Following Joe Pug’s debut full-length Messenger in 2010 and The Great Despiser in 2012, and a 2013 tour that ended in creative uncertainty, Pug is out with Windfall, another stellar album in his young discography. The latest sees Pug carving a clearer identity complete with a fuller traditional Americana sound which involves the standard finger-picked guitar and wistful vocals rounded out by drums, harmonica, pedal steel, piano, upright bass, and mellotron (courtesy of Wilco’s Pat Sansone). At once introspective, desolate, and wistfully hopeful, standouts on this collection include opener “Bright Beginnings”; the autobiographical “O My Chesapeake”; “Great Hosannas”; and closer “If It Still Can’t Be Found.” – Written by SMarx
SIMILAR | Chris Bathgate, Doug Burr, Frontier Folk Nebraska, JBM, Sam Quinn, Weinland