Mandolin Orange’s music radiates a mysterious warmth —their songs feel like whispered secrets, one hand cupped to your ear. The North Carolina duo have built a steady and growing fanbase with this kind of intimacy.

“Deer Tick is a band. They are from Providence. Deer Tick is band up of John McCauley, Ian O’Neil, Dennis Ryan, and Christopher Ryan. Deer Tick likes to rock out. Listen to Deer Tick”

Flatland Cavalry—the aforementioned Cordero, guitarist Reid Dillon, bassist Jonathan Saenz, drummer Jason Albers, and newest member, fiddle player Wesley Hall—has been stretching their legs across the country this past year after honing their craft and voice in the music boomtown of Lubbock, Texas.

Once compared to a man who wears many suits, in thirty-two short years Justin Townes Earle has experienced more than most, both personally and professionally. Between releasing four full-length-critically-acclaimed albums, constant touring, multiple stints in rehab, a new found sobriety, being born Steve Earle’s son, amicable and not-so-amicable break-ups with record labels, and facing the trials and tribulations of everyday life, it’s safe to say JTE has quite the story to tell.

Take one glance at the iconic tintype photograph which serves as the cover to his new album, Benton County Relic, and you know immediately that Cedric Burnside is the real deal. “When I first saw it, I thought I looked like an outlaw,” he laughs.

The 39-year-old still lives on several acres not far from the Holly Springs, Mississippi, home where he was raised by “Big Daddy,” his grandfather, the late singer/songwriter/guitarist R.L. Burnside whom Cedric famously played with, just as his own father, drummer Calvin Jackson, did. Cedric was literally born to the blues, more specifically, the “rhythmically unorthodox” Hill country variant which emerged from Mississippi, where he grew up surrounded (and influenced) by Junior Kimbrough, Jessie May Hemphill and Otha Turner, as well as delta musicians T-Model Ford and Paul “Wine” Jones.

Solo artist. Frontman. Behind-the-scenes songwriter. For more than a decade, Adam Hood has left his mark both onstage and in the writing room, carving out a southern sound that mixes equal parts country, soul and American roots music.

The Red Clay Strays are a country band from south Alabama with a sound as genuine as the dirt roads they grew up on. Their sound, with influences ranging from Johnny Cash, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Waylon Jennings, Marshall Tucker and country gospel among others, blurs the lines between country and southern rock and brings an authenticity that is unique to the Red Clay Strays.