RECENT ARTICLES

There’s a feeling that in order to achieve something—anything—you need to be inspired first. As if some divine light will find your brain and plant the seed of something great that you only need to act on. This of course is silly. One can wait around for a lifetime for such inspiration. A better way, then, is to begin something—anything—and then see if, while already moving, a bit of inspiration finds you to further fuel your push.

Texas-based artist Chrystabell knows this well. She waits around for nothing. Instead, she’s always moving, working, flying to some foreign land to return with more in hand. She creates her own inspiration rooted in what she finds stellar. It’s an alchemy all her own but one she’s always willing to share. She does so on her forthcoming album, Midnight Star, which is set to drop on Friday (January 21), and in her latest music video for “Silent Scream,” which American Songwriter is premiering today.

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British songwriter and performer, Miles Kane, embodies the idea that artists are indeed the sum of all their influences. And Kane’s influences are many. Growing up, the skilled musician was initiated to music from his family—his mother, in particular. He remembers Motown and the Beatles at family gatherings. Kane was born in Birkenhead, England, which is across the river from Liverpool (hence the Mop Tops). Around 12 years old, Kane found the guitar; namely, his cousin’s three-quarter-body Spanish style. He became obsessed, he says.

Soon, he got his own, along with the chord book for Oasis’ (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? With each passing day, Kane absorbed more and more music, especially from his cousins, who would go on to form the popular U.K. band The Coral. And at 18, Kane began to collaborate with famed British rocker Alex Turner of The Arctic Monkeys. Now, all of these elements both comprise and feature expertly on Kane’s newest LP, Change The Show, which is out Friday (January 21).

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There’s an old saying: you can’t go home again. The idea is that once you leave home, there is no real way to return because too much time has passed, too much has changed. You’re not the same person you were when you left. But the 70-year-old blues artist Keb’ Mo’ is living proof that sayings, like rules, are made to be broken. Mo’ was born in Los Angeles, and later in his life moved to Nashville, where he’s enjoyed a residence with his wife now for about a dozen years. But during the COVID-19 pandemic, a lot changed for the artist, both internally and externally. He’s reconsidered what’s most important, down to the very idea of what home is or can be. These changes and the perspectives they brought helped Mo’ to create his latest LP, Good To Be, which is set for release Friday (January 21).

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Mexican-born singer-songwriter Silvana Estrada believes in magic. And why wouldn’t she? Nearly every time she opens her mouth, she sees its spells come to fruition. But the type of magic Estrada subscribes to is not some bag of parlor tricks dependent upon new-age gadgets and slick mirrors. No, the kind she appreciates is timeless, unfettered by anything but itself. It’s the kind of incantation that can bring someone to recall a time and place they never knew they’d longed for. It’s the kind that can summon tears from previously stoic eyes. It’s the kind that moves you, to your core. And it’s sewn deeply into Estrada’s new forthcoming album, Marchita, set for release Friday (January 21).

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Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready has known Seattle-based musician Danny Newcomb since they were both five years old. McCready has played music with Newcomb since they were 11. In fact, he says, Newcomb is one of the main reasons he picked up a guitar, to begin with. Newcomb was the first on the block to get a six-string when the two were kids and as a result, McCready says, he wanted one, too.

One wonders if the history of rock music would be entirely different had Newcomb not been there from the beginning. And it’s memories like these that make McCready smile today because the band he and Newcomb started in 1999, The Rockfords, is finally getting its due shine and release date. Some 22 years after McCready, Newcomb and the band recorded their self-titled debut, it’s now set for release with a debut single, “Silver Lining,” out today (January 14).

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Sometimes it’s the unplanned moments that can change the course of a life, a globe, or a song. Whether considering the onset of a pandemic or letting yourself discover new notes in real-time, letting go to let something unknown in can be as important a skill as knowing the pentatonic scale. It can also be earth-shattering. For the Colorado-based band, the Lumineers, that was certainly the case with the creation of their newest LP, BRIGHTSIDE, which is set for release on Friday (January 14).

The new record began in the studio with songs unfinished, which was a new approach for the band, which formed in Denver in 2005. But the fresh approach, the openness to the faith that the songs would soon feel complete aided their production. It’s odd how this works. How something different can lead to renewed satisfaction. Yet, it’s often the topsy-turvy recipe to sonic transcendence.

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For Chris Dowd, songwriter and keys player for the genre-defying musical group Fishbone, a band is like an artistic movement. Like a painter who unveils a new style that legions imitate (read: Picasso and Cubism), a band can usher in a new sound that changes the proverbial angle upon which the world’s axis spins. And the founding six members of Fishbone, which began formally in L.A. in 1979, got to see how their music influenced myriad bands to come after them, despite some of those bands earning more financial success.

Yet, the movement was felt and it’s still being felt. Just weeks ago, Fishbone played a series of shows from Portland to Seattle that caused fans to line up around street corners for the doors to open. But for those who know the band and its history, the soaring highs and the harsh lows are all part of the journey for Fishbone. Still, though, the band keeps moving. Pushing boundaries. Breaking conventions. And now there are rumors of possible new music for fans in 2022.

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No one was going to outwork Brandy Clark. As a young person, up into the collegiate years, that meant no one was going to out-hustle Clark on the hardwood basketball court. A shooting guard, she had deep range. She was a skilled long-distance bomber before that became en vogue thanks to the likes of Sue Bird and Steph Curry. Clark learned an ethic for hard work at an early age. Both of her parents were hard workers, her father especially. He was an endurance athlete and the push to keep going, to keep up the effort of any kind was prized.

Clark internalized it, dribbling and shooting a Spalding. And kept it when her efforts took a left turn into the world of music and songwriting. Now, a longtime resident of Music City in Nashville, Clark’s star is rising. She is heralded as one of the greatest at her craft and she keeps getting better. As evidenced by her 2020 LP, Your Life is a Record, and its 2021 deluxe release, which has earned Clark her latest Grammy nomination for Best American Roots Performance for her bonus track duet with Brandi Carlile, “Same Devil.”

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