Jeremy Pinnell with David Quinn Live at Martin's Downtown

214 State Street,Jackson MS 39201

01 July, 2022

Description

Hardscrabble honky-tonk at its best, nodding to Johnny Cash and Buck Owens in equal measure. Ties of Blood and Affection is a stellar collection that could earn Pinnell comparisons to Sturgill Simpson.” - ROLLING STONE When Jeremy Pinnell released OH/KY in the summer of 2015 to stunned acclaim, it felt like an entire career compressed into one knock-out album. Hailed as a “mind-blowingly good” (KEXP) “tutorial on classic country music” (Popmatters), Pinnell’s debut immediately differentiated as authentic and unflinching. Dogged touring through Europe and the states and celebrated radio sessions followed, cementing Pinnell’s position as a no-fuss master of his craft. His latest album Ties of Blood and Affection presents a canny lateral move. Instead of doubling down on the stark themes and values of his debut, this sophomore album finds Pinnell finding comfort in his own skin and achieving the redemption only hinted at in his previous batch of haunted songs. Here Pinnell joyfully embraces the working life, family obligations, and faith. His new stories delve into acceptance and survival, all the while investigating his most challenging chapter yet: adulthood. While “If life don’t get any better / I’m alright with this” isn’t an out-right triumph, it’s an honest revelation. You can feel the room breathe and get a sense of these musicians eyeballing each other as their performances are committed directly to thick analog tape. Honest and careworn, Jeremy’s voice can touch on wry, jubilant, and debauched - all in a single line. Ties of Blood and Affection offers a fair dose resolution to Jeremy’s story. At his best, Jeremy Pinnell chronicles the joy and sorrow of being human, which is the best that anyone could do. David Quinn’s third album was born from a logo on a decades-old ashtray he found in a corner nook at Nashville’s Sound Emporium while tracking his previous record. The amber glass piece had seen better days, but it was the words “Country Fresh” imprinted on the side in its vintage font that grabbed Quinn’s attention. “I never stopped thinking about it and started using the phrase ‘country fresh’ to describe how I was living and all the things that I like. It just stuck with me and once I wrote the song ‘Country Fresh’ it ended up being the whole theme of the record.” His first two albums, 2019’s Wanderin’ Fool, and 2020’s Letting Go were both infectious roots records that put Quinn on the musical map, gaining praise from Saving Country Music, The Chicago Tribune, Wide Open Country, The Boot, The Americana Music Association, Glide Magazine, American Songwriter, and The Bluegrass Situation, just to name a few. Even with the litany of accolades Quinn has already landed, it feels like with Country Fresh, we’re only getting started with this Illinois native. In the wake of the pandemic back in 2020, Quinn left his adopted headquarters of Chicago in favor of a move to rural Indiana, into a house on a lake. This new — dare we say “Country Fresh” — setting enabled him to tap into the nostalgia of his childhood and rev up his creativity. For years he had been trying to find the words to describe his sound and what set it apart from his contemporaries. Last year, it finally hit him: he was making Black Dirt Country music. It’s the sound of midwestern storytelling, in the vein of his biggest influence, the country folk of John Prine, who was also born and raised in Illinois. Armed with a dozen new songs after soaking up his new life in the woods, Quinn decided that for this album he’d up the ante and produce it himself. Returning to Sound Emporium with handpicked players, including Laur Joamets (Drivin N Cryin) on slide guitar and solos, Micah Hulscher (Emmylou Harris) on piano, Fats Kaplin (John Prine) on fiddle, dobro, banjo and harmonica, Miles Miller (Sturgill Simpson) on drums, Jamie T. Davis (Margo Price) on guitar and Brett Resnick (Kacey Musgraves) on pedal steel, the album was engineered and mixed by Mike Stankiewicz (Willie Nelson, Shooter Jennings, Jason Isbell) and mastered by John Baldwin Mastering (The Rolling Stones, Merle Haggard, Kris Kristopherson). Alongside this star-studded ensemble, Quinn recorded a love letter to the midwest with tunes that tell stories of lost love, the open road, and finding one’s place in the world. Country Fresh is a collection of country-fried Americana gems corralled by Quinn’s singular voice and expertly- spun tales of heartache and triumphs amidst a vast midwestern landscape. Country music’s one constant, in its many permutations and guises, is that it tells us stories of real people living their ordinary lives, sometimes doing extraordinary things. On the new album, Quinn hits all of these notes. “Low Down” is a song about dealing with not really ever having a place to call home and wearing your welcome out wherever you go. “Cornbread and Chili” is a smile-inducing ditty that evokes the way Guy Clark wrote about his love for food in songs. “Boy From Illinois” is an upbeat song about the easy living of midwestern life. “Long Road” speaks to the downtimes and the feeling of hopelessness. Throughout the album, Quinn gives a masterclass in storytelling with the ability to stage vibrant vignettes of life, home, and heart. He burns through the songwriting at a cool stride, allowing you the chance to see yourself in his stories. Country Fresh is a statement-making record of gutting, instinctual songcraft. It’s depth is built from the road less traveled, but traveled often. There’s nothing pretentious about what Quinn has created here; Country Fresh simply sounds like its creator is taking you along on the ride of his life.