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Sarah Shook and the Disarmers
When Sidelong, Sarah Shook & the Disarmers debut album, was released in early 2017, it quickly earned kudos for its blast of fresh, fierce honesty and sly wit. It was a welcome new voice in a genre too often mired in the staid and conventional. And while that record may have come to many as a surprise, Years solidifies the point: Sarah Shook & the Disarmers have moved from getting peoples attention to commanding it. The albumwith its sharpened songwriting, unique perspective, deepened sound and roll-up-your-sleeves attitudewill grab you by the collar and put a defiant finger to your chest. It is resolute, blunt, and unflinching.
Inspired by artists such as the Sex Pistols, Elliott Smith and Hank Williams, Sarah sings with confidence, control, and, at times, a hint of menace. The Disarmers match her on every track, coloring the tales of resilience and empathy with as much urgency as ever as well as a broader sonic sweep. Its easy to hear Sarah as a close cousin to artists like Hurray for the Riff Raff and Margo Price on the title track, or in the country-60s mod vibe on Lesson. Good as Gold, sporting a kiss-off line for the ages, Youre as good as gold/ Im as good as gone, is both vulnerable and defiant, soaring with pop-inflected harmonies. And with an expansiveness evoking the wide-open West, What it Takes speaks to the truth of the record, to her life, and to the universe.
At its pounding heart, Years crackles with a pointedly contemporary and relevant take on the outlaw spirit. Built around the buoyant pedal steel of Phil Sullivan, and the post-punk rattle and Live at San Quentin hum of Eric Petersons guitar, there are echoes of Nikki Lane and Merle Haggard as much as Ty Segall. Its home is the ragged-but-real honky tonk, not the bro-country honky tonk. The barroom singalong New Ways to Fail is classic, smile-through-the-pain country. Damned If I Do could be the Drivin Nails in My Coffin of the 21st century, if we let it; a perfect song for rolling in the wry and sneaking in a quick two-step. The sinister The Bottle Never Lets Me Down will get anyone whos ever been wronged righteously flipping the bird as they knock back the next shot. Therapy in the face of personal devastation takes many forms, after all.
As Sarah herself tells it...
This record is about finding a way. A way through exhaustion, depression, betrayal, hangover after hangover, upper after downer after upper, fight after never-ending fight. Its about picking yourself up and dusting yourself off after years of being trampled and beaten down, jutting your chin out, head high, after theyve done their worst, and saying, Still here.
This record is shouting f**k you, I do want I want from the rooftops to the mother******g cosmos.
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LocationZeeland Street Market (View)
2031 Perkins Rd
Baton Rouge, LA 70808
United States
Categories
| Kid Friendly: Yes! |
| Dog Friendly: No |
| Non-Smoking: Yes! |
| Wheelchair Accessible: Yes! |
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