We’ve gone gaga over folk-y sister acts before. Swedish siblings First Aid Kit blew us away last year with their dulcet harmonies, and Athens, Georgia’s Hope For Agoldensummer did much the same. Now comes Lily & Madeleine, a bedroom folk project from two Indianapolis sisters who began turning heads when their video “In The Middle” [...]

George Jones, the legendary country singer known for such hits as “The Race Is On,” “White Lightning,” and “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” died early Friday morning in Nashville, Tennessee, his publicist said. Jones, who had been hospitalized the week before with fever and irregular blood pressure, died at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. A member [...]

Nashville guitar ace William Tyler is a musician’s musician, an artist who commands a lot of respect in Music City picking circles. He also seems to have little trouble winning over even the most hard-boiled of critics (read: Pitchfork, who gave his newly-released album Impossible Truth an 8.0 rating). American Songwriter dropped in on Tyler [...]

Singer-songwriter Elise Davis has won American Songwriter and Martin Guitar’s “The Pub Deal,” a year-long $20,000 publishing contract with HoriPro Entertainment Group, Inc. All the entries were carefully reviewed and discussed, with the help of judges Holly Williams, Dean Dillon, Martin Ambassador Mac Powell and Martin Ambassador Hunter Hayes. Davis, 24, has been releasing albums independently since her [...]

We caught John McCauley at the Shindig early Wednesday, several miles past the interstate in East Austin, so far east in fact that we felt like we were halfway to Dallas. But it proved to be a nice sanctuary from the crowds and the hustle, and a perfect way to spend the afternoon. McCauley was [...]

(Kentucky’s Houndmouth) SXSW 2013, Tuesday: A Post-Buzz World Today is the second day of the music portion of South by Southwest. For the last three years I have walked the streets of downtown Austin for this aural feast, lost amid a sea of musicians, industry stiffs, hangers-on, and earnest music lovers. Every year, at several [...]

Grace Potter,  a supercharged rock songstress best appreciated in the context of a huge freaking party, will join Kenny Chesney, Eric Church and many more great artists on the stages of Rock The Ocean’s inaugural Tortuga Music Festival next month, festival organizers announced today. “We are so excited to be traveling from Vermont to Tortuga [...]

In the song “Dear Jimmy Buffett,” Matt Hoggatt tells the mayor of Margaritaville that he “could sure use a record deal.” Buffett took the songwriter’s plea to heart. Earlier this month, Hoggatt, a detective from Gauthier, Mississippi, released Hotter Than Fishgrease on Mailboat Records, the label owned and operated by the famous beachcombing singer. “It’s [...]

We’ve been waiting with bated breath for Caitlin Rose’s sophomore effort The Stand-In, an album that’s being touted as a more robust record than her somewhat-folky debut, Own Side Now. “This album could be considered my first attempt at a high kick,” says Rose. “We’re not aiming to make indie-sounding records. How boring would that [...]

Emmylou Harris, one of God’s own singers, will release a duets album with Rodney Crowell this year. We spoke with the iconic chanteuse about the new record, the abiding influence of Gram Parsons, and eulogizing her father in song. A good duet: You get two voices that are unique and then you create a third [...]

As part of the Americana Festival, Guy Clark and long-time compadre Rodney Crowell discussed the legacy of Woody Guthrie at a panel on Thursday. The two songwriters played a few Woody songs, too. Clark performed “1913 Massacre” (a song he called “spine-tingling”) and Crowell contributed “Oklahoma Hills,” which he said was the first Guthrie song [...]