder how they happened. Luckily in this case we know, the album was recorded in three days using a band assembled by producer Chris Schlarb at Big Ego Studios in Long Beach. READ MORE…
Alexandra Riorden’s debut LP Angel City Radio is an abstract chronicle of the tumultuous healing process one endures after experiencing trauma, wrapped in a smoke-scented velvet curtain of shimmering indie-rock. Over the course of the album, Riorden explores the complexities of healing through independent but loosely connected vignettes. READ MORE…
June Star – “I Don’t Wanna Know”
“Human beings are messy emotional creatures,” says June Star’s Andrew Grimm. “Sometimes when we struggle to communicate in relationships it’s because there’s the voice we speak with and that voice in our head. ‘I Don’t Wanna Know’ bounces between a professed love to another person and a confessed loneliness on the inside.”
LISTEN ON THE BGS RADIO HOUR HERE