If the best revenge is living well, the best response to the bacchanalia of misguided musical choices and unrepentant celebrity worship that was last night's CMT Music Awards is... well, ignoring it as best we can and focusing instead on the good stuff. You know, the stuff that makes us want to associate ourselves with this genre of music rather than qualify every discussion of musical preference with "I like country, but not X." (The letter X is here meant to stand in for "Jason Aldean … [Read more...]

If you didn't find any new music to love last month, that's entirely your own fault: April will undoubtedly go down as one of the best release months in all of 2011, with fresh tunes from Alison Krauss, Steve Earle, Emmylou Harris, Jason Isbell, Foster & Lloyd, Del McCoury, Diana Jones, and more. Here's your quick-and-dirty guide to some of our favorites. As usual, some of the more obscure tracks date back a bit further. Believe it or not, we're fairly busy people and can't always be online … [Read more...]

This is already a couple weeks late, so I'll keep my comments brief so as not to delay it any further. Here are Country California's favorite tracks (mostly) appearing on new albums released in March. Josh Kelley - "Baby Blue Eyes" from Georgia Clay Not the best song on Kelley's country debut (that's "Naleigh Moon"), but probably the best showcase of his falsetto. Who doesn't enjoy a good falsetto? Charley Pride - "Maybe Love Will Save the Day" from Choices All these decades later, … [Read more...]

We're back with some of the best tracks of February, all but one of which appeared on new albums released within the month. Ya Ain't Crazy Henny Penny dates back to last year, but it's Canadian, so taking into account the exchange rate... Here are the best songs of February 2011. Carrie Rodriguez and Ben Kyle - "Unwed Fathers" from We Still Love Our Country Everyone from Dry Branch Fire Squad to Tammy Wynette has covered it, but I think Ben Kyle's sensitive reading (with Rodriguez's … [Read more...]

This is the debut of a new series designed to spotlight some of the best tracks released in a given calendar month. The focus will generally be non-singles on new albums released within the month, but I reserve the right to include singles or any newish indie stuff that I discovered within the month and think you might not have heard about yet. I'm giving myself a little extra leeway with the indie albums because they don't get the same promotional push on release day, so they're harder to … [Read more...]

You'll have to forgive me one last bit of 2010 wrap-up. As I compiled my year-end lists for The 9513 and the Nashville Scene, I promised myself I'd do a separate 'underloved' list to sweep up some of the ones that got left behind - albums I couldn't honestly rank in my Top 10 because of the stiff competition, but that I felt tempted to include anyway to make a point about their unjustly overlooked quality. I think this deal struck with myself resulted in a more honest overall list, free of … [Read more...]

As you look back on the year in country music these next couple months, don't overlook soundtracks. By my count, there have been three worthy country-centric soundtracks released this year, spanning outlaw, bluegrass, and pop-country styles. Here's a bit about each, including essential tracks if you want to cherry-pick: Crazy Heart (January 19) If you know about only one of these soundtracks, this is the one. Jeff Bridges' turn as Bad Blake won him his first Academy Award for Best Actor, … [Read more...]