Nikki Lane's third album Highway Queen sees the young Nashville rebel emerge as one of country and rock's most gifted songwriters. Produced by Lane and fellow singer/songwriter Jonathan Tyler, and recorded in Denton, Texas and Nashville, Tennessee, Highway Queen is an emotional tour-de-force. Blending potent lyrics, unbridled blues guitars and vintage '60s country-pop swagger, Lane's new music will resonate as easily with Black Keys and Lana Del Rey fans as those of Neil Young and Tom Petty. Highway Queen starts with the whiskey-soaked restlessness of "700,000 Rednecks," a rowdy call to action, and ends on the profoundly raw "Forever Lasts Forever," where Lane belts freely, mourning a failed marriage – the "lighter shade of skin" left behind from her wedding ring. Lane's journey to heartbreak takes exquisite turns. "Companion" is pure Everly Brothers' dreaminess ("I would spend a lifetime/ Playing catch you if I can"). Elsewhere, she goes on a Vegas bender on the rollicking "Jackpot," fights last-call blues ("Foolish Heart") and tosses off brazen one-liners at a backroom piano ("Big Mouth").
You know the kind of song that makes you feel uneasy, but excited? Maybe you felt it the first time you heard The Stooges "I Wanna Be Your Dog" or The Pixies "Monkey Gone To Heaven" -- creepy yet catchy songs that are ominous and playful at the same time. It's a category that now welcomes The Orwells' raucous third album, Terrible Human Beings, the Chicago band's most dynamic and engrossing collection to date. "Not too far back we sat down to write what we call mutilated pop songs," explains guitarist Matt O'Keefe." "We wanted to make songs that at their core are catchy and pretty, then slash them up," adds singer Mario Cuomo. "After two misfires we landed on something that felt right," O'Keefe continues, "like an engine failing to start then finally turning itself over." Whereas Cuomo was more focused on the his own tales of suburban malaise for The Orwells 2014 album Disgraceland, he found external inspiration for Terrible Human Beings. Movies such as the psychological thriller It Follows and noir fiction like Last Exit To Brooklyn provided fodder for a more narrative, vignette-based approach.
The 10 songs on Notes Of Blue are inspired by the spirit of the blues, but not the standard blues as most know it. The unique and haunting tunings of Mississippi Fred McDowell, Skip James and Nick Drake were all points of exploration for Son Volt's Jay Farrar for the new collection. The album opens with the country soul of "Promise The World," followed by "Back Against The Wall," a song that could stand alongside the great Son Volt songs of their early albums. However, Notes Of Blue reflects the blues as it resides in the folk tradition, but heavily amplified. The primal stomp of Cherokee St, the frenetic guitar on "Static" and the raw slide in "Sinking Down" exude grit and attitude. Conversely, tracks such as "The Storm" and "Cairo And Southern" seamlessly meld blues with hypnotic melodies that add a unique balance to the album.