Artist:Taylor Ashton (Featuring Rachael Price) Hometown: Vancouver, Canada & Brooklyn, New York Song: “Alex” Album:Romanticize EP Release Date: February 5, 2021 Label: Signature Sounds
In Their Words: “’Alex’ is a duet between two people living in a house with a bunch of other housemates and a thriving backyard garden. They’re both named Alex and they haven’t admitted their feelings for each other yet, and I don’t know if they ever will. These characters came to me in a dream, although I recognize in them aspects of myself and people from my past, and I imagine their house as some combination of all the ones I’ve lived in or stayed at over the years. Each time I imagine them, things change: they age forwards and backwards, their gender identities shift, and their reasons for keeping their feelings secret change.
“It’s a treat to sing this with the great Rachael Price, who I happen to be married to — we are roommates in a sense, but we definitely don’t have the same name and our feelings for each other are not a secret.” — Taylor Ashton
Lockdown has stolen headlines from a lot of great musical releases in 2020. One such release that maybe didn’t get its due is Folk n’ Roll Vol. 1: Tales of Isolation, an album by Kenya-born singer Ondara. Released in May, Folk n’ Roll is a spectral snapshot of the hard times that we all have felt during the global coronavirus pandemic. Ondara (formerly J.S. Ondara) uses his pure vocal tone and raw guitar-playing to communicate the incredible emotions that he and others have felt in a time of separation and uncertainty, with songs like “Pulled Out of the Market,” “From Six Feet Away,” and the tune featured in this video, “Isolation Blues.”
The steady, pulsating drive of the acoustic guitar lays a foundation for Ondara’s ghostly voice to fly over and cut right to the uneasiness that has become familiar to so many in 2020. The video depicts confusion and anxiety in a very relatable way. The first release since his debut, Tales of America, Ondara was quick to write, record, and release the album, making it a true window into the human experience in the early stages of a global pandemic. To reflect on what we’ve come through and to hear our shared human experience manifested into song, watch the video for “Isolation Blues” below.
After an extended break due to burnout and depression, Canadian singer-songwriter Kathleen Edwards at last returned in 2020 with a long-awaited collection of new material, Total Freedom. Her first release since 2012, it’s an effortless return to her usual pace, with songs that remind listeners of her many peak moments since her 2003 debut, Failer. Edwards began a “working sabbatical” in 2014, during which she rediscovered old passions and kindled new creative flames. In a trailer for the album she explains, “Total freedom is having a dog. Total freedom is liking coffee and then opening a coffee shop. Total freedom is getting older. Total freedom is not worrying about what’s happening tomorrow.”
These various concepts helped Edwards reapproach music with a fresh perspective and an eager spirit, not to mention that the songs coming out of those creative detours are of the highest order. In November, she offered a concert film (shot in 2018) titled Live at Massey Hall, capping a comeback of critical acclaim from Rolling Stone and NPR. Total Freedom also led Edwards and her band to CBS Saturday Sessions. Enjoy their performance of “Options Open.”
As sisters, our deepest musical influences come from the shared “Crock-Pot” of our household. Our mom is a classical singer and choral director, and daughter of an eccentric music-savant with an encyclopedic knowledge of Gilbert and Sullivan. Our Amish-born dad was raised in the shape note choral tradition, but flew the coop and became a guitar-plucking singer-songwriter in the vein of Paul Simon and Dan Fogelberg. We were raised on music with an emphasis on voice — Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Ella Fitzgerald and loads of art songs and choral music from all over the world.
We began playing together as a cover band, dipping into our teen favorites, from TLC to the Andrews Sisters, Sparks to ’90’s boy bands. Now that we’re writing our own music we’re pulling from an even broader scope, from the Brazilian and West African percussion Rachel studied in college to Amelia’s obsession with ’80s French pop to Rosie’s deep love of classic rock radio hits.
This playlist is a sampling of vocal-centric artists that straddle the line between various types of pop and folk music that are either currently playing on our speakers, or artists whose DNA flows through the music we make. — Call Me Spinster
Pinc Louds – “Soul in My Body”
I stumbled across this band only recently and am obsessed. The power and vulnerability of Claudi’s voice is mesmerizing, and I love their use of raw percussive sounds like the kalimba, held together with synthy glue. – Amelia
DakhaBrakha – “Baby”
DakhaBrakha formed as an avant-garde theater phenomenon in Kiev, and pulls together folk traditions and soul/pop in a way I’ve never heard before. I love the combination of acoustic instruments like harmonica, glockenspiel and bowed cello/bass with some electric twangs throughout. – Amelia
Call Me Spinster – “Morning”
This song began as a sort of call and response, a cappella lullaby. We toyed around with the idea of keeping it that way, using only body percussion. As we started building it, though, Rachel started hearing a samba-style bateria. As layers quickly snowballed, we started calling it our “Lion King song,” including elements like strings and cymbals that aren’t elsewhere on our EP — but still built around that simple vocal call and response. – Amelia
Fiona Apple – “Hot Knife”
I first listened to this song when a friend told us to cover it — but we didn’t dare touch it, because it is perfect. Fiona Apple’s frenzied energy building in layers and countermelody, on top of a rumbling drum and dissonant keys makes me feel like a sleepless night after a killer date when you feel like your heart might shake down the walls of the apartment. – Rosie
Zap Mama – “W’happy Mama”
Zap Mama was a staple of our combined middle/high school CD collection and one of the most memorable groups we’ve seen live. It’s a group of badass women led by “Zap Mama” Marie Daulne who mix pop, jazz, and folk. They’re living proof that voices can be anything and all other instruments are extra party. That party brings in elements of funk and hip-hop throughout the song, but goes back to a cappella sounds at the end, reminding you what the true elements are. “Chante, chante, she say, she say.” – Rosie
Rubblebucket – “On the Ground”
I have listened to this album on repeat over the past few years. It makes me dance and cry. Kalmia Traver’s honest and unfettered vocals feel like a best friend reminding me to look around once in a while and stop taking things so f-ing seriously. – Amelia
Cocteau Twins – “Iceblink Luck”
Heaven or Las Vegas is one of my favorite complete albums of all time. Elizabeth Fraser’s uber-melodic, acrobatic vocals were the obvious draw for me, but as we incorporate more electronic elements into the songs we’re working on for our first full-length record, I am paying closer attention to their perfect cocktail of dreamy distortion. – Amelia
Les Rita Mitsouko – “Marcia Baïla”
Catherine Ringer is one of the most balls-to-the-wall performers ever, not only in her vocal style, but [also] the weird visual worlds that she and Fred Chichin created over the years. If you haven’t seen the music video for this song or for “Andy” do yourself a favor. We are often drawn to artists whose visual aesthetic seems inextricable from their music: Kate Bush, Tyler the Creator, FKA Twigs, etc. – Amelia
Lim Kim – “Awoo”
One of the driving forces for finding new music is making playlists for my yoga classes. “Awoo” has a way of wiggling into many — it has the perfect blend of joyful yet meditative vocals and groovy yet simple rhythm. I love when the voice can be a percussion instrument without sounding like an a cappella group. Janelle Monae and Kimbra also nail this vibe. Lim Kim just hits right every time. – Rachel
Alabama Shakes – “Gimme All Your Love”
This album took us by storm as it did so many — and we keep coming back to it again and again, particularly as we began our recording journey. Brittany Howard has the rare ability to harness the raw energy of her live performance in the studio, and the pacing and build of her songwriting is so unusual and satisfying, like the turn in the middle of this song and the build towards the end. – Amelia
Björk – “Hyperballad”
Björk gives us all permission to feel epic feels with few words and ear-dazzling, diverse orchestration. She has been hugely influential for us and so many artists across genres for multiple decades, probably even in bluegrass. I would love to hear a banjo choir re-make of her album Post — just sayin’. – Rachel
Juana Molina – “Al oeste”
Juana Molina has this super sexy and intimate way of singing that feels almost like the microphone is lodged inside of her. Her songwriting always has a trance quality, with a wink. It lulls you into a dream and then adds a tickle to make sure you’re really listening. – Rachel
Judee Sill – “The Lamb Ran Away with the Crown” (Remastered)
We had to include at least one of the great earnest singer-songwriters of the ’60s/’70s, and who better than the enigmatic, bank robber-theosophist-composer Judee Sill? One of our own songwriting tendencies is writing singable songs that have something sneaky lurking underneath — a disjointed rhythm, an odd structure, an unusual chord progression… perhaps this is the ghost of Judee. – Rachel
Lucy Michelle – “Heart Race”
We grew up falling asleep to our dad picking guitar in the living room and this pattern mixed with Lucy’s lilting and beautifully raw voice is everything that is home. – Rosie
The Roches – “Hammond Song”
I also play in a band called Holy Sheboygan and our first gig ever was in Hammond, Wisconsin’s (pop. 2000) Earth Day Celebration. The lady who hired us pleaded for us to cover “Hammond Song.” We haven’t yet, but we did fall in love with The Roches. The shout-singing style is very reminiscent of our Amish family’s shape-note vocal production, the cascading almost choral songwriting, shameless unisons (#sistergoals), and the drone all fit right in to our sisterhood of sounds. – Rachel
There are a whole lot of ways you can tell the story of 2020, but for us here at BGS, it will be remembered as a year of especially remarkable songwriting from women in roots music.
We lead our playlist with the one and only Dolly Parton, who assured us that life will be good again. Parton’s songwriting is presented in an enticing new book, Songteller, and her ability to articulate complicated emotions — through lyrics that speak to all walks of life — is something that Brandi Carlile picked up on as a teenager. In this video interview from the 2020 BMI Country Awards (with a cameo from Dolly at the end), Carlile explains how Parton’s perspective on equality kept Carlile from divorcing country music completely.
Parton, who turns 75 next month, shares a number of important qualities with a new generation of singer-songwriters she’s inspired. In the case of Brandi Carlile, there’s a sense of belonging that is woven throughout their work, from Parton’s “Joshua” to Carlile’s “Carried Me With You.” Like Parton, Brennen Leigh is able to capture a sense of place and make it relatable, even for a listener who’s never been there. Kyshona Armstrong offers a sense of self-worth and self-awareness in her writing, as Parton does, allowing listeners to know them better. Likewise, Maya de Vitry and Parton share a sense of wonder and joy, portraying landscapes — internal and external — that are imagined, yet vivid.
On Prairie Love Letter, her full-length paean to her homeland on the Minnesota-North Dakota border, Brennen Leigh demonstrates a visceral, evocative grounding – just as Parton constantly speaks of her Tennessee mountain home: with a glint in her eye, and a sorrow in her heart for knowing she had no choice but to leave it. Leigh stakes her claim on both the wide, expansive plains and Nashville all at once, asking her audience “Don’t you know I’m from here?” As if to remind she’s as at home in bluegrass and country — and Music City — as Dolly herself.
“Backwoods Barbie,” “Dumb Blonde,” and “Just Because I’m a Woman” are all perfect examples of Parton’s lifelong radical self-possession. She expresses her agency boldly, confidently, without (visible) second guessing – from her wigs to her infamous tattoos to her nothing-special acknowledgement of her plastic surgeries, struggles with suicidal ideation, and so on, she is her fully realized, autonomous self. As Dolly told Jad Abumrad on Dolly Parton’s America, “Who we are is who we are… I would just bow out if I wasn’t allowed to be me…” Kyshona Armstrong‘s prescient album, Listen, holds similar space, as Armstrong doesn’t simply ask folks to listen; her presence, compassion, and radical honesty demand it. Because, first and foremost, she’s welcoming and non-judgmental in that aim, you will find yourself fully enveloped by her music before you realize the conviction within it.
Maya de Vitry made a gorgeous, poetic foray into heavier, rockier turf with How to Break a Fall, a gutsy, genre-bending set of songs. Their anger, release, and passion, expressed by the folk-rock production style, feels right out of Parton’s post-White Limozeen era, an effortless combination of seemingly disparate musical influences, distilled into something that, almost above all else, feels joyful. Where male-centered rock and roll finds itself often hung up on its endemic toxic masculinity, de Vitry and Parton stride into electrified sounds with their femininity forward, and the result is as charming as it is subversive.
It’s striking, among such an incredible volume of musical output from their Americana and country peers this year, that these women would stand out, above and beyond the still-common glass ceilings imposed upon them for decades. Dolly blazed a trail, but these dozens of writers — and singers and pickers and composers and front women and side musicians and authors and poets — would have crashed through inevitably on their own. With songs like Adia Victoria’s “South Gotta Change,” Sunny War’s “Can I Sit With You?,” “Troubled Times” from Laurie Lewis, the Secret Sisters’ “Cabin,” it’s obvious Dolly Parton’s songwriting legacy will be inherited by multiple generations worthy of carrying it on.
Throughout 2020, the BGS editorial team embraced this wealth of excellent music from women songwriters in roots music. It has been a privilege to share these original voices with our readers, too. Here are 50 of our favorite tracks from 2020:
Photo credit: Daniel Jackson for BGS, Newport Folk Fest 2019
Everyone has a “Dolly Story.” Whether it’s a personal interaction (like when Brandi Carlile confessed on my podcast, Harmonics, that when she met her backstage at Newport Folk Fest, Dolly prayed with Brandi to calm her nerves) or the first time you heard your own story in one of her songs (like when BGS editor Justin Hiltner explained to host Jad Abumrad how “Why’d You Come In Here Lookin’ Like That” is a gay anthem on his podcast, Dolly Parton’s America), these stories are the universal connectors for Dolly Parton fans.
My own love of Dolly Parton’s music goes back a very long time, but my “Dolly Story” finally happened a few years ago, when my husband and I got to meet her after her show at the Hollywood Bowl. It was surreal and wonderful and the moment was over far too soon, but from that day on I knew I wanted to live my life more like Dolly Parton.
One of these days, I hope to be able to have a longer chat with Dolly (DOLLY IF YOU’RE READING THIS YOU CAN BE ON MY SHOW ANYTIME). But until then, I’ve distilled four pillars of What Dolly Parton Means to Me:
1) Dolly is Always Unapologetically Herself.
“I’ve often made the statement that I’d never stoop so low as to be fashionable. That’s the easiest thing in the world to do…. Once they got past the shock of the ridiculous way I looked and all, they would see there are parts of me to be appreciated. I’m very real where it counts — and that’s inside.”
In today’s fractured society, there are few figures as unifying as Dolly Parton. Say her name to almost anyone, anywhere, and almost certainly they will know who she is. Maybe part of the reason for this is her indelible commitment to never being anything but herself. And it’s because of that raw honesty that she can mean so many things to so many people. Over the years when I’ve been pressured to conform to certain looks, trends, people, or situations for the “sake of my career,” Dolly has been a glorious, glittering reminder to never apologize for sticking to who you truly are.
2) Dolly is Always Decent.
“I think everybody should be treated with respect. I don’t judge and I try not to get too caught up in the controversy of things. I hope everybody gets a chance to be who they are.”
Decency and goodness are not just about building a massive resort and theme park to revive the economy of your hometown in East Tennessee (Dollywood). They’re not just about founding a charity that has given away over 150 million books to underprivileged children around the world (Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library). They’re not even just about donating over a million dollars to help fund a COVID-19 vaccine. (Seriously. The hero we needed in 2020.)
Real goodness and decency are about how you act when no one is looking. Dolly is not just a good person, but she is a decent one. She has a universal acceptance for everyone just as they are, and uses her wealth and visibility to stand up for those who cannot. If that’s not decent I don’t know what is.
3) Dolly is Always Resilient.
“I’m not going to limit myself just because people won’t accept the fact that I can do something else.”
Dolly may seem like a divine being sent from heaven above, but she’s as human as the rest of us. In so many interviews she’s talked about her rough patches, her health problems, her doubts, her frustrations and failures. But one thing she has never lost is a resounding resiliency to keep going. It’s important to realize that our heroes are just flesh and blood, but it’s also important to remember that what makes someone a true hero is how they remind us to get back up and keep going.
4) Dolly is Always in on the Joke.
“All these years, the people have thought the joke was on me, but it’s actually been on the public. I know exactly what I’m doing and I can change it at any time. I make more jokes about myself than anybody.”
As a comic actor, I love and admire Dolly’s ability to not only be in on the joke, but often two steps ahead of it. It’s easy enough to assume that she’s some dumb blonde with big boobs, but as she shows us time and time again, looking good and being the smartest person in the room are not mutually exclusive. You can see her adeptness in clips from her late night appearances from the ’80s and ’90s, where the host usually takes a cheap jab at Dolly’s ample attributes and makes the interview about her physicality rather than her talent. But without missing a beat, Dolly always throws it right back at him (it’s always a him), usually with a punchline that’s even funnier than the host’s bit.
It’s like she says in her classic song “Dumb Blonde:” “Just because I’m blonde / Don’t think I’m dumb / Cause this dumb blonde ain’t nobody’s fool.” I’ve sat on those same couches, fielded countless embarrassing questions, and in my retort I always try to ask myself: What Would Dolly Do?
Beth Behrs is an actress (The Neighborhood, Two Broke Girls) and host of the BGS podcast, Harmonics. Check out season 1 of Harmonics and follow Beth on Instagram at @bethbehrs for updates on season 2.
Artist:Stephen Kellogg Hometown: Connecticut Song: “I’ve Had Enough ” Album:I’ve Had Enough Release Date: December 18, 2020
In Their Words: “I’ve always been in theory, and actuality, an optimistic person. This year has tested that. 2020 has been scary and exhausting in myriad ways. Can we agree on that? No? Of course, we can’t. Because that’s what it’s like when you are homeschooling four kids through a pandemic while trying to knock out a living and swallow the bitter injustice of a morally bankrupt president who would rather take down a great nation than admit legitimate defeat.” — Stephen Kellogg
At BGS, we seek out roots music from all corners — for those readers encountering us for the first time, we’re not “just bluegrass.” With our annual year-end list, we’ve shaken off the “best of” title and instead gathered 20 recordings that inspired our staff and contributors. For many reasons (but especially the long-awaited return of live music and festivals), we look ahead to 2021, but first… here are the albums and songs that inspired us in 2020.
Courtney Marie Andrews – Old Flowers
Courtney Marie Andrews couldn’t touch my heart deeper. Her music has been the healing salve for the wounds of 2020. To me, she’s the true definition of an artist: A songwriter, a musician, a painter, a writer, a singer, a poet, an activist. My favorite song on her magical 2020 album is “Old Flowers.” It’s the perfect metaphor of resilience and rebirth after suffering, both in love and in life. Becoming whole again. If that ain’t a theme we could all grow from this year, I don’t know what is! – Beth Behrs
Anjimile – “Maker (Acoustic)”
Anjimile’s Giver Taker was the album I can’t stop (and won’t stop) telling people about in 2020. The full version of their single, “Maker” was a beautiful amalgamation of cultures and influences synthesized by an artist not constrained by cultural and creative preconceptions. To me, Anjimile’s acoustic version of the lead single distills the brilliance of their songwriting into its purest form. – Amy Reitnouer Jacobs
Danny Barnes – Man on Fire
Danny Barnes’ Man on Fire was a worthwhile gift to us all this year. Over the last couple of years, I’d heard chatter of a project in the works with names like Dave Matthews, John Paul Jones, and Bill Frisell involved. I am constantly in awe of what Barnes can create using the banjo as a pencil. This record was no exception, combining his unique style and songwriting with an electrified crew. – Thomas Cassell
Bonny Light Horseman – “The Roving”
There’s an odd bit of sorcery in the first measures of “The Roving,” a new version of an old folk tune on this supergroup’s debut. It opens tentatively, the instruments falling into the song like autumn leaves: First an acoustic guitar, then cymbals, then piano, all coalescing into a windblown arrangement that’s both understated and sublime. – Stephen Deusner
Bob Dylan – Rough and Rowdy Ways
Packed with jumbles of historic/cultural references and tall tales, bluesy swagger and prayerful romance, and climaxing with the shattered-mirror JFK assassination epic “Murder Most Foul,” Dylan’s first set of originals in a decade is breathtakingly masterful. It’s also, often, hilarious. Nearing 80, the Bard’s as playful as ever. And as poignant. And, justifiably, as cocky. – Steve Hochman
To me, Bob Dylan’s best era started in 1989 with his 26th studio album, Oh Mercy, and continues to this day with his 39th, Rough and Rowdy Ways. “Murder Most Foul” shows us that the master of his generation is as much in control of his folktale troubadour craft as he’s ever been. – Chris Jacobs
Justin Farren – Pretty Free
Knowing nothing about Justin Farren, I was immediately sucked into his evocatively detailed story-songs that involved returning diapers to Costco, getting a “two-paycheck ticket” while trying to impress a girl, and (in the all-too-appropriately-titled for-2020, “Last Year Was The Best Year”) a wild Disneyland adventure. Full of humor, sorrow, regrets and hope, Pretty Free was a musical world I visited often this year. – Michael Berick
Mickey Guyton – “Black Like Me”
Mickey Guyton’s lyrics illuminate the individuality and dilemma of any non-white vocalist in country music, and in particular the difficult journey of Black women in the field. Her performance is gripping and memorable, paying homage to many others who’ve faced ridicule and questions about why they’re daring to perform in an idiom many still feel isn’t suited for their musical style. – Ron Wynn
Sarah Jarosz – “Pay It No Mind”
Atop a Fleetwood Mac-style groove, Sarah Jarosz imagines the advice a distant bird might offer. But her songbird is no sweet, shallow lover. She comes with the weight and wisdom of something more timeless. Jarosz lets her fly via mandolin-fiddle interplay that personifies the tension between the endless sky and the “world on the ground.” – Kim Ruehl
Lydia Loveless – Daughter
“I’m not a liberated woman,” Lydia Loveless declares on her fifth album, “just a country bumpkin dilettante.” Don’t you believe it. Written in the shadow of her 2016 divorce and beautifully sung in a voice both epic and straightforward, Daughter finds this Americana siren at the height of her formidable powers. – David Menconi
Lori McKenna – The Balladeer
Lori McKenna‘s singular talent for capturing the joy in everyday details is on full display, from the church parking lots and hometown haunts of “This Town Is a Woman” to the stubborn tiffs and make-up kisses on “Good Fight.” But The Balladeer acknowledges the hard-as-hell times, too. With gentle accompaniment, commanding melodies, and McKenna’s signature lyrical wit, The Balladeer showcases a modern songwriting master. – Dacey Orr Sivewright
Jeff Picker – With the Bass in Mind
I love “new acoustic music,” but am often afraid I’ll be disappointed by it. Jeff Picker’s With the Bass in Mind immediately eases those worries by offering music that is creative, thoughtful, unexpected, and virtuosic while still feeling grounded and musical. All while effortlessly answering the once-rhetorical question: “What would a solo bluegrass bass album even sound like?” – Tristan Scroggins
William Prince – Reliever
William Prince‘s Reliever feels like the best pep talk I’ve ever had. In particular, “The Spark” finds him astonished with loving a partner who loves him back, no matter his own perceived flaws. As a whole, the album explores complicated emotions with a comforting arrangement (with duties shared by Dave Cobb and Scott Nolan). Sung with assurance by Prince, almost like he’s confiding in you, Reliever is both encouraging and excellent. – Craig Shelburne
Scott Prouty – Shaking Down the Acorns
We’d be remiss in our jobs as procurers of roots music culture to not include this stoically beautiful record on our year-end list of the very best. A hearty collection of 24 (mostly solo) old-time fiddle and banjo songs, there is something ever-present, comforting, and timeless about Prouty’s playing, and I have no doubt this is a record I’ll be revisiting like an old friend for years to come. – Amy Reitnouer Jacobs
Emily Rockarts – Little Flower
Montreal-based songwriter Emily Rockarts’ debut album Little Flower is one to remember. Produced by Franky Rousseau (Goat Rodeo Sessions), the album features lilting cinematic ballads punctuated with dance-in-your-room indie anthems. Rockarts’ musicianship is undeniable; her stunning melodies and refreshingly earnest lyrics make for a remarkable combination that is unlike anything else I’ve heard. Run, listen to Little Flower now! – Kaia Kater
Sarah Siskind – Modern Appalachia
Sarah Siskind brought her luminous, Nashville-honed songwriting back home to North Carolina a few years ago and let the mountains speak through her. Leading an all-star Asheville band live off the floor at iconic Echo Mountain studio, she’s made a heart-swelling set of songs that gather her special melodic signature, her meticulous craft, and her insight into how a rich musical region is evolving. – Craig Havighurst
Emma Swift – Blonde on the Tracks
Emma Swift reminded the music world of the power that artists have to control their work when she self-released Blonde on the Tracks, an eight-song collection of Bob Dylan covers. Her interpretations are as powerful and innovative as her methodical and thoughtful initial distribution sans streaming services. – Erin McAnally
Julian Taylor – The Ridge
Mohawk singer-songwriter Julian Taylor resides in what is now referred to as Toronto, but his masterful country-folk record, The Ridge, hits your ear as if plucked directly from Taylor’s childhood summers spent on his grandparents’ farm in rural British Columbia. Refracted through Taylor’s crisp, modern arrangements and undiluted emotion, The Ridge seamlessly bridges the elephant-in-the-2020-room chasm between rural and urban — musically, familially, lyrically, and spiritually. – Justin Hiltner
Molly Tuttle, “Standing on the Moon”
2020 has handed us its fair share of cover albums, with stay-at-home orders urging many to reach for the familiar — but none have meshed a variety of musical sources so creatively as Molly Tuttle’s whimsical …but i’d rather be with you. Her version of “Standing on the Moon” is the nostalgic and homesick, Earth-loving galactic trip of my pedal steel-obsessed, Deadhead dreams. – Shelby Williamson
Cory Wong – Trail Songs (Dawn)
A record that I didn’t know I needed came in early August when Vulfpeck guitarist Cory Wong released Trail Songs (Dawn). A change of pace for Wong, it features predominantly acoustic instrumentation and organic sounds. The album kicks off with “Trailhead,” which sounds like a Dan Crary instrumental until the groove drops in the second verse. BGS standbys Chris Thile and Sierra Hull make appearances as an added bonus. – Jonny Therrien
Donovan Woods – “Seeing Other People”
We may seem unsentimental, stoic, unemotional — especially when faced with something like a partner moving on, or a breakup, when it may be easier to seem fine, have a pint, and download Tinder. Donovan’s gift in this song is to show those complicated “yes, and” internal thoughts and emotions. It is beautiful. – Tom Power
Artist:Heather Maloney Song: “The Secret of Christmas” Album:Christmas Anyway EP Release Date: November 13, 2020
In Their Words: “I adore this song and I actually didn’t know it existed until pretty recently. While my producer Ryan Hommel and I were in the process of making the Christmas Anyway demos, our friend (and Ryan’s bandmate in the Amos Lee band) Jaron Olevsky, turned us on to the song. We listened to it and then pretty much simultaneously texted each other to say that we needed to record it. Not only is the original recording devastatingly gorgeous (because Ella), we both agreed that the lyrics are perfectly aligned with our central ideas for this holiday EP.
“Basically, the words felt like they underscored this sentiment: what makes the holidays meaningful isn’t dependent on any outer circumstances (the gifts we give/don’t give, if we are physically together/apart, etc.) — but rather, meaning is something we can choose to create (at any time) through the choices we make, our gestures of kindness and the way we frame those uncontrollable life circumstances.
“We asked Jaron to arrange our version of the song and he blew us away with what he came up with. Another dear friend and collaborator Cynthia Tolson played all of the strings and by the time I was singing the final vocal, we all honestly had to take a few cry breaks in the studio before we could get through it. This song is amazingly short and sweet for being so packed with meaning, and to me, singing it feels like singing one long beautiful sentence that slowly builds in intensity — and eventually culminates in the line that drives it all right home: ‘The secret of Christmas is not the things you do on Christmas, but the Christmas things you do all year through.'” — Heather Maloney
Artist:Andrea von Kampen Single: “A Midwest Christmas” Release Date: November 6, 2020
In Their Words: “When I sat down to write my first-ever original Christmas tune, I felt at a loss for what to even write about. This year has been tough and disappointing in so many ways for everyone. I wanted to lift spirits of people, but I didn’t feel like sleigh bells, ice skating, or any of the other quintessential Christmas topics were relatable right now. I started to think about what really makes me happy and feel at peace during the holidays. It hasn’t ever been the shopping or the big light displays, but the simple moments that show human kindness. That’s what ‘A Midwest Christmas’ is really all about.” — Andrea von Kampen
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