One of America’s most beloved unbiased bands, Turnpike Troubadours, will launch their extremely anticipated new album ‘A Cat in the Rain’ on August 25 through Bossier City Records/Thirty Tigers.
Produced by Shooter Jennings and recorded at Muscle Shoals’ Fame Recording Studios and Dave’s Room in Los Angeles, ‘A Cat in the Rain’ marks a long-awaited return for the band following their self-imposed hiatus in 2019. With these ten new songs, Turnpike Troubadours is again with a refreshed perspective on the genuine songwriting and signature foot-stomping sound that first captivated their deeply devoted fanbase. Pioneers of the Red Dirt music scene and initially from Tahlequah, Oklahoma, Turnpike Troubadours has amassed a large following all through their profession with greater than 1.5 billion streams globally and over 1.28 million equal items offered to-date. Further including to their famend profession, the band was inducted into the Oklahoma Music Hall of Fame in 2022.
This 10-song album is a story of reliability, rebirth, and redemption. It’s the story of brothers — Felker, fiddler Kyle Nix, metal participant Hank Early, guitarist Ryan Engleman, bassist RC Edwards, drummer Gabe Pearson — six musicians who ran the gauntlet of success, scrutiny, and even private troubles, and would struggle tooth and nail for each other. “We’ve been through a lot together and it’s only drawn us closer,” says Nix. “I’m insanely protective of all these people,” Pearson provides. “Just like I would be for my actual brothers.”
Turnpike followers thought the band was performed after they went on hiatus in 2019 amid lurid tales of frontman Evan Felker’s private descent into alcoholism. Speaking on that now, Felker sees life by a special lens, “I am in a different headspace having gotten sober. I had never written anything sober, so it was a total learning curve. But as far as playing with the guys, it was a breath of fresh air. Some of us hadn’t seen each other in a year or so and to be able to play together, suddenly you’re 22 again. It’s just that natural. But there was work to be done too, like learning how to write songs again. It was one of the most gratifying things I’ve ever been a part of.” Out of the ashes of despair comes ‘A Cat in the Rain’ and an entire new contemporary perspective and renewed enthusiasm for the craft.
Lead-off observe, ‘Mean Old Sun’ is the poster-child for this renewed enthusiasm, coming throughout like a defiant miners’ tune stuffed with Appalachian grit. Its melody is harking back to ‘Youngstown’ Springsteen assembly rural Kentucky in a head on collision of melody and which means. “It was a song about an outlaw in my mind,” Felker describes, “The character is this unrepentant gambler. And I came up with that line by turning different phrases and mixing metaphors together and thought it was interesting.”
Elsewhere, the themes of redemption and rebirth and may be discovered scattered liberally round ‘A Cat in the Rain’. The title observe, itself, seems like a really private analogy for each these concepts. ‘Like a country girl who came across a cat in the rain,’ Felker sings, needing ‘…a little shelter for a stray out in the storm.’ Once misplaced, however now discovered once more, this tune barrels alongside on a gradual beat of drums and electrical guitar licks, just a little accordion and an entire lot of assist from the Adam Duritz (Counting Crows) playbook of lyric writing. That Counting Crows affect will also be heard on tracks like ‘The Rut’ and the very private ‘Brought Me’. The former is a heavy, portentous observe that’s completely positioned in that pivotal ‘mid-album’ slot. “I don’t miss the style of liquor,’ Felker declares, ‘but the temporary shelter was a welcome compromise.’ ‘The Rut’ is a confessional tune with slight Gospel and mountain overtones. The Counting Crows affect may be heard within the heavy bass and slide guitars that underpin the tune though it’s far more prevalent on ‘Brought Me,’ which is an earnest tune of gratitude that the band clarify is a love tune from Evan Felker to his spouse while he states it’s a tune for the followers who’ve caught with them over time. It’s laid again, Folk-Americana vibe and gang vocal refrain places me in thoughts of a Crows observe like ‘Omaha’ and it’s probably the greatest on a robust album.
Further influences, as diverse as Springsteen, Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan and Eric Church may be discovered on tracks like ‘Lucille’, ‘Chipping Mill’ and the John Fullbright co-write ‘Three More Days’. ‘Lucille’ is a darker, fiddle-driven have a look at a relationship that runs its course however leaves a younger mom and child behind in its wake. Engaging, evocative storytelling is a function on ‘A Cat in the Rain’ and no-where is that this extra in proof than on ‘Lucille.’ The beating coronary heart of Americana FM radio, in the meantime, may be discovered on the infectious ‘Chipping Mill.’ Written by RC Edwards, Turnpike Troubadours’ bassist, we discover Evan Felker singing, ‘I sold my soul for Rock ‘n’ Roll….. however I all the time saved the perfect for you.’ It’s one other three minutes of soul looking and one other plea for redemption set in opposition to a robust melody and a few beautiful fiddles: it needs to be the kind of tune you hear on the FM Americana airwaves for the remainder of this yr . ‘Three More Days’, in the meantime, is a world-weary, tired-of-the-road tune concerning the sacrifices that touring musicians should make that Evan Felker says makes him consider his daughter. A Bluesy guitar solo evokes lodge bars and smoky golf equipment on a tune destined to grow to be a stay favorite.
Two covers spherical out this highly effective, private album. ‘Black Sky’, initially from the Ozark Mountain Daredevils, is a cool, earthy, natural tune pushed by Southern vibes and a gang-vocal refrain made for late nights and stay exhibits while album nearer ‘Won’t You Give Me One More Chance’, popularised by Jerry Jeff Walker, is all acoustic guitars and harmonica as Felker sings, ‘all I see is goodbyes and I wish I wasn’t there.’ Walker handed away while the band was making ‘A Cat in the Rain’ and Felker explains, “Probably my most listened to data have been Jerry Jeff data. He’s my favorite so we needed to do one thing that was a tribute to him.’ The tune is a touching and private plea that will need to have been very near home for Felker as he labored to place his life again collectively once more over the previous 2 to three years.
Fiddle participant Kyle Nix says of ‘A Cat in the Rain’ that it’s an album that exhibits ‘that you can redeem yourself. It doesn’t all the time have to finish in a shitty approach. Whether we’re speaking relationships, jobs or simply life. It’s necessary to look out for each other,’ and that’s precisely what Turnpike Troubadours are doing on this album. The themes of re-birth, contemporary begins and redemption run by this album like lettering by a stick of rock. Turnpike Troubadours are re-energised and making music in the one approach they know the way – with a ardour and a verve for what established them within the first place as probably the greatest earthy, natural purveyors of Folk-Americana-Country Rock on the market. ‘A Cat in the Rain’ breaks no new floor by way of fashion however what it does do is show that Evan Felker can write music sober and the band can obtain the heights and the excessive requirements that they beforehand set themselves simply as a lot, post-hiatus, as they did within the hectic, turbulent whirlwind of a profession that that they had as much as 2019. It’s a welcome return: now let’s see what they will go on the obtain within the years to come back.
Tracklist: 1. Mean Old Sun 2. Brought Me 3. Lucille 4. Chipping Mill 5. The Rut 6. A Cat within the Rain 7. Black Sky 8. East Side Love Song (Bottoms Up) 9. Three More Days 10. Won’t You Give Me One More Chance Release Date: twenty fifth August Record Label: Bossier City Records/Thirty Tigers Buy ‘A Cat in the Rain’ now
