Yearly Archives: 2026

Leon Majcen is proving to be prolific, but he’s not sacrificing quality for quantity. In tandem with the release of his latest single, the Clearwater, FL native announced on Friday that his next record The Leaving Kind is due out on September 4. And if the tracks released thus far are any indication, it’s going to be an album you won’t want to miss. Marking his 5th album since 2020 – and 4th since 2024 – Majcen has been on an […]

The post Leon Majcen Announces Next Record ‘The Leaving Kind’, Releases Stellar Single ‘Don’t You Cry’ first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

For a second, I’m sure this fisherman in Alaska thought to himself, “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.” Jaws wasn’t in the water, but the next best thing was: A mama brown bear. The fisherman was out on the water in Soldotna, Alaska when the fishing charter he was a part of turned into a grizzly bear tour. And hey… it must have been a good fishing charter if they ended up right in the middle of a bear feeding […]

The post Alaskan Fisherman Has Front Row Seat To Bear Chowing Down On Salmon Just A Few Feet From His Boat first appeared on Whiskey Riff.

Lance Cowan is on a roll. A music publicist for decades, he only recently reinvented himself as a folk/Americana recording artist. But he has now issued three excellent albums in as many years, and the latest of these is arguably his best. Called The Air That You Breathe, it cements his reputation as an affecting […]

The post Music Reviews: ‘The Air That You Breathe,’ by Lance Cowan, plus NRBQ, Mary Flower with Leon Cotter, and Boone Creek appeared first on Americana Highways.

The HillBenders Live at the Grand Ole Opry Vol. 1 Short is sweet, they say — and with Live at the Grand Ole Opry Vol. 1, The HillBenders prove that brevity can still leave a strong impression. Across just three tracks, they offer the first glimpse of their upcoming BeatleGrass project, and it’s an enticing […]

The post REVIEW: The HillBenders “Live at the Grand Ole Opry Vol. 1” appeared first on Americana Highways.

Merle Haggard deserves credit for a lot. But who knew that late in his career when an aging Merle Haggard was in his swan song, he also played a pivotal role in the legacy of another Country Music Hall of Fame act: Brooks & Dunn.

The post Merle Haggard Helped Get Brooks and Dunn Back Together first appeared on Saving Country Music.

The 21-year-old singer had wrote the song from her middle school self. She said her cancer diagnosis’ timing wasn’t a coincidence.

The post 21-Year-Old Singer Receives Cancer Diagnosis Just One Day Before Debut appeared first on Wide Open Country.

Brand New Heartache’s A New Alchemy fits into a long country tradition: two singers using harmony and disagreement to tell the truth about a relationship. The clearest earlier reference point is John Prine’s In Spite of Ourselves, a record that treated love as a conversation between imperfect people rather than a polished romantic ideal.

Bentley’s Bandstand: July 2026 Albert Castiglia, GRITS & GLORY. When it’s time to throw it all against the wall and get funky through the night, Albert Castiglia has the right idea. Take the whole gang to the Abbey Road studio in London and go for broke. And that’s exactly what Castiglia and his hopped-up crew […]

The post Bentley’s Bandstand: July 2026 appeared first on Americana Highways.

River Shook (Sarah Shook & the Disarmers) Finds a New Path on Solo Debut For much of the last decade, River Shook made country-rock that felt like it had been kicked down a flight of stairs and come up swinging. As the frontperson for Sarah Shook & the Disarmers, they wrote songs of bad decisions, […]

The post REVIEW: River Shook self-titled album appeared first on Americana Highways.

SusAF The Great Divider On The Great Divider, SusAF turns anger, grief, and political fatigue into three quick blasts of roots rock protest. The EP runs only about eight minutes, but each song lands with an impact. SusAF is the alias of a two-time Grammy-winning songwriter and guitarist with more than 25 million records sold. […]

The post REVIEW: SusAF “The Great Divider” appeared first on Americana Highways.