Starting tonight’s journey from Nashville with a song from the new Caroline Spence album Mint Condition that came out on the 3rd of May. It’s her first on Rounder Records who are giving a platform to lots of great songwriters at the moment. It has always been a good label, but it has risen to an even higher level since John P. Strohm took over in late 2017. But enough about the label, Caroline Spence is the real star here and she has written a powerful and engaging album. Sit Here and Love Me is a love song that leaves a strong impression. It’s written from the perspective of a person who is dealing with depression and the message for her loved one is that all you need to do is to be present and love me. Even anxieties aside that message is universal and something that can easily get lost in the world where we live with a phone attached to our hand. Be there for the one that is close to you and not for the guy who wrote a bad uninformed tweet on the other side of the globe. I definitely can personally learn from this song too, because sometimes I’m guilty of what I just wrote. Sit Here and Love Me goes a long way.
I know it’s way too obvious and an awkward transition, but next this train travels to Austin, Texas and I’m going to post Sit Here & Cry from Kathryn Legendre. Just because I love both of these songs and they just fit well under the same post. At least Jake Nyman would be proud of me. Kathryn Legendre is a wonderful country singer-songwriter and her great new EP Making It Up came out on the 17th of May on Shotgun House Records.
Every now and then also Finland delivers high quality roots music. At the moment, I’m personally excited about the forthcoming Iron Country Sisters debut that is due out this fall on Soit Se Silti. The latest single Leaves came out on the 24th of May and it’s another winner with engaging lyrics and eternally beautiful singing.
Closing up tonight’s post with one of the most courageous, powerful and important songs of the year. Emily Scott Robinson is a singer-songwriter from Greensboro, NC and her magnificent album Traveling Mercies came out on the 22nd of February. The Dress is a song that I love, but I hate that there is a reason for it to exist. She is a survivor of a sexual assault and the song tells that story and the fear and trauma it caused. I have no words so I just sit here and love this courageous song.
Four Arms to Hold You is an ongoing feature with a weird name. It might not contain a whole lot of words, but it does contain a whole lot of love towards the featured songs. Basicly this is just four albums / songs / artists that have done their part in holding me together and therefore I want to tell the world or the seven readers of this blog how much I love them. Not entirely sure do these kind of posts serve any kind of purpose and I do hope I manage to write longer posts too. Right now it just feels like the playlists and these kind of short posts are the only way to keep this dear hobby alive. Plus it’s really the music that matters, not my random ramblings and these posts will always contain magical music.