While Cycles has had a couple EP’s available on Spotify to listen to, they had still yet to record a debut album in the studio, until last week when they released their new album “Vacation”.  Over the course of the past couple of years the band has been together, they have created an extremely large amount of material that would leave one wondering; which songs would make the cut for the new album, and how they would sound in the studio compared to the live setting that many fans around the country have gotten used to.  For those o

The first chapter of Twiddle’s double album, PLUMP, was released in December 2015, helping to cement the reputation of the Vermont-based jam band, which has cultivated an enthusiastic following through consistent touring and jubilant live shows. On April 28th, the band will release PLUMP Chapter 2 along with a remastered edition of Chapter 1. The double album was produced by Ron St. Germain, known for his masterful work with Bad Brains, 311, and Sonic Youth.

The latest puzzle piece of the bluegrass and Americana string music revival is in bloom: Pickin’ On Nirvana: The Bluegrass Tribute Featuring Iron Horse springs into stores with a physical vinyl release for Record Store Day on Saturday, April 22.

Ryan Montbleau’s latest album, I Was Just Leaving, is a stripped-down journey into the nature of loneliness. Directly off the heels of the astronomical success of his cover of Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car,” which has clocked in over 15 million plays on Spotify as of the writing of this review, I Was Just Leaving operates in the same vein of profound simplicity. This solo offering marks a departure from some of Montbleau’s funkier work, providing listeners with a clear lens through which to experience his inspired songwriting.

Believe is the latest album by Colorado disco-grass pioneers, The String Cheese Incident. The band’s tenth album overall, it is only their third in 12 years and with a release date of April 14, it arrives almost exactly three years removed from their previous album, 2014’s A Song In My Head.

The stars seem to be aligning for John Craigie, a Portland-based songwriter whose stripped down and relatable songs are a refreshing dose of Americana in our saturated musical landscape. Craigie was recently picked by Jack Johnson to open for the West Coast leg of his Summer 2017 tour. This announcement comes after Johnson sat in during one of Craigie’s shows in Hawaii, and the two hit it off famously.

In the fall of 1991, the Jerry Garcia Band embarked on its first extensive Fall Tour since 1984. The previous year, Jerry Garcia had kept his band close to their West Coast home base, with San Francisco’s Warfield Theatre serving as their sanctuary. While 1990 and 1991 are widely celebrated as exceptional years for both the Grateful Dead and the Jerry Garcia Band, they were marked by profound loss, including the untimely deaths of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland and legendary promoter Bill Graham.

The Brothers Comatose are one of the most exciting bluegrass outfits to emerge in the past decade, and I await each of their stellar releases with bated breath. I first encountered the band at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass 2015, where I stumbled across the latter portion of their set, the sound of the dueling fiddle and banjo drawing me in from across the sun-soaked fields of Golden Gate Park.

There is a great deal of discussion of the rift between the progressive and traditional bluegrass scenes, yet a number of groups have taken great strides to tear down the barrier between the disciplines. Ned Luberecki is a perfect example of this dismantling, as he blurs the lines between traditional Americana bluegrass tunes and avante-garde interpretations of songs from outside the genre.

There is something undeniably appealing about music that evokes the desert landscapes of the American West. The imagery of sun-soaked plains of dust beneath a never-ending blue sky has pulled at my heartstrings since I first heard the Dead’s “Jack Straw.” This landscape has had a clear influence on psychedelic and improvisational music and provides the inspiration for BIG Something’s fourth album, Tumbleweed. The album is a sonic desert trip, which uses the barren landscapes as a canvas for an introspective journey.