SHARK-FIN AWARDS

Ruby Dice has now developed a collaborative album Take Me Back, and a short documentary Making A Life Out Of Art, celebrating the artists, friendships, and creative spirit that make Austin unique. This album is excellent and features lots of musicians and different musical influences. URL: https://www.rubydice.com/ Take Me Back features Ruby Dice’s …

If you’ve spent any time on the bluegrass festival circuit over the past few years, you already know that Nick Chandler and Delivered don’t mess around. They bring that high-octane, real-deal mountain bluegrass that gets folks out of their lawn chairs and down to the stage. Their album Look For Me captures …

“Freedom Chillin’ (Dave Aude Remix)” by Courtney Elle, arrives with a simple mission to preserve the carefree spirit of “Freedom” while giving the song a fresh frame. Rather than treating the original as something that needs replacing, this remix approaches it as a foundation, keeping its central groove and message …

Debut albums usually announce an arrival. Claude Carmichael’s Tennessee Hill asks what happens after the moving boxes are unpacked and the excitement wears off: When does an address become a home? For this veteran session singer and film music producer, the answer arrived on a country road outside Franklin, Tennessee, …

Some tribute albums arrive embalmed in reverence. Chrissi Poland’s Forever Muscle Shoals comes through the door breathing hard. Recorded live at FAME Studios and Muscle Shoals Sound Studio, this twelve-song collection honors an extraordinary American musical legacy without treating it as museum property. Poland approaches songs associated with Aretha Franklin, …

Indie music is having its day in court. Much like the film industry, merit is starting to inform the trend again, establishment recording houses finding themselves somewhat outsized by the rise of self-representing musical acts dominating the independent charts, algorithms, and dominating clicks as much as any Warner Bros. record …

There’s a certain kind of originality that can’t be manufactured, and it runs through every measure of “Pinewood Prison,” the latest single from Ashleigh Graham & Appalachian Highway. As a Roots Music Report chart-topping group, this band has already proven their staying power in the traditional bluegrass world, and this …

There’s always a risk in revisiting a beloved song. Listeners carry their own memories into it, and any new version has to justify its existence rather than simply imitate the original. Fortunately, Daron Tate’s bluegrass take on Robert Earl Keen’s “Feelin’ Good Again” clears that hurdle with ease, delivering a …

Circus Mind carefully rolled out what culminated into Road Less Traveled through a steady stream of single releases over the last year, allowing listeners to experience the album’s evolution one chapter at a time. Now assembled as a complete work, the album reveals a much broader vision, showcasing a band unafraid to …

Tony Kamel’s latest album release is the live entry “Live from the Bunker”, eschewing overtly slick production value for a decidedly scaled back, straightforward sound accompanied by Kamel’s signature, slightly caustic vocals. As far as indie acts go, Kamel is one of the more exciting to have come across my …